Day 3
Caring Hearts Virtual Experience Devotional
“Hunger and Thirst”
By Lia Fisher
I remember the first time I gave food and water to a hungry child while on a mission trip. I was a high schooler, it was a million degrees out, and we’d all been playing soccer for a long time. As I gave some water to a little girl, sweat dripping down her face, something deep in my spirit cried out, “Oh, Jesus I need you so desperately.”
It was absolutely a Romans 8, Holy Spirit praying the words that I wouldn’t have known to pray, type of moment. But my spirit felt an ancient biblical truth well up and flooded my world: meeting the physical needs points us to the deeper spiritual needs.
I love the stories in John 6 and while I’m not going to put the entire chapter in this short devo, I encourage you to take some time in the coming days to read through it. As a refresher, John 6 begins with a HUGE miracle: the feeding of the 5 thousand!! I could write all day about how God wants to use our little fishes and crumbs and multiply it beyond our wildest dreams but that is a devo for another day. But we do see here that Jesus’ heart is for the hungry and lowly. He embodies the character of Papa God, The Provider. God’s heart is to supply our every need. Sometimes we are the little boy without much to bring and sometimes we’re a face in the hungry crowd, but in both situations, Jesus is waiting and ready to do the impossible in our situation and meet our every need in abundance.
John 6 goes on and Jesus makes a big and beautiful “I Am” statement: I am the bread of life. John 6:35, “Jesus said to them, ‘I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst.’”
It makes sense that Jesus makes this statement right after the great miracle He had just performed but we know that He is speaking about so much more than food. In the beatitudes, He is speaking about so much more than hunger and thirst when He says, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.” (Matthew 5:6)
When we feel these physical aches or meet these physical needs we come into an understanding of why Jesus used them the way He did. When we eat after a long day of fasting or drink when we’re dehydrated we remember that our souls need to be fed and need water. We remember the POWER of the gospel alone to satisfy the hunger and thirstiness we feel in our souls.
When we live our lives, serving others, feeding the hungry, loving the least of these, we are being the very hands of Jesus which then point directly to the nature of God, the heart of the Provider.
When this is the pattern of our lives, we come into alignment with the apostle Peter when we feel like we don’t have the physical things that someone is looking for. Then we can utter his words saying, “ I have no silver and gold, but what I do have I give to you.” (Acts 3:6) and offer them the gospel, the love and the heart of the Lord, healing, or whatever the Lord has beyond the physical for them.
May your soul find total satisfaction in Him today. If your soul feels starved, I pray that you would take time to feast on His word and drink deeply in His presence today. I pray that from that place, you would take The Bread of Life and the Living Water to every corner of the earth; that every hungry person would eat and that every starving soul would encounter life, and life abundant in Him, the Bread of Life.
Questions to Answer:
Do you feel hungry or thirsty for God? Are you feeling the pains of needing something more from God? If so, do a self analysis, are you feeding yourself daily by spending time with him?
Who is someone you know that needs food or water? Is there a place in your community you can help? Can you make a meal for a friend in need or make a food package for the homeless person you walk by every day?
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