Cleansing and Purity
by Danielle Campfield
Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God. I love it when Jesus reveals the why in things. I love that He prioritizes purity of heart so much that it is an essential key to this Christian life. Those with pure hearts see God! For many years I struggled with purity. I struggled with believing that it was a reality for someone who had gone off the deep end of sin and into the world time and time again. For someone like me, who was well acquainted with her sin struggles and the dance of being on again and off again in her walk, purity wasn’t even something I desired. I desired the gifts of the spirit, I desired knowing Jesus, I desired community, but something about purity seemed just out of reach. Now, full disclosure, in hindsight that could be because I wasn’t ready to surrender and have Jesus be king over every area of my life (but that’s a different topic for a different time). There was a thing called purity culture in the Southern church when I was a teenager and it felt like an exclusive club to teens who had never partied, had sex, smoked, or snuck out of the house. I knew what I was doing all those years and knew that being a part of that club was probably never going to happen for me. For years, I continued to live and walk and grow in the Lord being happy with being good enough and accepting that there were parts of me that would never be pure. I treated purity so flippantly because I equated it to behavior modification and didn’t understand that those with pure hearts were special to God.
Years into adulthood, I was watching a sermon about sex and lust. To be honest, I usually turned off those kinds of messages feeling as though if you’ve heard one, you’ve heard them all. “Don’t do it” preachers would normally say, and that would be that. However, this time I listened in. And what this pastor said struck a chord. He said, “God is not here to take away fun. He is not here to modify your bad behavior. He is here to purify you and make you like his son”. My ears were ringing. He continued, “Purity has less to do with your behaviors and more to do with what is flowing out of your heart. The single most desire of my life is to see God, and with a pure heart I can see Him and see Him rightly”. I was undone at these words. A substance is considered pure when it is made up of one thing. One thing. A diamond would not be considered pure if it was filled with sand. Water wouldn’t be considered pure if it was murky with mud. In the same manner, how can our hearts be considered pure if they are hosting conflicting competitions for affection? How can one love the Lord and still desire and bring in things that would compete with that affection? Double mindedness is the thief of pure hearts. It aims to deceive us that our heart has room for more than one thing and one affection when the reality is following Jesus means there is an unwavering loyalty and devotion to him and submission to his lordship in our hearts and lives.
I want to encourage us family during this fast and moving forward, to let the Lord search our hearts and show us what is really in there. Like the Psalmist said, “Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me and lead me in the way everlasting” (Psalm 139). I pray that we ask Holy Spirit to take inventory of our hearts at this time in order to infuse His will over our own rewarding a purity that would allow God to be revealed and seen. This process may look and feel like the refiner’s fire. It may hurt. Parts of us and our desires that don’t look like Jesus will have to go. May we have pure hearts made up of one thing- love and devotion to God and his desires. May we with pure hearts gaze upon the beauty of God. Amen.
Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God. I love it when Jesus reveals the why in things. I love that He prioritizes purity of heart so much that it is an essential key to this Christian life. Those with pure hearts see God! For many years I struggled with purity. I struggled with believing that it was a reality for someone who had gone off the deep end of sin and into the world time and time again. For someone like me, who was well acquainted with her sin struggles and the dance of being on again and off again in her walk, purity wasn’t even something I desired. I desired the gifts of the spirit, I desired knowing Jesus, I desired community, but something about purity seemed just out of reach. Now, full disclosure, in hindsight that could be because I wasn’t ready to surrender and have Jesus be king over every area of my life (but that’s a different topic for a different time). There was a thing called purity culture in the Southern church when I was a teenager and it felt like an exclusive club to teens who had never partied, had sex, smoked, or snuck out of the house. I knew what I was doing all those years and knew that being a part of that club was probably never going to happen for me. For years, I continued to live and walk and grow in the Lord being happy with being good enough and accepting that there were parts of me that would never be pure. I treated purity so flippantly because I equated it to behavior modification and didn’t understand that those with pure hearts were special to God.
Years into adulthood, I was watching a sermon about sex and lust. To be honest, I usually turned off those kinds of messages feeling as though if you’ve heard one, you’ve heard them all. “Don’t do it” preachers would normally say, and that would be that. However, this time I listened in. And what this pastor said struck a chord. He said, “God is not here to take away fun. He is not here to modify your bad behavior. He is here to purify you and make you like his son”. My ears were ringing. He continued, “Purity has less to do with your behaviors and more to do with what is flowing out of your heart. The single most desire of my life is to see God, and with a pure heart I can see Him and see Him rightly”. I was undone at these words. A substance is considered pure when it is made up of one thing. One thing. A diamond would not be considered pure if it was filled with sand. Water wouldn’t be considered pure if it was murky with mud. In the same manner, how can our hearts be considered pure if they are hosting conflicting competitions for affection? How can one love the Lord and still desire and bring in things that would compete with that affection? Double mindedness is the thief of pure hearts. It aims to deceive us that our heart has room for more than one thing and one affection when the reality is following Jesus means there is an unwavering loyalty and devotion to him and submission to his lordship in our hearts and lives.
I want to encourage us family during this fast and moving forward, to let the Lord search our hearts and show us what is really in there. Like the Psalmist said, “Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me and lead me in the way everlasting” (Psalm 139). I pray that we ask Holy Spirit to take inventory of our hearts at this time in order to infuse His will over our own rewarding a purity that would allow God to be revealed and seen. This process may look and feel like the refiner’s fire. It may hurt. Parts of us and our desires that don’t look like Jesus will have to go. May we have pure hearts made up of one thing- love and devotion to God and his desires. May we with pure hearts gaze upon the beauty of God. Amen.