Pure of heart
Psalms 51:10 (NET)
Create for me a pure heart, O God! Renew a resolute spirit within me!
This is such a well-known scripture, but as I was reading it, I started to wonder – What does it mean to have a pure heart? What is the heart? David is obviously not referring to the physical organ that pumps blood through the body, so what does he mean?
The hebrew word for heart is lēḇ (pronounced lave, rhymes with save) and it occurs 596 times in the old testament.
The greek word for heart is Kardia and it occurs 160 times in the new testament.
It is easy to google or use blue letter bible to find the definition for leb or kardia, but after reading other people’s definitions I still felt that I wasn’t fully grasping it. So I starting reading some of these 756 verses where the word heart appears. And the more verses I read, the more I could grasp the essence of what the word means.
Proverbs 16:9 (NKJV)
A man’s heart plans his way, But the Lord directs his steps.
Proverbs 19:21 (NKJV)
There are many plans in a man’s heart, Nevertheless the Lord ’s counsel—that will stand.
Proverbs 4:23 (NKJV)
Keep your heart with all diligence, For out of it spring the issues of life.
Psalms 37:4 (NKJV)
Delight yourself also in the Lord , And He shall give you the desires of your heart.
Psalms 27:14 (NKJV)
Wait on the Lord ; Be of good courage, And He shall strengthen your heart; Wait, I say, on the Lord !
Matthew 6:21 (NKJV)
For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
Jeremiah 29:13 (NKJV)
And you will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart.
Philippians 4:7 (NKJV)
and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.
Matthew 22:37 (NKJV)
Jesus said to him, “ ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.’
Romans 10:10 (NKJV)
For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.
Proverbs 27:19 (NKJV)
As in water face reflects face, So a man’s heart reveals the man.
Matthew 5:8 (NKJV)
Blessed are the pure in heart, For they shall see God.
Your heart is your inner motivation, that which drives you. It is where thoughts originate and where decisions flow from. The heart is more emotional than intellectual. It is where your principles are stored, it is your inner sanctuary. It is where your principles are stored, it is your inner sanctuary. Your principles are the truths you live by, they are very difficult to change but not impossible.
So we have looked at what is the heart, now I want to look at a few scriptures regarding the condition of our hearts.
If David calls out and asks the Lord to create a pure heart in him, that must then mean that he realised that his heart is not pure, right?
Jer 17:9
“The heart is deceitful above all things,
And desperately wicked;
Who can know it?
But that’s Old Testament, aren’t we a new creation now?
Let’s look at some New Testament scriptures about the condition of the heart.
Mark 3:4-5 (NKJV)
Then He said to them, “Is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do evil, to save life or to kill?” But they kept silent. And when He had looked around at them with anger, being grieved by the hardness of their hearts, He said to the man, “Stretch out your hand.” And he stretched it out, and his hand was restored as whole as the other.
Mark 6:51-52 (NKJV)
Then He went up into the boat to them, and the wind ceased. And they were greatly amazed in themselves beyond measure, and marveled. For they had not understood about the loaves, because their heart was hardened.
Mat 15:7
“Hypocrites! Well did Isaiah prophesy about you, saying:
‘These people draw near to Me with their mouth,
And honor Me with their lips,
But their heart is far from Me.
Act 7:51
“You stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears! You always resist the Holy Spirit; as your fathers did, so do you.
Act 28:27
For the heart of this people is waxed gross
Rom 2:5
But in accordance with your hardness and your impenitent heart
Stubborn, hard, far from God, uncircumcised, impenitent, waxed gross!
So can you agree with me that the basic condition of the heart is not good?
And look what David says in Psalm 24:
Psalms 24:3-4 (NKJV)
Who may ascend into the hill of the Lord ? Or who may stand in His holy place?
He who has clean hands and a pure heart, Who has not lifted up his soul to an idol, Nor sworn deceitfully.
