Hangry

 Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be filled." Matthew 5:6....."People today are "hangry." Hungry for more and angry about life." Lisa Bevere

Hangry people. Bevere's quote from above really does describe a vast number of people today, including many in the church. We're hungry, but we don't really understand what it is we're hungry for. We think it is for more of what we've always understood as "the good life." More of those things that will make for such a life. More "stuff." We hunger for that, whether the "stuff" be something tangible, like money or goods, or intangible, like contentment, satisfaction, or the all elusive "happiness." Our problems come in when we find that having "stuff" only results in our hunger for more stuff, and the stuff never satisfies for long. We don't realize that the source of our hunger is a hunger for Him. We were created with a yearning for Him, and nothing else will satisfy that hunger but Him. The result then is a hunger that never finds satisfaction apart from Him, and then anger, because we feel a mounting frustration in our lives because we lack what only He can give. We become "hangry" people; hungry for a "more" we can never get, and angry about life, because He's the only One who can give life meaning and His promised abundance.

Examine all the ways we have sought to satisfy our hunger. We look for people to fill it. So many have married, sure that their mate would fill that hollow sense that something was missing from our lives. We're sure that person can fill it, but they cannot, because what is missing can only be found in Christ. So often, one or both parties become frustrated and angry, because the other has not met their expectations, and divorce is the result. Even when this is not the result, and people do love one another, there still exists that hunger. A hunger for something more. He is that something more.

We have sought out a host of counterfeits to try and satisfy our hunger and thirst. All of them are nothing more than junk food and soda pop in comparison to the One who is the very water and bread of life. When Jesus was at the well with the Samaritan woman, she was in the process of filling her jar with water. No matter how large her jar, the water would eventually run out. He told her that if she would ask, He would give her His water of life, which would never run out. Then, when His disciples had returned from the nearby town with food for them to eat, He refused it, telling them that He had "food to eat that you don't know about." In both cases He was telling them that what He offered, His Living Water and Bread, would give the human spirit what no other created thing could; life. Life, abundant, full, and free. No longer would they live captive to hungering for the things of this world, or suffering the frustration and anger at never finding true satisfaction in them. The only hunger and thirst they would know was for Him, and they would find Him, we will find Him, the One who ceaselessly satisfies our hunger and thirst for more of Him.

To what degree are you and I "Hangry" people today? Will we remain so? We don't have to. All we need do is come to Him, and drink of the water that never runs out, and eat of the Kingdom food that will always fill us. And we will be, as He promises, blessed. Let us do so. Let us be blessed.

Blessings,

Pastor O