The Word of Distress

Sam, Good morning. Good to be with you again this morning as we continue this series entitled Last Words, the study of the seven last words of Jesus. We’re in week five of this series, and this morning we’ll be studying the fifth saying the fifth cry from the cross, which is Jesus saying, I thirst. I thirst. Two little words.

Yet in the most revealing perhaps of all the words of his humanity, of his physical suffering, these two little words, I thirst. Of all the cries from Calvary’s cross, most revealing perhaps, of his humanity, the living water thirsts. The fountain that never runs dry is poured out. He says, I thirst. All God, yet all man.

He thirsts. Are you thirsty today? Are you thirsty for something today that you’ve yet to find satisfaction? Many of us as Americans would say, well, my food and my desire for water, those are met. We have those basic human needs met.

Most of us can say that, but what about those deeper needs? Many of us think, well, if I could just own this. If I had a better house, a better car, better job, nicer clothes. And so we spend money to try to satisfy our thirst, and yet our thirst remains. The more we spend, the thirstier we are.

Others are thirsty for love and for relationship. Maybe you came from a brokenness in your home, but who knows what reason it is. You’re seeking acceptance, but there’s something. You’re just thirsting. Especially that single person this morning who thinks, if I could just be in a relationship with this man, if I could just be in a relationship with this woman, a young single man might say, then my thirst for love and relationship would be met.

And so the young person gives their body away, but settles for sexual lust instead of waiting for covenantal love. And their thirst remains.

We try. We try to get our thirst quenched, but we’re still thirsty. And Jesus said, representing all of humanity’s cry, I thirst. Jesus cried out with the constant cry of all humanity, I thirst. Yet he took on our thirst that we might be satisfied.

He poured out his life that we might be. In the Gospel of John, Jesus cries out a word of distress, reflecting the distress of his body, but also the distress of his desire for us, so that the deepest thirst of humanity might be fully satisfied in him. We can have our deepest thirst. Listen to this. Our deepest longings can be fully satisfied in Jesus.

And as we look at the text, we’re going to answer, how, how this is possible? How can we be fully satisfied in this life? The text will give us three ways that Christ fully satisfies our deepest thirst, our Deepest longing. So let’s look at the Gospel of John. Today we’re going to be looking at two verses, but focusing on two words.

John, chapter 19, verse 28. After this, Jesus, knowing that all was now finished, said to fulfill the Scripture, I thirst. A jar full of sour wine stood there. So they put a sponge full of the sour wine on a hyssop branch and held it to his mouth. This is God’s word.

Amen. Looking for three ways on how Christ fully satisfies our deepest thirst. The first way is he understands our inmost feelings. Hear this. Jesus understands how you feel.

He knows exactly how you feel. Not from a distance, but because he’s been where you are. He has felt what you feel. He says, I thirst. Two little words.

Actually, in the Greek, it’s one little word, just one word in the Greek language, I thirst. You know, the shortest verse in the Bible is Jesus wept. And the shortest cry from the cross is, I thirst. And in both of these statements, we see the humanity of Christ deeply revealed. He cries at what makes us cry.

He thirsts at what we thirst for. He feels what we feel. He understands your innermost, your inmost feelings.

Why does he thirst? Why does he thirst? Well, because he became one of us. He took on our humanity. He became like us, so that he feels the pain that we feel.

He thirsts. He grieves. He bleeds. In Philippians, it says this. Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself by taking the form of a servant.

Being born in the likeness of men and being found in human form. He humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Make no mistake, this is physical thirst expressed. This is physical pain expressed. I thirst.

He had undergone a horrific 18 hours of abuse. The last cup that he had drank from, the last nourishment that he had had to his lips, was at the Passover supper the night before when he had said to his disciples, this is the last time I’ll drink of the fruit of the vine until the kingdom of God comes. That was the last drink he had. And then they walked out of Jerusalem and up into the garden of Gethsemane, where the Mount of Olives is. And there he asked his disciples to pray for him.

And he went in and prayed. And the Bible says that as he prayed that the sweat dropped from his forehead like great drops of blood. And then the temple guards came and they arrested him and took him and they. They beat him and dragged him into interrogation that lasted all night in the home of the high priest, where the Sanhedrin gathered. And they interrogated him all night.

