There’s something deeply spiritual about appetite. Not just physical hunger—but soul hunger. Longings. Cravings. What we reach for when we're empty. What we think will satisfy.
The truth is: we were
all born with an appetite for the wrong things. Not because we asked for it,
but because we inherited it. We came into a fallen world as sinners—not choice,
but by birth. Our taste buds were wired for junk. For lesser loves. For the
fleeting things that could never truly fill.
But the moment we
encounter Jesus—when grace finds us and we receive it and we are made new—everything
changes. We receive:
A new life.
A new spirit.
A new nature.
A new appetite.
Suddenly, we didn’t have
to “change” ourselves—God’s grace changed us and made us completely brand new. Now,
in this new life, we find ourselves longing for something higher. Something
better. Something holy.
But here’s the thing
about appetites: they’re shaped by what we keep consuming. And if we keep
feeding on the old junk from our old lives, we’ll never fully taste the new
life we’ve been given. We’ll have a new spirit, but a dulled palate. A full
inheritance, but an unsatisfied soul.
This is why Scripture
doesn’t just tell us to obey—it invites us to taste. “Taste and see that the Lord is good…” —Psalm 34:8. In Christ, our
appetites are redeemed and we get to taste something higher. Something heavenly.
“Christ’s resurrection is your
resurrection too. This is why we are to yearn for all that is above, for that’s
where Christ sits enthroned at the place of all power, honor, and authority!
Yes, feast on all the treasures of the heavenly realm and fill your thoughts
with heavenly realities, and not with the distractions of the natural realm.
Your crucifixion with Christ has severed the tie to this life, and now your
true life is hidden away in God in Christ.” —Colossians 3:1-3 TPT
So yes. The Bible is
very descriptive about this. These words are not a metaphor. It’s a deep,
divine invitation to enjoy Him. Literally. Sensually. Soulfully. Because God
knows what we sometimes forget: only He can satisfy the hunger inside us.
Hunger
is a Sign of Life
Think about it—what’s
one of the first signs that a baby is alive and thriving? Hunger. They cry for
milk, even before they know language. That instinct to eat and be filled is
baked into our being. And it’s the same spiritually. Hunger isn’t a problem to
fix. It’s a gift to steward. It means you’re alive. It means grace is already
at work in you, creating space for more of God. Grace doesn’t just save you. It
gives us new life with a new appetite—an appetite awakened to God’s love, life
and light. Grace invites you to the feast and gives you the desire to eat. From
beginning to end, it’s all a gift. Yet, so many of us are still starving. Why?
Starving
in a World Full of Snacks
We snack all day on
what doesn’t fill us. We scroll, we binge, we hustle, we numb. And still… we’re
empty. Still hungry. Still thirsty. It’s no wonder Jesus introduces Himself the
way He does: “I am the bread of life.”
—John 6:35. He’s not just a teacher. Not just a Savior. He’s a meal. A feast.
The soul-satisfying portion our hearts were made for.
But here’s the tension:
we often try to satisfy our spiritual hunger with worldly noise. We’re like
kids who don’t know what we’re missing, playing with mud pies in the slums
because we can’t imagine the feast God has set before us. That’s what C.S.
Lewis said in The Weight of Glory (as quoted by John Piper in his book,
Desiring God), and it marked me: “…it
would seem that Our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are
half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when
infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making
mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a
holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased.”
Too easily pleased. Too
easily distracted. Too easily fed by the junk of this world that leaves us
emptier than we began.
A
Shawarma Story: When You’ve Tasted Better
Let me tell you a story
that helped me grasp this.
In early 2022, my
sister introduced me to a shawarma spot that changed the game. I’d had shawarma
before—plenty of times, in fact—but this one was different. It was richer.
Better. It hit a spot in my taste buds that no other shawarma ever had. It
wasn’t just food. It was an experience. Naturally, I became its biggest fan. I
raved about it to anyone who cared to listen.
A year later, I had a
colleague who was also a shawarma lover. Everyone in the office knew it. She
even had her favorite plug—one she swore by. Out of curiosity, I decided to
give hers a try. The way she talked about it made it sound like heaven. But… it
didn’t taste like heaven. Not even close. It was dry, underwhelming, and
frankly, disappointing.
I didn’t insult her
taste, of course. I just gently offered her mine. “You have to try this other
one,” I said. And she did. Guess what? She fell in love with it too. In fact,
soon everyone in the office was eating it. That shawarma became a little office
legend.
What happened?
I had tasted something
better. And once you taste better, you can’t go back. The inferior doesn’t
tempt you anymore—not because it’s no longer available, but because your standard
has shifted. Your taste buds have changed.
That’s what it’s like
with Jesus. Once you’ve tasted the richness of His love, His presence, His
Word, nothing else hits the same. The world just doesn’t slap like it used to.
The parties, the attention, the ambition, the scrolling—it all starts to feel
stale. And this line from the worship song Your Presence is Heaven suddenly
makes sense: “Nothing in this world will
satisfy… Jesus, You’re the cup that won’t run dry.”
When
You’re Not Tempted by the Mud
I think of a guy from
college that tried to flirt with me in a way that clearly came from a place of
deep emptiness. He was looking for love in all the wrong places. But instead of
being flattered or tempted, I felt compassion for him. He didn’t know he was
loved by God. He didn’t know there was a love higher, deeper, and fuller than anything
the world could offer. Watching him in that moment reminded me of 1 John:
“Do
not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the
love of the Father is not in him.” —1 John 2:15
John isn’t saying “Stop
sinning or God will leave you.” He’s diagnosing the heart: people run to the
world because they don’t yet know how deeply loved they are by the Father God. But
when you know… really know… you’re loved by the God of the universe? When
you’ve tasted grace, tasted belonging, tasted the intimacy of Christ? As Lewis
described earlier, you won’t be “…like an
ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot
imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea.” The mud
doesn’t tempt you anymore.
