With a Pure Heart

Pursue righteousness, faith, love, and peace,

along with those who call upon the Lord out of a pure heart.

2Timothy 2:22

God once told Isaiah that the people of Israel “seek me daily, and delight in knowing my ways, as a nation that did righteousness, and did not forsake the judgment of their God.  They ask me for righteous judgments; they delight in approaching God” (Isaiah 58:2).

That kind of people sounds like good company for sincere people to keep.  It is good to seek God every day, to delight in knowing God’s ways, to ask for God’s righteous judgments, and to enjoy approaching God.  But God was sending Isaiah to these deeply religious people to show them their wickedness, not to congratulate them for their religiousness!  He was angry with these people and commanded Isaiah, “Cry aloud!  Do not hold back!  Lift up your voice like a shofar and show my people their transgression and the house of Jacob their sins!” (Isaiah 58:1).

God is not a beggar, grasping after and thankful for any praise He can get.  He is the Creator, and a very great King.  It is a great honor for us if He accepts our prayers and our worship, and wise saints offer praise with humility and fear.  Our God is worthy of more devotion than we can even offer, but He is good, and He will humble Himself to accept worship from a pure heart, a heart completely subdued before Him.

We get no “brownie points” for worshipping God; what we get is a blessing if He accepts the worship that we offer Him.  Knowing this, David cautioned God’s people to “serve the Lord with fear, and rejoice with trembling!” (Ps. 2:11).  God will, and has, rejected the worship of many, many people around the world.  People of the earth can be impressed with the appearance of devotion, but God never is.  He is impressed only with genuine, obedient faith.

In Isaiah’s day, Israel had become proud of what God had given them, of being His chosen people, of how often they gathered to seek His face, and how often they asked Him for more revelation.  Yet, they were neglecting to live according to His judgments, which they knew.  Theirs was a life that was “like righteousness”, but they were not righteous within.  They had all the appearance of a holy people without hearts that were after the holiness of God.  May God save us from an appearance of holiness and to learn to live truly, from the heart, in the holy way of Christ!