Today’s teaching is from Matthew
5:6 – “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness,
for they shall be satisfied.”
Although the teaching for today focuses
on a particular verse, all the Beatitudes make up a teaching all together that
identifies Jesus Christ and those who follow Him. The 1st and 8th
Beatitudes are bookends for the whole text. The Beatitudes identify not only
Jesus but the kingdom person who would follow after Him.
The sense of this 4th
Beatitude is one of urgency and immediacy.
In Matthew 25:1-13, this parable of Jesus
identifies how we are to persevere in our devotion to Him.
1 Corinthians 10:6 tells us that the
entire Bible is important for our instruction.
In Revelation 14:12 there is a warning
for the “saints” to persevere and keep all the commandments.
In Jude 21 we are to “keep”
ourselves ready and to be watchful.
All this is to identify that hungering
and thirsting for righteousness is not temporary but continual.
Hungering and thirsting is further
explained in Psalm 42: 1-2, John 4: 13-14, John 6:35.
And we are to hunger and thirst after “righteousness”
that is:
·
Legal, moral and volitional rightness with God
·
Rightness with others
·
Rightness for others
Righteousness is also the evidence of a
Spirit-regenerated life that is putting the Lord Jesus first.