We all have interests that capture our attention. Sometimes these interests manifest as hobbies, and those hobbies can even develop into obsessions. I don’t know about you, but I have many things that vie for my attention, yet none more so than people. I have discovered that I am absolutely fascinated by people. I want to understand why we do what we do, why we think the way we think, and what motivates us. I am even curious about what can propel human beings to perform seemingly supernatural acts or feats beyond human capability.
Over the years, I have found that my interest in others has been a sign of something profound; at least, it is when it comes from a desire to understand humanity, for I have learned that this is precisely what Jesus specializes in. As the author of life, it is essential to give Jesus the credit He deserves; moreover, His teachings should be our primary focus. I have also found that you cannot truly love people without loving the Bible. If we believe that God is the author of life and plays a role in all creation—regardless of how something has come to fruition—then it seems wise to not only believe in His teachings but also to find them worthy enough to model our lives after.
There are ongoing debates about the most important messages Jesus conveyed. If He truly had one main topic, what would it be? Yet, if you read the Bible at all, you will find that Jesus's teachings aren’t always entirely clear.
Many of Jesus' parables are rich with meaning yet can initially seem challenging to understand. He uses a lot of agricultural terms.
As we examine these texts, there are two common threads that run throughout Jesus's teachings.
The first one is this:
1. Our hearts can lead us towards God or away from Him.
Before we dive in to this, we must realize that to understand the Bible means we have to do our best to immerse ourselves in the culture of the people to whom these texts were originally written. Even the opening pages of the Bible reveal insights that, to the naked eye, are easy to overlook and often easy to misunderstand.
A simple example is the serpent mentioned in Genesis 3. The mention of the serpent likely evokes a common understanding of this story. Some of us might believe this refers to the satan himself or the deceiver; however, snakes held different meanings in ancient Near Eastern culture. When someone from this culture would have read this account from the Torah, they would not have thought of the satan but would have drawn from their understanding of snakes. In ancient Egyptian religion, snakes held significant symbolic importance, often associated with deities and divine power[1][2]. The cobra goddess Wadjyt was a patroness of lower Egypt, and the cobra was a symbol of Pharaoh's kingship[1]. Some snake deities were worshipped to avoid or heal snake bites[1]. However, in the Bible, snakes are generally portrayed negatively, associated with temptation, sin, and Satan[1]. During the Exodus, God used snake-related miracles to demonstrate His power over Egyptian deities[1][3]. When Aaron's staff turned into a serpent and swallowed the serpents of Pharaoh's magicians, it symbolized the superiority of the God of Israel over Egyptian gods[1][3][4]. This event, along with the subsequent plagues, was meant to show Pharaoh and the Egyptians that the God of the Hebrews was the true sovereign over nature and the universe[3][4]. The term used for "snake" in this context, "tannin," signifies a terrifying sea monster, representing the forces of chaos opposing God's will[4].
It is fascinating, then, that the conversation in Eden revolved around the choice of life or death. What we sometimes overlook is how swiftly we can deceive ourselves. Yahweh is not like these other gods; He never has been, and that is a primary message throughout the Bible. Nonetheless, we often struggle to view Him outside the lens of appeasement and retribution, much like these ancient cultures understood dieties. In Adam and Eve's story, let us not rush past the free-willed choice they made to determine their source of life and wisdom and how their life changed as a result.
God was present with them, and He is present with us if we choose to seek Him. However, our choices regarding whether to pursue lesser gods or the one true God remains unchanged. Just as Adam and Eve justified their decision to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, so too do we. Our hearts are susceptible to being deceived by our justifications as we try to assume God's throne over our lives.
The second theme we see is this:
2. Understanding the teachings of Jesus can only be found with a pure heart.
In Matthew’s account, many teaching moments arise from Jesus and many can appear confusing—almost like riddles.
Personally, I do not enjoy riddles. If someone tells me in advance that they want to share a riddle, my mind enters into hyper-focus mode; I scrutinize every last detail to solve it, often before the riddle is even completed. The problem with this approach is that I am already believing I must work excessively hard to understand something that is often quite simple.
Jesus's disciples even asked him why he taught the way he did and his response is divine.
The disciples came to him and asked, “Why do you speak to the people in parables?” He replied, “Because the knowledge of the secrets of the kingdom of heaven has been given to you, but not to them. Whoever has will be given more, and they will have an abundance. Whoever does not have, even what they have will be taken from them.
This is why I speak to them in parables:
“Though seeing, they do not see; though hearing, they do not hear or understand.
In them is fulfilled the prophecy of Isaiah:
“‘You will be ever hearing but never understanding; you will be ever seeing but never perceiving. For this people’s heart has become calloused; they hardly hear with their ears, and they have closed their eyes.Otherwise they might see with their eyes, hear with their ears, understand with their hearts and turn, and I would heal them.’
