Blessed Are The Pure In Heart
Matthew 5:8
MGCC – on December 19th, we as a church began a journey in the Gospel of Matthew…
NOW CURRENTLY – we are in Matthew chapter 5.
WHERE JESUS – after spending about a year… teaching the multitudes, healing the sick, cleansing the leper and telling everyone to repent for the Kingdom is at hand…
GATHERS – those who were following Him on a hillside overlooking the sea of Galilee, and then He lays out His radical counter cultural manifesto about what life in His kingdom is all about.
Now when Jesus saw the crowds, he went up on a mountainside and sat down.
AGAIN - that’s what rabbi’s did when they were about to drop some wisdom, they sat down.
His disciples came to him, and he began to teach them. He said: “Blessed (‘makarios’ - joyful, fulfilled, satisfied, content, happy)…
Blessed are the poor in spirit – Matthew 5:3
AND – we are like, that doesn’t make a lot of sense.
BECAUSE - we are conditioned to think, “Blessed are the rich.” YEAH - that’s how the equation seems to work in our world.
BUT - Jesus says, “Blessed are the poor. Blessed are the poor in spirit.” “Blessed are you when you reach this point where you recognize,
‘LORD, I am bankrupt. I need Your help. I can’t fix it, I can’t mend it, I can’t restore it, I can’t put the pieces back together again…please help me_____’
AND LISTEN B/S – there is a blessing for you in that moment, that you will never find outside of it.
And then Jesus says…
Blessed are those who mourn. – Matthew 5:4
NOW – this is just counterintuitive, it seems contradictory. “Blessed are those who mourn”… It’s like saying, “Happy are the sad, the sorrowful… blessed are the depressed’.
It doesn’t make a lot of sense.
HOWEVER- what we find… IS THAT - in the tears (in the pain and sorrow) there is a blessing from God that cannot be found outside of mourning. And a lot of us have experienced that comfort.
As Job says in Job 42:5, my ears have heard about you, but now my eyes have seen you.
And then Jesus says, Blessed are the meek… - Matthew 5:5
Those who keep their power and strength under control for the benefit of others and the glory of God.
for they will inherit the earth.
Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness,
Those who hunger and thirst: to know God, to be like Jesus, and to make this world a better place for
For they will be satisfied.
Blessed are the merciful…
Not just those who do acts of mercy, but those who ‘are’ become more merciful, such that, mercy begins to flow out from them, to those, who…
• Have a material need
• Mess up and need a second chance
• Are on the outside, alone, outcasts
• Doubt and are struggling in their walk
• Fail and disappointment them
• Hurt them
• Are lost and need to hear the Gospel (save others by snatching them out of the fire; to others show mercy with fear” -Jude 23
for they will be shown mercy
AND B/S – as I asked last week, “what if, Jesus was serious?”
LIKE - what if joy, fulfillment, satisfaction and contentment are found not in pursuing happiness (trying to control and make ‘just right’ all of the things happening around us), but rather, in pursuing a blessed life?
YEAH – what if, Jesus was serious?
AND – what if, you/me/we… took Him seriously… and began to really go after this life? B/S – here’s the deal…
The life you have always wanted, the life you were created to live, the Kingdom life… is within your reach. IN FACT – it is ‘the life’ that He (through The Spirit) has empowered everyone who has come into His Kingdom to live.
His divine power has given us everything we need for a godly life through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. – 2 Peter 1:3
MGCC – it’s 5/1/2022… And this morning we will unpack beatitude #6, in Jesus radical, counterculture manifesto about life in His kingdom.
Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will SEE God.
QUESTION – what is your first reaction to this beatitude?
‘Seeing God’ - awesome!
But being ‘pure in heart’ – impossible!
OKAY MGCC – let’s do this!
AND HERE - is how I want to attack our conversation this morning, BY - unpacking 3 things
• The Call
• The Promise
• The Path
Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.
NOW – this week, I kind of want to kind of reverse engineer this beatitude, and talk about, ‘The Promise’ first.
I. The Promise
QUESTION – and what is the promise? They will see God.
OKAY – but what does that mean, “They will see God”
I MEAN – in the Old Testament, when Moses asked God to ‘show Him His glory..’
