Thirsty? Try the Living Water!

There is this place inside me.  A void that comes around with different circumstances.  I try and fill that void sometimes with other things that I know are not good. An example is movies or TV shows like I have said before.  Overall, I'm doing better with TV, but I still struggle with over eating sometimes.  I am a sucker for carbs., pasta especially.  This weekend there was a picnic and I had to bring pasta salad.  It didn't get all eaten and now it sits in my fridge and has been beckoning me all week.  The last 2 days have been ridiculously bad.

I am beginning to see that these bad habits I have are attached to emotional stuff. And definitely like last post,  ways that again that devil tries to get at me. I have things in my heart that need healing hidden way deep. Some of them I may not even be fully aware of. 

Those pains and hurts or even sins are thirsty to be soothed in one way or another.  And hands down, food and media are the 2 prefered ways I soothe them.  Instead of looking to God I instantly and even sometimes knowingly turn to these things for relief.  I can't stand that hollow feeling in my heart. 

Really it is God calling me to lean on Him rather than use the shot of Novocaine from food or TV.  He wants me to draw close to Him and spend time with Him and let Him heal the wound in me.  But a lot of times like a wounded animal I withdraw and let the wound fester more, slowly eating away at me.

I read a story in John this morning about the Samaritan women.  Jesus had been walking through Samaria and was tired and stopped at Jacob's well.  The Samaritan women came to draw water from the well and Jesus asked her for a drink.  Jews and Samaritans did not get along and she was pretty shocked He would even talk to her.  But Jesus was using it as an opportunity to bring new light and hope into her life.  She had had 5 husbands in the past and now a boyfriend.  Her life full of pain and sin, and Jesus knew this.  He saw the chance to give her what her heart really needed, Him and hope of the Messiah, not the multiple husbands she was trying to fill the void and thirst in her life.  Jesus speaks in John 4:13-14 and tells her how she can forever quench this thirst.

•  "Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” NIV

Instead of running from that hollow feeling and quickly trying to soothe or quench that thirst with the temporary, I should press into God. The God who longs to help heal this part of me and forever quench this thirst in my soul to be whole. 

I managed to fast through dinner tonight.  Not that I need to skip meals all the time, but it is a way that I could press into God and focus on Him.  I pray to Him to help me with this hollow feeling, reveal to me where its coming from, and conquer this crazy thirst to eat myself into a corner over it. 

So tonight a small victory of pressing into God and through His strength fighting the temptation. Fasting clears the mind to hear God better as well.  I need to remember this living water from God will spring up, forever quench my thirst, and bring eternal life welling up to overflowing.  It might take some time for full healing in this area of my life, but tonight is a testament that He is working and will make me whole.

When do you feel that hollow thirst and void? How do you try and temporarily numb it? Try leaning into God next time praying for healing and strength to fight the temptation to numb.  He will give you living water welling up to quench that thirst forever!