Real Hunger, Real Purpose:

John 4:34
"My food," said Jesus, "is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work.”

I met a girl young recently who was plagued by the question of purpose.  Her spirit was hungry for something more, something more than this life was offering her.  She found herself waking up in the middle of the night with an aching desire for something deeper. 

On the one hand, it’s sort of strange that this need for purpose haunted her in the middle of the night.  But on the other hand, it makes sense.  The middle of the night is when our minds have kicked into slow gear.  When things are finally still.  When the distractions have died down and the noises have subsided.  There, in the quiet of the night, her spirit was finally heard crying out that it needed something more.

I believe many people can relate to that longing.  We all want to find meaning in this world.  We want our existence to be validated.  Our souls are hungry for purpose. 

Jesus understood this hunger, a hunger that supersedes the physical.  A hunger that could only find satisfaction in one thing: doing God’s work. 

John Chapter 14 describes a scene where Jesus is speaking to the Samaritan woman.  A woman who had experienced the injustice and maltreatment of her society.  A woman who was considered a cast away and whore.  A woman whose own sin had buried her deep into the pits of shame. 

The disciples were so distracted by their physical hunger, so distracted by the “noise” of their stomachs growling that they missed the true feast at which Jesus was partaking.  Jesus was offering love to one who had not known love.  He was offering life to a woman who had been dead in her sins.  He was doing the will of His father; He was feasting on food that would satisfy.

What about you?  Are you feasting on the food of God’s work in your life?  Are you focused on living a life completely sold out to God’s will? Do you find yourself satisfied and your spiritual appetites satiated with His love working its way in and back out of your life? Or are you still hungry?  Are you still longing for more?

Maybe you so distracted by the physical growling of your earthly stomachs that you are missing the hunger pangs of a whole new kind of feast.  Maybe you are ruled by the longings for the material rather than the spiritual. Maybe you find that if you are really honest with yourself, you discover that your purpose has become blurred by the tangible. 

It’s time to take a real hard look at ourselves and ask if we can wholeheartedly proclaim that we are satisfied in nothing else…but “doing the will of Him who sent [us]”. 

This is real purpose.  Feast on it.