First Baptist Church
March 10, 2002
John 19:28-29
Parched Souls
I’ve never considered myself a green thumb. I’ve never been very successful keeping houseplants alive. There was one time in my bachelor life, when I had five plants and everyone of them was dead. You know why they died. They didn’t receive the nourishment they needed . . . water. About two years ago, in July, we traveled to Chicago for one of my doctoral classed. We were gone for about 10 days. During the time we were gone, the temperature was about 95 everyday. There was little rain and when we came home our impatience were, you know what . . . they were dead. No watering was going to revive them.
Have you been there with your gardens. Remember last summer? There was very little rain, although, the weather people were predicting rain about every other day, it just didn’t seem to hit Ashland. If you didn’t help your garden along, your flowers and vegetables dried up and died.
And what about you and I? We need water too. Have you ever felt as if you were bone dry? Maybe you were working in the hot sun and the sweat was dripping off and a glass of cold water or iced tea hit the spot. When you think about those times when our mouth is parched, our tongue is dry and we don’t think we can do another thing until we get that drink of water — we can gain a new and greater appreciation for Jesus’ 5th statement from the cross. It was a simple statement, He didn’t cry out with a loud voice, in fact, I presume it was softly said, "I am thirsty!"
What is the point of this 5th statement from the cross? Is this merely a statement about a physical reality or is there something in this statement from Jesus that you and I can take with us? So, with that in mind let’s take a closer look at this statement by Jesus.
Think about the past 24 hours for Jesus. He had shared an emotional last meal with His disciples. He had prayed so hard and desperately in the garden of Gethsemane that Luke tells us Jesus’ sweat contained drops of blood. He was arrested and stood trial. Then He was beaten, whipped, mocked, spit upon and stripped naked. He had not slept nor had He had any food or drink. And now for the past 6 hours Jesus had been hanging from the cross with the sins of the world being heaped upon Him.
It’s been said that one of the effects of hanging from the cross is that you begin to suffer from extreme dehydration. The loss of blood, the nervous tension and the exposure to the hot sun would have led Jesus to have a raging thirst. On the one hand your lungs are filling up with fluid which asphyxiates the person, and at the same time your tongue becomes very swollen because of the immense dehydration.
That was the physical situation for Jesus. John now tells us that in order to fulfill the scriptures Jesus said, "I am thirsty." Jesus is referring Psalm 69:21, which states, "They put gall in my food and gave me vinegar for my thirst." It was of great concern and importance to Jesus that everything that He was doing and all that He stood for was being accomplished according to the plan God had set out for Him. So the guards took pity on Jesus and gave Him some of their drink. We must be aware that the drink the guards gave Jesus is different than the one He was offered earlier. The earlier one, was a narcotic and was meant to dull the pain. Jesus refused that drink. But He accepts a taste of this drink from the guards. The drink was simply a cheap wine which soldiers and peasants drank. After satisfying His thirst Jesus would be able to proclaim His final two words from the cross.
One other point about the drink, John tells us that the sponge soaked drink was handed to Jesus via a hyssop branch. Do you recall ever hearing of a hyssop branch? It was used to spread the blood of the lamb on the doorposts of Israelite homes during the first Passover. In taking on the sins of the world, Jesus became that lamb, a sacrifice for you and I.
We may be shocked to hear our Savior cry out just as you and I would. Yet, the suffering of Jesus was real. He had no special exemptions, not because He was God’s Son, in fact, those exemptions for suffering were taken on by Jesus, so we wouldn’t have to suffer them. His experience of physical pain was as deep and real as any that we would experience. This helps us better understand the words from Hebrews 2 . . . words which are directed to those experiencing pain —
"Since children have flesh and blood, Jesus too shared in their humanity.... he had to be made like His brothers and sisters in every way, in order that He might become a merciful and faithful high priest in service to God (Heb 2).
You see, we don’t have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are - yet was without sin. This allows and frees us to approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and grace in our time of need. (Heb 4)
There are times in our lives, maybe long periods of time where we may suffer in very deep physical ways. When the body fails to function as we believe it should. Our bodies scream and cry out with the hope to be renewed. In this Easter season we find one more reason to identify with Jesus.
