Hello everyone welcome come on down if you're upstairs and yeah, we're gonna get started with our worship gathering So glad that you're here on the last day of May because it's somehow it is June tomorrow. I think that's crazy But yeah, glad you guys are here and let's get into worship. Hi everybody who just sat down to stand directly back up awesome Start calling names if I have to Well, we wait for everybody to just make their way downstairs This first song is talking about how better is one day in the Lord's courts than a thousand elsewhere And I think what's so beautiful So much conversation But for those of you who can hear my voice can we prepare our hearts to be in the presence of the Lord that we can confidently say that better Is one day in his courts than thousand elsewhere So I'm gonna just start off by praying while we still wait for books to come on down So thank you Lord for this beautiful sunny sunny day We thank you for the camaraderie and the companionship and the friendships and all of the conversations that are happening today Thank you for community Lord. I pray Lord that we can be in communion with you today That we would turn our hearts ever more towards you And that we would expect that the God that we serve Can do both the miracles as well as be with us in the midst of all the things Thank you, Lord How lovely is your dwelling place?
Oh Lord almighty My soul longs and even fades for you For here my heart is satisfied With in your presence I sing beneath the shadow of your wings Better is one day in your courts better courts and thousand elsewhere Better is one day in your courts better is one day in your house better is one day in your court and thousand elsewhere One thing I ask and I would seek To see your beauty To find you in the place your glory One thing I ask and I would seek To see your beauty to find you in the place your glory Better is one day in your courts better is one day in your courts and thousand elsewhere better is one day in your courts better is one day in your courts and thousand elsewhere My heart and flesh cry out for you the living God your spirits water to my soul I've tasted and I've seen come once again to me. I will draw near to you I will draw near to you In your courts better courts and thousand elsewhere better is one day in your courts better is one day in your courts and thousand elsewhere better is one day in your courts better is one day in your cozs better is one day y'all I'll draw near to you, I will draw near to you So give us clean hands, give us pure hearts Let us not lift our souls to another Give us clean hands, give us pure hearts Let us not lift our souls to another Give us clean hands, give us pure hearts Let us not lift our souls to another. Give us clean hands. Give us pure hearts.
Let us not lift our souls to another. We bow our hearts. We bend our knees. Oh, Spirit, come make us humble.
We turn our eyes from evil things. Oh, Lord, we cast down our idols. Give us clean hands. Give us pure hearts.
Let us not lift our souls to another. Give us clean hands. Give us pure hearts. We bow our hearts.
We bend our knees. Oh, Spirit, come make us humble. We turn our eyes from evil things. Oh, Lord, we cast down our idols.
Let us not lift our souls to another. Oh God, let us be a generation that seeks, that seeks your face. Oh God, let us be a generation that seeks, that seeks your face. Oh God, let us be a generation that seeks, give us, give us clean hands, give us pure hearts.
Let us not lift our souls to another. Give us clean hands, give us pure hearts. Let us not lift our souls to another. Give us, give us clean hands, give us pure hearts.
Let us not let our souls to another. Give us clean hands. Give us pure hearts. Let us not let our souls to another.
Oh, God, let us be a generation that seeks, that seeks your face. Oh, God, I'll take a oh, God, let us be a generation that seeks, that seeks your face. Oh, God, I'll take a oh, God, I'll take a generation. God, we declare that you are holy this morning.
God, we thank you that we get to worship you, and that we get to bring praise to your name. Lord, I pray that we would honor you with the rest of our worship gathering. I pray that we would honor you throughout the week, and that we wouldn't just praise you and sing holy is your name at Church on Sunday, but that we would praise your name and think of you as holy throughout the week as well. God, I pray that your holiness would solidify in our hearts and in our minds, and that we would understand it a little bit more.
Do the same, amen. All right. Thank you, Emily. Thank you all.
Yeah, kids, have fun in your class. You're dismissed. Everyone else, you can be seated. All right, as you guys are getting settled, I'm just going to introduce the next portion of our gathering.
So if you're new, and you haven't been around a circle at your table before at a church gathering, this is something that we really enjoy doing here at ENCS. And it's a core part of who we are, is not just interacting with each other and getting to know each other and connecting throughout the week, but also getting to experience some of that at tables. So now the next part of our gathering is a chance for us to not just meet and greet each other for a little bit, but get to know each other in a deeper way than just hi. Bye.
