Luke 6:21a, 25a (3)

Introduction:

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-We’re going to be back in Luke 6 this morning if you’d like to follow along.

Last Week, we looked at:

The “Blessedness of Poverty”

The dangers of wealth.

Today, we’re going to be looking at:

The “Blessedness of Hunger” . . .

And the dangers of present satisfaction.

I had originally wanted to cover:

Both Beatitudes in verse 21

Both Warnings in verse 25...

…in one setting.

But after working through the first...

…I realized that we simply wouldn’t have time for the second.

Because like last week...

There is a lot of Bible on this subject.

It is another over-arching, foundational precept.

-We’re going to begin by reading the whole list again, so...

…we can be reminded of the broader context.

We’ll begin in verse 20:

Luke 6:20–26 (ESV)

20 And he lifted up his eyes on his disciples, and said: “Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God.

21 “Blessed are you who are hungry now, for you shall be satisfied. “Blessed are you who weep now, for you shall laugh.

22 “Blessed are you when people hate you and when they exclude you and revile you and spurn your name as evil, on account of the Son of Man!

23 Rejoice in that day, and leap for joy, for behold, your reward is great in heaven; for so their fathers did to the prophets.

24 “But woe to you who are rich, for you have received your consolation.

25 “Woe to you who are full now, for you shall be hungry. “Woe to you who laugh now, for you shall mourn and weep.

26 “Woe to you, when all people speak well of you, for so their fathers did to the false prophets.

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Pray

(4 minutes)

Verse 21:

Our verses this morning are very similar...

...to the ones we examined last week.

For instance:

They both describe a seemingly awful physical condition....

…in terms of happiness, joy, and blessing.

In that sense, They’re both:

Counter-intuitive

Counter-cultural

-They both:

Have the same tense relationship to Matthew’s account.

(i.e., the tension between the language of the physical and the spiritual)

-On top of all that...

...They both employ imagery...

…that occurs throughout the Bible.

But, where these similarities become unavoidably repetitive...

…we need to take that as an indicator that what the Holy Spirit...

…intended to convey through them...

Must be pretty important

It really does deserve to be repeated.

-Now, Look at verse 21 with me again...

…and notice the one thing that IS different.

It’s the tense of the verbs.

In verse 20, Jesus had said:

Luke 6:20 (ESV)

20 ...“Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God.

In keeping, He said in verse 24:

Luke 6:24 (ESV)

24 “But woe to you who are rich, for you have received your consolation.

both are in the present tense

But in verse 21, He says:

Luke 6:21 (ESV)

21 “Blessed are you who are hungry now, for you shall be satisfied...

Similarly in Verse 25, He says:

Luke 6:25 (ESV)

25 “Woe to you who are full now, for you shall be hungry...

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Notice that the consolation moves from...

A Present reality...

To a future one...

...And so do the warnings of retribution.

-This is critical to a proper understanding of this Beatitude...

(as well as the one we’ll look at next week)

-So, what was the present condition (in verse 21)...

…for which Jesus Promised a future consolation?

HUNGER!

-Again, this is not an association that anyone would naturally make...

Least of all, not someone who lived within the Mosaic Institution.

In fact, Hunger, Famine, and Starvation...

…were all signs of the final stages of God’s Judgment...

…upon the covenant breaker!

The last thing a First Century Israelite would do...

…would be to associate:

Hunger...

With the blessings of God!

-So, why does Jesus do so in our text?

Because (like we saw last week with the issue of “Poverty”)...

1. The hunger about which Jesus here speaks...

…is an absolute pre-requisite for Covenant Blessing!

2. There was widespread poverty...

…in the land of Palestine at this time.

What that means is that the people listening to him...

…could relate to his analogy experientially!

They knew all too well what it was like to:

Be in pain

long for sustenance

crave nourishment

to be devoid of strength because they didn’t have it.

To them, these analogies were capable of being much more profound.

Consider, for example:

Psalm 63:1–5 (ESV)

1 O God, you are my God; earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you; my flesh faints for you, as in a dry and weary land where there is no water.

There’s a desperation in that, that most of us can’t relate to.

Psalm 42:1–2 (ESV)

1 As a deer pants for flowing streams, so pants my soul for you, O God.

2 My soul thirsts for God, for the living God...

-That illustration is going to mean a lot more to you...

…if ever you’ve actually experienced such desperation.

-These verses are, of course, the ultimate point of our Beatitude.

