BLESSED ARE THE PURE IN HEART, FOR THEY WILL SEE GOD.
2513 katharós (a primitive word) – properly, “without admixture”
When I read through the many contexts “pure” is applied in the NT I get this summary:
- Physically pure – purified by fire, cleansed by pruning
- Clean – as in not forbidden
- Ethically pure – free from corrupt desire’ sincere, genuine, blameless, innocent from sin or guilt
It’s pretty easy to admit, left to my own devices my heart is far from pure. I will and do fail at each of the three ideas about being uncontaminated. Still it seems I am to strive toward the goal of a pure heart.
And do I keep working at it in hopes one day I will actually get to see God? Chances are pretty slim my efforts will produce this end result. It makes me think of Peter when Jesus wanted to wash his feet.
Simon Peter said to him, “Lord, not my feet only but also my hands and my head!”
Me: “Jesus, if you waiting for me to get pure in heart…well…I don’t know.”
Jesus said to him, “The one who has bathed does not need to wash, except for his feet, but is completely clean. And you are clean…
News flash to Peter…and good news to me. You are clean. You are Pure. Like so many benefits of salvation we stand pure before God because of what Jesus has done for us.
The trick is we don’t live in heaven. Down here on the ground we have a “mixed” nature. We are the word someone on IF found offensive “half-breeds”. We would like to live out of our “clean” self but that is a total bust except for this:
John 15:1-4 “I am the true vine, and My Father is the vinedresser. “Every branch in Me that does not bear fruit, He takes away; and every branch that bears fruit, He prunes it so that it may bear more fruit. “You are already clean because of the word which I have spoken to you. “Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in Me
Here is the way to pureness of heart –. That’s enough to think about for day one.
A Dollar 3 Eighty 
The longer I live, the more I see the contaminants, even new ones I had not previously understood to be offensive. .
Thankfully life is short and I don’t have to recognize them ALL, since He is faithful and just…
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I am forgiven because of Jesus’ sacrifice. Therefore, one day, I will see God. However, this is the passage that comes to my mind when I think about being pure in heart.
Romans 7:14-25
For we know that the Law is spiritual, but I am of flesh, sold into bondage to sin. For what I am doing, I do not understand; for I am not practicing what I would like to do, but I am doing the very thing I hate. But if I do the very thing I do not want to do, I agree with the Law, confessing that the Law is good. So now, no longer am I the one doing it, but sin which dwells in me. For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh; for the willing is present in me, but the doing of the good is not. For the good that I want, I do not do, but I practice the very evil that I do not want. But if I am doing the very thing I do not want, I am no longer the one doing it, but sin which dwells in me.
I find then the principle that evil is present in me, the one who wants to do good. For I joyfully concur with the law of God in the inner man, but I see a different law in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin which is in my members. Wretched man that I am! Who will set me free from the body of this death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!
I want to do good. I want to be pure in heart. But, I do the exact opposite. All I can say is thanks be to God that, through Jesus, I will see God one day. However, you cannot see him at work here on earth without a childlike faith and a pure heart. Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me. Amen.
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