O God, I have tasted Thy goodness, and it has both satisfied me and made me thirsty for more. I am painfully conscious of my need for further grace. I am ashamed of my lack of desire. O God, the Triune God, I want to want Thee; I long to be filled with longing; I thirst to be made more thirsty still. Show me Thy glory, I pray Thee, so that I may know Thee indeed. Begin in mercy a new work of love within me.
~A.W. Tozer
I read this passage by renowned pastor and author A.W. Tozer at breakfast this morning, and it stayed with me all day. As I drank my hot water at breakfast and filled my Sigg with clear, cold Culligan water at work, I mulled over Tozer's words.
O God, I have tasted Thy goodness, and it has both satisfied me and made me thirsty for more.
I thirst to be made more thirsty still.
On the surface, these seem odd prayers. Being thirsty is terrible. It cracks your lips, swells your throat, and consumes your thoughts. When you are thirsty, you must quench the desire or go mad. When I look at these prayers in reference to thirsting after God, however, they are strikingly profound.
Do I thirst after God with the same intensity I thirst after water? Must I quench my desire to be with Him, my desire to serve Him, my desire for Him to fill me to overflowing...or go mad? Sadly, not as much as I'd like. I sip from God. I wet my lips. But I too rarely take a big, chin-dribbling swig that drains the bottle in one gulp.
I want to thirst after God. Really thirst. And I pray the same for every single person served by Living Water International. I pray that quenching physical thirst would ignite spiritual thirst satisfied only by pursuing Christ daily, hourly, moment by moment.
I fast so that the thirsty in the world may become more thirsty.
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