So there'll be a prompt on the screen for you to chat at your tables for the next eight minutes. And yeah, enjoy your time at your tables. And then after that, Jake will come up to share our message for the day. But have a great time at your tables.
Whatever you want. Well done. Thank you. We know this small town.
Go, game, die. All your trouble. Come, yeah, I'm not. Come, yeah, I'm down.
Come, yeah, I'm down. Come, yeah, I'm down. Yeah, I'm down. Little Western men felt the way.
Try to live up to the say I am. Is it anyone there? Shane comes crawling my first name. He's learning a question.
If I'm the one who left you playing, it's the same fight all over again. It's the same I freaking know my skin. It's the same life when you let me in. You let me in.
You let me in. You are, yeah. This is my wife, like I surrender in slow mode. I'm going to pull us all in.
Good morning, everyone. If you hear me clap once. If you hear me clap twice, the power. So they don't remember in school when the teacher would take a really big book and slam it on the ground to get your attention.
That would have actually gone really well with my sermon today. I should have brought a giant book with me. Second service. All right.
Well, welcome. Good morning, everyone. Morning, every day's church. For those who don't know me, my name's Jacob Ferrari.
I'm an elder here at ENCS. And it is so good to see you. Whether I've known you for however long I've been here, which is a long time. Or if I'm just seeing you for the first time today, I just say welcome and good morning.
What a beautiful morning it is to worship our God, is it not? It is such an honor for me to always be up here and talking to you all. And I could not be more honored to speak on today's topic, but be attitude of having a pure heart. I was so excited to get it.
I was so excited to prepare for it. And it has been incredibly enriching for my prayer life. So I hope it has been for you as it is for me. I want to walk you through the Beatitudes as we've had them so far, because that's what our current series is, walking through the Beatitudes.
And then we're going to get into what I have today. So far, each of the Beatitudes has been building on the other. We've talked about poverty of spirit. We've talked about those who are mourning.
We've talked about those who are meek, those who hunger for righteousness, and those who are merciful, right? And if you follow the arc, Jesus has been systematically stripping away every false thing that we rely on in society. He stripped away wealth. He stripped away false happiness or escapism.
He stripped away self-strength, worldly hunger, power. Every exterior crutch, every performance is gone. You can go deeper and deeper until this moment when he gets to the heart itself. Now I know there are two more Beatitudes, at least, after this.
So I'm not going to say you're going to be like, this is the last Beatitude. I'm not saying that. What I am saying is that this one might be the one that cuts the deepest. Jesus doesn't just tell us what to do or how to feel in this Beatitude.
He goes after the one thing that everything else flows from, the heart. And at least in my opinion, this is the summit of the mountain, of the Beatitudes. The following Beatitudes flow out and operate out of what we're going to learn today. But this moment cuts to the heart.
All that is asked of us believers, as followers of King Jesus. So if you all bear with me, if you all stand, as we Rescripture, as we always do, we are reading the full Beatitudes here. And I'd like you to all read with me, actually, up and on the screen, or you can use your own Bibles. Now when Jesus saw the crowds, he went up on a mountainside and sat down.
His disciples came to him and he began to teach them. He said, blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are those who mourn for they will be comforted. Blessed are the meek for they will inherit the earth.
Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled. Blessed are the merciful for they will be shown mercy. Blessed are the pure in heart for they will see God. Blessed are the peacemakers for they will be called children of God.
Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you and people insult you, persecute you, and falsely say, all kinds of evil against you because of me. Rejoice and be glad because great is your reward in heaven. We're in the same way they persecute the prophets who were before you.
This is the word of the Lord. May I obviously do it. Heavenly Father, I pray that as I speak today, my words are only from you. I pray that you give great encouragement, great exhortation to my friends, to my brothers and sisters, and to all who are here to hear how you can exhort us to have pure hearts.
And what that means, Lord, and what that doesn't mean. Lord, I pray that as we move from this place, we know that in your heart, in your heart of hearts, you want this for us. That you're calling us to and that you're inviting us to, Lord. In Jesus' name, amen.
As I prepared for this sermon, I tried to think of good anecdotes to tell. And I kept oscillating between them. That's unusual for me. I'm actually pretty good at choosing a story that fits.
And I was oscillating until last night when my son had me up at 1 AM in the morning. And I thought, I know what I'm going to tell. For those who don't know Asher well or haven't heard our travails about Asher, I have no qualms about saying this to maybe embarrass him later in life. Asher's the worst sleeper, known to man.
