a year. Most of you have known about my brother George, and he's seventy-two. I remember one time many years ago, maybe fifty years ago, he sat in the audience in Toronto, Canada, and he sat and wept. But he didn't get saved. From that time on, he lived for this life. And all he thought about was having a big lovely house up on North Bay, one of the best fishing areas in Canada. And that's all I could hear about. And one day I said, George, you better be thinking about a house in the sky, heaven. But I've never been able to get very close to him. He wouldn't say much when I would mention spiritual things. And his wife, Bertie, was very much the same, although being a Catholic, On two occasions she brought the subject up and said she was not satisfied with Catholicism. So we had a good chance to speak to her. I said, Bertie, it's not Catholicism or Protestantism, nor Hinduism, nor Jewish. It's Christ. And so the last few months I've been very much burdened about going up this year to Canada. He loves to take me up to his big cottage with his big boat. And I've never been too much taken up with it. My main object was to win them to Christ. And just the other day I said, Lord, may something happen so as I can reach George and Bertie and Dave and Kathy for Christ. He has a wonderful son, an executive in the big business in Toronto, Canada. He had two lovely boys, about ten and nine. Last night the phone rang, and came, my niece said, Uncle, Bertie was in fact Bertie and her husband. George had just come back from being down in Texas. They take a trip every year, and they've been able to just about go where they want and do what they like. One day she said to me, your kind of religion is not my way of life. She won't have a good time. Oh, Kay said last night, Uncle, Bertie was rushed to the hospital and operated on. She got a bad cancer. I said, Kay, I hate to say this, but I said, thank God. This may be the break that will bring all four of them to Christ. For the whole family is shaken. They just live for this life. So I hope, I hope you'll pray, that God will overrule. When I get up there, I'll find them receptive to the gospel. I don't know how Kay said George was very badly shaken. God does these things. God's not interested in the body. God's interested in the soul. And if it takes this to bring all four of them to Christ, I can only say, thank God. And so I hope you'll pray about this. Shall we turn in our Bibles over to John? John's Gospel, Chapter Nineteen. John's Gospel, chapter nineteen and verse twenty eight, nineteen and twenty eight. After this, Jesus knowing that all things were now accomplished, that the Scripture might be fulfilled, he said, I thirst. I want to emphasize those two words. I thirst. I don't know whether you ever read about Nansen, the great explorer, with his party. They were crossing Greenland, many days and weeks, never for a single waking moment. They were oblivious to all-consuming thirst. for water. The cold was so intense that they went over those fields of ice, only able to melt a little snow or ice, to have some coffee. They couldn't have anything further to drink than that. And so he said, finally, when they were going over this vast area, they touched on painfully for days, dreaming of what it would be like to have a drink of water. And so after one time they settled, thought they'd better strike camp, they did. And they began to wonder, just where are we? So they decided to explore their surroundings. And as they did, they thought they saw some water glistening in the sunlight as the sun was going down. And they thought, could that be water? And then with excitement they ran. And it was water. They threw themselves down and drank and drank and drank. Oh, they're delicious, as he writes in his diary. all the delicious taste of water, and enough was unstinted we could drink all that we watered. That is the instance I read about, and I thought of it. Here's a man, or a group of men, and they're thirsting for water. They know the value of water, and they suffered in order to have water. I thirst, said the Lord Jesus. No human being has ever thirsted like the Lord Jesus Christ thirsted on the cross. He says, I thirst. And what a thirst it was. The Lord Jesus Christ shows in this one cry his humanity. All seven of the cries of the cross, they're different. And this is the only one you see his humanity shine out. I thirst. When he says, Father, forgive them, they know not what they do. He was thinking of others. When he said, The thief, today shalt thou be with me in paradise, he was thinking of others. And the other remaining Christ did not manifest his humanity, but this one did. In other words, the Lord Jesus Christ was a human being. He had human impulses just like every man has, sin apart. Do you know what it was on this occasion, the thirst? Also, we knew what it was to sleep. He knew what it was to be weary. He knew what it was to groan. He knew what it was to rest, as he did on Psyche's well. He knew what it was to sigh. He knew what it was to, in other words, rejoice and to hunger. He knew what it was to be hungry, and he knew what it was to marvel. for we read two or three times he marveled and he knew what it was to weep he wept three times in the Bible and he knew what it was to pray all these things are the impulses of man all through our lives