Matthew, again, makes it clear in his account:

Matthew 5:6 (ESV)

6 “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness...

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To point out the obvious...

…there is no inherent virtue in starvation.

You could starve yourself to death...

…and still wake up in eternal torments.

But… the hunger that Jesus is referring to here...

(That hunger which is a necessary attribute for citizenship in the Kingdom)

…will not leave you unsatisfied in the end.

It is the hunger:

For God!

For His Kingdom!

For His righteousness to fill the earth!

( 12 minutes, 16 total)

-But, we need to back up a bit.

There’s a reason why we hunger.

We hunger because:

We’re NOT full

We’re empty

We’re NOT (already) satisfied

If you’re full, you aren’t going to be looking for anything to eat, are you?

This is true:

Physically

Spiritually

Mike McKinley observes that the hunger referred to in our text:

...has both material and spiritual overtones.

Those who lack physical comforts in this life are most likely to turn to God’s promise of help. - Mike McKinley

Is this not what we saw a few weeks ago?

1 Corinthians 1:26–29 (ESV)

26 For consider your calling, brothers: not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth.

27 But God chose what is foolish . . . God chose what is weak . . .

28 God chose what is low and despised in the world...

29 so that no human being might boast in the presence of God.

This is what these Beatitudes are ultimately all about.

About the principle:

James 4:6 (ESV)

6 . . . “God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.”

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So, how do you get into the Kingdom?

Well, first you experience the first Beatitude:

Spiritual Poverty

That empties you of:

Spiritual self-confidence

Any hope of your own righteousness.

Once, (By the grace of God) you’ve been emptied out...

You begin to hunger.

And brethren, that’s a blessed condition indeed!

Why?

Psalm 107:9 (ESV)

9 For he satisfies the longing soul, and the hungry soul he fills with good things.

This is who He is!

This is His unchanging nature.

This is an everlasting Kingdom ethic!

Mary prophesied about it in the Magnificat:

Luke 1:48–53 (ESV)

48 ...he has looked on the humble estate of his servant...

51 He has shown strength with his arm; he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts;

52 he has brought down the mighty from their thrones and exalted those of humble estate;

53 he has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich he has sent away empty.

This had long been the hope of the faithful remnant in Israel

The LORD had declared through The prophet Isaiah:

Isaiah 55:1 (ESV)

1 “Come, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters; and he who has no money, come, buy and eat! Come, buy wine and milk without money and without price.

See the similarities to our text?

Luke 6:21 (ESV)

21 “Blessed are you who are hungry now, for you shall be satisfied...

This was the message ALL ALONG!

-Now, through what means does this satisfaction come?

How do those who have no money, buy food?

Through the One who said:

John 7:37 (ESV)

37 . . . “If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink.

And through the One who said:

John 6:35 (ESV)

35 . . . “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst.

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Those who come to Him with:

ravenous, desperate hunger...

...Are going to be Filled!

He will provide for them the righteousness that they so desperately seek!

He will give them:

Spiritual Satisfaction… NOW!

Entire Satisfaction… In the Age to Come!

-That’s what John saw concerning those who had come out...

…of this present time of great trouble...

He was told:

Revelation 7:16–17 (ESV)

16 They shall hunger no more, neither thirst anymore...

17 For the Lamb in the midst of the throne will be their shepherd, and he will guide them to springs of living water...

That’s why, to hunger and thirst...

…is to be Bless-ed!

(9 minutes, 25 total)

-But remember this, brethren, and examine your own hearts...

Remember that the opposite is equally true:

Luke 6:25 (ESV)

25 “Woe to you who are full now, for you shall be hungry...

This too is an eternal Kingdom ethic:

Israel was warned:

Deuteronomy 6:10–12 (ESV)

10 “And when the Lord your God brings you into the land that he swore to your fathers . . . to give you—with great and good cities that you did not build,

11 and houses full of all good things that you did not fill, and cisterns that you did not dig, and vineyards and olive trees that you did not plant—and when you eat and are full,

12 then take care lest you forget the Lord, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.

I mentioned to you last week that so often...

…what we perceive to be a blessing...

…might actually be/become a curse!

This is why!

This is our fallen tendency:

To take God’s good gifts...

…and make them the objects of our worship...

To be so consumed by them...

…that we lose our hunger for righteousness!

It should sober us to see that the Scripture says...

