Come to Jesus

Dannah Gresh: Today on Revive Our Hearts, we’ll finish up our series “Satisfying Our Thirst.” But Nancy, we wanted to spend just a few moments with a fun story. I’ll let you set it up.

Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth: Well, it’s hard to believe we’ve already reached the last day of May. Not only are the summer months ahead, but here at Revive Our Hearts we’re also about to close up our fiscal year. I wanted to share an email that actually came to you, Dannah.

Dannah: Yes.

Nancy: It’s from a girl named Victoria, and she’s a big fan of the True Girl podcast.

Dannah: That’s right. Victoria is eleven years old, and she’s from Australia. 

Nancy: Here’s what she said: Victoria included her persuasive essay. It's so precious that our producer contacted her and asked her if she would read it for us. And here's her opening paragraph in her own voice.

Victoria: In school, we were asked to write a persuasive text about what we would do with $100, and I wrote that I would give it to the creators of True Girl. 

Nancy: Now, True Girl is one of the podcasts in the Revive Our Hearts family of podcasts. It’s hosted by you, Dannah, along with Staci Rudolph. 

Victoria included her persuasive essay. I won’t read the whole thing here, but here’s her opening paragraph:

Victoria: If had been given $100 I would absolutely choose to give it to Dannah Gresh and Staci Rudolph. The reasons being that they encourage girls to be proud of being a Christian. They do special podcasts, and they help with moments or emotions in everyday life. I don’t know about you, but we need more Christians in this world. Especially since there’s more drama and madness than there was years ago. 

Nancy: Wow, she’s right about that! But how precious is it to see what God is doing in this girl’s heart to give her sane, sound thinking in a world of drama and madness! Precious!

Now, it occurs to me, Victoria may not have $100 to give to help support the True Girl podcast, but maybe you can. 

Your donation of any amount here on the last day of May will help us continue to encourage young women like Victoria and women of all ages, all around the world. 

Dannah: I love that. Thanks, Victoria, and keep listening! If you’d like to make a donation to Revive Our Hearts, just head over to ReviveOurHearts.com and click where it says “Donate,” or call us at 1-800-569-5959. 

Nancy: Let me just say a huge "thank you" to all who have participated with us in helping to meet this fiscal year-end need during the month of May. We look forward to letting you know over the next few days how the Lord has provided. Regardless of whether we've met the goal or fell a bit short or perhaps exceeded it, we know that the Lord is our ultimate provider, and He will meet our needs day after day, as He will meet yours. We give thanks to Him and to each one who have had a part to support this ministry. Thank you so much! 

Dannah: You’re listening to the Revive Our Hearts podcast with Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth, co-author of Seeking Him, for May 31, 2023. I’m Dannah Gresh.

Do you ever get so involved in activities about Jesus that you forget to spend time with Jesus? There are many good things we can spend time on that can help us grow in faith. Things like church activities, worship music, and podcasts. But as good as they can be, these things are no substitute for spending time with Jesus Himself. Here is Nancy to encourage us to spend time with the Savior.

Nancy: We have been looking at how we get our thirst satisfied. We've seen as we've looked at the story of the woman at the well that we, like that woman, are all thirsty. That thirst isn't just physical. We have emotional thirsts and spiritual thirsts—longings of our hearts that cannot be satisfied by anything or anyone on this earth other than God Himself. That's a good thing. In fact we've discovered that disappointment and loneliness and loss can actually be a blessing because they force us to turn our eyes to the One and the only One who can lastingly satisfy. Jesus is the well of living waters that was promised to us as a gift from God.

We have said that we first have to come to the place where we admit we're thirsty. Then we have to identify what the substitutes are that we've settled for in our lives, the wells we've been turning to, to get our needs met. Then we have to recognize the utter futility of trying to fulfill our thirst, trying to meet our needs in anything or anyone other than Jesus. Ultimately, everything and everyone I look to, to satisfy me other than Christ, will fail me. When I look to those people, when I look to those things, I'm setting up myself for disappointment.

I know what I talking about, I've done this so many times in my life. It's something I find that I keep going back to. Idolatry is a natural pull on the heart. But through Christ we have that pull back to the place of putting our whole trust and security in Him and finding our fullness in Him, the fountain of living waters.