So now David is saying, we cannot come into the presence of God if we don’t have clean hands and a pure heart? So how are we supposed to get a pure heart? Already in the old Testament God made an awesome promise:
Eze 11:19
“Then I will give them one heart, and I will put a new spirit within them, and take the stony heart out of their flesh, and give them a heart of flesh,
Isn’t that and amazing promise? But, when we read any scripture, we have to ask ourselves certain questions to be able to better understand the scripture.
So lets look at these 5 questions:
- Who is speaking?
- To whom is he speaking?
- When will this happen?
- How will this happen?
- Why will it happen? What is the purpose?
By only reading this scripture, we are actually not able to answer these questions. So it is very important to look at the context.
Let’s start in verse 17:
“Son of man, your brethren, your relatives, your countrymen, and all the house of Israel in its entirety, are those about whom the inhabitants of Jerusalem have said, ‘Get far away from the LORD; this land has been given to us as a possession.’
“Therefore say, ‘Thus says the Lord GOD: “I will gather you from the peoples, assemble you from the countries where you have been scattered, and I will give you the land of Israel.” ’
“And they will go there, and they will take away all its detestable things and all its abominations from there.
“Then I will give them one heart, and I will put a new spirit within them,[fn] and take the stony heart out of their flesh, and give them a heart of flesh, “that they may walk in My statutes and keep My judgments and do them; and they shall be My people, and I will be their God.
Now we can see that
- It is God who is speaking
- He is speaking to Ezekiel, his relatives, his countrymen and all the house of Israel in its entirety.
- Do we know when? The scripture doesn’t reveal the exact time, but it says
– God will gather them
– God will assemble them and
– God will give them the land of Israel
– And they will go there (to Israel)
– And they will take away all its detestable things and all its abominations (a process of purification)
– And then….. - We’ve already seen that there is a part that God will do and a part that man will do, but we don’t know the exact details of the how.
- v 20: that they may
– Walk in My statutes
– Keep my judgements (other translations: ordinances / laws / regulations)
– And do them
– They shall be my people
– I will be their God
So we have decided that this passage was initially written by Ezekiel and it was God speaking to the Israelites. Do you think it was only spoken to the Israelites?
Off course not! The whole story of Israel is a type and shadow of the modern church. Therefore, God was also speaking to us when he spoke to Ezekiel! This scripture is speaking to us about a time when God will give us a new spirit and a new heart and we can learn a lot by asking the same questions, but applying it to us personally.
- It is still God speaking
- He is speaking to us, individually, He is speaking to us as the LCF family and he is speaking to the global church and He is speaking through His Living Word
- The answer to question 3 can be interpreted on different levels, but as I was reading the scripture, this is what the Holy Spirit deposited in my heart, specifically for LCF:
– God will gather the right people to this church
– He will assemble them into a strong, unified group of people
– He will bless them and he will bless the mandate he has given them
– The people will heed God’s call to come to this church
– And they will purify firstly themselves and the house of the Lord and then this purification will spread to the whole of Heidelberg
And then I will give them one heart and I will put a new spirit within them and take the stony heart out of their flesh and give them a heart of flesh. That they may walk in my statutes and keep my judgements and do them, and they shall be my people and I will be their God.
Isn’t that an amazing promise? But can you see that there is a part that God will do and there is a part that is our responsibility? Interesting that this scripture also talks about purification, right?
Pure simply means ‘pure’, nothing else. Without anything that shouldn’t be there. 100% “it”. For example, pure gold, is 100% gold, nothing else. To purify means to remove all dirt or filth. How do you purify gold? You have probably all heard the story of how gold is heated and smelted and then the impurities float to the top and can be scooped of? And how the same happens to us when we go through a difficult time and that allows the wrong things in us to surface so we can get rid of it? Gold refining is actually a bit more complicated than that and there are different ways, but one of the most common is called the Miller process.
