A Clean Heart Part 1: Inward Purity
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Introduction
Introduction
Archimedes and the golden crown: not all that glitters is gold.
Those who have seen their great need of mercy, who are poor in spirit and desperate for righteousness, have as a result these positive characteristics.
The Gospel according to Matthew (2. The Beatitudes, 5:3–12)
The first four beatitudes express in one way or another our dependence on God; the next three the outworking of that dependence. - Leon Morris
Purity
Purity
To help us understand the meaning of this beatitude, it will be helpful for us to explore what exactly purity of heart is, so that we may find this passage both instructive and encouraging.
The Meaning of Purity
The Meaning of Purity
First, let us look at what Jesus means by “pure.” In evangelicalism in the last 30 years or so purity is usually used in the context of sexual purity. As a response to the sexual immorality and permiscuity that has become so common and expected in the world around us, a focus on abstinance from premarital sex, pornography, and even casual romance has in a way highjacked this word. Unfortunately, this means that the true meaning of the word has often been lost as a result, for many it has more to do with virginity than the kind of purity that Jessu is talking about. While abstaining from sexual immorality of any kind is certainly a part of how purity is displayed, it is not the heart of what it means to be pure.
To understand tthe biblical backdrop from which Jesus is speaking, we can look back at perhaps the most difficult book in the Bible for a modern reader to read: the book of Leviticus.
Leviticus is all about how God’s people live lives of worship towards him. It includes everything from how to offer diffirent sacrifices and offerings to how to treat skin diseases and cases of mold in your home. Dietary laws, festivals, sexual ethics, pagan practices, and many other aspects of Israelite life are covered that leave readers today wondering how any of it is relavant for us over 3500 years later. Throughout this book which is often the greatest leap to many well-meaning attempts to read the Bible cover to cover the theme of purity and clean and unclean is emphasized again and again.
Unclean vs. sin. These two things in the law are not the same but still related. Sins are actions that incure moral guilt, while uncleanness or impurity is being in an inappropriate state to be in the presence of God.
Purity and holiness connected. For people to be in the presence of God they not only had to abstain from sin, they had to be holy to be in the presence of a holy God.
The role of the Levites, who are the namesake of the book of Leviticus, was to be the judges of the holy and unholy in society.
You are to distinguish between the holy and the common, and between the unclean and the clean,
The need to distinguish between clean and unclean is not only a religious distinction, but a social one as well. Worshipping YHWH took place in every area of life, and being a Kingdom of priests (Exodus 19:6) meant that the congregation of the people were to be holy and thus clean. This was symbolized in the various everyday need of purity, the need to purify when unclean, and the inevitibility of becoming unclean. Women became unclean during mentruation, men became unclean from seminal emmission. You became unclean through various diseases, from touching anything dead, from even sitting somewhere where an unclean person sat. There were things you did that would make you unclean, and there were things that you just couldn’t control that made you unclean. In the end, one thing stands out really clear in the book of Leviticus: to dwell in the presence of God means you need to be holy as he is holy, not just in the house of God, not just in your religious practice, but in your whole life.
Pure in Heart
Pure in Heart
Now with that backdrop in the law, we can move onto the specific type of purity that Jesus is looking for and that outward cleanliness was meant to point towards.
Purity in heart is not a new topic in the NT, it has its roots deep in the OT and it progresses throughout salvation history. All the law was based on the two great commandments which show obedience, even to purity laws, extending from a love for God that consumes our entire being. So even before the purity laws are given, true purity before God happens in the heart.
“And now, Israel, what does the Lord your God require of you, but to fear the Lord your God, to walk in all his ways, to love him, to serve the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul,
In the Psalms, purity of heart becomes a very important theme that comes up time and time again, even Psalm 1 describing the righteous person not by outward cleaness but by inward delight in God.
but his delight is in the law of the Lord,
and on his law he meditates day and night.
Truly God is good to Israel,
to those who are pure in heart.
