When Your Soul is Restless

[00:00:03] Welcome to the Pursuing Faith podcast, where we explore questions of faith, doubt, and life. I am your host, Dominic Done. Okay, out of curiosity, how many of you were here last week? Okay, most of you.

[00:00:25] We saw there in John 3, Jesus is having this conversation with a guy named Nicodemus. Here in John 4, Jesus is having another conversation. This time it's with a Samaritan woman. And you're gonna see really quickly that everything is different.

[00:00:40] John 3, Nicodemus, he was in a totally different place than this woman here in John 4. He was a godly guy. He knew scripture. And yet this woman had all kinds of sin issues and baggage. He was well-respected in his community. She was despised and pushed to the margins.

[00:01:00] I mean, everything about their life and story was radically different. But what I love about Jesus is that Jesus took time to be with her, to have a conversation with her. And we're gonna see today just the simple power of a conversation. What that can do.

[00:01:17] Just taking the time to be with someone and to share your heart. How walls begin to come down. So hopefully you're there already. John 4, let's dive in together. It says, now Jesus learned that the Pharisees had heard that he was gaining and baptizing more disciples than John.

[00:01:33] Although in fact it was not Jesus who baptized but his disciples. So he left Judea and went back once more to Galilee. Now notice verse 4, he had to go through Samaria. So he came to a town in Samaria called Sychar.

[00:01:47] Near the plot of ground Jacob had given to his son Joseph. And Jacob's well was there. And Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, sat down by the well. And it was about noon. Now to give you a sense of what's happening here geographically.

[00:02:01] I wanna draw your attention to this map. And if you have a Bible, maybe in the back of your Bible you have a map that's similar to this. But I want you to notice a few things. First, in the south you have Judea.

[00:02:12] Judea is where the capital city Jerusalem is. It's pretty dry and barren, desert-y in that area. And then if you look to the right you see the Dead Sea. Then you see Qumran and then Bethany beyond Jordan. That's where John the Baptist was baptizing people.

[00:02:29] And then notice up north you have Galilee. Now Galilee is where Jesus spent the majority of his ministry. Teaching and preaching and opening up scriptures and sharing his heart. It's where, of course, he taught the famous Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 5-7.

[00:02:46] The Sea of Galilee is there. He walked on water and calmed the storm. It's a beautiful area. Which by the way, if you ever get a chance to go to Israel, it really makes the Bible come alive. Like from 2D to 3D.

[00:02:59] And this part of Israel is my favorite. Just absolutely gorgeous. Rolling hills and lakes and rivers. But then notice in the middle you have this place called Samaria. Now there was huge tensions between the Jewish people who lived in Judea and Galilee and those who lived in Samaria.

[00:03:18] They were called the Samaritans. And they hated each other. Why? Well, to give you a little bit of the history and the context and the background. If you're taking notes, you can jot some of this down if you want.

[00:03:29] But the story goes back to the 10th century BC. And you can read about it in 1 Kings 12. And what you see there is the ten northern tribes of Israel. They broke away from the two southern tribes. Why? Because of taxes.

[00:03:44] They felt that they were being taxed too high. Which is how all great revolutions begin, right? So they break off. They go to the north. And then what happens in 722 BC, the Assyrians, they come down and they invade the ten northern tribes of Israel.

[00:04:01] They took thousands of Jewish people back to Assyria. And those who were left behind were left in poverty. And many of them intermarried with the Assyrians. And so the byproduct of those marriages were, well, the Samaritans. And the Samaritans couldn't stand the Jewish people.

[00:04:24] And the Jewish people hated the Samaritans. In fact, it was so bad that in the 4th century BC, the Samaritans actually started their own version of Judaism. They're like, you know what? We don't need you guys in the south. We'll build our own temple.

[00:04:38] And so they did at a place called Mount Gerizim. They made their own priesthood and stories to go along with it. And the Jews, especially those in the south, they saw them as traitors, as enemies, as apostate. And they said, you know what?

[00:04:52] We're not going to have anything to do with you. They refused to even talk to Samaritans. In fact, the only time that Jewish people used the word Samaritan was as a curse word. It was a four-letter word. One rabbi in the 1st century, he said this,

[00:05:09] let no man eat of the bread of the Samaritans for he who eats their bread is as he who eats the flesh of pigs. So BLTs are out. Point being, they did not get along. And they did everything in their power to stay out of each other's way.

