Listen To Those Hunger Pains

Text:

Matt. 5:6

Is anyone hungry tonight? (ask your neighbor)  

I’m the only thing that stands between your hunger and Pizza Hut or McDonalds.

Hunger is a gift.  God put it into our system when he made us.

It compels us to eat so our body can be nourished and energy gained from the food.

Hunger is like a warning sign, when your body says “hello, its time to feed me”

To us, not only do we have to eat to live but we enjoy eating!!!!

Last week, when the Methodist invited us all to dinner, someone must have told them how Pentecostals love to eat because they had lots of food waiting for us.

I enjoy the taste of food! Wouldn’t eating be boring if you had no taste buds!

Your tongue tells you if something is sweet or sour.

You can ask my wife, my tongue gets confused sometimes what is sweet and sour.

My taste buds get mixed up!

*I’ll eat something and say “man that sure is sour and she says, sour, that’s as sweet as you can get”  (vice versa)

My day starts out with usually eating a bowl of cereal and two cups of coffee.

Then I get so busy during the day that I usually don’t eat any lunch so around 4pm, I start getting a headache, that reminds me to eat.

I go home around 5-6pm and eat and the headache goes away and the hunger pains stop for awhile.

Hunger starts out with a little nudge, then a rumbling and then it kind of slaps you in the Face.   The American Medical Assoc. says the normal person can live 9-10 wks w/o before they die.  I guess I’m not normal!!!

·        In 1932 when famine struck Russia a peasant said “We’ve eaten everything we could lay our hands on – cats, dogs, mice, birds, the bark off trees and sorted thru horse manure for the grains in it.”

·        In 70ad When Rome surrounded Jerusalem and besieged the city. People got so hungry they ate their own children and shoe leather.

When you get really hungry, you’ll eat whatever you can find!!!

Interesting though, if you ignore the pangs of hunger, they will go away.

You may be weak, tired and about to die but the pain of hunger will cease.

*Dangerous to keep saying NO to God because after awhile we will forget what his voice sounds like that’s telling us to eat from his spiritual table.

Someone once asked after they experienced God “Pastor, considering my background and how far God has brought me from, why would anyone ever leave God”

(answer)

I believe physical and spiritual hunger have something in common.  If you don’t feed it, if you don’t give it attention when its asking, it will eventually go away.

-that’s how someone can come to church for yrs and keep saying no to God, because they’ve refused to eat spiritually for so long, they no longer feel the hunger pains of conviction.

-they can sit in Gods house wk after wk and hear the preacher preach and altar call after altar call, just refuse to eat what the Lord is trying to fed them. Never come to altar.

-they leave service after service w/o receiving what God had for them.

You can only say No to God so long and then the hunger pains go away!

If you’re here tonight and haven’t been baptized or received the HG, don’t put it off any longer. The more you tell God, that you’re not hungry, the harder it gets for you to pray and come to an altar.

*If you hear what I’m saying!

*If you want to be saved, you still can tonight

Just as my natural man needs natural food, my spiritual man needs the Spirit of God.

If I don’t listen to that spiritual man crying out for more of God, it will eventually become weak and almost unnoticed.

Rom. 8:5-9 (Read)  It’s a wrestling match between two forces.

Voice of your flesh vs. Voice of the Spirit.   Both want your attention!!!

Living in the same house, whichever one you listen to the most, the other will be pushed into the closet and forgotten.

It’s almost like two brothers that don’t get along.

It’s like we have both Cain and Abel inside of us.

o   Cain is always mad at Abel.

o   Cain will kill Abel if you let him.

o   It’s our responsibility to control the carnal Cain w/I us.

o   Cain will never offer us the correct praise and sacrifices to God

o   Cain wants to do things his way.

But the Abel in us knows what God wants and we have to let him loose.

Gal. 6:8 “For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption, but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap everlasting life”

This pastor is concerned about those tonight that keep saying No to God and keep putting God on hold.

We must Listen to those Sp. Hunger pains before its too late because God is going to call us all home to the Heaven where we can eat at the Marriage supper of the Lamb.

*******************************************

How many of your ladies collect recipe books?

You’re always trying something new and different.

I love my wife’s cooking. I’d rather eat her cooking than any restaurant.

She tries new stuff on me now and then. She keeps surprising me.

I had an aunt that cooked the same thing every week.

Monday night was spaghetti, Tuesday night was meat and potatoes, Wed. was Chili etc. (you knew what you were getting for supper when you visited her)

That may be boring physically but it’s not so bad concerning your salvation!

The recipe for your salvation tonight is Acts 2:38 (read)

You should know whether you’re saved or not.

You aren’t 500 diff. recipes to get to Heaven folks!

Bible says: “One Lord, one faith and one baptism”

When you receive the Hg, its just like it got served 2,000 yrs ago.

You speak in tongues just like everyone else does.

You get baptized in Jesus Name just like everyone did.

“Jesus is the same yesterday, today and forever”

*****************************************

Are you felling Hungry for more of God yet?

