“Blessed”

THE BEATITUDES: How to Be Truly Blessed Sermon Series

“Blessed”

(Part #7)

KEY PASSAGE: Matthew 5:8 (NASB & NLT)

As the season turns, may I urge you to worship God when you are not here at this church. The nights may be cleared, the stars shine, and the wind blows in our faces. May we pause in the beauty of the earth and the glory of the skies and give God thanks for His presence, the hope that He brings, and the truth that He revealed. The psalmist writes in Psalm 19:1, “The heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament shows His handiwork.” It is a beautiful thought. God made it all, whether you pause to enjoy it or worship Him through it. It is still there. I encourage you to take time [take time] to worship God. God has put it all together to reveal His greatness and glory. You may have your seat. And let us thank our worship team [again] for ushering us into God’s presence. Thank you, worship team.

TITHE and OFFERING

We are about to give our tithe and offering to the church, and I want to remind and acknowledge that God owns everything. We give tithe and offerings as a symbol of our dependence on God. I hear the words of Moses and know that the tithe is holy and an act of worship. Malachi’s words challenge us to bring the tithes into the storehouse, reinforcing that the tithe is God’s plan for supporting the Church. And through the words of Malachi and Jesus, we are reminded that when we obey God and tithe, God will pour blessings on our lives. I pray that tithing can become more to you than it is now, and I hope that through a renewed commitment to tithing, you will discover the joy of living a generous life. May God bless you as you give to Christ’s church. Ushers, please pass around the plates. The worship team will lead us as we collect our tithes and offerings.

Baptismal Certificates and Bible Presentation

Two Saturdays ago, we baptized some of our church members at Lakeview Park in Lorain, Ohio, and I want to call on Michael and Shawn, Sr., to come forward so we can present the certificate of baptism and a Holy Bible.

WELCOME

Please stand up, greet some folks around you, and welcome them to worship. We welcome you [all] again to our Sunday Worship Service and are glad to have you in God’s house. Our first-time visitors, please stand so we can see you. We also welcome all who join us online. Let’s clap for our online viewers.

ANNOUNCEMENT

· The Marriage Checkup Workshop is on Friday, October 25th, at 6:00 p.m. and Saturday, October 26th, at 9:00 a.m. I want to remind all married couples that the spots are filling up, so please register for the marriage workshop if you can.

· Wednesday Night Bible Study Connect is at 7:00 p.m. Please join us on Wednesday night to STUDY THE WORD OF GOD.

· We changed the church’s weekly prayer to the first Saturday of the month. We will continue to assemble on Saturday for those who want to meet and pray. Please let us know if you would like to come and pray at the church on Saturday morning.

· Please complete the sermon survey sheet and return it to the usher and media team.

PRAYER FOR ILLUMINATION

Let’s pray together as we begin our study today.

Holy Father, thank You for the Lord Jesus, who loved us and gave Himself for us. Lord, [it is impossible for us to express] our thanks adequately for the abundance of Your blessings upon us. You are so gracious in granting us the privilege of being Your children. We thank You for the gift of eternal life. We also thank You for all the material gifts You provide in the world about us. We make our gratitude tangible by bringing our tithes and offerings to Your altar. Bless the use of these gifts in communicating the wonders of Your love and the measure of Your mercy. Bless these gifts to enrich the human spirit, and may Your name be honored and glorified in it all. We pray that You take the place of the demands on us, the self-help we seek, the struggles we face, and the messes we have created, and give us Your peace like we have never known it before. Help us to trust You in the name of Jesus, Amen.

DECLARATION of FAITH in GOD

Let us stand and say the Declaration of Faith in God together.

SERMON INTRODUCTION

We have been studying the Beatitudes and working our way through Matthew chapter 5, verses 1 through 12, in an expository manner. We are finding out what it means to be truly blessed. We have discovered that blessing is more than stuff. When we close this sermon series, it will be with a sermon called “Pursuing the Blessed Life” because you will discover something very interesting: that when God wanted to stop blessing His people, one of the ways He would do it was to give them more stuff.

The ‘stuff’ God gave them became a curse. Because they wanted the stuff, they didn’t want God. So, we are talking about How To Be Truly Blessed. [And this morning] I want to draw your attention to chapter 5 of Matthew’s gospel. In verse 8, Jesus says, “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.” I want to read this verse from the New Living Translation Bible version for you. “God blesses those whose hearts are pure, for they will see God.”

With this statement from our Lord Jesus that I just read to you, we face one of the greatest utterances in the whole of Scripture. And, of course, we could never exhaust this verse [Because] it stretches into so many themes and realities. We will only try today to discover its central meaning [purpose], a long way from exhausting the riches in this text that we are about to look at today. And so, I would recommend further study of this great statement on your own time.

