The Testing of Spiritual Hunger (Matt. 5:6)

SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 4/30/2020 11:24 AM

My Worship Time                                                           Focus:  The Testing of Spiritual Hunger”

My Worship Time                                                                              Reference:  Matthew 5:6

            Message of the verse:  “6 Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, For they shall be filled.”

            In this Spiritual Diary we will look at five marks of genuine hunger and thirst for God’s righteousness.

1.     Dissatisfaction of self:  I suppose an example of the opposite of this quality can be seen from the Pharisees as they truly loved their own righteousness and thought that they were on their way to heaven because of their own righteousness.  Believers realize that we need the righteousness of Jesus Christ in order to have a relationship with the Lord.  Thomas Watson wrote “He has most need of righteousness that least wants it.”  Paul wrote in Romans 7:24 “Wretched man that I am! Who will set me free from the body of this death?”

2.     The second mark of genuine hunger and thirst for God’s righteousness is freedom from dependence on external things for satisfaction.  Perhaps the things that are going on in our country and also around the world has showed us that we don’t need all the things that we thought we needed.  I remember a story from John MacArthur’s sermon on this subject about someone he knew that was a house builder in Colorado.  The story was there was a natural disaster which destroyed many homes of considerable value.  Since his friend was a builder he began to rebuild the homes for people.  One thing that may be strange was that not one of the people he was building for missed their old homes because the consensuses was that none of them missed the “things” that were in their old homes.  John MacArthur writes “Neither can anything but God’s own righteousness satisfy the person who has true spiritual hunger and thirst.”

3.     The third is craving for the Word of God, which is the basis spiritual food that He provides for His children.  I suppose that no one has had to beg a hungry man to eat.  Think about the story of Jacob and Esau found in Genesis 26:29-34.  Let us look at Jeremiah 15:16 “Your words were found and I ate them, And Your words became for me a joy and the delight of my heart; For I have been called by Your name, O LORD God of hosts.”  MacArthur adds “The more we seek God’s righteousness, the more we want to devour Scripture.  Feeding on God’s Word increases our appetite for it.”

4.     Fourth is the pleasantness of the things of God.  First we will look at Proverbs 27:7 “A sated man loathes honey, But to a famished man any bitter thing is sweet (NASB).  “When you’ve stuffed yourself, you refuse dessert; when you’re starved, you could eat a horse” (Message).  “A person who is full refuses honey,  but even bitter food tastes sweet to the hungry”(NLT).  I realize that this may be kind of a strange verse but let us look at it from a spiritual way.  The believer who seeks God’s righteousness above all other things will find great fulfillment and also satisfaction even in those things that humanly are disastrous.  Again we look at a quote from Puritan Thomas Watson who comments that “the one who hungers and thirst after righteousness can feed on the myrrh of the gospel as well as the honey.”  MacArthur notes “even the Lord’s reproofs and discipline bring satisfaction, because they are sings of our Father’s love.  ‘Ro those whom the Lord loves He disciplines, and He scourges every son whom He receives’ (Heb. 12:6).”

5.     This is the final mark of true spiritual hunger and is unconditionally.  When a believer’s hunger and thirst are genuine then they will make no conditions; as they will seek and accept God’s righteousness in whatever way that He chooses to provide it, and thus will obey His commands no matter how demanding they may be.  MacArthur adds “The least of God’s righteousness is more valuable than the greatest of anything we posses in ourselves or that the world can offer.”  The story of the rich young ruler tells us that he wanted only the part of God’s kingdom that fit his own plans and also his desires, so this made him unfit for the Kingdom of God.  This young ruler thirsted more for other things than for the things of God, his desires were not unconditional.

            John MacArthur concludes this section and this chapter by writing “The spiritually hungry do not ask for Christ and economic success, Christ and personal satisfaction, Christ and popularity, or Christ and anything else.  The want only Christ and what God in His wisdom and love sovereignly provides through Christ—whatever that may or may not be.”

            We will end by looking at two verses which help us understand the spiritually hungry cry:  “My soul is crushed with longing After Your ordinances at all times” (Ps. 119:20).  “At night my soul longs for You, Indeed, my spirit within me seeks You diligently” (Isa. 26:9).

            Spiritual meaning for my life today:  One of the things that I have issues is where I am living as I have lived in Northeast Ohio all of my life and the weather is not something that I like at all.  I know that at this time in my life that this is where God wants me, so I will have to trust the Lord to give me the grace to stay where He has planted me.

My Steps of Faith for Today:  Grace to learn contentment, humility, and joy in the Word of God.

4/30/2020 12:05 PM

The Result of Spiritual Hunger (Matt. 5:6)

SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 4/29/2020 9:26 AM

My Worship Time                                                           Focus:  “The Result of Spiritual Hunger”

Bible Reading & Meditation                                     Reference:  Matthew 5:6

            Message of the verse:  “6 Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, because they will be filled” (HCSB).

