“Blessed are the Pure in Heart” Matthew 5:8

“Blessed are the Pure in Heart”

Matthew 5:8

Introduction

When I was growing up, there were things my dad did that I always found humorous. One of the things Dad did was he’d get so focused on something that it would take three or four times calling to him before he’d respond. He would tune everything else out and become complete absorbed in whatever he was doing or watching. Always good for a laugh.

It seems, though, that I’ve become my dad. I can’t tell you how many times I’ll hear one of my children yelling at me to get my attention. Being on the receiving end on the issue, I now understand what Dad was doing and why I have a tendency to tune things out.

The words of Jesus today speak about a person who becomes focused. Not focused on a television show or a book or something, but focused on God and the things of God. When Jesus tells us that the pure in heart are blessed, He is speaking of someone who becomes focused on the kingdom of God to the exclusion of everything else. Such a person has the blessing of seeing God.

For the Hebrew world of the Bible, the heart was the center of the person. The heart housed our mind, our emotions and everything that makes us who and what we are. In other words, the heart represented the total person. It’s what we would call the soul today. The Greatest Commandment—to love the Lord with all our heart and soul and mind and our body—is what is meant about being pure in heart. The pure in heart is the one who is pure in his or her entire being.

Central Truth: The blessing that falls on the pure of heart is the promise of a close, intimate relationship with God.

The pure in heart:

Reject outward appearance and perception.

There are two ways to interpret the phrase “pure in heart,” and both speak to turning our backs on the ways of the world and toward God. Let’s first look at the negative, on what the pure in heart do not do.

When Jesus was dealing with the opposition of the Pharisees, time and time again, He would mention how the Pharisees would focus on outward symbols and ignore the relational issues of living for God. The Pharisees focused on ritual washing, of wearing the proper clothing and the appearance of being spiritual. We can see Jesus’ response to the Pharisees in His words in Matthew 23, among other passages in the Gospels.

Jesus, on the other hand, always focused on the reason we do the things we do. At the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus would begin an idea with, “You have heard it said . . . But I tell you . . .” The point Jesus was making is that the things we do don’t matter as much as why we do it.

The point of this is that the pure in heart is someone who isn’t caught up in the appearances and what people think of us. Instead, the one who is pure in heart is looking for what God is calling us to do, being open to His leadership and direction. The one who is pure in heart listens to the voice of God through the work of the Holy Spirit and looks away from the world’s thinking. The pure in heart is someone who is committed entirely to doing God’s will.

Have a singleness of purpose.

Not only are the pure in heart focused on hearing and doing God’s will, but the pure in heart have this goal as their only goal. The pure in heart are single-minded in their relationship with the Lord.

I told you about Dad and his ability to focus on something to the exclusion of almost everything else. When a person becomes so focused on one thing, the distractions fade away. The pure in heart want one thing and one thing only, and that is to be in right relationship with the Father. Everything else becomes secondary or less.

I got into the habit a long time ago of reading or doing something else while watching TV. It started with watching football games. I’d find myself using the game more as background noise while I read the paper or a book, only looking up when I’d hear the crowd reaction. Then I’d put whatever I was reading aside and would watch the replay.

Nowadays, I find myself either reading or playing games on my smart phone while I also have the TV on. I notice that it’s hard to follow the story when I’m playing the game, and it’s hard to play the game when I have one eye on the TV and the other on the smart phone or in the book. When I allow myself to become distracted, when I allow myself to be swayed by more than one loyalty, I can’t really do either very well.

And that’s what Jesus is speaking about when He speaks of the pure in heart. The pure in heart do not allow themselves to become distracted. Such people don’t get swayed by the circumstances of life, the lure of the world and its ways. The single-minded person is the one who knows what he wants and gives up everything else to gain his hope.

In Matthew 13:44-46, Jesus tells two parables, one about a hidden treasure in a field, and the other about a pearl of great value. In the first parable, Jesus says a man finds a treasure in a field. The man buries the treasure in the field, then sold all he had so he could purchase that field. The second parable speaks of a man selling everything he had in order to purchase the valuable pearl. In both cases, the focus of the man became singular, and nothing else mattered in comparison to acquiring that which was so valued.

So it is with the pure in heart. The great price of walking in humble fellowship with God is so much that we are willing to give up everything else that hinders that aim. Jesus constantly warned us about the cost of discipleship, and He constantly told us that the cost was steep. It means placing God first and only, with everything else coming a distant second.

The pure in heart single in on the will of God, and they are blessed as a result of this focus.

Have the promise of seeing God.

In Psalm 24:3-4, the psalmist wrote,

“Who may ascend the hill of the Lord?

Who may stand in His holy place?

He who has clean hands and a pure heart,

Who does not lift up his soul to an idol

Or swear by what is false.”

In Psalm 51:10, the psalmist wrote, “Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me.”

Both psalms speak to the desire to understand God in a new, deeper way.

There are those who say the idea of the promise of seeing God in the context of this verse is that as we live a life with a pure heart, we discover the presence of God in every walk of life. There is some truth to that. It’s true that when we seek God we discover Him in various places and ways. But I think the promise in v. 8 is more concrete.

Moses was a man with a pure heart, and Exodus 33:11 tells us that “The Lord would speak to Moses face to face, as a man speaks with his friend.” To be sure, Moses did not actually see God’s face. Later in the chapter, Moses makes that request, and God tells him, “I will cause all My goodness to pass in front of you, and I will proclaim My name, the Lord, in your presence. . . But you cannot see My face, for no one may see My face and live” (Exodus 33:19a, 20).

The idea of being in the presence of the Lord as Moses was is a possibility, speaking with God face to face, even if it doesn’t mean a literal seeing God’s face. That possibility is present in this verse.

And then there is the promise of the day when we shall be glorified and we shall literally see Christ. John, in his first letter, wrote, “Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when He appears, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is. Everyone who has this hope in him purifies himself, just as He is pure” (1 John 3:2-3). The reality is that those who are pure in heart are the ones who will have that very real and very intimate relationship with God.

Again, as has been mentioned with the other of the Beatitudes we’ve looked at, the idea of seeing God is not a result of our purity of heart. That is to say, being pure in heart does not earn us the right to see God. Rather, the blessing is that as we grow in purity of heart, our closeness to God grows closer. It is a case of “both, and.” Just as we recognize our spiritual poverty we turn to God to be enriched, and just as we mourn and turn to God for comfort, so the pure in heart leads us to earnestly seek God with that heart, and the reward is that God promises us that we find Him when we seek Him.

Conclusion

As I said, I find myself distracted by things. I try to do more than one thing at a time, and when I do, I am reminded once again that I am not very good at multi-tasking. Studies have shown that to be true not just of me, but of everyone. When we don’t give our full attention to one thing at a time, we fail to do our best in any of the tasks.

The same is true in our walk with God. If we really want to see Him, we cannot spend half our time listening to the things of this world, or seeking out the things of this world. We have to turn away and commit ourselves to follow God and God alone.

Are we ready to make that commitment? Are we ready to make that commitment today?