The Pure of Heart

Blessed are the pure of heart, for they shall see God.

It is the office of the Holy Spirit to gradually purify our hearts so that we can see God.  We ourselves cannot see how cluttered, how impure we are, how much we desire all that is not God.  Purity of heart is not something we "acquire" by our own effort--it is the Gift of God: 

"When the Holy Spirit comes, He will convict the world of sin."

"Search me, O God, and let me know if there is anything in me that displeases you" (ps. 39)

Impurity can be revealed only by God Himself, because we cannot see it in ourselves and no one else can judge our motives.  It is painful to allow God to search our hearts; we do not know what He will uncover there, but we do know that whatever He finds is something to which we are soulfully attached, something we have been depending on "to see us through" life, something we are afraid to let go of.  If we give it up, we have nothing left for our defense.  We do not yet believe that God Himself is our "shield and our very great reward," and as Paul says, "we do not want to be found naked."

God offers us the skin of His very own Son, but we prefer our fig leaves as clothing, so we continue to hide from His gaze.  The Pharisees, seeing Jesus with Mary Magdalene, thought that He did not know "what sort of woman was touching Him," but she knew that He did know her.  She was not hiding from Him, as were the Pharises who were afraid to expose their own shamefulness to His gaze.  She was justified because she allowed the Holy Spirit to bring her to Jesus for healing; they remained in their sin.  Her heart was pure; theirs, impure.  They wanted something else more than they wanted God's action in their lives.

When Jesus taught us to pray, "Thy kingdom come," He was teaching us purity of heart.  If we want anything else more than that, we need a heart transplant.