A Pure Heart

“Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God.”  Matthew 5:8

To be pure in heart is all-inclusive, that is, taking everything about a person’s Christian life into account.  The goal of every believer should be to have a heart that’s pure, filled with the love of God with no room left for any self-righteous notions or pride in oneself.  Webster’s Dictionary defines “pure” as “free from anything that adulterates, taints, impairs ,etc.: unmixed; clear”.

How in the world can one’s heart be pure and untainted by sin when we live in a sin-cursed, sin-saturated world?  Everywhere we turn, there are ungodly influences which range from subtle ridicule to outright blasphemy.  Men and women violate every commandment of God as they shake their defiant fist in God’s face.  If folks would only follow the two greatest commandments as stated by Jesus: “Thou (and that means everyone) shalt love the LORD thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind” and “Thou (again, everyone) shalt love thy neighbor (that means everyone else) as thyself: (Matthew 22:37, 39), the genuine effort to follow through as one who places love for God and for others above self would go a long way toward having a pure heart.  Jesus has a way of making the complicated simple, the rough places smooth, and the difficult easy.  However one cannot have this kind of sacrificial (agape) love through self-effort.

Even as we attempt to live godly lives, we still have a sin nature of which we must deal.  Proverbs 4:23 tells us to “guard our hearts, for out of the heart flows the issues of life”.  The only way to have a pure heart is for it to be cleansed by the blood of Christ.  When God looks at the heart of one who has trusted in Christ, God cannot see the impurities.  He only sees the blood of Christ.  Those made pure by the blood of Christ are the only ones who will see God and live with Him throughout eternity.

Some folks get all upset and argumentative when they hear that Jesus Christ is the only way to be made right before the holy and righteous God.  I guess the only way to explain their rejection of the gospel is that they are blinded to the truth of scripture.  They apparently don’t see God as the sovereign Ruler of the world of which He created.  Since God made the world and mankind, isn’t it His right and prerogative to set the standard by which man should live?  He gave man the opportunity to live knowing that man would violate His standards, but He was completely fair in making a way whereby man could be forgiven and put in right standing before Him.  God requires purity, and He made the way so that man could have a pure heart through His Son Jesus Christ.  Without the cleansing that Christ’s blood provides, there is no hope for anyone to live eternally with the LORD.