Only
a Greater Taste Can Displace a Lesser One
John Piper wrote about
this extensively in his “serious book about being happy in God” called Desiring
God. Like me, he once thought that seeking joy in God was selfish—that if he
went to church or served just because it made him happy, it somehow spoiled the
purity of the act. But then he discovered that “God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him.” He
discovered that seeking joy in God is not selfish—in fact, it’s worship. It’s
what we were made for. Suddenly, all those hunger pangs in us made sense.
Piper found his
breakthrough through the writings of Blaise Pascal and C.S. Lewis. Pascal said:
“All men seek happiness. This is without
exception... The (human) will never takes the least step but to this object (of
seeking one’s happiness).”
It’s not a sin to
desire happiness or pleasure. It’s how we’re wired. The problem is when we
settle for ‘mud pies’ to satisfy ouinstead of the feast of God’s presence. And Pascal
made it even clearer: “There once was in
man a true happiness of which now remain to him only the mark and empty trace,
which he in vain tries to fill from all his surroundings, seeking from things
absent the help he does not obtain in things present. But these are all
inadequate, because the infinite abyss can only be filled by an infinite and
immutable object, that is to say, only by God Himself.”
Piper admits that based
on the revelations he had from Pascal and Lewis’ writings, “…now it started to dawn on me that this persistent and undeniable
yearning for happiness was not to be suppressed, but to be glutted—on God!”
Look at that! Your
permission to indulge your heavenly cravings and binge-eat! “This persistent and undeniable yearning for
happiness was not to be suppressed, but to be glutted-on God!” Because enjoying
God is our most important duty in life and only a greater taste (God) can
remove the inferior one (sin).
The
Cross Gave Me New Taste Buds
I look back at moments
like that campus encounter and realize: I’ve changed. The cravings that once
ruled me don’t speak as loud anymore. Not because I’m more disciplined. But
because I’m more satisfied. The cross of Jesus Christ did that. It severed my
attachment to the world. It gave me new taste buds. How? When Jesus died on the
cross for me, He also died AS me. My old nature who had that old appetite for
old junk also died with Jesus on that cross and was buried with Him, and when
He rose from the grave on the third day, the new me who has new taste buds,
came up with him.
“God
forbid that I should boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by
which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.”
—Galatians 6:14
God didn’t just use the
cross to perform surgery on my heart to give me a new heart. He also used the
cross to perform surgery on my taste buds—reshaping my desires, affections, and
longings—so that the cross breaks the power of sin over my life. The love of
Christ has saved me and now changes me by giving me a new appetite for Christ
that overwhelms my old appetites. The light of grace has made the darkness lose
its appeal. We don’t fight sin by cursing the darkness. We fight it by turning
on the light. By feasting on grace. By tasting and seeing.
Enjoying
Jesus Makes Sin Lose Its Appeal
I read something in Max
Lucado’s Outlive Your Life that deeply encouraged me. He reflected on Peter and
John, who healed the crippled man at the Gate Beautiful and then boldly
preached to the Jews. Just days before, these disciples were hiding in fear. So
where did their courage come from? Lucado said: “If you want to be courageous tomorrow, be with Jesus today.” Of
course, the Holy Spirit also baptized them with boldness and power, but their
daily time with Jesus was foundational.
Spending time with
Jesus today saves us, heals us, and builds us for tomorrow. When tomorrow
comes, and sin tempts us or fear threatens, our default becomes courage in the
face of it. That’s exactly how it felt in my experience on campus. I was conscious
of Jesus, full of His love, and suddenly, what might have been a temptations
didn’t have a hold on me.
We often think
following God is difficult, but the Lord shapes us as we walk with Him. He
molds our hearts, affections, longings, and desires. He redeems and transforms
our desires so that the yoke He gives—already easy—and the burden He
carries—already light—become easier and lighter to bear.
This too, is His mercy.
The more time we spend with the Lord, the more sin loses its appeal.
Why?
Because we’ve tasted
something greater.
His love.
His grace.
His presence.
So here’s the
invitation: Come hungry. Leave full. Come often. Taste again. There’s more.
Always more. Because Jesus is not a snack. He’s the feast. Let’s flip the
script: Your appetite is not your enemy. It’s an echo. A clue. A compass
pointing to the only One who can truly satisfy.
Don’t settle for the
slums.
There’s a holiday at
sea waiting.
And the table is set.
Not yet in the fam?
God is a good Father who loves you so much and wants you to be part of His family as His child. He offered His only Son, Jesus Christ, to pursue your heart and save you and bring you into the family. All you need to do is to receive His love and you can live in it and enjoy it for the rest of your life. Will you receive it? Then please say this prayer:
Father in Heaven, I thank you for loving me. Thank you for sending the gift of Your Son, Jesus Christ, to save me from my sins and give me eternal life. I believe in my heart that Jesus died for my sins, He was buried and on the third day, He rose again, to make me right with you. I declare that Jesus Christ is my Lord and Saviour. I thank you that I am now saved and I'm a member of your family. I ask that You fill me with the Holy Spirit and help me to know You more. In Jesus' name, amen.
Welcome!
If you said this prayer for the first time, you're now a child of God and I am excited that you are my sibling in Christ. Welcome!!! 🥳There's a whole party going on in Heaven right now, on your behalf, like the excitement over a newborn baby. Will you please reach out to me and let me bless you with a resource that will help you get started on your journey of faith? Click here to do so. I love you and can't wait to meet you.
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