there have been times when we've been able to thus express our humanity as this happened with the Lord Jesus here you see him as a true man, the man Christ Jesus. Remember when he was listened from the dead? He went into the upper room, and some of his disciples went there, and there he was. He showed them his hands and his feet. The next week, they were there again. Thomas wasn't present on the first occasion, and when he had talked to some of the disciples who told them that the Lord was risen, and he had showed them his hands and his feet, Thomas said, I don't believe it, except I see in his hands the print of the nails, and put my finger in the print of the nails, and thrust my hand into his side, I will not believe it. I can't believe it. So the second Sunday Thomas turned up. The Lord knew what had happened the previous week. And when he saw Thomas, Thomas, reach hither thy finger and thrust it into my hand. Reach hither thy hand and thrust it into my side, and be not faithless but believing. What was Thomas's reaction? My Lord. and my God." Yes, she was a real man. You find that over in Galatians four-four, but when the fullness of time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law. The Lord Jesus was a true man. He thought it not robbery to be equal with God, as you read over in Philippines. He thought it not robbery to be equal with God. It wasn't something to be grabbed and grasped in case he wanted to hold something, or he wanted to steal something. No, he thought it not robbery to be equal with God. The Lord Jesus was equal with the Almighty in his power. But he made himself but no reputation. He took upon himself the form of a servant and was made in the likeness of men. And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient under death, even the death of the cross. There Hebrews three. For verily he took not on him the nature of angels, he took on him the seed of Abraham, a physical body, wherefore at all things he behooved him to may be aid, like unto his brethren, that he might be a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God. And another verse says, That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the word of life. And John's speaking. He says, For the life was manifested, and we have seen it, and bear witness, and show unto you, that eternal life, which was with the Father, that may manifest unto us. And so you see the Lord Jesus Christ was a perfect man, Seventy-seven times in the New Testament, he as a man is referred to the Son of Man. And I want to say this, he was a true man. A number of years ago, I went to Gettysburg, that place where many truers go. And I went into a museum. And that museum had one thing on display. Maybe some of you have seen them. That is, they had seven statutes of Christ, and the sculpture was there. And when I got the first look of his work culturing the Lord Jesus, I wanted to turn around and go back. He had all the features of a woman. And I looked on the wall and there it had the story. And this man said the Lord Jesus was extremely feminine. He was gentle. And he pointed out why he made this culture. It turned me sick. Jesus Christ is anything else than being feminine. And I'll give you a passage of Scripture to prove that. and the Jews Passover was at hand, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem, and found in the temple those that sold oxen and sheep and doves, and the changes of the money sitting. And when he had made a scourge of small cords, he drove them all out of the temple. And the sheep and the oxen, and he poured out the changes money, and over through the tables, and said unto them, That soul thou take these things, hence make not my father's house a house of merchandise. And the disciples remembered that he said, The season of thine house hath eaten me up. The Lord Jesus Christ showed his manhood. He keyed that place out, and you can imagine seeing those tables and animals flying out their door. He manifested what he was. He was a man. every bit a man, the son of man. He raised the dead, and he knew what it was to control the elements. He could walk upon the sea, and he could do many other things, like he turned two rows of five fishes into feeding five thousand. He changed the water into wine in John chapter two. Yes, he was a man. Not a phantom, he was a man. God is not going to be a spirit, or rather he's not going to be one like the one we've been talking about, P.I. thirst. God will never thirst. Angels will never thirst. And we who are saved will never thirst. There's a verse like this over in Revelation seven-fifteen. Therefore are they before the throne of God, and serve on day and night in his temple, and he that sitteth on the throne shall dwell among them. They shall hunger no more, neither thirst any more, neither shall the sun light on them, nor any heat. For the Lamb which is in the midst of the throne shall feed them and shall lead them unto living fountains of water, and God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes. Though there will be angels, plenty of them in heaven, none of them will thirst. Almighty God will not thirst. Those of us who are saved will not thirst. Yet here is one on the cross, He thirsted. Showing his manhood, he was a true man. What caused this thirst? You likely know many times when you visit sick people, some when