Hungering and thirsting after righteousness. God always meets a man at the point of his desire. God will do just as much for your life as you desire for him to do. You were just as close to God today as you want to be. The marvelous thing about the Lord is you can have all of him that you want.
whatever else you may be hungering and thirsting after tonight, you are never really filled with it. You may not be able to get all the money you want, you may never get your fill and be satisfied with the things of this world, but the truth is that you can have all of the Lord that you want. It is only when a man is hungering and thirsting after righteousness that he is really filled.
Sometimes we blame circumstances or our own personal weaknesses, for not being any more spiritual than we are. The truth is that we are just spiritual as we want to be. God always meets a person that the point of his desire, and he will carry that person no further then that desire. The one hopeless condition that a man can get himself into is where he is not aware of the needs that he has. He has no appetite for the things of God. God loathes this condition. Revelation 3:15-17. when God wants to work in our life, he has to bring about some circumstances that will create an awareness of a need. Deuteronomy 8:2-3, God dealt with Israel to make them hungry. A Spiritual desire.
Jesus says, if a man is following me this will be one of his birthmarks. He will hunger and thirst after righteousness. Notice the place of this beatitude. The first one: bankruptcy. The second is mourn. The third is meekness. And fourthly, hunger and thirst for righteousness. Jesus is saying, blessed and holy are those who hunger and thirst to be right. Those who would be like Jesus every area of their life.
I. Being Satisfied with Just a Little Bit
1. You hear people say, “I don’t want to overdo it.” Or “You can go too far with this religion.”
2. Most of us have the spiritual appetite that can be satisfied. That can be at peace with just a little slice. God pronounces no blessing upon this.
3. I know some people who, if they have one slice of righteousness over here, it justifies them for having no righteousness in this area.
a. Being a witness doesn’t give us an excuse for sin.
b. Church attendance and tithing doesn’t give us an excuse to not live holy during the week.
4. Have you ever noticed this inconsistency in the Christian life?
5. On the other hand, there are people who never do anything wrong, but you would never go to them with a problem or a broken heart. Why? An absence of love.
6. Inconsistency! Over here we’re doing great, but over here there are vast areas of desert life where God is snot honored.
7. Jesus is saying, “Blessed and holy is the person who is hungering to be totally righteous in every respect of their life.”
II. Jesus Describes Our Desire for Righteousness
1. God uses hungering and thirsting which are master appetites. They are God-given appetites. Every man has a God-given appetite after God.
2. God teaches that this appetite is built in, so we are without excuse, Romans 1:18-20
3. Our problem is that we often satisfy that appetite in the wrong way. Like a child who eats the wrong food and gets a stomachache.
4. There are some people in the church that are fretful and fussy and complain, gripe, and seem to have a religious stomachache all the time.
5. Never happy, always complaining, never satisfied. Do you know what is wrong? God has given them an appetite and they are trying to satisfy it on the things of the world.
a. If a man wants power, he will not be satisfied.
b. If a man wants pleasure, he won't be satisfied.
c. If a man wants money, he won't be satisfied.
6. It is only when we turn to Jesus that we will be satisfied.
7. How strong is your desire to be holy, to be like Jesus? Do you feel like you are going to starve and die of thirst if you don't get this righteousness?
8. What does it really mean to hunger and thirst after righteousness? Let's have an examination. What will I be like? Matthew 6 gives us three characteristics.
III. We Will Have the Right Affections
1. Verses 19-21
2. He says some people's affections are centered on things physical, material, and temporal. All sail and no sky.
3. That's foolish! If you have a treasure on earth, it is vulnerable to all the enemies on earth, Verse 19.
4. Moth: clothes. rust: to be eaten or devoured. Thieves: break in and steal.
5. Jesus said a man who lives by this philosophy is a fool. He will wake up one day and it will all be gone.
6. I can always tell where a man's heart is. It always follows his treasure, verse 21.
7. How was your heavenly bank account today? That's the only thing that is eternal, verse 20.
8. Jesus said if a man is hungering and thirsting after righteousness, he will be right in his affections.
IV. We Will Have the Right Allegiance
1. Verse 24
2. The word mammon means material things. Everybody here trusts in something and is a servant to something.
3. You're either a servant to God or to mammon. Is a physical and spiritual impossibility.
4. You hold to one, despise the other. What a picture of many today. A tight hold on mammon and we underestimate God.
5. Don't worry about your life. Would you like to know if you are trusting in God or mammon? Verse 25
6. a simple test: if you are worrying about the things of this life: food, clothing, houses, you are trusting in mammon and not in God.
7. The mark of an unbeliever is they worry about the things of this life. Many are Christians on Sunday and unbelievers on Monday, Verse 32.
V. We Will be Right in Our Actions
1. Verse 33
2. Jesus says, if you're going to seek anything, seek this. If you're going to worry about anything, worry about this. If you're going to be ambitious, Be ambitious about this.
3. You have a single ambition, the righteousness of God. He'll take care of everything else.
4. He's not talking about heaven in this verse. The Kingdom of God is not a place, but a way of life.
5. Jesus is saying you should seek to have the role of God in your life. When that's right, everything else will fall into place.
6. Notice, seek first... If you put him first, there will be blessing. If you put him second, you'll be miserable.
7. The promise is that if you come to this place in your life, you shall be filled and satisfied, Philippians 4:11.
8. why could Paul say this? He had already said, “For me to live is Christ.”
9. What are you hungering and thirsting after tonight?
