Podcast: Gospel: The Pure Heart

This is a transcript of one of our recent podcasts. To subscribe to the podcast using iTunes, please click here. To listen to the podcast without iTunes, please follow this link.

For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart. And no creature is hidden from his sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give account. Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.
-Hebrews 4:12-16

When I was very young, I was in a certain science class. This was probably fourth grade. We had a test scheduled on this particular day, but for whatever reason the teacher decided to postpone the test until the next day. Those of us who were not prepared were happy. But there were many who were ready for the test and wanted to take it. They didn’t want to spend another night studying when they were ready to go. So the teacher gave us a choice. Take it today, or take it tomorrow.

A portion of the class took it right away, and it was a HARD test. I was not part of that group. I spent the evening studying and came back the next day for the test. The only thing was, the teacher had changed the test. And the second test was really, really easy.

I probably would not even remember this day except that one of my friends, whose name is Dan, stood up in class and said that it wasn’t fair. And he argued the point until he was sent to the principal’s office.

It wasn’t fair. We all knew it wasn’t fair. And frankly, we probably would have all talked about how unfair it was in whispers after class except that Dan stood up, and suddenly, we didn’t have an excuse anymore. If you would have asked me why I didn’t talk to the teacher about it, I could have said a number of things before he stood up. I would have said, “Oh, you don’t ask about this stuff.” Or, “You don’t know what it was like in there – no one said a word!” But then he stood up. I’m not saying he went about it the right way, but one thing it did do was to tear away all of the false excuses and leave the truth – I was scared to say anything.

That’s not my biggest regret in life. Not even close. No, my biggest regrets are when I caused people to hurt because of selfishness. When pride, lust, anger, and hatred came out in my words or actions and brought about harm that I can never repay. I regret thinking badly about people. I regret being so absorbed in my own stuff to help. I regret the lies, the insults, the screaming, the fighting. I regret those moments when I am so angry that all I can think about doing is hurt someone. I regret doing all of these things with God.

These are sins. It’s hard for us to understand how serious they are, because they are part of our everyday lives. Every day we get angry at someone. Every day we lust after someone. Every day we seek our own selfish desires. When God tells us to love Him “with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength,” we sort of shrug and go about our way. It’s a standard we’ve never seen met, and so we push it aside as something that cannot be done and shouldn’t be attempted. We look around, make sure no one else is suddenly doing something holy and cool, and rest in the assurance that we’re no worse than the next guy.

But God looks at things a little bit differently. His holy standard is perfection, and anything less than that is a capital crime. He looks into our hearts and judges the pride, ambition, lust, and greed within. He sees the way we react in anger at people, people He intended us to love. He made us to worship Him, and instead we spend all our time and money on entertainment.

And our excuse may go something like this. “God, you really don’t know what it’s like down here! It’s just unreasonable to expect that much from us. We can’t be perfect! This world just isn’t set up like that.”

I’ll tell you something – that is exactly what my response would be. There isn’t a day that goes by that I react rightly to everything that happens. There isn’t a day I’m not plagued with sin. I try, but I’m just not good enough to make it. I’d be the first guy looking around the class, making sure no one is standing up, and then settling into that excuse that this is just the way things go.

Except that God does know. God does understand. And if anyone had any doubts, He proved it by becoming a man and living a life with all of the temptations and trials as anyone else. Jesus lived a perfect life, down to even the intentions of His pure heart.

Here’s the cool thing. He didn’t do it to prove we aren’t good enough. We’re not good enough, but He didn’t need to prove it that way. History has given plenty of proof of that. No, He did it to provide for us a way. He didn’t do it to say, “I told you so!” but to take away all of those sins from us.

The wages of sin is death, and no sin can be forgiven without the shedding of blood. So when Jesus died on that Cross, dying the death He did not deserve, His Blood was not paying the price of His own sin, because He had none, but for ours. He took our sin upon that Cross and paid that price. Because of His perfect life, because of His pure heart, He was able to lay down His life for us, even though we did not deserve it.

He also gives us His righteousness, that same pure heart, so we can stand before the Father on the Day of Judgment and be accepted into life as though we hadn’t a blemish on us.

And He doesn’t expect anything from us in return, because this was the ultimate act of love and mercy. Jesus died for us.

Repent from your sins. Confess them and turn away from them. Believe in Jesus and His sacrifice. And turn in confidence to Him. He knows what you’ve been through, because He was there too. But more than that, He can forgive you.

Which you need, because there has only been one pure heart on this earth, and it isn’t yours.