While we might be familiar with our thirst for God, one aspect of prayer we might forget is God's thirst for us.
God desires us more than we desire him and waits patiently for us to reach out to him.
The Catechism of the Catholic Church highlights this simple reality of prayer, focusing on this profound mystery:
"If you knew the gift of God!" The wonder of prayer is revealed beside the well where we come seeking water: there, Christ comes to meet every human being. It is he who first seeks us and asks us for a drink. Jesus thirsts; his asking arises from the depths of God's desire for us. Whether we realize it or not, prayer is the encounter of God's thirst with ours. God thirsts that we may thirst for him.
Mother Teresa knew this aspect of prayer well and always sought to prominently display the words of Jesus on the cross, "I Thirst."
She wrote in a letter, “He thirsts for you. He loves you always, even when you don’t feel worthy. When not accepted by others, even by yourself sometimes—He is the one who always accepts you.”
Prayer is always a response to God, whether we realize it or not. God first created us and is constantly calling us home.
Whenever we pray, we respond to that invitation and ask God for that life-giving water that our soul needs.