God told Him that He could not let Moses see His face or he would die…
But God said after I pass by I will let you see my back, the afterburn if you will of His glory. (Exodus 33:20-23)
Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God
OKAY – so maybe this promise about ‘seeing God’ is referring to the promise that we find in Scriptures like the following…
Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when Christ appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. – 1 John 3:2
OR – in Revelation 22… where it talks about how one day we will gather around the throne of God and that we will see His face. MAN – we can only Imagine! AMEN?!
BUT UNDERSTAND MGCC – Jesus in this beatitude is not talking about seeing God sometime in our future, but about seeing God in our now.
AND LISTEN – for to understand what ‘they will see God’ means… it is helpful to look at the 3 different words that the Greek’s (NT written in Greek) had for SEE.
NOW - one Word basically meant – to see with your eyes…
LIKE - I see my hand in front of my face right now.
I see the clock on the back wall.
I see…
Another word means – to see and observe.
LIKE - going out to see a movie. Or better yet, seeing and observing a movie for free @ home
WOW – movies are expensive.
AND - the 3rd word, which is the word that Jesus uses here is, Horaho (Huh raho), means…
to perceive, to know, to become acquainted with by personal experience
AND LISTEN – if you think about it, we kind of use our one word ‘SEE’ in the exact way.
QUESTION – have you ever traveled to go see some friends or family members?
OKAY – so what do you mean by
‘You are going to SEE them?”
Did you mean that you drove to where they live and…
• Waited to see them come out of their house and then just drove away.
• Or that you set up some launch chairs in their front yard and just sat back and observed them for week and then left.
• Or did you go into their home, share some meals and send time with them personally?
Horaho… to perceive, to know, to become acquainted with by personal experience
AND HEY – check this verse out about Moses, it’s in the same chapter where God tells Moses, that He cannot see His face or He will die.
The Lord would speak to Moses face, as a man speaks with His Friend. – Exodus 33:11
UNDERSTAND – that on the day on the hills by the sea of Galilee Jesus said,
“Listen, I am going to tell you how to SEE God, how to know Him and have personal relationship with Him?”
QUESTION – can you see how radical and offensive what Jesus was saying was, to the Scribes and Pharisees.
I MEAN – they were the keeper of the rules.
AND – there were, a lot rules, not only the 613 laws found in Old Testament, but many others that made up on their own.
LIKE – who was this young upstart, x carpenter turned rabbi,
to tell all of those people who not only do not keep all the rules, but who more than likely didn’t even know all the rules that they could see God, that they could have a relationship with God. THAT’S – our job!
Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God
Matthew 5:8
MGCC, B/S…
DO YOU – want to SEE God?
DO YOU - want to have a personal relationship with Him?
UNDERSTAND – this is the promise of Matthew 5:8
II. The Call
Blessed are the pure in heart… - Matthew 5:8
NOW IF JESUS - would have left off those last 2 words and simply said…
Blessed are the pure, for they will see God.
Jesus hearers, especially the Pharisees and religious leaders would have been all over it…
BECAUSE - they were experts… like they had an A+ rating in outward purity. YEAH – for them it was more like
• Blessed are the rule keepers
• Blessed are the outwardly clean
• Blessed are those who maintain a good image
AGAIN - they had all kinds of rules and traditions about…
• what to eat and what not to eat,
• what to wear and what not to wear,
• how far you could walk away from your home on the Sabbath
• who to get close to and who to stay away from
• who to eat with it and who to avoid
• rules about exactly how to wash your hands before you eat…
AND LISTEN – all of these external things were an effort to ‘appear’ pure to those watching.
BUT AGAIN… Jesus did not simply say “blessed are the pure…’ INSTEAD – He took it so much deeper, He took it to the inside
Blessed are the pure in heart… - Matthew 5:8
AND B/S - that is an entirely different matter.
I MEAN – there is a massive chasm, a huge difference – between ‘appearing’ pure on the outside, and ‘being’ pure on the inside.
GET IT?
NOW – to the Greeks the heart (the Greek word ‘cardia’), is defined as…
The fountain and seat of our thoughts, passions, desires, appetites, affections, purposes, will and character.
B/L - it’s who you are on the inside, it’s the real you.
Which is why all throughout the Scriptures we that God cares deeply and passionately about the heart. A few passages.
Circumcise your hearts, therefore, and do not be stiff-necked any longer. – Deuteronomy 10:16
Now then,” said Joshua, “throw away the foreign gods that are among you and yield your hearts to the LORD, the God of Israel.” - Joshua 24:23
But the LORD said to Samuel, “Don’t judge by his appearance or height, for I have rejected him. The LORD doesn’t see things the way you see them. People judge by outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart.”