[00:05:25] How so? Well, let's say a Jewish person wanted to go north to Galilee. The logical way was to go right through Samaria. But because they hated the Samaritans so much, they would go clear around Samaria, even close to Jordan or into Jordan.

[00:05:40] And it took a couple days extra just to do that. But it shows us the level of their hatred. It's like if you're going up to Seattle, I-5 is the quickest way. Now, you can take 84 and go through the gorge and then head north.

[00:05:52] It will take you much longer. You'll get some good photos, but it doesn't make any sense. So why would they do this? And it shows us just the depth of this racial tension, how much they hated each other.

[00:06:05] And it was just expected by Samaritans and by those who were Jewish that you just don't interact with these people. What I love about Jesus is he didn't play by the rules. Jesus didn't discriminate against the outsider. Jesus said, okay, there's a people who are despised.

[00:06:22] Those are the people I want to be with. And he carves a path right into the heart of Samaria. He sits down by a well, and then he has a conversation. Check this out, verse 7. It says, when a Samaritan woman came to draw water,

[00:06:35] Jesus said to her, will you give me a drink? His disciples had gone into the town to buy food. And the Samaritan woman said to him, you're a Jew, and I'm a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink? For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.

[00:06:52] And Jesus answered her, if you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water. So Jesus goes into the heart of Samaria,

[00:07:03] and he finds this well in a city called Askar. Now, here's another interesting fact. You can visit Askar today. Here's a picture of it. It's in the West Bank. It's not necessarily the safest place to go, but you can go.

[00:07:17] And here's a picture of part of the city, and I want you to notice that there's a church there. It's an Orthodox church, and this Orthodox church was built over the site where historians and archaeologists believed that Jacob's well was. So the very place where Jesus went,

[00:07:33] here's a picture on the inside. Again, you can go see this for yourself. They say this is the spot. It's a very distinctive kind of well that's carved into rock, and they say this is the actual site where Jesus had this conversation with the woman at the well.

[00:07:47] Now, keep in mind when Jesus was there, there wasn't a church there. This story doesn't take place inside a church. It's outside. It's hot. It's dusty. Jesus is tired. He had taken this long journey up from Judea in the south, going into Samaria,

[00:08:06] and while he's there, it says a Samaritan woman came out from the village to draw water. Now, this was actually unusual. Historians tell us that in that culture, women would draw water first thing in the morning. It's a lot cooler then.

[00:08:20] They don't have to contend with the dust and the heat and the flies, and they'd also do it together. This is something they do for protection, but also a time just to interact and to be together. So this is very unusual.

[00:08:33] You have a woman who is out there alone, and she's there midday. So something's telling us like she wasn't welcome with the other women who were a part of this village. We'll see why in a few minutes. And Jesus, he strikes up this conversation with her,

[00:08:49] and he's like, hey, can I have something to drink? And she's shocked. She's like, you're a Jew. Why would you talk to me? And not only that, you're a Jewish man. Now, in the first century, this is where we get into another level of discrimination.

[00:09:04] Men and women, for the most part, didn't really socialize publicly. There was a lot of walls, a lot of sexism, a lot of discrimination. And yet again, Jesus doesn't play by the rules. Jesus believed that the gospel wasn't just for a select few,

[00:09:22] but it was for the world. He believed that all people, male, female, Jew, Gentile, rich, poor, urban, suburban, like all people are welcomed in. All people have a seat at the table. And one of my favorite passages is Ephesians 2. It says, for he himself is our peace,

[00:09:41] who has made the two groups one, and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility. And his purpose was to create in himself one new humanity. That's the church, that's us, where it's no longer about labels or race or gender or whatever.

[00:09:58] One new humanity, it's the church. We're united in the gospel, thus making peace. There's so much in this. But notice the phrase hostility. He's destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility. The word hostility in the Greek language is literally the word hate.

[00:10:18] In other words, all the hate that we see in the world right now, whether it's racial tension, whether it's political tension, whether it's war or injustice, fill in the blank. All the hate that's in the world right now has been overcome by radical grace.

[00:10:38] We get to embody a new and living way where it's not just about divisions and barriers, who's in and who's out, but we're united, we're brought together because of the blood of Jesus. What's the answer to racial tension? What's the answer to hostility between nations? What's the answer?