Bar none. Always has been. He doesn't go to sleep well at the beginning, always wakes up in the middle night, and wakes up early. So I've had a terrible sleep life for the past four years.
That's OK. I love him. I'll do anything I can for him to make it so that he has a comfortable life. Oftentimes when he was growing up, or he's four now, but as he was two and three, he would have these spells, sort of a nightmare spells, I guess.
The first time I experienced him as a father is having a nightmare. And we'd go into his room at night, and he would just be screaming terrified in the middle of the night. I mean, he would be like, there's a monster right there. He would make you feel like, oh, Jesus, do I need to exercise something?
What is going on with my son that he can't even focus on me? He'd say, Asher, what's going on? Tell us about this. What is going on?
Asher. Asher. He wouldn't even recognize us. He would not know that it was me here.
I would ask him, who's talking to you right now? And he wouldn't even say, but what's because he didn't know? He thought he was going to be a good person. He would not know that it was me here.
I would ask him, who's talking to you right now? And he wouldn't even say, but what's because he didn't know? He thought I was part of the problem. He would push me away.
He would think I was the monster. And it was a really hard thing to know that I was scaring my son when I'm actually just trying to calm him down. I'm trying to get into a moment of focus. Where are you?
And you know, whoever it was, I had to sit there and wait. Sometimes for five minutes, sometimes for ten, sometimes twenty, sometimes a half hour. It was scary, but we'd wait. Eventually, he would calm down.
He'd either wake up or he'd go back to sleep. But when he woke up, you'd see this moment. His eyes would sort of clear up. And he would look at you and he'd say, Daddy, like none of that just happened, by the way.
Nothing like that. You didn't just put me through the ring or there, kid. And he'd give you a hug. And he'd curl up.
He'd be like, I'm okay now. And he'd go right back to sleep. But if you'd have to wait for that moment, for that focus to come, to see you. Okay, so why am I telling you this?
Mainly because I want you new parents to know what you're in for. But what you're in for today is those with a pure heart will see the best are those pure and hard for you will see the face of God, for you will see God. I want to do this very quick. What do you all think of when you think of pure?
Clean, who's a clean? I like clean, clean. Well, children. In this end.
Righteous. One more. Good. Good.
Good. We're all wrong. You're not wrong. The word that is translated in the pure in Greek is called catharos.
It doesn't primarily mean morally spotless, innocent, good, righteous. It actually doesn't have that primary meaning. Although it could. The primary meaning is actually unmixed or undiluted.
You think of like pure gold that said the draw's kind of pulled out of it, right? Pure water where no sediment's holding it. It's this idea that there's nothing clouding. That it's just the thing.
So in this context specifically, the opposite of pure of heart is not necessarily an immoral heart that Jesus is talking about. He's talking about a divided heart. But the fact of the matter is the difference between the two of divided and immoral might not be so different. But we'll get to that later.
The old one that I follow fairly regularly is John Piper. John Piper hopes a blog called the siring God. He'll make you feel inadequate. It's the gospel.
How much you need to love God. He doesn't mean to. He's just going kind of to Tim Teller's point of you'll never know how much God loves you until you know how inadequate you are, right? But he makes a great point about purity.
He says purity of heart is to will one thing. No double mindedness, no divided allegiance, no mixture of motives. It's the person who said God and God alone is what an after. It's the person that said it and it's the person that shows it.
That makes their life. God is my God and I am his people. He's himself returns to this very idea. Just a few chapters later, actually, still be in the terminal amount.
Matthew 6, 22, he says the eye is the lamp of the body. If your eye is in the King James version, if your eye is single, your whole body is full of light. Now that word hapless, single, same root as wholeness or undivided. So basically what she's saying is if your eye is undivided, if your eye is pure, your whole body is full of light.
Think of windows, right? Clean windows. Not so much. The pure heart and the single eye are the same concept.
One vision, one object, one lord. No different banners, no separate allegiance. One God. And we see this idea constantly.
It's said through our scriptures, you think of Matthew 6, 24, when Jesus says man cannot have two masters. He's talking about money and talking about him. He's talking about God. He can't have both.
He can't be divided. James 1, 6, he says, but when you ask, you must believe and no doubt because the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea blown and tossed by the wind, that person should not expect to receive anything from the lord. Such a person is double minded and it's unstable in all they do. Isaiah 29, 13 says, the lord says, these people come near to me with their mouth and honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me.