– 1 Samuel 16:7
As a face is reflected in water, so the heart reflects the real person. – Proverbs 27:19
Guard your heart above all else, for it determines the course of your life. – Proverbs 4:23
A good person produces good things from the treasury of a good heart, and an evil person produces evil things from the treasury of an evil heart. What you say flows from what is in your heart. – Luke 6:45
OKAY – here’s the deal…
A central part of living in Jesus Kingdom is understanding that God cares more about our heart, our inside…
THEN – He does about the outside which is so to fake.
ESPECIALLY – in this age of social media.
LIKE – if you want everyone to think that you have a perfect family here is all you need to do…
• hire a professional photographer
• dress everyone up
• find the perfect scenic outdoor setting
• then snap the pictures, make the posts
• and let the likes and approvals start streaming in
“what a beautiful family”
QUESTION – but what was happening the week before, or the week after the photo shoot.
NOW – I am not saying it’s bad, it’s just not real.
LIKE – you do not get to know who people are by looking at their Facebook or Instagram.
AGAIN – God looks more on the inside (at the heart)…
Where we are, what we are.
BOTTOM LINE – God doesn’t do pretend…
OKAY…
SO JESUS – drops this well-worn word pure, into His sermon and then gives it a dramatic new spin.
Letting us know that the way of His Kingdom,
IS NOT – about outward appearance, but about the heart.
YES B/S – in God’s economy it’s about purity of heart over purity of image.
Get It?
Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God
HEY – can I be honest with you for a minute, not that I haven’t been so far.
‘Seeing God’ - awesome!
But being ‘pure in heart’ – impossible!
OKAY – so let’s dive a little deeper into what it means to be pure in heart.
AND FIRST – let me say, that it does not mean sinless, because as God say through John.
If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. – 1 John 1:8
NOW - the word pure… is the Greek word katharos
(ka thah ros)
AND LISTEN – it does not mean something that has never been dirty. WHICH – is good news, AMEN?!
BECAUSE – we all got sin.
I MEAN – if we have to have always been pure and spotless, we would be in a heap of trouble.
NOW - scholars suggest that this word basically has two meanings.
FIRST - it means “to make pure by cleansing from dirt, filth, or contamination.”
It was used to describe…
• Metals that had been refined by fire until they were free from impurities.
• Soiled clothes that had been washed clean,
• Grain that had been carefully sifted to remove all impurities.
SECOND - it refers to being “unmixed, having no double allegiance.”
The basic idea is that of integrity, singleness of heart, as opposed to duplicity, or a divided heart.
James addresses this very thing in James 4…
Come near to God and he will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. – James 4:8
QUESTION…
AND HOW – where they being doubled minded?
WELL – in the James 4:4,5 we read…
You adulterous people, don’t you know that friendship with the world means enmity against God? Therefore, anyone who chooses to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God. Or do you think Scripture says without reason that he jealously longs for the spirit he has caused to dwell in us.
- James 4:4,5
OKAY SO - let’s put these two definitions together.
A person with a passion for purity is one who has been cleansed in character so that the way they look in public is the way they look in private. They are undivided, authentic, sincere, unpretending – not faking it, a person of integrity.
In ancient Rome, sculpting was a popular profession.
AND - there were a lot of sculptors because this was a big demand in the marketplace. All kinds of false gods were sculpted and then sold.
AND BECAUSE - there was so much demand, there were a lot of sculptors who really weren’t very good sculptors, right?
I MEAN - they were inferior craftsman. AND - they would build these sculptures because they wanted to make a quick buck, but it wasn’t a great product.
So the legitimate sculptors started to mark their statues with these words: Sine cera…from which we get our word sincere. And the word sine cera…it literally means “without wax,”
BECAUSE - here’s what the inferior sculptors would do.
They would go to their sculptures and they would put wax in the cracks and the pieces that didn’t quite get molded right. They would fill those in with wax.
SO IF - you’re just looking at it on the outside, it looks fine; it looks perfectly acceptable. But a lot of it is actually wax.
AND SO - those who were pure sculptors…they would say sine cera, “without wax.” They would mark it that way. And then they would set it out in the sun, and the sun would expose whether or not there was wax because it would melt the wax. So it was shown (and) it was proven to be pure.
