THE BEATITUDES
BLESSED ARE THE PURE IN HEART
DR. JIM DIXON
MATTHEW 5:8, 1 JOHN 3:1-3
OCTOBER 28, 1990
Mt. Olympus, the tallest mountain in Greece, stands 9,570 feet in height. The mountain has jagged peaks. It is oftentimes covered with snow and ice. It is oftentimes shrouded with clouds and mist. In ancient times, the Greek people believed that Zeus had his throne on top of Mt. Olympus and that from the top of that mountain he was enthroned in glory. The Greeks believed that the twelve major deities all had their palaces and temples on the top of Mt. Olympus. As the centuries went by, the Greek people longed to see the gods. They longed to ascend Mt. Olympus and see the gods. They wanted to see the palaces, and they wanted to see the deities. But they were afraid. They were afraid that in climbing the mountain they might somehow bring the wrath of the gods upon themselves.
It was about the year 800 that a few Greek men decided to take a chance. They wanted to see the gods. They wanted to see what they believed to be the council of the gods. They were so excited about seeing the gods that they were willing to risk the wrath. They climbed Mt. Olympus. It was hard. The journey was long, but this group of Greek men reached the summit. There they saw ice and snow, but they were stunned to see no palaces, to see no thrones, to see no deities. All they saw was ice and mist and clouds and jagged rock. They descended the mountain and shared with the people. “There are no gods on Mt. Olympus—nothing but snow and ice.” The people were disbelieving; but as time passed and others ascended Mt. Olympus to see the gods, they, too, saw that nothing was there and reported back to the people. This is why it is said that Homer and his Odyssey described the home of the gods as a heavenly Mt. Olympus instead of an earthly one.
Mt. Olympus represents, in some sense, the desire of humanity to see God. Throughout history, people have longed to see God. In some sense, Elijah saw God before he was caught up into heaven in the whirlwind. Moses saw God’s back, as it were, and he heard the voice of God in the burning bush. From time to time, the Jewish people saw the angel of God’s presence, and there were the pillar of fire and the cloud of glory that accompanied the children of Israel in their wilderness wanderings, both representing the presence of God. There was the Shekinah, the glory of God’s presence, that hovered over the mercy seat of the ark of the covenant and the holy of holies at the tabernacle and temple. But no one saw God.
Some people experience theophanies, whereby they encountered physical manifestations of God’s presence, but nobody saw God. In fact, the Bible tells us that no one can look on God’s face and live. No human being can look in the face of God and live. The Bible says, “No man has ever seen the Father. The only Son who is in the bosom of the Father, He has made Him known” (John 1:18). But then, in this incredible verse, this amazing Beatitude, we have this promise, “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God” (Matthew 5:8). What an incredible and incomprehensible promise.
This morning we will examine the pure in heart. The Greek word for pure is the word katharos. This word has a multiplicity of meanings, all critically important to our understanding as Christians. We are going to explore some of these meanings this morning.
First of all, this word pure, the word katharos can mean clean or washed. To be pure in heart means that your heart has to be washed. This word katharos was used to describe “soiled clothing that was made clean through washing.” This word katharos, this word pure, is the word used in the Bible to describe Jesus washing His disciples feet, “to be washed.”
Some things in this life are easy to wash. Friday I washed my car. In fact, I did not really wash it. I went to a gas station and filled up the gas tank, and I got a free wash. I did not even have to punch in a code. I just pushed the green button. I took my car right on through and drove my car away. It is easy to wash a car. This morning I took a shower. It is relatively easy to wash my body. This suit that I am wearing has been sent to the cleaners. It is not hard to wash clothing or clean clothing.
