WHAT DO YOU REALLY WANT?
Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.
Matthew 5:6
What is it that you really want? Money? Are you thinking that if you had enough money to pay your bills and buy the house that you’ve always wanted and the car that you’ve always wanted then you’ll be happy or blessed? Maybe it’s marriage? Do you think that if you marry the right person then, no matter what kind of problems you have, you’ll be happy? Jesus says that the truly happy people are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness. Do you?
What hinders a person’s hunger? Sometimes it is sickness. Similarly, in the spiritual realm if you are spiritually sick, then you are not craving God, His word or His people. In the physical realm, we go to the doctor and take medicine. In the spiritual realm, we stay away from the doctor and refuse medicine; go figure. What we need is to see the spiritual doctor (your pastor) and take the spiritual medicine (Bible). It’s the path to spiritual health. Satisfaction with the world can hinder spiritual hunger. Check out Matthew 13:22; 1 Timothy 6:9-10; and 1 John 2:15. Are you so enamored with the pleasures of life and the quest for money that you are shortchanging yourself spiritually? Remember what Jesus said to the woman at the well? “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is who says to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would have asked Him, and He would have given you living water” (John 4:10). Have you asked Him? Satan can also hinder spiritual hunger. Satan either comes to you as a roaring lion or an angel of light. When he comes as a roaring lion, he threatens to take everything you have. Most laugh and say, “OK, but we don’t have anything.” If that doesn’t work, he comes as an angel of light and promises to give us all kinds of things. If you know what God has said, then you respond, “Unnecessary; I already have everything” (1 Cor. 3:21-23). But some are fooled. Don’t be fooled. Ask the Lord to give you a hunger for righteousness.
Ike Graham