I live in the most prosperous country in history, but I’m so hungry. My biggest food dilemma is whether I’m going to make nachos or just have Cheetos for a midnight snack, but I’m so hungry. We have the choice of several mega markets within minutes of our house stocked with enough food to supply a small country, but I’m so hungry. For about ten bucks I can hit the all you can eat buffet and eat as much steak, sides, and dessert that I can keep down, yet I’m still hungry.
So very hungry.
After meeting the Samaritan woman at the well, his disciples tried to get Jesus to eat something. His answer confused them. He said that He had food they knew nothing about? They were so physical world focused, they assumed someone must have brought him food. But while they were running food gathering errands, Jesus was busy transforming lives. His response to the disciples questioning:
John 4:34-35 Jesus said to them, “My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to accomplish his work. Do you not say, ‘There are yet four months, then comes the harvest’? Look, I tell you, lift up your eyes, and see that the fields are white for harvest.
That’s what I’m hungry for. Famished. But I’m not talking about the harvest. I’m talking about the relationship Jesus had with the Father, “Him who sent me”. Jesus was so in tune, in relationship with the Father, that He always knew where to go, what to do, who to talk to, and what to say that would be perfectly aligned with the Father’s will. That was his spiritual food, the sustenance of his existence. I’m so hungry.
Just to be honest, much of the time I’m wondering what God’s plan might be – where I should go, what I should say. The rest of the time I’m pretty much distracted by the hectic pace of modern life or the ease and variety of mind-numbing electronic entertainment. Going to church, whatever church seems like a Scooby snack. The ministry activities I’m involved in are like a tiny appetizer. Devotions and prayer times help but often feel like an IV drip for a man on life support. I’m simply starving.
I really don’t think I’m all that unique in this. In fact, I believe that God made man with an inherent hunger for divine relationship. Just as addiction often covers some other internal emptiness, we have to fill that void with something, anything. Personally, I’ve tried to fill that void with a lot of things in the past, from sin to overachieving ministry attempts. None of that works. I’ve come to realize that there is absolutely nothing that will fill that void other than God’s presence, and there is no microwaveable, step by step formula to find it.
But first, you have to be hungry. The type of hungry that will do anything it takes to be satisfied. The good news is that kind of hunger and thirst comes with promises.
Matt. 5:6 “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.
You see, that hunger doesn’t mean we are in the wrong place, doing the wrong thing. Moses talked with Yahweh. He called down plagues from heaven, turned a staff into a snake, parted the Red Sea and spent 40 days on Mount Sinai in His presence. Yet after all that he was still hungry for more.
Ex. 33:18 Moses said, “Please show me your glory.”
The word “please” in English doesn’t really do the urgency of the Hebrew justice. It was an earnest plea, I beg You! If we aren’t desperate for more, then something else may be filling the void. But if we seek, Him. Really seek Him, with everything we are. He will show up. We will find Him! It’s all part of the plan.
Jer. 29:11-13 For I know the plans I have for you, declares Yahweh, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope. Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will hear you. You will seek me and find me, when you seek me with all your heart.
I’m so hungry…