It is a joy to be with you, and I have been looking forward to the privilege that is mine. I am sure that many, many brothers have had that privilege and could come up here and share. But I am very thankful for the opportunity to hold a full Saviour before your hearts, and I know that you have come to see a full Saviour.
As we get ready to look in the Word of God, there is a principle that is absolutely indispensable—the principle of life and the principle of Bible study—and that is total reliance upon God’s Holy Spirit. It is His Word, and only God can reveal God; and He delights to reveal Himself.
This verse from 1 John 5:20 says:
We know that the Son of God is come,
and hath given us an understanding,
that we may know Him that is true.
The Son of God has come, and by His grace He has given us a measure of light and understanding so that we might know Him. The way the Bible uses that precious word know is intimate. Adam knew his wife, and she conceived. Abraham knew his wife. It speaks of all the intimacies of the marriage tie.
He has called us to know Him. So may the Lord take us this weekend into a deeper heart knowledge—an intimate union with our Lord Jesus Christ.
So let us pray together and commit our time to Him, brothers.
Our Father, we do thank You that the Son of God has come, and He has given us understanding in order that we might know Him who is true, whom to know aright is life eternal.
As we gather this weekend, we would ask You, Lord, to do what is so much on Your heart and unveil, in a fresh and living way, the Lord Jesus unto us. We thank You, Lord, that it does not depend upon us, but upon Yourself and Your Holy Spirit.
So we would ask You to anoint Your Word and our eyes and hearts, that we might behold the Lord Jesus. We thank You for every passage in the Word of God, and in a special way tonight for the Psalms. We ask You, Lord, to open our hearts and prepare us for what You want us to see this weekend.
We want to add faith to this prayer by saying, “Amen.” In Jesus’ name.
Let me set before your hearts what is on my heart to share with you. I think the easiest way is by quoting two different verses from the Gospel of John. The first is in John 4. Please turn to John 4.
This is from our Lord’s discourse with the woman at the well. John 4:13-14:
Jesus answered and said unto her, Every one that drinketh of this water shall thirst again:
but whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst;
but the water that I shall give him shall become in him a well of water springing up unto eternal life.
Our Lord Jesus promises here that if anyone drinks the water He offers, he will never thirst again. That water will become in him a well, a fountain, springing up into life eternal.
Quite apart from all that is promised in that precious passage, I want you to notice in verse 14 the little expression, in him: “will become in him a well of water springing up unto eternal life.” Hold that thought, and then turn to John 7.
John 7:37-38:
Now on the last day, the great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried, saying, If any man thirst, let him come unto Me and drink.
He that believeth on Me, as the Scripture hath said, from within him shall flow rivers of living water.
There are some advances of this truth in John 7 beyond the truth mentioned in John 4. At this time, I am only going to focus on one of those advances.
Both passages present our Lord Jesus as the living water—not only the Giver of living water, but the life of God Himself. John explains it in John 7:39: “This spake He of the Spirit.” He is talking about His own life.
But John 7 goes beyond John 4. In John 4, the promise was a fountain in me, springing up into everlasting life. The promise in John 7 is not a well of water in me, springing up, but rivers of water through me, going out.
Not river. It would have been a marvellous thing if the Holy Spirit had used the singular and simply said, “a river.” But He did not say “river”; He said “rivers.” He used the plural.
The Greek word there, they tell us, is very powerful. It is the word potamos, and it is not merely a river. It is flood. It is raging torrent. It is an overflowing river—not merely a bubbling spring in my heart, but rivers, torrents, floods coming out of my life.
In both John 4 and John 7, the Lord Jesus is the One who satisfies by His indwelling life. But one has to do with the personal quenching of thirst: in me, a fountain bubbling up. Then, through me, rivers—raging torrents—flowing out: the life of God flowing out.
The Lord Jesus not only quenches the thirst in my heart; He wants to quench the thirst in the world. In me, through me—that is what I would like us to look at. Not only how He satisfies my thirst, how He is a fountain bubbling up in my heart, but then how His life flows through me unto the world.
For most of the principles I want to share, we are going to stay in John 4. We are going to discuss the great discourse our Lord had with the Samaritan woman at Jacob’s well. But because there are so many passages throughout the Bible on thirst, water, and rivers, I am also going to take the liberty to jump around a little and use some of those by way of illustration.