[00:10:59] It's the gospel. It's Jesus and him crucified. We preach the gospel, we stand on the rock of the gospel. That's what causes us to be united and for those walls to come down. You know what I love about our church

[00:11:12] is that is the heartbeat of so many of you. So many of you have a passion for this. We believe that we're to be a church and a people who receive the gospel, yes, but then we act on it, that we join God in his mission

[00:11:27] to renew and restore all things. And this is the heart of Jesus, that Jesus, he goes right into Samaria. He goes to the place where no one else wanted to go. It would've been so easy for him to just stay in a place of comfort and security,

[00:11:42] but he doesn't. He says, where are those broken places and how can I be a part of this and how can I bring the gospel and how can I love people? So Jesus, he strikes up this conversation and notice her response. It's classic. Verse 11, sir, the woman replied,

[00:12:00] you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water? Are you greater than our father Jacob who gave us the well and drank from it himself? As did also his sons and his livestock?

[00:12:15] And Jesus answered, everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, this is the verse by the way, if you like to underline stuff, this is the one to underline.

[00:12:28] Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life. And the woman said to him, sir, give me this water so that I won't get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water.

[00:12:41] And he told her, go call your husband and come back. I have no husband, she replied. Jesus said to her, you're right when you said you have no husband. The fact is you have had five husbands and the rabbi or the man you now have

[00:12:57] is not your husband. What you have said is quite true. I just love this. Go get your husband, I don't have one. You've had five and you're sleeping with a guy now, but technically you're correct, you don't have one.

[00:13:10] Sir, the woman said, I can see that you are a prophet, which is what you say when the conversation gets awkward and you want to change the subject, right? You're a prophet, flattery. Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place

[00:13:25] where we must worship is in Jerusalem. So this gets into some of the background, the tension between the Jews and the Samaritans, how they started basically their own religion. Woman, Jesus replied, believe me, the time is coming when you'll worship the Father

[00:13:38] neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. You Samaritans worship what you do not know, we worship what we do know for salvation is from the Jews. Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the spirit and in truth

[00:13:52] for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit and his worshipers must worship in the spirit and in truth. And the woman said, I know that Messiah called Christ is coming and when he comes, he will explain everything to us.

[00:14:08] Check this out, he drops a bomb right here. Jesus declared, I the one speaking to you, I am he. It's ego ami in the Greek. It's the same exact phrase that God said to Moses at the burning bush, who shall I say sent me?

[00:14:22] And God said, I am that I am. It's a statement of deity. And here Jesus uses that same phrase. He says, I am, I am God, I am the Messiah. I am the Messiah. Now listen, because Jesus spent time with this woman,

[00:14:37] because he listened to the voice of the oppressed and the marginalized, because he asked her questions. In the process of that, he's able to uncover the root of her brokenness. And what was that? She was thirsty for God, but had been trying to satisfy that thirst

[00:14:55] with other things. In her case, it was relationships. So she thought she could find her identity and her security and her happiness in men. So she bounces around from relationship to relationship, thinking, oh, if only I can date that guy. If only I could be with him.

[00:15:13] But those relationships, they weren't satisfying her. And Jesus says, if you drink of these waters, you're gonna thirst again. But if you drink of the water that I give you, you will never thirst. And again, she's thinking hyper-literally. Just remember Nicodemus. Jesus said, you must be born again.

[00:15:29] And he's like, how can I get back inside my mother's womb? That's kind of weird. She's kind of thinking the same literal way. Okay, where is this water? Do you have a secret stash somewhere? Is there another well? That sounds amazing.

[00:15:41] But Jesus here isn't talking about H2O. He's talking about living water. Let me hear you say living water. Living water. This is one of the most important phrases, I think, in this passage. And it's one actually that has its roots in the Old Testament. Here's one example.

