Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. We have come to believe and to know that you are the Holy One of God.”
John 6:68

St. Augustine was something of a player, to use the common phrase of today. In The Confessions he wrote something that has stuck with me all these years. It was quite sobering (and funny) when he prayed, “Lord, give me chastity [sexual purity] but not yet.” You can tell he felt the weight of his ongoing temptation. That’s something we can all relate to.

When Jesus was tempted in the wilderness, he responded each time with something from God’s Word, the Bible (Matthew 4:1-10). Memorizing and quoting the Bible does not work like magic to make temptation go away, but having God’s Word sunk deeply in our hearts, like Jesus did, confronts the false reality that temptation offers. Our temptations are lousy substitutes for the things our hearts really long for; they never satisfy. By contrast, the gospel and the whole of God’s Word offer a defining picture of what a real, satiated life looks like.

There is something else that has stuck with me for years. It’s today’s verse and it’s from the mouth of the disciple, Peter. At a time when some disciples were abandoning Jesus, he asks the Twelve if they want to leave too, and Peter exclaims, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.” 

Lord, today my great temptation is I’m hungry to find meaning and life apart from you. Yet where will I go to find that? Only you have the words of life. Let your words sink more deeply into my heart. Spark a desire in me to fill myself more with your words rather than the talking heads around me.