Context and Flow of the Text
• Robert Harris put it like this, "First, God convinces a man of his own emptiness, and lets him see himself as spiritually poor, and thereupon he begins to mourn in himself. This mourning makes him meek, and that meekness leads him to an earnest desire, a hungering and thirsting after righteousness. This is the order." This order seems to make perfect sense.
• Spiritual Hunger/Holy Hunger — "It shows us a true character of a godly man. He hungers and thirsts after spiritual things…" (Watson, 123)
• A dead man will never hunger: to hunger means 1. SIGN of life; 2. TENDS to life (R. Harris) — we were dead before but now made alive and this hunger is a sign of that life.
• Longing, ardent desire, a panting after — Ps. 42:1-2: "1 As a deer pants for flowing streams, so pants my soul for you, O God. 2 My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When shall I come and appear before God?"
Encouragements to Hunger
1. Watson says, "by exercise of holy duties the spiritual appetite is increased" (134)!
2. Christian Fellowship— converse with God's people. Ask for prayers; pray for others what you want them to pray for you.
3. Confession and Petition — admit it, confess it.
4. Ponder your life — take stock (use of time, means of grace, your thought life, etc.)
5. Be in the way (public ordinances, Reading, praying…) — blind Bartimaeus cried out to the Lord to have mercy on him — be there when God visits
6. The Lord Jesus and the Precious Gospel — Jesus invites you to "come to" Him (Mt. 11:28); he promises you'll be blessed if you hunger and thirst |
