30 Days of Prayer: Day 18 – Common Spiritual Thirsts

In today’s devotional prayer, take your bible and read Ecclesiastes 2.

The teacher is a man who experienced tremendous spiritual thirst and chapter two gives us the various ways he tried to fill that emptiness in his heart.

Filling the empty heart

Spiritual thirst is the same — people might be too busy to do anything about it now.

But eventually, it becomes so great that the person will begin to find a solution.  We are wired that way, by design, by God.

“He has also set eternity in the hearts of men; yet they cannot fathom what God has done from beginning to end” (Ecclesiastes 3:10)

It’s a whole in the heart that Pascal says

What else does this craving, and this helplessness, proclaim but that there was once in man a true happiness, of which all that now remains is the empty print and trace?

This he tries in vain to fill with everything around him, seeking in things that are not there the help he cannot find in those that are, though none can help, since this infinite abyss can be filled only with an infinite and immutable object; in other words by God himself. [Pascal, Pensees #425]

How Ecclesiastes tried to fill his empty heart

Read Chapter 2:1-11, verse by verse.

I said to myself, “Come now, I will test you with pleasure to find out what is good.” But that also proved to be meaningless.

“Laughter,” I said, “is madness. And what does pleasure accomplish?”

I tried cheering myself with wine, and embracing folly—my mind still guiding me with wisdom. I wanted to see what was good for people to do under the heavens during the few days of their lives.

I undertook great projects: I built houses for myself and planted vineyards.

I made gardens and parks and planted all kinds of fruit trees in them.

I made reservoirs to water groves of flourishing trees.

I bought male and female slaves and had other slaves who were born in my house. I also owned more herds and flocks than anyone in Jerusalem before me.

I amassed silver and gold for myself, and the treasure of kings and provinces. I acquired male and female singers, and a harem as well—the delights of a man’s heart.

I became greater by far than anyone in Jerusalem before me. In all this my wisdom stayed with me.

I denied myself nothing my eyes desired; I refused my heart no pleasure. My heart took delight in all my labor, and this was the reward for all my toil.

Yet when I surveyed all that my hands had done and what I had toiled to achieve, everything was meaningless, a chasing after the wind; nothing was gained under the sun. (NIV)

Read it again out loud, taking the time to think and reflect upon your friends on your prayer list.

You’ll see that the Teacher tries several things to quiet that restlessness in his heart:

• Pleasure
• Joy
• Wine
• Work
• Money
• Women
• Sex
• Power
• Wisdom and education

In the end it is all meaningless.  He concludes:

For a person may labor with wisdom, knowledge and skill, and then they must leave all they own to another who has not toiled for it. This too is meaningless and a great misfortune.

Our friends

Our friends may not be aware of sin, but they may be aware of the emptiness that propels them to search after these things, even to the point of addiction.

Do you know someone who

• Works too hard to avoid feeling the pain?
• Seeks out one night stands for joy, but then feels awful the next morning?
• Pulls levers on manufacturing equipment, but wonders – there must be something more?
• Joy in relationships but keeps finding unhealthy and destructive relationships?
• Avoids going to church for every reason, even some that make no sense?
• Gambles all their money away in pursuit of greater money?
• Tries to fill the emptiness with drugs, alcohol, sex, work, fame, etc?

Today’s Action

Pray through Ecclesiastes 2, phrase by phrase.  Ask the Lord of the harvest to show you which of your friends on your prayer list has a spiritual thirst similar to Ecclesiastes.

Begin to pray that the Lord would give you a conversational opportunity to speak about spiritual thirst with your friend in the next 10 days.

Today’s Prayer

He, who was the Friend of sinners, seeks the lost one now
Sinner come, and at His footstool penitently bow
He who said “I’ll not condemn thee, go and sin no more,”
Speaks to thee that word of pardon as in days of yore.
Yesterday, today, forever, Jesus is the same.
All may change, but Jesus never! Glory to His Name!
Glory to His Name! Glory to His Name!
All may change, but Jesus never! Glory to His Name!
— AB Simpson