Their worship of me is based on merely human rules they have been taught. Who does that sound like in Jesus's time? You're going to have to modify the engagement today. Who does that sound like?
Who are you talking about in his time when you're speaking? Who's that? I don't like Jews. Who else?
Barrisys. You're like unwashed, you're whitewashed tombs, you look good on the outside, but inside you're having to be dealt with inside. You come at me with ritual purity but you don't come at me with mortal purity. You don't come at me with love and mercy for others.
You're only doing the ritual outside portion. It's important here to know that, as I just said, Jesus isn't asking for perfection. He's asking for direction. He's not asking that you've arrived, but that you've turned and your whole self is turned toward the same thing.
My friends, this is repentance that he's talking about. Repentance isn't so much turning away from something but turning towards something, right? It's turning towards him. It's saying, I confess and I agree that your way is better for me.
And from this moment on, I will be under your flag, not under the world, not under my own, not under something else. It takes an undivided mind to make that turn. So the first question I have in our series here that I want you to reflect and pray on, I'm not sure they're going to end up at the ends. You might want to get a paper out.
What are the competing things in your heart that are trying to will it at the same time? Is that another way? What are the other loyalties that divide your allegiance? You see, that's the first thing that we need to contend with.
We need to know what's drawing our loyalties. There's always something, always. John Mark Comer says that you are always being formed, whether unintentionally or intentionally. There's always media out there.
There are always people out there. There's always crisis out there that is trying to form you, that is trying to gain your allegiance. You have to admit what it is. You have to confess it.
Next, you have to understand what it is that Jesus is calling you to and what it is here, asking for a pure heart. He's asking no less than what the Jewish people have understood as Shema. We've said that a few times up here. Everyone remember what Shema is?
Anyone want to say it from their head? What? If you're going to do it, I'm going to have you say I'm going to do it. I was a rhetorical.
Don't worry, at least I'll do it. Shema is an old prayer from Deuteronomy 6, 4 through 5. It says this, here, oh Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength.
It wasn't just a prayer that would be said every now and then. This was the pillar of Jewish life back then. They would say it in the morning, they would say it in the afternoon, they would say it in the evening. It would be written on their door posts.
This would be the heart of the Jewish people to Shema. It was the very center of their identity. The fact that they would say that the Lord is one and the Lord is our God. It's the first part of the fulfillment of all covenants, that God is our God and we are His people.
And God is calling us to love Him with all of our heart, with all of our soul, and with all of our strength. Another theologian that I love to him, Mackey, he would describe that as basically saying, there is no way in life to get around loving God. What that means is you can't go, oh, I love God with my heart, but I'll go over here and I won't love him over here. To Mackey would say that's impossible with this.
Loving with your heart with your soul and your strength means you're loving here, here, and all around you. It is a single mindset and it would encompass you. Now here, Jesus obviously doesn't abolish the Shema. He actually fulfills it.
He declares it here. Now he says, the kingdom of God belongs to people who have been praying, reciting, and internalizing Shema their entire lives. For them, the fulfillment of their faith has come. Those who live out Shema are those who have declared their allegiance to God by holding to Torah over the law, by hanging to the words of the prophets, and by turning away from the ways of the world and looking only to God in His ways.
For them, He gives them comfort and says, your faith is rewarded because their God is here. Their God is talking to them from mountain, telling them that they are about to be blessed, that they are blessed, and that it has not all been for not. This is why Jesus has such a sharp conflict with the Pharisees. They're not bad people actually, right?
Most of them actually thought that they were loving God. They were devout, studious, disciplined, but in their hearts they probably, even though they were trying to love God, they were missing the point. At some point they lost the plot. Now you hear that?
You lost the plot. At some point they forgot what it was they were doing. Jesus diagnosed them, at least the Pharisees he interacted with. He diagnosed them.
He said, you clean the outside of a cup, but inside there's extortion and greed. That's Matthew 23, 25 to 26. They had the external behavior of Shema, but their hearts were still serving something else. Their status, their reputation, their fear of Rome.
Again, they're living a very fearful time. All persecution is right around the corner. It's there. It's a valid fear.
If you're not Jesus, they had a divided heart dressed in devout clothing. But the pure and hard aren't the most morally impressive people in the room. They're always not clothed that way. They're the ones who stop pretending to want two things and only want one thing.