“The Miller process is based on the fact that virtually all the impurities present in gold combine with gaseous chlorine more readily than gold does at temperatures equal to or greater than the melting point of gold. The impure gold is therefore melted and gaseous chlorine is blown into the resulting liquid. The impurities form chloride compounds that separate into a layer on the surface of the molten gold. “(https://www.britannica.com/technology/gold-processing/Refining)
So you need heat and you need the chlorine gas blown into the melted liquid. Doesn’t that sound like the Holy Spirit breathing on us? He is the one that helps us and enable us to get rid of all the nasties in our lives!
Now I have a question for you. Col 1 says we are holy, unblameable and unreprovable in his sight, right? So – are we pure or do we still need to become pure?
1 Thes 4:1-7
Finally then, brethren, we urge and exhort in the Lord Jesus that you should abound more and more, just as you received from us how you ought to walk and to please God; for you know what commandments we gave you through the Lord Jesus. For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you should abstain from sexual immorality; that each of you should know how to possess his own vessel in sanctification and honor, not in passion of lust, like the Gentiles who do not know God; that no one should take advantage of and defraud his brother in this matter, because the Lord is the avenger of all such, as we also forewarned you and testified. For God did not call us to uncleanness, but in holiness.
James 1:27
Pure and undefiled religion before God and the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their trouble, and to keep oneself unspotted from the world.
2 Cor 6:14 – 7:1
Do not be unequally yoked together with unbelievers. For what fellowship has righteousness with lawlessness? And what communion has light with darkness? And what accord has Christ with Belial? Or what part has a believer with an unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God. As God has said:
“I will dwell in them And walk among them.
I will be their God, And they shall be My people.”
Therefore “Come out from among them And be separate, says the Lord.
Do not touch what is unclean, And I will receive you.”
“I will be a Father to you, And you shall be My sons and daughters, Says the Lord Almighty.”
Therefore, having these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God.
I think from these verses it is quite clear that sanctification, becoming pure and holy, is a process and that the responsibility lies with us.
We briefly mentioned Col 1, let’s read it now.
Col 1:21-22
And you, who once were alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now He has reconciled in the body of His flesh through death, to present you holy, and blameless, and above reproach in His sight
Awesome! Do you think we should maybe read the next verse as well? Do we know the next verse as well as we now the preceding 2 verses?
v23: if indeed you continue in the faith, grounded and steadfast, and are not moved away from the hope of the gospel which you heard,
The passion translation says it like this:
Even though you were once distant from him, living in the shadows of your evil thoughts and actions, he reconnected you back to himself. He released his supernatural peace to you through the sacrifice of his own body as the sin-payment on your behalf so that you would dwell in his presence. And now there is nothing between you and Father God, for he sees you as holy, flawless, and restored, if indeed you continue to advance in faith, assured of a firm foundation to grow upon. Never be shaken from the hope of the gospel you have believed in.
That does sound like we have a part to play doesn’t it?
1 John 3:2-3
Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is. And every man that hath this hope in him purifieth himself, even as he is pure.
So, every man purifies himself…
Because of the hope in the return of Christ
Do you think we must read on?
v4: Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law: for sin is the transgression of the law.
There is a nice and easy definition of sin. But which law do you think John is referring to? The law of the OT or the law that Jesus taught and demonstrated to them when he spend 3 yrs with them? The old law said you are not allowed to commit adultery. Jesus’ new law says if you as much as look at a women lustfully, you have committed adultery in your heart.
v5: And ye know that he was manifested to take away our sins; and in him is no sin.
v6: Whosoever abideth in him sinneth not: whosoever sinneth hath not seen him, neither known him.
Do you also start to feel like Paul is touching a nerve now? If I sin, I do not abide in him? If I sin I haven’t seen him?
I think this is exactly what Paul is saying! If we are truly immersed in Christ 24/7, we will not be able to sin (because in Him is no sin). But we get busy with life, our focus gets pulled away from him, we get distracted by all the stuff around us and we, unintendedly, for even just a moment, step out of Christ’s presence, and then we are open to sin.
