The Bible talks about feasting and food quite a bit.  If you want to let your mind wander through the Scriptures tracing out the theme of food, go read the June 23, 2007 post entitled (creatively enough) “Food.” It won’t do more than just get you started, but you’ll see something of what I’m talking about.  This book is not exactly vegetarian–friendly reading. 

“A cucumber should be well sliced, and dressed with pepper and vinegar, and then thrown out as good for nothing.”
—Samuel Johnson

“Vegetables are interesting but lack a sense of purpose when unaccompanied by a good cut of meat.”
—Fran Lebowitz

Noting God’s interest in food and feasting (both as reality and as metaphor), it shouldn’t surprise us that when the King took his place upon the mountain to teach his people how true godliness is revealed and lived out (Matthew 5.1,2), he said to them, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.” (verse 6)

God promises complete and utter satisfaction to those who hunger and thirst for righteousness. 

But what does it look like to hunger and thirst for righteousness? 

Is Jesus talking our “legal” righteousness before God — that is, our justification?  If so, then that means to hunger and thirst for Christ Himself, for he is our only righteousness. 

Or is Jesus talking about our “moral” righteousness — a righteousness of character and conduct that is pleasing to God?  If so, then we are again driven to Christ Himself because that kind of infinite righteousness will never be achieved by our merely external conformity to a collection of rules.  That would be the deceptive, self–flattering trap in which the pharisees found themselves.  The moral righteousness that God requires penetrates to heart, mind, and motive. 

But perhaps Jesus is pushing us even beyond that.  Perhaps he’s pressing his disciples to cultivate a hunger and craving for the redemptive good of the world itself. Perhaps we should consider this as a call to a greater interest in a “social” righteousness.  God is quite interested in that form of righteousness too, after all.  Indeed, that’s part of the hunger that drove him to the cross.  John Stott puts it this way:

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