THE HUNGER THAT DRIVES THE SOUL TOWARDS CHRIST
A Sunday Message
NO SENSE OF HUNGER
It is quite intriguing how in severe illness, we lose the appetite for food. Eating is no longer appealing to the seriously sick. The problem is not the food, but the body’s anomalous condition. The trouble is not external but within.
However, when our health is restored, the appetite recovers. The unappealing bread becomes enticing when wellness returns. The food looks delightful again when the sense of natural hunger returns. Craving replaces repulsion on eating and hunger supplants revulsion on food.
If a sick person has an aversion to food, imagine the incapability of a lifeless man to have natural cravings. The Apostle Paul revealed the spiritual state of an unbeliever when he said,
And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world… (Ephesians 2:1)
In his natural state, man has no cravings for the things of God. They are not desirable and delightful to him. He may affirm their veracities and even subscribe to the creeds, but he does not possess a genuine hunger for spiritual realities. The Scripture confirms this in the Apostle Paul’s writings.
“None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God. (Romans 3:10-11)
The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned. (1 Corinthians 2:14)
It is not surprising that when the Lord spoke about Himself as God’s spiritual provision for eternal life, they find it explicitly unappealing. This lack of spiritual craving exposes a deep and serious spiritual malady. Their evident lack of spiritual hunger betrays an absence of spiritual life.
By proclaiming that He is the Manna from heaven, the Lord reveals how He is heaven’s provision for our eternal and spiritual deprivation. He said,
As the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so whoever feeds on me, he also will live because of me. This is the bread that came down from heaven, not like the bread the fathers ate and died. Whoever feeds on this bread will live forever.” (John 6:57-58)
THE LORD JESUS PROVIDES LIFE AND EXPOSES THOSE WHO DO NOT POSSESS IT
It is humanly impossible to raise a dead man from the grave. It is equally inconceivable to produce spiritual life within ourselves nor to anyone else.
No religion can do it. No pastor, priest, nor prophet can accomplish it. No good work and meritorious living can produce it.
Only God can achieve it. The Father has chosen the Son to accomplish it according to His will.
The Son brings forth this spiritual life in the soul of man through the power of His words and the work of the Holy Spirit. Jesus said,
It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh is no help at all. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. (John 6:63)
The Apostle Peter confirms,
Since you have been born again, not of perishable seed but of imperishable, through the living and abiding word of God. (1 Peter 1:23)
Unfortunately, not everyone receives this life because only the spiritually hungry have the cravings to receive it. The desperate yearning for Jesus Christ, the Eternal Life from heaven, is the result of an earnest spiritual hunger that persist within a believer’s inner being.
Remember this, if there is no life, there will be no hunger. A spiritually dead man can never be spiritually hungry nor find the things of God spiritually palatable. Not only will he not, but he cannot.
Anyone who thinks that the words of Jesus are distasteful and His offer of divine life unappealing is revealing not just a lack of faith but exposing an absence of life in the spirit.
Those who do not have the life of Christ within, do not possess eternal life.
In reality, their unbelief is the evidence of this reality. Jesus knows this about them even from the beginning. He tells the unbelieving crowd,
But there are some of you who do not believe.” (For Jesus knew from the beginning who those were who did not believe, and who it was who would betray him.) (John 6:64)
A LACK OF SPIRITUAL HUNGER REVEALS AN ABSENCE OF SPIRITUAL LIFE
God is never surprised nor stupefied when a person rejects His Son Jesus. This is because God is absolutely sovereign in all things “who works all things according to the counsel of his will. (Ephesians 1:11)
To reject Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior is an unmitigated admission that the heart has no real need of Him. The ‘self-sufficient’ man is choosing freely in conformity to his lack of desire and absence of hunger within the soul.
A man will not come to Christ because of his own perception of adequacy. Doing so will be utterly incompatible, dishonest and unnatural to his belief and conviction. He denies the Savior because he cannot deny himself.
Unless God the Father produces spiritual life within him, he will not sense a craving to come to Christ as he perceives and receives Him as the Manna from heaven. There is no hunger in the absence of life.
Jesus explicitly revealed this when He said,
“This is why I told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted him by the Father.” (John 6:65)
KNOWING JESUS CHRIST WILL EITHER REPEL OR ATTRACT THE HEART
The divine revelation of the Christ and the exposition of His teachings will either drive away or draw the soul towards Him. The Lord Jesus Christ will either produce revulsion or fascination from the heart.
Any believer who shares the glory and the gospel of Jesus Christ will either see rejection or reception from the hearers. The message is the same, but the responses are not because the difference lies within the hearts of hearers.
Many follow Jesus Christ because they are drawn to Him by selfish expectations. Unfortunately, the moment He reveals Himself for who He really is and speaks the eternal words of God, they choose to turn back out of desperation. They decide not to walk with Him anymore.
Remarkably, according to the Lord, this is proof that the Father has not granted them to come to Him.
After this many of his disciples turned back and no longer walked with him. (John 6:66)
The very One who breaks some hearts into repentance and faith, is the same One who offended others into rejection.
DO YOU SENSE THE HUNGER FOR GOD?
The Redeemer said,
“Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. Go and learn what this means, ‘I desire mercy, and not sacrifice.’
For I came not to call the righteous, but sinners.” (Matthew 9:12-13)
In the unregenerate condition, everyone is spiritually sick in this world, but many do not know this. Most will not recognize it. However, those who see the true deplorable condition of the heart will be hungry enough to run towards Christ Jesus.
They recognize that He is Savior and Lord, who came to live and die on the cross for their redemption and restore them for God’s glory in eternity.
He revives their souls, imparts His life, removes the curse and reign of sin over their lives. The Spirit’s work of healing and restoration manifest. The Scripture reveals that this desperate decision to come in sincere faith to Christ is proof that they have been drawn by the Father and chosen from the beginning.
The invitation still stands,
The Spirit and the Bride say, “Come.” And let the one who hears say, “Come.” And let the one who is thirsty come; let the one who desires take the water of life without price. (Revelation 22:17)
Let the one who is thirsty come to the Lord and Redeemer, Jesus Christ, the Son of God.
Pastor Jay-R Remorosa