Reading the Sermon on the Mount With John StottSample

Those Who Are Hungry

Righteousness in the Bible has at least three aspects: legal, moral and social. Legal righteousness is justification, a right relationship with God. Since Jesus is speaking in this Sermon to those who have already believed in him and who already belong to him, this righteousness is already their possession. We are made right with God through faith alone in Jesus alone.

Moral righteousness is right living—righteousness of character and conduct that pleases God. Not the rule-keeping righteousness of the coldly religious but the warm, inner-driven righteousness that flows from the Spirit within us. This is the righteousness we should hunger and thirst for.

Social righteousness enters into this picture too. Social righteousness seeks to bring justice and freedom from oppression and integrity into the fabric of human culture. Christians are committed to hunger for righteousness in the whole human community.

There is perhaps no greater secret of progress and growth in Christian living than a healthy, hearty spiritual appetite. Maybe some of us are dragging along in our spiritual growth because we have lost our appetite, our longing, for the right things. Yet in this life our hunger will never be fully satisfied, nor our thirst fully quenched. We will receive the satisfaction that the beatitude promises, but our hunger is satisfied only to break out again.

Like all the qualities included in the beatitudes, hunger and thirst are perpetual characteristics of the disciples of Jesus. Not until we reach heaven will we “never again” be hungry and “never again” thirst, for only then will Christ our Shepherd lead us “to springs of living water” (Revelation 7:16-17).

Looking back, we can see that the first four beatitudes reveal a spiritual progression. Each step leads to the next and builds on the one before. To begin with, we are “poor in spirit,” acknowledging our spiritual bankruptcy before God. Next we are to “mourn” over the cause of that spiritual poverty, our sins and the reign of sin and death in our world. Third, we are to be “meek,” humble, aware of the abundance of God’s grace to us and willing to show the same grace to others. Fourth, we are to “hunger and thirst for righteousness.” Confession and sorrow for sin lead us to desire to see things made right.

Adapted from Reading the Sermon on the Mount with John Stott. Copyright © 2017 John Stott's Literary Executors. Used by permission. For more information, please visit www.ivpress.com/reading-the-sermon-on-the-mount-with-john-stott.