How Thirsty Are You?

Psalm 63:1-2: "You, God, are my God, earnestly I seek You: I thirst for You, my whole being longs for You in a dry and parched land where there is no water. I have seen You in the sanctuary and beheld Your power and Your glory."
      You will not be thirsty for God until you KNOW God. Only God can put that thirst in you, and only after He has done a miracle of regeneration in Your heart. David had a wonderful relationship with the Lord, one that he violated a few times, to be sure. Yet at the end of the day, God's verdict on the life of David was that he was (literally) "a man in pursuit of God's own heart." The hunger and thirst after God only will come after we "taste and see that the Lord is good." (Psalm 34:8). The irony of relationship with God through Christ is that the more we find satisfaction in Him, the more our hunger and thirst for Him grows. Bernard of Clairveaux put it this way in one of his hymns:
     "We taste Thee, O Thou Living Bread, and long to feast upon Thee still,
      We drink of Thee, the Fountainhead, and thirst our souls from Thee to fill."
      (Jesus, Thou Joy of Loving Hearts)
      This is why regular worship, meditation, prayer, Bible study and other disciplines are so vital.
      Do you know that you can be thankful to God for your health, your family, your home, your job, and not be worshiping God at all? Until You are truly thankful to God just for who He is, your worship is superficial.
      That may be a primary problem with the church here in North America these days. We have lost the art of simply treasuring God for being God. We have it so well here that we've come to expect His blessings. The danger is that, after a while, we can begin to demand His blessings. Many American Christians simply do not believe anymore that God can judge or punish America (even though He judged and punished His chosen people, Israel). We choose to follow the words of Irving Berlin over the Word of God.
     Why is the church in the third world exploding while we continue to close churches every day in the U.S.? I believe it is because Asian Christians and African Christians and South American Christians who are under severe persecution have discovered that all they have is God - and all they need is God. If persecution is what it takes to wake us out of our spiritual sleep here, then I suppose we ought to be praying to God to send a persecution. A revival would be better, but at this point, I will take whatever God gives to renew His church here.
     But one thing is for sure: We had better start getting hungry and thirsty. When Jesus taught us in Matthew 5:6, "Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled," the Greek words used for "hunger and thirst" are not terms that describe a hunger to be satisfied with a Snickers Bar, but rather, a hunger that we will die from if we do not eat and drink soon. The good news is, this kind of hunger and thirst WILL be satisfied. And remember this: to hunger and thirst for righteousness is to hunger and thirst for Christ, because He IS our righteousness. (1 Corinthians 1:30)
     "And Christ is the Head of the body, the church; He is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything He might have the supremacy. For God was pleased to have all His fullness dwell in Him. ... In Christ are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge." (Colossians 1:18-19, 2:3, NIV). So let's hunger and thirst like this is true.