Now, I want to home in on this, and this is my heart this weekend: What does it mean to have a bubbling fountain within? And what does it mean to have rivers gushing out? That is the bottom line, and that is what we are moving toward throughout this weekend.
But first, I want to deal with a little issue that will prepare us for that. When you look at the promise in John 4, at first sight the Lord has created a problem because of His goodness. I speak as a fool, but because of the wonder of this promise, He has actually created a problem. He solves the problem, but let me bring it up again.
Every one that drinketh of this water shall thirst again:
but whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst;
but the water that I shall give him shall become in him a well of water springing up unto eternal life.
It is that little expression, “shall never thirst.” He promises that if you drink, you will never thirst again. What did He mean by that?
Some of you have trusted the Lord Jesus many, many years ago. This January was fifty years for me. When I first trusted the Lord, I do not know how long before that He had been working in my heart, but as far as my knowledge goes, fifty years ago I trusted in the Lord.
Can I say that in those fifty years, not one time have I ever thirsted? Well, I cannot say that, and I do not know if you could say that. What does it mean? He made a promise: if you believed in Him, you would never thirst.
Yet you know there is a right way to thirst. The Bible encourages you to hunger and thirst. As newborn babes, desire the sincere milk of the Word, that you may grow thereby, and so on. So how are we to understand His wonderful promise that in us He will be a bubbling fountain, removing all thirst, and through us raging rivers, removing the thirst of the thirsty all around us?
I want to be absolutely free from the kind of thirst He does not want me to have, and I want to have the kind of thirst He wants me to have. So I want to deal with that first.
I know what He is saying is, “He that believeth on Me shall never, never thirst like this.” See, I need to know what that is. It is not never thirsting, but never thirsting like this. But he that believes in Me will thirst like this. So I need to know what kind of thirst He has promised that I never need to have again, and what kind of thirst He is going to work in me.
I read this verse from Isaiah. I lifted it right out of its context because it is a powerful word picture apart from the context. In its context it is very powerful, but we do not need the context. I just want you to hear this verse: Isaiah 29:8.
It shall be as when a hungry man dreameth, and, behold, he eateth;
but he awaketh, and his soul is empty:
or as when a thirsty man dreameth, and, behold, he drinketh;
but he awaketh, and, behold, he is faint, and his soul hath appetite.
That is a powerful illustration, because there is a thirst that is just a dream. It is not real; it is fake. And there is a water that is just a dream. That is not real; it is fake.
The Lord Jesus desires to give us real living water and to answer a real thirst—not a dream. I know you brothers have not taken this weekend out of your lives, and I know you have not recklessly spent the Lord’s money to do that and come here to hear about some dream of what God might do for some dream of a thirst you have, only to wake up at the end and go back the same way you came here—still thirsty and fainting.
We do not want that, because the Lord is speaking of realities. There is a real thirst and a real supply.
I am always thankful when I have the opportunity to present the Lord Jesus to hungry people. I have chosen a familiar text: the woman at the well. How many times have you read that? How many times have you studied it? How many times have you taught it? How many times have you heard others teach it? It is a familiar text.
The truths we are going to look at are nothing new. You have heard all of this before. I suspect I have nothing to say this weekend that you have not already heard, and my guess is that you have heard it a lot clearer than I am going to be able to communicate. We need the Lord to quicken us to some very old and precious truth.
I was glad when we sang “Just as I Am,” because that is the simplicity. One of the things I have been praying for this weekend is that God would bring us back to the simplicity—to that first time when we tasted of that living water and He did satisfy our hearts. We want to come back there again.
Now, I want to take two things for granted, brothers, as we begin. The first one I am really going to take for granted. The second one, I think I will be a little naive if I take it for granted, but I am probably going to do it anyway. God will help us in that.
The first thing is this: I am taking for granted that nobody is here who has spiritual adipsia. Are you familiar with that word? Adipsia. It is a real disease. It is rare. You can look it up on Google, or whatever they do.
It is when a person has no sensation of thirst—when they are thirsty but they do not know it. It is a real disease, rare and terrible, when that thirst mechanism is broken down.
People who suffer from adipsia have to drink by the clock. They have to measure everything. They have to see how much they have had. According to what I read, the survival rate for those who have adipsia is very, very low, because they get dehydrated and do not even know they have it. Pretty soon, they just dry up and die. They do not even know when they are thirsty.
