The Bible works for those who believe it will. Every time you read a verse, and meditate on it, God will make some aspect of it come alive to you. This is why the Bible is described in Hebrews 4:12 as “living and active”. And it is!
Even in the familiar verses there are truths you have not seen yet. Jesus told His disciples, “The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life” (John 6:63).
I have found this to be the case yet again; in particular three statements made by Jesus Christ have become very real and precious. Let me set them out for you to emphasise a particular truth:
“Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled.”
“Whosoever drinketh of this water shall thirst again: But whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him
shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life”
“I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst“.
The verses are Matthew 5:6; John 4:13-14; John 6:35 (all KJV). Look them up in your Bible, read the context, read them in a modern translation. These verses thrill me because Jesus is teaching his disciples the totality of His gift of eternal life to all who believe. “Completely satisfied” is how the Amplified Bible renders Matthew 5:6. In my experience that is far more than any church I have attended has led me to believe. Usually I was told that salvation was God’s greatest gift, but once I had that then what I needed was this, or that, or the other.
Yet Jesus said that when I received righteousness I would be completely satisfied; when I came to Him I would never hunger; when I believed on Him I would never thirst! I’d rather believe Jesus than the church!
Look again at the story of the woman at the well in John 4. The contrast is obvious: the life that He was making available wouldn’t need to be “topped up” daily. He also said that without any help from me, without any daily drawing of water, there would be “a spring of water welling up (flowing, bubbling) [continually] within” (Amplified Bible); the New Living Translation renders it as “a perpetual spring”.
What is the implication of these three statements? Surely it is firstly that the gift of eternal life would totally quench my thirst and satisfy my hunger; that something received by grace does not need works to maintain it. I am completely satisfied; I will rest in that truth. Paul later revealed that God has blessed me with all spiritual blessing (Ephesians 1:3) and that just as the fulness of the Godhead dwells in Christ, so I am complete in Him (Colossians 2:10). The emphasis of my ministry for many years has been to declare to believers the magnitude of what God has done for them.
The second implication is that every day and in every way the spring within is working. Without any help from me the “perpetual spring” keeps bubbling and flowing… and never runs dry. When Jesus visited Jerusalem some time later, He boldly stood and declared: “If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.’ Now this he said about the Spirit…” (John 7:37b-39a). So this perpetual spring is the power of God resident within; it is the life of God resident within; it is the wisdom of God resident within. Paul later described it as Christ living in me (Galatians 2:20) and Christ living as me (Colossians 3:4).
To me, these are thrilling truths. God has completely satisfied the needs of my life — it is time I started to believe it. Then the Christian life will become the “rest” and “peace” that Christ promised (Matthew 11:28-30; John 14:27). Does it sound too easy? Sorry, I didn’t write the Book.
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