I have recently discovered a new desire to see Christ. To really see Him in his fullness, in his glory, in his majesty, in his love, in his compassion. I long to have a vision of him like John did in the book of Revelations. We sing the song “open the eyes of my heart Lord, I want to see you”, and it has taken on a new meaning, a new urgency for me. When I sing it I sing it like I mean it, I cry out to the God to really open my heart to see him. And I really believe that, if we are able to see Jesus in that way, and we can keep that in front of our eyes, the world will not be able to distract us and pull us into sin.
v7: Little children, let no man deceive you: he that doeth righteousness is righteous, even as he is righteous.
v8: He that committeth sin is of the devil; for the devil sinneth from the beginning. For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil.
When John speaks here of “he that commiteth sin”, he is referring to someone that commits sin in a continuous and unrepenting way. A better translation of commit might be practice – He that practices sin (in a habitual way) is of the devil. For me the focus should in any case be on the second part of the verse – our victory is in Jesus Christ.
v9: Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin; for his seed remaineth in him: and he cannot sin, because he is born of God.
Again, John refers here to people that live in sin. Whosoever is born of God does not practice sin. Jesus explained to Nicodemus that you have to be born again, that you need to be born of the spirit. If we are born of the spirit, we do not have a sin nature anymore and we cannot be comfortable living with sin.
v10: In this the children of God are manifest, and the children of the devil: whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God, neither he that loveth not his brother.
Our lives will bear fruit and that fruit is what other people will see. It will either be righteous fruit or unrighteous fruit. Unrighteous fruit cannot come from God (he is without sin). So if it doesn’t come from God, who does it come from? The only alternative is – the devil. And then that interesting phrase at the end – ‘ neither is he that loveth not his brother’.
v11: For this is the message that ye heard from the beginning, that we should love one another.
John is shifting gears here, going from sinning to loving. Why? Because love is, in a sense, the opposite of sin.
Skipping down to verse 18:
My little children, let us not love in word, neither in tongue; but in deed and in truth.
My children are a good example of this. They love to tell me how much they love me, but their actions do not always correlate with what they are saying! I know they love me, but they do not yet understand the full meaning of love, they are not always loving in deed and in truth.
And hereby (by loving in deed and in truth) we know that we are of the truth, and shall assure our hearts before him.
Love is an automatic outflow of living in the truth – who is the Truth? Jesus Christ.
For if our heart (our inner thought processes, source of our emotions, origin of decisions) condemn us, God is greater than our heart, and knoweth all things.
God is greater than our heart – we must choose to listen to God and not go by the feelings in our heart. What does God say about us? He says:
You are chosen
You are a royal priesthood
You are holy!
Beloved, if our heart condemn us not – If God’s truth becomes ingrained in our hearts, if it becomes a principle stored in our hearts… then have we confidence toward God.
And , (When we come to God in confidence that He is our loving Father and that we can approach Him without shame or guilt, then) whatsoever we ask we receive of him, because we keep his commandments, and do those things that are pleasing in his sight.
And just in case you were wondering what his commandments are…
v23: And this is his commandment, That we should believe on the name of his Son Jesus Christ, and love one another, as he gave us commandment.
In conclusion: We have been sanctified by the blood of Christ and because of Christ’s sacrifice, God sees us as holy and blameless. But we also have a responsibility to continue in the process of sanctification by keeping our hearts pure, to choose against that which is not of God.
2 Tim 2:19
Nevertheless the solid foundation of God stands, having this seal: “The Lord knows those who are His,” and, “Let everyone who names the name of Christ depart from iniquity.”
Can you see how these things go together? It is almost like the one cannot exist without the other.
If we can see Jesus and understand his love for us, if we can grasp more and more of what He did for us, if we can allow ourselves to be consumed by the majesty and the awesomeness that is Jesus, if we choose to abide in him more and more and more – we will automatically put away that which is not of God. We will automatically choose to live holy lives and one of the biggest signs or fruit of this will be in our love for other people.