AND THIS - is what we’re getting at when we talk about being pure in heart.
It’s a heart without wax.
It’s a heart that is authentic, unpretending, sincere, it’s a heart of integrity.
NOW WHEN – you read the Gospels, you fins that Jesus gave His strongest rebukes, to those who were pretending on the outside. Who were not people of integrity.
“Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You clean the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence.
Blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and dish, and then the outside also will be clean.
“Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside but on the inside are full of the bones of the dead and everything unclean. In the same way, on the outside you appear to people as righteous but on the inside you are full of hypocrisy and wickedness.
– Matthew 23:25-28
Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God
Matthew 5:8
THEY – will be able to have a personal relationship with Him.
UNDERSTAND MGCC – God loves honesty and integrity when come to Him.
REMEMBER – the parable Jesus told of the tax collector and the Pharisee praying to God.
Pharisee – ‘God I am so awesome, and thank you that I am not like other men (those filthy sinners)… I fast twice a week, and give a 10th of all I have.
Tax Collector – beat his chest and said, ‘God, have mercy on me, a sinner.’
Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God
Matthew 5:8
NOW – to understand this idea of being pure in heart a little better…
I want to talk brief about two kinds of purity.
• Positional Purity
• Practical Purity
A). Positional Purity
NOW – even though may be such things as…
Self-cleaning ovens, self-cleaning washing machines,
Self-cleaning litter boxes and even self-cleaning underwear
Underwear that you could wear for days, weeks, or even months without getting smelly. 2 for $99
BUT – there is no such thing as a self -cleaning heart.
UNDERSTAND B/S – your positional purity is God’s job.
AMEN?! It’s a purity given to us by Jesus.
IN FACT – we read of that very thing in Acts 15…
NOW – Paul and Barnabas are in Jerusalem reporting on how the gentiles are coming to faith.
God, who knows the heart, showed that he accepted them by giving the Holy Spirit to them, just as he did to us. He did not discriminate between us and them, for he purified their hearts by faith. – Acts 15:8,9
UNDERSTAND MGCC – if you surrendered your life to Jesus, if you are ‘in Christ’… you are positionally pure.
AND LISTEN – it is not based on your feeling, but rather on your obedience to the Gospel.
Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!... God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. – 2 Corinthians 5:17,21
So in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith, for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. – Galatians 3:26,27
WHEN – God looks at us…
He sees Jesus, He sees His righteousness.
AGAIN – positional purity is God’s job.
B) Practical Purity
NOW – this is a lot tougher. Because like many times we don’t feel very pure. But this is the practical side of purity of heart.
AND LISTEN – all over the New Testament we are encouraged to strive for purity of heart…
TO – take off and put to death the old, and put on the new.
AGAIN – our positional purity was given to us by God.
Practical purity is God working in our lives as we surrender our lives more and more to Him.
LIKE – Paul said in Philippians 2, it is us and God working together.
Continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose. – Philippians 2:13,14
AGAIN – this is hard to live out.
LIKE – I know I am positionally pure, but being practically pure in this fallen world, or when times are tough can be really difficult.
AND B/S – that is what we need Jesus.
UNDERSTAND – ‘I’m not enough, unless you come’
Is not just a good song to sing on a Sunday, but a great way, in fact the only way to live out our walk with Christ.
AND – let me be clear…
Practical purity is not about perfection, it’s about direction.
Not are you perfect, but are you even trying, even aiming at the goal of purity of heart, of being a person of integrity.
III. The Path
How do we live out purity in heart in our everyday lives
A) Be Careful
Some questions to help us unpack this…
What are you allowing to influence your life?
UNDERSTAND - if we are going to be people of integrity, people who are pure in heart practically. Be careful…
What are you allowing to influence your life?
I like how Paul puts it in Philippians 4…
Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things. – Philippians 4:8
MGCC - what if we kind of made this a filter for everything that comes into, or is in our lives and heart.
AND LIKE - if it doesn’t fit, we filter it out
That’s being careful.
You say, that’s intense… maybe, or maybe it’s just being careful, or it’s purity of heart
QUESTION…
Whatever is in your thoughts and life
Is it true and honorable and right and lovely…
Am I thinking of things that are excellent and worthy of praise.
Be careful. Is there accountability in my life.
Listen there has got to be people in our lives as we try to walk this purity heart out, who know us enough to call out our stuff.
