SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 10/29/2015
11:29 AM
My Worship Time Focus:
The Residents of the New Heaven and New
Earth
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Revelation
21:6b-7
Message of the
verses: “I will give to the one who
thirsts from the spring of the water of life without cost. 7 “He who overcomes
will inherit these things, and I will be his God and he will be My son.”
As we look at this verse and a half of verse we see that
there are two descriptive phrases which tells us who will dwell in the New
Heaven and New Earth and those phrases are “the one who thirsts from the spring
of water of life without cost,” and then a more familiar one “he who overcomes.” We looked at who the overcomer was when we
studied the different churches at the beginning of our study of the book of
Revelation. The word “overcomes” is
found eight times in the book of Revelation (NASB), and the word “overcome” is
found four times in the book of Revelation (NASB). Okay I guess I had better start at the beginning
and look at the first term, “thirsts” before we look at the overcomer.
Jesus began His “Sermon on the Mount” by talking about
one who has a hunger and thirst for righteousness: “"Blessed are those who hunger and
thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.” This is of course a beatitude meaning a
blessing and we have seen beatitudes in the book of Revelation, as I recall
there are seven of these blessings in Revelation. Isaiah 55:1 says “"Ho! Everyone who thirsts, come to
the waters; And you who have no money come, buy and eat. Come, buy wine
and milk Without money and without cost.”
John MacArthur writes “Those who will be redeemed and enter heaven are
those who are dissatisfied with their hopeless, lost condition and crave God’s
righteousness with every part of their being.
The psalmist expressed that strong desire in Psalm 42:1-1 ‘As the deer
pants for the water brooks, So my soul pants for You, O God. 2 My soul thirsts
for God, for the living God; When shall I come and appear before God?’ The promise
to such earnest seekers is that their thirst will be satisfied.” Now we have an example of this in the book of
John and it ties in with receiving the water of life which is what is needed to
receive eternal life as Jesus will put it.
Let us first look at the passage in John chapter four and I want to emphasize
the fourth verse which says “And He had to pass through Samaria.” Going through Samaria was not what the Jews
did in that day, in fact they would go way out of their way to avoid going into
Samaria because of their hatred for them as they were not true Jews, but had
mixed “blood” which happened after the Assyrians defeated the Northern Kingdom
of Israel in 722 BC and then sent some of them back to the land but they had
intermarried with Gentiles. Here we see
that Jesus had to go through Samaria and the reason that He had to go through
there was He was going to meet the “woman at the well.” Now as we look at the story this woman did
not realize that she had a hunger and thirst for spiritual things until Jesus
spoke with her. She was a woman who had
five husbands and was now living with someone who was not her husband and so
probably the women of that village did not have a high opinion of her, along
with some of the men. She has to travel
a ways to get water at the well, which we find is a very famous well as we read
the story as Jacob had dug the well and water was still coming out of it many
years later. My point again is that she
did not realize her need to for salvation.
“10 Jesus answered her, “If you
knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,’
you would have asked him, and
he would have given you living water.” 11 The woman said to him, “Sir,
you have nothing to draw water with, and the well is deep. Where do you get
that living water? 12 Are you greater than our father Jacob? He gave us the
well and drank from it himself, as did his sons and his livestock.” 13 Jesus
said to her, “Everyone who
drinks of this water will be thirsty again, 14 but whoever drinks of the water
that I will give him will never be thirsty forever. The water that I will give
him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” 15
The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water, so that I will not be thirsty
or have to come here to draw water.” 16 Jesus said to her, “Go, call your
husband, and come here.” 17 The woman answered him, “I have no husband.” Jesus
said to her, “You are right in saying, ‘I have no husband’; 18 for you have had five husbands, and the one
you now have is not your husband. What you have said is true.” 19 The woman
said to him, “Sir, I perceive that you are a prophet. 20 Our fathers worshiped
on this mountain, but you say that in Jerusalem is the place where people ought
to worship.” 21 Jesus said to her, “Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when
neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father. 22 You
worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. 23 But the
hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the
Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship
him. 24 God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and
truth.” 25 The woman said to him, “I know that Messiah is coming (he who is called
Christ). When he comes, he will tell us all things.” 26 Jesus said to her, “I who speak to you am he.’” Well the end of the story is that now the
woman realizes she has a thirst for righteousness and she becomes a believer,
but it was the Lord who while speaking to her showed her, her need for
salvation.
As mentioned we have seen the word overcome and overcomes
in Revelation earlier in our study, but let’s go to another letter that John
penned to see the meaning of this word: “1Jo
5:4 For whatever is born of God overcomes the world; and this is the victory that has overcome the world-our faith.” True believers in Jesus Christ are those who
have overcome as John tells us in this verse.
John goes on to write in verse five “Who is the one who overcomes the world, but he who believes that Jesus is
the Son of God?” So we see in
these two phrases those who will inherit eternal life and live in the New
Heaven and New Earth.
Jesus goes on to say “I will be his God” and then later
on they “will be My son.” These also are
wonderful words for us to hang onto especially when times are tough.
Spiritual meaning
for my life today: I am thankful for
the fact that the Holy Spirit have me a thirst for God and for salvation and
also that because of this call that I answered through His power that I am now
one who has overcome.
My Steps of Faith for Today: Trust
that the Lord will lead me through the preparation of my study to teach a
lesson from Ezekiel next week.
Answer to yesterday’s Bible
question: “Simon Maccabees.”
Today’s Bible
question: “What did Jacob promise to
give God, if God took care of him?”
Answer in our next SD.
10/29/2015 12:18 PM
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