As the deer pants for streams of water, so pants my soul for You, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. Psalms 42:1,2
It’s likely that all Christians struggle at times with their spiritual appetites. We know they aren’t what they once were, or what they might be, or we look at other believers who are hungering and thirsting for the presence of God and wonder what’s wrong with us.
Many have never experienced a hunger for God in any tangible way; some even teach that such a hunger doesn’t exist once we’re saved in the first place. “Once Jesus lives in you,” they teach, “you have all of Jesus there is to have.” While that is true in one sense, it doesn’t mean we live in an experience of all of Jesus that He wants to reveal to us.
Spiritual hunger is not something unusual that is reserved for only a few impassioned believers; the normal state of a Christian is to be thirsty and hungry for God. He “satisfies the thirsty and fills the hungry with good things” (Ps 107:9). All we need is to be thirsty and hungry.
Song of Songs presents a parable where Jesus lays a banquet of His presence before us. And if we’re not feasting out at that banquet it’s usually because either we’re sick—or we’ve been snacking on something else.
The most common spiritual “sicknesses” are unbelief and unforgiveness. “Without faith it is impossible to please (God), for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him” (Heb. 11:6). Most of us believe that God exists, but if we don’t really believe that He will respond to our pursuit of Him with a greater experience of Himself, we are likely to be half-hearted seekers.
Unforgiveness not only dampens our hunger but also puts us in a very precarious position with God (Matt 6:14,15). It is unlikely that we will even try to draw close to God when we know there is unforgiveness in our lives.
Unbelief and unforgiveness are two spiritual common sicknesses take the edge off our hunger and keep us at a distance from God. If we suspect that some form of spiritual sickness is interfering with our hunger for God, we shouldn’t feel condemned. Instead we need to cry out with the psalmist, “Search me, O God, and know my heart; try me…and see if there is any wicked way in me” (Ps 139:23). This invites the Holy Spirit to reveal the sin and revitalize our hunger for God.
Next time we’ll talk about the problem of coming to Jesus banquet with a full stomach.