I want to close this series by focusing on the words of Jesus as He speaks about how we get our thirst satisfied. I'm really just going to sum all this up by saying that we need to come to Jesus and drink. Come to Jesus and drink.

We've been looking at the story of the woman at the well in John chapter 4. Three chapters later Jesus stood up at a great feast, the Feast of Tabernacles; and I want to read what He said in that context. John chapter 7 beginning in verse 37: "On the last and greatest day of the feast, Jesus stood and said in a loud voice, 'If anyone is thirsty . . .'" Anybody here thirsty? What we've been saying: we are all thirsty; everyone has a thirsty heart.

Jesus is speaking to all of us—not only those who were there in that setting but those of us in this room today. If anyone is thirsty, let him do what? Go to more church services? Let him put another CD in the CD player with some songs that will lift his spirit? Let him go call a friend? Nothing is wrong with all those things, but what did Jesus say? "If you're thirsty, come to me. Come to me and drink."

The woman who left Jesus at the well went back to Samaria, and what did she say to her friends in the town? "Come see a man!" Not, come to an experience; not, come to a thing; not, come to just any person, but come to the Son of God! Come see a person, Jesus Christ, He is the Messiah. Jesus said, "Come to me and drink." Then in the next verse we see that we come to Him and drink by faith. "Whoever believes in Me as the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him" (John 7:38).

Could I ask, by the way, as you think about your life, is your life a source of overflow and life-giving fullness and water to quench the thirst of others? Does that describe your life? That's what it's supposed to be like. We're supposed to be so full of Christ and of His spirit, drinking so deeply of Him that others who are thirsty see the fullness in us and they say, "Can you tell us where to get a drink?" That's the way God wants it to be for you as a wife, as a mom in your home, in your church, in your community, in your workplace, that your life is filled to overflowing.

Remember what Jesus told that woman at the well, "The water I give you will become in you a spring of water, leaping up to eternal life." Not just to fill you but to become a source of fullness and life to others. Listen ladies, God didn't just save us so He could make us happy. He saved us so He could have a relationship with us and then use us as instruments of blessing and fullness and revival and hope in other lives.

So first we have to get filled with Him. We come to Him and drink by faith and Jesus said that if we would believe in Him that streams of living water would flow from within us. By this He meant the Spirit whom those who believed in Him were later to receive. This is not a matter of feelings. This is a matter of faith—faith that God is willing and able to fill us up and meet our needs. Jesus said, "He who believes in Me will never be thirsty."

I find that this is something that having once trusted Christ to come into my life to be my Savior even as the woman at the well did, I find I have to keep going back to Him and drinking again, drinking afresh, drinking by faith. Just two days ago I found myself on my knees before the Lord crying out to Him and saying, "Oh Lord, I am so thirsty. I am so needy and the things and people of this world are not satisfying me."

We know that's true. We know we shouldn't expect them to satisfy, but I was just agreeing with Him that they don't satisfy. Then I cried out to Him and said, "Oh Lord by faith I believe in You that You are able to fill my cup. I lift it up Lord. Come and quench this thirsting in my soul. Bread of heaven feed me 'til I want no more. Fill me up and make me whole." There on my knees before the Lord by faith I again drank of Him. I said, "Lord you are enough. You are sufficient for this moment, for this need, for these circumstances in my life. You really are all that I need."

I didn't feel that to be the case. I felt like I needed a whole bunch of other things. By faith I acknowledged that Christ really is sufficient. You say, "Did you get up off your knees and feel all full?" No. I didn't feel that my cup was all filled up but by faith I agreed that He is sufficient to meet the deepest needs and longings of my heart.

Where there are unfulfilled longings still left, those are a gift because they keep me from getting too satisfied down here on earth. God is using those unfulfilled longings to keep my heart detached from this earth, to keep me as a pilgrim on this earth and to cause my heart to be more attached and my longings more firmly set on heaven.

That thirst is really a picture of a homesick heart. Our hearts are sick for a home we will never have this side of heaven and for One whom we now love and worship and pray to and praise by faith. One day faith will be sight and prayer will be praise and then there will forever be no more unfulfilled longings.