And they said, prophesy, which one of us hit you? And they abused him and mocked him. And then as the morning arrived, they took him to Pilate, asking Pilate to crucify him. Well, Pilate said, this is a Jewish matter. And so pilgrimage, I send him to Herod.

So Herod was visiting Jerusalem at this time because it was Passover week. And so they marched him over to Herod, and Herod mocked him and saw him and sent him back to Pilate. And then Pilate said, I find no fault in this man. But I’ll tell you what, I’ll give him 40 lashes. So he has 40 lashes.

Beaten with the Roman whip, which was called the Cat of nine tails. It had nine strips of leather, and knotted in each strip of leather with were pieces of bone and glass and metal. And the Roman soldiers had perfected the art of scourging, so that when they would beat the back of a person that as it would hit, it would peel off the flesh, exposing bone and even organs. And so he had this done to him. And then he had put over him this robe and a crown of thorns pressed down so that blood came down over his face.

And then he. He said, who do you want me to crucify? This Jesus? This one you call the Christ or Barabbas. And they chose Barabbas to set free.

And so he crucified him. And so then they made him carry his cross down the Via Dolorosa, the road leaving Jerusalem. And as he carried it towards the hill called Golgotha, the place of the skull, he collapsed from exhaustion, and someone else had to carry his cross. And now, six hours later, after he’s been spiked through the hands and through the feet, and as he’s been hanging here for six hours, he says, I thirst. Make no mistake, this was physical thirst.

I’m surprised it wasn’t some other statement. I hurt. Get me out of this. Help me. The expression was, I thirst.

Oh, from these tender lips, from our blessed Lord. He says, I thirst. This week in my community group, we were talking about the series, and I was asking them to pray for me as I prepared for this coming for today. And in my community group, we have a local orthopedic surgeon who’s a member of our church that attends in my group, his name’s Doug, Doug Friels. And I asked him, I said, you know, I’VE read some medical experts on this topic about how Jesus died.

What was the physiological thing going on here? What was it that people that were crucified, what did they die of? What were the effects of crucifixion? I said, but why did he thirst? I mean, I want to understand it from a doctor’s point of view, from an orthopedic surgeon’s point of view.

Why did he thirst? And was it the blood? It was probably all the bleeding that had happened. That’s probably it. I was thinking.

And he goes, well, it would have contributed. All the things that you’ve mentioned would have contributed. But. But I believe it was probably the way he was gasping for breath that dried his mouth out. And he said, you have to understand that crucifixion, the person dies really of suffocation because their arms begin to go out of joint and their body begins to lean forward.

And as it leans forward, it puts so much pressure across the chest that the lungs can’t draw breath. And they suffocate. They can’t. And the only way to breathe is to press down on the spike through the feet and to grab the spikes through the hands and pull up. And then the gasping would be through the mouth to try to grab breath.

And he said this would cause the lips to crack and the tongue to cleave to the roof of the mouth. And he thought, in his opinion, that perhaps he was experiencing the thirst of one who was gasping for breath through the mouth. Maybe you’ve had a bad cold. Maybe you’ve. You’ve been a runner.

I don’t imagine I would understand why you would run. But some of you enjoy running. And sometimes you gasp for breath and your mouth is dry and you can’t wait to get a drink of water to quench your thirst because your lips begin to crack. But Jesus had not had a drink for 18 hours, and he had suffered this abuse. He says, I thirst.

It’s the first expression of any physical ailment that he has made. And it’s the only expression he does make. I thirst.

Why did he say this? Because in his humanity, his body was thirsty. And what did they offer him? The Bible says they offered him sour wine, or as one translation says, vinegar wine. This drink is mentioned in the Old Testament as a refreshing drink and also in Greek and Roman literature as well.

Boaz offered it to Ruth when she came to work in his field. And he said, here, dip your bread in this sour wine. It was a common beverage appreciated by both laborers and soldiers alike. It Relieved thirst more effectively than water. And it was inexpensive.

