“As a deer pants for flowing streams, so pants my soul for you, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When shall I come and appear before God?” –Psalm 42:1-2 (ESV).
Thirst is not a pleasant physical reaction to lack of liquid. Perhaps you have had to fast to take serious medical tests. Or perhaps you have been in a situation where drink was not available, and it seemed to your liquid-starved body that you would give almost anything for a cool, satisfying drink.
Have you ever been so spiritually thirsty that your soul yearns for the living God? The Psalmist gave a beautiful metaphor to describe the spiritually thirsty condition. It was like a deer, having traveled miles without coming upon a watering place, and was panting and yearning for a flowing stream. We can see that in our mind’s eye and know that the deer is searching frantically for the water that will assuage thirst.
May I suggest that each Christian should cultivate that need for spiritual water just like the deer, and also we humans, have that built-in need for physical water to satisfy thirst. Within beautiful Psalm 42, which was a “maskil”—or a song or hymn performed in worship—is a chorus that rings true to the theme of the whole Psalm. We find the chorus in verses 5 and 11 of Psalm 42 and again in verse 5 of Psalm 43:
Thirst is not a pleasant physical reaction to lack of liquid. Perhaps you have had to fast to take serious medical tests. Or perhaps you have been in a situation where drink was not available, and it seemed to your liquid-starved body that you would give almost anything for a cool, satisfying drink.
Have you ever been so spiritually thirsty that your soul yearns for the living God? The Psalmist gave a beautiful metaphor to describe the spiritually thirsty condition. It was like a deer, having traveled miles without coming upon a watering place, and was panting and yearning for a flowing stream. We can see that in our mind’s eye and know that the deer is searching frantically for the water that will assuage thirst.
May I suggest that each Christian should cultivate that need for spiritual water just like the deer, and also we humans, have that built-in need for physical water to satisfy thirst. Within beautiful Psalm 42, which was a “maskil”—or a song or hymn performed in worship—is a chorus that rings true to the theme of the whole Psalm. We find the chorus in verses 5 and 11 of Psalm 42 and again in verse 5 of Psalm 43:
“Why are you cast down, O my soul,How can the God-thirst be assuaged? The Psalmist gives us the answer to that question. We remember God. Just like we remember good times, recall people who have touched our lives, so we remember God. Recall how His steadfast love is with us in the daytime and His song is with us in the night. Metaphorically, this recalls times when He has given light to our pathways and times when we have walked through shadowy places. The second admonition in getting the soul that thirsts for God back to Him lies in hope. Poet Emily Dickinson had this to say about that intrinsic aspiration of the soul:
And why are you in turmoil within me?
Hope in God; for I shall again praise Him,
My salvation, and my God.
“Hope is the thing with feathersYes. “Hope in God.” The thirst for God can be fulfilled. He has been waiting for our return—waiting to fill us—and all we have to do is remember and hope…and return to Him.
That perches in the soul,
And sings the tune without the words,
And never stops at all.”
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