Will The Righteous Hunger?

A question was recently put before me; Why does the Bible talk about the righteous will not beg for bread and God taking care of us like the lilies of the field, but the apostles experienced hunger? The passages under consideration are Psalm 37:25; Matthew 6:25-34; and Philippians 4:10-12.

Psalm 37:25 says, “I have been young, and now am old; Yet I have not seen the righteous forsaken, Nor his descendants begging bread.” If this means that the righteous will never be in want of food, then it contradicts many other passages in the Bible. David and his men lacked food when he was running from Saul (1 Sam. 21:1-6). As noted in Philippians 4:10-12, Paul hungered. Lazarus was a beggar (Lk. 16:19-21). The saints in Judea experienced more than one wave of famine (Acts 11:27-30). Hence, Psalm 37:25 cannot be interpreted as an iron-clad universal law without doing damage to the unity of the Scripture.

So, what does it mean? It seems to me it is a truism, a general statement. The main idea being, God takes care of His people and gives them what they need. It is similar to Matthew 6:25-34. There Jesus said God will take care of our physical necessities, so we can concentrate on putting the kingdom first. This does not mean we will always, on all occasions, have all the food, clothing, and shelter we desire. Rather, it means God is watching over us and giving us what we need. We will get through tough times one way or another. If we scrape by, we will do so by trusting in God. If we do not survive, we will awake in the arms of the angels. Either way, God takes care of us.

That which has been is what will be,
That which is done is what will be done,
and there is nothing new under the sun.
- Ecclesiastes 1:9

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Worship In The Age of Showbusiness
By Dan Chambers