God’s Provision

Dannah Gresh: Betsy Goméz realized she had been looking for fulfillment in the wrong places.

Betsy Goméz: When you grow up in church, sometimes you think that you’re okay. Even though you have problems in your life or in your marriage, it’s okay. But for the first time in my life, I could see that I was full of pride. My life was a very sinful life. I was focused just on myself, and I was not taking care of my husband. I was not taking care of my son. 

Dannah: This is the Revive Our Hearts podcast with Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth, co-author of Seeking Him, for Memorial Day, May 29, 2023. I’m Dannah Gresh.

Last week Nancy began a series called “Satisfying Our Thirst.” We saw how women today are like the woman at the well Jesus encountered in John chapter 4.

A lot of women carry a bondage of guilt.

Andrea Griffith: For years the words that went around in my head were, "You did it. You hid it. And now, you will never be rid of it."

Dannah: Some women can search for satisfaction in fame and popularity.

Nancy Stafford: So I started doing all these commercials and modeling. I moved to New York. I was at the top of my game, but I still didn't feel good about myself.

Dannah: Other women are searching to be satisfied by success in their careers.

Betsy: I wanted to work full time in ministry one day in my life.

Dannah: We’ll hear more of that story later in the program. But first, let's join Nancy where we left off in our teaching series, “Satisfying Our Thirst.” She’s sharing some of the messages women have written to her about ways they’ve looked for satisfaction.

Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth: One woman said, "I've been seeking fulfillment in areas other than Christ—men, food, shopping, friends, anything except Jesus Christ."

Another woman said, "Because my needs have not always been met by my husband . . .

And by the way, there is no husband who can meet all the needs of a wife. If you want your husband to be drawn to you, one of the things you may need to do is go home and set him free from the prison of your expectations. When men sense that their wife is trying to make him a prisoner of what she thinks is a a good husband is, invariably, the nature of that man is to bolt. It's to resist that kind of imprisonment. To release your husband from those expectations of being "god" in your life will not only set you free. It will set your marriage free.

This woman said, "Because my needs have not always been met by my husband, I have tried to meet my needs at the well of work. I have often sought fulfillment in the workplace."

Another woman said, "I placed unreasonable expectations on my husband and children to provide for my peace and happiness."

Now, we've been seeing this week that when we forsake God as our fountain of living water . . . We're no conscious that we've forsaken Him We don't consciously say that we've forsaken God. But when we fail to look at Him to meet the deepest needs of our hearts and we turn to other things or people to supply what God intended to supply for us, what are we guilty of? Idolatry. We've replaced God. We've come up with cheap substitutes for God in our lives. Yes, we are all thirsty, but the problem is we try to satisfy our thirst in all the wrong places.

Now I want us to look over these next few days at God's provisions, to see that God has made a provision for us just as He made a provision for that woman who came to Jesus at the well thousands of years ago. She came looking for water. Jesus said to her in John 4:10, "If you knew the gift of God and who it is who asks you for water, you would have asked Him and He would have given you living water."

You see, God has a provision for my thirst. He created the thirst. He made us in such a way that we are not filled without Him. We are empty without Him. And He wants that thirst to drive us to Himself as the provision. Now it's encouraging to me to know as I read God's Word that God wants to satisfy my thrists and my deepest longings. They will not all be satisfied this side of heaven. That's important to remember, but God does want to satisfy my thirsts and my deepest longings.

There are so many references to this in the Scriptures particularly in the Psalms. I think of a passage in Psalms that says, "God satisfies the longing soul and He fills the hungry soul with goodness" (Psalm 107:9). Then another place in Psalms the people asked and God brought quails and satisfied them with the bread of heaven. And then God says, "Open wide your mouth, and I will fill it. I will feed you with the finest of wheat; with honey from the rock, I would satisfy you" (Psalm 81:10; 16). Why do we settle for cheap substitutes when God wants to fill us with something that really does satisfy? God wants to satisfy our thirsts and our deepest longings.

