Daily Devotional – Sept. 22, 2020

Trust things are going well. It hasn't been all that long ago, a little over well maybe a year and a half and my father who had Parkinson's disease in the first few months of 2019 started to deteriorate pretty rapidly and got to the place where he had to get put in an assisted living facility and when he first went in there in the assisted living place he was he was doing pretty well and one of the things that he really liked was dinner and the mealtime.

They had good food, he really appreciated it and so forth. Well, had a trend, had a little episode and it caused him to lose some of his quite a bit of his mobility and they had to trans, we had to transition him from the assisted living part of the of the place, the unit, the facility to really just like a nursing home kind of care, skilled nursing care and he didn't like that very well and I got him set up in there and went to see him after he got situated in his new room and I saw a tray and had food on it.

I said, what are you eating dad? Nothing. Why not? What you need to eat? I don't want anything, not hungry, don't want it, you know. And in talking to the nurses and so forth that was a pretty standard response every time food was brought.

He didn't want it, didn't want it, had no appetite. Have you had one of those seasons of life lasted maybe a couple of days or maybe a few months where you simply had no appetite? Well, I'm sure somebody noticed and if they did or maybe you actually shared with others that you know you just just didn't have any appetite.

Maybe you went to your doctor and told him you didn't have an appetite. What's the first question that they're gonna ask? It's gonna be something like, what's wrong? What's going on? Right? Because they recognize that if you don't have an appetite when you should then there's something something else wrong.

The lack of an appetite is a symptom. It's a symptom of a deeper problem and that could be something like fear. It could be some overwhelming fear that is so consuming you that you don't even want to eat.

Or maybe anxiety. Perhaps sorrow or grief. Just so stricken with with grief. Perhaps there's an underlying physical illness. Like in my dad's case, I come to find out part of the problem with his lack of appetite, you know, the Parkinson affected his you know affected his taste some and his ability to swallow and he just didn't want to just want to deal with it.

So the physical illness. Or perhaps an intense conflict. You're at loggerheads with somebody and that that conflict is just a constant source of a constant source of stress in your within you that you just don't have any appetite for food.

You don't want to eat. Well, what's true with your physical appetite is also true of your spiritual appetite. John Owen put it this way. He said, the loss of spiritual appetite is an evidence of the decay of all other graces.

And what Owen is getting at is if your spiritual appetite isn't healthy, that indicates a deeper problem. That lack of a spiritual appetite is merely a symptom of a deeper problem. Well, in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus began with the Beatitudes.

You remember those? The blessed are statements? Well, the fourth one, the fourth beatitude in that list reads this way. Jesus said, blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.

So how's your appetite for righteousness? If your appetite for righteousness is, you know, waning, something else is wrong. Something else is awry. That is, if you're feeling rather indifferent about living life as God prescribes it in His Word, or perhaps you really don't even care to find out how God prescribes life and how it is to be lived in His Word, you really don't have a appetite to find out what He has to say about what pleases Him, what He likes.

Well, if that's the case, then there's a serious lack of other graces. And frankly, you know, we can look right there in the Beatitudes, and you can see some of the other graces where Jesus says, blessed are the, you know, blessed are the poor in spirit, and so forth.

So looking at those surrounding Beatitudes, you can see some areas where if you don't have a hunger for righteousness, you're probably lacking also in these other areas, these other graces, these other things that the Beatitudes touch on.

For example, no hunger or thirst after righteousness means you probably don't have any poverty of spirit. You're not seeing yourself as impoverished in your spirit before God. And I'm pretty confident that there would be no mourning, sorrow over sin and its effects in your life, or in the life of somebody else that you're affecting.

You don't hunger or thirst after righteousness, I'm pretty confident also that you're not humbling yourself before God. And if you have no hunger or thirst after righteousness, your relationship with other people is probably wanting.

That is, you probably have a lack of mercy that you show toward others. Probably have an impure heart, insincere, duplicitous. And what about conflict? You know, he says, blessed are the peacemakers. If you're in conflict with others and, you know, could care less about it, and doing nothing to make peace, well, that's one of those graces that you're lacking that is underlying the lack of hunger or thirsting after righteousness.

Now, I realize if you're listening to this today that most of those things are probably not true of you, and that there is at least some degree of hunger after, you know, what God has to say. Otherwise, why would you be listening to this?

Why would you be paying any attention to some guy, you know, providing a devotional? Well, I commend you for that appetite, and I just pray and trust that this time that you spend these few minutes just watching a devotional broadcast every day would help to stimulate that appetite all the more.

I hope you have a healthy hunger, and may these times where we look at just a simple idea in God's Word that encourages us in our Christian walk, may those things just increase that hunger and feed it.

So, let's pray today and ask God just to give us a greater hunger and thirst for righteousness. So, our Father and our God, we do realize that our appetite is a symptom of underlying things, and I pray as we consider this question today about our spiritual appetite that we could honestly look at our lives and look at what we want and what we're after in life and be able to discern just how hungry we are, hungry for the things of the Lord, hunger for righteousness, and I pray that you would deepen that hunger and that we would find satisfaction.

Your Word promises those who hunger and thirst after righteousness will be satisfied, and may we find our appetite satisfied on a daily basis, and may it return every day that we might have it satisfied every day, and so this we pray in Jesus' name, Amen.

All right, well, I trust the Lord will bless you today with some good food, spiritual food, and have your hunger return again tomorrow. Well, God bless you. Have a good Tuesday.