SERMON EXPOSITION

As we have done through the study of the Beatitudes, we ask and answer critical questions that allow us to get to the heart of what our Lord Jesus is saying. Developing a complicated sermon outline is unnecessary when you have a simple statement like this [before us this morning]. The first question that always comes to mind of the Bible student is this: What is the context for these words? Words like this are not created out of a vacuum; they are not dropped from any existing circumstances onto the scene. Instead, they emerge from a historical, religious, and spiritual setting. That is precisely the case in these words that our Lord spoke that day on the mountain in northern Israel.

Let me provide you with some background and context for these critical words. First, when Jesus Christ came into the world, Israel was in a desperate condition. Let’s start with Israel’s political condition, and we will work our way to the spiritual element, which will be the focus of our message today.

[From a political point of view], Israel had lost its freedom and was under the bondage of the Roman Empire. Economically, Israel was struggling because of the Romans’ exorbitant, actually criminal taxes on the people so that the people had to give up much of what they worked hard to earn in unfair taxation. [And then] Spiritually, Israel was also in great trouble. We want to focus on the spiritual element because blessing has to do with the well-being of the soul, which is what the Beatitude addresses. And that is “How to be Truly Blessed?”

Many of you here this morning struggle with allergies. That is when the dust and pollen [paa-lin] of the atmosphere and air create misery. You suffer from a stuffy nose, runny eyes, and congested feeling because the air taken in has been contaminated in light of your makeup, bringing about an allergic reaction. They hope for better days when the air is clearer and cleaner so the allergies don’t dictate their well-being. This particular blessing is related to the prerequisite for seeing God yourself. Let me put it another way: to experience heaven on earth. Some of us should be tired of piggybacking off other folk's testimony. You want your testimony. You want your [own] breakthrough. But the qualification, the prerequisite, [Watch this] Jesus says, is pure of heart. Or the purity of the heart.

Please notice church that the pure in heart are [given the assurance] that they will see God. The way that relates to our allergic reaction [Watch This] is that the word pure means unmixed, undivided, and undiluted. A pure-hearted person is one whose motives are unmixed, whose thoughts are holy, and whose conscience is clean. In other words, many of us do not see God for ourselves because we take in what has contaminated our spiritual systems, creating watery spiritual eyes and an inability to see God for ourselves—failure to experience heaven while we live here on earth.

This is a [specific] blessing given to a specific group of Christ’s followers. Jesus says if you want to see God, you want to see His work; you want to see His power, you want to see His provision; you want to see His transformation; you want to see His deliverance, you want to see His victory, you want to see Him for yourself, then you are going to have to be pure of heart. You will have an unmixed, undivided, undefiled heart as the basis of that. Spiritually, purity of heart means singleness of devotion. It means not being disconnected from God by allowing [Watch This] something else to defile the relationship.

To understand why it is important to see God, purity is essential because God and sin are incompatible. The two don’t get along. The two don’t live in the same environment. Let me give you an illustration. It is like you and the garbage in your house. I hope you don’t get along with the garbage in your house too long. At least twice a week, you take the trash outside because you and the garbage were not made to live together. The garbage is there, and it is a reality, but your goal is to deliver the garbage outside so those designated to pick it up , [and] get rid of it.

Now, the garbage will show back up again in a day or two. But you will take it back out again because you and garbage are incompatible. You and I would have a problem with people [who are] compatible with garbage. We will have an issue with folks who are comfortable living with waste. The same principle applies to God and sin. God and sin are incompatible. The two can’t meet because of God’s holiness. The two can’t live together because of God’s high standards. God and sin cannot live together because of God’s purity.

So, God can’t be comfortable where unrighteousness is allowed to express itself freely. This statement, ‘pure of heart,’ or ‘purity,’ in Matthew 5:8 has to do with not allowing the defects [Watch This] to penetrate the heart to cause God to remove Himself or distance Himself from intimacy with us.

Far too many Christians today have a long-distance relationship with God. They are more like Pluto than Mercury. They are a long way off. And you know Pluto is pretty cold because it is made primarily of ice and rock. Because it is located so far away from the proximity to God. The doctor will wash their hands and sterilize the surgical instruments in an operating room. They do this because [number one] they need to make sure that there is no introduction of bacteria or infection in the operating procedure. They also do this because they need the purity of the room to have a successful surgery and to transform the patient’s physical well-being.

Jesus is saying that if you and I are going to see God at another level, experience God at a deeper level, and relate to God on a more intimate personal level, then there must be the pursuit of purity of heart. Please don’t misunderstand what Jesus is saying. Jesus’ concern is about the purity of your heart. Because it is easy to camouflage ourselves, we look much cleaner than we are. Everybody in here looks spiritual right now. You have on Holy Ghost clothes, you are carrying a Holy Ghost Book, you did Holy Ghost shouting, Holy Ghost waving, Holy Ghost jumping, Holy Ghost turning and twisting and tripping. Some of you ladies have on a Holy Ghost hairdo. I mean, you look like you and God got together this morning. My point is that it is easy to mask and cover up unrighteousness with a righteous look, righteous action, or going to righteous locations.