Then, here's the truth that I think is so liberating: that is that Jesus Christ Himself is the water that truly satisfies. Not only does He give us living water, but He Himself is God's provision for my thirst. It's not that He gives us something new, some greater spiritual experience, some great key to the Christian life. He is our life. He is the water. He is the one who truly satisfies.

Now you may not think that sounds very profound; but for me this is a life-giving, life-changing truth when I start to realize that Christ is my life. Jesus said to the woman at the well, "Whoever drinks of this water will thirst again"—that is the water in this well—but whoever drinks of the water that I give him will never thirst" (John 4:13-14). He is that water. He says, "If you knew the gift of God and who it is who's speaking to you, you would ask Him and He would give you Himself."

I who speak to you and He. I am God. I am the Living Water. There is only one well that truly, lastingly satisfies—only one. God has made us so that we will never be satisfied with anything less or anything other than God's provision, and that provision is Jesus Christ.

Now, John Piper speaks of this matter of a spring that satisfies. And he says that "a spring satisfies thirst, not by removing the need you have for water, but by being there to give you water whenever you get thirsty—again, again, and again." So Jesus isn't saying here, "If you come to Me, you have a relationship with Me, you'll never have any more longings again." But He's saying that there will always be in your life the source of supply for those longings to be met. There will always be that well of water in you. That's enough! That will enable you to be satisfied regardless of what circumstances you're facing in your life—regardless of what friends you have or don't have, regardless of the dark moments or difficult moments. He's saying that within you there will always be this well, a source of life. And it is Jesus Christ Himself who is that living water.

I spoke some years ago on the woman at the well at a conference in a Midwestern state on a Friday night. The next morning a woman came up to me and she said, "Early this morning after hearing your message last night, I wrote a song." She handed me the piece of paper on which she had written these words. I looked at the words and I could tell immediately that this was not just a song about my message. It was not just a song about the woman at the well but that the words that June had written were her story, that she was that woman at the well.

I put her on the spot that morning in front of several hundred women and I said, "June would you willing to sing this song for us, right here in this conference?" She did. She was willing. She got up and sang with no accompaniment just as you're going to hear it now, the song she had written, "Come See a Man." For, you see, the invitation is not to some thing. The invitation is to come see some one. That's what the woman at the well said to the people of Samaria when she went back into town, "Come see a man! It's Christ. He's the Messiah. He's the one who lastingly satisfies." That woman found acceptance and fullness in a man, Christ Jesus. That's exactly where June found that fulfillment and that acceptance as you're going to hear from her right now.

For most of my life I felt like a woman, a woman of ill repute.
For the things I have done and what was done to me,
I felt I was of no use.

Like the woman at the well who spoke to Jesus alone, looking for a drink,
I've been looking for love in all the wrong the places—helpless, needy, and weak.

But now that I know Jesus, to the world I will proclaim
These words of invitation.
I will forever lift up His name, and I will sing.

Come see a man who knows all about me,
Who knows what I've done and the love that I need.
Come see a man who won't leave or forsake me,
Who died on a cross to set me free.

Come see a man who gives life eternal,
Who's the Bread of Life, Living Water for your thirst.
Come see a man who gives new beginnings,
Who gives second chances, who gives new birth.

His name is Jesus. His name is Jesus.

And if you feel the same way, believing there is no where to go.
You too, can come to Jesus, where the living waters flow.
He loved you, this I know.
And you can sing:

 

I know a man who knows all about me,
Who knows what I've done and the love that I need.
I know a man who won't leave or forsake me,
Who died on a cross to set me free.

I know a man who gives life eternal,
Who's the Bread of Life, Living Water for your thirst.
I know a man who gives new beginnings,
Who gives second chances, who gives new birth.

His name is Jesus. His name is Jesus.

