Monday, August 8, 2005
I’m not sure if it’s harder for a baby to have major surgery or for adults like us. The baby has no idea of what’s going on – which might make it easier. We know too much, so we get to worry a lot. Little Jamie’s not even a year old, but recently he had to undergo heart surgery; which I associate with old guys like me. Jamie is the nephew of one of our team members, and she’s from Australia. The miles made it pretty tough on her, so we all joined her in praying for this little guy so far away. And thankfully, Jamie came through with flying colors. His heart was fixed. It was a tough operation, but it had to be done. You see, Jamie had a hole in his heart, and you can’t just leave it that way!
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about “Heart Holes.”
It’s understood that a hole in a human heart is serious business and that you have to take corrective action to get it fixed. Thank God, there are surgeons with the ability to do just that. But when it comes to emotional holes and the spiritual holes in the human heart, it’s amazing how many people are walking around with that heart condition untreated. But, like its physical equivalent, a hole in your heart spiritually will greatly limit what your life could be, and one day it will cost you your life. The good news is there’s a surgeon who repairs the spiritual hole in the human heart.
Our word for today from the Word of God comes from John 4. It’s a story out of Jesus’ life. It’s noon, it’s hot; Jesus stops at a well – for a meeting that it turns out God has arranged. A woman arrives at the well with her water pot to get another day’s water supply. She has no idea Jesus knows all about her. She’s a woman with a past, with a reputation, with a lot of mistakes in her life. As the conversation proceeds, she’s forced to admit that she’s been divorced five times and she is currently living with another man. Her life has been an endless search for love and fulfillment in a series of unfulfilling relationships. She’s got a hole in her heart that has never gone away. Maybe like you.
Jesus addresses it in a disarming way – by comparing it to the physical thirst that brings her to the well every day. Verse 13 of chapter 4 - He says, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again.” Thirsty again – that’s a word picture of our lifelong search for something that will quench the thirst in our soul – to fill that hole in our heart. It could be that every relationship, every accomplishment, even your religion has left you “thirsty again.”
Listen to Jesus’ offer: “But whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” Well, who needs all these trips to wells that never fill you up when Jesus could put a spiritual and emotional spring inside you that will finally quench your thirst. All our lives, it’s our creator we’ve been thirsty for - because all of the me-first, sinful choices of our life - they’ve cut us off from the One who made us. But all that garbage was heaped on Jesus when He went to the cross to pay for your sin and mine so we could finally find that peace-giving relationship with God that we’ve needed all along.
It’s a relationship that’s within your reach right now; if you’ll tell Jesus you want Him to be your Savior from your sin. That woman we just read about did not have “meeting the Savior” on her list for that day, and probably you don’t either. But Jesus met her where she was, which is what He’s doing with you right now. So today could be your last trip to wells that never satisfy.
If you’re tired of that hole in your heart, if you’re ready for the personal relationship with your Creator that can finally fill it, I’d love to send you my booklet that I wrote about beginning this relationship. It’s called Yours For Life. I just need to hear from you that you want it, and you could let us know that by going to yoursforlife.net, or if you’d like to call toll free and ask for it, its 1-877-741-1200.
Jesus is the only Heart Surgeon who can finally repair the lifetime spiritual hole in your heart. Why go one more day with the emptiness when the Son of God is waiting to finally make it go away forever?