That is why Jesus had to tell the Scribes and the Pharisees in Matthew 23:25, “… For you are so careful to clean the outside of the cup and the dish, but inside you are filthy—full of greed and self-indulgence!” In other words, you have this external outward show that looks like you and God are on the up and up. You and God are running buddies. You and God are hanging out with each other when your whitewashed tombs are full of dead men’s bones. There was no purity of heart. There was only purity of look, [purity of] location, and [purity of] activity. “But the heart was far from God.” Jesus said in Matthew 15:8, “These people honor Me with their lips, but their hearts are far from Me.”

What kind of righteousness must we attain to be in God’s kingdom? What does God require of us? And it is that question of the heart that Jesus answers in the Beatitude. How good does a man or a woman have to be? What is required of us believers? What is the standard? In verse 8, “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.”

It is not the lowest person in the world that is the standard; it is God, the highest being in the universe, the highest, the holiest, the sinless God of the ages, is the standard. When God sets the standard for righteous character, [Watch This] He sets it at His [own] level. So the Lord answers the question of the people by saying that only the pure in heart will see God’s kingdom. Only the pure in heart will know God. Only the pure in heart will inherit eternal life. Only the pure in heart will be saved, for they attain God’s standard alone.

To understand this, we will have to talk about the heart first. Because Jesus says, purity must exist in the heart. So the question is, what is the heart? We are familiar with the phrase physiology, but sometimes, theologically or spiritually, the phrase seems a little bit vague to us. When God uses a spiritual concept [or principle] [Watch This] with a physical counterpart, you first go to the physical counterpart to understand what it does in the physical realm and how] its concept is applied to the spiritual realm.

So, let’s pause on the spiritual heart for a moment and visit the physical heart. All of us here today have a heart. Your heart is the centerpiece of your life. It is the pump that keeps life happening. You can make it without your hand. You can make it without your foot. You can make it without your ears. You can make it without your eye. But you can’t make it without your heart because your heart pumps life. Your physical heart pumps blood, and Leviticus 17:11 says, “… the life of the flesh is in the blood.”

The blood supplies nutrients to the body as it takes oxygen throughout it. Hundreds of times every day, thousands of times, countless millions of times throughout our lives, this pump causes life to flow throughout our physical bodies. The job of your physical heart is to cause life to show up in every other location of your body.

Well, inside your body, you have the real you, [which is called] the soul. The soul is your personality. It is the ‘You’ that will live forever. Your body, this body, will not live forever, but your soul will live forever. Your soul comprises three fundamental components: your emotions [that is, your feelings]; your intellect [that is, your thinking]; and your will [that is, your capacity to make choices]. Intellect, emotion, and will; you can choose, think, and feel.

That is in your soul. But just as the body has a pump that pumps life to the physical man, the soul has a pump that pumps life to the inner man. And God has given the pump to the soul, the same name He gave the pump to the body. [Watch This] It is called the heart. It is the job of the heart of the soul. The [job of the heart] is to pump God’s thinking into your spiritual mind, God’s feelings into your emotions, and God’s choices into your will. The soul becomes healthy as long as the heart is free to pump what the soul needs to survive.

The Bible says in 2 Corinthians 4:16, “While the outward man is decaying, getting older, slower, fatter, and weaker the scripture says, the inward man is supposed to be being renewed day by day.” In other words, in God’s economy, the older you get on the outside, the younger you should be getting on the inside. [And you should be] getting younger in your personality while you are getting older in your body. So, if your soul is as old as your body, [Watch This] you have two heart problems, not one. The physical man has a heart challenge, and a heart challenge in the spiritual man because the life principle is not being pumped through the soul.

The scripture clearly states in Proverbs 4:23 that it is “in the heart that the issues of life spring forth.” 1 Samuel 16:7 gives us a wonderful picture of the heart: “For the Lord does not see as man sees; for man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.”

SERMON ILLUSTRATION

Many of us have gone to restaurants and ordered well-done hamburgers or [well-done] steaks, only to cut them and see that they were raw and pink on the inside. In other words, the outside looked like everything was fine, but when you went inside, you saw it had not been cooked properly. Many of us as Christians aren’t well done yet. Our outside looks well-cooked because we go to church, shout, read our Bible, pray, and praise. The inside is still raw, which indicates that the heart needs something. Who is going to see God? Who has a right to ascend His holy hill? Who has a right to go into His presence? Those who have been given His righteousness have been cleansed on the inside by the washing of regeneration and the renewing of the Spirit of God.