There are no examples of its use as a hostile gesture. The thought then is not a corrosive vinegar offered as a cruel jest, but of a sour wine of the people. This is according to Dr. William Lane, who wrote on this topic. So this was the drink. The Romans, the Roman soldiers were drinking this drink at the first foot of the cross.

And so they offered this sour wine to Jesus. It would have quenched his thirst. It’s not the apple vinegar that we pour over our greens. No, this is a sour wine, probably mixed with water. It was a common person’s drink.

Why did he say yes to this when he had refused the earlier. See, there had been an earlier offer of a drink when he first arrived on Golgotha. Matthew and Mark both speak of this first offer that he refused. Matthew says, and when they came to a place called Golgotha, which means place of a skull, they offered him wine to drink mixed with gall. But when he tasted it, he would not drink it.

Mark talks about it, but instead of saying the word gall, he uses the word myrrh, he says, and they offered him wine mixed with myrrh, but he did not take it. Apparently, gall and myrrh are synonymous here. And this, this was a kind of drink that had a medicating narcotic effect on the one who would drink it again, according to Dr. Lane, he said, according to old tradition, respected women of Jerusalem provided a narcotic drink to those condemned to death in order to decrease their sensitivity to the excruciating pain. Apparently when Jesus arrived at Golgotha, he was offered wine mixed with gall or myrrh, but he refused it, choosing to endure with full consciousness the sufferings appointed unto him.

He would not take that cup. He chose to drink from the bitter cup of suffering with his eyes wide open and his full consciousness. He would not medicate the pain. He refused that drink. But then at the end, when he saw he was nearly at the finish line, he said, I thirst.

And they offered him sour wine. They offered it to him on a sponge. The scripture says a sponge, A sponge full of this wine. This is not the man made modern sponge that we see today, shaped in a perfect little square. No, these are the sponges that the Greeks were known for, the Greek divers that would dive deep into the Mediterranean Sea to harvest sponges.

And so they would have been of an irregular shape and type, and they would have been brought out and left in the sun until the sponge was dried out and it went through a process of cleaning. And this would have been the kind of sponge the Romans would have used. And I don’t know how often they used these sponges. Perhaps these sponges remained up at the hill called Golgotha. And they used them for all the executions they did.

I know there are some reports that the sponge was saved by saints and passed around. They tore off pieces. And different churches throughout the Middle Ages claimed to have pieces of this sponge. I don’t know if it was ever verified, but it was a simple sponge that the Greek divers would have brought up from the bottom. It was this sponge.

He wasn’t offered this sweet wine in a golden goblet as was deserving of a king. No. He was offered to suck on a sponge of sour wine which was deserving and was the practice of the Roman soldiers as they offered it to a criminal. He was identified with us. He was human.

And he said, I thirst. In Isaiah, it says he was despised and rejected. A man of sorrows acquainted with deepest grief. We turned our backs on him and looked the other way. He was despised and we did not care.

Yet it was our weaknesses he carried. It was our sorrows that weighed him down. Isaiah, the prophet Saul, the son of man, the son of David, the Son of God. Jesus, suffer for us in our place. Hebrews speaks of him.

It says, since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens. Jesus, the Son of God. Let us hold fast our confession, for we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us then with confidence, draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need. He understands how you feel.

You can come with confidence before the throne of grace, knowing that there’s no condition of humanity that he is not familiar with. You can come to him, to the one who understands. He said, I thirst. He identifies with our thirst. He understands our inmost feelings.

Have you suffered? He has too. Have you been betrayed? He has too. Has one turned away from you for another?

He has felt that too. Have you been in pain as he was? He has too, everything you have felt. He says, I thirst with you. But you can bring that thirst to the one who understands.

He knows how you feel. Jesus said, I thirst. And then secondly, the second way that we see how he meets our deepest needs, says he meets our real needs. He meets our real needs.

Scripture says, after this, Jesus, knowing that all was now finished. Knowing that all was now finished. See, Jesus went into this with his eyes wide open. He didn’t accidentally end up at the cross. He came to die.

