I am reading a book by Donald S. Whitney, 10 Questions to Diagnose Your Spiritual Health. In this he made this statement about “the sweetness of the quest.” The context is in the answer to the question “Do you thirst for God?” At first I struggled with the concept of the sweetness of the quest, quest is such a macho word, evoking incredibly graphic images and concepts of battles, struggles, courage and defiance of evil, that it just shouldn’t be coupled with sweetness. However, as I thought further I wanted to recognized that there is a sweetness in the midst of the quest that keeps one moving in the midst of difficult and demanding endeavors.
I remember being a 16 year old hiking through Bryce Canyon in Utah in the middle of June. We were ill-prepared not having enough water for the 2 day hike we had embarked on. At stages along the hike there were some shallow creeks that I would have never drunk from without purifying the water. Time didn’t permit us to do so and the only relief the streams offered was to lie down and soak for a few minutes to cool one’s body temperature from the scorching sun and arid atmosphere. It was a marked moment of misery that second day.
Have you ever encountered one of those kind of moments? Maybe you have been working hard and close to dehydration, exhaustion, and desperation. I am sure you have some ability to relate. David described this in terms of the deer that pants for water in Psalm 42. I have heard and read that Psalm often, but never really sensed the desperation on the part of the deer. It is as if I had missed out on that key thought of its panting for the refreshing water. However, I am beginning to understand in a new sense, the desperation of my own soul for the living water, which alone can satisfy my thirst. In Philippians 3:10 Paul employs a key phrase, “that I may know him.” It is the goal of God for us to have this kind of intimate relationship and continued longing for Him to satisfy every part of our being.
Whitney identifies three types of thirsty souls. First is the Thirst of an Empty Soul. This is the natural man or woman who is devoid of God. The call for this person is to taste and see that the Lord is good (Psalm 34:8) The irony of The Empty Soul is that there is great dissatisfaction in the things of this life, yet they are all he pursues. Truly, he would be readily satisfied in regard to the pursuit of God.
The Second type of person is said to have a Thirst of the Dry Soul. This is the person who has tasted the living water, knows its refreshment, yet is now missing it. Whitney writes, “A Christian soul becomes arid in one of three ways. The most common is by drinking too much from the desiccating fountains of the world and too little from “the river of God”” (Psalm 65:9).
The Third type of person has a Thirst of the Satisfied Soul. This is the person who has “tasted and seen that the Lord is good” (Psalm 34:8). The interesting thing is that the taste is so wonderful and uniquely satisfying, that there is developed a craving for more. I think that this is why the best illustration is found in hungering and thirsting for the things of God. I personally love sweets. However, there are some sweets that I just can’t get enough of. Katie makes this incredible dessert called “Blueberry Crunch.” It is an incredible mixture of blueberries, pineapples, sugar, cake mix, butter, and pecans. It is best served warm with a scoop of vanilla ice cream. Whenever she makes it there is an intense longing to go back to the refrigerator as soon as my hunger begins and serve myself a bit more. Each serving satisfies, nevertheless, that only lasts so long.
Jonathan Edwards wrote the following:
Spiritual good is of a satisfying nature; and for that very reason, the soul that tastes and knows its nature, will thirst after it, and a fullness of it, that it may be satisfied. And the more he experiences, and the more he knows this excellent, unparalleled, exquisite, and satisfying sweetness, the more earnestly he will hunger and thirst for more.
If you were to consider the type of thirst you have, which would it be and why? What must you do to discover more of The Sweetness of the Quest? Tune back in for my next entry this week, as I will explore some of the ways to answer these questions.