How to Cultivate Spiritual Hunger

Spiritual hunger has to do with desire for God. When we are hungry, there is a deep craving to know God and meet with Him that drives us to personal devotion. Below is an excerpt from Living From the Secret Place that describes how we can cultivate spiritual hunger in our lives:

While there can be a sovereign component to our spiritual hunger, there are also things we can do to cultivate desire in our relationship with God. Even when hunger comes as a result of an unexpected encounter with the Lord or a seemingly unasked for grace, we must continue to steward and nurture this hunger.

If you don’t find yourself in a time of deep desire for the Lord, know that you can be intentional to grow in this area. Below are three ways that you can help to cultivate greater hunger for God in your life.

1. Ask God for Hunger

In the kingdom of God, good things don’t always come as a matter of course. They come by persistent asking and diligent seeking. Jesus taught this principle in relation to prayer.

Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened. (Matthew 7:7-8)

He concludes this segment of teaching by saying that God will give good things to those who ask Him (see Matthew 7:11). The fact is, sometimes we don’t have because we don’t ask (see James 4:2). Hunger for God is a good thing! We can and should ask God to give us a greater desire to encounter Him and know Him more.

So ask, seek, and knock. Ask God to give you a greater hunger for Him, His Word, and for spiritual growth. Ask Him to draw you closer to Him and to reveal Himself to you in a greater way. Ask Him to give you a greater desire for His presence and a longing to know Him more. Ask Him to give you a love for the secret place.

2. Remove Distractions and Obstacles

Sometimes we lack spiritual hunger because of various distractions and obstacles in our lives. Maybe our schedule is filled with so many activities that we can’t take the time it requires to cultivate true devotion and desire for God. Maybe our lives are filled with so much other noise that our appetite for the Lord is drowned out. Maybe we are feeding on so much entertainment that our spiritual drive has been sapped. These are serious things to consider if we want to grow in the secret place.

Imagine you have dinner reservations at a high-end steakhouse. On the way to the restaurant, you pull into a convenience store and fill up on candy bars, chips, soda, and other junk food. You arrive for dinner, but you are so stuffed full that the thought of putting any more food in your stomach is repulsive. You have no appetite for even the most exquisite of food.

This is the place that many believers find themselves in today in relation to their spiritual hunger. Excessive entertainment (even when it is wholesome entertainment), mindless scrolling on social media, and constant intake of daily news has so filled their soul that there is no appetite for the things of God. Remove the “junk food” from your diet, and you just might find your hunger for God increasing.

There are legitimate responsibilities that we must attend to in our work and family life. But find what unnecessary distractions and obstacles are present and remove them from your life to create more space and time for your relationship with the Lord.

3. Put Disciplines Into Practice

We’ll discuss the importance of spiritual discipline shortly, but for now I want to mention that sometimes hunger can grow as we simply step out to do the practices that we know we are supposed to do. Don’t wait until you feel like it. Prayer might start as a duty, but it can turn into a delight as you consistently pray out of obedience to God. Reading the Bible might feel like a chore, but as you take the time to feed on the Word, your hunger will grow. Discipline begets spiritual practice and spiritual practice begets hunger, which in turns leads to more spiritual practice. This principle can be applied to various practices in our relationship with the Lord.

As we pray for God to increase our hunger for Him, remove distractions and obstacles, and step out in obedience, we will cultivate a greater spiritual hunger.

Click image below to purchase:

Time alone with God was never intended to be a boring duty or empty ritual. It was meant to be a passionate pursuit of God that leads to encountering His presence and knowing Him more.

Living from the Secret Place is a call to personal devotion. With rich scriptural truths, personal examples, and practical teaching, this book will equip you to grow in the most important thing you can do—spend time alone with God!