SERMON EXPLANATION

When you came to Christ, you were given a new heart. That is part of the New Covenant. The prophet Ezekiel wrote it this way: In Ezekiel 36:25, God speaks, “ I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.” God has to wash your heart. You have a heart transplant. God didn’t do with your physical heart, which comes later in your new body. He gave you a new spiritual heart, and [He placed it in the core of your soul]. That is a promise of new covenant regeneration. That is the new birth. That is transformation. That is sanctification. [You see] The Kingdom of God has always belonged to folks with a pure heart. It has always belonged to those who have been cleansed.

Jesus says, “They shall see God”. He says if you are pure of heart, you shall see God. Let me say it another way. The purer the heart gets, the clearer God becomes. For many of us today, God is just an idea, a concept, a philosophy, a thought, and a theology. God is not an experimental reality to many Christians. And even though we are taking in data and information and hearing good sermons, [Yet] we don’t see God for ourselves. We do not have an intimate experience with God. We do not know God enough to touch Him in the spiritual realm. We have not yet learned to [Watch This]; comprehend God with our spiritual eyes.

When you don’t see God, all you see is people. Let me put it this way. When you don’t see God, all you see is what you see. In other words, you are limited to the physical realm because God is a Spirit, according to John 4:24. So if you don’t see God, [that means] you don’t see the spiritual realm, which means you are in bondage to what you see. A lot of our misery is because we are in bondage to what we see.

Seeing God means perceiving and sensing His reality. I love this one. Moses said, “I want to see You, and I want to see Your glory, and I want to see Your face.”God responded, telling Moses, “… then you got to leave the people.”Come up here to the mountain because if you want to see my face, you can’t hang out with the other people. God told Moses, “That is a great request, Moses, but not a smart one.” Because “No man can see My face and live.” So, to see my face means you are ready to die.

We are told that Moses saw [the back of God]. [Watch This] When Moses sees God’s back, he picks up a pencil and a notepad and writes, “In the beginning, God created heaven and earth. And the earth was without form and void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God hovered over the waters.”

Moses, who wrote the Pentateuch, the first five books of the Bible, wasn’t alive when the events in Genesis happened. Moses was not around the creation of God. But because Moses saw the back of God in Exodus 33:23, he could look back with his spiritual eyes, see what God was doing in the beginning, and record it in the book of Genesis. I want you to know this: when you see God, He shows you what He is doing. He can show you what yesterday looked like and how He will use it to make a better tomorrow if you see God. Moses saw God.

FAITH APPEAL, CALL to ACTION and ALTAR CALL

David said, “Open my eyes; show me where I have gone astray from you so I can see it; address it so I can see you.” A lot of us ought to be tired of being spiritually blind and not being able to see spiritual reality. Not being able to see and look at religion won’t give you spiritual sight. Attending church every Sunday won’t give you spiritual sight; going to Bible study won’t give you spiritual sight in the sense of seeing God in reality. It will give you information and inspiration but not spiritual eyesight because spiritual sight has to do with the condition of the heart, not the location of the pew. Spiritual sight is when God starts showing you stuff because now the heart is beaten in the soul, pumping grace through it.

We preached on mercy last week. God’s mercy and grace broke us under the weight of our sin, and [Watch This] we cried out to God, poor in spirit, mourning, and meek. We told God of our hunger and thirst for righteousness. God poured out mercy upon us and purified our hearts so that we could see Him. God calls for a heart conviction. Until one has a clean heart, a purged heart, and has been covered with the garment of righteousness, you will never see God because God requires holiness.

God knows what He is doing in your [life] and [my life]. All you have to do is see God. But to see God, you have to be pure of heart. You have to be willing for God to show you what is wrong so you can confess it and repent it so He can transform you. So he can let you see, “I know what I am doing. I am yesterday and tomorrow. I am the beginning and end, the Alpha and Omega, the Starter and finisher. I have you covered. You have to see what God is up to.” Because the more pure your heart is, the more of God you see. “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.”

If you are here today without Christ, your heart is impure, and that means your transgressions separate you from God. Please come forward so we can pray with you. If you need prayer because of a long-distance relationship with God, please come forward so we can pray for you. Let’s stand on our feet and pray.

BENEDICTION

Let us pray.

Father, again today, we have enriched our hearts as we have shared in Your faithful Word full of power and truth. Confirm it to us in the deepest part of our hearts that may issue in acts of will that please You. Make us pure, oh God, for Jesus’ sake. Lord Jesus, meet us right where we are, and we will thank You for doing that work in us that purifies us not just for Your glory but thank You, gracious God, so that we can go on seeing God for ourselves. What an extraordinary reward for purity. In the name of Jesus, we pray, Amen. God bless you. We will see you next week at 10:30 a.m.