I get hungry and thirsty a lot…but for righteousness?

Pete Alwinson:
I get hungry and thirsty a lot… but for righteousness? We’ll talk about it, on Key Life.

Matthew Porter:
This is Key Life. We’re here to let you know that because of what Jesus has done, God will never be angry at you again. Steve invited our friend, Pete Alwinson to do the teaching this week. Pete is a former pastor, founder of ForgeTruth.com and the author of Like Father Like Son.

Pete Alwinson:
Thank you Matthew. And welcome to Key Life. Happy Monday. I hope you had a great week-end and that your pastor’s sermon was as good as mine. What a privilege it is to go to church and hear God’s holy word and worship with his people. Well listen, this week we’re going to be jumping into this whole idea of hungering and thirsting for righteousness and looking at some other Beatitudes. But before we do that, why don’t we bow our heads and our hearts and pray. Our great God, what a privilege it is to come into your presence today, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. We thank you for the worship that took place this week-end. We thank you for our pastors, our worship leaders and all those that stand before us and lead us into your presence. We thank you for those that took care of our kids in the nursery and those that taught Sunday school and other classes. Lord, we thank you for your body, the body of Christ. And Lord, we thank you for the gospel that is ours, it’s such a great salvation. And we just pray that as we look at the word of God today, that you would free us, that you would open our hearts and that Lord, you would really be with the one who teaches. And so, we pray that you would forgive his sins and Lord that you would use one who has finite to communicate your infinite truth, because we have come here to see you and you only. We pray in Jesus’ name. Amen. Well, it is a privilege to be with you again and always to look with you in God’s word and to focus on how grace, how grace changes everything in our lives. As we look at the Beatitudes, it’s important to remember that really this is Jesus’ Kingdom Manifesto. It’s his saying as he comes as the King of the universe, this is the way you used to think about living, but now I want to tell you the right way to live. And so, in the Beatitudes, which is really his eight point introduction to the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus is giving us his vision for new life in him and how life ought to be lived. But as we’ve seen already, and we’ll see again, it really is a life that we cannot live by ourselves. And that’s true in this Beatitude here, Matthew 5:6.

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.

Now I want you to know that I love to eat. I love to eat all kinds of food. I love red meat. I love to eat, I love food. And so, I love to eat. I love to drink. I mean, I love food, but Jesus says that we’re really, really happy when we hunger and thirst for righteousness. And his promise is that we’ll be satisfied. Now it’s important to understand that this builds on the Beatitudes that come before. So, when he says.

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness.

He’s already taught that if we’re poor in spirit, we’ve come to God saying, I need you, that we mourn over our own sins, that we know we don’t have what it takes to be righteous. And therefore we’re meek before God, we want to follow God’s ways. And so, all of those three works of grace, work of the Holy Spirit then lead us to become those that hunger and thirst for righteousness. I want you to know that I didn’t wake up this morning and say, as a Christian, Hey, today’s a great day to fail. Or I’d love to be a mediocre Christian. No, you know, none of us wakes, if you’re really a follower of Christ, when you wake up, when you start your day, you want to be what God wants you to be, because you’re so thankful for all that he’s done in your life. It is grace that energizes godliness. We’re not on this moralistic thing, but it’s important to understand that with the work of the Holy Spirit in our life, we do come to hunger and thirst for righteousness. You may have heard about Winston Churchill, who was an inveterate Scotch drinker and cigar smoker. One time he said to the Saudi king, who was a good Muslim and wouldn’t touch alcohol, he said.

My rule of life prescribed as an absolutely sacred right, smoking cigars and also the drinking of alcohol before, after and if need be during all meals and in the interval between them.

Goodnight. He was hungry and thirsting for other things, but Jesus says we hunger and thirst for righteousness. Now, simple and straightforward, what does this teach? Well, it simply teaches, that we are hungry for Jesus to come back and bring his Supremely righteous power onto the earth. We don’t need to over-complicate this, those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, hunger and thirst for righteousness to be seen in this world. We look around and we see so much that is simply not right, but we want that righteousness to be seen in government, in education, in every area of life. And we’re happy when we’re righteous personally as well. Did you know, this is a major scene, a theme of Psalms, listen to Psalm 107:9.