“Blessed are those (that means you will blessed) which do hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they shall filled”

Some people convince themselves they have to get everything right in their life before they come to God. Consecutively, they never make a move or they stop somewhere along the line.  –Good news for you tonight! It’s OK to “snack” ahead of time with God.

-It’s OK to lick the icing off his cake before its cut.

-Its alright to eat a little bit before the main meal with God.

-It won’t ruin your supper.

We’ve all got things we’re working on in our life, don’t let those things keep you from serving the Lord.

Repent and get baptized and let God help you with the rest!

Go ahead and get the HG even though you aren’t perfect.  (God doesn’t save perfect people, he saves sinners and makes saints out of them)

If you feel hungry, eat a little bit!   Try it out ! Bible: “Taste and see that the Lord is good.”

We went over to the Boat House to eat a couple weeks ago for a special occasion and the waitress asked if we wanted to try their soup before we ordered.

-Did I say: “I know I can’t eat anything until the whole meal is cooked and ready to be served?”  Bring it on!!!!

She knew what she was doing! It was wonderful and most of us ordered it as an appetizer. We had appetizers before the main meal!

You can have God before everything is right in your life.

In fact, you need God, to get things right!!!

************************************************

It’s fundamental for all “godly living” people to hunger and thirst after more of God.

You can go to the cookie jar anytime with the Lord.

I love Swan Ice Cream. My wife will order some ice cream and put it in the freezer.

Well, I get a little bit here and there for a few weeks and then when I’m scooping out the last little bit, she says: “I didn’t’ get any of that”. (Who’s fault is that- not mine!) (It was there for the taking!)

Your spiritual condition depends on how hungry you are and how often you feed that hunger.

David : “As the deer panteth after the water brook, so panteth my soul after thee oh God”

There are times that I’m physically not hungry but when I walk into the house and smell something cooking, it sparks my hunger!!

-Ever been somewhere where they just start talking about a certain type of food,

and the conversation made you crave that food.

-the smell and the talk made the hunger mechanism kick in

I’m hoping tonight that this sermon is doing the same thing to us all tonight.

God is stirring the hearts of men for hunger recently.

Since 9-11, church attendance is up. Back sliders are coming back to God.

Saints are on fire and out winning souls.

Romans “For as many as are led by the spirit, they are the sons of God…whereby we cry

Abba Father… and we are the children of God.”

******************************************

(Everyone to say) “I’m not a P.O.W.”      Stands for “Prisoner of War”

I’m a child of God!

During war times, the Geneva Convention rules say that a prisoner must get fed at least 3 times per wk.  That’s not much!!!  Just enough to keep you barely alive!

-don’t think right , your judgement isn’t good, slowly starving to death

We need to quit living on a POW diet of only three meals a week at church and begin to learn how to cook for yourself.

-Sunday morning, Sun. evening and Thurs. night isn’t enough to grow in God.

-its not enough just for the preacher to cook the food all the time.

Its not the will of God that people only eat when at church and what is served.

We need to be so hungry for God, that we prepare some food at home in our own prayer time and devotions during the week.

We need to come to church and gather together! Church is like the “all you can eat” occasion but you’ve got to have your own walk with God outside of this sp. kitchen.

What would happen if everyone came to church with something they cooked during the wk? If everyone had something to offer instead of only showing up so they can just survive?  It would be like a “Spiritual Potluck”.

God gives us some much at church that he even gives us “doggy bags” to take some home!        -but you can’t depend on leftovers all week.

-you’ve got to some of your own cookin in the Word.

Deut. 8:3 “…man shall not live by bread only but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of the Lord…”

Is. 55:10   God tells us his word is like bread to the eater and “so shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth, it shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please and it shall prosper…”

John 6:35  Jesus said “I am the bread of life…”

*************************************

If you’re frustrated in your walk with God, its because you’ve got the two forces working in your life together.

 

What would happen if we told our flesh “Godliness with contentment is great gain”?

“          “          “          “          “          “   “I’m going to seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness”?

Closing:

Tonight over in the Middle East, a war is going on!

Jews and Arabs are killing each other and how knows the outcome?

It all stems back to Abraham having two sons by two diff. women. Ishmael and Isaac!

They both claim to have the same Father and are fighting over the same land.

They cannot co-exist with one another for very long w/o friction.

There comes a time that one will have to kick the other one out.

If you’re going to get what God has for you, you’re going to have to send the “flesh packing”.

Just like Abe send Ishmael into the dessert, you’re going to have to tell the flesh to “take a hike”.

God put a hunger in everyone of us that has to be met.

If the hunger pains aren’t heeded, then we will eventually die spiritually.

The world is trying to met that hunger with drugs , alcohol, nicotine and immorality.

They’ll eat anything they can get their hands on just to satisfy the hunger pains in their soul.

They get so busy making a living, working jobs and doing hobbies that they don’t stop to eat at the Lord table and it catches up with them soon enough.

*Only Jesus can satisfy your soul

You can’t just live at the edge of Gods table, you have to “belly up” and dig in.