“Blessed are those whose thoughts are pure. They will see God.”

Pure Thoughts.

“Blessed are those whose thoughts are pure. They will see God.”ⁱ

There's a lot to be said for purity of thoughts, I will include a bit of it in this post. Purity of heart is more than actions, but the motivations behind the actions, which are visible only to God.ⁱⁱ To see one's face or to be in one's presence, to Jews were expressions of great favour. In this context to see God is to “be his friends and favorites, and to dwell with him in his kingdom.”ⁱⁱⁱ

Webster's Dictionary includes 12 definitions of “pure”, I will comment on only a few:

2. Free from moral defilement; without spot; not sullied or tarnished; incorrupt; undebased by moral turpitude; holy.

Of course that means absolutely free from moral defilement and there are none who meet this criteria except for Jesus Christ. The Pharisees were outwardly righteous, but inwardly were full of impurity.^iv Jesus saw through their facade and let them know that God held them accountable for more sins than they probably imagined.^v

3. Genuine; real; true; incorrupt; unadulterated; as pure religion. James 1.

At a glance this could appear to be an alternate route to Heaven however Jesus says He is the only way. Besides there is none who have lived free of sin. Again Jesus called the Pharisees hypocrites, because they abandoned the Word of God for human traditions.^vi

5. Free from guilt; guiltless; innocent.

As mentioned earlier there are none who are guiltless before God. All therefore rely on salvation through faith in Jesus Christ.

6. Not vitiated with improper or corrupt words or phrases; as a pure style of discourse or composition.

The religion of any person who can not control their own tongue is worthless.^vii Though people can tame all sorts of wild animals nobody is able to tame the tongue. We use it both to praise God and to curse our fellow man.^viii

9. Free from vice or moral turpitude. Titus 1.

Nice, but just like freedom from sin and moral defilement Jesus Christ is the only one.

Because even our best efforts to purify ourselves fall short of God's standard we need to rely on faith in Jesus Christ who lived without sin, died for us and was raised on the third day so that we can be put right with God through faith in Him.

I have referred to several English translations of the Bible in writing this which is made easy by e-sword, a free downloadable program. For further information I recommend reading the Bible.

© Ken Glasgow 2010

This page was written using Open Office 3, open source software from the www.openoffice.org this software is available to download for free.

iMatthew's Gospel chapter 5 verse 8, “God's Word” translation of the Bible.

iiAlbert Barnes notes on the Bible, & Jamieson Fausset & Brown commentary.

iiiAlbert Barnes notes on the Bible.

ivJohn Gill's exposition of the entire Bible.

vMatthew's Gospel chapter 23 verses 23-36.

viMark's Gospel chapter 7 verses 5-13

viiThe letter of James chapter 1 verse 26

viiiThe letter of James chapter 3 verses 7-10.