            In our SD from yesterday we looked at the object of spiritual hunger and now today we want to look at the results of spiritual hunger.  I will now quote from the NLT for verse six and I think that you will see the result of hungering and thirsting for righteousness:  “6 God blesses those who hunger and thirst for justice, for they will be satisfied.”  The highlighted portion of verse six from the NLT is the answer to the question of what the result of spiritual hunger is.  John MacArthur writes “Chortazo was frequently used of the feeding of animals until they wanted nothing more.  They were allowed to eat until they were completely satisfied.”

            What Jesus’ pronouncement is that those who do hunger and thirst for righteousness will be given total satisfaction.  It is God’s work in the giving of satisfaction, as MacArthur writes “as the future passive tense indicates:  ‘they will be satisfied.’  Our part is to seek; His part is to satisfy.”

            Now we have been talking about paradoxes in a few of our SD’s on the beatitudes and we will see one here because though saints continually seek God’s righteousness, always wanting more, and never getting all, thus they nevertheless will be satisfied.  I suppose that Moses was satisfied when the Lord put in the cleft of the rock and allowed His glory to pass by the backside of Moses, which is something that Moses desired for a long time.  The word “suppose” may not be correct as perhaps it was Moses’ desire to see God’s glory with his eyes, yet that would certainly have killed him.  Moses now has the opportunity to see God’s glory in heaven as all true believers will someday too.  Think about something that you truly love to eat, perhaps a Thanksgiving day meal with all of the trimmings and then a great desert.  You feast on it and yet afterwards when you are hungry again you still want more.  It is the very satisfaction that makes us want more.  We want to eat more of those things because they are satisfying.  Now the person who hungers and thirst for God’s righteousness finds it so satisfying that he wants more and more.

            The Psalms are full of God’s satisfying those who seek and love Him and we want to look at a few at this time.  “For He has satisfied the thirsty soul, And the hungry soul He has filled with what is good” (Ps. 107:9).  “The young lions do lack and suffer hunger; But they who seek the LORD shall not be in want of any good thing” (Ps. 34:10).  “The LORD is my shepherd, I shall not want…You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; You have anointed my head with oil; My cup overflows” (Ps. 23:1, 5).

            In the book of Jeremiah he predicts the great blessing of Christ’s millennial kingdom as he assured Israel that in that day “I will fill the soul of the priests with abundance, And My people will be satisfied with My goodness," declares the LORD” (Jer. 31:14).  In the NT book of John and the fourth chapter Jesus tells the Samaritan woman at the well in Sychar that “but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him shall never thirst; but the water that I will give him will become in him a well of water springing up to eternal life.’”  Again in John’s gospel and this time in 6:35 Jesus will tell many of those who had eaten the bread and fish through His miracle the following “"I am the bread of life; he who comes to Me will not hunger, and he who believes in Me will never thirst.”  We see in these two metaphors total satisfaction from water and from bread which both speak of what Jesus gives to His children.

            Spiritual meaning for my life today:  I learned in this section that I am to desire to be hungry and thirsty for righteous and then it is God who will make me satisfied. 

My Steps of Faith for Today:  To hunger and thirst for righteousness, to have the Lord give me contentment, humility and joy as I study His Word.

"The Object of Spiritual Hunger" (Matt. 5:6)

SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 4/28/2020 10:04 AM

My Worship Time                                                      Focus:  “The Object of Spiritual Hunger”

Bible Reading & Meditation                                     Reference:  Matthew 5:6

            Message of the verse:  ““Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied” (ESV).

            As we begin this SD I want to again quote a small paragraph from John MacArthur and then we will move onto looking at “The Object of Spiritual Hunger for Salvation, and then for Sanctification.”

            “As with the other beatitudes, the goal of hungering and thirsting for righteousness is twofold.  For the unbeliever the goal is salvation; for the believer it is sanctification.”

For Salvation

            As I look back at the road that I traveled to get to the point where the Lord saved me I can think of a number of things that God was doing in my heart from the time that I was a young boy to the time when I finally received Christ as my Savior.  I think that as I look back at those times that I had a hunger and thirst for righteousness, and what I was seeking was actually salvation, which is the righteousness that comes when I would turn from sin and submit to the lordship of Jesus Christ, which actually came after I was saved.  Speaking of the lordship of Jesus Christ, I do believe that every person who is a true believer will end up submitting to His lordship, and in my case I first of all accepted Jesus Christ as my Savior and then later on in my walk with the Lord I knew that He was my Lord, the One who I would follow. 

