Blessed are the Pure in Heart

The Beatitudes: A Mirror, Not a Roadmap

0:03 Now let us turn again to the Gospel according to Matthew, Matthew's Gospel, Chapter 5, as we continue our studies in this sermon of all sermons, the Sermon on the Mount, and in particular the Beatitudes, these eight blessings enunciated by our Lord Jesus, which give to us, as we learned in the Sunday school class, perhaps the most certain description in all of the Scriptures of the character of a true Christian. Now remember, the Beatitudes are not a road map directing us how to become Christians. They are a mirror reflecting to us what a true Christian is. Blessed is the man that knows the difference in how to use a road map and how to use a mirror. And I think most of you can.

1:03 I think, in fact, your children might... It's a snicker if the next time you're planning your summer vacation trip, you've started looking in a mirror.

1:10 No, you don't use your mirror for that. You use it for something else. You used it this morning.

1:19 And so when we come to the Scriptures, we face portions which are a road map. They are a revelation by the Spirit of God as to how we're to enter the now day. Other portions, a revelation. A revelation.

1:39 A revelation. A revelation. We will be, if we've entered the now day, and have truly passed from death unto life. We come this morning to Matthew chapter 5 and verse 8.

Progression of the Beatitudes and Introduction to Purity of Heart

1:53 That's one of the most profound statements in all of the Word of God. Matthew 5 and verse 8. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. Our studies show that there is a definite progression in these Beatitudes that our Lord Jesus...

2:21 ...did not utter them in a haphazard way.

2:25 We last week looked at them in terms of an ascending and a descending ladder. And on the bottom row of our ladder ascending in this picture, we have poverty of spirit. The members of the Kingdom of Heaven are those who have seen themselves as utterly poverty stricken spiritually. They have nothing to commend themselves to God.

2:50 They recognize they need something. They are living outside of themselves if they are to be accepted as God. Poverty of spirit gives birth to holy mourning, a brokenness over our sin and our wretchedness. And when I've seen my wretchedness and been broken, then the evidence will be a meekness, a breaking down of the strut and the cockiness of the flesh and of a damning ego.

3:17 And there will be that lack of ill will, that absence of ill will and rebellion. And the blessed absence of ill will to man. But I'm still empty. I've seen my poverty.

3:31 I've been broken over it. It's had its revelation or its outworking in my relations to others. But then we come to the middle one on that ladder. Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they should be filled.

3:46 And the man who's been filled with the righteousness of God and Christ and been filled with the Holy Spirit who becomes the indwelling power to make him actually righteous, then there will be manifested in his life mercy. Blessed are the merciful. A man who's seen himself a recipient of mercy becomes a merciful man. He looks with pity upon those in their need.

4:14 And now we come today to the second of these descending rungs on the ladder. Blessed are the pure. Blessed are the pure. Blessed are the pure.

4:23 Blessed are the pure. Blessed are the pure. In all the study and meditation, prayer, contemplation, and referring to other commentaries and books, I come to you this morning with the consciousness again that we see through a glass dark. If I can this morning, but faintly and poorly at best, set before you the marvelous truth of this text, I will feel that the hour has not been wasted. Instead of making this statement, blessed or perfectly happy are the pure in heart, that you have entered this universe invulnerable by God, to love and worship him. Clear and Reese.

5:55 No matter what the pious people who all around us desire this spiritual, physical, spiritual, pathological experience, they are in pure blessedness. blessedness, nor true happiness here or in eternity.

6:42 Pathways are all your pursuit for happiness will be in vain.

6:53 Christendom would learn this. For we have groups and men and movements that are just flooding our country with attempts to make us happy. Chuck us under the chin and make us happy. If we want to be happy, we've got to be holy. And the man or woman or movement or church or ministry that's going to make me happy is the one that's the instrument in the hands of God to make me holy and pure in heart. For perfectly happy are the pure in heart. Let's begin with that question and see if purity of heart is purity of the said blessed. First of all, it touches the root of my

Purity of Heart: Touching the Root of Our Being

7:53 being. It's not about the heart. It's merely to the heart, the center of our personality. In some heathen cultures, I was talking with a man who works with bricklet Bible translators.