Then we can sing it together, together as a Body of one.
We can tell the world about Jesus, Jesus Christ God's risen Son.
And we all can sing:

Come see a man who knows all about me,
Who knows what I've done and the love that I need.
Come see a man who won't leave or forsake me,
Who died on a cross to set me free.

Come see a man who gives life eternal,
Who's the Bread of Life, Living Water for your thirst.
Come see a man who gives new beginnings,
Who gives second chances, who gives new birth.

His name is Jesus. His name is Jesus.
His name is Jesus. His name is Jesus.

As I listened to June sing that song, I realized that here was a woman who had her own story. Some time after the conference I called her and I said, "June, could you tell me a little bit more about your story?" She was happy to do that and to give me permission to share it with others. She told me how she had grown up in the home of an alcoholic, abusive father, a father who sexually molested her for some time when she was a child.

She then told how she had entered into a season of life of trying to get that thirst satisfied and ending up in many addictive and immoral relationships looking for love as she said, "in all the wrong places." Then came a day when she came and saw a man. His name is Jesus. She found a man who knew all about her but loved her, loved her unconditionally, was willing to restore her, to renew her, to give her a new life.

It was interesting that she shared with me that she had to come to a place where she realized she was a sinner who needed God's forgiveness, not just because of what had been done to her. She had to work through issues of forgiveness with her dad and others. She said she realized that her heart had been filled with poisonous, venomous anger and hatred and that she was a sinner in need of this living water. She had looked for wells other than Christ to satisfy the deepest needs and longings of her heart. It was when she got to Christ and began to let Him fill up the empty places of her heart that a well of water begin to spring up within her.

You know what she's doing today? She's involved in ministering to women in prison, women who come from backgrounds similar to her own. And the well of water that God has caused to spring up within her is now a well of water giving life to others. She said, "I thank God now for the hurt, for the pain, for the longing because through it I have found a man, Christ Jesus."

Father, thank You for the power and the love and the mercy and the fullness that we find in Christ. Thank You for second chances . . . and third and fourth, and fifth. Thank You for mercy. Thank You for knowing all about us and still offering us that living water. Thank You that You are God's provision for our sin, for our emptiness, for our need.

Lord Jesus, we look to You, and we are filled. Thnk You in Jesus' name, amen.

Dannah: Wow. June’s song is so powerful! So is the truth from God’s Word that Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth has been sharing with us.

This teaching series is called “Satisfying Our Thirst.” You can hear the whole series by visiting ReviveOurHearts.com, or check it out on the Revive Our Hearts app. And why don’t you share it with someone you know who could use it? You’ll find a link to the podcast version of the program at ReviveOurHearts.com. It’s also available on YouTube.

Something has come up a few times during this series: We can be tempted to look for success in our jobs as a source of satisfaction. But like all the other empty wells we’ve looked at, the well of professional success doesn’t provide the living water we need. It could be a good thing, but it doesn’t fill our hearts.

Betsy Goméz went through a process of finding this out. She grew up in church. But all the women who were admired there had gained success in careers.

Betsy: I didn’t have this caring example of a mom and home. I just grew up looking at women, that they left even their homes and family to dedicate themselves to ministry. That was my dream. I wanted to work full-time in ministry one day in my life. Then I went to college. I graduated in marketing, and I made a Master in Communications. I thought everything was okay, and I didn’t have that example or a visual model that taught me how to be a wife or a good mother. I thought that I learned everything I had to.

I got married very young with the idea that everything was going to be perfect; that I didn’t need to have a role model; that I didn’t need anybody to tell me how to be a mom or a good wife. So I think I didn’t realize I had a problem during our first years. Then I got pregnant. So when I got pregnant, I started thinking that it was going to be a big challenge for me, being a mom and also being a full-time worker.

Dannah: Even though she knew it would be challenging, Betsy hurried back to the workforce. In her community, it was just assumed that being a professional woman was a higher priority than investing in children.

Betsy: In my country we have a three-month maternity leave. But my job needed me in two months. So I had to leave my house, and I had to go to my job earlier than I was supposed to. When I did that, I thought it was okay because I needed to maintain my job and I needed to be responsible with my projects.

