While preparing Good Friday this year, I read a book by Arthur Pink dealing with the various things Jesus said while dying on the cross. One of Jesus’ final words spoken on the cross was a simple phrase: “I thirst.” The book describes this phrase as being a reflection of the same thing people all over the world are crying out, every day, as they go about their lives. They chase wealth, success, the perfect home, the perfect family experience, entertainment, sex, and the next novel thing or experience. The book I read was written in the late 1800s, but it is as accurate today as it was then. We continue to hunger and thirst for happiness and contentment, looking for it in the things we can have or do in the world around us. Pink points out that for most folks the continued cry, even after getting what we’re chasing after, is “I thirst.” He goes on to argue that the reason that the thirst is so persistent is that it isn’t a physical thirst, but a spiritual one. The philosopher Blaise Pascal explains that the spiritual thirst that exists in all people is a result of our separation from God. God created us to be in relationship with himself. That is what we were designed for. The fact that the creation is fallen and people sin creates distance between us and Him. We thirst for the connection with Him that we were designed to have.
Jesus alluded to this reality when he said: “If anyone is thirsty, let him come to Me and drink.” He also referred to this universal spiritual thirst on the various occasions he talked about offering “living water” that he offered to folks that would cure thirst forever. The living water He was talking about is God’s Spirit and reestablishing our relationship with God. It is a cure for our thirst. This is the real reason we celebrate Easter. The Bible says that all people sin and the whole creation is damaged by sin. Sin is literally a crime or offense against God. Good Friday is the remembrance of Jesus taking God’s anger against sin and providing a way for us to be reconciled to Himself. Our thirst can be quenched through reconciliation to God. We can become what we were made for. Further, we can overcome our sins and our slavery to bad behavior, through Him. The good news doesn’t end there, because after Good Friday there’s Easter Sunday. Easter is the celebration of Jesus’ resurrection, signaling the end of death and proving to all who follow Him that death is not the end of us. Death is the result of sin entering the world. However, Easter teaches us that we do not cease to be when we die. All people will be resurrected in the end, in the same way that Jesus was. We are reconciled to God and have assurance of eternal life in Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection. God goes to extraordinary lengths to fix the creation. This is what we celebrate Easter weekend.
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