Daily Devotional For Wednesday, May 28, 2025
Good morning Southside. Have you ever been so hungry that you thought you might not make it? Have you ever been so hungry that your stomach growled so loudly that others could hear it? Food is such a part of our daily lives and we almost live to eat and eat to live. Jesus said this in Matthew 5:6, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.” (NASB). Jesus said this in John 6:35, “Jesus said to them, ‘I am the Bread of life; he who comes to Me will not hunger, and he who believes in Me will never thirst’” (NASB). David writes in Psalm 34:10, “Even strong young lions sometimes go hungry, but those who trust in the Lord will lack no good thing” (NLT).
Do you see a trend here? – hunger! How hungry are you for the Lord and His Word? Most of us may miss one meal a day due to our schedules, but we rarely go through the whole day, a 24-hour period, without eating something. Our physical bodies will not allow it. If we attempt, we get weak, dizzy and cannot concentrate. Yet, so many Christians will go through the whole day and never feed their spiritual hunger with the Word of the Lord in the Bible.
A daily dose of God’s Word will satisfy our spiritual hunger. Hunger is about want. And when we feel vulnerable to sin, it is a sign we have not fed our spiritual hunger. Have you ever noticed that when you get very hungry, you can also get very angry? We have a cute cultural word for this feeling – “hangry”. This is the combination of two words – hungry and angry. We become short-fused, irritable and impatient with people. “Hangry” is our “excuse word” for our lack of kindness and grace to others. Have you noticed that when you feed your physical hunger, all of that “hangry” goes away immediately?
Instead of feeding our spiritual hunger with the word of the Lord, we feed it with spiritual junk-food such as watching TV, scrolling our phones, mindless reading. This tempts us and misleads with the false promise of rest and escape, but none of these things will sustain our souls. Unmet spiritual hunger festers selfishness and spiritual wandering. David writes this in Psalm 107:9, “For He has satisfied the thirsty soul, And the hungry soul He has filled with what is good” (NASB).
As I said above, hunger is about a want. In Matthew 5:6 above Jesus makes it clear that our spiritual hunger for God is passion we should not ignore and when we satisfy that passion with His Word, God keeps His promise to us – satisfaction. A genuine redeemed Christian has a hunger for God and only seeks God to satisfy that spiritual hunger. This is the point of Isaiah 26:9, “My soul longs for You, Indeed, my spirit within me seeks You diligently; For when the earth experiences Your judgments The inhabitants of the world learn righteousness” (NASB).
Tuesday morning in our prayer time at church, Pastor Hunter shared a story he had read. It was so powerful that I looked it up to get more details so I could share it with you today. The story is about a man named William McPhearson.
Sometimes hearing other people’s passion for God’s Word helps inspire our own. One person—William McPherson—had a commitment to Scripture that was remarkable. He was a Scottish quarry worker who came to America in 1893 and settled outside of Denver. A hard worker, William eventually earned the spot of quarry superintendent. Though he had a number of admirable traits, he tended to be a bit impatient at times.
One day his impatience got the best of him and he grabbed a live stick of dynamite. It exploded while he was hovering over it. They were hours away from a doctor, but thanks to the efforts of his coworkers, he didn’t die. Unfortunately, though, the accident left him with no hands, little feeling in his face, and no eyesight. From that moment on, he was blind. Up to this point in his life he had lived for himself, reckless and free. Now, he was entirely dependent on others to help him get by. On several occasions before, others had tried to share Christ with him; now, due to his accident, he was in a place to listen.
He gave his heart to the Lord in the coming months but was not satisfied by simply having someone read Scripture to him. He longed for the ability to read it for himself. His injury was taxing to those around him, though— emotionally, physically, and financially. Eventually, his family found themselves unable to take care of him so he entered a home in Illinois for the aged and disabled.
Day in and day out he lived in darkness and solitude. He lived out the repetitive mornings, the same-song afternoons, and the identical evenings, armed with little more than his new- found hope in Christ. It was desperately lonely, and he had little hope that anything about his life would change until he died.
At the nearby school, lecturers would come and speak about various topics that the people in the home were facing. One day he learned of a young blind girl who had learned Braille and was able to read her Bible with her fingertips. William couldn’t do this because the explosion had taken his hands.
Over time, this young girl lost the feeling in her own hands and was distraught. She brought the Bible to her lips one day to kiss it goodbye, and to her amazement, felt something. She discovered that she could feel the raised letters with her lips! The story of this young girl had William pondering whether there was hope for him. He had lived in blackness for five years when God sent a blind girl named Anna Johnson to the home to work with some of the blind patients.
Working with William proved to be frustrating, though: he had no hands, so conventional reading wouldn’t work. He had no feeling in his face, so the technique the little girl had adopted wouldn’t work either, although they tried many times. One day William asked Anna when she was about to go home for the day, if she could leave with him one of the little cards they had been practicing with.
He kept trying to feel the little raised bumps with different parts of his body, when he realized he had not prayed and asked God for help. So he earnestly begged God for help. The next time he raised the card to his lips, his tongue slipped out and brushed the paper. To his astonishment, he could feel the raised letters with his tongue! He couldn’t wait for Anna to come back so he could tell her. With Anna’s help, William learned how to read braille with his tongue. In the 65 years that followed, and after much bleeding and soreness, William McPherson read the entire Bible four times with his tongue” (Source: Chicago Tribune, April 27, 1913).
I am absolutely blown away by this man. His example leaves those of us who can see with no excuse. God forbid we die and stand next to William in heaven, and we can’t say that we have read the Bible once with all parts of our body functioning properly. That would be a true tragedy. The goal is not to read the Bible from cover to cover, but for the Bible to read its truth through you each day of each year. William McPherson saw biblical truth that many Christians will never see nor experience, due to his hunger for the Word of God.
Assignment: Take a moment and reflect on how you satisfy your spiritual hunger. Are you in the Word every day so that the Word gets into you every day? What are your typical excuses for not being in the Word everyday? If you ate physically as little as you eat spiritually, what would that say about your spiritual health? Make the commitment to be in God’s Word every day. There are many apps out there that will help you do this or request an Open Windows 3-month daily devotional from Southside. Or, you could read these daily devotionals I write for you each day. Do you really want to stand before God one day and say, “Lord, I didn’t have time to be in Your Word, but I do know alot about movies, music and “majoring on the minors”.
Scripture To Meditate On: Psalm 34:8, “O taste and see that the Lord is good; How blessed is the man who takes refuge in Him!” (NASB).
Prayer To Pray: “Lord, please forgive me for satisfying my spiritual hunger with everything but You and Your Word. As David wrote in Psalm 42:1-2a, “As the deer pants for the water brooks, So my soul pants for You, O God. (2) My soul thirsts (and hungers) for God, for the living God.” Lord, convict me to be in Your Word daily so that I do not sin and wander from You. I love You Lord. In Jesus’ name, Amen!”
I love you Southside! – Pastor Kelly