When Jesus went to the cross, as He hung there dying for my sins and for yours, one of His last words He cried out was when He said, "I thirst" (John 19:28). Can you imagine the God who made the universe, and the 340 quintillion gallons of water on the face of the earth that all fit in the palm of His hand, that He would let Himself go to a point where He was thirsty? Why did He do it? So that you and I would not have to thirst.

He said, "I am willing to endure this thirst and to be separated from My Father and to experience all the disappointment and the failure and the guilt and the shame caused by sin. I'm willing to have that thirsty heart Myself so that I can give to you the gift that comes from above, the gift of living water." He will meet your deepest need and mine. So we just need to tell Him, "Here's my need. I can't make it without You."

For those who are thirsty, Jesus offers an invitation. We read about it both in the New Testament and in the Old. Let me read you the Old Testament version in Isaiah Chapter 55:1. "Come all you who are thirsty, come to the waters. And you who have no money, come buy and eat." Now that sounds like a strange thing to say if you don't have any money, you can come and get all you need.

If I go into my grocery store and go through the aisles and put everything in my cart that I need and then I go to the checkout counter and I say, "I'm sorry but I don't have any money." What will they say? No money, no groceries. But in God's divine grace grocery store He says, "You don't have any money? That's just the kind of customer I'm looking for. Here, take a cart, take two, take three, take all you can wheel. Go down through these aisles and put into that cart everything you need in your life. Fill your cart up. Fill it full, and then come and tell Me you don't have anything to pay and I'll say, 'That's what grace is for.'"

He says, "You who have no money, come buy and eat. Why do you spend your money on what is not bread and your labor on what does not satisfy? Listen to me and eat what is good and your soul will delight in the richest of fare. Give ear and come to me."

"Come see a Man" the woman at the well said. Come to Jesus and drink. When you come to Him, you will find He really does meet every need of your heart.

• Are you thirsty? He is living water.
• Are you hungry? He is the Bread of Life.
• He's strength for those who are weak.
• He's righteousness for those who are sinful.
• For those who are wounded, He is healing.
• For those who are weary, He is rest. ,\
• For the empty He is fullness.
• He is joy for the grieving.
• He is peace for the troubled heart.
• He is beauty for those who have been scarred.
• For those who don't know which way to go, He is the way.
• He is home for the rejected.
• He is the lover for the unloved.
• For the fatherless He's a father.
• For the widow He's a husband.
• He's freedom for those who are in bondage.
• He's refuge for the fearful.
• He's hope for the hopeless and the discouraged.
• He's fruitfulness for those who are barren.
• For those who are dead, He is the Resurrection and the Life.

Come to Jesus and drink.

Would you by faith say, "Oh Lord, I come to You fresh this day, and I know that You are the fountain of living waters, the only One who can supply the deepest needs of my heart. Forgive me, Lord, for looking to other things and people to satisfy that God-shaped vacuum and hole in my heart. Right now by faith, I drink of You. I take You by faith. Fill me up. Fill my cup until it overflows. May my life give life and hope to others around me this day. 

Thank You Lord Jesus, for You truly are all that we need. In this afresh we drink deeply of You, that rivers of living water may fill us from within and flow to others. In Jesus' name we pray it, amen.

Dannah: That’s Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth, wrapping up the teaching series, “Satisfying Our Thirst.”

If you missed any of Nancy’s teaching about the interaction between Jesus and the woman at the well in John 4, you can hear it by visiting ReviveOurHearts.com, or listening on the Revive Our Hearts app. Throughout this series we’ve heard from women who could relate to this woman.

They’ve all tried looking for satisfaction in all kinds of things but finally discovered Jesus. Many of them felt baggage and guilt from past relationships, just like the woman at the well. That’s true of the final guest we’ll hear from.

While growing up, Jacque was well acquainted with hurt and pain. Her father was absent, and she felt that loss. Then another man abused her at age nine. She came to resent men, even as she married her husband.

Jacque came to know the Lord, but she was still in bondage to a lot of sinful patterns. Nancy and Carrie Gaul from the Revive Our Hearts team talked with Jacque about the freedom she found in Jesus Christ. The Lord used Nancy’s book, Lies Women Believe and the Truth That Sets Them Free.

