Are You Conscious of Your Spiritual Need?
THERE is no mistaking the need indicated by an empty stomach. If you persistently ignore it, the function of your body is impaired; even death can ensue. No less serious is your need for spiritual nourishment. The reaction may not come as fast, but failure to care for it can warp your thinking, impair your mental health and shorten your life. In a nation the cumulative result of this neglect is manifest most prominently in moral breakdown.
Modern society is sick because it is not conscious of its spiritual need. This is evident from the rising crime rate, the increasing rate of marriage failures, juvenile delinquency, disregard for high moral standards and failure of people to live together in peace. In its feverish pursuit of material things and its idolizing of scientific achievements, it has lost sight of its spiritual need.
Man’s efforts to build an artificial world in which he stands as the only guiding intelligence are certain to fail. More and more he finds that he is incapable of sanely controlling the awful forces of destruction he now possesses. As Professor O. H. Mowrer wrote in The Atlantic Monthly: “As man, through science, acquires more and more control over the external world, he has come to feel less and less capable of controlling himself, less and less the master of his own soul and destiny. . . . We remain optimistic about what man can continue to do through science by way of dealing with his environment, but we have become extremely pessimistic about man.”
Although modern society is thus spiritually impoverished, you do not need to be. You do not have to go along with it in exalting men and ignoring God, reaping the fruitage of its moral decay. If you are conscious of your spiritual need, you will rely on God; you will take the initiative to study the Bible and gain understanding of God’s will. Molding your life by that divine guide, you will find contentment, security and spiritual health. Regarding those who do so Jesus said: “Happy are those conscious of their spiritual need, since the kingdom of the heavens belongs to them.”—Matt. 5:3.
How concerned are you about your spiritual need? Do you study your Bible regularly and understand it? Do you know who God is and what he requires of those who worship him? Do you use that knowledge to help satisfy the spiritual needs of others? It means life, everlasting life, for you to do so.