Wait For It. . .Blessed Are Those Who Hunger Now

“Blessed are you who hunger now, for you will be satisfied. Woe to you who are well fed now, for you will go hungry. . . Woe to you who laugh now, for you will mourn and weep” Luke 6: 21, 25.

I believe one reason Jesus blessed those who are hungry and weep now has to do with sin and temptation. Because when we resist temptation to sin (which is to resist the temptation to meet our own needs and take care of ourselves), we will have unmet needs and be uncomfortable now.

Sin is always an illegitimate attempt to meet a legitimate need. To read the Luke 6 version of the beatitudes, click here.

Blessed are Those Who Hunger Now

And He pronounced woe upon those who are well-fed and laugh now because only sin provides immediate gratification. God’s blessing comes by faith and patience. This means we must wait for it.

Almost anything important that we receive immediately or now is ill-gotten gain. This is the great lure of sin. If we yield to it, we will get what we want. We will get our needs met now. We won’t have to wait.

But little do we know that it’s temporary. “An inheritance gained hurriedly at the beginning will not be blessed in the end” Proverbs 20:21.

On the other hand, when we resist temptation to get what we want and need by sinning, we are then forced to trust in and wait for God. To meet our needs. To take care of us. And He requires that we exercise faith and patience to inherit the promises.

That means we must wait. And while we’re waiting, we will be uncomfortable, maybe even in pain. Because our needs will be unmet. And it will seem like we’ve been abandoned rather then taken care of while we wait.

But we can still have peace and joy in the promise while we wait for its fulfillment. But that is living by faith. And this does not come easily or naturally to us mortals.

So, I don’t think these verses are saying woe to him who has his needs met and is happy. Rather, woe to him who insists on getting them met immediately by looking to sin rather than God.

Jesus predicts that those who are well fed and laugh now will mourn and weep. This is because sin provides immediate but temporary gratification.

Short Term Pleasure over Long Term Happiness

Every time we choose sin over righteousness, we are choosing short term comfort/pleasure over long term happiness. Because in order to be happy in the long run, we must be emotionally healthy. And in order to get and stay healthy, we must resist temptation and say no to sin.

Choosing sin makes us progressively more unhealthy. And since we must be healthy to be happy, progressively unhappy as well.

The broad path is pleasant and comfortable now, but its destination is misery (Mathew 7: 13,14). Those who choose this path are well fed and laugh now but will mourn and weep later.

The narrow path, on the other hand, literally means the path of affliction, trouble and suffering tribulation (Vine’s Expository Dictionary of the NT).

But its destination is glory. Those who choose this path are hungry and weep now but will be blessed later.

The Israelites had to spend time in the wilderness after they left Egypt. And before they could enter the promise land. And they were blessed as long as they were hungry and wept in their unmet need.

They were on their way to the promise, a land flowing with milk and honey. The envy of all lands on the face of the earth.

As long as they were on that narrow path of affliction, trouble and suffering tribulation, they were on the path to glory.

But as soon as they insisted on getting what they wanted and needed now, refusing to wait for the fulfillment of the promise, they had woe. And their bodies fell in the wilderness. Blessed are those who hunger now.

Looking Back Instead of Ahead

You see, the Israelites weren’t satisfied with the manna God was providing from heaven. They wanted meat instead. And they wanted it now. The thing is, once they got to the promise land, they would have all the meat they wanted for the rest of their lives.

Deuteronomy 12:20 tells us “when the LORD your God has enlarged your territory as he promised you, and you crave meat and say, ‘I would like some meat,’ then you may eat as much of it as you want.”

The only thing God required of them is that they trust in and wait for Him to supply it. Instead, they insisted on having meat now.

Rather than trusting in and waiting for God to meet their need and take care of them, they “became like those who complain of adversity in the hearing of the Lord” Numbers 11:1. They had “greedy desires” and said “who will give us meat to eat?”

Instead of looking ahead to the abundant meat God would give them once they got to the promise land, they looked back to their life in Egypt with apparent fondness.

“We remember the fish we used to eat free in Egypt, the cucumbers and the melons and the leeks and the onions, but now our appetite is gone” Numbers 11: 5, 6a.

As a result of their greed and refusal to trust, God gave them their desire now, but they weren’t able to enjoy it for long.

“While the meat was still between their teeth, before it was chewed, the anger of the Lord kindled against the people, and the Lord struck the people with a very severe plague” Numbers 11:33.

The blessing was immediate or now, but temporary. Blessed are those who hunger now.

God Wanted Adam and Eve to Wait for it

Adam and Eve did the same thing. I believe God had every intention of allowing them to partake of the tree of knowledge of good and evil or wisdom. But they had to resist the temptation to eat it before they were ready.

Before they had gained endurance in doing what’s right. Before they had become mature. But, of course, this is a process. And any process requires time. And faith and patience. It’s only by faith and patience that we inherit the promises.

Instead, they insisted on having the rewards of wisdom now, before they had done the hard work to become wise. “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom” Proverbs 9: 10. Consequently, they received immediate but temporary gratification.

Had they resisted the temptation and gone through the process of maturation, they would’ve had to wait for their reward- to partake of the fruit. But it would’ve been permanent. They wouldn’t have had to leave the garden. They could’ve enjoyed that fruit every day of their eternal lives.

Here’s why I believe the fruit represents the rewards of wisdom. Proverbs 3: 16 describes the rewards of wisdom this way: “Long life is in her right hand; in her left hand are riches and honor”.

These correlate loosely with the characteristics of the fruit. It was good for food (long life), pleasant to the eye (wealth) and could make one wise (honor).

The reason I believe God was going to eventually allow them to partake of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil or wisdom is that it’s God’s will for His children to be wise. That’s His ultimate goal for us.

But it’s not something we attain immediately. We get it progressively as we fear God by resisting temptation. And as we wait. By faith and patience, we inherit the promises.

For similar posts to Wait For It. . .Blessed Are Those Who Hunger Now, see I Don’t Feel Blessed When I’m Poor in Spirit or The Afflictions (Opportunities) of the Righteous.

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