Satisfied in ONLY God - Matthew 5-7

Matthew 5:6 (ESV)

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

Matthew 5:20 (ESV)

For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.

Matthew 5:48 (ESV)

You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

Matthew 6:33 (ESV)

But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.

Is there any question in your mind of what God requires and is looking for regarding out walk in this world?  We have many hungers in our lives.  We hunger for significance.  We hunger for belonging.   We hunger for recognition.   We hunger for comfort.  We hunger for safety.  None of those hungers are wrong.  They may, in fact, be a natural outcome of being born in the image of God.   It is not the hunger that is wrong.  It is the resources we search for when attempting to satisfy the hunger.   We are going to have desires.   That is part of the human condition.    The struggle is that our desires attempt to satisfy themselves through wicked things and that turns everything upside down:

James 1:13-15 (ESV)

Let no one say when he is tempted, “I am being tempted by God,” for God cannot be tempted with evil, and he himself tempts no one. But each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire. Then desire when it has conceived gives birth to sin, and sin when it is fully grown brings forth death.

God wants us to desire Him and His righteousness.   He is SO wants us to desire His righteousness that He made a way for us to have it, for FREE!!

2 Corinthians 5:21 (ESV)

For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

God made Jesus sin for us so that we might have His righteousness.   Matthew, in this Sermon on the Mount, is telling us to desire that God has already so richly provided.   That should be our deepest and only desire.   That is the ONLY thing that will satisfy us.   

Proverbs 13:25 (ESV)

The righteous has enough to satisfy his appetite,

but the belly of the wicked suffers want.