Some things are more difficult to wash. Take the city of London, for instance. London became rather dirty through the years. London is, of course, the capital of the United Kingdom (England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland). It is a very old and ancient city. It was established by the Romans in A.D. 43. When they first established the community of London, they called it Londinium, from which the name London comes. The city of London today has seven million people. It is the ninth largest city on the earth. Every year eight million tourists journey to that city to see Big Ben, Westminster Abbey, Buckingham Palace, St. Paul’s Cathedral, and many other ancient buildings and attractions.
London did not really become great until the 16th and 17th centuries when it began to burn a lot of coal. More coal was produced in England in the 17th century than in any other nation on earth. In fact, in that century, 80% of the world’s coal was produced in England. More coal was burned in the city of London than any other city in the world. That became true for 300 years. Because of all this coal, London entered into an industrial revolution and tremendous progress, but it also became very dirty. The air in London became very dirty. The buildings in London became very dirty. They became so bad that in 1952, during an incredible smog alert, 4,000 people died in the city of London. In the last 30 to 40 years, the city of London has tried to clean itself. It has tried to wash. The burning of coal was banned in the city of London, and the air has become relatively pure. In more recent times, people have even tried to scrub and chemically treat the ancient buildings, to wash them, to make them clean. Londoners have spent hundreds of millions of dollars and hundreds of millions of labor hours cleaning and washing the city. It is hard to clean a city, but it is humanly possible if you are willing to spend enough money and enough time.
But there is one thing that humankind cannot clean, and that is the human heart. No matter how much money is spent, even if you spend hundreds of millions of dollars, no matter how many labor hours are expended, even if you spend hundreds of millions of labor hours, it is not possible to clean your heart. It is not humanly possible to clean my heart. The Bible tells us the only one who can wash your soul, the only one who can clean you within is Jesus Christ. The Bible says that if you would be washed, you need to receive what the Bible calls the “washing of regeneration” (Titus 3:5). You need to receive what the Bible calls the baptism of the Holy Spirit. The Bible says that when you embrace Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior—when you come to that moment where you make a commitment and invite Jesus Christ to be the Lord of your life, to live for Him truly, trusting Him as your Savior from sin— in that moment you have faith enough to make that commitment, He sends His Spirit within you and you receive the washing of regeneration. Though your sin be as scarlet, you are washed white as snow (Isaiah 1:18). Apart from this washing, the Bible says, you will never see God. Unless you are cleaned inside, unless you are washed inside, you will never see God. “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God” (Matthew 5:8).
In Matthew, chapter 8, a person with leprosy came up to Jesus Christ. This person said, “Lord, if You will, You can make me clean.” This person used the word katharos, the same word used in this Beatitude, the word meaning pure. “Lord, if You will, You can make me clean” Katharos. Jesus reached down and touched this person. He said, “I will. Be cleaned. Be cleansed. Be washed.” The person’s body, with the degeneration of the nervous system and the rotting of the flesh, was immediately made clean.
If you would be washed, if I would be washed, we must reach that point where we come up to Jesus Christ and say, “Lord, if You will, You can make me clean. Lord if You will, You can wash me inside.” When you do that, Jesus will reach down. He will touch you and say, “I will. Be cleaned.” “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God” (Matthew 5:8).
Secondly, this word pure, the word katharos, sometimes means genuine. Sometimes the word katharos is used in the sense of real or genuine—that which is not counterfeit, that which is not fake. Is the faith in your heart genuine or is it counterfeit?
Have you heard of the Piltdown Man? The Piltdown Man was allegedly discovered by Charles Dawson in 1912. He brought the skull fragments to the British Museum. For 40 years the Piltdown Man was honored as the missing link in the evolutionary world, the missing link that bridged modern human beings and the apes. But in 1952, there was an amazing discovery. It was discovered that the Piltdown Man was phony. It was counterfeit. It was a fake. It was not genuine. It was not real. The Piltdown Man had the jaw of an orangutan. The skull was really the skull of a modern person carbon dated to 1200 AD. Someone had taken the skull of a man from a Middle Ages cemetery, taken the skull out of that cemetery, combined it with the jaw of an orangutan, chemically treated the bones to synthetically fossilize them, and perpetrated a hoax on the scientific community. This was one of the greatest hoaxes ever perpetrated on the scientific community in the history of this world. The Piltdown Man was a phony man.
