MERRY WEDNESDAY BY PARRIS BAILEY
I love the story of Hudson Taylor, he founded the China Inland Mission many years ago. I guess you could say, he went through some pretty rough stuff. He lost some of his children and in the end even his wife. But he writes of a beautiful encounter with God that helped him in the rough times. He said, “Do not let us change the Savior’s words. It is not “whosoever has drunk,” but “Whosoever drinketh”. It is not of one isolated draught He speaks, or even many, but of the continuous habit of the soul. In John 6:35, also, the full meaning is, “he who is habitually coming to me shall be no means hunger, and he who is believing on me shall by no means thirst.” The habit of coming in faith to Him is incompatible with unmet hunger and thirst. It seems to me that where many of us err is in leaving our drinking in the past, while our thirst continues present. What we need is to be drinking-yes; thankful for each occasion which drives us to drink ever more deeply of the living water.”
When his wife died of fever and some of his children, he made the choice to send the rest of his children back to England. Let’s read his account. “How lonesome were the weary hours when confined to my room! How I missed my dear wife and the voices of the children far away in England. I understood why the Lord had made that passage so real to me, “whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst”. Twenty times a day, perhaps, as I felt the heart-thirst coming back, I cried to him, “LORD, YOU PROMISED!” YOU PROMISED ME THAT I SHOULD NEVER THIRST.” And whether I called by day or night, how quickly He came and satisfied my sorrowing heart! So much so that I often wondered whether it were possible that my loved one who had been taken could be enjoying more of His presence than I was in my lonely chamber.”
This passage has been kept in my heart through the years. The Lord promises us to fill our hunger and satisfy our thirst if we would but come to him. He is able to heal us and redirect our issues! His joy will meet our need. Today I will decide to drink again, not live off the past or hope for some unforeseen expectation. Today He is enough for me!