November 2020 — pg. 9
L+L: What do you think it means to hunger and
thirst for righteousness?
Estelle Martin: When there is a physical
hunger or thirst, there is an intense
desire to satisfy that longing for food by
eating something and slaking the thirst
by drinking something to quench the
thirst. When you hunger and thirst for
righteousness, you are reminded that Jesus
is all our righteousness, and God’s way of
making us right with Himself depends
on our faith in Christ alone. We will be
satisfied by our response to His open
invitation to be in right relationship with
Him as we long for His righteous character
to be evident not only in our own personal
lives, but in the lives of others here on
earth.
Laura Warth: My encounter with this
scripture was in 2013 when God woke me
up, and He said, “Wake up. It’s time.” Those
were His words to me, and I woke up out
of a deep sleep. One of the first things God
would teach me as He was leading me
in prayer was how to hunger and thirst
for righteousness. As I read this verse,
and I really began to ask God to change
my desires to what He desires. I began to
pray, “God give me a love for the things
that you love and a hate for the things that
you hate.” So I began to ask Him to fill
me with His desire to love righteousness
and to hate wickedness. We become
righteous because that’s what Christ Jesus
is, and that’s our position, but then we’re to
pursue righteousness. That was really what
I was focusing on, because I knew who I
was, but I wasn’t doing what I should have
been doing. I had to really learn how to
approach God and how to pray in order
for me to experience a righteous lifestyle.
L+L: Do you think Christians in 2020 have lost
their hunger and thirst for righteousness? If so,
what are ways we can regain that hunger and
thirst?
Laura Warth: Absolutely, because I’ve seen it, and
I’ve experienced it even in my own life. So much in
Christianity of what people think is in line with what
the world thinks, even their goals. I do believe that
Christians are not praying like they should, and that’s
why they’re not experiencing high levels of righteousness
in their own lives. They’ve not been pursuing God
intentionally or passionately. They’ve not spent time
in the secret place of prayer in order to get to know
Him and let Him reveal to us what His righteousness
is. Prayer is the key. When we pray in line with God’s
will, we can and should expect to encounter God in a
personal and powerful way. When we encounter God in
those ways, God meets us there, and He begins to deal
with us specifically. Now we’ve entered into a place of
prayer where we can have these deep, long and heartfelt
conversations with God, and He can begin to speak to
us about areas. God is very specific. He won’t give us a
general assignment. ... In that television show that I
was watching, He began to say to me, “What is taking
place? I want you to open your eyes and see. The wife on
the show gossips. She lies. She dishonors her husband.
Does that amuse you? Because it doesn’t amuse Me.” ...
He started telling me about the music that I had, and it
wasn’t crazy or cursing music. Here’s what He began to
download into my Spirit. A lot of those songs that I still
had, even though they were not what I consider bad,
some of them were still tied to my life before Christ.
The memories, the sounds and the rhythms of those
songs would immediately trigger an emotion and take
me back to what I was doing — the party lifestyle, the
carnal lifestyle.
Estelle Martin: While I cannot speak for all Christians
losing their hunger and thirst for righteousness, I
can say that during this global pandemic and the
racial uprisings we have experienced this year, we
have all certainly been challenged to re-examine our
relationship with God as opposed to our service in His