Wednesday, January 22, 2020 Some material taken from A Spiritual Appetite by Van Houser
Blessed are they
which do hunger and thirst after righteousness for they shall be filled.
Matthew 5:6
Matthew 5:6
Hungry for Righteousness
Have you ever had a large group of
people going out to eat together that can’t decide where to go? I always hate being the one to have to pick, because
what if I pick somewhere that someone in the group doesn’t like? Everyone of us has different tastes in foods
that we like.
Trying to satisfy our spiritual
hungers we consume large quantities of physical things. God has put eternity in
our hearts and we have an inconsolable longing. We try to satisfy it with
greater financial position, being more popular, going new places, sexual
exploits, sports, mind altering substances, getting more things, etc. But the
longing remains.
Our souls are hungry, and our hearts
are thirsty. We have an insatiable
longing for something, but everywhere we turn to try to satisfy it proves to be
insufficient. We are restless, and almost
everywhere we turn the grass seems greener than where we stand. The great
tragedy for us is that even though this is the Spirit of God beckoning us to
Him, we turn away again and again to temporary pleasures that continuously turn
to ashes in our hands. These lusts of the soul leave the sediment of guilt and
loneliness. The drugs and alcohol can't keep you from waking up in the real
world again and again, finding yourself with the same (or more) problems. Coming
to the end of ourselves brings us to a place of desperation. And in our
desperation, after we have exhausted all other possibilities, we turn to God as
the only hope for our lives.
Our lives are cluttered with
broken remains of random hungers that are thrown away before they're worn out,
but we just had to have them. Reckless hungers drive us to drugs, danger, and depression.
It is important that our desires be the best because we inevitably get what we
desire. The Bible plainly states, for as he thinks within himself, so he is. (Prov. 23:7).
We all want things – we were born
wanting. As Christians we have to be
diligent to keep that in check because it can take over our hearts if we
continuously give in to our desires. It
may not even be a terrible desire like drugs or alcohol, but anything we let
take over our heart becomes the wrong thing when we give it a space meant only
for God.
Brother Van often says:
- What you WANT determines what you SEEK.
- What you SEEK determines what you BECOME (destiny).
- Man BECOMES what he WANTS--"he shall be filled."
When we seek the wrong things,
sadly our lives become tainted with the consequences and it can consume us –
our thoughts, our finances, our freedom.
It is a valuable lesson to learn early!
We were made for eternity and only eternal things will truly satisfy our
longings. Until we figure that out, we
will keep running from one thing to another, collecting all the things that don’t
work, I know because my house is full of things that satisfied me for a moment
but left me empty in the long run. Only continually coming to eat and drink at
God's banqueting table will fulfill all the longings of our souls.
Why do you spend
money for what is not bread, and your wages for what does not satisfy? Listen
carefully to Me, and eat what is good, and delight yourself in abundance.
Isaiah 55:2
