Craig Smith

Matthew 5:8



Over and over I hear it again

That the Father desires pure heart

Not to seek earthly treasure or the favor of man

But to be found with pureness of heart



Chorus

Pure heart is what the Father desires

Holy heart purified by God's holy fire

Broken heart, proven to be faithful and true

Fashion in me a heart that's thirsting for You



Search ever chamber, expose them to me

Create motives of honor and simplicity

May you find faithfulness, integrity

A heart which is worthy for Your eyes to see



Chorus



My only ambition is to stand before You

And find I was pleasing in Your sight

And obedient child of God, faithful and true

Found with pureness of heart



Chorus



The pure heart is free of mixed motives. It is one emptied of self, and

filled with total devotion to the Lord.--Craig Smith



In the natural realm, when we speak of the heart, we are referring to

the chief physical organ in the human body. Though failure of other

human organs can result in death, no other part plays a more important

life sustaining role than that of the heart.



This is also true in the spiritual realm. Throughout Biblical history,

the heart has represented the man himself. The very center of his

every emotion and appetite. It is no wonder then, that the Lord requires

we love Him with all our heart. A heart wholly devoted to the Lord is a

heart which is pure, it has no admixture. It is not divided, polluted, or

contaminated by foreign substances.



The Psalmist tells us (Ps 51:16,17) God is not pleased with sacrifices and

burnt offerings. In fact, He told the Israelites, the very ones He set

up the sacrificial system through, that He no longer took pleasure in

their burnt offerings, and that the offerings had even become

"worthless." (Is 1:11-13) The problem was not in His system, but was

instead in the hearts of His people. He knew their hearts, and their

hearts were void of the necessary total devotion and love for Him. They

were merely going through a heartless motion of meaningless religious

ceremony. The result, "When you spread out your hands in prayer, I will

hide my eyes from you, yes, even though you multiply prayers, I will not

listen." (Is 1:15) He then appeals to them to repent of their sins and by

doing so, even though their "sins are a scarlet, they will be washed

white as snow..." I cannot help but mention the close parallel in

Israel's situation then, with the present situation in our western

culture today. According to various polling systems, the majority of

people living in the United States have a belief in God. However, for a

majority, we do not seem to have a great effect on our society. Could it

be that a great many of those polled are jus going through "meaningless

religious ceremony"? We would all do well to compare our present

relationships with Christ with the early churches relationships to

Christ.



Once again, what pleases the Father is the whole heart devoted to Him.

The acceptable sacrifices to the Lord are no longer "burnt offerings"

but instead "...a broken spirit, a broken and contrite heart..." The word

"broken" in these passages refers to a crushing into the form of powder.

If you were to take a small stone and toss it into a swift stream of

water, the stone would resist the flow and quickly sink to the bottom.

However, you could recover the same small stone, pound it into a fine

powder, and then pour it from your hand into the stream and even though

it is the same mineral substance, it no longer resists the stream's flow,

but instead floats wherever the stream carries it.



In many ways we are like the small stone. With selfish, unsubmissive

hearts, we resist God's flow or direction and find ourselves sinking.

However, if we are wise, we will approach the Lord and ask Him to reveal

any and hurtful object in our hearts. Reveal anything that divides us

from a right relationship with Him and restore us to the joy of our

salvation. May our prayers be that He will crush us into submissive,

totally devoted hearts. Suddenly we will realize we are flowing with

Him and being totally fulfilled by our relationship with Him, instead of

living in the strife of resistance. We will never know total

fulfillment, until He has from us a total heart, a whole heart, a pure

heart.--Craig Smith