…that this is what led to the sin of Sodom:

Ezekiel 16:49–50 (ESV)

49 Behold, this was the guilt of your sister Sodom: she and her daughters had pride, excess of food, and prosperous ease, but did not aid the poor and needy.

50 They were haughty and did an abomination before me. So I removed them, when I saw it.

This is similar to the indictment that Christ made to the church at Laodicea

Revelation 3:17 (ESV)

17 For you say, I am rich, I have prospered, and I need nothing, not realizing that you are wretched, pitiable, poor, blind, and naked.

You see, experiencing your best life now...

…can be a great danger to your life to come.

This is where the physical and the spiritual once again intertwine.

If this world can satisfy your longings...

Then you’re not going to be living for the world to come!

If you’re too satisfied with life in this “present evil age”. . .

Then you aren’t going to have the age to come in your sights.

Remember the warnings of Luke 17?

Luke 17:26–30 (ESV)

26 Just as it was in the days of Noah, so will it be in the days of the Son of Man.

27 They were eating and drinking and marrying and being given in marriage, until the day when Noah entered the ark, and the flood came and destroyed them all.

28 Likewise, just as it was in the days of Lot—they were eating and drinking, buying and selling, planting and building,

29 but on the day when Lot went out from Sodom, fire and sulfur rained from heaven and destroyed them all—

30 so will it be on the day when the Son of Man is revealed.

Then he says this a couple verses later:

Luke 17:32 (ESV)

32 Remember Lot’s wife.

What did she do?

Why?

What did it cost her?

Then, In the very next verse, Jesus summarizes the principle:

Luke 17:33 (ESV)

33 Whoever seeks to preserve his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life will keep it.

Jesus had made this same point in the previous chapter:

Luke 16:19–26 (ESV)

19 “There was a rich man who was clothed in purple and fine linen and who feasted sumptuously every day.

20 And at his gate was laid a poor man named Lazarus, covered with sores,

21 who desired to be fed with what fell from the rich man’s table. Moreover, even the dogs came and licked his sores.

22 The poor man died and was carried by the angels to Abraham’s side. The rich man also died and was buried,

23 and in Hades, being in torment, he lifted up his eyes and saw Abraham far off and Lazarus at his side.

24 And he called out, ‘Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus to dip the end of his finger in water and cool my tongue, for I am in anguish in this flame.’

25 But Abraham said, ‘Child, remember that you in your lifetime received your good things, and Lazarus in like manner bad things; but now he is comforted here, and you are in anguish.

26 And besides all this, between us and you a great chasm has been fixed, in order that those who would pass from here to you may not be able, and none may cross from there to us.’

The judgment, here, is permanent.

There is no “crossing over” once you’ve “crossed over.”

So, You have two options:

Your best life now

Your best life then

Jesus said:

John 16:33 (ESV)

33 I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.”

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He wins in the end!

If you’re in Him...

If He’s your Master...

You win IN THE END!

But if He isn’t:

You LOSE… severely!

You LOSE… eternally!

(12 minutes, 37 total)

-Now, there’s a very important application that we need to make here:

Sometimes...

Oftentimes...

Your present sufferings...

…Are actually God’s blessings upon your soul!

They’re causing you to look:

Beyond the temporal

To the eternal.

Paul described the life of an apostle this way:

2 Corinthians 4:7–11 (ESV)

7 But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us.

8 We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair;

9 persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed;

10 always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our bodies.

11 For we who live are always being given over to death for Jesus’ sake, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal flesh.

What a profound theology of suffering already!

But then he says this:

2 Corinthians 4:15–5:1 (ESV)

15 For it is all for your sake, so that as grace extends to more and more people it may increase thanksgiving, to the glory of God.

16 So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day.

17 For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison,

18 as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.

1 For we know that if the tent that is our earthly home is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.

He goes on to conclude:

2 Corinthians 5:6–10 (ESV)

6 So we are always of good courage. We know that while we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord,

7 for we walk by faith, not by sight.

8 Yes, we are of good courage, and we would rather be away from the body and at home with the Lord.

9 So whether we are at home or away, we make it our aim to please him.

10 For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may receive what is due for what he has done in the body, whether good or evil.

Let’s read our text one more time:

Luke 6:21 (ESV)

21 “Blessed are you who are hungry now, for you shall be satisfied...

Luke 6:25 (ESV)

25 “Woe to you who are full now, for you shall be hungry...

Pray

(6 minutes, 40 total)