“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.” (Matthew 5:6)
“But whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For His sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith-that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection, and may share in His sufferings, becoming like Him in His death, that by any means possible I may obtain the resurrectiion from the dead.” (Philippians 3:8-11)
The first step in simplifying your life is deciding who you are going to dedicate and your life to. Who or what are you serving? We can never begin to simplify our lives until we settle that issue. That happens when we recognize our spiritual poverty, mourn (repent) over our sinful condition and submit to the Lordship of Jesus. Those who do this are “blessed”, according to Jesus.
Today’s beattitude asks the question…what are you hungry for? What are you passionate about? Jesus says, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness”. This is the next step in the process. If we are totally sold out to God and understsand that we cannot live without Him…then, we will be passionate…thirsty…starving for righteousness. So, What is righteousness?
First of all, Biblical righteousness is not doing right things. Although doing right things is often the result of righteousness. Righteousness is being rightly related to God and the desire to please Him in all we say and do. It is a condition of relationship. To be “good” with God. We all struggle with doing the right things and we often fail, but do we continuously long to be “right” with God? We acknowledge our weaknesses but our concern is…Are we right with God? This desire for relationship involves regular maintainance.
“If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” (1 John 1:9)
If your greatest passion is to be right with God and be pleasing to Him you are taking the next big step in simplifying your life. If that relationship is your number one pursuit then all other things go to second place. If our passion is our wealth than our lives will be constantly complicated with disatisfaction and envy. If our passion is our career than our lives will be continually filled with pressure to do what ever it takes to impress and advance. We will never have enough or achieve enough to find peace and simplicity in this world. Even as Christians we will miss the abundant life that Christ promised if these are the passions we pursue.
Paul’s words from Philippians are filled with passion. You can sense that there is nothing more important to Him than knowing Jesus and being right with Him. Read them again.
Today, ask yourself the question…What are you passionate about? What do you hunger and thirst for?
“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.”