He has satisfied the thirsty soul and he has filled the hungry soul with what is good.

And then Psalm 34:10.

The young lions do without and suffer hunger, but they who seek the Lord will not lack any good thing.

We as God’s people who hunger and thirst for righteousness, hunger for his way in our life, for his kingdom way in our life right now, even before it’s instituted in the end times. At the end of the book of Revelation, there’s this great line that says.

Come Lord Jesus.

Maranatha, in the 1970s, that was a big watch word for a type of music that came on. Maranatha music, which was the music of the Jesus people, the comeback Lord Jesus type of music. But, this text teaches us to hunger and thirst for what is coming, even now, because it is his righteousness that fills us and fills us with every good thing. I love the clip a friend sent me of Ernie Johnson, the other day. Ernie Johnson was with TNT Sports, still is, I guess, has been for 32 years. And he went to speak to the Alabama football team and he talked about how he came home from work one day and his wife said, honey, we’re going to adopt a child from Eastern Europe. And he said, well, look, we’re following the script. I mean, we have two children already, we have a job and we’re following the script. And she said, well, we’re adopting the child from Eastern Europe. And they did. And when they got this little boy, the one they picked out, the orphanage worker in Eastern Europe said, don’t take this boy, he’s bad. Turns out this boy had multiple sclerosis and they brought him home and they developed him and he has all kinds of physical issues, but they’ve poured into his life and they’ve developed him and he became in his wheelchair, a motivating force for local sports teams. And apparently he’s just an incredible kid. And Ernie Johnson’s point was don’t follow the script of the world. Oh, and I love that. I love that. You see, as Christians who will hunger and thirst for righteousness and not follow the script of the world, because those who are following the script of the world are doing things so much their way that they’re missing out on the blessings of God.

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be satisfied.

That’s another way of saying, do things God’s way and you will be blessed. I love it. And I found that to be true in my life. I have found it so to be true, that whenever I go my own way and try to make my own way work, it doesn’t. But when I understand God’s will, when I crave righteousness and when I grow for a salvation, in salvation and for sanctification, it makes every bit of difference in my life. How do we hunger and thirst for righteousness? How do we fuel this? Well, number one, fuel hunger and thirst for righteousness by getting up before you normally do, then do what I do. I spend time in what I call my daily appointment with God, it’s my dog. And as Chuck Swindoll said one time.

Two types of people exist in the morning, springers and sleepers.

And I’m a sleeper. I wake up, press the coffee pot, get it going. And with my Holy cup of Java begin to think about who I am in Christ. And I begin to say, Hey, I am God’s deeply beloved and redeemed son. Voice establishing my identity in the morning is crucial. Remembering who I am and when I remember who I am, that leads me to desire, to live the way my Father wants me to live, to hunger and thirst after righteousness, because I remember who I am. And then I don’t have to go out into the world to find my identity. I don’t have to go out and try to prove who I am, because I can remember who I am as God’s deeply beloved and redeemed son. You take it to heart.

Matthew Porter:
Thank you Pete. That was our friend, Pete Alwinson teaching us today from the Beatitudes, the introduction to the Sermon on the Mount. And great news. Pete will be with us throughout the rest of this week. So, be sure to join us again, starting tomorrow. There’s a good chance, you know the name Philip Yancey, but there’s an equally good chance, you don’t know his amazing story. Recently, Philip joined us on Steve Brown Etc. And wow. He had some powerful stories to share with us about the journey that led him to God. We put that entire conversation on a CD, and if it’s okay with you, we’ll mail it to you, for free. Just let us know where to send it, by calling us at 1-800-KEY-LIFE. That’s 1-800-539-5433. You can also e-mail [email protected] to ask for that CD. If you’d like to mail your request, send it to

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