            It was in poverty of spirit that I saw my sin, and the sin that God used to get my attention was swearing, something that I knew was sinful and that offended the Lord.  One can probably follow the route of the beatitudes to see coming to the Lord Jesus Christ as becoming one’s Savior as one must be poor in spirit to see their sin, and then in mourning one will lament over that sin and turn from it, and then in meekness one submits their own sinful way and power to God, and now in hunger and thirst one seeks God’s righteousness in Christ to replace their sin.

            We will look at some OT passages where righteousness is used as a synonym for salvation.  Isaiah 51:5 “"My righteousness is near, My salvation has gone forth, And My arms will judge the peoples; The coastlands will wait for Me, And for My arm they will wait expectantly.”  Note:  When one looks at the book of Isaiah one must remember that the first 39 chapters are like the OT, and then the last 27 chapters are more like what is going on in the NT as Isaiah talks a lot about the Messiah.  It has been said that Isaiah is a miniature Bible.  Daniel wrote of the time when “"Those who have insight will shine brightly like the brightness of the expanse of heaven, and those who lead the many to righteousness, like the stars forever and ever” (Dan. 12:3). 

            There must come a time when a person abandons all hope of saving themselves, abandon all hope in self-righteousness, and then he begins to hunger for the salvation that brings God’s righteousness and also the obedience that God requires, then he will be “blessed,” to be made divinely happy.

            As one looks at the people of Israel back when Christ was on the earth, and continue to look at them from that point to today the biggest obstacle to receiving the gospel was their self-righteousness, their confidence in their own purity and holiness, which they imagined was created by good works.  I have to say that this is the problem with many people and the religions that they follow today.  MacArthur writes “Because they (the Jews) were God’s chosen race, and as keepers of the law—or, more often, keepers of men’s interpretations of the law—the felt heaven was assured.” 

            Jesus, their Messiah told them, however that the only way to salvation was by having a hunger and a thirst for God’s righteousness to replace their own self-righteousness, which in fact was really unrighteousness.

For Sanctification

            Now we move onto looking at the object of spiritual hunger for believers and this is a part of the sanctification process of all believers, for the object of hungering and thirsting is to grow in the righteousness that believers received when they trusted Christ. 

            We have written about sanctification in earlier SD’s and stated that once we become a believer that we are sanctified, and while on earth growing more like Christ we are being sanctified, and then once we get to heaven we will be totally sanctified.   We are not perfect while on earth but we are perfect in God’s eyes because of the fact that we are “in Christ,” and God sees the righteousness of Jesus Christ when He looks at believers here on earth.  MacArthur writes “Children of the kingdom never stop needing or hungering for more of God’s righteousness and holiness to be manifest in them through their obedience.  Paul prayed for believers in Philippi that their love might ‘abound still more and more in real knowledge and all discernment, so that you may approve the things that are excellent, in order to be sincere and blameless until the day of Christ’ (Phil. 1:9-10).

            This may seem strange to some who read this but I have said that I listen to the sermons that John MacArthur preaches and on this particular sermon I remember hearing about different verbs in the Greek language, and the strange thing is that I had a vivid dream about these verbs.  I think that this is important enough that I want to quote four paragraphs here from John MacArthur’s commentary that talk about Greek verbs.  I hope that not many of you will dream about this, but if you do that’s ok too.

            “In the Greek language, verbs such as hunger and thirst normally have objects that are in the partitive genitive, a case that indicates incompleteness, or partialness.  A literal English rendering would be:  ‘I hunger for of food’ or ‘I thirst for of water.’  The idea is that a person only hungers for some food and some water, not far all the food and water in the world.

            “But Jesus does not here use the partitive genitive but the accusative, and ‘righteousness’ is therefore the unqualified and unlimited object of ‘hunger and thirst.’  The Lord identifies those who desire all the righteousness there is (cf. Matt. 5:48; 1 Peter 1:15-16).

            “Jesus also uses the definite article 9ten), indicating that He is not speaking of just any righteousness, but the righteousness, the only true righteousness—that which comes from God and, in fact, is God’s very own righteousness which He has in Himself.

            “It becomes obvious, then, that we cannot possibly have our longing for godliness satisfied in this life, so we are left to continually hunger and thirst until the day we are clothed entirely in Christ’s righteousness.”

            Spiritual meaning for my life today:  I have known for a very long time that I am clothed in the righteousness of my Lord, and yet today as I looked at this truth again it had new meaning for me to think that the righteousness that I posses is just like God’s righteousness. 

My Steps of Faith for Today:  Continue to realize that I am poor in spirit and therefore I desire the Lord to teach me contentment, humility, and also to continue to give me joy as I study His wonderful Word each day.

4/28/2020 11:04 AM

The Meaning of Spiritual Hunger (Matt. 5:6)

SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 4/27/2020 9:42 AM

My Worship Time                                                      Focus:  “The Meaning of Spiritual Hunger”

Bible Reading & Meditation                                                 Reference:  Matthew 5:6

            Message of the verse:  “6 “Happy are those who are hungry and thirsty for true goodness, for they will be fully satisfied!” (Philips).