That is a terrible disease on the earthly level. It is very terrible when you bring it into the people of God: spiritual adipsia—people who do not know when they are thirsty. It is a deadly, deadly thing.
But Hebrews 6:9 says:
But, beloved, we are persuaded better things of you, and things that accompany salvation.
So we trust that of you. I know you would not be here if you did not have some kind of thirst.
The second thing I would like to take for granted is that you all have thirst, and I hope you all have the right kind of thirst. That is the part I am not sure I can take for granted across the board.
Knowing my own heart, and having been acquainted in the last fifty years with other Christians, there is a probability that maybe some brother does not have the right kind of thirst. If that is the case, that is why I want to start here, because we have to begin on the same page.
If you are going to understand the fountain bubbling in your heart, if you are going to understand the raging rivers, it is in answer to the right kind of thirst. So it is important to identify what is the right kind and what is not the right kind.
I am going to home in on this a little slowly, so please turn to Psalm 56. This is just an illustration that will get us to Psalm 42.
Psalm 56:3:
What time I am afraid,
I will put my trust in Thee.
If that were the only verse you had, would you not say that is good? That is spiritual. “When I am afraid, I will put my trust in the Lord.”
If you read the psalm, men have been trampling on the psalmist from morning until night. He says in Psalm 56:5-6 that they distort his words, their thoughts against him are evil, they attack him, lurk, watch his steps, and wait to take his life. Nobody who reads that can blame that Christian for being afraid.
But look at Psalm 56:11:
In God have I put my trust:
I will not be afraid;
what can man do unto me?
That is a little better, is it not? “When I am afraid, I will trust Jesus.” Or, “I will trust Jesus and not be afraid.” Which would you rather have? Humor me. The second one is sort of a higher faith.
I would rather be in a place where I trust Jesus and am not afraid. But praise God, when the other comes into my life, when I am afraid, I can trust the Lord. I am not saying that is not spiritual. I am just saying there is a higher plane.
The same thing you see there is true of thirst. There is a thirst, and there is a higher thirst. I want us to begin there as a starting point for the weekend.
Now we are going to look at two passages. Please turn to Psalm 42, and also Psalm 63. If you can somehow mark those places, we will be going back and forth between Psalm 42 and Psalm 63.
Even though Psalm 42 does not give a historical reference in the title, commentators are generally agreed that it was written to describe David’s experience when he fled from Absalom. They get that from Psalm 42:6, where it describes the land of Jordan, the peaks of Hermon, and so on, because when he fled from Absalom, that is where he was.
Now, the title does not say that it is even David’s psalm. Whether it was written by the sons of Korah, written for the sons of Korah, written about the sons of Korah, or whether David gave it to the sons of Korah to put a tune to it, we are not one hundred percent sure.
It is almost one hundred percent certain that Psalm 63 concerns David when he fled from Absalom. The title says that it was written “when he was in the wilderness of Judah,” and they say that pretty much answers when it was written.
The likeness I want to draw is not so much whether this is David or whether this concerns his flight from Absalom. That is unimportant. The important thing is that, whoever it is—even if it is two different people—there is a similar experience.
Psalm 42:1-2 says:
As the hart panteth after the water brooks,
so panteth my soul after Thee, O God.
My soul thirsteth for God, for the living God:
when shall I come and appear before God?
If that were all you had in that psalm, just those two verses, I think you would have to conclude that the psalmist had a great longing for the Lord. Under the figure of thirst, he describes his longing for the Lord as a deer pants for the water brook. Who can fault a thirst like that? He is longing for the living God.
Now look at Psalm 63:1:
O God, Thou art my God;
early will I seek Thee:
my soul thirsteth for Thee,
my flesh longeth for Thee
in a dry and thirsty land, where no water is.
You have the same thing: an intense yearning for the Lord Himself. In one psalm, the illustration is a deer panting for the water brook; in the other, the illustration is a desert, a wilderness where there is no water.
Both speak of thirst. Both are after the Lord, and both give a strong illustration to show the intensity of that particular thirst. Literally, in Psalm 63, the flesh is yearning; it is fainting for the Lord.