8:07 And it's interesting, when they come to translate certain verses, in some tribes, they would translate it this way, blessed are the pure in liver. Because in that heathen culture, they think that the center of their personality is their liver. To express the reality, the real you, in that culture, you'd have to write, blessed are the pure in liver, the pure in the stomach. We're not speaking of that physical organ that pulses the blood through the veins and arteries and nerves, no. But we use the term heart in the biblical sense of the center of the real me. It involves my mind, what I think, what I feel, and my way. The personality than that of my being, Jesus said, what I, Jesus said in Matthew, and then he mentioned certain things, is not really the basis of what I am. The Scripture says, if a man thinketh in his heart,

9:32 so is he. The thoughts of my head, the center of my personality. 423 says, guard thy heart's images, for I have a problem of the head, but

10:41 see, it's basically a problem of the heart of your personality. Two texts of the Bible that reveal this so clearly. Jeremiah 17 9, where the prophet says, you can know, as he ministered in the midst of Israel in all of her sin and her back sin, he comes out with this exclamation that the problem of thoughts about God will not be doing it. But the prophet cries, the problem with Israel is not the heart. The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately with it. And our Lord Jesus in that passage I referred to a moment ago, but I want us to look at it a bit more carefully.

11:44 A very basic passage in the Gospel of Mark, chapter 7. Will you turn, please, to this passage? Chapter 7, and beginning with verse, well, let's go back a little bit.

12:12 Let's go back to verse 15. Jesus said, there's nothing from without a man that entering into him can defile. But the things which come out of him, these are they that defile the man. Let a man have ears to hear, let him hear. When he was entered into the house from the people, his disciples asked him concerning the parable. You see, he was dealing with people whose whole thought of holiness and sin was external. If you read when you go home today, the first 13 verses of Mark 7, you'll get this picture. The Pharisees were always concerned with washing pots and pans and cups and having them ceremonially cleaned. They were concerned that they did the right things with their hands in the right way at the right time. And if anybody didn't cleanse something outwardly and didn't do outwardly what they were supposed to do, the Pharisees said, uh-oh, he's ceremonially, religiously unclean. Jesus said, you've got it backwards. No dirt that enters from the outside can pollute a man. No

13:17 food that enters from the outside can pollute a man. Jesus, Jesus said, what rises up from within the man and touches his way, that's what pollutes him. Not what comes from the hands in, or the mouth in, or the feet in, but what flows from the heart out. This is defiling. So he said to his disciples in verse 18, Are ye also without understanding? Do you not perceive that whatsoever thing from without entereth a man, it cannot defile him because it entereth not into his heart. So the Lord said, Nothing is defiling until it touches the heart. But it merely enters into the belly, and goeth out into the breath, purging all meats.

14:00 And he said, That which cometh out of the man, that defileth the man. For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, whether those thoughts are bitterness, loss, jealousy, envy, anything that's called an evil thought. Jesus said, It flows out of this fountain of iniquity, the human heart. Adulteries, it starts in the heart. It doesn't start with a seductive glance. It doesn't start with a wrong association. It doesn't start with an over familiar relationship. Jesus said, Every adulterous relationship started in the polluted heart of man or woman.

14:47 That's where it started, he said. Adulteries, fornications, young people, some of you that have been playing with this matter of illicit sex relations outside of marriage, it starts in your heart. And some of you think, Oh, well, I know how to go far, so far, no further. I'll never commit fornication.

15:06 Listen, unless something happens in your heart, there's no proof you won't. These things proceed out of the heart. Fornication, murder, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, simply because you've done something. All are commendable. You get proud because there's a condition of heart that produces pride.