[00:15:57] Jeremiah chapter two. This is worth writing down. Jeremiah chapter two. God says, my people have committed two sins. They have forsaken me the spring of, here it is, living water. And they have dug their own cisterns. What's a cistern? Basically, it was a stone or wood reservoir

[00:16:16] that they would carve out and it became something to hold their water. So you've forsaken me the spring of water. You've dug your own cisterns, broken cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot hold water. Now, the phrase living water in the Hebrew, which is the language of the Old Testament,

[00:16:35] is the phrase maim kaim. Let me hear you say maim kaim. Maim kaim. And the Hebrews, they use this phrase to describe not the kind of water that you would get from a tap or a bottle or from a store. Maim kaim was used specifically

[00:16:53] to describe fresh water, water that bubbles up from a brook or water that comes down from the heavens in rain. It's fresh. It hasn't been tainted. It hasn't been polluted. And they would use this phrase, maim kaim, to describe what happens when you encounter the presence of God.

[00:17:15] It's rich. It's authentic. It refreshes you. It heals you. It's like coming to a fresh source of water on a dry, dusty, thirsty day. Maim kaim was a phrase they used to describe an encounter with God that was so vivid and real and rich.

[00:17:37] It was like you're standing on the liquid edge of heaven meets earth. God is there. You would say maim kaim. Maybe you've experienced this too. A time at home maybe when you open up the scriptures and it's like the word just leaps off the page

[00:17:54] right into your heart. The Hebrews would say, ah, that's maim kaim. Or a time of prayer and you're there in your room or you're on your knees and you're pouring out your heart to God and it's like God just shows up in the room

[00:18:08] and maybe it brings you to tears. The Hebrews would say, that is maim kaim. Or it's that moment when for years you had run from God and you've been trying to find your satisfaction in other things and for the first time you open up your heart

[00:18:23] and you give your life to Jesus and he comes into your life and it's so different. It's so transformative. It's so beautiful. You don't have words to describe that moment when the God of the universe begins to take control of your life. That is maim kaim.

[00:18:40] You're stuck in traffic and everyone else is grumpy but you have worship on and as you're singing you just sense God's presence. Maim kaim. Maim kaim. Living water. And when you drink of the water that God offers, not the water of this world but you find your satisfaction,

[00:18:58] your rootedness, your identity in this God, there's nothing more liberating and life-giving and refreshing than that. You drink of these waters, you'll thirst again but Jesus says, you drink of the water that I offer, you will never thirst. But God says, notice, this is important. He says,

[00:19:18] instead of looking to me for your satisfaction, you've made your own cisterns. You've carved out places in your life that you hope will bring you joy but the problem is they're broken. You know that phrase, I can't hold water? This is where it comes from.

[00:19:31] That that area in your life you're looking to, you're hoping will satisfy you and fulfill the gnawing restlessness of your soul. God says, uh-uh, it's not gonna do it because you fill that well up, it's a broken cistern and by the morning, it's dry.

[00:19:48] The things you hope will satisfy apart from God cannot and will not. Think of all the ways that we do this in our own life. Whether it's sex or romance or money or power or fame, a hobby, even ministry. If you pursue those things thinking, okay,

[00:20:04] if only I could get that or date her or land that job or get that raise or buy that house or earn that degree, then I'll be satisfied and you pour all that effort and energy and focus into it hoping that it will bring you

[00:20:19] to this place of, oh, I'm content now. But what you'll find is if that is your priority, it's only gonna leave you more thirsty than ever before. So this afternoon, the Rams will beat the Patriots. It's gonna be amazing to see. Oh, ha ha ha ha.

[00:20:39] The official, yeah, go Brandon. Yeah, do you guys know that? Brendan Cooks goes to West Side. He's playing on the Rams, so go Rams. They'll win. Here's the official prophecy. By three, they're gonna win by three. It'll be a close game, but they're gonna win by three.

[00:20:52] You're like, Dom, I thought this was a non-profit organization. So now we'll see this afternoon in this epic match not only the Rams win, but we're also gonna see one of the greatest quarterbacks, right, of all time, Tom Brady. Like legend, unbelievable what he's done

[00:21:10] and what he's accomplished and just how ridiculously good he is and he's old too, which gives me comfort. How old, he's like what? Like 40, 40 what? 42? Oh my gosh, crazy. And he's like at the Super Bowl, amazing. So that gives those of you who are over 40,

[00:21:27] there is hope still. Ha ha ha. I saw this interview with Tom Brady. Maybe some of you saw it. It was actually a few years ago. Steve Croft was the guy interviewing him and was just asking questions about his life and his trajectory and in this conversation,

[00:21:43] Tom begins to open up and he starts to share a little bit about his own story and then at one point in the interview, and this really captured my attention, he began to share about just meaning and kind of his quest for fulfillment

[00:21:57] and I'll just read to you what Tom said. He said, why do I have all these Super Bowl rings and still think that there is something greater out there for me? I mean, maybe a lot of people would think, hey man, this is what it is.

