“Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God” (Matthew 5:8)
This is the last article on this beatitude. We have looked at several things regarding purity of heart and what it means to see God. This week the focus will be on growing in our vision of seeing God and motives to seek the sight of His glory. With that in mind, let’s remind ourselves that the blessedness that is spoken of is the sight of God and the soul’s taste of God. We must desire God for Himself rather than thinking that we can pursue God for a blessedness other than Himself. To put this a different way, if we are going to pursue a growth in our vision of God, we need to make sure that we are pursuing God for God. If we are going to pursue God, we need to check our motives in what we do. If our motives are wrong, we are trying to use God to obtain something we love more than God.
The first thing to understand is that to see God we must have a pure heart. Cleaning up the outward person is not a bad thing, but what Jesus taught us is that it is what comes out of the heart that defiles us. No matter how much we clean and apply whitewash to a tomb, inside that tomb are death and bones. We must never mistake outward morality with a clean heart. That is exactly one of the errors that the Pharisees fell into. It is the inward person that we must primarily deal with and that will take prayer and meditation. It will take much self-examination and much dwelling in the sight of His glory which transforms us into His image. It will take much prayer, humility, and brokenness to be cleansed and for Christ to dwell in the heart with glory. That point must be burned and driven into our inward person so that we may look at the depths of our hearts. It takes a pure heart to see God and that is far different than just outwardly moral behavior.
Two, we must know seek to be done with sin in all ways. Jesus says to cut off the hand and foot and even to pluck out the eye. Without going into what that means, we know that it means that we are to cut to the depths of our being in order to repent of sin. We must seek to be done with sin of the body and of the heart. Whatever it is that displeases our God, we must be done with it and that at all costs. If it is what the older writers called a darling sin or a beloved sin, then that is something that we are not repenting of and so love it more than God. If we truly desire God, we must repent of all known sin and then any sin that the Lord reveals to us. Jesus said to deny ourselves (Luke 9:23ff) which is to deny anything of the self and take up the cross as a slave of Christ to follow Him.
Three, we should seek a devoted heart to God. While we must flee from sin, we must realize that this cannot be truly done apart from pursuing God Himself. If we are not pursuing God, we are leaving one sin for another sin. It has been said that we should be too full of God to pursue sin. II Timothy 2:22 gives us this principle: “Now flee from youthful lusts and pursue righteousness, faith, love and peace, with those who call on the Lord from a pure heart.” A proper fleeing from sin is only done when we are pursuing God. Notice that this also includes a pure heart. There is no pursuing true faith, love and peace without a pure heart or without growing in the purity of heart. But our hearts must be fully devoted to God and not the world if we are going to truly pursue the sight of God and His glory.
Four, we cannot see the glory of God apart from Christ. Last week I tried to set out the truth that we will never see God’s glory apart from seeing Him in Christ. There is no other way. However, there are many ways of being sidetracked from this. We are told that God can be seen by reason or by moral issues. We are told that the glory of God can be seen in other religions. Without disputing that entirely since God’s glory is seen in all things in some way, there is no way to the Father but through Christ. We must never get away from the basic truth that God is to be sought through Christ and cannot be seen in truth apart from Christ. As Jesus in John 17 tells us, He manifested the name of the Father to men: 5 “Now, Father, glorify Me together with Yourself, with the glory which I had with You before the world was. 6 “I have manifested Your name to the men whom You gave Me out of the world; they were Yours and You gave them to Me, and they have kept Your word.” We must continually study the Person and works of Christ in the hope that the Spirit will open our eyes to the glory of God in all of His ways and attributes.
Five, it is not that we can earn the sight of God by our scholarly actions in the pursuit of an academic knowledge of Christ. No, all that we do must be done in prayer for the work of the Holy Spirit in this. No man can understand the things of God unless God shows Himself to that man. God alone reserves the right to open the hearts and eyes of men so that they may see Him and His glory. I Corinthians 2 sets out the truth of this for us: 10 “For to us God revealed them through the Spirit; for the Spirit searches all things, even the depths of God. 11 For who among men knows the thoughts of a man except the spirit of the man which is in him? Even so the thoughts of God no one knows except the Spirit of God. 12 Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, so that we may know the things freely given to us by God.” We must seek the sight of the glory of God in total dependence upon the Spirit. He alone can reveal the thoughts of God and God has given the Spirit in order to show men His glory.