There are a lot of phony people in this world. There are phony people in the church. There are phony people in this church, people whose faith is not genuine but counterfeit. You have all heard the Lord’s parable of the wheat and the weeds. In this world there is wheat and there are weeds. At the close of this age, there will be a final judgment that separates the wheat from the weeds, the good from the evil. Sometimes that is a scary picture.
There is a more disturbing picture in another parable, the parable of the dragnet. The parable of the dragnet, told by our Lord Jesus Christ, tells us that the kingdom of God, the church of Christ, is like a dragnet being pulled through the sea, being pulled through this world, gathering fish. In the dragnet, fish of every kind are gathered. Some are good, and some are bad. At the close of the age—within the net, within the dragnet, within the kingdom, within the church, the visible church,—there will be a sorting and a separation, even within the church of the genuine and the fake. That is a more disturbing picture.
In this church, this morning, some are genuine and some are counterfeit. If you do not believe in Christ and are willing to say, “I do not believe in Christ,” you are not counterfeit. You are being honest. But if you say you believe in Christ—you espouse Christ, you call yourself a Christian—but in your heart you do not really believe or seek to honor him as Lord, you are counterfeit.
If you do not believe in Christ, you are welcome here. We long to see you come to the point of belief. If you are counterfeit, you are welcome here. We long to see the Holy Spirit touch your heart and move you from what is fake to what is real. But the warning of God is given by His Holy Spirit at this time and in this place: “Unless your faith is genuine, unless your heart is real, you will never see God.”
I was reading about Howard Carter who went into the tomb of Tutankhamun years ago. When he entered the tomb, he found a casket. It was a beautiful casket. Howard Carter opened the casket. Within the casket, he saw a second casket with gold leaf on it. He opened the second casket. Within the second casket, he found a third casket. He opened the third casket. When he opened the third casket, Howard Carter found a fourth casket made of solid gold. He opened the fourth casket. Within the fourth casket, Howard Carter found the body of the boy king wrapped in gold cloth; a gold mask was upon his head. As Howard Carter began to unravel the gold cloth, he discovered the body of Tutankhamen. It was rotting, decomposing. It did not matter that the externals were beautifully adorned, laden with gold. It did not matter how beautifully prepared the body was; the body was dead.
The world looks on the externals. You might have a tremendous covering, and it might look great. You might go to church regularly. You might live a relatively moral life. The world sees the externals, but God looks on the inside. He knows whether there is life there. Unless you have genuine faith in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, there is no life in you; and you will not see God.
Thirdly, and finally, this word pure, katharos, means unadulterated and unmixed. This is really the primary usage of this word. When gold was without alloy, without impurity, it was called katharos, pure. When a husband and wife are married and are faithful to each other, knowing no others, they are called katharos, pure, unadulterated.
John F. Kennedy was the 35th president of the United States. He was the youngest man ever to be elected president of the United States and the youngest U.S. president to die in office. When he died on November 22, 1963, our nation was stunned. The world was stunned. When his body was taken from the White House to the Capitol, 300,000 people lined the street to get a glimpse of his body as it went by. At the Capitol, 250,000 people went by to see the casket. When his body was taken from St. Matthew’s Cathedral, where mass was conducted, to Arlington Cemetery, 1,000,000 people lined the streets. As he was buried at Arlington and the eternal flame was lit, millions of people watched on television. Dignitaries from 90 nations were there. When people think of John F. Kennedy, they think of incredible charisma for he was a man of great charisma. He moved people. When people think of John F. Kennedy, they think of a president who took a strong stand against Nikita Khrushchev and Fidel Castro. They think of the Cuban Missile Crisis when the world teetered on the brink of thermonuclear war.