If all you had were the first two verses of each psalm, you would say they are the same. Somebody is in trouble. Somebody is thirsting after God—one thirst like the deer, one thirst like a dry and thirsty land where there is no water. They are two strong illustrations showing a deep intensity of thirst.
I am suggesting, as with the verses in Psalm 56, that Psalm 42 is a psalm of thirst and Psalm 63 is a psalm of thirst. But here is what I am suggesting: Psalm 63 is a higher thirst than Psalm 42, and I am praying that we will end up in Psalm 63.
Go back to Psalm 42. I want to home in on several poetic expressions. In the language of poetry, he is giving a testimony. He is talking about his life. We may not know the details—whether he is running from Absalom or what it is—but you can tell that he has some kind of trouble.
In addition to his panting soul, look at Psalm 42:3:
My tears have been my food day and night,
while they continually say unto me, Where is thy God?
I get from that verse that this has probably been going on for a little while. Day and night, his tears have been his food. Either it means he is so sad that he has lost his appetite, or it means he had sadness for breakfast, lunch, brunch, and supper. He is just sad.
His tears have been his food all day long because people are mocking him. Evidently, God is not active in his life in a visible way, and they are saying, “Where is your God? You are going through this now—where is the Lord? You say you trust in the Lord; where is He?”
The psalmist says that this is affecting him. He has been crying all day long and all night long. That is his experience.
Then in Psalm 42:4, he describes his painful memories:
These things I remember, and pour out my soul within me,
how I went with the throng,
and led them to the house of God,
with the voice of joy and praise,
a multitude keeping holyday.
Evidently, whatever he is going through, he is remembering fellowship. He is remembering corporate worship. He remembers when he could go to the house of God with the people of God, but something has come into his life and he cannot do that now. He truly misses it.
He is trying to comfort himself by remembering the good old days—remembering when he could gather with the people of God, worship the Lord together, and praise God together. That memory is painful for him now because he cannot do it anymore.
Then you have this refrain in Psalm 42:5 and Psalm 42:11:
Why art thou cast down, O my soul?
and why art thou disquieted within me?
hope thou in God:
for I shall yet praise Him
for the help of His countenance.
You cannot read that without seeing faith, because he is pointing his heart to the Lord. He is saying to himself, “Hope in God.” But he uses a strong word: “Why are you in despair?” The word is sunken. He has a sunken soul.
Psalm 42:7 describes his circumstances:
Deep calleth unto deep at the noise of Thy waterfalls:
all Thy waves and Thy billows are gone over me.
It is a very graphic picture. I know a lot has been written on “deep calleth unto deep,” but in the context here, it is simply these relentless waves rolling over his life and situation. One wave comes in and knocks him down.
I do not know if you have ever been in a big surf. We do not get great surf where I am, up in Rhode Island, but I am not good in even little surf. I remember one time I almost drowned. The Lord saved me. I did a stupid thing. We had a hurricane, and I decided that was a good time to go out because I like rough water.
I went out with my son David, my firstborn son, and I got caught in a tide that was pulling me out. If it were not for the Lord, who sent a wave, I cannot body-surf, but I did that day. A wave took me, and I went right onto the beach. I thought it was over. I waved goodbye to my son.
But before I started getting carried out, a wave came and hit my face on the bottom and knocked me down. I tried to get up, but that wave spoke. That was deep, and it said, “Come on, deep.” Deep called to deep. Another wave came and knocked me down, and I was rolling over. I could not get my footing.
I tried to get up, and another wave came, and another one. Wave two called to wave three, and wave three called to wave four. Deep called to deep, and I kept going down and down. Finally, I got up, but then I started being pulled out, and God saved me. That was a miracle of the Lord, and I praise God for that.
But that is what is going on in his life. He is talking about when blow follows blow, when it rains, it pours. You know those expressions. Misfortune does not come, they say, in single file, but marches in battalions. He is getting one thing after another, and he says, “All Thy waves and Thy billows are gone over me.”
Put it together. In his heart, he says, “I am panting like a deer looking for water. All day long I do nothing but cry. That is my food, day and night. Everybody is mocking me, saying, ‘Where is your God?’ God seems so far away. Everything is coming one thing after another, knocking me down and rolling me over. Deep calleth unto deep. All Thy waves and all Thy billows are gone over me.”
“My soul is in despair. I am discouraged. I am sunken down.” He is describing his situation.