they're very sick, they whisper water. They're asked by the nurse, do you want something? Yes, water. Suffering goes along with thirst. What caused the Lord Jesus to say, I thirst? Just think of this awful, awful thirst. The intensity of it. What caused it? Gethsemane, for one. As the Lord Jesus left the upper room, then was journeyed toward the cross. He stopped him at Gethsemane, beneath the shade of those olive trees, the Son of God, nature weeping on her strength. And he sweat as it were great drops of blood falling down to the ground. He went and found his disciples sleeping, and he went back three times. He went and cried out, If it be possible, let this cup pass from me, not my will, but thine be done. What caused the blood-like sweat? No major ruptures, but tiny, tiny vessels broke under the pressure he was under. As he anticipated the cross, that's why his sweat was stained and colored by blood. who the pressure the Son of God was under, as he anticipated the cross. And as he left Gethsemane, he met a band of men, and Judas was among them. And that's when it was that Judas walked up and kissed the Son of God. And the Lord said, Judas, Meetest thou the Son of God with a kiss. It was the kiss of death. It was then that he was turned over by those soldiers, and he even wondered why they came, why he said, I've been with you in the temple. You've not done this before? What's the cause? They had apprehended him by Judas, betraying him. And they took him to Caiaphas. They hustled them off, pushed them over to where Caiaphas was, and that was the Sanhedrin, because there were twelve men there. I don't know what happened in that room. The Lord Jesus Christ stands there. And what happens? They accused him of just about everything he could be accused of. The bitter... accusations they brought against the Son of God. They ridiculed the Son of God. And you have to read the story, Your Son. How the Sanhedrin and those men poured out their bitterness and ridicule and scorn. It was no five-minute meeting likely lasted three or four hours. and they had the Son of God there to laugh, to scorn. And then they had their little day and turned them over to Pilate. He was taken to Pilate, and I'm not going to go into all that happened. We mentioned that last week. How and he stood before Pilate, and he was made fun of, they tore the hair from his cheeks and big chunks of flesh, at the root of the hair they yanked from his face. They spit upon him, put a crown of thorns upon him, and smote him on the head, driving those thorns deeper into the flesh. They bowed the knee in mockery, saying, Hail, King of the Jews! What a beastly scene you see in Pilate's judgment hall. They used that rat lash a leather lash, those pieces of metal. And as they gave it, and that thought there across his back, they pulled it, and chunks of flesh came off. The Son of God was beaten before his enemies. And only God knows, and no man can describe what he suffered at Pilate's Judgment Hall. There's another move. Here, Pilate heard that he was of Herod's jurisdiction. So Christ was taken over right across town to Herod. Herod was delighted to see him. He heard many things about him, and now here he is standing before Herod. And when Herod started asking him questions, we read, Jesus answered him nothing. As a lamb before it is sheared, it is dumb. He opened not his mouth. This so infuriated Herod, take him back to Pilate. His men and men of war also had their share in afflicting the Son of God. He goes back to Pilate. And Pilate further begins to humiliate the Son of God. all during these agonizing hours. There is no mention in Scripture I've been going through it the last week. Through these agonizing hours, maybe fifteen or twenty hours, there's no mention that anyone gave him a sip of water or a bite of food. What an agonizing situation this was. That was before he cried out, I thirst. The crucifixion. What lamentation she had, and I have a text here. My strength is dried up like a potchard, and my tongue cleaveth to my jaws, and thou hast brought me into the dust of death, for dogs have encompassed me. Talking about men, For dogs have compassed me. The assembly of the wicked have enclosed me. They pierce my hands and my feet." You know, that was a strange thing, talking about how Scripture's fulfilled. The way the Jews put people to death in the Old Testament, they stoned them. They stoned them to death. They didn't shoot them either. And when Rome came to power, they didn't stone to death. Neither did they shoot them. Their means of capital punishment was to crucify people. This was what happened. The Lord Jesus Christ was crucified. I was mentioning this last night to one of the Christians. One hardly realized. to visualize it would make you sick. Because Rome, flogged, flogged, and kept and bruised and battered, the criminal who was to be put on that cross, he suffered almost at the hands of Herod and Pilate before he suffered on the cross. Sometimes he were too weak to even reach the cross. Jesus Christ humbled And he found Simon a siren to carry the cross. Finally, all that ordeal, that suffering and pain, was over. There were six long hours. Three hours of light when he suffered at the hands of men. From nine o'clock in the morning till twelve, and how he suffered at the hands of men. Men, what a scene you have. Here a