They're the ones that say, yes, Jesus, I want your way. I'm not perfect, but you are holy, and I choose you. Because only you can make me like you. I can't do it myself.
So the next question I have for you is, again, you might want to take out pen and paper here, is the Shema, your prayer, or your performance. Do you love God with all your heart, or has been trying to give him the Sunday morning portion? Well, the rest of your heart is already somewhere else. How many of you right now are thinking about anxieties that may or may not come to fruition?
How many of you are thinking about what's going on at work right now? How many of you are thinking about what's going on in Washington DC right now? How many of you are anxious to pull out your phone and check something on social media? Okay, I am.
I'm just reading fiction, but Jesus asked for more. And finally, make a mistake. There's a payoff here. It's an extraordinary payoff that Jesus attaches to this beatitude.
He says, the lessed are they who are pure in heart, for they will see God. Pull yourself in the Jewish perspective at that point, listening to him. Who's the only person that's ever come face to face with God? Moses, right?
Maybe Elijah, I don't know. There's certain people, right? There's certain people in history that you would say only they were worthy of coming face to face with God. And you're telling me, Jesus, that I'm going to come face to face with God?
Ironically, as they're talking face to face with God. Piper's insight, John Piper's insight is valuable here. Virtually all of our spiritual sight in this life is mediated. We see images and reflections of glory.
We hear echoes of his voice. We see him through his word, through his work in the world, through his people. We see God now, but dimly, like a mirror. 1 Corinthians 1312 says that.
But there will be a day. And this is the day that Paul describes when we see face to face, direct, unmediated. When God himself dwells among us. No more inferences, no more implications, no more straining to see the glory, through creation, and scripture and community.
Just God. St. Augustine would say that this is the ultimate sumum bonum for those Latin majors out there. The highest good that every human soul has been reaching for since the beginning.
We were made to be in the presence, unmediated with our God, to behold him, to commune with him. Anyone ever read Dante's Inferno? Yes, somebody, yeah. Anyone ever read Paradiso?
I know it's boring, right? Inferno's so fun. It's so fun. Paradiso's boring, right?
Not so much when you look at this. See, Dante wrote Paradiso as a reflection of this. At the very, as the cosmos would swirl, you'd go up through the cosmos up to higher and higher levels of heaven. And at the very top, Dante pictured a rose.
And all believers would fit into that rose. At the very center of that rose was the tranny. And when Dante beheld it, he beheld something that he could not comprehend. The ultimate beauty, the sumum bonum, of which all things are directed around.
It was a concept, the heavenly holy of holies. And it presented one of the most beautiful pictures in literature that we have of this idea. So I encourage you to look at Paradiso in the wise. But here's a study about this idea of a future promise.
While it is a future promise, and while we do live in a mediated state between seeing God directly and seeing him through others, the Beatitudes are present phrases. He doesn't just say, he just doesn't say they'll see God someday. And today, the Beatitudes are now descriptions. The people are blessed now.
They describe the life of the kingdom that is already broken in. Again, God's talking to them right there face to face. They are now the pure in heart. See God now.
As the heart becomes more undivided, the vision becomes less clouded. Those who knew the words of the prophet, those who knew truly knew Torah, who truly knew Shema. You would see constant examples of them encountering Jesus and saying, you're the Messiah. They recognized their God.
They saw it because they knew. Their mind was clear. Their heart was pure. They were undivided.
There wasn't things blocking their vision. They saw him. But this works in reverse too as a warning. Think about what impurity does to your spiritual sight.
When your heart is pulled by competing loves when you're serving two masters, when you're trying to keep one foot in the kingdom and one foot in the world, what happens? You can't see him clearly. Not because God hides, because your vision is obscured. The sediment of your divided heart clouds the waters.
You begin to think he's not there. He doesn't show up. He's unfaithful. You begin to think the worst in your brother and sister that there against you, your heart becomes hardened and obstinate.
If you know me, you know I love Lord of the Rings. No question about that. There's a scene in the first one, Fellowship of the Ring. Very beginning.
Bill Babbagn's, he's the uncle, a Frodo, the hero, right? He first has the ring. This really corrupt thing that we know needs to be gotten rid of. And his first thing that he's going to do is going to leave and he's going to live with the elves.
The first thing he has to do is get rid of the ring and give the Frodo. Frodo can go off in his adventure. And Gandalf, our wise and good wizard that guides everyone in the War of the Rings world, right? He tells Bilbo, hey, what about the ring?