Behold, you delight in truth in the inward being,
and you teach me wisdom in the secret heart.
Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean;
wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.
Hyssop was a brush-like plant used to paint the doorposts on the Passover night in Israel. The blood of lambs caused the wrath of God to pass over them while it judged the Egyptians. David asks to be metaphorically cleansed with atoneing blood, not in his outward actions primarily, but in his heart. He continues:
Create in me a clean heart, O God,
and renew a right spirit within me.
David sees the true purity that the law pointed at, and more than cerimonial cleansing, David seeks a pure heart, the Holy Spirit, and the ability to be in the presence of God and not removed because of the impurity of his own heart.
It’s also something Jesus will go into later in Matthew:
Matt 15:11 ;16-20
it is not what goes into the mouth that defiles a person, but what comes out of the mouth; this defiles a person.”
And he said, “Are you also still without understanding? Do you not see that whatever goes into the mouth passes into the stomach and is expelled? But what comes out of the mouth proceeds from the heart, and this defiles a person. For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false witness, slander. These are what defile a person. But to eat with unwashed hands does not defile anyone.”
The heart is easily misunderstood by modern readers as being the centre of emotion. For them, that was actually the intestines. The heart was the centre of the entire person, your reason, your emotion, your personality. In short, your heart was you in every meaningful way.
So if we bring this all together, what does it mean to be pure in heart? To be pure in heart means to inwardingly holy. It means that the disposition of your entire person is to be the desire to be in the presence of God. Additionally, it means to embrace God’s promises by faith, not because of the things he will give us, but because he is purely our hearts desire.
Whom have I in heaven but you?
And there is nothing on earth that I desire besides you.
My flesh and my heart may fail,
but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.
When Peter was talking to the early Jewish saints who were suspicious about Gentile believers, he said:
Acts 15:9 (ESV)
Peter says, “and he made no distinction between us (Jews) and them (Gentiles), having cleansed their hearts by faith.
Faith in Christ, according to Peter, is true purity in heart. To simply believe God and have it counted to us as righteousness. To cling to the rock of our salvation and trust him alone, follow him alone, that is what it means to be pure in heart.
Holiness
Holiness
So we have established that the pure in heart are those who have believed on the person and work of Jesus Christ and have put their faith completely in him for their salvation. However, it would be disengenuious for us to leave the definition of this inward purity there. Otherwise, we will miss the full picture Jesus is presenting to us through these beatitudes of what it means to be blessed. As it has often been said, we are saved by grace alone, but not grace that is alone. So we also see throughout Scripture that purity of heart which is obtained by faith will produce holiness in our minds and lives. The purity laws were external demonstrations of what should have been a heart reality. When purity does come to someone’s heart, it makes its way out into their life, not in what they eat or what they’ve touched, but in how they live reflecting the pure character of a holy God.
This is the centre of Christian living in the NT. Purity that begins with a new heart and is played out in Christ-like living. On this, the Scripture has a lot to say. The focus is not on living morally, but living with the mind and heart of Christ. A heart that hates sin, loves the church, and longs for the salvation of the lost. A heart that desires nothing more than the pure presence of God.
let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water.
This purity compels us to follow Christ and partake in his mission, in correct doctrine, and in a whole-hearted ministry. Paul, introducing his letter to Timothy, describes the difference between his ministry and the preaching of pseudo-preachers:
The aim of our charge is love that issues from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith.
It also is the foundation for Christian love, as the Apostle Peter says in his first epistle
Having purified your souls by your obedience to the truth for a sincere brotherly love, love one another earnestly from a pure heart,
Pure faith begets a pure heart, which begets a pure love for God and for our neighbour. The pure in heart are those who have trusted in Christ, believed on his work alone for their salvation, are being santified by the Spirit, and desire nothing more than the presence and pleasure of God.
Conclusion
Conclusion
Seek a pure heart at the cross. (Girl who worshipped holiness, not Christ)
Judge the purity of the heart by pure conduct.