            There are many people around the world today who are going hungry, but the Lord has truly blessed our country in that most people in our country, and most countries in the west who have never really known what true hunger is about.  The “hunger and thirst” that our Lord is speaking of here is of a much more intense sort, the kind many people go through each and every day of their lives in different parts of the world.  Realize this that Jesus was using a metaphor for spiritual hunger that many, many people around the world are going through each and every day of their lives.

            John MacArthur tells a story from WWI in his commentary that I will quote at this time as it surely has much to say about the meaning of hunger. 

“During the liberation of Palestine in World War I, a combined force of British, Australian, and New Zealand soldiers was closely pursuing the Turks as they retreated from the desert.  As the allied troops moved northward past Beersheba they began to outdistance their water-carrying camel train.  When the water ran out, their mouths got dry, their heads ached, and they became dizzy and faint.  Eyes became bloodshot, lips swelled and turned purple, and mirages became common.  They knew that it they did not make the wells of Sheriah by nightfall thousands of them would die—as hundreds already had done.  Literally fighting for their lives, they manged to drive the Turks from Sheriah.

As water was distributed from the great stone cisterns, the more able-bodied were required to stand at attention and wait for the wounded and those who would take guard duty to drink first.  It was four hours before the last had his drink.  During that time the men stood no more than twenty feet from thousands of gallons of water, to drink of which had been their consuming passion for many agonizing days.  It is said that one of the officers who was present reported, ‘I believe that we are all learned our first real Bible lesson on the march from Beersheba to Sheriah Wells.  If such were our thirst for God, for righteousness for His will in our lives, a consuming, all-embracing, preoccupying desire, how rich in the fruit of the Spirit would we be?’” This quote MacArthur gives is from a book entitled “Water” and was written by E. M. Blaiklock in August of 1966 and the quote is found on page 27.

            MacArthur goes on to say that this is the kind of hunger and thirst of which Jesus speaks in this beatitude.  Jesus was using the strongest and deepest impulses in the natural realm here to represent the depth of desire the called of God and redeemed have for righteousness.  MacArthur states “The present participle is used in each case and signifies continuous longing, continuous seeking.  Those who truly come to Jesus Christ come hungering and thirsting for righteousness, and those who are in Him continue to know that deep longing for holiness.”

            There is a parallel passage in Luke 6:21a where we read “Blessed are you who hunger now.”  The desire for righteousness is to characterize our life now and then in the rest of our earthly existence.

            A good example of what Jesus is talking about, that is to hunger and thirst for righteousness all of your earthly life is found in the life of Moses.  Moses was 80 years old when he went up on the mountain to see the burning bush, and I believe that this began his hunger and thirst for righteousness.  He then went to Egypt and saw God destroy that nation, and then completely destroy the army of Egypt as He drowned them in the Red Sea.  Moses saw God’s glory in the pillar of cloud and the pillar of fire that led Israel through the wilderness.  Moses built the Tabernacle and saw the Lord’s glory shining over the Holy of Holies.  We read then in Exodus 33:11 “Thus the Lord used to speak to Moses face to face, just as a man speaks to his friend.”  Was this enough for Moses?  The answer is no for Moses was never satisfied and always wanted to see more.  He continued to plead, “I pray Thee, show Thy glory” (v. 18).

            We can see that Moses never had enough of the Lord and yet from that dissatisfaction became satisfaction.  Because of his continual longing for God, Moses found favor in His sight as seen in veres 17, and God promised him, “I Myself will make all My goodness pass before you, and will proclaim the name of the Lord before you” (v. 19).  Moses would eventually be hid in the cleft of the rock and have the Lord’s glory pass behind him for if he looked on it in his human condition he would have died instantly.

            More examples from the OT as David writes  in Psalm 63:1 “O God, You are my God; I shall seek You earnestly; My soul thirsts for You, my flesh yearns for You, In a dry and weary land where there is no water.”

            Think for a moment of the apostle Paul who had great revelations from God, and yet he was not satisfied.  Paul had given up his own righteousness that was derived from the law and was growing in “the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith.”  However he still longed to “know Him, and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death” (Philippians 3:9-10).  Then we see that Peter expressed his own great desire and hunger when he counseled those to whom he wrote, and before I quote 2 Peter 3:18 I have to say that this is one of my favorite verses and that this was the very last words that Peter would write before he and his wife were crucified upside down for the cause of Christ:  “but grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To Him be the glory, both now and to the day of eternity. Amen.”

