April 21

Purity of Heart

Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God. — Matt 5:8

There is no beatitude in the Bible for anything unclean. We are told also that there is no room in heaven for anything that defileth. Therefore if we hope to enter heaven we must prepare for it here. To a child who expressed the wonder how he could ever get up to heaven, it was so far away, a wise mother’s reply was, “Heaven must first come down to you; heaven must first come in to your heart.” The words were very true. Heaven must really be in us, or we can never enter heaven. And just as we become pure in heart is heaven entering into us.

But what is heart purity? It is not sinlessness, for none are sinless. A pure heart must be a penitent heart that has been forgiven by Christ and cleansed by His blood. We have a Bible promise that though our sins be as scarlet they shall be as white as snow. The pure heart is one, then, that Christ has cleansed. It is one also that is kept pure by obedient living and close communion with God. We are taught in the Scriptures that an important part of true religion is to keep one’s self unspotted from the world.

It is an evil world in which we live; but if we faithfully follow Christ, doing His will, keeping our hearts open to every influence of the divine Spirit, we shall be kept by divine power from the corruption that flows about us. As the lily remains pure and unstained amid the soiled waters of the bog in which it grows, so does the lowly, loving, patient heart of the Christian disciple remain pure in the midst of all this world’s corruption. Over such a heart God’s face beams in perpetual benediction. The vision on earth of course is never full and clear, but it grows brighter and brighter as the believer walks ever toward the morning, and at last it will be unclouded and full in the perfect day of heaven.