In his sixth Beatitude, Jesus said “Blessed [or “happy” GNB] are the pure in heart for they will see God” (Matthew 5.8). Or as the Psalmist said, “Who shall ascend the hill of the Lord? Who shall stand in his holy place? Those who have clean hands and pure hearts”. In the words of the GNB: “Those who are pure in heart” they have the right “to enter God’s holy temple”.
Let’s be honest, that is a pretty tall order. I once read of an Anglican minister, who one Christmas Eve stood at the church door and administered a breathalyser to test his parishioners who came to the Midnight Service. Those who exuded excessive alcohol fumes were turned away. But suppose it were possible to do a test of people’s hearts, how many of us would be deemed to be pure in heart? Note that when the Bible speaks of the ‘heart’, it does not have in mind a physical heart which sends blood around the body. No, as one commentator said, “in the Bible the heart is the real or true self, the psyche at its deepest level”. The heart is the place where we think and feel. The heart is the real me!
As for the word “clean”, the underlying Greek word here is katharos (the Greek word from which we get the name Catherine). Originally, katharos meant ‘clean’. It was the word people used of clean, pure water. It was like that of a mountain stream, free from all impurity. Later katharos came to mean ‘unmixed’ or unadulterated’. For instance, pure corn was corn which had been winnowed and sifted and was no longer mixed with chaff. Similarly, a ‘pure’ army was an army purged of the discontented, the cowardly, and the ineffective. It was a pure army in the sense that it was a first-class fighting force.
“Blessed are the pure in heart”, said Jesus. In other words, happy are those whose thoughts and motives are unmixed with anything devious, ulterior or base. To put it another way, happy are those who are not deceitful or hypocritical in their walk with God. Or as J.B. Philips put it:
Happy are those who are utterly sincere, for they will see God. Those who are pure in heart are those who do not say one thing and mean another; they are those who do not play religious games; they are at the very core of their being 100% genuine in their following Jesus.
The pure in heart are not just sincere, they are single-hearted in the sense of being single minded. As they seek to live out their faith, they are single-minded in their devotion toward God. They want to go all out for him. As William Temple, a former archbishop of Canterbury (1942-1944) said, they have “a passionate aspiration towards the holiness of God”. Jesus said, “they seek first the kingdom of God” (Matthew 6.33). They are concerned above everything else with the Kingdom and with what God requires of them. It is the sincere – the single-minded who really mean business with God – who will see God.
We cannot, of course, see God in this world, but the day is coming when we shall see God. John in his description of the new Jerusalem says of the redeemed, who are before the throne of God, “they will see his face” (Revelation 22.4). As the apostle Paul wrote to the church at Corinth, “now we see in a mirror dimly, but then we will see face to face [God]” (1 Corinthians 13.12). “My dear friends”, wrote the apostle John, “we are now God’s children, but it is not yet clear what we shall become. But we know that when Christ appears, we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is” (1 John 3.2 GNB).
For those who seek to be followers of Jesus, here is a challenge to be what we profess to be and to be sincere, single-minded followers of Jesus. There is also an assurance that those who are sincere and single minded as they follow Jesus, will one day see God. What a wonderful thought!