On the last and greatest day of the festival, Jesus stood and said in a loud voice, “Let anyone who is thirsty come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from within them.” By this he meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to receive. Up to that time the Spirit had not been given, since Jesus had not yet been glorified.
On hearing his words, some of the people said, “Surely this man is the Prophet.” Others said, “He is the Messiah.” Still others asked, “How can the Messiah come from Galilee? Does not Scripture say that the Messiah will come from David’s descendants and from Bethlehem, the town where David lived?” - John 7:37-42
The author of the psalms wrote, "I thirst for you, my whole being longs for you, in a dry and parched land where there is no water." (Ps.63:1) And here Jesus stands up during the festival and proclaims, "Let anyone who is thirsty come to me and drink." In the psalm, God is the one who quenches our thirst. Here, Jesus is saying, I am he for whom your soul thirsts. He is God.
But the great mystery is that the quenching of the thirst comes not in drinking in the goodness of God (though he is good and the satisfier of our souls) but rather in the outflowing of the Spirit's work in us to refresh and satisfy those who are near us. Satisfying the desire of the thirsty was never designed to stop with us. In fact, that is a stagnant pond, not a river of living water. Rivers are always looking for an outlet and so should the Spirit's work in me.
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