"I Thirst"

This cry of Jesus on the cross follows his praying Ps 22: “My God, My God, why have you forsaken me.”  Then he says: “I thirst.”

 Was Jesus remembering also Ps 69 at that moment: “Save me, O God...I am weary with my crying; my throat is parched. My eyes grow dim with waiting for my God....Do not hide your face from your servant, for I am in distress--make haste to answer me. Draw near to me, redeem me, set me free because of my enemies....They gave me poison for food, and for my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink....”

One author says that Jesus is thirsting for the Father, who is his food and drink. During his agony in which he became sin for us, he experienced a sense of the absence of the Father. This absence has now become so excruciating as to intensify that thirst to a point beyond bearing. As Adrienne von Speyr explains: “He has lived in God and from God. In his forsakenness he is expelled from his element, which is God. So he now experiences thirst: thirst of the body, but even more thirst of the spirit, thirst for presence.”

We can never fully understand nor enter into that outer cry which rises from the inner depth of his soul. It is the cry of the Beloved Son for the Beloved Father. To thirst for the living God is the cry of one who knows that the Father is his point of reference.  Spend some time reflecting on this scene and this prayer of Jesus to the Father.