15:35 All these evil things come from within and defile the man. Now, do you see the teaching of our Lord Jesus? Jesus made it unmistakably clear that the basic root of sin is the human heart. The seed of the personality has been defiled and polluted and it's here that the gospel must come and do its glorious work.

The Curse of External Christianity: Phariseeism

16:01 Now, we are cursed in our day for failing to recognize this. Most evangelical Christianity assumes that the only thing that's wrong with the sinner is that he's got a few kinks in his head or maybe a few empty places. So, if he doesn't believe that Jesus is the Son of God, we've got to tell him he does. Get that kink straightened out of his head.

16:21 Then, if he doesn't know that Christ died on the cross for sinners, we've got to fill up that empty space with that fact and we tell him Christ died on the cross for sinners. So, if he doesn't get the kink straightened out of his head, and the empty place is filled up with the truth, then we say he's got a few things out of joint with his feet. Maybe he goes to this show and goes here and goes to the beer hall. We've got to tell him he ought to get that back in line.

16:43 They're out of joint there. And then there are a few places you don't go that you ought to. You ought to go into the prayer closet and pray. You ought to go to church.

16:51 So, we feel if we can get the kink straightened out of the head, and a few of the empty places filled, if we can get a few of the actions of the feet that are out of joint and out of the way, bring them into the right way, we feel well we've done our job and under God we've seen conversions. That's the problem. We can get the kinks in the head straightened out and the empty places filled. We can get the wayward feet brought into reasonably straight paths and never really touch the man's basic problem. The problem is not his head or his feet. The problem with sinners is the heart. And one of the tens of orthodox religion, Bible, that merely gets the kinks in the head straight and gets the wayward paths of the feet lined up, it produces what it produced in the day of Christ. And what was that in the day of Christ? Phariseeism.

18:01 Do you remember what Jesus said of the Pharisees in Matthew 23? Some of the most searching words in the scripture. My own heart has been burned afresh by the fire of the Spirit of God as I've read through some of these portions in the past few days. Matthew chapter 23, notice now Christ's word to the Pharisees, especially verse 25.

18:28 We'll want to use scribes, Pharisees, hypocrites, for ye may clean the outside of the cup and the platter, but within they are full of extortion and excess. Thou blind Pharisee, cleanse first that which is within the cup and the platter, that the outside of them may be clean also.

18:54 Do you get the picture? Suppose this glass now were dirty on the inside and the outside. Jesus said the problem with you Pharisees is that you take a wet cloth, not clean the outside. Wherever you find a little bit of dirt, you just rub it off, clean it up.

19:14 So now, if this were of course not transparent, if it were a china cup, I could hold it up to you and you'd see the outside and say isn't that beautiful? Or that's what you Pharisees do. You cleanse the outside. You spot clean it. And anything you're not supposed to do, your hands aren't supposed to do, your feet aren't supposed to do. Oh, you're correct. He says your feet are right in line with what they ought to be. And what you say, you've got right thinking. Jesus said all that the Pharisees bid you to do, observe. They've got no kinks in their head as far as the basic truth of Moses. He said they're alright on that.

19:49 But Jesus said the problem is when you turn the cup over and look on the inside, it's full of filth and unclean. You see, it's possible to spot clean a vessel from the outside so that it appears beautiful to men and leave the inside utterly untouched. But listen now, if you're plunging the water right under there and scrub the inside, in the process, the outside's going to get clean. That's what Jesus said.

20:16 He said cleanse first that which is inside. The outside may be clean also. See? You cannot have inward purity without being outwardly clean any more than I can plunge a coffee cup into the dish water right down under there and scrub the inside without the outside getting washed too.

20:35 But I tell you, you can spot clean the outside of the cup and have it full of filth on the inside. You get the picture? Now that's exactly the illustration that Jesus used here. He said you Pharisees have been guilty of getting the kinks in your head right and the out of the way places of your feet right that you've never been made pure in your heart.

21:03 And he said the fountain of iniquity has never been touched. And I believe with all of my heart that this is one of the great curses of modern evangelical Christianity. That we have succeeded in our generation in cleansing the outside but the inner fountain of iniquity has not been touched. Whatever the Lord Jesus meant when he said blessed are the pure in heart.

