VOICE OF TRUTH FOR TODAY
While drifting along the ocean’s surface, I spotted a familiar shape on the seafloor below — a heart urchin skeleton. God often uses His creation to speak, and this moment was no exception. Heart urchins are marine animals named for their heart-shaped bodies, and when they die, their delicate skeletons are sometimes found by divers and beachcombers.
This one, however, was not yet clean. When I picked it up, dark, decaying residue poured from inside. To preserve it, the impurity had to be removed. I shook it repeatedly in the water until it ran clear — and in that moment, the Holy Spirit revealed a powerful truth about the human heart.
Scripture tells us that a pure heart is essential to our relationship with God. “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God” (Matthew 5:8). We are also instructed, “Guard your heart with all diligence, for out of it spring the issues of life” (Proverbs 4:23). When our hearts are corrupted, that decay eventually reveals itself through our thoughts, words, and actions — damaging our relationships and distancing us from God.
Because the consequences of a polluted heart are so serious, God lovingly intervenes. Often, His method is trials — something we naturally resist. Yet just as surgery removes cancer to save a life, God allows hardship to remove what is harmful to our souls. Moses reminded Israel that God used the wilderness to reveal and prepare their hearts (Deuteronomy 8:2).
Trials are not evidence of God’s anger, but of His love. He desires intimacy with His children and refuses to let anything remain that separates us from Him. As Paul declares, “Nothing… shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:38–39).
When God shakes us, it is not to harm us — but to purify us. A pure heart is worth the process.
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Excerpt from Voice of Truth Magazine
“A Pure Heart” by Christa Jewett