constant appetite for more?

Have you been told sometime in your Christian walk that you need to feed your spirit by reading your bible every day? This is my experience: As a babe in Christ, it was explained to me that just as we need to eat physical food every day, we needed to eat spiritual food every day. So I did this ‘’religiously’’, reading chapters and chapters of the bible. I started in Genesis and after a few chapters I got really bored and felt like I was wasting my time. I jumped around the bible reading from here and there and yet I still felt unfulfilled! It seemed like reading the bible was not filling me up, and was not satisfying my unquenchable thirst and hunger for ‘’something’’. I read the bible day after day looking for something special, something that I thought would change my life forever. And yet deep inside me I ached for ‘’something’’ far more! I attended different conferences, and still I ached…….

Mat 5:6 KJV  Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled.

I prayed and asked God to fill me over and over again. I thought that righteousness was something that was earned and accomplished so I cleaned my act up!!! But it didn’t happen as my appetite for more of Him had not dwindled at all and in fact was increasing. I read the following scripture:

Joh 4:6-15 KJV  Now Jacob’s well was there. Jesus therefore, being wearied with his journey, sat thus on the well: and it was about the sixth hour.  (7)  There cometh a woman of Samaria to draw water: Jesus saith unto her, Give me to drink.  (8)  (For his disciples were gone away unto the city to buy meat.)  (9)  Then saith the woman of Samaria unto him, How is it that thou, being a Jew, askest drink of me, which am a woman of Samaria? for the Jews have no dealings with the Samaritans.  (10)  Jesus answered and said unto her, If thou knewest the gift of God, and who it is that saith to thee, Give me to drink; thou wouldest have asked of him, and he would have given thee living water.  (11)  The woman saith unto him, Sir, thou hast nothing to draw with, and the well is deep: from whence then hast thou that living water?  (12)  Art thou greater than our father Jacob, which gave us the well, and drank thereof himself, and his children, and his cattle?  (13)  Jesus answered and said unto her, Whosoever drinketh of this water shall thirst again:  (14)  But whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life.  (15)  The woman saith unto him, Sir, give me this water, that I thirst not, neither come hither to draw.

In light of this scripture, i was obviously doing something wrong because I was still thirsty. What was He talking about? He was saying that His water didn’t need to be drunk everyday like natural water, but only one time!!!!! This was in direct conflict to what I had been taught, because I was told that I had to read the bible every day to get filled and to grow!!!! If I didn’t read every morning I felt terrible.

Again Jesus continues with the same train of thought:

Joh 6:32-35 KJV  Then Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Moses gave you not that bread from heaven; but my Father giveth you the true bread from heaven.  (33)  For the bread of God is he which cometh down from heaven, and giveth life unto the world.  (34)  Then said they unto him, Lord, evermore give us this bread.  (35)  And Jesus said unto them, I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst.

Jesus described Himself as the “bread of life” and told his disciples that if they would once eat of this bread, they would never hunger again. Yet in my experience, if I didn’t study my Bible for spiritual food each day, I was backsliding!!!!!

Then years later my eyes opened, and I saw why I was my appetite was not quenched. I was reading with the purpose of finding the ‘’formula’’ so that I could do things for God – specifically heal the sick. I was sincerely thirsty and hungry but all for the wrong reasons. I was so focussed on ministering and doing evangelism crusades and inwardly I desired to attain Christian ‘’rockstar’’ status by being a powerful  man of God.

Jesus was saying that the letter, and the physical realm will never satisfy your spiritual hunger or thirst. I was trying to satisfy a spiritual hunger with the logos word. It was only when God revealed His Son in me to me, that I began to be filled. It is only as I see Christ the Living Word in the scriptures, am I filled. Jesus rebuked the Pharisees for this error: Joh 5:39-40 KJV  Search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me.  (40)  And ye will not come to me, that ye might have life.

I was just like these Pharisees, because I thought that I would be filled just by reading the scriptures. What I didn’t know was that there is no life in the scriptures without seeing Christ, for He is Life – 1 Jn 5:11-12. We also cannot formularize Jesus’ works on earth, because it just will not work, believe me I have tried for years!!!!

So how are we filled? We must search the scriptures with Christ spectacles on. For when we come to the Son – the Bread and Living Water, we SHALL BE FILLED!!!! We are to know Him, we are not to know what He can do or what He did. If we run after what He can do, we will become spiritually famished and will be unfulfilled! But if we come to Him, we will be filled. When we know Christ in us, who is Righteousness, then we will be filled – Mat 5:6.

In closing:  “ Are you still spiritually hungry and thirsty?’’ If you are then ask God to reveal His Son in you to you, for it is only the Holy Spirit who can reveal this to you. This is the beginning point of fulfilment.