What do you do when you are spiritually dry?

Do you ever think, “I want to desire God more,” but for whatever reason, you’re just spiritually dry? The things that you know should thrill your soul feel commonplace. Maybe your desire for God’s word, your desire to pray, or your desire for holiness is cold. It’s a miserable thing to know how you ought to feel, and realize that you’re not there. So what do you do? What do you do when you are spiritually dry?

There are so many things that can be done, but I want to give one piece of advice with two practical applications for those who feel spiritually dry: Don’t stop going to the fountain. Often when we feel dry, we are tempted to neglect the one thing that will satisfy our souls. Think about it: When you feel dry, what things do you want to toss out? Bible reading, prayer, fellowship. But this is the problem. If you are dry, spiritually thirsty, the worst thing you can do is go to the desert! You need to go to the fountain! God calls Himself “the fountain of living waters” (Jer 2:13). If we do not desire God, we need to go to God!

And here is the thing: God is desirable. The fact that we might not desire God is not because of any deficit in God. The problem is with us. What we need is a fresh view of God. We need to see Him, because when we see Him as He truly is, we will desire Him. So how do we get our eyes on God? How can we really see Him? We must look to the Word.

Look to the Word

First, we must open the Scriptures to see God. In God’s word we see His character, His promises, His justice, His mercy. In the Scriptures we find God’s examples and teachings. In the Bible we are confronted with our own shortcomings and the promise of redemption. We need, as the Apostle Paul said, to open our Bibles and behold, “the glory of the Lord” (2 Cor 3:18). If we neglect the Word of God, we will never see God, and we will remain perpetually dry, or superficially stirred.

Look to the Word Made Flesh

Second, we must open the Scriptures to see the Word, Jesus, the Son of God. Jesus is “the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature” (Heb 1:3). In Him, “the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily” (Col 2:9). “No one has ever seen God; the only God, who is at the Father’s side, he has made him known” (John 1:18). Jesus says to one of His disciples, “Whoever has seen me, has seen the Father” (John 14:9). We need to fix our eyes on Jesus, the Word made flesh. We need to see Christ is the Scriptures, and when we do that, we will be like those blessed disciples who said, “Did not our hearts burn within us while he talked to us on the road, while he opened to us the Scriptures?” (Luke 24:32).

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What do we do when we are dry? We must run to the fountain of living waters. Don’t be deceived into running to broken cisterns, but come and “draw water from the wells of salvation” (Isa 12:3). Look to God’s word, and look to the Word. Come to Him, all who are weary and heavy laden, and He will give you rest.

© Jacob Crouch 2022, 2023