I was not realizing my most important project that I just released. It was my baby. I just wanted to follow the example I saw in my mom of a hard-working mom. That situation forced my husband to spend more time in my home since he had a more flexible work. He worked as a consultant. He could choose his schedule. He used to spend more time with my little boy.

Moses Gomez: I thought if I helped in my house, I helped with our marriage.

Dannah: This is Betsy’s husband, Moses. He had a God-given desire to serve his family. But he also knew that God had called him to lead his family and provide for his family as well.

Moses: We knew behind that situation, something wasn’t working okay.

Dannah: Because of her work schedule, Betsy had very little time to spend with her son.

Betsy: I had the opportunity to be with him on weekends because I got home very late at night or in the evening, and I was really tired. I was thinking about myself. I wasn’t thinking about my baby. The worst part is that I wanted everybody to think that I was a perfect mom. I used to do everything that I could to let people think that everything was okay. In my heart I started feeling like I knew something was wrong.

One day I remember, I was very late at my work, and I felt like I don’t belong here. It was like in that moment I felt that was the worst place for me to be in that moment. And I thought, “Why? If I can’t be here, where? Where?” And I thought, “Ministry. I have to be working in ministry full time.” Well, I felt like so anxious and stressed for a week. In my heart I felt like I was doing something wrong.

Dannah: Betsy’s worries increased one day when she arrived home, saw her son, reached her arms out, and watched him run away toward his dad. He treated Betsy like a stranger.

Betsy: When I got home, my son rejected me because we didn’t have the opportunity to spend time together, like to bond.

Moses: When I saw him rejecting her, than I decided to be concerned because this is not a normal situation, because everybody told us that boys prefer moms.

Dannah: Betsy got some important perspective on her situation one night when she couldn’t sleep. Moses had attended a Desiring God conference in the U.S. There, he had heard about Revive Our Hearts and told Betsy about it.

Betsy: I listened on the Internet to a message that Nancy gave at a True Woman conference, and it was called “What Is a True Woman.” When I kept on listening to what she was telling, I realized that I was so far away of what God had intended for me as a woman. I remember her telling about the responsibilities of a woman at her house, with her husband, with her children.

Nancy (conference message): "And so train the young women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled, pure, working at home, kind and submissive to their own husbands that the Word of God may not be reviled." (Titus 2:3-5)

Betsy: The thing that impacted me the most was the way she taught that it was sin, like you were sinning. When you don’t accomplish God’s design for your life, you are telling Him, “I don’t want to live according to Your design of what You intended for me.” That teaching helped me to understand that I had to live according to God’s priorities and not according to sinful ways. When I started listening to this teaching of Nancy, I felt so confronted. For the first time in my life, I could see myself as a sinner.

When you grow up in church, sometimes you think that you’re okay. Even though you have problems in your life or in your marriage, it’s okay. But for the first time in my life, I could see that I was full of pride. My life was a very sinful life. I was focused just on myself, and I was not taking care of my husband. I was not taking care of my son. That night I cried for hours because I couldn’t imagine that I was a sinner woman and my priorities were very, very mixed. They were not in the right place.

Dannah: Betsy realized that her priorities were out of order. She was a talented marketing professional, but for this season of life, she had been called to a very important role. She decided to quit her job so she could devote her energy and talent to raising the next generation.

Immediately fear set in. What would her family think? Was she wasting all the effort she spent in getting her master’s degree?

Betsy: I was convicted that my first ministry and my first responsibility in this world is to take care of my family and to be a support for my husband. When I came to the realization about quitting my job, I thought it was going to be easy. When I actually quit my job, I looked at myself and said, “Okay, what am I going to do now? How can I start?” I think God started to break so many things in my life and wrong patterns that I had learned. God started to change my heart, putting in me the desire of doing what I had to do. I never had the desire before of cleaning my house or doing the laundry by myself.