Jesus's teachings can be similar to us in that if our hearts are hard towards Him, we will try to analyze God in our own strength and may end up deeming the Bible ridiculous. His teachings will seem counter to my instincts or to what I believe is morally right. Indeed, the Bible can sound convoluted; that is the result of our inadequate attempts to grasp the things of God without allowing Him to teach us. Do you hear the irony?
The Apostle Paul was aware of this dynamic when, in response to a church dividing over which leader to follow, he wrote, “For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God” (1 Corinthians 1:18 NIV). He was showing these people how feeble-minded they were being by the things that were dividing them. It was throwing them off course from what God was wanting to do through them.
Jesus repeatedly reminds us that godly truths can only be comprehended through godly understanding. This means we must step aside. It doesn't imply that we don’t use our minds; rather, our ability to understand God comes from a pure heart—one that is humble and seeks after God—humbly seeking wisdom not for personal gain, but simply to experience the life and love that only He offers and to honor Him because of His faithfulness and love that He has given us.
When we decide to live contrary to God’s will, we simultaneously say no to Jesus and willingly open the door to the influence of lesser gods. We step away from divine protection, and our hearts become vulnerable to the voice of death that shame brings. Shame severely impacted Adam and Eve; they began to act differently and lost trust in each other and in God. They even operated out of fear of God.
Lesser gods—including those that ancient Near Easterners feared—demanded appeasement. The sacrificial system originated with these gods, not with Yahweh. People believed that they needed to placate the anger of these gods to find favor. We can see how, in their moment of shame, Adam and Eve began to fear Yahweh. Influenced by the serpent, their shame clouded their perception and led them to see God as they did these pagan gods. In that moment, He became a God who wanted to punish rather than a Father who wanted to restore.
When we experience shame from our sinful decisions, we see God differently, thereby distorting the truth of who God created us to be. Jesus guides us back toward kingdom understandings—the things of heaven, the things that truly matter. He desires to lead us back to the Father, but the pathway begins with a heart that is willing to receive.
A pure heart is a powerful thing. Perhaps you can relate when I say I remember when I relinquished my heart’s power. I recall when I began to loosen my grip on God’s hand as a child and how my life started to change. Shame infiltrated my heart's conversations, and I became convinced of falsehoods about God. I surrendered my power; I let go of the pure heart I had for others and quickly began to harbor disdain instead.
Godly sorrow is holy for a reason. It is beautiful, restorative, healing, and it washes shame away. We begin to see life differently, and the teachings of Jesus ignite a bright clarity in our hearts.
A pure-hearted person possesses tremendous strength. The pure love, awe, and wonder that children exhibit provide a glimpse into a heart that hasn’t been hardened by the sins of this world. Children haven’t learned to fear the way we have; they are not skeptical (well, most aren’t!), nor are they deceitful until taught otherwise—until they are instructed to rely on their own understanding. A pure-hearted person will pursue life’s absurdities as perceived by the world, yet they will also recognize the world’s offerings as superficial compared to the fullness of life available in God.
The battle for the throne of the cosmos was won long ago, yet there remain forces that seek to lure us away from a life surrendered to God—a life offered with pure motives. A life given not merely for what we can receive in return but because He is the only source of true wisdom. The serpent deceived Eve into believing that God feared mankind becoming like Him. The irony is that God designed us to be just like Him. Jesus demonstrated a life of complete surrender to the Father, showcasing the transformative power of such a commitment. His motives were pure, and His surrender to death marked the most significant historical power move, providing a way of life for humanity that is unwarranted yet profound.
I pray that today we allow these ancient stories to find their place in our lives. Let’s wrestle in our hearts to question how much we continue to behave as though we are serving a lesser god, doubting that God is truly who He says He is. In what ways have we relinquished the power of a pure heart to the distractions of this world?
Let us today recognize that we may very well be giving up something precious whenever we yield to the world, possibly even eternity. Yet, in a single moment of decision, we can begin to shed the lenses of shame and walk with an upright spirit. God does not merely seek our belief in Him; He wants to work through us from the purity of our hearts to establish His kingdom on earth. Today is the day to reclaim the power of a pure heart.
[1] Larry Richards, Every Miracle in the Bible (Nashville: T. Nelson, 1998), 63.
[2] Thomas S. Millington, Signs and Wonders in the Land of Ham: A Description of the Ten Plagues of Egypt with Ancient and Modern Parallels and Illustrations (London: John Murray, 1873), 47.
[3] Carl Friedrich Keil and Franz Delitzsch, Commentary on the Old Testament, vol. 1 (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1996), 309.
[4] P. G. George and Paul Swarup, “Exodus,” in South Asia Bible Commentary, ed. Brian Wintle (Rajasthan, India: Open Door Publications, 2015), 88.