21:33 He was talking about a purity that touches the root of our being. And so I plead with you this morning if you are resting content that the kinks in your head have been straightened out and you know what you ought to know about Christ and you're better in this right relationship. And if the activities of your hands are fairly moral and respectable and the paths of your feet fairly correct. Dear one, this is not what Christ is talking about. A purity in the outside of the cup and the platter. He said blessed are perfectly happy are the pure in heart for they and they only shall see God. And the only men or women who will ever look upon the face of God with holy rapture who've experienced that cleansing which has touched the roots of their being. Isn't that what Christ said?

Purity of Heart: Restoring Original Function

22:31 Blessed are the pure in heart for they and they only shall see God. So whatever purity of heart is, it's a purity that touches the root of our being. Now, secondly, purity of heart is a purity which sets right or restores the heart to its original function. When do we call something pure? If I say this is pure gold, what do I mean? If I say this is pure uranium, and if I say this is pure water, if I say this is pure air, what do I mean when I say a thing is pure? Think for a moment if you will. What do you mean when you talk about something being pure?

23:16 I believe what you mean is this. You're saying that there's nothing in that substance foreign to its own nature. If you've got pure gold, what you're holding is gold and nothing else mixed with it. There's no tin, no brass.

23:37 It's pure gold when it possesses only the faculties that gold is supposed to possess. When I talk about pure water, I'm talking about water that's nothing but hydrogen and oxygen in their proper proportions. No outside matter in there, no dirt, no poisons, no bleach, nothing else. It's pure water. When I talk about pure air, I'm talking about air that possesses only the constituents that air is supposed to possess. You say, Pastor, why are you giving us a lecture on gold and air? Because you've got to know what the concept of purity is.

24:17 Now Jesus said, blessed are the pure in heart. Blessed are those whose heart possesses that which the human heart is supposed to possess. Blessed are those whose heart is only that which the human heart is supposed to be made up of. Well, what was the human heart made to be?

24:42 The only way I find out is I go back to the beginning of Genesis and I read that account of the Creator creating a perfect man and a perfect woman and placing them in that perfect environment and I try to discover what was the condition of their hearts in that original creation and it's easy to see as you read the story and absorb the atmosphere that the heart of Adam and Eve was first of all a heart before the foe and a deep love for God. As you read that picture, there's nothing but the evidence that Adam and Eve delighted in God who made them. Their hearts, the seat of their beings, were the fountain out of which flowed a deep love for their Creator God. We find also that their hearts was that their hearts were the seat of loving obedience to God. No evidence until chapter 3 that Adam and Eve counted obeying God a chore of duty. The only evidence that there is there is that they counted obedience to God a delightful exercise when God said brush the garden, keep it, replace the earth, subdue it. No indication

26:05 except that Adam and Eve delighted to do the will of God. So the heart was the seat out of which there flowed this deep love for God, this glad obedience to God. And it's obvious they loved the purity in which they were set. There was no iniquity about them or within them and there's no indication that they had a hankering for it until that serpent who was more stubborn than any beast of the field came along.

26:34 So that Adam and Eve from the heart delighted in that pure garden. There was no little corner or bush where they could go and do something on the sneak that was sin. No, no, that garden was perfect light and holiness and they delighted in it because their hearts were holy. They loved purity and they loved one another with a perfect relationship.

27:00 No evidence that there was any jealousy, any bitterness, any suspicion, any friction, any misunderstanding. They don't have arguments. We just have misunderstandings. No evidence that they had no misunderstandings.

27:13 Not even that. And the reason was that the fountain out of which all these things flow was a pure fountain. They loved God from the heart. They obeyed God from the heart.

27:26 They loved His purity from the heart. They loved one another with a proper relationship from the heart. But all sin ended and immediately what did sin do? Immediately sin polluted.

