Who shall ascend the hill of the Lord? And
who shall stand in his holy place?
He
who has clean hands and a pure heart,
I have read that Portland, Oregon is a destination for many
ship captains. It is 100 miles from the
ocean and is not easy to reach, so why do experienced ship captains seek out
this port? Sea captains know that as
they routinely go through oceans that a tiny water shellfish called a
barnacle attaches itself to the hull of the ship and will stay there the rest
of its life and surround itself with a rock like shell. These tiny little shellfish may at first glance appear to be beautiful. However, as more and more barnacles attach themselves
to the hull of a ship they will slow the ship down, diminish its progress, and decrease its
efficiency. The removal of barnacles can
take days in dry dock as the barnacles are scraped off, however, wise captains
know that Portland is a fresh water harbor and that barnacles will die and fall
off. Barnacles are not able to live in
sweet fresh water.
As Christ followers we collect heart barnacles as we move through life on a daily basis. Seemingly little hurts, little disappointments, little betrayals, wrong attitudes and many more seemingly tiny impurities attach to our hearts. These “little sins" will slow us down, diminish our progress, and decrease our efficiency.
Jesus is our fresh water harbor. When we enter
His holiness and purity, we can ask Him to examine our hearts and reveal
anything that has attacked itself to our hearts. As we confess, our heart barnacles are removed leaving us once again with clean pure hearts.
Today I urge you to take this time to come away from the
world and enter the presence of Jesus.
We cannot purify our own hearts – Jesus is the only one who can do that. Let's enter 2013
renewed and refreshed and ready to serve free from all hindrances. Let our prayer be give us pure hearts.
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