John 7:37,38 – On the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried out, saying, “If anyone thirsts, let him come to Me and drink. He who believes in Me, as the Scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.”
When we begin to drink in this River of Living Water our lives become like a bubbling fountain flowing out of us like a living river that flows from the source of life. It flows out of us to the other thirsty ones in our world. So our thirst results in drinking, our drinking results in an overflowing fountain, this fountain flows out to quench the thirsty in our world. Drink in Christ through faith, worship and ministry flow out and the result is love and healing to the hurting. Here we can begin to understand the depths of what it means to never thirst again. Jesus is describing the secret of satisfaction and joy that He experienced even in His time on earth as a man. He drank in life from the Father and He poured this same life on all who came to Him in the power of signs, wonders, and miracles. This is the very joy of our Christian life, we drink in God’s love and His love flows out of us in the form of prayer, worship, and ministry. Here is a quote from Martin Luther about the effect of the Spirit in our lives:
“He that cometh to Me shall be so furnished with the Holy Ghost, that he shall not only be quickened and refreshed himself and delivered from thirst, but he shall also be a strong stone vessel, from which the Holy Ghost in all His gifts shall flow to others, refreshing, comforting, and strengthening them, even as he was refreshed by Me.”
So capturing the essence of this passage is the very heart and soul of our Christian faith. We look to Jesus seated at the Father’s right hand, we worship Him and enter into His presence. We drink in deeply of His presence who fills every part of us with His incomparable love, His unspeakable joy, and a satisfaction that we never even knew existed. From there we soon start to experience overflow. This overflow of Living Water flows out of us in the form of ministry to those who we find as part of our lives. This river is more powerful than you can imagine and flows out of us to heal the weary and scattered sheep of His pasture.