Then add Psalm 42:9:
I will say unto God my rock, Why hast Thou forgotten me?
why go I mourning because of the oppression of the enemy?
He feels forsaken by God. The enemy is winning. He is defeated. I give him credit: he calls God his Rock. That is good. He sees God as his Rock. But still he asks, “Why have You forgotten me?”
It is not possible to read Psalm 42 honestly and objectively and not see that this man is living a life that I do not want to live. He has problems, everything is happening in his life, God seems very far away, and it is causing him to be depressed, discouraged, and in despair.
I have never broken a bone in my body. I have never had a fracture. One time I did get a bad sprain from a violent game of tetherball, but that is it. Listen to his description in Psalm 42:10:
As with a sword in my bones, mine adversaries reproach me;
while they continually say unto me, Where is thy God?
It is as if he is looking for poetic descriptions to describe his situation, and he says, “All my bones are shattered.” I do not know what it would feel like to have all your bones shattered, but spiritually, that is where this man was.
Do not forget: this is not a backslider. This man is not in rebellion against the Lord. He loves the Lord. He is longing for the Lord. He is thirsting for the Lord. His heart is after the Lord.
He remembers the fellowship of God’s people fondly. When he pours out his soul, it is to the Lord. When he thirsts, it is after the Lord. In Psalm 42:5-11, he actually starts counselling himself. He begins to talk to himself.
This is a tremendous passage, where his higher nature begins to rebuke his passionate nature, and he begins to preach to himself. He does not like what is going on in his life. He sees the situation.
Have you ever gotten into that place where you are going through something and you have all the answers up here? You know exactly what to do. You know the answer. If somebody came to you, you would sit them down and say, “Let me tell you: here is your problem, and here is what to do.” But then it comes into your own life.
You have all the right answers, and that is where he is. He says, “Why are you discouraged, O my soul? Hope in God. Stop being so stupid. What is going on here?” He begins to yell at himself and talk to himself. His higher self is addressing his lower self: “Snap out of it. Why are you fretting? What is wrong with you?”
“How can you be so stupid? God has been so faithful. Look in your life. You have got the lion and the bear. Do not worry about Goliath. You know He can do it.” He is giving a sermon to his own heart.
Psalm 42:8 says:
Yet Jehovah will command His lovingkindness in the daytime,
and in the night His song shall be with me,
even a prayer unto the God of my life.
You see faith in that prayer. He knows someday this is going to pass. Someday he is going to sing again. Someday the waves are going to stop beating on his head. Someday the mourning and grieving are going to be replaced with song. One day he will be able to go with the body again and worship the Lord in corporate worship.
He has counselled himself to hope in God. He knows it is coming, but he is frustrated to death. I do not know if you have ever been in a situation like this, but I have. It is so frustrating to have the answers up here and not know how to get them here.
You know you could trust the Lord. You know you are to turn it over to the Lord. You know it is foolish to worry. You know God is on His throne. Yet there you are: “Why are you in despair, O my soul? Why are you disquieted within me? Hope in God.”
He keeps calling himself to trust in the Lord, but instead he is discouraged, distressed, restless, fearful, abandoned, defeated, lonely, and overwhelmed. It is hard for me to say, brothers, that is how you should thirst. I think there is a better way.
Please turn to Psalm 63. This is a psalm of David when he was in the wilderness.
I have no reason to believe that the circumstances in Psalm 63 are any different from the circumstances in Psalm 42. They may be exactly the same circumstances. I am inclined to think perhaps both psalms describe David in the same situation, but be that as it may, listen to Psalm 63:1 again:
O God, Thou art my God;
early will I seek Thee:
my soul thirsteth for Thee,
my flesh longeth for Thee
in a dry and thirsty land, where no water is.
Notice the difference in this psalm. He still remembers fondly the fellowship of the saints, but as you go through the psalm, I do not see him crying day and night. I do not see his soul poured out because there is no corporate worship. I do not see his testimony of despair, literally sunk down.
I do not see him complaining about relentless waves throwing him down and not enabling him to get his footing. There is no sense of him being forgotten or forsaken by the Lord. There is no mourning that the enemy has the upper hand.
Both psalms begin with thirst. Both begin with thirst after the living God. Both begin with a strong illustration of how dry it is. But listen, please, and follow along. I hope you will catch the ring of victory and see the contrast in this psalm.
