Good Enough is Not Good Enough
Ezekiel 47:1-12
June 5, 2005
Today we are continuing the sermon series on the beatitudes and have come to the fourth: “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled” (Matthew 5:6).
Eugene Peterson’s paraphrase in “The Message” renders that verse like this. “You’re blessed when you’ve worked up a good appetite for God. He’s food and drink in the best meal you’ll ever eat.”
In other words, the blessed ones are those whose deepest desire is to claim the goodness of God and the salvation that God offers; to individuals, to the church, and to the whole world.
When you travel south from the Sea of Galilee along the Jordan River, you find yourself in the midst of a lush, green land which is rich with agricultural products that feeds much of Israel.
At Jericho, you can turn up the road that runs to Jerusalem. In just a few short miles,
you leave the valley and enter into the wilderness of Judea. Mile after mile, you travel through some of the harshest county in the world; a world of mountain, rock, sand, and blistering heat. Down in the valley, the water flowed in abundance. Here in the wilderness, water is scarce and becomes even more precious than gold.
If you decide not to go to Jerusalem, you can instead journey to the heights overlooking the Dead Sea. Here you will find the desert fortress of Masada. There, besieged by the Roman army, the last of the Jewish rebels died in the year 70. This is also the area of Qumran, the site at which was found the Dead Sea Scrolls.
From these desolate heights, you can gaze down on the huge expanse of water in the valley below. In our modern day, as we carry plastic bottles of water wherever we go, that sight doesn’t stir the same emotions that it once would have done.
Think about being in the midst of this wilderness with no water when, suddenly in the midst of the desert arises a lake, miles long and hundreds of feet deep. Imagine making your way to this lake to quench your thirst, only to discover that it is so salty that it is useless.
One of the things that I don’t like about swimming in the ocean is the salt water. I know that many people love the ocean, but the salt burns my eyes, and I hate to be all sticky when I get out. Toni loves to vacation in Florida. She loves the ocean and the beach. I usually confine myself to the swimming pool. The salt content of the Atlantic or Pacific Oceans or the Gulf of Mexico doesn’t compare to the salt content of the Dead Sea. That water is so thick, all you have to do is lay back in it and you float.
I remember walking along the shore and getting the legs of my jeans wet. They were stiff as a board when they dried because of all the salt.
So, as you stand at the heights of the wilderness of Judea overlooking the Dead Sea, that poem comes to mind: “Water, water everywhere, and not a drop to drink.”
A couple of the psalmists paint a picture of the thirst of their souls, a thirst even greater than physical thirst in the desert. “O God, you are my God, I seek you, my soul thirsts for you; my flesh faints for you, as in a dry and weary land where there is no water” (Psalm 63:1).
“As a deer longs for flowing streams, so my soul longs for you, O God (Psalm 42:1).
Let’s face it. Sometimes our spiritual lives are as dry and dusty as the Judean wilderness. Sometimes we just can’t connect with God. Sometimes our prayers just don’t seem to rise beyond the ceiling.
Sometimes it seems as though God is far off. Sometimes our thirst for spiritual refreshment is so great that it seems to be beyond being quenched. Sometimes, we don’t even know how thirsty we really are.
The desert wilderness has taken root in the depths of our being. We don’t know where to turn or who to turn to. Sometimes we indulge in superficial promises of thirst-quenching or hunger easing, only to find them as worthless as the Salt Sea in the desert. When we are that thirsty, we look to the Bible.
The prophet Ezekiel speaks about the fresh river that flows into the Dead Sea making it alive once again.
“…I saw water coming out from under the threshold of the temple toward the east…This water goes down to the Jordan Valley where it enters the sea. When it empties into the Sea, the water becomes fresh. Swarms of living creatures will live wherever the river flows” (Ezekiel 47).
Can you understand what is going on here? Here is a promise that God will turn the Dead Sea into a lake teeming with life. Those who hunger and thirst this much, says Jesus, will be satisfied….just as the prophet promised. Those who are so excited that they can’t wait to see the Dead Sea become fresh are the ones who will find refreshment.
Just a little thirsty won’t do. Just a little hungry won’t do. When you desire God with all your heart, you discover that the dead, dry landscape of your soul will be renewed and refreshed. When you are desperate; when you are at the end; when you can’t go on any more; when there is nowhere to turn…that is when you will be satisfied. The promise is that out of desperation comes satisfaction. Out of hopelessness comes fulfillment. Out of despair and misery comes joy.
Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied (Matthew 5:6).
Let me tell you a couple of stories about a couple of very different men.
Tom was the sort of person who we would all like to strive to become. He was born in an intact, loving, Christian family. He was taught the values of right and wrong from an early age. Some of his earliest memories are of being in church, Sunday School, and youth fellowship. He listened to his pastor and did his best to live life as one who took the teachings of Jesus seriously. He was kind and generous.
In high school, he could be counted on to take the side of the skinny, pimply kid who was being picked on by the varsity jocks. When he started dating, he was always the gentleman.
In college, he met a wonderful young woman with whom he quickly fell in love. Both serious students, they waited until graduation and the start of their careers before they got married.
After a few years, children began to come along. Tom and his wife made sure that they raised the children with Christian values and morality. Church was an integral part of their family life.
He was consistently the top salesman for his company. He coached little league, worked the concession stand at school athletic events, served as president of the PTA, ushered in church, and sat on the neighborhood watch committee.
His church began a Stephen Ministry. If you are not familiar with that, Stephen Ministry is a program in which laity are taught to offer care to people inside or outside of the congregation, as an extension and supplement of the church’s total ministry.
Stephen Ministry takes seriously the New Testament teaching that every person has particular spiritual gifts which can be used to build up the Body of Christ.
Tom really didn’t want to do this, but because he was a leader in the church, he felt obligated. So he finished his training and was consecrated as a Stephen Minister.
People began to come to him with stories from their heart; stories of their needs, wants, and desires; stories of their failures; stories of their spiritual dryness; stories of their dashed dreams; stories of their struggles with God.
Tom quickly discovered that he really didn’t care. He hated listening to the stories. He couldn’t identify with any of them and didn’t really want to. Each time someone would come to him for help, it seemed like an eternity passed until he could get rid of them. He couldn’t figure out why they just couldn’t pull themselves up by their bootstraps and fix the problem.
Let me tell you about another fellow named Jim. Jim grew up on what most of us would consider to be the wrong side of the tracks. He never knew his father. Apparently he was some sort of drifter who breezed through town, struck up a whirlwind romance with Jim’s mother, and then quickly disappeared.
Jim was smaller than the other kids and found out that the only way to survive was to be quick with his mouth and even quicker with his fists. He barely made it through high school. In his adult life, he worked a series of minimum wage jobs. He had two failed marriages behind him.
He learned to drink at an early age. On Friday and Saturday nights, he could usually be found down at the Green Parrot Bar and Grill, drinking his paycheck amid the cards and the smoke and the cussing, and carrying on.
Deep down inside of Jim, far below the surface where one almost never noticed, was a gentle heart just waiting to come out.
One of the waitresses down at the Green Parrot had made a mess of her own life, and she found a kindred spirit in Jim.
She would invite him to stay after closing time, and they would just sit and talk for hours on end. She would pour out her heart and he would listen. She felt as though she had made a mess of her life and there was no way to reclaim it.
Jim told her what he saw: a woman with a sweet spirit who had messed up a little bit, but one who had the potential to turn her life around and come out on top.
Talking to him, she felt as though she mattered, as though someone cared, as though things were going to work out.
Tom is the guy who had it all together, but couldn’t quite translate that into sincerity and empathy. Jim is the fellow who lived on the edge in so many ways, but had a big heart and a willing, listening ear.
Neither one of these guys is all good or all bad. They are both pictures of partial goodness. But it seems to me that we have to set our sights higher than just “partial goodness.” It seems to me that it is not enough to be satisfied with only “partial goodness.” Good enough is not good enough. The Bible talks simply about wanting complete and total goodness with your whole heart, mind, and soul.
When we realize that we are desperate for righteousness, then comes fulfillment and satisfaction. When we are frantic for the goodness that only God can bring, that is when God gives us relief and true happiness.
It seems to me that we are too often content with just being good enough. We are too often satisfied with doing just enough to get by. We don’t always expend the necessary energy to reach for the best.
But the promise of this beatitude is that those whose lives are marked by a refusal to want anything second best or second rate, are the ones whose strivings are satisfied.
When we do our best to empty ourselves of our own agendas and open ourselves up to God that we might be filled with God’s agenda. Jesus promises that our hunger and thirst for God’s righteousness will be satisfied. I hope and pray that none of us will be satisfied with anything but the best.