[00:22:12] I've reached my goal, my dream, my life but for me, I think, God, it's got to be more than this. This can't be all it's cracked up to be. Then Steve Croft asked him, he said, well, what's the answer? And Tom Brady said, I wish I knew. Interesting.

[00:22:34] Even though Tom, I mean, he has everything that people would say you need for happiness. And then he says, I have all that and there's something missing. There's an ache in my heart. There's a restlessness that's there. Almost nothing that our culture says will give us satisfaction

[00:22:52] actually will. Postmodern philosophers, they have a term for this. It's called, they call it hyperreality. It's an interesting phrase and there's a whole like field of research that goes into this but essentially, hyperreality, the way they use it is they say, we live in a world of symbols.

[00:23:10] Everything's visual and this is especially true in an image-driven culture such as our own. But the problem is, the reason why it's called hyperreality is because the symbols appear more attractive than the reality that they're representing. Now, we see this all the time. Hyperreality is everywhere.

[00:23:31] Think for example of those dating apps. I'm so glad I met my wife before dating apps were a thing. I was talking to someone recently about this and you know, on those dating apps, you'll set up your profile image and it'll match you with someone

[00:23:45] who they think you'll like or whatever and what so often happens is you go to meet that person, nine times out of 10, they look nothing like their profile image. You were hoping for Thor. Instead, what you see is Mr. Bean. Right? It's hyperreality. Where the reality

[00:24:09] isn't truly a representation of the image. Or, think for example of those beer commercials that we'll be inundated with this afternoon. And notice in those beer commercials, most of the time, everyone's like happy and young and playing volleyball and perfect bodies and perfect abs.

[00:24:28] But what's so amazing and ironic is that the reason they got into that commercial and have those perfect abs is because they don't drink. Right? What is it? It's hyperreality. That the vision, the visual is not an accurate representation of the reality or think pornography.

[00:24:46] Think of how pornography entices people with its alluring promise of satisfaction that only leaves the consumer more frustrated and discontent. Hyperreality. Philip Yancey's one of my favorite authors. In his book, Rumors of Another World, he said a society that denies the supernatural usually ends up elevating the natural

[00:25:06] to supernatural status. Annie Diller tells of experiments in which entomologists entice male butterflies. This is interesting. They entice male butterflies with a painted cardboard replica larger and more enticing than the females of their species. Excited, the male butterfly mounts the piece of cardboard again and again he mounts.

[00:25:30] Nearby, the real living female butterfly opens and closes her wings in vain. Man, that just nails where we're at as a culture. I think it describes men too but that's another conversation. We're surrounded by cardboard butterflies. It's everywhere. It's everywhere. We're gonna see it this afternoon.

[00:25:53] Alluring advertisements that fuel our discontent. Perfectly curated social media posts. Temptations, distractions, materialism, consumerism. Things that promise satisfaction and you go after it, I promise you. You go after it hoping that it's gonna satisfy the longing and ache and need of your soul

[00:26:16] and what you will find is it won't deliver. It's hyperreality, it's fake, it's a broken cistern. And Jesus into this plastic, superficial, cardboard butterfly world, he stands up and he says you drink of these waters, you're gonna thirst again.

[00:26:42] But if you drink of the waters that I give you will never thirst because West Side Family the only thing that can satisfy the need and the ache of your soul is God. And notice here that Jesus doesn't condemn this woman for having desire.

[00:27:01] This is so important because I think we can get this wrong sometimes. Desire is good. Desire for food or sex or opportunity, success. That's a good desire to have. But here's the problem. It's when we look to those things to do what only God can do.

[00:27:21] We put all of our effort and energy and focus on that or him or her or some goal or some dream and that becomes our idol and we go after that and it will turn into a broken cistern. Tim Keller, he said this.

[00:27:37] He said if we look to some created thing to give us the meaning and hope and happiness that only God can give it will eventually fail to deliver and will break our hearts. I know that so many of you, you know this because you've experienced this.