Psalm 63 says:
O God, Thou art my God;
early will I seek Thee:
my soul thirsteth for Thee,
my flesh longeth for Thee
in a dry and thirsty land, where no water is.So have I looked upon Thee in the sanctuary,
to see Thy power and Thy glory.
Because Thy lovingkindness is better than life,
my lips shall praise Thee.So will I bless Thee while I live:
I will lift up my hands in Thy name.
My soul shall be satisfied as with marrow and fatness;
and my mouth shall praise Thee with joyful lips;
when I remember Thee upon my bed,
and meditate on Thee in the night watches.For Thou hast been my help,
and in the shadow of Thy wings will I rejoice.
My soul followeth hard after Thee:
Thy right hand upholdeth me.But those that seek my soul, to destroy it,
shall go into the lower parts of the earth.
They shall be given over to the power of the sword:
they shall be a portion for foxes.But the king shall rejoice in God;
every one that sweareth by Him shall glory;
for the mouth of them that speak lies shall be stopped.
Do you see any difference between Psalm 42 and Psalm 63, as far as victory is concerned? Yet they both begin with thirst—thirst after the living God.
I am suggesting that there is a thirst here, and I am not condemning it. I do not doubt he had that thirst. I do not think he is recommending it; he is simply giving his testimony. He had it. But he is saying there is another thirst.
Psalm 63:5, I believe, is the key:
My soul shall be satisfied as with marrow and fatness;
and my mouth shall praise Thee with joyful lips.
You see, in Psalm 63 the psalmist is thirsting for the Lord, but while he thirsts, at the same time, he is already satisfied. “My soul is satisfied.”
He is not searching for satisfaction. He is searching from satisfaction. He is thirsting from rest, not for rest. God is not absent in this psalm. There is no suggestion that he has been forsaken by the Lord.
Are there enemies in Psalm 63? There sure are. Look at Psalm 63:9. But there is no despair in his life. There is no discouragement, no sunken soul, no mourning day and night, and no tears from morning until night for breakfast, lunch, and supper.
He is not saying, “What is wrong with you, stupid man? Hope in God.” What is he saying? Psalm 63:8:
My soul followeth hard after Thee:
Thy right hand upholdeth me.
Do you see the difference? He is not thirsting for something he does not have. He already has it, and now he has a legitimate thirst for more.
He is not thirsting for something he does not have. Psalm 63:7 says:
For Thou hast been my help,
and in the shadow of Thy wings will I rejoice.
He is not waiting until things get better. There is a difference between the thirst in Psalm 42 and the thirst in Psalm 63. I think one is thirsting for, and one is thirsting from.
One is thirsting after joy, contentment, peace, and rest. The other says, “I found my rest. I found my joy, my peace, and my contentment. I thirst for the living God from satisfaction, not for it.” He is not looking for anything. He has it in the Lord.
I know there is a chorus that we sing, and it encourages us to thirst after the Lord as the deer pants for the water brook. I understand the hymn writer’s heart. I know what he meant by that.
He had two great principles, and I agree with both of them. Number one, the end of all spiritual thirst should be the Person: thirst after God. Number two, his point in bringing up the deer is intensity. You should thirst after God with the intensity of a deer seeking water.
So I do not have a problem with the song at all. I think the Lord should be our sole desire:
Whom have I in heaven but Thee?
And there is none upon earth that I desire besides Thee.
I think our thirst ought to be intense. Until you can love the Lord your God, as Mark 12 teaches, with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, you are not intense enough. You should thirst with great intensity.
But I honestly believe that the hymn writer, whoever it was, went beyond the figure in the psalm. The psalmist was having this experience. I do not know if he saw a deer, but he saw something that illustrated his agony.
Just as Paul was in prison in Rome, saw the Roman guard in armour, and used that as an illustration of the Christian in the armour of God, this man was in agony and thirst. He was suffering. He was depressed. He was in despair. His soul was sunk down. Then he saw this poor dehydrated deer, and he said, “That is how I feel in my heart.” That is why he brought up the deer.
I was amazed at some of the commentaries as they describe this. None of these are my words; these are quotes from several commentaries.