You haven't given up the Frodo yet. And Bilbo says, yes, right here. And then he looks at it. He says, but I don't really think I want to give this away.
Now they think about it. And Gandalf says, well, why not? You want to give it a minute ago and you should. And then Bilbo gets really agitated.
He says, it's my precious, actually. Why shouldn't I keep it? And Gandalf says, well, why are you getting a little angry here? Well, if I'm getting angry, if you're trying to steal it from Gandalf and he accuseses Gandalf.
And even squares up through the fight, you Gandalf for this. It's a little hobby. I don't have to use this wizard again. And what does Gandalf do?
He grows. Gandalf shrinks the room and he grows and he says, Bilbo Baggins. Don't take me for some cheap conjure of magic tricks. And that shuts Bilbo up.
And Bilbo all of a sudden becomes childlike. And what does Gandalf do? Sorry, it's a good thing for me. He shrinks down and he says, I'm not trying to rob you.
I'm trying to help you. And Bilbo gets teary-eyed and goes to him and hugs his friend. The reason I get teary-eyed is because this goes back to my story about Asher. You all remember Asher and his poor say when he can't figure out who was who and who was what?
The minute Asher was able to calm down, the minute I was able to say to Asher, who's with you buddy? And he was able to look at me and say, Dad, I knew at that moment that the divide was gone. He could see clearly who was trying to help him. And I think that's how often God looks at us.
We're so divided in our mind and our heads and our hearts that he can't get through to us. So sometimes he has to slam and say, Hey, who's talking to you? Who's with you right now? There's a verse in Psalms.
Oh, I don't have it. This is on the fly where God's saying all the things that he does. He can bring the enemy to needs. He can make the javelins break.
And he says, And I can make a nation be silent and know that I am God. See an undivided heart requires a moment where you're willing to take away the divide. Or you're willing to let God in and say, Hey, I'm not one that you should fear. But if you're going to be divided, then you're going to be feared for a minute.
You're going to be fearful for a minute because I need to get your attention. Excuse me, I lost my... I went off on something there. But God's a revealing God, right?
The point is that he's a revealing God. He's not hiding from you. He's from the burning bush to the manger to the empty tomb. He wants to show you who he is.
The question is never whether God wants to be seen. The question is whether your heart is clear and focused enough to see him. That's why he has to slam down the fist sometimes. He has to know that, is your mind clear?
Can you see me? A kingdom life is not a life without discipline. We devote ourselves to teaching and prayer. We devote ourselves to being together, to generosity.
We devote ourselves to the means of grace. When me and Noel teach formations, we teach about the practices. Not because we just want you to learn these random things that the church has done. Not because we want you to learn about random things that can earn your salvation.
No, what we want us all to do is discipline ourselves. Because as we devote ourselves to being with Jesus in our prayers, in our scripture, reading, in our community with one another, we become more like him. And we begin to do what he did and does. We begin to recognize our God.
You see, like Bilbo, when the temptations and storms actually reach us in our strength and will aren't enough. And trust me, they're not going to be enough. Your will, your strength will never be enough. We will need to recognize the voice of the one who calls us out of it.
When we are like Asher, having a tantrum, having a nightmare, and we can't see our nose in front of our face, we at least need to recognize the voice of our Father, who calls us out of it. And says, Daddy's here, relax. That's the beauty of the gospel. It invites us into kingdom living.
It calls us to move beyond the fear and distractions of the world, but not by our own strength, but by the grace of the king who's already come. By the empowerment of the Holy Spirit, and by the love of the Father, who sacrificed everything to give us new sight. You see, our undiviteness doesn't win the fight because the fight's already been won. Our undiviteness lets us recognize our king, so that we might rally to the banner and his banner only.
So my final question is, what would it look like this week in your actual daily life to have one object of the heart? What would you stop chasing? What would you start singing? To conclude us up, the beatitude is simultaneously a description, a promise, an invitation.
It describes what kingdom citizens look like. They're not sinless, but undivided, a disciplined, people, a zealous people, and overwhelmingly loving people. And as you can see, as you become more undivided and you walk in the ways of Jesus, you actually become more morally pure, because you start doing what he asks you to do. One's a symptom of the other.
It's a promise. The pure in heart will see God, now in part, and one day in full, face to face glory. Never forget the promise. And finally, it's an invitation.