27:39 The seat of their beings. Their hearts. So that when we read the next few chapters what do we find? We find instead of delighting in God, we find Adam and Eve running to hide from God. The heart, the fountain out of which love to God flowed, became polluted and defiled so that now they had no spontaneous love to God. The heart became impure. It should have been a heart unstressed. But then things of pure desire for God is now mixed with an aversion. We find them loving their sin. We find them choosing one another. And in these three or four areas where the heart and its purity evidenced itself, love to God, love for His will, love was pure, love for the creature, immediately that fountain is polluted and things come into the heart that have no business being there. Indifference and aversion to God. Rebellion

28:53 to His will. Love for what was unclean. And wrong relationship one to another.

29:01 This is what happened in the fall of man. But God didn't leave man in this state. He said, I'm going to send someone to bruise the head of the serpent. And God purposed a redemption before the foundation of the world. But now we get this. What was His purpose in promising their Savior? What is God's purpose in sending His Son?

God's Purpose in Redemption: Purifying the Heart

29:22 It's to deal with that heart.

29:26 Ever we're to love God again as we ought to, that divided heart has got to be made pure. There was a pure golden goblet of some kind. And someone mixed in with that gold, its luster and its purity and ever that's to become a pure goblet again, it's got to be melted down and all the impurities drawn off. That's what the human heart must experience. That was once the pure gold goblet in which was held spontaneous love to God. Love for His will, love for His ways, and love for humanity. Now we take that I'm going to do something for man and my beloved son. And I'm going to send him to bleed and to die. And I'm going to make provision

30:18 that my purpose in making provision is not merely when you get it, is not merely to take a spray can of gold. I'm going to make the heart pure. I'm going to make it pure. That's why Jesus said, the blood that enters a life that was indifferent to God once again begins to love Him for what He will. That's why Jesus said, this is life eternal, that they may know Thee, the only true God in Jesus Christ, and Thou His Son. 1 Corinthians 1.9 says, God is faithful by whom You are called unto the fellowship of His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord. In 1 Thessalonians, Paul says, how that ye turn to God from your idols to serve the living and the true God. What happens?

31:27 When the Holy Spirit makes us new creatures, all the heart is pure, so that once again God becomes the object of our delight, and we love Him with a pure love. What happens to this attitude of aversion to the will of God? This faith, all of it to God. Oh, that changes too. For the Scripture says in Romans chapter 6, that ye who are the servants of sin have obeyed from the heart the form of doctrine which was delivered unto you, and being made free from sin, and become servants of the fruit and the holy. It becomes pure in that sense that once again the will of God becomes the delight. What happens in this area of aversion to that which is holy and pure? Oh, the Scripture says that we are born of the Holy Spirit, the life of God, the divine seed of God comes to indwell us, and we can no longer be at home in the realm of sin. The

32:30 heart once again becomes the seed of desire to be pure and holy, as He is holy. For it is written, being holy for I the Lord your God am holy. And so when God's salvation comes to the heart, it comes as that which purifies God, which removes an element, once again be the seed of love to God, love to His will and lovefulness and love for the future. And this purity is only the work of God's own Spirit within us. No one can do it.

33:08 But the Scripture says that we purify our hearts by faith. Acts 15, 9. And when by faith we appropriate His salvation, our hearts are purified. And we experience what the Lord Jesus talks about.

The Heart's Role in Conversion: Conviction, Illumination, Faith

33:24 I don't know if this is of great concern to you this morning, but it ought to be. For God's work of grace always zeroes in on the heart. Where is real conviction of sin at? Acts 2, 37 says, Now when they were pricked in the heart, they cried out, many brethren, what must we do?

33:46 A person's not ready to get saved simply because he admits he is a sinner. I can go out on the streets today and I could be four or six o'clock tonight. I'm convinced I could get a dozen people to admit their sins. But there is no real brokenness about that sin.

34:05 No real contrition.

34:08 Acts 2, 37 says, When they were pricked in the heart, and Peter said repent into that time.

