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Those - Who - Hunger MARTIN LUTHER

The document discusses Jesus' Sermon on the Mount, specifically the beatitude "Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness." It says this beatitude has both an external application of longing for justice and fairness in society, as well as an internal application of desiring personal virtue. It argues that if people hunger primarily after things of this world rather than Christ, they will be unhappy, but that those who hunger for Christ above all else will be satisfied and filled with true riches.

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Daniel Jilo Lefo
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50 views4 pages

Those - Who - Hunger MARTIN LUTHER

The document discusses Jesus' Sermon on the Mount, specifically the beatitude "Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness." It says this beatitude has both an external application of longing for justice and fairness in society, as well as an internal application of desiring personal virtue. It argues that if people hunger primarily after things of this world rather than Christ, they will be unhappy, but that those who hunger for Christ above all else will be satisfied and filled with true riches.

Uploaded by

Daniel Jilo Lefo
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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The Sermon on the Mount.

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst


for righteousness.

Martin Luther King famously said, “We will not be satisfied until
justice rolls down like rivers and righteousness like a never ending
stream”. He was speaking of social justice in 1960s America, but he
was also echoing the Biblical prophets who frequently insisted that
reverence for God demanded that God’s people treat fellow human
beings made in God’s image with dignity and respect. The world is
not impressed with those who make a profession of being religious
but don’t play fair. Neither, it seems, is God.

The Lord Jesus was preaching His Sermon on the Mount to those who
had expressed an interest in following Him and was spelling out the
kind of people the Messiah King requires His subjects to be. And one
of the basic principles He has laid down in the opening statements we
call the Beatitudes is this: “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst
for righteousness, for they will be filled”. (Matt 5 v 6)

Martin Luther King was not wrong in applying scripture to the


injustice he saw in his day. For a godly person who shares the heart
of His Master Jesus, Son of God, cannot help but be grieved by the
injustice we witness in the world. Men excluded from work because
of race or religion. Women and children killed in the street by
chemical weapons. Young girls kidnapped for the sex industry. Such
exploitation and abuse stirs in the godly person a righteous
indignation. As it doubtless does in the heart of our loving Creator.
We long for righteousness – a society that is fair and safe and our
faith prompts us to pray and work towards such a world.

But this beatitude has a deeper and more personal application. We


long for a better world out there. But we also long for a better, more
virtuous way of thinking and acting in ourselves. We hunger and
thirst to be better people.
We discover greed or jealousy still living in our hearts and we are not
satisfied. We find ourselves thinking or speaking in a manner
unworthy of our Master and we are disturbed.

We know we are spiritually poor without God’s grace and love. We


mourn because of the sins that have separated us at times from our
Heavenly Father. We are meekly honest enough to trust for the help
we need, living out that humility in the patience and decency we show
to others. And we hunger and thirst for righteousness, for all that
pleases God. Like starving, desperate people we yearn constantly to
be more like our Lord Jesus. We long for more of him in our hearts
and lives and daily practice.

In actual fact we all know that often people, ourselves included,


hunger after anything and everything BUT Jesus. We are consumed
by the desire for money and possessions even though we claim to
know they don’t bring happiness. We at times seem taken up with
being popular, or well-placed, coming out tops, having a good name
and reputation. We are desperate when it comes to health, clinging on
to this ailing life, though we know it must one day end. We run after
the pleasures and distractions of this world, living for the next
holiday, or shopping trip or episode of our favourite TV show.

Most of these things are not wrong. Many of them can be quite
wonderful up to a point and can be enjoyed with thanksgiving. But
when we try to fill our heart and soul with just these we come up
empty. The ‘rich young ruler’ had them all but he went away sad
because he couldn’t buy Jesus and assurance of Heaven quite so
easily. Pascal said “Inside every person is a Christ-shaped vacuum
which none but He can fill”.

If we, like the rich young ruler, try to be the kind of shallow believer
who nominally trusts in Jesus just as an extra life assurance for
heaven, while all along giving our affection and passion and hunger to
lesser things, then we should expect to be dissatisfied, unhappy
people. It’s like we’ve tasted the banquet at the top table in the Ritz
but have chosen to eat garbage from the bins in a back alley!
True riches, real wealth of heart and soul, according to Jesus, lie in
being willing to sacrifice some of the temporary comfort and prestige
of this passing world. Live simply and generously. Discover the joy
of giving away what we have been given to help those in greater need.
Discover the joy of knowing and serving Jesus and becoming fruitful
for His eternal Kingdom, even though the world should hate and
persecute us. Let them take from us what they will. They cannot take
away our freedom (as William Wallace apparently said in at the Battle
of Stirling!) – the freedom we are given in Christ.

The freedom that comes when we accept deeply the truth of scripture
that those who hunger and thirst primarily for all that pleases God, for
a Christ-like heart and life, for the Lord Himself will be blessed and
filled.

That those who seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness,
labouring in love for the spread of the Gospel and the building of
Christ’s Church will have the necessities of life added unto them by
our gracious Father in Heaven.

That He Who did not spare His own Son but gave Him up for us all
will also … along with Him graciously give us all things!

That those who entrust every anxiety to the Lord in prayer with
thanksgiving have their hearts and minds kept in Christ with a peace
that passes understanding for God is supplying all our need.

We ask and we receive in abundance, we seek and we find our loving


Father has it covered, we knock and doors are opened by our
Sovereign Lord.

We delight ourselves in the Lord above all else and He gives us the
desires of our hearts.

We hope in the Lord and so renew our strength, soaring on wings like
eagles.
We hunger and thirst for nothing more but nothing less than Jesus
Himself and we are beautifully, wonderfully, gloriously satisfied!

“Now none but Christ can satisfy


None other name for me
There’s love and live and lasting joy
Lord Jesus found in Thee.”

Amen

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