scene of hatred, bitterness, revenge, insult, a scene of spite, unspeakable cruelty, hostility, shocking, insulting words and deeds. Here is man in those hours of light pouring out his venom, his venomous heart, upon the Lord of glory. Three or four dark hours will leave till next week, or three. You have these hours of light, and you have these hours of darkness. The hours of light is man, invicting upon the Son of God all the beastly cruelty. Like animals, they've done it. We'll see what happened the next three hours, darkness. So the Lord Jesus, on this occasion, he suffered. And it was. All that I've mentioned is only brief. That's what caused them to say, I thirst. I thirst. I wonder, it says in John, I think it is, that someone dipped the sponge in vinegar and gave him to drink. You turn to Mark, Mark fifteen, I think it's about verse twenty-three. Someone else gave him something to drink, mingle with myrrh, and he wouldn't take it. It was a mixture like an opium. a painkiller, he wouldn't take it. He wasn't going to take a painkiller. He was going to suffer the full extent of man's wickedness and sin. So he says, I thirst. There's not something lovely in this text. When Jesus knew that all things were now accomplished, and that the Scripture must be fulfilled. That's a remarkable thing, a wonderful thing, but an awful thing too. The Scripture must be fulfilled. This is what it says, you read in your Bible. After this Jesus, knowing that all things were now accomplished, that the Scriptures might be fulfilled, saith I thus. While on the cross the thoughts of the Son of God reviewed the whole canon of Scriptures. His keen, his active Jewish mind, and he was well educated, he went back over the whole of Scriptures. I've got to fulfill every one that refers to my life, my death. I'm going to say this. He was well acquainted with those Scriptures. He's the only man in the world who ever fulfilled the Ten Commandments perfectly. He's the only one that did. And as he scanned over the past, the whole range of the Word of God, then, and not till then, he says, I thirst. Every scripture's got to be fulfilled. He reverenced the Bible. And when you stop to think of some of the texts that you can read for yourself, Isaiah, Isaiah, Isaiah, Isaiah, you read that. psalm twenty-two psalm sixty-nine psalm seventy all about the suffering the ignorance shame the son of god went through there he's hanging up there suffering bleeding dying and yet such was his love for the word of god such was his mind and heart that he glorified god in fulfilling all those scriptures concerning his birth, his life, especially his death. Scripture must be fulfilled. Jesus Christ didn't say to finish, or I thirst until every jot and tittle of the Word of God was fulfilled. Not one skip. Not one word is missing. And that's something for all of us to remember. It's wonderful to remember these lovely scriptures about our future. It wasn't lovely for the Lord Jesus with his active mind to know what was in those chapters. He went over them. And by the Spirit of God, David gives them to us in Psalm twenty-two. Yes, the Word of God has been fulfilled relative to Christ's coming into the Word. Relative to His life, relative to His death. It's all here. And it's been fulfilled. The Bible spoke, for instance, you go back to Enoch. The Lord cometh with ten thousands of His saints. That was uttered four thousand years ago. And the Scriptures must be fulfilled. The Scriptures concerning his death, his resurrection, his ascension, and his being at God's right hand, you find that in Psalm one, ten, four, and is coming again. All these Scriptures are going to be fulfilled. All those relative to the past have been. All those relative to the future will be. When you stop to think of this, this is solemn. All scriptures relative to you and your salvation have got to be fulfilled. For instance, when you think of your, for instance, your salvation or my salvation, my salvation, yes, is a fulfillment of prophecy. What I mean by that is, the bible told me what i was to be before i could be saved a lost and guilty sinner i acknowledge that god's word says if you believe if you trust if you accept the lord jesus christ as your savior the scripture says you shall be saved scripture's got to be fulfilled he that believeth on the sun is not condemned. You will not be condemned if you believe on the Son, but he that believeth not the Son shall not see right, but the wrath of God abides on him, and the wrath of God will abide forever on every soul who does not believe in the precious blood of Christ. The Scriptures must be fulfilled, and God will fulfill every word. of His Father. You see here, I thirst, it's an expression of a universal need. I believe that what I told you about my brother, they haven't thirsted for anything, spiritual, over all these years. All they've done is be satisfied. with the material things of life. I'm hoping that through what has happened and happening, when I get to Canada, I'll find one or more of my family thirsting for Jesus Christ. Do you have any thirst for Jesus Christ? I trust you have. You know, the Bible gives us some lovely text, Oh, everyone that thirsted, you'll find it in Isaiah fifty-five. Oh, everyone that thirsted. Come ye to the waters. He that hath no money. Come, buy wine and milk without money and