Tuesday, June 1st, 2021
I was studying the beatitudes with John, a man in his 30’s struggling with alcohol addiction and freshly out of jail – again. We had reached the 6th beatitude when he asked, “Pat, what does it mean to be pure in heart?”
“What do you think it means, John?”
He had a blank look on his face before a dim light appeared in his eyes. “I guess it means the things you told me I should be doing to stay near Jesus – reading the Bible, praying, being in a Bible study, going to a Spirit-filled church, having Christian friends, and stuff like that.”
I smiled. “Very good, John. Those are things you do if you’re pure in heart, but being pure in heart is more of a disposition than what you do.” His face went back into blank mode and stopped there, so I continued on. “What I mean is that being pure in heart is more about what you believe and who you are inside than what you do. You can’t do out of yourself. The being comes first and the doing comes out of that. To be pure in heart means to rid yourself of all sinful and worldly thoughts and to see yourself and the world around you as God sees it.”
“How do I do that, Pat? Where do I start?”
“You start by getting rid of all the impurities in your heart – problems, premonitions, people, politics, pitfalls, and pratfalls. Then you fill yourself with the things of God, the main one being His truth. Here’s two lines of a poem that will help you remember that.
My heart’s an empty vessel,
Seeking all that’s true.
Our time’s up for now. Think about what’s meant by seeking all that’s true. Search the Bible for answers. Then we’ll talk about that next week.”
Good bye, Pat
Good bye, John.