God’s Favor Is On Those Desperate for Justice

In this session, Dr. Josh Olds explores the fourth Beatitude: “God’s favor is on those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.” He frames the Sermon on the Mount as the constitution of God’s kingdom, a manifesto for life in the “already and not yet” — a kingdom inaugurated in Jesus’ death and resurrection, present by the Holy Spirit, but not yet here in its fullness.

Josh unpacks what it means to hunger and thirst for righteousness, not as a mild preference for “being good,” but as an insatiable craving for justice the way a starving person craves food and water. Drawing on C.S. Lewis and the language of inaugurated eschatology, he shows how our deep, unshakable longing for “things to be made right” is actually a sign that we were created for a different kind of world — a world shaped by God’s justice, not the empires of men.

From there, the episode presses into the public, social shape of righteousness: God’s people are called to hunger for justice not only in their personal lives but also in racial equity, economic fairness, the protection of marginalized communities, creation care, and more. Quoting Ron Sider, Josh insists that biblical social concern and the message of the cross belong together as part of “the whole gospel for the whole person.” Those who are desperate for justice — who refuse to be satisfied with anything less than God’s right-making work in the world — are the very ones Jesus promises will one day be filled.

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