David in Psalm 51 10 says, create in me a clean heart, O God. David, David's prayer is ours. This is not something we manufacture by gritting our teeth and being more disciplined. Remember, discipline helps us see.
It doesn't actually help us. It doesn't actually empower us to be undivided. God purifies the heart and the instrument is faith. You come to him, you stay near him, you let him do the work.
The whole sermon on the mount, the whole kingdom life flows from this. A people who have one Lord, one love, one object. A church that looks at the world and says, we are God's people, and he is our God. On his prayer.
Heavenly Father, thank you for this message today. Lord, I pray that you seal in us a drive, a want, a desire, a motivation to be undivided. To be undivided in our homes, to be undivided in our work places, to be undivided on the streets of Seattle, to be undivided in our communities. Lord, there is so much that's pulling us in different directions.
There are so many distractions. There are so many empty banners. Lord, and I pray right here right now that you make your banner the only banner that we see. I pray that you clear our hearts, that you clear our minds, that you clear our eyes so that we can see them.
I pray that we devote, that you give us new encouragement and new education to devote ourselves, to your teachings, to your word, to generosity, to our community, Lord, that you convict our hearts where we haven't been undivided. And Lord, I pray, each one of my friends here is willing to admit, myself included, what is dividing our hearts right now? What's the thing that's playing on our heart right now that's asking to say, come here, don't look at that banner. What is it?
So that we might confess to one another and be healed. Heavenly Father, I pray out of love for each of my friends here to love them, to bless them, to show them what a good friend you are that wants to help. Like Gandalf with Bilbo, like me with my son, that you're not there to harm, that you're not a monster, that you are a loving God and you are here to help. Pray all these things and your sons mind it.
Amen. There are questions for you to reflect and pray on. This is not our group time at this moment, so this is sort of pray, reflect and pray to yourself. Again, I did not put the questions on this slide, so hopefully you wrote them down.
But I also like to consider the question I posed to what extent you can. And then I'll come up and transition to the share time. Thank you. Alright, this is transition to our share time.
So, to accept possible, please take time to share to one another what the Holy Spirit has been doing for you in the midst of the sermon. And again, try to pray for one another as well. We're praying people, we are people that are there for each other. There are other guidelines left to take for heaven to do that.
That's the same. Don't worry about it. Don't worry about it. That's my fault.
There's that's my experience right here. Up on the screen. Follow those. Thank you.
I'm just going to take a minute to transition us out of our discussion time and it's our close. Would you guys join me in prayer? Jesus, thank you so much for your word and the way that you search our hearts. God, I pray.
Thank you for your promise that the pure heart will seek out and the call of the Shama on our lives to love you with all of our hearts, so in strength. As we go from this time of discussion into the close of our gathering, would you keep working in us? Help our divided hearts and our divided desires simplify our hearts to follow you, Jesus. And help us to love you well.
God, I pray that we would see you clearly. God, I pray that we would respond well this week and that we would connect with each other and that we would have hearts that are fully yours. Amen. Alright, yeah, as we prepared a head out, I just want to give us a couple of different ways to respond.
If you're new, we would love to connect with you. We have our Connect cards. This is the best way for us to get to know who you are a little bit, so we can reach out and get coffee with you, get to know your story. We would love to do that.
Our team would love to do that. There's also our prayer request cards. This is for everyone. If you have a prayer request or something you want to share with our church leadership, please let us know.
We do prayer for these every week and would love to partner with you in that way. This is also our time for giving. We just want to say thank you to those of you who give faithfully and times and offerings. You're giving enables us to be the church and make disciples and fulfill the mission that God has for us in this city.
So thank you. If you would like, if you're not part of that and would like to join in giving, there's top cards in your table in the downloader app. That's the easiest way to give and you can set up giving on there. You can drop also physical giving or your cards off at the black box over there by the staircase.
But as we close, I want to send us with these scriptures. In Deuteronomy 6, it's a Shama. Here, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.
And then in Matthew 5, blessed are the pure and heart for they will see God. So as you go, may the spirit gather, your divided heart and your divided desires into a single love for him. And make you pure in heart. And as your love and your heart is more fully and holy is, may you see him more clearly and replace his into this week.
Yeah, that's all we have for our gathering today. You can feel free to hang out, chat, connect at your tables, pray for each other if you haven't. And we will see you in a community group this week. Have a great Sunday.