            Now we have a quote from John Darby that I found in MacArthur’s commentary as he writes “To be hungry is not enough; I must be realty starving to know what is in God’s heart toward me.  When the prodigal son was hungry, he went to feed the husks, but when he was starving, he turned to his father.”  “That is the hunger of which the fourth beatitude speaks, the hunger for righteousness that only the Father can satisfy” (MacArthur).

            Spiritual meaning for my life today:  I want to think for a moment on 2 Peter 3:18 which tells me that I am to continue to grow in grace and in the knowledge of God, that I am not to be satisfied unless that I am growing in His grace and knowledge.  As I am learning from these beatitudes that I am poor in spirit and cannot do this on my own I have to continue to realize that it is the Holy Spirit through the Word of God that can cause me to grow and the more that I grow then like Moses, David, Paul, and Peter the more I desire to grow.

My Steps of Faith for Today:  2 Peter 3:18 “but grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.  To Him be the glory, both now and to the day of eternity.  Amen.”

4/27/2020 10:44 AM

PT-2 "The Necessity for Spiritual Hunger" (Matt. 5:6)

SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 4/26/2020 9:04 AM

My Worship Time                                             Focus:  PT-2 “The Necessity of Spiritual Hunger”

Bible Reading & Meditation                                                 Reference:  Matthew 5:6

            Message of the verse:  “6 “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.”

            In this SD we want to continue to talk about the prodigal son and compare him to some is similar situations today.  The prodigal son knew when it was time to go home, but there are many today who desire to stay in the far country, away from God and away from His blessings as the love to buy with their money pleasure, power, popularity, fame and every other form of self-satisfaction.

            John tells us in 1 John 2:15-17 “15 Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. 16 For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world. 17 And the world passes away, and the lust thereof: but he that does the will of God stays forever” (AKJV). 

            MacArthur writes “Seeking satisfaction only in God and in His provisions is a mark of those who come into His kingdom.  Those who belong to the King ‘hunger and thirst for’ the King’s ‘righteousness.’  They desire sin to be replaced with virtue and disobedience to be replaced by obedience.  They are eager to serve the Word and will of God.”

            We have mentioned that the Beatitudes are in order and spiritual hunger logically follows the progression.  We have seen in the first three Beatitudes that they are essentially negative, that they are commands to forsake evil things that are barriers to the kingdom of God.  We saw that in poverty of spirit that we turn away from self-seeking; in mourning we turn away from self-satisfaction; and in meekness we turn away from self-serving.  These first three beatitudes are also costly and they are also painful as becoming poor in spirit involves death to self.  Mourning over sin involves facing up to our sinfulness, and becoming meek involves surrendering our power to God’s control.

            Now as we look at the fourth beatitude we find it is more positive and also it is a consequence of the other three.  When we put aside self, sin, and power and then turn to the Lord, we are given a great desire for righteousness.  The more that we put aside what we have, the more we long for the things that God has.

            John MacArthur quotes Martyn Lloyd-Jones:  “This Beatitude again follows logically from the previous ones; it is a statement to which all the others lead.  It is the logical conclusion to which they come, and it is something for which we should all be profoundly thankful and grateful to God.  I do not know of a better test that anyone can apply to himself or herself in this whole matter of the Christian profession that a verse like this.  If this verse is to you one of the most blessed statements of the whole of Scripture, you can be quite certain you are a Christian.  If it is not, they you had better examine the foundations again.”

            As believers we have to have a hunger and thirst for righteousness, or if we don’t then we better look at what Paul ended his letter to the Corinthians in 2 Cor. 13:5-6:  “5 Test yourselves to see if you are in the faith; examine yourselves! Or do you not recognize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you-unless indeed you fail the test? 6 But I trust that you will realize that we ourselves do not fail the test.” 

            MacArthur adds in conclusion to this section “To have God’s life within us through the new birth in Jesus Christ is to desire more of His likeness within us by growing in righteousness.  This is readily clear from David’s confession in Psalm 119:97, ‘O how I love Thy law.’  Paul echoes David’s passion for righteousness in Romans 7:22, where he testifies, ‘I joyfully concur with the law of God in the inner man.’  The true believer desires to obey, even though he struggles with unredeemed flesh (cf. Rom. 8:23).”  “And not only this, but also we ourselves, having the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our body.”

4/26/2020 9:33 AM

PT-1 "The Necessity For Spiritual Hunger" (Matt. 5:6

SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 4/25/2020 11:05 AM

My Worship Time                                          Focus:  PT-2 “The Necessity for Spiritual Hunger”

Bible Reading & Meditation                                                       Reference:  Matthew 5:6

            Message of the verse:  “6 “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.”