Now we love the verse in proverbs that says iron sharpens iron. We put it on t shirts and bumper stickers.
But listen iron sharpening iron is like an intense process
There are sparks and there’s heat and there’s friction.
But guess what, after all of that pain something is sharper.
That’s how we get sharper.
You need people in your life keeping you accountable
Be careful.
B) Be Consistent
AGAIN – it’s that idea of integrity… are you the same person no matter where you are.
There is a hard question for me to wrestle with, as I am sure it is for you.
Whether I am at home with my family, or I’m at church, or I’m out with friends, or I am at home by myself at 11 pm,
Am I the same person.
Like can someone drop in on you at any time 24/7 and find the same person. Be consistent.
Here’s a tough one with this consistent thing… is what you are aligning with publicly representative of who you are privately?
LIKE – if I scroll through my Facebook page or you scroll through your Facebook page is all of that stuff we are posting publicly aligning with who you are privately.
There’s no fakery, there’s no deceit. No pretending.
What you see, of what you get.
Be consistent.
I came across the following quote this week.
And that’s kind of the mentality many of us have adopted with our lives.
You know, we push into the spotlight things that we want people to know, and we hide parts of us that we want to keep a secret.
In other words, we live by one script when we are on stage (as we put on a good show)…
But once we come off the stage… (at home, in the car, in the hallway)… it an entirely different Script all together…
BUT LISTEN - that’s not a blessed life, it’s not even a healthy life. Checkout this quote from a psychology textbook, called Coping with Stress. That’s the name of the book.
Here’s what the author says:
“People who tend to keep secrets or live inauthentic lives have more physical and mental complaints, on average, than people who do not, including greater anxiety, depression and bodily symptoms, such as back pain and headaches.”
There is this…there are these side effects when you don’t have a pure heart, when you’re pretending to be more on the outside than you are on the inside.
It’s not the path to a blessed life.
UNDERSTAND – it is exhausting and frustrating to live your life as a full time actor or actress, where everywhere you go you are pretending, you are putting on a show, you’re reciting your lines…
AND - it just wears you out.
C) Be Courageous
QUESTION – do you call out what is wrong and encourage what is right, no matter what political party or camp it puts you in.
UNDERSTAND B/S - it does not matter what Jersey you are wearing as a Kingdom person you call out what is wrong and you encourage what is right.
AND LISTEN - we live in a world right now that won’t let you do that.
“Oh your on this side so you need to say all the things that this side is saying.”
BUT LISTEN - as Kingdom people we are not any of those sides, we are on HIS side.
I don’t care if it is on this side or that side.
If it’s wrong I am going to call it out if it right I am going to encourage it.
Let’s us not forget that we are citizens of the Kingdom, and that the only thing that can change hearts is the Gospel.
So we be careful, and we be consistent and we be courageous and do you know who that will lead you to be, someone who is contagious.
D) Be Contagious
I MEAN – seriously, if you do those 3 things people are going to take notice.
They are going to come up to you and say,
‘dude, how can you stay so calm and grounded in this crazy chaotic world.’
NOW – as we wrap up… I just…I feel like it’s important for me to tell you…to tell you that because of the role I’m in here at church. Without even meaning to, without even meaning to I can pretend to be more than I really am.
I can be putting on a show.
Standing on a stage, reciting some lines.
YOU SEE - there is part of my instinct that says, “Look, if I’m going to do this role effectively,
THEN - I need to…I need to cover up some stuff, push it back, don’t let it show.
LIKE – there have been times when I have pretended to be strong and confident when behind the mask I was feeling weak and afraid.
AND SO - the tendency is that…
We cover things up.
We put a smile on our face.
We act like we’ve got it all figured out—even though we all know that’s not true.
In his book What's So Amazing About Grace, Philip Yancey writes,
"As a child, I put on my best behavior on Sunday mornings, dressing up for God and for Christians around me. It never occurred to me that church was a place to be honest. Now, though, as I seek to look at the world through the lens of grace, I realize that imperfection is the prerequisite for grace. Light only gets in through the cracks."
HEY – come on…
Can we just admit that a lot of dishonesty, a lot of performing and pretending… happens in a place where we should be the most… real and authentic, and least fake and pretending.
AND – do you know what I think…
I think God is using these recent conversations and this study of Matthew to help us get there.
Blessed are the pour in heart, for they will see God.
Matthew 5:8
