The Christians who walk the blameless way with the integrity of their hearts

“I will give heed to the blameless way When will You come to me? I will walk within my house in the integrity of my heart” (Psalms 101:2).

                People are seeing the way we walk.  Especially our family members are watching how we live.  But they cannot pay attention to our hearts.  And they cannot see our hearts.  How can they see our hearts that we cannot see and we don’t know well?  But God is looking at our hearts well.  And God knows our hearts well.  Therefore, the Christians who live their faith before God live by focusing on what God sees.  They wish to imitate the heart of the Lord.  And they try to obey the word of the Lord with the heart of the Lord.  But those Christians who live a religious life before people live by focusing on what they see.  As a result, even though their hearts don’t resemble the heart of Jesus, their conduct seems to resemble Jesus in people’s eyes.  Therefore, they are praised by the people, and they are even honored by them.  Perhaps when they were first praised, their consciences were both remorseful and distressed in their hearts.  But in the midst of them, they don’t repent, turn away their hearts, and pursue a right life of faith before God, so they continue to be conscious of people and live a life of praise and respect before them.  As their life continues, they eventually imitate people's right life of faith.  Then, like the Pharisees, their lips honor God, but their hearts are far from God (Mt. 15:8).  Where should we focus and live?  Is it God or people?  Is it our heart or our conduct?

In Psalm 101:2, the psalmist King David says, “I will give heed to the blameless way” and “I will walk within my house in the integrity of my heart.”  As I was meditating on this verse, I titled this quiet time meditation as “The Christians who walk the blameless way with the integrity of their hearts.”  But after I wrote this title, I thought that those who read this meditation seemed unable to agree with the word “the blames way.”  The reason is that we believe that no one in this world can walk in the blameless way.  We believe that only Jesus walked the blameless way with blameless and perfect heart as the perfect sinless Man on earth.  That is why his followers, we Christians, have a duty to imitate Jesus’ perfect heart and perfect and blameless life.  For reference, the words "the blameless way" and "the integrity of my heart" that King David referred to in Psalms 101:2 mean "a blameless heart" and "a blameless life."  In other words, we are instructed to be blameless Christians.  As we live our faith, we must become more and more blameless Christians.  Although we cannot be fully blameless Christians on this earth, we must move forward toward that goal.  In order to do this, we must first seek the blames heart.  The reason why we put our heart first before our actions is because our actions should naturally come out of our hearts.  We seek for the blameless hearts, so that in our blameless heart we should naturally express our blameless conduct.  Then what is the blameless heart?

First, the blameless heart is far from the perverse heart.

Look at Psalms 101:4 – “A perverse heart shall depart from me; I will know no evil.”  Here “A perverse heart” refers to crafty heart, a life that is different inside and outside (Park).  In other words, the perverse heart refers to hypocrisy.  King David stayed away from this hypocrisy, or the perverse heart.  He also turned away from those who practiced deceit (v. 7).  He prevented those who practiced deceit to dwell within his house (v. 7).  So David stayed away from all the wicked things.  By destroying all the wicked, he tried to cut off all who do evil from the city of the Lord (v. 8).

We, Christians, who seek a blameless heart, must stay away from the wicked heart.  In other words, we must stay away from the cunning heart.  We must stay away from hypocrisy.  Therefore, we must not live different inside and outside life.  And we must stay away from lies.  Therefore, we must stay away from evil.  We must live a life that is far from hypocrisy and wickedness by staying away from evil and false hearts.  We must draw near to good works with a sincere heart.  In pursuit of blameless heart, we must live a life of doing good with the sincere heart.

Second, the blameless heart does not accept a proud heart.

Look at Psalms 101:5 – “Whoever slanders his neighbor in secret, him will I put to silence; whoever has haughty eyes and a proud heart, him will I not endure.”  King David didn’t tolerate those who had haughty eyes and the proud heart.  If he has tolerated those who had haughty eyes and the proud heart, then they would observe the work of the country, would abuse the people superciliously, and would try to sit in high places, and will eventually rebel.  Such proud people would quietly slander their neighbors (Park).  That is, the proud are those who harm others with secret propaganda.  King David not only didn’t tolerate such proud and disloyal servants, he also destroyed them.

We Christians who seek the blameless heart should never tolerate the proud heart.  Also, we should not tolerate the proud.  In addition, we must never slander our neighbors quietly.  We should not tolerate those who quietly slander our neighbors.  The reason is that when the Lord called us, He didn’t call us to harm our neighbors, but to love them.  Therefore, we must love our neighbor with humble heart.  In pursuit of the blameless heart, we should humble ourselves and consider our neighbors better than ourselves, and look to their interests (Phil. 2:3-4).

Third, the blameless heart is a faithful heart.

Look at Psalms 101:6 – “My eyes will be on the faithful in the land, that they may dwell with me; he whose walk is blameless will minister to me.”  King David searched his people and kept away from those who had wicked and proud hearts in the land, and he hated the deeds of faithless men (v. 3).  And he brought the faithful in the land close to him, making them to minister him (v. 6).  The reason was because he needed faithful workers, not cunning men or proud men.  In other words, King David made faithful men to serve him who walked in the blameless way (v. 6).

We, Christians, who seek perfect, blameless hearts, should hate the apostate's works.  And we must love the works of the faithful.  In order to do this, our hearts must first be faithful.  And we must be faithful to our Lord.  The reason is because it is required that those who have been given a trust must prove faithful (1 Cor. 4:2).  We must be trusted with very little.  Then we can be trusted with much (Lk. 16:10).  We must be faithful to the Lord even to the point of death (Rev. 2:10).  Therefore, when we stand before the Lord, I hope and pray that we may be praised by the Lord, “Well done, good and faithful servant!” (Mt. 25:21, 23).