To the pure in heart...
Posted: December 4th, 2023, 7:59 pm
Titus 1:15
15To the pure, all things are pure; but to the defiled and unbelieving, nothing is pure. Indeed, both their minds and their consciences are defiled.
16They profess to know God, but by their actions they deny Him. They are detestable, disobedient, and unfit for any good deed.
Let's talk about these verses for a minute.
To the pure all things are pure, but to the defiled and unbelieving, nothing is pure.
Defiled = stained- their conscience is stained- their view on the world is stained
Unbelieving = not persuaded to trust in God, not trusting in God- not believing they have been purified by the blood- actively disbelieving they have been been purified and forgiven, instead leaving themselves in constant condemnation.
Peter states in 2 Peter 1: that if we are not growing into the Lord it is because we have forgotten that we have been forgiven of our sins.
While there is a lot of corruption in the world, I have come to believe many of us are actually defiled and unbelieving. We struggle to accept the mercy and love of God often relying more on our own works than the blood of Jesus- leaving ourselves condemned on a daily basis because we believe we aren't "doing" enough, rather than trusting in God's mercy and being able to do out of freedom, not to avoid condemnation.
I believe that we need to rely more on the mercy of God and trust in His righteousness to give us righteousness in order to see the world through the eyes God desires us to see, so we don't fall into the same category of those which call sin good and good sin. I have noticed a tendency for members or former members of the church to begin to find evil in anything and everything- without seeing God who is also able to work in the world. We seem to have stared so much into the abyss or "fought" monsters so much, we often become that which we hate. I'm reminded of a series of books i used to read when I was younger. In these books, the "good" had "won" but after many years, "good" began to become dogmatic, extreme, and even cruel. Thought police were formed to put in jail those who even had evil thoughts at any point. Often condemning hte people for those thoughts, but not listening long enough to realize often those thoughts were merely temptations and not the entire person. The "good" was on a quest to destroy evil... when in reality it had become the tyranny. What once had intent, and pure, had become defiled because all it saw was evil in the world and mercy was lacking, patience was lacking, seeing that even amongst groups who had wrong thinking or understanding, that good things still existed among them- in the name of good, evil had won, but on the outside it looked like good, but inside it had become twisted and corrupt, vaunting itself even above the powers that created them- it became so self-righteous that it even began to ignore the truth and the life that created them. Twisted, some people even sought to become a god themeselves because they saw themselves as such a paragon of virtue above that which established virtue. They had defiled themselves, relying on doing their works to declare their righteousness rather than having a clean inner vessel and the works flowing naturally through htem, they needed outward expressions continually, outward shows of mercy, which created and bred hypocrisy- until even the powers that created them stopped proffering their divine power to them, they were cut off- not without warning, but wiht much warning, but they perceived the world in such a way that they couldn't understand that "mercy triumphs over judgment." Instead judgment became their sword and mercy was a cursed word. This led to their destruction- until the people again humbled themselves and just believed the words of those who created them. Are we believing we are serving God while "stoning" those around us? Or will we understand God does'nt desire us to stone, but to teach and lift up- to teach others they can change and need not remain?
Good does not force others to believe a certain way. It invites. D&C 121 comes to mind. There are consequences for sins, we do reap what we sow, and the power of life and death is in our tongues, but judgment is not ours, it is the Lord's and it will happen when He says. Until then we must make sure that we do not defile our consciences (and no one can do that to us, we can only do it to ourselves by not believing Christ) and that we do not fall into unbelief, but that we believe the words of Christ towards us... and towards others- even when they don't believe.
15To the pure, all things are pure; but to the defiled and unbelieving, nothing is pure. Indeed, both their minds and their consciences are defiled.
16They profess to know God, but by their actions they deny Him. They are detestable, disobedient, and unfit for any good deed.
Let's talk about these verses for a minute.
To the pure all things are pure, but to the defiled and unbelieving, nothing is pure.
Defiled = stained- their conscience is stained- their view on the world is stained
Unbelieving = not persuaded to trust in God, not trusting in God- not believing they have been purified by the blood- actively disbelieving they have been been purified and forgiven, instead leaving themselves in constant condemnation.
Peter states in 2 Peter 1: that if we are not growing into the Lord it is because we have forgotten that we have been forgiven of our sins.
While there is a lot of corruption in the world, I have come to believe many of us are actually defiled and unbelieving. We struggle to accept the mercy and love of God often relying more on our own works than the blood of Jesus- leaving ourselves condemned on a daily basis because we believe we aren't "doing" enough, rather than trusting in God's mercy and being able to do out of freedom, not to avoid condemnation.
I believe that we need to rely more on the mercy of God and trust in His righteousness to give us righteousness in order to see the world through the eyes God desires us to see, so we don't fall into the same category of those which call sin good and good sin. I have noticed a tendency for members or former members of the church to begin to find evil in anything and everything- without seeing God who is also able to work in the world. We seem to have stared so much into the abyss or "fought" monsters so much, we often become that which we hate. I'm reminded of a series of books i used to read when I was younger. In these books, the "good" had "won" but after many years, "good" began to become dogmatic, extreme, and even cruel. Thought police were formed to put in jail those who even had evil thoughts at any point. Often condemning hte people for those thoughts, but not listening long enough to realize often those thoughts were merely temptations and not the entire person. The "good" was on a quest to destroy evil... when in reality it had become the tyranny. What once had intent, and pure, had become defiled because all it saw was evil in the world and mercy was lacking, patience was lacking, seeing that even amongst groups who had wrong thinking or understanding, that good things still existed among them- in the name of good, evil had won, but on the outside it looked like good, but inside it had become twisted and corrupt, vaunting itself even above the powers that created them- it became so self-righteous that it even began to ignore the truth and the life that created them. Twisted, some people even sought to become a god themeselves because they saw themselves as such a paragon of virtue above that which established virtue. They had defiled themselves, relying on doing their works to declare their righteousness rather than having a clean inner vessel and the works flowing naturally through htem, they needed outward expressions continually, outward shows of mercy, which created and bred hypocrisy- until even the powers that created them stopped proffering their divine power to them, they were cut off- not without warning, but wiht much warning, but they perceived the world in such a way that they couldn't understand that "mercy triumphs over judgment." Instead judgment became their sword and mercy was a cursed word. This led to their destruction- until the people again humbled themselves and just believed the words of those who created them. Are we believing we are serving God while "stoning" those around us? Or will we understand God does'nt desire us to stone, but to teach and lift up- to teach others they can change and need not remain?
Good does not force others to believe a certain way. It invites. D&C 121 comes to mind. There are consequences for sins, we do reap what we sow, and the power of life and death is in our tongues, but judgment is not ours, it is the Lord's and it will happen when He says. Until then we must make sure that we do not defile our consciences (and no one can do that to us, we can only do it to ourselves by not believing Christ) and that we do not fall into unbelief, but that we believe the words of Christ towards us... and towards others- even when they don't believe.