            I have heard it said that you cannot live too long without food and only three days without water.  I remember reading a book about fasting when I was about to fast and the author stated that the longest that he had ever conducted a fast was for 90 days.  I know that may seem impossible to you, but after studying a bit about fasting I truly believe that if that person had a lot of fat on their body that they could go that long without food, but they surely drank water as most fast need to drink water.  I truly believe that when Jesus fasted 40 days in the wilderness that He did drink water, otherwise He would have had to use His Godly powers to keep Himself alive.  The point in all of this is that human beings need both food and water to survive and Jesus’ analogy demonstrates that ‘righteousness’ is not an optional spiritual supplement but a spiritual necessity.  MacArthur adds “We can no more live spiritually without righteousness than we can live physically without food and water.”

            In MacArthur’s commentary he talks about different famines that have taken place from the time of Joseph in Egypt all the way to the famines that have taken place more recently in Africa.  Throughout the course of history there have been tens of millions of people who have died as a result of famine or other diseases that are related to malnutrition.  The point is that a starving person has a single, all consuming passion for food and water and nothing else has the slightest attraction or appeal; nothing can even get his attention. 

            Again the spiritual meaning of this truth about physical issues is that those who are without God’s righteousness are starved for spiritual life.  I can remember when I first became a believer while on a vacation in Florida that the first thing that I did was to go out and to buy a Bible.  I chose the “Living Bible” and it cost me $6.95 back in January of 1974.  I went to a Sunday school class with my friend and wanted to take the lesson papers home with me so that I could study them.  I had been lost and now God saved me and I wanted to know much about what had happened to me.  I had been listening to sermons on tape and that is what the Lord used to bring me to salvation, as these sermons were from the Word of God the only thing that a person has to have in order to be saved, for that is the only place where this truth is found.  I remember looking at astrology books on my layover at the Atlanta airport wondering if this would satisfy me, and then a young couple came up to me to tell me about what the Bible had to say about the Lord and about the end times.  I did not care at that time although I remembered their conversation and still do today.  I was interested in things like the prodigal son was into, the pods that he was feeding the pigs, things like “weed” and other things that I will not mention, but they were all “pods.”  We will conclude this rather short SD from another quote from John MacArthur:  “Like the prodigal son, they will eat pigs’ food, because they have nothing else.  ‘Why,’ God asks, ‘do you spend money for what is not bread, and your wages for what does not satisfy?’  (Isa. 55:2).  The reason is that men have forsaken God, ‘the fountain of living waters, to hew for themselves cisterns, broken cisterns, that can hold no water’ (Jer. 2:13).  Though God has crested men with a need for Himself, they try to satisfy that need through lifeless gods of their own making.”

4/25/2020 11:32 AM

Intro to "Happy are the Hungry" (Matt. 5:6)

SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 4/24/2020 12:37 PM

My Worship Time                                                                Focus:  Intro to Happy are the Hungry

Bible Reading & Meditation                                                       Reference:  Matthew 5:6

            Message of the verse:  “6 Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled.”

            MacArthur begins by writing “This beatitude speaks of strong desire, of driving pursuit, of a passionate force inside the soul.  It has to do with ambition—ambition of the right sort—whose object is to honor, obey, and glorify God by partaking of His righteousness.  This holy ambition is in great contrast to the common ambitions of men to gratify their own lusts, accomplish their own goals, and satisfy their own egos.”

            Let us take a moment and talk about Lucifer, who has most know was the being who is now called Satan.  Lucifer means “star of the morning,” or more literally, “the bright one.”  Lucifer was probably the most glorious being God ever created, that things changed, and they probably changed in a great hurry.  I heard one commentator say that it probably took Lucifer 20 minutes to sin.  We have gone over Isaiah 14:13-14, which speaks about Lucifer’s fall and why it happened before but let us look at those verses:  “13 "But you said in your heart, ’I will ascend to heaven; I will raise my throne above the stars of God, And I will sit on the mount of assembly In the recesses of the north. 14 ’I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will make myself like the Most High.’”  Notice the “I will’s in this passage, which relate to pride.  Lucifer’s problem was with ambition.

            When we studied the book of Daniel we came across King Nebuchadnezzar who was a man who certainly was full of himself, and God told him not to be so full of himself or else he would have a very big problem.  Chapter four speaks of this and as Nebuchadnezzar was looking over his kingdom he became prideful over what he said that he did and for seven years lived like an animal.  Nebuchadnezzar’s problem was with wanting praise.

            In Luke 12:16-21 Jesus told a parable about a rich farmer whose crops were so abundant that he did not have enough space to store them.  He said he would tear his barns down and build bigger ones and the live like a rich man for the rest of his life, which as Jesus went on to say would be the next day.  God called him a fool.

            MacArthur adds “Lucifer hungered for power, Nebuchadnezzar hungered for praise; and the rich fool hungered for pleasure.  Because they hungered for wrong things and rejected God’s good things, they forfeited both.”