without price. God's salvation is free. Again you have in John chapter four, the womb of the well. Who so drinketh of this water? shall thirst again, said the Lord Jesus of the woman at the well. And he's prophesying, but whosoever shall drink of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst. And that's true. Ever since he uttered that over nineteen hundred years ago, many people have taken that thirst to heart. They banked on the things of this world, and they thirst again. It's temporary. I remember when I got saved, I used to fight with Sam Ellis, welterweight champion. We were buddies up at the boxing ring. And one day after I was saved, I had taken a drink at the fountain in the railroad shops. And I knew someone was looking over my shoulder And it was Sam Ellis. And he said, What about some dances this summer? I said, Sam, I've drank of those waters. We've had some wonderful times together. But Sam, the Bible says, Whosoever drinketh of these waters shall thirst again, but whosoever drinketh the water that I shall give them shall never thirst. I said, Sam, how many times a day do you come here to this fountain? You're working not far away on a big locomotive. Well, I said, I'll be over here every few minutes. I said, Frank, Sam, that's true. But I said, I no longer drink of the well that you and I have enjoyed these last year, four years. I found another fountain. And that's the Lord Jesus Christ. Sam, I don't think he died a Christian. But that's it. And the Lord, on that last day that day, my great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried, If any man thirsts, let him come unto me and drink. He that believeth on me, as the Scripture said, Out of his inward pots will flow rivers of living water. Christ is asking you to drink of Him. He said, I thirst. I wonder if you thirst for the person of our Lord Jesus Christ. Revelation twenty-two, and that is both there, and the bride says come. He that hears they come, and whosoever will come, and take the rivers of water of life freely. In this blessed book in my hand, it not only prophesies what is essential concerning you, if you're going to be in heaven, but you're a lost and guilty sinner, but it also prophesies how you may be saved and get your thirst saved and be satisfied. And it also prophesies if you don't take of that living water, you'll be eternally condemned. That's in your Bible. God's word will be fulfilled. I trust you'll realize that. The Lord Jesus Christ, He's thirsting for you. He's thirsting for your love. he's thirsting for your faith he's thirsting for your trust could it be that the Son of God is so thirsting for your salvation you won't give him a tear even a drop of tears in repentance the choice is yours he says from that cross either He thirsts for every sinner in the world. He longs for all the compassion of the Son of God. The intensity of the Lord Jesus is thirst for sinners. The intensity is seen on the cross. What Nansen experienced and his men going over the Greenland, this minute minute, compared to the passion the intensity of the thirst of the Son of God when he was on the cross. Scripture is to be fulfilled. He said, I thirst. I wonder if the Word of God will be fulfilled in your life. Will you this morning acknowledge you're a loss. Gilty sinner on your sins helped to nail him there. Don't forget that. And yet he loves you so much. He's been thirsting for you ever since you were born. And today, you've turned him down up to now. Will you accept him? Accept him this moment. and all the hunger and thirst of your heart will be fulfilled. Now none but Christ can satisfy in another name that is. There's love, there's life, there's lasting joy, Lord Jesus found in him. You'll find it well. All the pools of this poor world are filthy. They are contaminated. Oh, the fifth you see in this word, the wickedness that goes on after the sun sets and day, night, night time comes off. Men and women in these dens of iniquity, the cesspools of iniquity, the wickedness, the ungodliness. And you're drinking of that. You see enough on the TV to defile your mind. But He's offering you living water, pure as crystal, is water that you'll drink and be satisfied. Satisfied for time, satisfied for ever. My brother knows that. When I get to see him, Lord willing, I will. I'm birdie too, I hope. I'm going to tell both of them. I have two things in life. I cannot lose. I have eternal life. I can't lose that. I had one life. At the age of nineteen, I accepted Christ. and I turned my life over to him. And for sixty years I've had the preaching, the privilege of preaching of our Lord Jesus Christ and the waters of salvation. He bids you drink. And I can't lose that, my life. And my brother George chose the other way. He's not a wicked fella. I've never known him to drink or smoke. But he just wanted this world. That's all his wife wanted, his son wanted. But the whole thing collapsed around them. The waters of this world will dry up and you'll thirst forever. Like the rich man. It won't be as much as a drop of water to cool his partied tongue, for he chose this life instead of the next. He chose sin in the world instead of Christ and glory. The choice is yours. Jesus Christ said, I thirst. Will you begrudge him? A tear. He thirsts for you. He wants to save you. He will save you now. God will fulfill his word.