Franz Kafka wrote a story entitled “The Hunger Artist.” Professional fasting was a respected, lucrative, and celebrated art. The Hunger Artist was the main attraction. He sat in a cage for forty days without eating or drinking. When the fast ended, his manager made a speech. The band played. A woman led the weakened but triumphant hunger artist out of the cage. But the day came when fasting was no longer understood or appreciated. The hunger artist lost everything and joined the circus to survive. His cage was placed with the animals. He became depressed. No one paid him any attention. One fast went past forty days because his attendants neglected to count the days. In his dying breaths, he shared his secret: “I have to fast. I can’t help it. I couldn’t find the food I liked. If I had found it, believe me, I should have made no fuss and stuffed myself like you or anyone else.” 

The Hunger Artist was a parable about spiritual hunger and thirst. More specifically, it was a testimony. Franz Kafka, an atheist, was The Hunger Artist. Kafka desired his other works to be burned, but insisted this story be preserved. It was the story of his life. “The Hunger Artist” is also the story of every person who seeks satisfaction without God. The soul starves because nothing in this world satisfies. Augustine wrote, “Thou hast made us for thyself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it finds its rest in thee.” There is a God-shaved void in every life that cannot be filled by anything or anyone but God. 

Isaiah 55:1-2 says, “Come, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters; and he who has no money, come, buy and eat! Come, buy wine and milk without money and without price. Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and your labor for that which does not satisfy? Listen diligently to me, and eat what is good, and delight yourselves in rich food.” God extends a gracious invitation to come to him and find satisfaction. Matthew 5:6 confirms this invitation: “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.” The first three beatitudes bless those who look at themselves and see their need. 

• The poor in spirit acknowledge their lack of merit needed to win God’s approval. 
• Those who mourn grieve the character, condition, and consequences of their sin. 
• The meek adopt a lowly posture toward God and others because of their unworthiness.

The fourth beatitude blesses those who look away from themselves and their need to God and his provision. God demands righteousness. What God demands from us; God supplies in Christ. The handout of amazing grace is available to those who desire it. Jesus says, “If you hunger and thirst for righteousness, congratulations! You are already blessed.” Do you want to be blessed? God blesses those who hunger and thirst for righteousness. 

• The unbeliever must be hungry and thirsty for righteousness to be justified.
• The believer must be hungry and thirsty for righteousness to be sanctified.

John R.W. Stott wrote: “There is perhaps no greater secret of progress in Christian living than a healthy, hearty spiritual appetite.” How is your appetite? Matthew 5:6 describes a good spiritual appetite in three ways. 

The Ultimate Necessity

“You are what you eat.” Bad foods ruin health. Good foods promote health. What is true physically is true spiritually. You are what you eat. 

• What is the diet of the blessed? 
• What menu does God approve? 
• What food and drink satisfy? 

Jesus says, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness.” Many hungers and thirsts drive people to God. We look to God for health, wealth, success, fulfillment, relief, guidance, and happiness. Many churches are preoccupied with ministering to felt needs rather than true needs. But the Lord does not promise to satisfy our felt needs. He blesses those who desire the ultimate necessity: righteousness. Churched and unchurched people describe themselves as “spiritual.” But there is no virtue in being spiritual. Every person is a spiritual being. The devil is spiritual. God commends the righteousness, not the spiritual. 

John Bengel wrote: “This verse is the center of this passage, and the theme of the whole sermon.” Matthew 5:6 says, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness.” Matthew 5:10 says, “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake.” Matthew 5:20 says, “For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and the Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.” Matthew 6:1 says, “Beware of practicing your righteousness before other people in order to be seen by them.” Matthew 6:33 says, “But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.”

• The Beatitudes are about righteousness. 
• The Sermon on the Mount is about righteousness. 
• The Bible is about righteousness. 

What is righteousness? Righteousness is conformity to the will of God. It is to reflect the character of God and obey the commands of God. To be righteous is to be right with God. This is the human dilemma. God is holy; we are not. We must give an account to God for our lives. All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. Romans 3:10 says: “None is righteous, no, not one.” But 2 Corinthians 5:21 says, “For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.” This is the great exchange. 1 Peter 2:24 says: “He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his would you have been healed.”