            In this beatitude Jesus declares that the deepest desire of every person ought to be to “hunger and thirst for righteousness.”  What is that exactly?  That is the Spirit-prompted desire that will lead a person to salvation and keep him strong and faithful once he is in the kingdom of God.  MacArthur adds “IT is also the only ambition that, when fulfilled, brings enduring happiness.”  We are surely all looking for happiness.

            Our Declaration of Independence assets that our citizens who live in the United States have the right to the pursuit of happiness, and when written or founding fathers did not presume to guarantee that all who pursue it would find it, because that is beyond the power of any government to provide.  Every citizen can seek whatever kind of happiness he wants in the way he wants it as long as he is not breaking any law.  It is sad that most of our citizens, like most citizens around the world have chose to pursue the wrong kind of happiness, in ways that provide no kind of happiness.

            MacArthur concludes “Jesus says that the way to happiness, the way to being truly blessed, is the way of spiritual hunger and thirst.”

            Spiritual meaning for my life today:  Sadly to say there have been things that I have sought after that I thought would bring me happiness even after I became a believer, but the truth is that they have not done that.  This must change.

My Steps of Faith for Today: Seek after true happiness, seek to be truly content, be humble and have joy as I study His Word.

4/24/2020 1:12 PM

           

The Necessity of Meekness (Matt. 5:5)

SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 4/23/2020 9:29 AM

My Worship Time                                                               Focus:  “The Necessity for Meekness”

Bible Reading & Meditation                                                 Reference:  Matthew 5:5

            Message of the verse:  “5 Blessed are the meek: for they shall inherit the earth” (AKJV).

            Now if I would ask you what is the first thing that we see meekness is necessary for perhaps some would say it is necessary for salvation, and I believe that would be correct.  We see in this verse that only the meek shall inherit the earth, and this is true because only the meek belong to the King who will rule the future kingdom of earth, something we have written about before.  Let us look at Psalm 149:4 from the NIV version of the Bible:  “For the LORD takes delight in his people; He crowns the humble with salvation.”  The disciples came to Jesus and ask them who would be the greatest in the kingdom of heaven and His answer is found in Matthew 18:2-4 “2 And He called a child to Himself and set him before them, 3 and said, "Truly I say to you, unless you are converted and become like children, you shall not enter the kingdom of heaven. 4 “Whoever then humbles himself as this child, he is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.”

            Another reason for the necessity of meekness is because it is commanded.  We will go to a book from the OT that perhaps not many have read a lot to find where it is commanded as we go to the book of Zephaniah 2:3 “Seek the LORD, All you humble of the earth Who have carried out His ordinances; Seek righteousness, seek humility. Perhaps you will be hidden In the day of the LORD’S anger.”  (See the highlighted part.)  Next we go to the book of James ad he commands believers in 1:21 “Therefore, putting aside all filthiness and all that remains of wickedness, in humility receive the word implanted, which is able to save your souls.”  MacArthur adds “Those who do not have a humble spirit are not able even to listen rightly to God’s Word, much less understand and receive it.”

            Next reason for the necessity of meekness is that we cannot witness effectively without it and we will go to Peter’s  first letter to see why:  “but sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts, always being ready to make a defense to everyone who asks you to give an account for the hope that is in you, yet with gentleness and reverence;” (1 Peter 3:15).  This is a wonderful verse to memorize and to put into practice for after all we who are believers have the best hope of anyone.  Again MacArthur adds “Pride will always stand between our testimony and those to whom we testify.  They will see us instead of the Lord, no matter how orthodox our theology or how refined our technique.”

            This forth reason perhaps should be higher in the ranking for what this forth reason is  makes it very important and that is the necessity of meekness is to bring glory to our Lord.  This is the opposite of pride, for pride wants to bring glory to ourselves.  Meekness is reflected in our attitude toward other believers.  Humility in relation to fellow believers gives God glory.  Let us finish this SD by looking at Romans 15:5-7 “5 Now may the God who gives perseverance and encouragement grant you to be of the same mind with one another according to Christ Jesus, 6 so that with one accord you may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ 7 Therefore, accept one another, just as Christ also accepted us to the glory of God.”

            Lord willing in our next SD we will begin to look at Matthew 5:6 “Happy are the Hungry.”

            Spiritual meaning for my life today:  I took from this section the necessity of being meek when witnessing.  I have to become a friend before giving the truths of the gospel unless perhaps I am not going to see that person again.

My Steps of Faith for Today:  Trust the Lord to help me with being more content, humble, and to have joy as I study God’s Word.

4/23/2020 10:02 AM

The Results of Meekness (Matt. 5:5)

SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 4/22/2020 9:45 AM

My Worship Time                                                                  Focus:  The Results of Meekness

Bible Reading & Meditation                                                 Reference:  Matt. 5:5

            Message of the verse:  “5 God blesses those who are humble, for they will inherit the whole earth” (NLT).

