November 2007

ARTICLE TOOLS

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BLESSED are the pure in heart, for they will see God.
Matthew 5:8

MAKE EVERY EFFORT to live in peace with all men and to be holy; without holiness no one will see the Lord.
Hebrews 12:14

WHO IS PURE OF HEART? Only those who have surrendered their hearts completely to Jesus that he may reign in them alone. Only those whose hearts are undefiled by their own evil—and by their own virtues too.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer The Cost of Discipleship

NOW when [people] attempt to live a double life spiritually, that is, to appear pure on the outside but are not pure in the heart, they are anything but blessed. Their conflicting loyalties make them wretched, confused, tense. And having to keep their eyes on two masters at once makes them cross-eyed, and their vision is so blurred that neither image is clear.
Clarence Jordan, Sermon on the Mount

OPPOSING PURITY of heart is lust of any kind—for wealth, for recognition, for vengeance, for sexual access to others—whether indulged through action or imagination.
Jim Forest, The Ladder of the Beatitudes

A PURE WILL loves God with the whole heart and soul and mind. It is "fanatical"—the greatest insult the modern mind can conceive, and the greatest compliment God can give. It is also the greatest compliment a lover can give: "I love you with my whole heart and soul. My love is not divided. You have no rival."
Peter Kreeft, Back to Virtue

THERE IS an interaction between seeing and being. The kind of person you are affects the kind of world that you see. … And conversely, what you see affects what you are.
Simon Tugwell, The Beatitudes

INDEED, what would one search for when one has God before one's eyes? Or what would satisfy one who would not be satisfied with God? Yes, we wish to see God. Who does not have this desire? We strive to see God. We are on fire with the desire of seeing God.
Augustine, Sermon

THE PURE IN HEART are blessed because they will see God. Although this will not be ultimately true until the new heaven and earth, yet it is also true even now. Our perception of God and his ways, as well as our fellowship with him, depends on our purity of heart. The visio Dei—what an incentive to purity.
D. A. Carson, The Sermon on the Mount

TO SEE GOD in terms of the Beatitude's promise is to be able to stand before him, accepted into his presence at the Last Judgment.
Robert A. Guelich, Sermon on the Mount: A Foundation for Understanding

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Recent Reflections columns on the beatitudes include Blessed Are the Merciful. Blessed Are Those Who Hunger, Blessed Are Those Who Mourn, Poor in Spirit, and Blessed Are the Meek.

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