34:19 The message of faith and repentance if they're ever to be effectual must be to men and women who have been pricked in the heart. Now I ask you to do this. Have you ever felt in the seat of your being the awfulness of your sin? I'm not asking you have you admitted you're a sinner and done some bad things.

34:39 I'm asking you, have you ever been pricked in your heart? Have you ever felt the wound of conviction in the deep seat of your being until the thought that you dared to defile a holy God and trample his walls underfoot and be indifferent to his Son has literally filled you with holy care? I tell you, there are times in my sober moments when I tremble in my spirit to think of the years I lived without God and without Christ. Have you ever trembled? Have you ever been pricked in the heart? That's where conviction in the heart, the illumination that causes us to know that Christ is the only Savior of sinners. Where does that come? Not primarily to the head. Paul says in

35:36 2 Corinthians 4, 6, But God who commanded light to shine out of darkness hath shined in our what? To give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. No man or woman savingly believes that he gave Christ to the heart. The love of God, the one worthy of your love and devotion and obedience, so that you've thrown yourself down at his pierced feet and have promised you've said, My Lord and my God. What's in the heart? What's in the heart? What's in the heart? Where does

36:38 real faith come from? I'm not from the head. But Paul says in Romans 10, 9 and 10, If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in thine what? Heart that God has raised from the dead, thou shalt be slaved for with thee.

36:55 What man believeth unto righteousness?

36:59 Heart believing. The center of my being. What's in the gospel? Faith is not nodding my head to the fact that there's nothing of this. There's nothing.

37:36 And when conviction has been in the heart and the illumination of Christ has been in the heart and when faith has been exercised from the heart, having purified their heart, from beginning to end, conviction in the heart, from the heart. And beloved, when God's conviction in the heart reveals Christ to our hearts, we believe in the heart to purify the source of our problems when dealt with. The whole life will be radically changed. For as a man thinketh in his heart, so will he. Out of the heart, proceed the issues of life.

38:35 And that's why Jesus said, blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God. Now I've just given you one verse after another, rightly related in nothing but the theology of Christian conversion. And this concept that we nod to the cross and trip into the kingdom that is blighting the church today is not the concept of the Word of God. We're only about a third of the way through the message, so I'm not going to make any attempts to finish this morning.

Manifestations of Heart Purity: Desire for Holiness

39:12 So I'll bring the third point, or really only the second major point of my message. What is heart purity? We've described it. Now, briefly, what are the manifestations of heart purity?

39:25 If I have experienced this purity of heart, then there's going to be a change in the life. And what will the manifestations of that change be? I want to give you several this morning. Number one, there will be a genuine and a vital incarnation to holiness of thought. You will listen carefully now. I've put these words in their order purposely. There will be a genuine and a vital incarnation to holiness in thought, in motive, in attitudes, by conduct. That is where I started, not from the outside in, but from the inside out. Okay? This will

40:14 be the come life, and if it's in my least desired regard, then I'm not going to be content that I've nearly cleaned up my life from the outside out. I don't know anything about this.

40:50 A genuine and vital incarnation and desire to be holy from the inside out. I am convinced there are people in this building who, because you no longer smoke, you no longer drink, you no longer run around with a left crowd, you don't do this, you don't do that, you're absolutely convinced that you're ready to meet God. But a purity of heart? Absolutely not.

41:19 That's a faithful. Do you say that he abides in him, ought to walk as he walks? Chapter 3 of 1 John says, Every man that hath his hope in Christ purifies himself, even as he is pure. Where is Christ's purity?

41:41 Ah, not merely in his outward actions, but with the purity of thought, a purity of motive, a purity of attitude, and then a purity of life. God says every true Christian wants to be pure, and he is pure. See? He wants a purity that's like unto the purity of their love.