            This beatitude is no different than the others and that is the result is being blessed, being made divinely happy.  God gives the meek His own joy and gladness.

            MacArthur writes “More specifically, however, the ‘gentle…shall inherit the earth.’  After creating man in His own image, God gave man dominion over the whole earth (Gen. 1:28).  The subjects of His kingdom are going to come someday into that promised inheritance, largely lost and perverted after the Fall.  Theirs will be paradise regained.”

            In our study of the book of Revelation we learned that at the first part of the book, chapter four, we saw the rapture of the church, that is all believers from the time that the church began until the event called the rapture went to be with the Lord as described in 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18, and eluted to in Revelation 4: After these things I looked, and behold, a door standing open in heaven, and the first voice which I had heard, like the sound of a trumpet speaking with me, said, "Come up here, and I will show you what must take place after these things.’”  Then we learned after the event called the “Tribulation” ends, and it ends with the Lord Jesus Christ returning to planet earth will all of His raptured saints to end the last battle of the tribulation period.  He will then separate the sheep from the goats, that is the believers from the unbelievers soon after His return, and then will make the earth very similar to what it was when He created it at the beginning of Genesis.  All the believers will then go into what is called the Millennial Kingdom which is the promised kingdom that God made to Israel, and here is where those who are gentle, those who are meek, will abide on the earth.  The reason is because they understand their unworthiness and sinfulness and cast themselves on the mercy of God.  MacArthur adds “The emphatic pronoun autos (‘they’) is again used (see vv. 3, 4), indicating that only those who are meek ‘shall inherit the earth.’”

            For the most part many of the Jews believed that the kingdom given to them by the Messiah would be given to the strong, of whom the Jews would be the strongest.  However the Messiah Himself said that it would belong to the meek, ad to Jew and to Gentile alike.

            MacArthur explains “Kleronomeo (to ‘inherit’) refers to the receiving of one’s allotted portion, one’s rightful inheritance.  This beatitude is almost a direct quotation of Psalm 37:11—‘But the humble will inherit the land.’ For many generations faithful Jews had wondered, as God’s people today sometimes wonder, why the wicked and godless seem to prosper and the righteous and godly seem to suffer.  Through David, God assured His people, ‘Yet a little while and the wicked man will be no more; and you will look carefully for his place, and he will not be there’ (v. 10).  The wicked person’s time of judgment was coming, as was the righteous person’s  time of blessing.”

            What are we to do then? Well are responsibility is to trust the Lord and obey His will.  There will be a settling of accounts, whether in judgment or in blessing, and it is in His hands and will be accomplished exactly in the right time and in the right way.  Now in the meantime, God’s children live in faith and hoep which is based on the certain promise, the divine pronouncement that “they shall inherit the earth.”

            In his letter to the Corinthians (1 Cor. 3:21-23) Paul both warns and assures them as he writes   21 So then let no one boast in men. For all things belong to you, 22 whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas or the world or life or death or things present or things to come; all things belong to you, 23 and you belong to Christ; and Christ belongs to God.”

            There is another certainty and Paul writes about this in 1 Cor. 6:9a “Or do you not know that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God?”  There is coming a day when the Lord will take the earth from the hands of the wicked and will give it to His righteous people, those whom He will use, as seen in Psalm 149:7-9 “7 To execute vengeance on the nations And punishment on the peoples, 8 To bind their kings with chains And their nobles with fetters of iron, 9 To execute on them the judgment written; This is an honor for all His godly ones. Praise the LORD!” 

            The inheritance we are talking about for believers is not only for the future however.  This promise of future inheritance itself gives us hope and happiness now.  We are able to appreciate many things, even things on earth in ways that only those who know and love the Creator can experience.  John MacArthur quotes the following words written by Wade Robinson:

“Heav’n above is softer blue,

Earth around is sweeter green;

Sometime lives in ev’ry hue

Christless eyes have never seen!

Birds with gladder songs o’erflow,

Flow’rs with deeper beauties shine,

Since I know, as now I know,

I am his and He is mine.”

            He gives another quote from a century ago when George MacDonald wrote, ‘We cannot see the world as God means it in the future, save as our souls are characterized by meekness.  In meekness we are its only inheritors.  Meekness alone make the spiritual retina pure to receive God’s things as they are, mingling with them neither imperfection nor impurity.’

            Lord willing, we will finish up our study of Matthew 5:5 in our next SD as it will be a fairly short one.

            Spiritual meaning for my life today:  I know that I live on a cursed earth, but even so the earth is beautiful and it is my desire to appreciate it more than I have.

My Steps of Faith for Today:  I trust that the Lord will continue to work on my heart and life as He continues to give me contentment, humility, and joy in studying His Word each day.  4/22/2020 10:31 AM