The Search for Living Water
Matthew 5:6

There is said to be a strange plant in South America which finds a moist place and rests there for a while, sending its roots down and becoming green. When this bit of earth dries up, the plant draws itself together and is blown along by the wind until it finds another moist spot, where it repeats the same story. On and on it rolls, stopping wherever it finds a little water and staying until the water is exhausted. But after all its journeyings it is nothing but a bundle of dead roots and leaves. The life of this plant tells the story of those who drink only at this world's springs. They go on from spring to spring, and at the last, at the end of the longest life, they are nothing but bundles of unsatisfied desires and burning thirsts. In contrast, Jesus tells also of the heavenly water which He gives to those who believe on Him. "Whosoever drinketh of the water which I shall give him shall never thirst" (John 4:14). In Christ all the soul's cravings are met. There is no want or desire in our nature which cannot in Him find perfect satisfaction. One of the Beatitudes reads, "Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled" (Matt. 5:6). Noah's dove flew from the ark and went on weary wing everywhere, but found only a waste of desolate waters, with no place to alight. Then she flew back to the ark and was gently drawn within, where she found warmth, safety and rest. This story of the dove illustrates the history of every soul that, having wandered everywhere in search of rest, at last returns to God and finds satisfaction in Him. --J. R. Miller