We come this morning to the
sixth beatitude which has to do with purity of heart and with seeing God.
Whereas the promises associated with the previous beatitudes talk about
belonging to the kingdom of heaven, inheriting the earth, being comforted,
filled, and receiving mercy, this one says is certainly one of the greatest
because it offers us the promise of seeing God. As with all the others,
this beatitude fits in sequentially with the others.
Those who have come to see
their sinful state for what it is, they are the poor in spirit, they have
mourned over their sins, been brought to the humility of recognizing their own
inability to do anything about it and have thus hungered and thirsted for the
righteousness of God and were consequently filled, as they received the
bountiful mercy of God. This has brought them to the point of being saved,
which means their sins were washed away and they have been made pure.
As we
seek to understand all that our Lord is saying to us in this text, there are
several things we must consider.
First of all, I want us to
consider what the heart is. What exactly is this heart to which Jesus refers?
Certainly it is not the muscle which pumps blood through our bodies, it must be
something more?
Then we need to ask
ourselves what is this purity about which Jesus speaks. If the pure in heart
enjoy a state of blessing and privilege, what does it mean to be pure?
And what does it mean to
see God? Is the scripture speaking literally or metaphorically? What is it
saying, and then how do we make the application of this text to our everyday
experience?
Only those who have surrendered their hearts
completely to Jesus that he may reign in them alone. Only those whose hearts
are undefiled by their own evil—and by their own virtues too.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer The
Cost of Discipleship
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