The Pure in Heart.

My Bible commentary says when something is pure it is unmixed with anything else. Pure gold is not mixed with any other metal. It says a heart that is pure is single-minded.

Is my heart single-minded? Is God first in my life? Is my heart pure?

When I look at myself, I don't feel pure but I try not to live by my feelings. God says I have a new heart, therefore I do have a new heart and I will give my heart to him each day and let Him change it.  The apostle John says to try to live with love so that, "...whenever our hearts condemn us, God is greater than our hearts and knows everything." 1John 3:20 And James says, "Indeed we all make many mistakes."

"Beloved, we are children of God and it has not appeared as yet what we will be. We know that when He appears, we will be like Him, because we will see Him just as He is. And everyone who has this hope fixed on Him purifies himself, just as He is pure." 1 John 3:3

There is an example of God purifying hearts in our family. One of my daughters had been angry at her real father, my first husband, for years. She once told me she would never forgive him for the past. But after my grandson's death she has become more committed and closer to God. After the funeral she told her father she loved him and later she told me she has forgiven him. God purified her heart.

"And God, who knows the heart, testified to them by giving them the Holy Spirit, just as He also did to us. And God made no distinction between us and them, purifying their hearts by faith." Acts 15:9

It seems to me our hearts are made pure by God through hope and faith, which is our trust in God and His promises. I do trust God that he is purifying my heart each day and that some wonderful day I will "see him just as He is".

The Beatitudes: Being a Good Person.

"Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be satisfied." Matt. 5:6

When I was a child and watched movies on our little black & white TV I was always impressed with the good people in the show. I would think, "I want to be like that: brave, honest, loving, and good."

Later, as an adult Christian I still feel the same way. When I watch The Lord of the Rings, I wonder if I could be as brave as Frodo and Samwise Gamgee. Would I die for what is right? Would my faith remain strong? I long to be a good person.

Jesus says if we desire goodness in ourselves as much as we desire a cold drink and a good meal, we will get it. He will give his goodness to us. And just as we need to drink and eat food each day, in the same way we need to ask God daily for his goodness to live in us.

After we have asked, simply believe it is true for Jesus said it was. If we stumble and fall, he will pick us up, dust us off and help us keep walking in the path of goodness. "For I am the Lord your God who holds you by your right hand. Who says to you, 'Do not fear, I will help you.' "

Beatitudes: Blessed are the Meek.

"Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth."

Another word for meek is humble.

Most of the  leaders of the world could not be called meek. In the business world a humble man may be looked down on.

Moses, although he stood up to the king of Egypt and led the Israelites through the desert, was called meek. He spoke to God face to face. His strength was in God and he humbly realized this. "Now the man Moses was very meek, more than any man on the face of the earth." Num. 12:3

Psalm 37:11 says "The humble shall inherit the land."

The meek in this world may never own a plot of land. Moses never did. God and Jesus were talking about our life after death when we would inherit not only eternal life but land of our own. In the old testament God speaks of how we will build houses and inhabit them. (Isaiah 65:21) Jesus said he is preparing homes for us in heaven. (John 14:2) When there is a "new earth" it will be ours. (Rev. 21:1 & Isaiah 65:1)

I found this definition of meekness from Biblos.com here: http://bible.cc/matthew/5-5.htm
This is an amazing site that has comments on every verse in the Bible. And if you can't find a verse you are looking for you just have to type in part of it and they will find it.

I know this is long, but I feel meekness is misunderstood for cowardice. Jesus was definitely not a coward. He had a very strong, forceful personality.


The meek - Meekness is patience in the reception of injuries. It is neither meanness nor a surrender of our rights, nor cowardice; but it is the opposite of sudden anger, of malice, of long-harbored vengeance. Christ insisted on his right when he said, "If I have done evil, bear witness of the evil; but if well, why smitest thou me?" John 18:23. Paul asserted his right when he said, "They have beaten us openly uncondemned, being Romans, and have cast us into prison; and now do they thrust us out privily? nay verily; but let them come themselves, and fetch us out," Acts 16:37. And yet Christ was the very model of meekness. It was one of his characteristics, "I am meek," Matthew 11:29. So of Paul. No man endured more wrong, or endured it more patiently than he. Yet the Saviour and the apostle were not passionate. They bore all patiently. They did not press their rights through thick and thin, or trample down the rights of others to secure their own.

Meekness is the reception of injuries with a belief that God will vindicate us. "Vengeance is his; he will repay," Romans 12:19. It little becomes us to take his place, and to do what he has promised to do.

Meekness produces peace. It is proof of true greatness of soul. It comes from a heart too great to be moved by little insults. It looks upon those who offer them with pity. He that is constantly ruffled; that suffers every little insult or injury to throw him off his guard and to raise a storm of passion within, is at the mercy of every mortal that chooses to disturb him. He is like "the troubled sea that cannot rest, whose waters cast up mire and dirt."