He left heaven and came to earth and became a man. He came to do this for us. He came so he could say, I thirst. He came saying this. In fact, John says even the phrase I thirst was a fulfillment of Scripture that he came and that the prophets had said he would be in this condition of thirst.

Look at Psalm 69, 21. It says, for my thirst they gave me sour wine to drink. That’s the psalmist talking about that. Centuries, centuries before Christ was. Even Psalm 22, as we talked about last week, describes his thirst.

My strength is dried up like a potsherd. My tongue sticks to my jaws. He came fulfilling the prophecy that he would thirst. You see, here’s why he came. He knew that we were trying to quench our thirst, but we were trying to quench it from the wrong well.

We were putting things into our life and we were drinking up of the things of this world, but nothing would satisfy. He came and said, I thirst so that you might no longer thirst by being satisfied in Him. You see, he made you for himself. Why are you here? Why do you exist?

He made you for himself. You were designed by a Creator who loves you and lovingly made you. And he says, I want you. In a way, his thirst was now the thirst of the Divine. If the prior thirst was the thirst of the humanity that he felt thirst in his physical body, this is the thirst of the Divine One who says, I am the only one that will satisfy your thirst.

He came knowing this.

You know, when you go to the doctor, the dentist, especially the dentist, the first time you go, you’re nervous because you don’t know what they’re going to do to you. You don’t know if it’s going to hurt. And for most of us, you’re probably a little kid. First time you go to the dentist and you go in there and they’ve got all these implements and there’s a lot of machinery in there that, oh, my goodness, what are they going to do? Then they roll out this tray that’s got stuff on it.

You’re like, oh, man, that looks disturbing. And so it’s the fear of the unknown. You’re nervous about that. But then the second time you go to the dentist, you know what they’re going to do to you. You know exactly how it’s going to feel, what’s going to happen.

Jesus went to the cross knowing. Knowing this is the God of the universe now who comes to die knowing what he would endure, knowing with eyes wide open, Knowing he comes. He says, I thirst so I might quench your thirst. Philippians says, my God will supply every need of yours according to his riches in glory in Christ Jesus. He says, I’ll supply every need.

Not every greed, every need in Christ Jesus. What you need is Jesus.

You’re trying to fit all kind of things in your life, but what you need is Jesus.

Augustine said, thou hast made us for thyself, O Lord, and our hearts are restless until they find their rest in thee. Pascal, the French philosopher and mathematician, said, there’s a God shaped vacuum in the soul of every man that can only be filled by the person of Jesus Christ. You’re trying to fill that hole in your soul with all kind of things that won’t fit. Jesus says, I thirst for you so that you might be with me and know me. I made you for myself.

Hear the invitation of the Lord from the book of Isaiah. Isaiah, the prophet hears the voice of the Lord speaking through him. Perhaps this is the voice of Christ, if you will. This is certainly the voice of the Lord. Isaiah says, but I hear the voice of Jesus.

Here come everyone who thirsts. Come to the waters. He who has no money, come buy and eat. Come buy wine and milk without money and without price. Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread and your labor for that which does not satisfy?

Listen diligently to me and eat what is good and delight yourselves in rich food. Incline your ear. Come to me. Hear that your soul may live. And I will make with you an everlasting covenant.

He says, come unto me all you that are thirsty. I will quench your thirst. Come to me. Do you remember the story that John tells us in John chapter four of the Samaritan woman? The woman at the well.

Jesus led his disciples on the shortcut to north part of Israel to Galilee. Normally, Jews would stay along the Jordan and avoid the land of Samaria. But Jesus said, no, I must go that way. And he took them there. And as they approached the city of Sucar, outside the city, there’s a well there called Jacob’s well.

And he said, I’m going to pause right here and you go on in. It’s noon and we’re hungry, so go on into Sucar and get us something to eat. He paused because he had an appointment. He was there to see a woman. She comes out at midday.

You see, gathering water was women’s work in those days. And so they would come out at sunup when it was still cool in the morning, and get that water that they needed for cooking and perhaps for washing and those kinds of things. During the daylight hours they would come out talking and sharing the latest gossip and enjoying one another’s company, as is the habit of women. And then they would come again as the sun went down at the end of the day, having the water needed for that evening. But not this woman.