[00:27:50] You've gone down that path. Jesus doesn't condemn her for having desire because the problem isn't desire. It's disordered desire. But here's the thing. When God becomes the desire of your heart. When God becomes your first love. When God becomes the thing that you're passionate about

[00:28:13] and pursuing and chasing after it's then that all the other desires of your life fall into place. And here's the catch and this is so beautiful. When God is first, your desires don't become less fulfilling. They actually become more fulfilling. This is what the world doesn't understand

[00:28:34] about Christianity because there's a stereotype that you guys are just uptight and boring and you're suppressing all your desires. No, you've got it wrong. The thing is you pursue desire. You worship desire. It's a broken cistern. But you go to the well of living water,

[00:28:48] find your satisfaction in God. Then all the other desires in their rightful place are the most beautiful, satisfying thing imaginable. And this is why, in fact I was reading just a couple days ago. Did you know they did a whole study on this,

[00:29:01] recent article and it was all about like sexual satisfaction. And they said the highest demographic of people in our nation who have the highest satisfaction in their sex life. Guess who it is? It's Christians. Check this out. 84% of people who attend church

[00:29:21] on a regular basis said that they were extremely satisfied with their sex life. 84%. So here's the takeaway. You want a better sex life, we'll see you next week here at West Side. You're like, honey, we're committed. We're going to church. It's a value. Now why is that?

[00:29:48] This actually taps into something that is so important. It's when God is first, when your soul is drinking from him. When he is the one who is your ultimate satisfaction. What it does is you're no longer putting all this pressure on other things, expecting that to satisfy you.

[00:30:04] Or him or her or that relationship or your spouse or whatever. All of a sudden because your ultimate satisfaction is God, then it takes the pressure away. Everyone can breathe. You can relax. You can enjoy, desire for what it is. This is why Jesus said in Matthew,

[00:30:25] seek first the kingdom and his righteousness and all these things will be given to you as well. So I'm going to invite the worship team to come up right now. And I just want to ask a simple question. Are there any broken cisterns in your life?

[00:30:43] You know many times, in fact almost every time I've heard this sermon preached before, I've heard it taught from the perspective of, okay you drink of these waters, you will thirst again. And it's always like big picture. Like you drink of the well of pornography, you'll thirst again.

[00:30:59] You drink of the well of adultery, you'll thirst again. If you drink of drunkenness, you'll thirst again. Yeah that's true. Obviously it's not going to satisfy you. But what really hit me this week is, I don't think Jesus is simply talking about all that big stuff.

[00:31:15] I think he's talking about things that maybe have gotten in the way of our relationship with him. Do you know that a broken cistern, it can be a good thing. It can be something that in its place is beautiful even. But when your focus is on that,

[00:31:34] it leaves you more empty. And I tell you what, this is something God's been speaking to me on because it's easy for me to make ministry a broken cistern. Where I'm focused on it and I'm preparing stuff and meeting with people and decisions,

[00:31:47] like all this stuff that's happening, I love it and I'm passionate about it. But where the Lord has to speak to my heart over and over again is look, that's not why you do what you do. Dom, you need to find your source in me,

[00:32:01] your satisfaction in me. You need to love me. You need to pursue me. And if I drink of him, the ministry becomes beautiful. But if I'm focused on the ministry, it's a broken cistern and I wonder why I'm tired and exhausted and discouraged.

[00:32:16] And this is true for any area of our life. Is there something this last week, this last month, this last year even, and it's just for whatever reason, it's been your priority, it's been your focus. And today you're like, man, there's like Tom Brady said,

[00:32:35] I know there's more. I've been so fixated on my career, been all about this relationship. I'm doing all this stuff, mission even, but my focus and priority hasn't been God. I think today the Lord is just bringing some of us back to our first love.

[00:32:53] I think he's saying to some of us, you need to drink of me. You need to love me. You need to spend time with me. And I will do that which no one else can do. And you will find your fulfillment

[00:33:08] and your satisfaction when you come to the waters. Isaiah 55 says, all who are thirsty, come. Drink freely without cost and your soul will find its rest. We hope you enjoyed this episode of The Pursuing Faith. If this ministry has encouraged you in some way,

[00:33:33] would you consider leaving a review on iTunes or your favorite podcasting platform? That would help a ton in getting the word out. Also, if you want to partner with us or see what we're up to, check out our website, pursuingfaith.org.