“The dried-up blood after exhaustion in man and beast does not merely call for moisture, for quenching, for water, but in agony it cries out for it, so far as the parched palate still permits—the crying with husky throat and a moaning with an audible voice.”
Another commentator says, “The exhausted hart, no more able to endure its sufferings, moans in despair from the pure impulse of nature. At the point of dropping to the ground, no longer able to go without water, it breaks the air with its agonising cry for water and must presently succumb unless it finds the water.”
Another says, “After a long drought, the fainting hind longs for the stream. The hunted hart instinctively seeks after the brook to lave its smoking flanks and escape the dogs.”
Another says, “Here is a picture of a dehydrated deer after a long chase.” Another says, “A thirst like this, like the deer, is awful, insatiable, clamorous, deadly.”
The word for deer here is joined to a feminine verb, so it is a hind, a female deer. The word for “pants” is literally “breathes.” It brays. It moans. It is this intense moaning of the deer crying out for some kind of water.
I am quoting all that not to ruin that beautiful chorus. I hope you still sing it, and I hope you still desire to go after the Lord. I am not saying otherwise. But I am saying that the way the psalmist used the deer, you would pray, “Lord, do not let me thirst after You like a deer pants for water,” because he did not have it.
It is not like the pictures you see of a deer that has found the brook. That is a great picture, but the deer in the psalm had not found the brook. He was still looking for the stream and seeking after it as though he did not have it.
I do not think we should pant for the Lord like that. I remember one time talking to a pastor, and he said, “When I baptise somebody, I would love to hold them down just before they die, and then they would come up gasping for breath. Then tell them, ‘When you hunger after the Lord like that, when you thirst after the Lord like that, like you were looking for that breath—’”
God does not want you to live that way, like some dehydrated deer ready to drop dead. That is not the Christian life. That is not what Christ died for. His death brought us into something much better than that.
This idea of stretching for the water brook and never quite finding it—how Satan loves to make a goal out of a starting point. He is always trying to put it out in the future.
We are never quite surrendered enough. We are never quite dead enough. We are never quite spiritual enough. We are never quite crucified enough. We are never quite involved enough. We never quite study enough. We never quite pray enough.
We are always thirsting after it as if it is out there somewhere. “Someday, I cannot wait. Someday I will be filled with the Spirit. Someday I am going to know Christ in His fullness. Someday God is going to use me, like rivers flowing from my heart.”
It is not out there. It is not someday. It is now. We have it. Thirst from rest, not for it. You already have it in Christ. You have that fountain within, and so do I. Now we can thirst in the right way.
Jesus said, “If you believe in Me, you will never thirst like the deer pants for the water brook.” That is what He is saying. You are not going to thirst like that, because you already have it.
I know Christians who feel guilty because they are not moaning and groaning and agonising all the time, braying after the presence of the Lord. They feel almost inferior if they are not gasping after God and always crying for revival.
Why in the world do you want revival? You ought to be revived. Some people just need vival; they do not need revival. They just need to have it in the first place.
I have no question that Psalm 42 describes the actual condition of the psalmist, but I do not think he is recommending it. He is describing it because that is his testimony. But he is not describing what should be, what could be, or what Christ promised. He is describing what was true in his life.
There was a time in his life when he lost the water brook. He lost the fountain. He lost the stream. He did not have it. He knew the answer up here, but he did not know quite how to get to it. He was going after it as though he did not have it.
He was not victorious. In an unhealthy way, he depended on his feelings, on corporate worship, and on favourable circumstances. Because those were denied, he said, “God has left me. God has forsaken me.” He lost the sense of the presence of God.
I think he did the right thing when he began calling himself back to faith, when he began preaching to himself and told himself to hope in God. But I do not believe that God intends us to thirst after the Lord that way. You cannot live at that pitch. You would go crazy at that. That is not the spiritual man.
Read Psalm 42 and tell me: is that the overcoming life? Is that where He leads you daily in His triumph? Is that the life hidden with Christ in God? Is that the life seated with Him in the heavenlies? Is that someone who is more than a conqueror in all these things through Him that loved us? Is that the more abundant life?
You see, it is not. To thirst for Christ after you have found Christ is to seek a lie. It is not real. You are going to wake up and be thirsty again.
Brothers, I do not want you to misunderstand me. I am not suggesting that you do not thirst after the Lord. I pray that you will have an insatiable thirst for Him while you rest in the Christ you have.