This woman had been married five times and she was now living with a man that was not her husband. She didn’t come out at that time of day. She came out when the sun was high overhead at the least convenient hour so she could get water when no one else was there. And then she finds this Jewish man sitting at the well. His name’s Jesus.

He says, woman, will you give me to drink? And she does. And he says, I’ve got water that’s better than any water you ever had. It’s water that doesn’t run out. And she goes, you don’t even have a bucket.

He goes, you don’t understand. You don’t need a bucket for the kind of water I have. It says in John 4:13, everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, pointing to the well, but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life. And the woman said to him, sir, give me this water so that I will not be thirsty and so I won’t have to come out here in the middle of the day to draw water anymore.

He goes on to tell her that he’s the Christ, that he’s the Son of God, that he’s the one that’s been the long awaited. For one, she goes running into Sukar. Normally she would sneak in and sneak out, but she even left her bucket. I believe she dropped her bucket and ran into the city. She said, come see the man who told me everything I’ve ever done.

Could this be the Christ? And the whole city comes out, and that city believed in Jesus. They came to the well and they were thirsty no more. Yet many of us go to the wrong well.

We’re trying to drink from the wrong well, and we just have to keep going there because it just makes us thirsty for more. And the more we try, the thirstier we are. And we try every kind of thing to fill that hole in our soul. But Jesus says, I thirst so you don’t have to thirst anymore. He’s the only one that will quench that thirst from your soul.

Why? Because he made you for him. You belong to him. There’s no other that will feel that thirst. No relationship with a man, no relationship with a woman.

I’m with filled marriage. But it’s a picture of what Jesus wants to have with you. He wants to be at one with you. You and him and him and you. He made you for himself.

Quit trying to find substitutes if you have him. It makes your marriage perfect, by the way. It just perfects it. He perfects all your friendships with men and women and people in the church. But get that one right, thirst for that one and find it met in Jesus.

Stop drinking from the wrong well. Pray as David prayed in His Psalm. Psalm 42. He says, as a deer pants for flowing streams, so pants my soul for you, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God.

This is David praying. And then the Son of David comes along. He says, you don’t have to thirst anymore. You don’t have to thirst anymore. Believe in me and you’ll have living water that’ll rush up inside of you like a fountain.

You’ll no longer thirst. He meets all our real needs, not the ones we think we need, but our real needs, our deepest needs. So he knows how we feel and he meets our real needs. And the third way that Jesus fully satisfies is he offers our only propitiation. Pastor, you used a big word there.

It’s a theological word, isn’t it? Yes, it is. You need to know it. That’s why I’m using it. Stretch a little.

It’ll be good for you. It’s in the Bible, this word. So it’s important you’ll say. Well, it’s not in the text. 28, 29.

The verses you just read. I don’t see propitiation. You’re right. That word’s not in today’s text. But it’s surely written on the cross in Christ’s blood.

Propitiation. What does it mean? It means satisfaction. Satisfaction. It satisfies God’s thirst for justice and holiness.

It satisfies God’s thirst for being reconciled to us. It satisfies both God’s justice and God’s love at the same time. Propitiation. We see it at the cross, where God’s holiness, God’s justice and God’s love meet in the person of Jesus.

The dictionary says the word propitiation carries the basic idea of appeasement or satisfaction. Specifically towards God. Propitiation is a two part act that involves appeasing the wrath of an offended person and being reconciled to that same person.

Both are happening here.

Your thirst is being satisfied, but so is God’s thirst for justice and love. That’s the word, propitiation. Now you know what it means. It means satisfaction, it means appeasement, it means reconciliation. He says all is now finished to fulfill the scripture.

What kind of scripture is he talking about now? Well, now he’s talking about propitiation. How he came to be the propitiation for our sins. You know, he knew what that was going to taste like, knowing he knew what it was going to taste like. That’s why when he was praying in the garden of Gethsemane, he talked about the cup, it’s a bitter cup.

