Are You Anxious to Meet God?
My soul thirsteth for God, for the living God: when shall I come and appear before God? (Psalms 42:2)
As the chosen children of God, we should truly desire to meet God. Deep in our souls there should be anxiety to meet Him, but not the dreaded type of anxiety we usually think of when we use the word. Our anxiety is of a different sort. It is eagerness. It is not anxiety pent up as if to meet God is to face our doom. Instead, it is like a child who cannot wait on Christmas Eve to open all his presents. The 42nd Psalm expresses this eagerness in another way by using the term thirsteth. The psalmist’s desire to see His Lord was as a man dying of thirst in the desert and seeing a beautiful flowing spring in the distance.
The psalmist said, “My soul thirsteth for God, the living God…” You might suppose “the living God” would not need to be an often-repeated phrase in scripture for surely nothing is clearer than the fact we serve a living God. The first chapter of the Bible does not announce the existence of the living God. Rather, the author assumes there must be a living God who made this marvelous universe. God’s majesty is evident across the heavens, so do we really need a chapter that explains there is a living God?
The theme of this section of the psalms is deliverance. It corresponds to God’s deliverance of Israel during the exodus. This phrase “the living God” appears in the book of Joshua as the Israelites were ready to cross the Jordan River to attack the fortified city of Jericho. This is the point where they would begin the conquest of Canaan.
In front of them was their first obstacle. How would they get an army across the river when it was at flood stage? In chapter 3 verse 10, Joshua explained that they were about to see the evidence of the living God, or as a direct quote, “the living God is among you.” The evidence announced itself when the priests who carried the Ark of the Covenant stepped their feet into the waters of the Jordan River. The river immediately stopped flowing and they crossed on dry ground. This was no small feat—a miracle at any time—but especially since at this time of year the river overflowed its banks. A torrent of water cascaded down the channel making it impossible to cross.
To stop the water at their crossing point, meant that God must also stop all the tributaries from flowing as well. In the 16th verse, this is what happened. Joshua said, “The waters which came down from above stood and rose up upon an heap very far from the city Adam, that is beside Zaretan: and those that came down toward the sea of the plain, even the salt sea, failed, and were cut off: and the people passed over right against Jericho.”
The significance of the phrase “the living God” in Joshua is Israel’s confrontation with an enemy that also had their gods. The enemy was formidable and certainly more warlike than the children of Israel. One of the fears of Israel when they attempted to conquer Canaan was the Canaanite’s iron chariots and their plentitude of horses. Israel did not have these and were at a great disadvantage—except for the living God. Canaan’s fortified cities and armaments were no match for the living God. The gods of the Canaanites were dead gods of stone, and their horses were mere creatures that God created with the spoken word. He could as easily destroy them all with only a thought.
This kind of genuine deliverance makes this section of Psalm 42 fit its section’s motif. Trust in the living God is the foundation of our great hope. The living God ensures the reality of our faith. This is the God that we shall see—as Job said, “In my flesh, shall I see God” (Job 19:26). He ever lives and is working in the world to bring us to Him.
The psalmist said in this verse that his soul thirsted for God. How do we satisfy this thirst? There is only one way—we drink from the wells of salvation by faith in Jesus Christ. Jesus said: “If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink. He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water” (John 7:37-38). Living waters from the living God—what can be more satisfying?
Pastor V. Mark Smith