Your Soul's Desire...are You Thirsty?

Psalm 42:1-2 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?

I am continuing to work my way through the Psalms as of late and today's post covers a pair of verses that includes figurative language that is quite beautiful. For those who may not be accustomed to the King James rendering of these scriptures, it is important to note that "hart" here is an old word used to describe a "full mature stag" or deer. So what we have here described is the the soul and its desire for God being compared to the deer that is longing and looking for the quenching water found in water brooks (streams that run in valleys).

Next we read of the thirst the soul has for the living God and a desire to be with God and to see his face. God is often described as being "the living God" and the reason is to distinguish God from the false Gods that people worship. Friends our God is a living God and unlike the idols people have carved out of wood and stone that have neither eyes to see nor ears to hear. Our greatest longing should be to come face to face before our God in heaven.

In the Treasury of David, C.H. Spurgeon writes:

O to have the most intense craving after the highest good! this is no questionable mark of grace. Not merely for the temple and the ordinances, but for fellowship with God himself....because he lives, and gives to men the living water; therefore we, with greater eagerness, desire him. The ever-living God, the perennial fountain of life and light and love, is our soul's desire....to see the face of God - this is worth thirsting after!

My friend does your soul long and thirst for the one true and living God? Can it be said of your soul that it desires God as the deer desires to drink from the water brook?

Jesus Christ, the son of the living God, says in John 7:37-38 "If any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink. He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water."

The living water that Jesus gives those who thirst is the only thing that satisfies the longings of the soul. If today you are thirsty and tired I urge you to fall to your knees at the foot of the cross and drink.