Are you hungry?

In my short time on this earth, in the context of rural living, I have been asked many times, “are you hungry”. This very question, nearly every time, has been asked due to the concerns of my physical appetite, meaning, have I eaten today. The concern or desire to ensure that someone is sufficiently nourished is one that is very near and dear to God’s own heart, and therefore it should also be one that is near and dear to the heart of His believers! God not only fed the hungry, He also commanded His followers to do the same: Leviticus 23:22, Deuteronomy 15:11, Isaiah 58:10, Luke 3:11 to name just a few. God knows that, while He created us, He created us to NEED something outside of ourselves to sustain us. The body needs many things to survive, such as air, water, food, clothing, shelter, etc… However, in spite of these things God wanted humans to know that He is the creator of ALL good things that humans need for survival on earth. The Bible teaches us that God is the creator of all things good, hence His response to all six days of creation. While this remains true, today, God also created us to understand that just because we eat one meal, the problem with food is, we will become hungry again in mere hours from our last meal, just as we will become thirsty, soon after our last drink. This also brings up the point that if we do not eat again after our last meal our bodies have a very specific way of letting us know that we will not last forever after eating just one time. That we must repeat this process for the entirety of our lives if we wish to remain healthy and sustain all we do in our days.

The problem, I have found, is that food will only sustain us for so long and God knowns this truth all too well. We find the same issues with air, water, shelter, clothing, etc. These items become temporary and often forgotten. I could not begin to tell you what I ate five years ago on this date with any level of accuracy. This is where the point becomes clearer. Food is not the thing that will sustain us for eternity, it is simply a process to reveal, to each of us, that we cannot sustain ourselves. We NEED something outside of each of us to sustain us, and this is where God comes in.

If you have been to church at some point in your life you may be familiar with “The Lord’s prayer”. This is found in Luke chapter eleven and Matthew chapter six. Within this prayer, Jesus teaches His disciples to pray like this. The second line of this prayer reads “give us each day our daily bread” (Luke 11:3). Many, over the years, have simply thought this prayer was thanking God for merely the food we put into our mouths, each day. While the Lord does want us to give thanks for our food, as well as everything else in our lives. The apostle Paul directs in his letter to the Philippians to do just this, in chapter four verse six: “Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.” However, the point Jesus is making in the “Lord’s prayer” is not merely food alone, for as I alluded to earlier, food will only sustain us for a short time. Jesus better defines this point in His temptation from satan when Jesus was tempted to turn stones into bread. Jesus responds in Matthew 4:4 “But He answered and said, “It is written, ‘MAN SHALL NOT LIVE ON BREAD ALONE, BUT ON EVERY WORD THAT PROCEEDS OUT OF THE MOUTH OF GOD.” Jesus was quoting Deuteronomy chapter eight verse three in this rebuttal to being tempted. In His words we really find the heart of this matter.

“Man cannot live on bread alone, but on EVERY word that proceeds out of the mouth of God”. This verse is one of those lessons that followers of Jesus MUST take with them to all places to all faces. While food and water will, at some point, leave us seeking it again at the next turn, the follower of Jesus will NEVER need anything else outside of the words of God to fully sustain them. Perhaps Paul says it best to his fellow servant of Christ, in I Timothy 4:6 “In pointing out these things to the brethren, you will be a good servant of Christ Jesus, constantly nourished on the words of the faith and of the sound doctrine which you have been following.” The point I am trying to achieve is pointing you to the word of God, and not to your favorite meal of choice. Our need for food and water will always be there, and it will always leave us wanting more, as where the word of God will ALWAYS be the one thing that will sustain us, not for an hour, a day, a week or a year, rather it will sustain the believer for ETERNITY if they continue to be constantly nourished by it!

Paul goes on in I Timothy chapter four to define it like this; “On the other hand, discipline yourself for the purpose of godliness; for bodily discipline is only of little profit, but godliness is profitable for all things, since it holds promise for the present life and also for the life to come. It is a trustworthy statement deserving full acceptance. (I Timothy 4:7b – 9) Paul’s desire is not to start his own food truck business, rather it is to point us to the ONE thing that can sustain us now and later, and that is only found in the words that proceed from the mouth of God.

Be mindful that many things in this life will try to sway and distract you from being sustained and completely nourished. It is my hope and prayer that you will seek God in His word daily and make Him known to everyone. May the Lord bless you in all you do for the Kingdom of Christ!