Your Greatest Desire
Psalm 63:1
O God, You are my God;
Early will I seek You;
My soul thirsts for You;
My flesh longs for You
In a dry and thirsty land
Where there is no water. (NKJV)
There are few desires more intense than the desire for thirst. Thirst is a desire that people simply don’t ignore. To a truly thirsty person, everything is secondary to water. Have you ever noticed the way thirsty people go after water?
Recess is over and thirty thirsty kids push their way to the front of the water fountain line.
The series of plays is over and the football player sprints off the field straight to the water cooler and grabs two cups of water, one for his drenched head and one for his dry mouth.
After several hours of yard work on a hot summer’s day, you stroll into the house, grab a bottled water out of the fridge, and drink it all before coming up for air.
A weary wanderer in the desert, who has just enough strength to put one unsteady foot in front of the other, somehow begins to run desperately toward the distant mirage he thinks is water.
Unlike these four people, I doubt that your greatest physical desire at this moment is water. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if you are reading this article over a hot cup of coffee or with an ice-cold Diet Coke by your side. Most of us don’t allow our thirst to go unsatisfied for long. That is, if we can help it.
But sometimes we can’t. When David wrote Psalm 63, his greatest physical desire was likely thirst. The title of this Psalm indicates that David wrote these words while he was running for his life through the wilderness of Judah. And during this flight, likely from Absalom, David and his men were often weary and thirsty (2 Sam. 16:14).
In light of David’s situation, the first verse of this Psalm begs the question, "What is your greatest desire?" Maybe your greatest desire is having a boyfriend or girlfriend. Maybe you want to get a new car more than anything else. Your greatest desire might be anything from going to college, to getting a job, to retiring from your job, to regaining your health, to making money, to pleasing others, to any number of other things. I don’t know what the greatest desire in your life is right now. What I do know is that, whatever it is, it should be no match for your desire to know God.
Ps 42:1—As the deer pants for the water brooks, So pants my soul for You, O God. NKJV
Ps 143:6—I spread out my hands to You; My soul longs for You like a thirsty land. NKJV
Matt 5:6—Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, For they shall be filled. NKJV
~Daniel Hope