He said, lord, disciples, y’ all pray for me. And he goes in and it says, he prayed so that sweat dropped like drops of blood from his forehead. And he said, lord, if there’s any way for this cup to pass from me, is there any way, but not my will yours be done? Remember that prayer Garden of Gethsemane? He drank that cup.

He drank it to the bottom. That’s what’s happening right now. Jesus, knowing that all is now finished, he’s drunk it all the way down until he’s drunk the dregs of it. Now some of us, we’ve got these modern coffee makers today, we don’t know what dregs are.

That’s when those coffee grains are down there at the bottom. You drink that and you go, and that’s not that good. That’s the dregs down there. If you ever go to the Middle east and they offer you coffee, get ready, it comes out in a little bitty cup, little bitty cup. And it’s up to the top, it’s got kind of a foam on the top.

And don’t ask for no cream and sugar. They’ll be offended. It’s just, it’s ready to go, they say, and you drink and you drink it. What you don’t realize if they’ve cooked the coffee inside the water, there’s no filtering going on. And they just wait for the coffee grains to settle to the bottom.

And it’s leaves, it’s about, I don’t know, quarter of an inch deep of coffee grains that have, they’re more like syrup. They’ve been cooked so hot. And you sip that and you could put a spoon in this coffee, the spoon will stand up. And when you drink it you’ll stand up. And this is some coffee now.

And it’s got a little bit of a bitterness to it, but it’s good. But if you drink it all the way to the bottom, whoa, the dregs will hit you. Jesus said, is there any way this cup could pass from me? He’s talking about the cross. He’s talking about the beating.

He’s talking about the mocking, the scourging. He’s talking about the whole thing. And he goes, not my will, but yours be done. He has bottomed. He has drunk this all the way.

He goes, it’s finished. And then he says, I thirst, man. He’s getting ready to run a victory lap next two Sundays. Don’t miss it because he doesn’t express any more pain. Next two Sundays, man.

He’s already. He knows I need to clear my throat so I can say the next two things I’m getting ready to say. He took that last drink so that he could say some stuff loud, so he could declare victory. He’s almost, he says, knowing that it’s all now finished and to fulfill the Scripture. He says, I thirst.

He’d already drunk that cup.

He’d fulfilled his job of drinking the cup of suffering.

The sour wine must have tasted sweet compared to the bitter cup he’d already swallowed. He drank that cup that actually belonged to us. That bitter cup belonged to me. That bitter cup belonged to you. That suffering that was my suffering.

He drank. The book of Revelation speaks of a bitter cup for those who reject Christ and follow the Antichrist. Instead, they follow the beast. They take the mark of the beast. Revelation 14 speaks of a cup that they would drink the wine of God’s wrath, poured full strength into the cup of Zenger and be tormented.

Jesus drank that cup. So you don’t have to. So I don’t have to drink that cup. He drank the cup.

Then there’s this detail, interesting detail. We’ve already talked about the sponge full of wine that he had up to his mouth. And he got some liquid out of it so he could speak. But it was lifted. The sponge was lifted.

Did you catch it? It was lifted on a hyssop branch hyssop. Branch hyssop. You see this? It grows wild in the Mediterranean.

It has this bushy top that when it’s dried, it’s got an absorbent characteristic. It was well familiar to the Jews. The hyssop plant just grew in the wild all over.

It grew in the wild all over the Middle East. And so the hyssop branch was used by Jews in ritual sprinkling throughout temple worship. The first mention of it is in Exodus, chapter 12, where Moses called all the elders of Israel and said to them, go and select lambs for yourselves according to your clans, and kill the Passover lamb. Take a bunch of hyssop and dip it in the blood that is in the basin, and touch the lintel and the two doorposts with the blood that is in the basin. None of you shall go out of the door of his house until the morning, for the Lord will pass through to strike the Egyptians.

And when he sees the blood on the lintel and on the two doorposts, the Lord will pass over the door and will not allow the destroyer to enter your houses to strike you. This is the first Passover. He says, take hyssop and dip it into the blood and paint it on the doors so the angel of death will pass over your house. Now here it is Passover week. On the night before the Sabbath.