Jacque: So in the book, Lies, she talks about “I can’t help the way I am.” I was such an angry, volatile, ugly human being, and I expected everybody to just deal with it. “Look, I have been hurt. I have been wronged. I have the right to lash out, so you all need to just deal with it.”

That was where I was coming from. I believed that. I believed I was a victim of circumstance, so I had a right to act this way, the right to be angry, the right to be bossy. "I am the way I am, and I can justify it."

I practiced that for years. Because I didn’t have a father, because I had been abused by a man at the age of nine, sexually, because of these things I don’t like men and I will not like men; therefore, I will love women.

So I had an affair with a woman while I was married to my husband. By God’s grace, my husband did not lash out; he did not retaliate. Do you know what he did? He poured the Word of the Lord over me. He prayed over me.

We went to our pastor and told our pastor. My pastor told me this was a sin, and I said, “Yes, I know.”

He said, “You need to stop.”

I said, “Yes, I know.”

Literally, the Lord severed that. This was early on in our relationship. This was months into our marriage. I think God that He used that to launch me into this other new world of understanding womanhood and manhood and how He created that to be sacred and to be a holy covenant between one another.

I think in our culture now, man, that seems to be acceptable. I think He’s using that experience in my life to help me teach other women that I know that are battling and that are tripping up over that lie. They are tripping up over that lie that says, "I deserve this. I am this way because I am. I have my rights. I can do what I want to do. I’m supposed to be happy.”

Boy, those lies can circulate and create a monster. It’s not the way the Lord intended things to be. I avoided talking about it because it is so shameful. It was so hurtful to my husband. But by God’s grace, he has been an amazing man that I never knew before.

Carrie Gaul: Jacque, would you talk to the woman today who is struggling with same-sex attraction—maybe hiding behind that, being afraid. Would you share even the struggle with that.

Jacque: I know that for some women they think that the only person who will understand them is another women. They take comfort in the fact that a woman understands in a way that a man never could.

I’m here to tell you that you’re wrong. I’m here to tell you that Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life. Once you realize that He loves you more that anyone could love you, that will start releasing the lie from your thought process.

I pray very faithfully for lesbian women because I think they are caught up in the most detrimental lives. We can’t procreate; we can’t love in a holy, covenant way if we are doing that. I wear this bracelet to remind me to pray for my sisters that are lost, that are broken, that are afflicted.

Carrie: And we want to say the God loves them.

Jacque: Amen! He loves the sinner.

Dannah: That’s Jacque Chislea talking with Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth and Carrie Gaul about the way God takes broken pieces of our lives and can make something beautiful.

Nancy, the Lord used your book Lies Women Believe to get a hold of Jacque’s heart and bring big changes to her life. 

Nancy: I’ve been so encouraged by Jacque’s story. It's been an incredible joy to watch the power of the truth of God's Word set her free. My prayer is that thousands of women, women all around the world, would recognize the lies they've been believing and would experience the transforming power of His truth, just as Jacque has.

That's what Revive Our Hearts is all about. I'm so grateful for the prayers and the financial support of so many listeners who have helped to make this ministry possible.

Dannah: Like we mentioned at the beginning of today’s episode, today is the last day of May, which means it’s your last day to help us meet our goal for our fiscal year. Your much-needed support will help us continue producing life-transforming teaching through our podcasts, broadcasts, and biblical resources.

To say “thank you” for your donation of any amount, we’d like to send you a couple resources. The first is volume one of (Un)remarkable: Ten Ordinary Women Who Impacted Their World for Christ. Then you’ll also get a digital copy of volume 2. Both resources are filled with inspiring stories of women whose lives pointed others to Christ. Request your (Un)remarkable volumes when you give by calling 1-800-569-5959, or go online to ReviveOurHearts.com. Thank you so much for your support at this crucial time!

When the apostle John was describing Jesus, he said He was “the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.” And if you and I should be like Jesus, we also should be full of grace and truth. The problem is, we often lean one way or the other. Tomorrow, Mary Kassian and Bob Lepine discuss how we can grow in that ability to both stand up for truth but also do it with grace. I hope you’ll be back for Revive Our Hearts.

Revive Our Hearts with Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth is calling you to freedom, fullness, and fruitfulness in Christ.

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