42:01 And my lovely, spotless, sinless Lord was pure from the heart out into the hands of the priest. And if I have an inglorious life as he was, in my motives as he was, in my attitudes as he was, and then in my life as he was. God remains when it's his father after the holiness without which no man shall see the Lord. This kind of holiness detaches the heart. The second manifestation of this will be there will be a consciousness of and a burden concerning the impurity that still remains in you. This purity of heart that God effects in his marvelous salvation is not a perfect purity or an absolute purity now. Hallelujah, it's going to be then that we read, we shall be lightened and we shall see him as he is. But it's not a perfect or absolute purity.

Manifestations of Heart Purity: Burden Over Remaining Impurity

43:11 It's a basic purity so that the concept of loving and the will is broken to obey him and the affections go out to him. But when the heart is thus been made pure by the operation of the Holy Spirit, one of the clear manifestations will be this. A consciousness of and a burden concerning the impurity that still remains. Only people who are concerned about heart purity are those whose hearts are already pure. All the rest are all they're concerned about is if I got enough purity to keep up my reputation as a good churchman. That's all they're concerned about. It's going to be very practical, shall I? Joseph Eileen, the mighty Puritan preacher said, he says, it's not the general preaching that does any good, but it's the hand-to-hand combat. I want to come to some

44:02 hand-to-hand combat this morning. Will you listen carefully? Some of you sitting here this morning, will you listen to me? Do you know anything what it is to have a real, genuine, honest burden about the fact of your indifference to prayer? Do you know anything what it is?

44:25 To get on your knees and long before God, that a whole man who's been a Christian longer than six months will know what I'm talking about.

45:12 Fellowship and living and in their relationship. But I wouldn't want to record how many thoughts of impurity have drifted through the minds of those of us gathered even in the past week. Would you? Do you know what it is to go down before God and cry out for cleansing of those thoughts? Know anything about that? What about the thought? Covetousness. In your heart, is there more concern about getting some clean than getting on with God? What about the thought of resentment? Somebody's crossed you and done something they should not have. And you haven't spoken out and you haven't openly and investigated? No.

46:09 But in your heart, every time you see that person, something rises up. Maybe when you come and you see me, it rises up. It wouldn't be the first time.

46:21 It is to go down before God and cry out. If God is Olivia from the thoughts of meanness. Those who've been made pure in heart do. Because in a bird being and there is this information to holiness, they're not content to really have the cup and the platter clean on the outside. They're not content unless they know they're clean on the inside. Do you know anything about that? Do you? Conscience do this work. I could preach heart purity until I was blue in the face. But it's prying your own conscience with questions such as this that is going to be the instrument. It's in God's hands to cause you to reflect upon your own condition. Several questions which I've jotted down. Are you content

47:19 with mere respectability? Freedom from gross uncleanness? A pure heart is one which makes conscience of foul imaginations, evil desires. A heart is one which is content with the will of God. It's unbelief and it's coldness of affection and weeps in secret over its lack of holiness. So in the famous Puritan preacher said, I do not understand how a man can be a true believer to whom sin is not the greatest burden, trouble and sorrow. When David prayed, he didn't just pray, oh God, give me a clean life. He prayed create in me, oh God, a what? A clean

48:15 heart. He said, oh God, thou desires truth. He knew it. Here's a man crying out for purity in the heart.

Manifestations of Heart Purity: Cultivating Influences

48:28 That manifestation of heart purity with the first two genuine and vital information to holiness of consciousness and burden concerning the impurity that still remains. And thirdly, a serious regard to those influences that will help us grow up cultivating a pure heart. By those influences, Jesus said in John 17, Father, sanctify them, purify them through the word. Thy word is truth.

49:04 Thomas said, wherewithal shall a young man come his way? By taking heed thereto according to thy word, thy word have I hid in my what? In my heart. Get the word down there is where I trouble with my feet if my heart's right. Seriously, I'm going to hide the word in my heart. Now I ask, are you serious about this book? I'm amazed at how many professing Christians spend no time in this book. I say professing Christians. I don't believe they're true Christians. Any man who can willfully, continually over the period of months and years and have left this book has no grounds to claim he's a Christian. Because Jesus prays for all of his own children. Father, sanctify my own through the truth. Let me pray.

