Should I be hungry for God?
I came across this verse in Scripture and it jumped out as one that we push off into eternity. The problem I have with doing that is that the context doesn’t seem to suggest we need to leave it until we die.
Jesus was saying some difficult things that made many of his followers turn back. One of these things was:
“I am the bread of life,” Jesus told them. “No one who comes to Me will ever be hungry, and no one who believes in Me will ever be thirsty again.
John 6:35 (Holman Christian Standard Bible)
It’s safe to assume, He’s speaking about spiritual things here. So why do we follow an inferior covenant in our language to God?
Why do we say, “I’m hungry for God?” or “I’m thirsty for the Spirit” or even “I’m desperate for the Father?”
Think of that last one in natural terms. If I am desperate for my earthly father, am I in a right relationship with him? No.
The psalms are wonderful and they cover the gambit of human emotion. We take most of our language for hunger, thirst, and desperation from their inspired utterances.
Maybe Jesus was just talking about one day when we all get to heaven, that we’ll never be spiritually hungry or spiritually thirsty again.
But He was responding to the crowds call to give them the bread that He spoke about. Since He said, as Luke records:
“So I say to you, keep asking, and it will be given to you. Keep searching, and you will find. Keep knocking, and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and the one who searches finds, and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened. What father among you, if his son asks for a fish, will give him a snake instead of a fish? Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him?”
Luke 11:9-13 (Holman Christian Standard Bible)
Why do we think He withholds His promises to us now?
It’s because of our experience.
We experience the hunger and thirst for the Father, and I’m not saying these are bad things. If this is simply a matter of semantics, I’ve wasted my time. I don’t think anyone one of us should strike sentiments in our vocabulary that our given to us by the inspired word of the Father. Instead my goal here is to give everyone – including myself – expectation that in this life, we can be satisfied without being content.
Jesus promised that NO ONE who comes to Him WILL EVER be hungry or thirsty again. I don’t want to say, “I’m a no one”, but we need to realize that includes all of us who follow hard after the Father.
To not satisfy our hunger and thirst in this life, would simply be cruel.
It’s not the role of a Father who is in a good mood.
Very nice post, I surely love this site, keep it up.
whoever said that? (“I’m hungry for God?” or “I’m thirsty for the Spirit” or even “I’m desperate for the Father?”) I have never said those things and i have found my peace in this world that is slowly reverting back to chaos. I have been through many trials and passed them all, knowing that there are more for me yet but i have no fear and know that i will come out in peace. I have went hungry and thirsty. in fact i survived a fifteen mile hike through some pretty rough and hot terrain with nothing but a bottle of water and a cookie that i had the previous day. I have also survived some extreme amounts of pain and discord that have stories way to long to go in to details and write about. If anything to be hungry for god would be to experience the world that he loves so much through his eyes and emotions. It must be difficult for him/her to see his/her beloved fall to the scum of the world. I mean they already took his children from him/her.
I guess what i am trying to say is that you have to know how to come to him/her
@sirious I think you’ve got it right. Many people don’t know. That’s why I write this blog.