Matthew 5:8 - Pure Heart

Matthew 5:8

Would you take God’s precious word and turn to Matthew 5; we have been for the last several weeks, looking at the beatitudes from the Lord’s Sermon on the Mount. And each time we read a beatitude; the Lord starts off with the word “blessed”. Now I don’t know about you, but I have been blessed studying and preaching these verses, because it makes me realize that Christianity, that being a child of God, is more than just saying it, it is living it.

Now today, we come to the next verse in this great section and it is found in verse 8, listen to what the Word of God has to say to us:

“Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God”

The Lord has preaching to a congregation that has only known part of the message, they have only seen the side of the Law, from the Old Testament. Now Jesus is here and he is enlightening them to God’s grace, and teaching them that being a child of God, is more than obeying the commandments, it is having a changed life. A life that has been made new, through the Lord himself.

In this verse, the Lord speaks a blessing on those that have a pure heart. That is to say, someone who has a heart of integrity and godly character, these are the pure in heart. A person who does the right thing, even when no one is watching. This is what the Lord is talking about. Now let me ask you this morning, is your heart pure? When no one is around, do you make the right choices? If you can’t answer with a confident yes, friend, you need to have your heart checked. Because, only the pure in heart will see God.

Now you might be here, and you might say I have a strong heart, and I have a willing heart, and that is good. Listen, we need people who are willing to give themselves, and serve, but if your heart is not right with God, if it is not beating the precious blood of Jesus Christ, then friend, it is a heart that wicked.

Jeremiah 17:9 “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?

I tell you, if you don’t have a heart for Jesus today, if you allow your life to give in to sin, then friend your heart is contaminated. It needs to be dealt with by the master. It needs to be checked here at the altar, by Jesus Christ himself. Listen, if you want a pure heart, a heart that does the right thing, then you need to allow Jesus to reign in your life.

Listen today, as the Lord speaks to us on three areas that concern the heart.

The Pollution that Corrupts the Heart

“The heart of the human problem is the problem of the human heart” – A. Rogers

· Being raised here in Johnston County, going fishing was always a fun time for me. We go to little ponds behind peoples’ houses and spend an afternoon trying to catch a whopper. On occasion, we would have access to a boat, and we would put it in the river and flow with current, wetting a line. Now what was funny, that anytime we might tell someone where we were going to go fishing, 9/10 times they would say, don’t eat any fish out of that river, it is polluted.

· Well, just like the river can be polluted with the garbage of man, the heart of man is polluted also.

· Did you know that when you were borne, you were born with a polluted heart? A heart that is corrupt, filthy, and selfish.

· Now we might say, that sounds pretty awful to say about a person, but the Bible teaches that each one of us is a sinner, that all of us were born and our hearts become polluted with sin.

· You know one of the things that irks me? Seeing a person driving down the road and throwing out their trash. Our roadsides are littered with garbage, pollution. And as terrible as that is, the hearts of man have become a landfill for the spiritual pollution, God calls sin.

· Now I will tell you, just like pollution is destroying the landscapes and country sides, sin is destroying people.

· Let me ask you, would you go and take a sack of garbage, and just tear it open right there in the middle of your house, and pour it out all over the floor? How about your bed? Would you pour it out on our bed? No, that sounds so foolish to even suggest, then why do we take the sinful, wretched, immoral, filthy, vile, and wicked things of this world and dump it into our hearts?

· Friends the heart is polluted and contaminated.

· When I worked in the automotive industry, we would occasionally have a person who would bring their automobile in. They would want us to change out the transmission fluid, when you look at the fluid, the fluid was dark, and had a horrible smell, and if you looked closely, there would be debris in the fluid. We wouldn’t change it, you know why? If we changed it, that transmission would quit running. It became dependent on that pollution.

· I want you to know, that there are some, and you might be here right now, you’ve become dependent on that sin, you can’t make it with out it. If you were to try to get rid of it, you would fail.