49:55 And the prayer of Christ is going to be answered. And he said, thy word is truth. So a man or woman who willfully, deliberately neglects and ignores the word of God over a long period of time simply does so because he's never been made pure in heart. If he were pure, he can go on.

50:18 The fellowship of his people. There's a wonderful verse in 2 Timothy 2.22. The verse says to Timothy, Timothy, flee youth for lust. It doesn't stop there. Follow after righteousness, godliness, faith, and meekness with them that call. Isn't that a wonderful verse? Call to Timothy, look.

50:42 Look back on the things that will draw you aside in your youth. Begin to pursue those things that are eternal. Righteousness, holiness, faith. And he says, as you do it, Timothy, find some other people that are running after the same thing. And you run along together. Purity of heart. It's not something that is evidenced in the life. How could Timothy find some more people who were calling on the Lord out of a pure heart? There had to be some evidence that they were calling on the Lord out of a pure heart, right? If I say go on out and find everybody who's a Republican, you can't do it unless all the Republicans are wearing green buttons. They're wearing a green hat. There's got to be some mark of identification.

51:27 Well, for Timothy, you find others who are running after the Lord with a pure heart and calling on the Lord. What if the evidence is such a thing? Why, because it's obvious.

51:38 They're the kind of people that when they get together, all they may talk about, the weather, they may talk about business, but that soon goes into the background. And they're talking about the things that really matter. Talking about Christ and the Scriptures and how to love Him and know Him better and how to be used to Him. They're the people that when they get together, they want to get on their knees.

52:03 And pray. And their conversation centers in their beloved Lord. And it's obvious that their desires go out to Him. How I thank God for some of you in whom I've seen this. I bless God for it. How I thank God for some of my dearest friends. Several of them came busy last week. The time they hit the board. The time they left. They were just calling on the Lord out of a pure heart. Not crying. That's just her.

52:32 Their interest gravitated to the things of God. To the Word. To the Scriptures. To Christ.

52:39 No one stood and said, all right, you're free preachers now. You've got to talk about spiritual things. No. Nor did we say, oh well, we've been preaching all day Sunday and we live in these things. We need a little diversion. We need to change. We need to be broad. No, no, dear Lord.

52:53 You get together with men and women who have pure hearts and you're going to find that their desire for heart purity is going to bring your thoughts and your conversation to those things that are going to help you. And you know it. Now I lay those three simple manifestations.

Conclusion: The Promise and a Challenge

53:11 We'll take the promise next week. They shall see God. Are these things manifest in your life? Heart purity will always be manifest by an inclination.

53:22 A real inclination to that which is pure from within.

53:28 It will manifest itself in a great concern over the remains of impurity within. It will manifest itself by getting on with those who also are seeking the Lord's from a pure heart and availing ourselves of every means that we might experience purity of heart. Jesus said, perfectly happy are the pure in heart. For they and they only shall see God.

54:02 You know what some of you be tempted to do when you leave this morning? I don't agree with Pastor Mark.

54:14 Beloved, if I've been true to the word of God, your issue's not with me. It's with God. I've given you His word. And at any point I've not faithfully expounded this word, you have an obligation to come to me and show me and I'll correct it from this point of opening. And if this has been an honest exposition of the word of God, then you better settle it, dear friend. If you don't know this purity of heart that we talked about, you're never going to see God except in judgment.

54:46 May God have mercy and cause some of you who've been content with an external purity to touch the heads and the hands and the feet, but who've never known this. May God, the Holy Ghost, bear in and make you restless until you experience this purity. For in it, there's perfect happiness. We thank Thee for the words of our Lord Jesus. We thank Thee that some of us can praise Thee, that we ever were put in our hearts, and ever with our hearts we held Thy Son, and ever with our hearts believed on Him, and experienced this purity of heart. But Lord, we're painfully conscious of so much that remains yet.