9/18/2023

In his Sermon on the Mount Jesus taught:  “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.” (Matthew 5:8) 

C. S. Lewis said:  “It is safe to tell the pure in heart that they shall see God, for only the pure in heart want to.”  What are ways to cultivate this “want to”?

1.  Choose not to get caught up in unGodly, worldly ways of thinking.

The Apostle Paul wrote:  “Do not be shaped by this world; instead be changed within by a new way of thinking.  Then you will be able to decide what God wants for you.”  Romans 12:2a (NCV)

2.  Discipline your thinking to focus consistently on the way of Jesus.

In his book “Life Without Lack”, Dallas Willard writes:  “Once you begin to have an impression of who God truly is, everything else fades into insignificance.  When the bountiful sufficiency of God himself and the glorious realm of his kingdom are continually brought before the mind, it puts everything else in its proper place and opens us to a life in which we find God more than capable of supplying everything we need.”

3.  Allow the Holy Spirit to guide you through each day.

The Apostle Paul wrote:  “So I tell you:  Live by following the Spirit.  Then you will not do what your sinful selves want.”  Galatians 5:16 (NCV)

Oswald Chambers wrote: “The tiniest thing we allow in our lives that is not under the control of the Holy Spirit is quite sufficient to account for spiritual muddle, and all the thinking we like to spend on it will never make it clear.”  But, “When the natural power of vision is devoted to the Holy Spirit, it becomes the power of perceiving God’s will and the whole life is kept in simplicity.”

Marcus Aurelius wrote: “Your mind will take the shape of what you frequently hold in thought.”

What “shape” will your thinking take today?

-Michael