The Bible speaks of righteousness in three ways: Legal righteousness is justification by faith alone. It is to be saved by trusting the finished work of Christ. Moral righteousness is obedience, conformity, and submission to God. Social righteousness is justice and vengeance for the oppressed. Matthew 5:6 encompasses all three. It is primarily about being right with God. You cannot have assurance of salvation, live a moral life, or seek justice for others if you are not right with God. The poor in spirit, the mourners, and the meek recognize they are sinful, not righteous. As they hunger and thirst for righteousness, they are satisfied. 

Psalm 107:8-9 says, “Let them thank the Lord for his steadfast love, for his wondrous works to the children of man! For he satisfies the longing soul, and the hungry he fills with good things.”

A Holy Ambition

Righteousness is the object of desire for the life God blesses. It is not the desire for the proper object that is blessed. It is the proper desire for the proper object. Hunger and thirst are apt metaphors for intense spiritual desire. We know the meaning of these words. We do not know the magnitude of them. Most of us do not know what it means to hunger or thirst. William Barclay wrote: “The hunger which this beatitude describes is no genteel hunger which could be satisfied with a mid-morning snack; the thirst of which it speaks is no thirst which could be slacked with a cup of coffee or an iced drink. It is the hunger of the man who is starving for food, and the thirst of the man who will die unless he drinks.”

The ancient Near East often suffered drought, famine, and pestilence. It was more common for a person to die of starvation than obesity. When Jesus spoke of those who hunger and thirst, he was talking about those he was talking to. They knew what it meant to hunger and thirst. These were not words of preference selections. These were words of limited resources. You hunger and thirst for necessities, not luxuries. To hunger and thirst for righteousness is to be desperate for God.

Hunger and thirst are signs of life. Dead people do not hunger or thirst. The Puritans said, “He has the most need of righteousness who least wants it.” Likewise, hunger and thirst are signs of health. A sick person loses his appetite. When health and strength are regained, the appetite returns. This is the life God blesses. It is not the righteous who are blessed. Those who hunger and thirst for righteousness are blessed. Some people live with no ambition at all. They are only existing, not truly living. Many lives are consumed by sinful ambitions. They are doomed by their desires. 

Galatians 6:7-8a says, “Do not be deceived: God is not mocked, for whatever one sows, that will he also reap. For the one who sows to his own flesh will from the flesh reap corruption.” God blesses holy ambition. What is holy ambition? 

A Consuming Desire for God. Hunger and thirst for righteousness are all-consuming. 1 Peter 2:1-3 says, “So put away all malice and all deceit and hypocrisy and even and all slander. Like newborn infants, long for the pure spiritual milk, that by it you may grow up into salvation – if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good.”

• Your appetite for God is ruined by spiritual junk food. 
• You cannot feed the flesh and crave the word. 
• God will not fill the one who is full of himself. 

You must get rid of anything that is ruining your appetite for God. Then you must long for the spiritual milk like a newborn baby. A baby’s longing for milk is natural, instinctive, and consuming. A baby does not want an allowance, a video gaming system, or the keys to the car. A baby only wants milk. This is what it means to hunger and thirst for righteousness. Psalm 42:1-2 says, “As a deer pants for flowing streams, so pants my soul for you, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When shall I come and appear before God?”

A Comprehensive Desire for God. Hunger and thirst typically refer to a desire for a portion of a thing. This is the assumption with which we use these terms. A hungry person may want a big plate of food, not the whole prepared meal. A thirsty person may want a tall glass of water, not the entire supply of it. But in this beatitude, Jesus uses the terms comprehensively. 

• It is a desire for the whole, not just a part. 
• It is a desire for the fullness of it, not the portion of it.
• It is a desire for the total amount, not a limited amount. 