He is in your heart. He is already there to be that bubbling fountain. You do not have to seek after it. It is there. It is Him.
Now seek after Him from rest, from satisfaction, from contentment. He has not forsaken you. The enemy is not victorious. You do not need to mourn the whole day through.
When God engineers and allows His waves and billows to go over you, He has a wise and loving purpose. If He were only love, the billows would not come. But because He is also wise, He can allow what He hates.
That is why, when you are going through testing, He did not say to pray for strength; He said to ask for wisdom, because God is wise in what He allows. You are already victorious.
You do not have to go around as so many Christians do. They say, “How is it going?” “I feel like all my bones are shattered.” That is not the victorious Christian life.
We have the water brooks, brother. We need to start off on the same page. We want to begin with that thirst—thirsting from the reality of all that we have in Christ, satisfied in Christ, content in His finished work.
All that is in Christ is ours now. We thirst after the living God. The bubbling well within is so that we will never have to thirst again like this. But now we can thirst in the right way.
I want to close with one more passage. Please turn to Psalm 43.
I am going to read a verse from Psalm 43 and see if it sounds familiar. Psalm 43:5:
Why art thou cast down, O my soul?
and why art thou disquieted within me?
Hope in God:
for I shall yet praise Him,
who is the health of my countenance, and my God.
Does that look like anything in Psalm 42? The reason I call attention to that is because the same refrain in Psalm 42:5 and Psalm 42:11 is now in Psalm 43:5.
Originally, those psalms were one. There are forty-six manuscripts that do not have Psalm 42 and Psalm 43 as separate psalms; they have one psalm. They were together.
I am glad the Holy Spirit split them apart, because as he was preaching to himself, he found the answer in Psalm 43. I want to close with the answer he found, in case there is some brother here who has been thirsting after what you already have. May God deliver us from that.
Psalm 43:3-4 is the key:
Oh send out Thy light and Thy truth;
let them lead me:
let them bring me unto Thy holy hill,
and to Thy tabernacles.Then will I go unto the altar of God,
unto God my exceeding joy;
and upon the harp will I give thanks unto Thee,
O God, my God.
Verse 3 does not begin with the words, “Send out Your light and truth.” It begins with this word: “Oh.” Do not forget the oh.
“Oh, send out Thy light and Thy truth.” I think sometimes we forget that passionate oh. That is the inner cry of the heart: “Oh Lord, save me. Oh, draw near to my soul. Oh, that I had wings like a dove. Oh, that my ways might be established before You. Oh, visit me with Your salvation.”
Do not lose the oh. That is important. Look what he prays. He says, “The only way out of this situation is that I need a revelation.” So he says, “Oh, send forth Your light and Your truth.”
Now let us say God answers that. Where are that light and truth going to take him? Just look at the verses. “Send out Your light and truth; let them lead me.” Where? To Your holy hill. To Your dwelling place.
Then, Psalm 43:4: “I will go to the altar of God.” Finally, “to God my exceeding joy”—or, the joy of my joy.
Do you see what he is saying? “What is wrong with me? Why can I not trust? Oh God, send forth a revelation.” That revelation will take me into the presence of God. The presence of God will take me to the altar of God. The altar of God will take me to God, my exceeding joy.
He knows the answer, and that is our answer. If there is somebody here—I hope there is not—but if you have been seeking after what you already have and you want to start seeking from satisfaction, let us all start on the same page tonight.
Ask God to put that prayer in your heart: “Oh, send forth Your light and truth. Let them lead me into Your presence. Then I will go to the altar. That will not be a problem. Then I will go to the altar, and then to God Himself, my exceeding joy.” That is the One I thirst after.
May God help us in this incipient stage of this series to start with the right kind of thirst, so that we might learn what it means that the Lord Jesus Christ, His life in me, is a bubbling fountain. What does that mean? That His life through me is raging rivers. What does that mean? But it has to start here.
Let us pray.
Oh, send forth Thy light and Thy truth, and let them lead me. Let them bring me into the presence of God. Then I will go to the altar, and to God my exceeding joy. Then I will praise.
Lord, work this in our hearts, we pray. I pray that no matter how any brother has arrived at this weekend, every one of us might leave thirsting from our union with Christ.
We ask in Jesus’ name. Amen.