HUNGRY AND THIRSTY

A blazing hot sun, no shade for miles, empty canteen, dry mouth — and no water anywhere! You think this is trouble? Hang on, there’s more! On top of everything, you are lost and hungry. Somehow you got off the trail you were supposed to be on and now you can’t find your way back. And you’re hungry because you didn’t take time for a full meal before getting started on your hike.

It is one thing to be hungry or thirsty but to be both at the same time is painfully uncomfortable and has potentially dangerous consequences. And, yet, that’s the level of intensity Jesus was describing as He sat with His disciples and shared what became known as The Beatitudes.

As Jesus laid out the characteristics of who would be blessed in the kingdom of God, He said that those who were painfully, intensely hungry and thirsty for more of Him would be filled to overflowing. “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied (filled)” (Matthew 5:6, ESV).

This verse is truly one of the great keys to personal growth in Him. The key that unlocks the door to spiritual growth is hunger: hunger for more of Him and more of His Word; hunger that causes us to shut the door on the noise and demands of life and get up close and personal with Him. The concept is not complicated but often is overlooked, perhaps because we think it is just too simple or too old-fashioned.

Let’s look at the verse for a moment:

Blessed means “to experience the fullness of all that God is, to be happy and spiritually prosperous.” Happiness is a by-product of righteousness. This is not a smiley-face type of happiness; it is the joy, the peace, the contentment that comes from a life that has been made right with God.

Food and water are physical necessities and when we find them difficult to obtain, we can become rather intense in our desire to satisfy our needs. Righteousness (to be in right standing with God) is shown here to be a spiritual necessity. Just as it is not wrong to desire food and water in the natural, so it is fully natural to desire righteousness in our spiritual life.

In Luke 15 we are given an illustration of a believer who goes astray in his pursuit of righteousness. The Prodigal thought that pleasure, possessions and popularity would bring him the satisfaction he craved and so he wandered away from a correct relationship with his father. As he came to the end of his empty pursuit, he made this telling statement: “How many of my father’s hired servants have more than enough bread, but I perish here with hunger!” (Luke 15:17). The Prodigal was intensely hungry but there was no answer for him in the direction his path was taking him.

The story of the Prodigal is a parable about the condition of many in the church today. Much of their discontent exists because the church’s focus has shifted from the pursuit of righteousness to other, less important, things. Over twenty million believers have left the church in the U.S. in the last few years, largely because they are spiritually hungry and have not been taught how to eat. 

“They shall be satisfied.” This is a promise of spiritual fulfillment, a promise to the spiritually famished: “Your hunger and thirst will be satisfied!” The word satisfied speaks of being fed to the point that you are “filled and happy” in Him. This satisfied or filling that Jesus speaks of has a double fulfillment. There is an initial filling that takes place when the hungry heart reaches out to God, and a continual refilling that takes place as the relationship proceeds. Notice that I said, “as the relationship proceeds.” We are to grow in our relationship with Him just as a husband and wife grow together in a successful marriage.

When the Prodigal came to his senses and acknowledged his hunger, he did something about it: He went home to where plenty of food was available. If you are satisfied with little or nothing spiritually, then welcome to a life full of the pangs of hunger and the resulting lack of spiritual health. If, on the other hand, you are hungry and ready to do something about it, then God has made you an irrevocable promise: “You will be satisfied!”

There is no spiritual disappointment for the hungry heart that reaches to Him! You will be filled with a peace and contentment that is beyond the understanding of human reasoning.

O, God, you are my God; earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you; my flesh faints (has intense desire) for you, as in a dry and weary land where there is no water” (Psalm 63:1).

“I love those who love me, and those who seek me diligently find me” (Proverbs 8:17).