We can have hope because in our physical pain we are not alone. For God himself has suffered. We must understand that and hang on to this precious truth.
And there is one more nugget, one more treasure to be found in the words we read -- words which bring life to you and I. Recall another time when Jesus experienced thirst. We find it in John 4, He was thirsty and Jesus spoke to a Samarian women at a well. Jesus told her that while we may have physical thirst, there’s a deeper thirst that no amount of water will satisfy. Jesus tells the women at the well, "Everyone who drinks the water from this well, will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give to hem will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give will become in you a spring of water welling up to eternal life." (4:13-14)
The body needs water to survive, for without it, we will die.
Later in John 7:37, Jesus says "If anyone is thirsty, let them come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, streams of living water will flow from within you."
Aren’t those great words from Jesus? You see, not only do we need physical nourishment, water to survive, but we also need spiritual water to satisfy our thirst, that emptiness in our souls. And you know what that feels like —
It is those times when you feel totally depleted. You feel that you cannot go on for one more day. You want to give up, but that is when you call on God and He resupplies you with His water, His living water, so that streams of life begin to flow once again within you. You see, God is waiting. . . waiting for you and I to call on Him and accept that water that will satisfy our thirst. But we must call on Him, for if we don’t we will never, never be satisfied.
We realize one morning that our marriage is not what we wanted. We find our career ending, our health deteriorating, our friends moving, our toys are not satisfying us. We recognize that something must change, and we come to understand that our souls are thirsting after the living God. The God who can change it all, if only we give in to our pride and humble ourselves.
We want peace and refreshment. We want to feel good about ourselves. We want to wake up in the morning and lie down again at night with the sense that all this running around, all this activity that we are constantly involved in, all this expending of energy, all this doing, matters. We want it to count in the grand scheme of things. We want to know that we count.
So hear the cry of Isaiah, as he anticipates the coming of Jesus, "Come, all of you who are thirsty — come to the waters; and you who have no money, come, buy and eat! Come, buy wine and milk without money and without cost. Listen, listen to me, and eat what is good, and your soul will delight in the richest fare. Give ear and come to me; hear me, that your soul may live. . . Seek the Lord while He may be found; call on Him while He is near. . . Turn to the Lord and He will have mercy, turn to our God, for He will freely pardon." (Is 55:1-3,6-7)
Those are great words from Isaiah. The point of the scripture is the INVITATION. That’s right it is an invitation to you and I to COME, COME to the One who can bring you the refreshing waters, the stream of living water that will satisfy your greatest longings in your soul.
It does not mean that all your troubles will go away, it does not mean that pain and sorrow and grief and death will go away ~~ but it means that we have the confidence that we will never ever have to go through this life alone. Accept the invitation of our God to fill your soul with His living waters. It is an invitation.
Psalm 107:9 tells us, "For God satisfies the thirsty and fills the hungry with good things."
Hear the words of Revelation 7:16-17, "Never again will they hunger, never again will they thirst. The sun will not beat upon them, nor any scorching heat. For the Lamb at the center of the throne will be their Shepherd; He will lead them to springs of living water. And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes."
In Revelation 21:6, Jesus proclaims, "I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the End. Whoever is thirsty I will give them drink without cost from the spring of the water of life."
And again in Revelation 22:17, "The Spirit and the bride say, "Come! Come!! Whoever is thirsty, let them come; and whoever wishes let them take the free gift of the water of life."
Do you get the point? Jesus thirsted so that our thirst would be quenched; that our spirits could be touched once more by the nourishing, life-giving Spirit of God. So when we cry out like the author of Psalm 42, saying: As the deer thirsts for streams of water, so my soul thirsts for you, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. Jesus hears that cry and He knows what your experiencing. Jesus took it all upon Himself on the cross. The gift of eternal life is yours, it is free. The gift of the eternal springs of water, water which will quench our souls thirst, is free. The offer is always present, it is available for you right now.
Come, Jesus bids you come.
Come and find your soul restored.
Come and find healing for your bitterness.
Come and find forgiveness from God Almighty.
Come and accept the gift of peace in your soul.
Come and allow God to fill your cup so that it will never again be empty.
But, my friends, we must come.
