Do You Have a Thirst for Christ?

As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, my God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When can I go and meet with God? Ps. 42:1-2

Lord Jesus, there’s no craving more demanding than thirst. It’s neither patient nor polite. When we get thirsty, we’re quick to slake its unrelenting demand, one way or another. Thirst will not be denied. We’ll do almost anything to satisfy our thirst.

Because this is true, we join the psalmist in crying out: Jesus, intensify our thirst for you. So ignite our craving for fellowship with you nothing else will gratify us. Keep us panting like the deer which pants after streams of water—the unpolluted, undistilled, never-ending brooks of your bounty.

Don’t let us be even momentarily satisfied with any other beverage than the draft you draw, the potion you pour, the life-giving libation you alone can give. May every broken cistern to which we turn for relief become repugnant to our taste (Jeremiah 2:13). Don’t let a change from difficult circumstances to more favorable ones; or a temporary diminishing of our pain and sadness; or some windfall profit, financial or otherwise, decrease our longing to connect and commune with you.

If we take up King David’s lament, “When can I go and meet with God?” you answer back without delay, “Right now, my beloved; do not wait. If you’re thirsty, come to me and drink.” “Whoever believes in me, streams of living water will flow from within them” (John 7:38 NIV).

If we should say, “But Jesus, where can we find you?” you answer back even quicker, “Not in the law; not in your strivings; not in your labors; not in your earnestness; not in your self-loathings; not in your vain promises; but only in the gospel. Come and fall into the rivers of my love. Stand under the cascading waterfalls of my grace. Open your heart wide to my supply, and I will fill you to overflowing with everything you need and more than you want.”

Even so and evermore, Jesus, school us well in pant-theology. In the coming hours, cause our cry to become, “Whom have I in heaven but you? And there is nothing on earth that I desire besides you” Psalm 73:25. So very Amen we pray, in your all-glorious and all-generous name. - Scotty Smith

Scotty Smith is Founding Pastor of Christ Community Church in Franklin, TN and a Council member with The Gospel Coalition.