William Barclay translated it: “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for the whole of righteousness, for complete righteousness.” This beatitude rebukes half-hearted religion. If you can take or leave God, you might as well leave him because he will not be taken halfheartedly. Hunger and thirst cannot be covered, concealed, or categorized. The hungry cannot hide it. The thirsty have to tell it. 

Psalm 63:1-4 says, “O God, you are my God; earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you; my flesh faints for you, as in a dry and weary land where there is no water. So I have looked upon you in the sanctuary, beholding your power and glory. Because your steadfast love is better than life, my lips will praise you. So I will bless you as long as I live; in your name I will lift up my hands.”

A Continual Desire for God. The verbs are in a grammatical emphasis that denotes habitual action or continual activity: “Blessed are those who keep hungering and thirsting for righteousness.” This does not contradict the promise that they will be satisfied. It intensifies it. In John 4:13-14, Jesus says to the Woman at the Well, “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks of the water that I give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” This is the promise Jesus makes to all who come to him. 

John 6:35 says, “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst.” Jesus offers true, deep, and lasting satisfaction. The more he satisfies, the more we long for him. Philippians 3:10-11 says, “That I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead.” Paul was satisfied with Jesus. He was not satisfied with what he knew about Jesus. He continually longed to know Christ increasingly. Psalm 34:8 says, “Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good! Blessed is the man who takes refuge in him.”

Guaranteed Satisfaction

Matthew 5:6 says, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be satisfied.” Satisfied means “to fill.” It is the picture of a farmer feeding his herd until the animals no longer hunger or thirst. So those who hunger and thirst for righteousness will be satisfied. This is a divine passive. The hungry and thirsty are not satisfied automatically. God satisfies them. In Luke 1:53, Mary sings, “He has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich he has sent away empty.” Those who hunger and thirst for righteousness will be satisfied. The verb is in the present tense. God satisfies continually, perpetually, and unceasingly. This is the rich storehouse of divine resources. God’s pantry never runs low. God’s well never runs dry. John 1:16 says, “And from his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace.” 

• Immorality may gratify you, but it won’t last. 
• The nightlife may excite you, but it won’t last. 
• Strong drink may stimulate, but it won’t last. 
• Ungodly companions may please you, but it won’t last. 
• Foolishness may interest you, but it won’t last. 
• Filthy greediness may thrill you, but it won’t last. 
• Worldliness may satisfy you, but it won’t last. 

 Jesus says, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be satisfied.” The original is emphatic: “They, and only they, shall be satisfied.” Do not fill in the blanks. If you hunger and thirst for righteousness… 

• You may not be healed of your sickness. 
• You may not experience financial freedom. 
• You may not be promoted in your career. 
• You may not win friends and influence people. 
• Your marriage problems may not be resolved. 
• Your wayward child may not change their ways. 
• You may not have your goals and dreams fulfilled. 

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied with that for which they hunger and thirst: righteousness. This is a bold claim. This is a daring promise. This is a life-changing opportunity. This fourth beatitude strips us of excuses for our lack of spiritual health, growth, and fruit. You cannot blame parents, friends, enemies, preachers, or churches for your spiritual paralysis. If Matthew 5:6 is true, you are as close to God as you want to be. But if you hunger and thirst for righteousness, you will be genuinely and completely satisfied. 

In 2016, Wanda Dench sent a group-text invitation to her family, inviting them to Thanksgiving dinner. 17-year-old Jamal Hinton accepted the invitation. When Wanda later sent a picture of herself at work, the teenager discovered she was not his grandmother. This white grandmother had invited a black teenager to Thanksgiving dinner. When Jamal recognized the error, he texted Wanda to ask if he could still get a plate. She insisted the invitation stood, saying, “That’s what grandmas do… feed everyone.” The two went viral. It became a holiday tradition for their families to share Thanksgiving. 

God knows your name and number. He has extended an invitation for you to join salvation’s supper. It is not an accidental invitation. God has invited you on purpose. It is not for a holiday meal. It is an invitation to eternal life. You have sinned and fallen short of his glory. Yet there is room at the cross for you. The Lord is ready, willing, and able to satisfy the deep needs of your soul. It is what God does!