Taste and See

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied. Matthew 5:6

AS WE BEGIN

All of us know what hunger feels like. As famished babies, we cried, and as ravenous adults, we may get irritable, or, as they say, “hangry.” We also know the kind of hunger that compels us to sacrifice and achieve; a hunger that occupies our thoughts, shapes our vision, and gives rise to our ambitions. Over time, this hunger shapes our identity. As physicians often say, “We are what we eat,” an axiom that is equally true in the spiritual realm.

When we maintain a diet of selfish ambition, duplicity, materialism, and infidelity, we inevitably personify these qualities. Like the food addict who consumes the entire canister of Pringles and then moves on to the tub of Breyers ice cream, we can slide from moral compromise into deeper patterns of self-destruction, including greed, lust, envy, and the other so-called deadly sins. Philosopher James K.A. Smith emphasizes the necessity of “rehabituating” our hungers. That is, submitting our deepest longings and cravings to the supremacy of Christ.

We are called to hunger and thirst for righteousness.

DEVOTIONAL INSIGHT

The righteousness that we are to seek is God’s redeeming grace—a grace that blesses humanity where we need it most: in relation to God, in the renewal of our souls, and in the structures of society.

OBSERVATIONS

God’s righteousness manifests his glory as he extends his gracious hand of salvation. Jesus personified this righteousness, and now anyone who embraces him by faith enjoys his redemptive blessing. When Matthew, the tax collector, repented, he experienced God’s justice and blessing. So did the prostitutes and those dismissed as “sinners.” So, Jesus told the religious rulers, “Truly, I say to you, the tax collectors and the prostitutes go into the kingdom of God before you” (Matthew 21:31). Is it any wonder the Jewish leaders sought to arrest him? An alternative kingdom was now encroaching upon their religious economy—indeed, the kingdom of God.

“This blessedness,” says Donald Hagner, “is ascribed not to achievers, but to receivers.” We must work very hard to resist the natural urge to find something within ourselves that deserves God’s favor. From beginning to end we are saved by divine initiative. How else can we explain God’s acceptance of cowards such as Abraham, and adulterers and murderers such as David? (See Romans 4:1-8.) And of course, how do we explain our own faith?

APPLICATION

While contending for this gospel of justification by faith alone, the Reformers insisted that our faith does not remain alone. Calvin was convinced that “we dream neither of a faith devoid of good works nor of a justification that stands without them.” United to Christ, we consequently encounter the renovating work of the Spirit, which in turn yields the fruit of righteousness (Galatians 5:22–23).

In this way, Jesus transforms our appetites from the inside out. Such a person, says Martin Luther, “continually works and strives with all his might to promote the general welfare and the proper behavior of everyone and... helps to maintain and support this by word and deed, by precept and example.”

Those who hunger and thirst for righteousness will display that they have been satisfied as they live increasingly righteous (yet still imperfect) lives. Do you hunger and thirst for righteousness? How is this new appetite being revealed in your life?