Lenten Midweek Sermon: "A God Who Thirsts"

+ Lenten Midweek 5 – April 10, 2019 +

Beautiful Savior Lutheran, Milton

Psalm 22:12–18; John 19:28–30

In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Water is life. The world’s surface is 71% water, our bodies are roughly 60% water, and we’re hard-pressed to find something we do in our daily life that doesn’t involve water.

Without water, we die. Water is life. The same is true throughout John’s Gospel. John baptized Jesus in the water of the Jordan River. Jesus told Nicodemus that he must be born from above, born again by water and the Spirit. At Cana, Jesus made two- to three-hundred gallons of water into the finest vintage wine. “I will give you living water,” Jesus promised the woman at the well. Jesus walked on the stormy, wind-tossed waters of the Sea of Galilee. Jesus healed a blind man with spit and mud to heal his eyes. Jesus washed His disciples’ feet with a bowl of water. And when the soldier took a spear to confirm that Jesus was in fact dead, John tells us that he unleashed a river of blood and water from His side.

Water is life. A theme which flows like a tributary, growing wider and swifter throughout John’s Gospel, until it leads us to Jesus. To his cross born for us. To his word spoken to us.

Jesus, knowing that all was now finished, said (to fulfill the Scripture), “I thirst.” 

In Jesus’ seemingly ordinary request for a drink, he reveals the extraordinary work he is doing for us on the cross. He thirsts not for Himself but for the salvation of all men. As He is dried up, He is becoming the draft of forgiveness for those who hunger and thirst for righteousness.

Behold the very Rock who was cleft in the wilderness to give a wellspring of life-giving water to His thirsting, complaining people. Behold the One who created the waters that flow, rivers that run, oceans that surge, water tables that nourish, and springs that bubble. Behold the God who made six stone jars of water to be the choicest vintage of wine the wedding guests had ever tasted. Behold the man! He is thirsty. Dried up, parched. His tongue sticking like Velcro to the roof of His mouth, craving even a sip of sour wine from a sponge. Behold the man who thirsts. For you.

If Jesus thirsts for us, for what do we thirst? For what does our flesh ache and groan? Not just a drink of water, probably. That is far too ordinary. For money, power, influence, success, popularity, comfort, perhaps. Maybe we thirst for more likes, more reviews, more respect, or more attention at any cost. Jesus’ physical thirst on the cross also reveals our thirst and need for God himself. 

“O God, you are my God; earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you; my flesh faints for you, as in a dry and weary land where there is no water.” (Psalm 63:1)

I am poured out like water,    and all my bones are out of joint;
my heart is like wax;    it is melted within my breast;
my strength is dried up like a potsherd,    and my tongue sticks to my jaws;    you lay me in the dust of death. (Psalm 22:14-15)

Yes, we, like Jesus, are thirsty. But where we thirst for ourselves, Jesus thirsts for you. 

Jesus, who took on our human flesh, flesh that hungers and thirsts, flesh that needs sustenance, flesh that can be beaten, abused, mocked, nailed to a cross, and hung until it thirsts in peril for its life. For you.

Jesus is deprived of life to save our life. Jesus suffers one of humanity’s most basic needs to satisfy our greatest need before God. Jesus fulfills the scripture to accomplish our rescue from every thought, word, and deed we’ve done in hopes of satisfying our own thirst. Jesus thirsted on the cross so that we need never thirst for God. 

Behold the man who empties Himself so that you might be filled. Behold the man who is cut off so that you can be grafted in. Behold the man who thirsts so that you can be satisfied. Behold the man who thirsts so that men might drink and never be thirsty again. Behold the man who is parched and dried up so that you might find in Him a river of life. Behold the man who thirsts as He dies so that you might never die—not like this, not the big death, not this death separated from God, not death and hell.

In Jesus, your thirsts, your desires, your needs are quenched. Every thirst is primal, a hearkening back to the days in the Garden of Eden. Every thirst is eschatological, hearkening forward to the new creation, to the river of life, to the renewed heavens and renewed earth.

Behold the man whose blood still flows for you. Behold the man who was dried up with thirst so that your dry lips could be satisfied with the drink of His blood for true drink. Behold the man who thirsted. Behold the man who bids you thirst no more. Behold the man who is the headstream of a new drink, the river of life.

Jesus delights to give us his living water. He pours out living water from his pierced side and washes away your sins. Jesus bathes you in his death and resurrection in the living waters of the font, a true fountain of life. In his Holy Word, Jesus sends forth a river of life, teeming with his promises declaring you his new creation. Jesus’ forgiveness floods the wasteland of our sinful hearts into a reservoir of his mercy. In the Holy Supper, Jesus gives us the same body that thirsted on the cross to satisfy our hunger for righteousness. Jesus fills the cup of salvation with the same blood shed on the cross for you that we might never thirst again. 

In Jesus, water is life. Now and forever. 

In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.