For some of us, the memory of John F. Kennedy will always be mixed because his marriage was adulterated. He married Jacqueline on September 12, 1953, and pledged himself faithful unto death. But by overwhelming testimony, he was not faithful. He was a womanizer with countless affairs before he ever entered the White House. At the White House, as Jackie was so often gone, he shared his bed again with women. Whether they were secretaries or women from Hollywood, he shared his bed. Peter Lawford said he literally functioned as John Kennedy’s pimp. One of Kennedy’s best friends, Senator George Smathers said that he never knew a man who had a more active libido; but an active libido is no excuse for adultery.
The Bible says that if you are truly a Christian, you are married to Jesus Christ. The true church of Christ is called in the Bible the bride of Christ. So if you are a Christian, you are married to Christ, and your marriage to Christ as a Christian is even more important than your earthly marriage. I can tell you on the basis of the authority of the word of God that nothing is more important than your marriage to Christ. You are called to faithfulness that you might seek utter purity in this relationship.
The reality is that we are not pure in this relationship. Even when our faith is genuine, not counterfeit, we still have impurities that mingle and mix in our lives. We are not always pure in thought or motive. We do not always seek first Christ’s kingdom.
Perhaps you have heard of William Brodie. William Brodie was a respected businessman (and with this we will close). William Brodie was a respected businessman in the mid-18th century in the city of Edinburgh. His father was a very wealthy cabinetmaker. William Brodie was a city councilman. He was a deacon at the most famous church in Edinburgh. He had a wife, and they had four children. He was a committed family man. In a straightlaced city, he was the model of morality. But, on October 1, 1788, William Brodie was executed on the gallows because it was discovered that he was living a double life. For the last 18 years, he had robbed banks and businesses all over England and Scotland. He had committed violent crimes. He had mistresses in cities all over Britain and even in Europe. He had a double life.
Almost a hundred years later, in 1884, Robert Louis Stevenson wrote a play about William Brodie called “Deacon Brodie and the Double Life.” Two years later, Stevenson took this theme of a double life and wrote his famous novel, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Robert Louis Stevenson believed that in all people there is this mixture of good and evil. This good can never overcome the evil, and they live side by side in every human from birth to death.
Here we are Christians. We have received a new nature as the Spirit of Christ has come within us. We have been born anew, but we still have the old nature. We seek to walk in the Spirit rather than in the flesh. We want to be faithful; but even as Christians, there is a mixture of motives and a mixture of thoughts. What does God expect of you? What does God expect of me? He does not expect us to be sinless in this life because the Bible says, “All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23). The Bible says, “If we say we have no sin”—and that is in the present tense—”If we say we do not now sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us” (1 John 1:8).
What does God expect of us? He expects us to seek purity. In your heart, do you really seek purity? Do you long out of your love for Jesus Christ to please Him? Do you long to be found by Him without spot or blemish? Do you long to stand before Him and see Him smile? Do you long to hear Him say, “Well done.” If you are pure in heart today, it does not mean you are without sin. It means in your heart you long to be rid of sin. In your heart you long to be rid of Mr. Hyde. In your heart you want to be unadulterated, without impurity. You seek, you really seek, faithfulness to Jesus Christ with every fiber of your being.
If you are pure in heart and to the extent that you are pure in heart, you will begin to see God even in this life. You will begin to see God’s power manifested through your life. You will begin to sense God’s presence. You will begin to see His joy in your heart; and one day, as a Christian, you will see Jesus Christ face to face. “Blessed are the pure in heart ,for they shall see God” (Matthew 5:8).
Pure means washed; and unless you are washed, you will never see God. Pure means genuine. Unless your faith is real, you will never see God. Pure means unadulterated, unmixed. As we seek purity of heart, conformity to this Beatitude, we seek to be faithful, utterly faithful, in our marriage to Jesus Christ. Let us close with a word of prayer.