· Friend don’t lose heart, when that customer came in and wanted the fluid replaced, and we wouldn’t do it, because we knew that what they really needed, was not the fluid replaced, but the transmission replaced.

· Friend, the miles of this life have polluted your heart. Those little lies over the years, those things you’ve lusted over or coveted, those little underhanded deals, those filthy words that you have utter, they have accumulated and they have destroyed the heart.

· I will tell you, sin corrupts and destroys the heart! And anytime you give in to sin, it is polluting your heart and soul!

The Power that Changes the Heart

How are we to have a pure heart then? Didn’t Jesus say here in this verse, blessed are the pure in heart? How are we have a pure heart, if our heart has been polluted? Friend, the answer is easy, all we have to do is come to Jesus.

Now just like you go to the doctor when there is something wrong with your physical heart, if we want the heart of our soul treated, then we have to go to Great Physician. Jesus Christ.

Listen, when you go to Jesus, it isn’t like these teleconferences that we have today, no sir. No, Jesus is right there and he doesn’t have anyone waiting in front of you.

You know, that’s how we think we ought to be treated. That if this person goes first, then I will go next, listen, when it comes to Jesus, he is waiting just for you, there is no need to wait for someone to go before you.

Well, what will happen preacher? Its just a simple visit. Listen:

1. God Reviews the Heart

a. A few years ago, I went to the doctor, for a check-up, and one of the things they wanted to look at is my heart. What was the condition of my heart?

b. You may have had something similarly done, they may put you on a treadmill, and they tell you to start walking, they want to hear your heart beat, they want to see what the heart is doing. They want to make sure that the heart is healthy, and that there are no problems.

c. Well, just like that doctor checking out your heart, Jesus does the same for us. Friend, I want you to know, that Jesus knows your heart. He knows what kind of condition it is in. He knows if you have a pure heart or a defiled heart.

d. You may ask, how does Jesus know my heart? Jeremiah 17:10 “I the LORD search the heart, I try the reins, even to give every man according to his ways, and according to the fruit of his doings.”

e. Now I see you here this morning, I see you seated out there. I can look out and know that your heart is beating, but there is one thing I cannot know, that is the condition of your heart.

f. I don’t know if your heart is about to quit, I don’t know if your heart has an irregular beat, and just like those things, I don’t know if your heart loves Jesus, I don’t know if your heart is faithful to the Word, I don’t know if your heart is cold or indifferent.

g. However, Jesus knows the condition of your heart. Every part of it, from inside and out, Jesus knows your heart, because he sees your heart. Listen God’s eyes sees past the surface, and God searches the heart.

2. God Reveals the Heart

a. Now God reviews the heart, but did you hear what that verse said? It said, “I try the reins”

b. That is to say, that God tests the heart. Now, I want you to remember back to a moment when your heart was tested. Not by a doctor, not by North Carolina Heart & Vascular, not by doctor Wefald, or by Wake Med, but when something came and tested the purity of your heart.

c. Maybe it was some circumstance, some situation, that God allow to come into your life, to see how you react.

d. Let me ask you, did you pass?

e. Have you ever been rude to a person? Don’t answer out loud. “Well, that person made me mad.” Well, they just revealed the anger that’s in you. They didn’t put that rudeness in you; that rudeness was already there. All they did was push the hot button. God is just trying the reins. One thing after another, God allows circumstances to come into your life.

f. And it reveals our heart. Now we might say, I have a good heart, but let the right circumstance come, and out of the heart the problem is revealed.

g. The Bible tells us in Proverb 4:23 “…out of the heart are the issues of life.”

h. You know why you struggle with anger, bitterness, resentment, aggression, immorality, lying, envy? It’s in your heart. And its out the heart, that you have the problems these issues.