God surrounded me with a bunch of girls and friends that helped me. In the beginning I was kind of embarrassed. I didn’t want them to teach me because I wanted to figure it out myself. But then God helped me to be humble and accept. I remember one of the Revive Our Hearts radio shows I remember that Nancy was telling me, “You don’t have to be shy of asking for help.” Also, I had this great desire in my heart to teach my son the Word of God. So I asked for some materials. It’s been amazing.

Dannah: Betsy continued to learn how to embrace serving her family. She learned many practical things that she was never taught while growing up like: how to cook, or how to organize a home. But far more importantly, she was learning to have a heart for serving others. 

In this process God used a teaching series from Revive Our Hearts. Betsy went to ReviveOurHearts.com and found archives of the series, “The Counter-Cultural Woman: A Fresh Look at Proverbs 31.”  This teaching series had a big effect on Betsy.

Betsy: I think it was perfect for me because it helped me to put everything in place. That series helped me, day by day, to understand the purpose of God for me as a woman, as a wife, as a mom. I remember that she said, “If you are married, I think it would be a good idea to listen to this radio show with your husband.”

So I called my husband and I said, “Okay. We have a date. At noon we have to listen to this radio program.”

So he said, "Okay."

My husband and I listened to that radio series. It was amazing how this was impacting not just me but also my husband because he stepped up as the full provider of our house, of our home. That released me of any sense of guilt of leaving my job. So I quit my job. It was very funny because I kept on explaining to my boss the reasons I was going to quit my job, and nobody understood in my office. Like, “Betsy, you are making the worst decision in your life.”

Dannah: After quitting her marketing job and focusing on her job as a wife and mom, Betsy needed support. God brought Laura Gonzalez into her life. Laura is instrumental in translating Revive Our Hearts into Spanish and heading up the Revive Our Hearts ministry in the Dominican Republic.

Laura gave Betsy a copy of the workbook, Seeking Him. Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth and Tim Grissom wrote it to show readers how to walk through a process of personal revival. Betsy committed to going through the workbook and meeting with a small group to discuss it.

Betsy: So my husband and I went to this study together, and it was amazing. I think that it was like the best moment in years because we could see each other as we really were. And we started confessing a lot of things that we didn’t know about each other. It was perfect in that moment because it was a new start for us—being honest with ourselves and having a clean conscience. Sometimes we thought that what happened in the past was in the past. You don’t have to touch that. You just have to move on from where you are.

Being transparent and honest with each other helped us in so many ways to understand how sin was stopping us to grow, and how our relationship could grow knowing each other as the way we are. So I think that confession was primary for the revival in our home.

Honestly, there were moments I wanted to close the book, and I didn’t want to continue. But then the Holy Spirit helped us to move on and not being ashamed of our sin because that is why Christ came, to make us free of our sins. We had a lot of pride in our hearts, and we didn’t realize we had it.

Moses: Wow, Seeking Him is an amazing tool of Revive Our Hearts ministry.

Dannah: Again, this is Betsy’s husband, Moses.

Moses: I need God. I need His grace. I need to be merciful with my wife. I need to be honest with my wife. And He helped me to be clear—totally clear—crystal clear with my wife. He helped me to go back and tell her something that maybe I didn’t tell her because I thought that was in my past. The exercise to start to confess to her and to be merciful to each other has made our relationship stronger.

Betsy: This Seeking Him study helped us to see ourselves as we really were. So a revival started to happen in my house. I thank God for resources like this and ministries like this.

Dannah: As Betsy continued to experience a revival in her home, she began to look for ways to support her husband. She wanted him to do all God had called him to do. Now, Betsy enjoyed living in Santo Domingo and didn’t want to leave. But an opportunity rose for Moses to take a new step in ministry.