On the day before the Sabbath, when the Passover lamb would be offered. And the true Passover lamb, the true Lamb of God, is offered sour wine on a hyssop branch. He’s the real lamb. He’s the one that makes all those Passover lambs good. They’re all like checks written on a future deposit.

He’s the deposit that made it all true. Do you see him? He says, I thirst. I thirst to finish this race for you. I thirst to be the Lamb of God that all those little lambs and centuries past pointed towards.

He’s the fulfillment. And so we see the hyssop lifting the wine to his mouth.

He thirsted for this moment. In Luke, it says, and when the hour had came, this is at the Passover meal. The day before he was crucified, he reclined at table, and the apostles with him. And he said to them, I have earnestly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer. Literally in the Greek, I have desired that I have desired.

I have thirsted and desired to get this done.

He came for this purpose.

He says, I tell you, Luke, chapter 22. Again, I will not drink of the fruit of the vine until the kingdom of God comes. And he took bread, and when he had given it, given thanks, he broke it and gave it to them, saying, this is my body which was given for you. Do this in remembrance of me. And likewise the cup, after they had eaten, saying, this cup is poured out for you, is now the new covenant in my blood.

He. He desired to do this for us. And so he did. Hebrews says, therefore he had to be made like his brothers in every respect so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God to make propitiation for the sins of the people. Propitiation, satisfaction of God’s love and God’s justice for our sins.

Because He Himself has suffered when tempted, he’s able to help those who are being tempted. He is our propitiation. He satisfies God. When God looks at you, if you’ve received Jesus as your propitiation, as the satisfaction, then he says, I count you worthy. I count your sins paid for.

He no longer has any condemnation towards you. He is our propitiation. John says in this is love. Not that we have loved God, but that he loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. He has satisfied God’s thirst for righteousness and love towards us so that we might have our thirst satisfied in Him.

Christ willingly died in your place. He is the propitiation for our sins. He said, I thirst because he earnestly desired to save you from your thirst. Will you receive Him? Will you recognize this?

He knows how you feel. No matter what you’re going through right now, you’re coming to a God. You’re coming to Christ knowing He understands. You don’t have to explain it to Him. He understands you.

No one else understands you like he does. And he knows what you need. You might think you need this or that. Better to say, give me what I need, Lord. Take away my desires for things I don’t need.

I want to just need what you say I need because you made me. And then he satisfied the Father’s need too. Can you imagine? I don’t think the Father really needs anything. But he desires us.

He wants us. He’s not willing that any should perish. He wants you. God wants you. God loves you.

He sent Jesus as a propitiation. The living fountain said, I thirst that our thirst might be quenched. The King of Glory drinks sour wine from a sponge, that we might sit at the banquet table of the King and drink from golden goblets while walking on golden streets, entering through pearly gates. He became us so that we might be with Him. He said, I thirst that we might have our thirst quenched.

Let’s pray.

Lord, thank youk, Jesus. Thank youk.

I pray for the One that’s here today. And you came in far from God, but you hear him speaking to you now. He understands you. That’s that stirring you’re having right now that you can’t explain that. That wooing is him.

He desires you. He wants you. He made you. He died for you. Would you come to him right now, right where you are?

You can pray with me. What matters is not so much the words as it is what you believe in your heart. Would you pray? God, thank you for Jesus. Thank you that he died on the cross for me.

That he rose from the grave, that he lives today. I believe that I ask him now to come into my life and forgive me of my sin. I repent of them. I turn away from them and I turn to Jesus. I want him to quench the thirst of my soul.

I want to be a Christ follower. If you’re praying that prayer right now, believing in your heart that God raised him from the dead, saying with your mouth that he’s the Lord, then he says, I’ll save you. He came for you. This is why he came. Others are here and you know this.

You know what Christ has done for you. You’ve received it. But would you be reminded today and repent of those things that you’ve been thirsting for that are not of Him. Stop drinking from the wrong well, friend. Repent right now from that relationship that you know is not right.

From that which you’re seeking and thinking about and desiring. Lord, we repent of those desires that are not for you and from you. Lord, we want to drink from the well that is Jesus. Oh, we pray all this in his name because he’s worthy. It’s in Christ’s name we pray.

Amen.