3. God Replaces the Heart

a. Now friend, God will review the heart and he will reveal the heart, but friend if you will allow him, he will replace your heart.

b. You might be saying, I don’t want my heart replaced. Its doing just fine. And God will say, that’s your choice, I’m not going to make you.

c. God gives us the choice, we call it free will.

d. I would go to customers when I was at the dealership, and I would tell them, I have seen the condition of their transmission, it needs replacement. It was malfunctioning and in ruin, and I would have some to tell me, don’t do anything, it will be fine. You know what I did then? I left it alone.

e. I couldn’t make them change it, I saw the problem. I knew it was going to fail, but until they said, okay, lets replace it, then I couldn’t do anything.

f. Friend, God is the same way. He won’t force you to change your heart, but he will plead with you. He’s seen it, he knows the problem, he knows where it is going to leave you. But until you say okay to God, nothing can happen.

g. Now I haven’t even got to the good part yet, listen I would have people who would want their transmission changed but there was a problem. They couldn’t afford it. They would say, I want to get it fixed, but there is no way I can pay to have it done. Then this is when I would tell them, don’t worry, it is under warranty. The maker is going to pay the cost to fix it.

h. Listen, you’re here right now, and you want your heart to be changed, you want to have a pure heart. But you look at yourself, and say I can’t afford it. And you will never be able to afford it, because it has already been paid for. Its been paid by the maker, Jesus Christ.

i. If you want to have your heart changed, all you have to do is come to Jesus, and he will give you his heart. A heart that truly is pure. And friend it won’t cost you a thing, because Jesus has already paid it all.

j. Jesus paid it all, all to him I owe, sin had left a crimson stain, he washed it white as snow.

The Promise that is Conferred on the Heart

· Now we have been looking at the heart, and we saw first the pollution that corrupts the heart, then we saw the power that changes the heart, and finally friend, we see the promise that is conferred on the heart.

· Now brethren, Jesus has told this congregation that those who are pure in heart will receive a blessing. And what is the blessing? They shall see God.

· The scripture has made it plain, right here in this verse, that it is the pure in heart that will see God.

· I want you to know, that when you are living a life of sin, you are blind. You don’t see the Lord.

· I’ve seen them many times, a man or woman, who is living in sin, and something bad happens to them, and they say, where is God. Well listen, God is right where he’s always been. He makes himself known, but when you’re living a life of sinfulness, you can’t see God, even if he was standing right in front of you.

· Note this verse – 2 Corinthians 4:4 “The god of this world has blinded the minds of those who do not believe, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine on them.”

· The Devil doesn’t want you to see God, listen it makes the devil jump with excitement, when a man, woman, boy or girl, say I don’t see God, I can’t believe in him. The devil has just pulled the bag over their eyes.

· And there are some, who live a life in sin, and they want to see God to believe in him. There are some who go to great lengths just to see God. Some have pierced their bodies, some have fasted, others have lived in caves, some have given their money, others have gone on pilgrimages. All of that, just to see God.

· Listen, none of that will get you any closer to seeing God, you want to know how to see God? I’ll tell you, just get your heart pure, you’ll see God then.

· I can see God, and if you are a child of God you will see him too. Now you might be saying, you can see God? Yes, with the eye of faith. When you get your heart right, you’ll spiritual eye will see.

· You’ll begin to see God like never before. You’ll see God in your circumstances, you’ll see him in nature, you’ll see in the face of a little child, you’ll see him in scripture; friend you’ll see God.

· Now there are times, when you and I can get busy, and they may be good things we’re doing, but it takes our attention away from God. I get caught up in something, and my eye gets off of God. Have you ever been like that? Friend, what we have to do, is just get down on our knees, and say God, I want only you, fix my eyes on you. And you know what, you’ll see God.

· Let me ask you, how’s your heart? Is it pure, is it true? Is it seeing God? If you’re here and you’re saying, I sure wish I could see God in my life, I’ll tell you how it will start, by coming and getting your heart right with Christ.