Mensa Otabil - A New Appetite
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Matthew 5: 6 Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be filled. We can recognize these words of Jesus Christ as the opening of His Sermon on the Mount or the introduction to the Beatitudes, where He taught extensively about the values of His kingdom and how His kingdom functions.
Jesus regarded hunger and thirst as foundational to our pursuit of righteousness. This means that if we want to live for God, there has to be a hunger for it, and that is a very instructive point. When you are hungry for something, your appetite is greater for it; when you’re not hungry for it, you have no appetite for it. No matter how sumptuous a table is set before you with the best delicacies of food, if you are satisfied and your stomach is full, you would not eat any of it. But if you are hungry, then you can eat what is set before you.
God is saying that if we are full of ourselves, if we are full of our own righteousness, if we think we are righteous by ourselves and are okay, then we don’t need God. We can manage our own lives and have no thirst for knowing God, serving Him, or doing His will. In this case, even the death of Jesus Christ, the sacrifice on Calvary, and all that Christ has made available to us is meaningless because we have no need for what He offers us. If we want to grow spiritually, increase in God, and become godly in our lives, then there has to be a permanent hunger in our hearts for the things of God. No matter how much God teaches us, no matter how much we know of Him, no matter how much we’ve experienced Him, no matter how long we’ve been Christians, and how many years we’ve lived for the Lord, our hunger for God must be constant.
When we have this hunger for God-a constant desire to say, «Lord, I want to know You; God, I want to understand Your Word; God, I want to get close to You» — if you have this kind of hunger, then whenever you pick the Bible, you would not say, «Oh, I know it; I’ve read it for 40 years, and I know everything in it.» When you have hunger, even after 40 years, it is still fresh for you, it satisfies you, and it speaks to you. There are people who go to church and, after some time, say, «Well, you know, I’ve been going to church for a very long time,» and the hunger to be in the presence of God, to be in the company of other believers, and to be in a place where God is worshiped wanes. When you lose that hunger, then going to church will also dissipate from your life, and you can get to the point in your Christian life where you no longer desire to go to church or be among believers because you feel that your hunger has been satisfied.
Jesus is saying, «Blessed are those who hunger and thirst.» No matter how many years you’ve been going to church, you must have a thirst for entering the presence of the Lord, worshiping with other believers, and being in the company and fellowship of those who love God and seek to please Him in prayer. No matter how long you’ve prayed and how many times you’ve prayed, if you don’t have a hunger and thirst to talk to God and to be in His presence, then, after some time, you may say, «Well, you know, I’ve prayed enough to last me a lifetime.» Can that happen? No matter how much you eat today, the food will digest, exit your system, and you' ll be hungry again. The same applies spiritually; no matter how much you pray today, no matter how many hours you pray, it will exit your system, and you need to pray again. No matter how much Bible you consume today, it will leave your system, and the same holds for attending church. Whatever we put in eventually comes out, and we need to refill and top up. There is no food that satisfies us permanently, so spiritually, there is no spiritual discipline we undergo that meets all our spiritual needs.
Hunger and thirst for God; continue to desire Him, continue to desire to do His will, continue to desire to live a holy life, continue to desire to pray and be in the presence of God, continue to desire to go to church, continue to desire the gifts of God. Your spiritual hunger must always be present so that you will be filled with all the fullness of the Lord. Let us pray. Say with me: «Heavenly Father, I hunger and thirst for You and Your will; fill my life with Your fullness. In Jesus' name, Amen and Amen.»