Blessed are the pure in heart ...

“Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God,”

This verse has been adopted as the text for the mystics. This blessed state of heart purity has the most amazing promise attached to it, that they will see God! Jesus is declaring that a pure heart is the condition for intimacy with God. This is one occasion in the Scripture where purity is predicated of the heart. The heart is the focus of the personal life, the very centre of our being. Jesus said later,

“For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies” (Mat.15:19).

To be pure in heart means to be pure throughout,

“He that hath clean hands, and a pure heart; who hath not lifted up his soul unto vanity, nor sworn deceitfully” (Ps.24:4).

The outcome of inward purity is the realization of the mystic vision of God,

“Truly God is good to Israel, even to such as are of a clean heart” (Ps.73:1).

One is reminded of the words of Job when he is confronted by the vision of God,

“I have heard of You by the hearing of the ear: but now my eye sees You” (Job 42:5).