Betsy: Since we got married, he had dreamt to start theology and graduate. We moved to the other city. I had no help at home with the house or my son. I got pregnant. So I had the perfect opportunity to practice what God was preparing me to do. So I am right now just taking care of my son, taking care of my husband, taking care of my life, my spiritual life, my house. I think that sometimes God needs to put us in a place where we just have Him and just Him.

Dannah: Earlier, we heard how Betsy felt called to full-time ministry. She now realized that calling was being fulfilled, right where she was.

Betsy: I thought ministry was going out of my house and impacting lives out of my home. It is so great that now I can understand that in this season of my life, God is calling me into a full-time ministry to impact the lives I care for the most, my husband and my children. And honestly, in the beginning I thought I was going to be in my house sitting down with nothing to do.

But now I understand it’s not only about cleaning or washing dishes or preparing meals or giving a bath to my boy. It’s about caring, about loving, about nurturing, about teaching my son—impacting my son with the message of Jesus Christ. I know that this ministry is going to impact a lot of lives in better ways than if I go outside my house.

Dannah: Do you remember how Proverbs 31 meant so much to Betsy? Her husband sees his wife developing the qualities described in this chapter.

Moses: Verse 28 it says, “Her children rise up and call her blessed; her husband also, and he praises her.”  And I would like to say to my wife that you are a blessing for us.

Dannah: Since that interview, Moses has finished seminary and is serving as a pastor. Betsy still believes in making her home a high priority. And slowly the Lord has led her into some ministry activities outside her home. You may have heard her or seen her serving with Revive Our Hearts at a conference or on video.

As Betsy found, nothing can satisfy us except for Christ. Which takes us back, Nancy, to the theme we’ve been focusing on last week and today. 

Nancy: As we’ve been mentioning all through this series, Jesus is the only One who can quench the thirst of our hearts. That’s what the woman at the well learned, and really it’s what every follower of Jesus discovers. He’s the only one who can truly satisfy our deepest longings. 

Some months ago Revive Our Hearts received this message from a listener named Bafokeng. As you might imagine, she’s not from America. She lives in South Africa.

Well, this precious woman wrote to thank us and briefly tell us her story. She’s thirty-one years old, not married, and wondering if she ever will be. (Do you hear hints at those deep longings?) She says, 

Listening to your podcast this morning, I was teary at the thought that, with no prospects in sight, the Lord may be calling me to serve Him in singleness. . . . What made me most teary though is hearing again of missionaries who've lived with a heart on fire to serve Christ at all costs because He is their all. I keep thinking I am content in Christ, but He (in His mercy) continues to reveal layers and layers of areas in my heart where I am trusting something (or someone) else more than Him.

Nancy: Okay, I think we can all identify with Bafokeng here, can’t we? Listen to what she says next: 

I don't want marriage if it means less satisfaction in Christ. It's hard to type those words, but I pray that the Lord would make this true in all areas of my life. That it be Christ above all as I fix my eyes on eternity, and through that may He use me. May whatever else He blesses me with be a gift that further glorifies Him. Thank you for your service to women all over the world through your ministry.

Nancy: Wow! She gets it! What about you? How would you fill in this blank? “I don’t want (blank) if it means less satisfaction in Christ.”

Well, we’re able to encourage listeners like Bafokeng thanks to the faithful prayers and giving of friends like you. This Wednesday is the last day of our fiscal year. We’ll be closing the books on the last twelve months of ministry and looking ahead to the summer months and our new fiscal year.

Can we count on you for a donation here before May finishes up? We have some exciting things planned for the next year, and you’re invited to be a part! Would you consider making a donation before the month of May is over? You can head to ReviveOurHearts.com, or call us at 1-800-569-5959. 

I hope your Memorial Day today is both enjoyable and safe. Let’s remember those who have given their lives in defense of our freedom.

Tomorrow we’ll continue looking at this rich passage from John chapter 4, and how Jesus is the only real way to satisfy our thirst.

Please be back for Revive Our Hearts.

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

All Scripture is taken from the NIV84 unless otherwise noted.

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