What Jesus Did! 'More than Anything Else' — Matthew 5:6

Other translations use the wording, "hunger and thirst for righteousness," where this translation refers to those who "hunger and thirst for justice."* Except for a voluntary fast, most of us who spend our time on the internet don't know what it's like to be really hungry. But nearly all of us, at one time or another, have been very, very thirsty! To hunger and thirst for righteousness and justice is to want what pleases, honors, and reflects God more than anything else. To be righteous becomes our consuming passion. This spiritual commitment takes on a primal drive, much like hunger and thirst drive us physically. Like so many of these beatitudes in Matthew 5:3-11, finding our lives in God, his nature, and his character is our only path to true and lasting fulfillment.

* The same Greek word is sometimes translated "righteousness" and sometimes "justice" in a particular version of the New Testament. For example, Matthew 10:41 has the same basic Greek word as Matthew 5:6.