Six, we must understand that we must have strong cravings for this, though those are also the work of grace in the heart. The writers of the Psalms spoke of the longing soul as one that craved God as a deer in the wilderness would pant for water (Psalm 42:1-4). They also spoke of the lovingkindness of God as being better than life itself (Psalm 63:3). We must learn that this is the true language of love. If we are to love God with all of our being, then we must seek God for love in order to love Him. There must be the craving and aching of the soul in its desire and pantings after God. But this cannot be worked up, it must come by grace. We must look at our little desires after God and begin to cry out to Him for greater desires. It is not until we ache and long with strong cravings will we begin to see more of His glory. God does not reveal Himself to those who are lukewarm.
Seven, we must preach to ourselves and others that there is nothing greater in life or in eternity than the blessedness of seeing God. We are surrounded with the world and the things of the world, but we must tell ourselves constantly that those things will perish and we must know God and we must see God. This sight of God is the blessedness of the Beatitudes. It is in this that we will find true happiness which is to share in the joy of God. It is in this sight and taste of God that we find life that is truly life or the abundant life. We must preach to ourselves and pursue purity of heart because there no thing in the world is worth more than a glimpse of the glory of God. God alone can fill the soul with that which satisfies it because He alone created the soul and He created it where it could not be filled with anything but Himself. There are the deceptions and lies of sin and the world, but the greatest blessedness is the sight of God.
Eight, we need to tell ourselves that when we follow the lusts of the flesh and eyes we are given over to sin. When we choose those things we are trading the sight of God which is what is best for the soul for sin which is the very worst for the soul. When we are given over to selfishness or coveting we are actually pouring filth on the heart which is like throwing dirt on our spiritual glasses. When our glasses or hearts are covered with filth, we have no way or seeing the glory of God. What we are doing, then, is exchanging the glory of God for idols. Oh how we need to look at the depths of our hearts and our motives in this. We may always rationalize and excuse our sin, but we need to fight through that and realize that our hearts are motivated by the very things that God hates and that Christ died for. Christ died in order to give us the knowledge of God and we go out and do the things that hide the sight of the glory of God.
Nine, we need to remind ourselves that heaven awaits all who have a pure heart, a sight of God, and then those that love that sight of God. What is heaven but to see His glory and to have Him shining His glory in and through us? What can heaven be but a filling of our souls with a sight and taste of His ravishing glory? We must also tell ourselves and others that if we truly don’t desire a sight of the glory of God now, what makes us think that heaven will be a place that we would enjoy? Heaven is a place where God alone shines and His glory alone fills all that are there in all of their being. Those in heaven are filled with the love of God which gives them a love for God and they re ravished with Him. If we don’t long for a sight of God now, heaven would be an awful place. Yet the rewards that we seek are not monetary riches, but a greater sight of God. What we are to work for on earth is a greater sight of God now and also for eternity. Jonathan Edwards pictured our time on earth as developing a capacity for heaven. When we arrive in heaven we will be filled with the love of God to our capacity. That should motivate us to pursue God now.
Ten, the doctrine of hell should motivate us too. People in hell will see God to their eternal displeasure. They will never have a pleasant view of God, but instead the God they hated on earth will fill the sight of their soul with His perfect justice, holiness, and wrath. The more of God they see the more they will hate Him. This should motivate us to seek a true sight of the glory of God from pure hearts always remembering that people earn hell from their works while those in heaven obtain all that they have by grace. We must run the race with endurance fixing our eyes on Jesus, yet knowing it is all by grace. There is nothing but unpleasant things if we do not obtain pure hearts by grace in order to see and taste of His glory. There is nothing but glory beyond our present conception if by grace we obtain pure hearts and a sight of God. What do you really love? Your pursuit of a pure heart or of the world (though maybe in a religious way) will show you the true nature of your soul and eternal destiny. Don’t be deceived.
God Loves... Himself 
Leave a comment