Blessed are the pure in heart-001

• Jesus is concerned with our heart. It is not enough to clean up our act on the outside.
• The aim of Jesus Christ is not reform the manners of society, but to change the hearts of sinners.
• The heart is what you are, in the secrecy of your thought and feeling, when nobody knows but God.
• What you are at the invisible root matters as much to God as what you are at the visible branch.
• Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart.
• From the heart are all the issues of life.
• The heart is utterly crucial to Jesus. What we are in the deep, private recesses of our lives is what he cares most about.
• Jesus did not come into the world because we have bad habits that need to be broken. He came into the world because we have such dirty hearts that need to be purified.

https://www.desiringgod.org/messages/blessed-are-the-pure-in-heart

Tithes, Offering & Firstfruits - Mensa Otabil - 001A

First Principles (Genesis)

Offering: minha

1. Gift: given without expecting anything in return. Can be given to show appreciation or affection. It is not a requirement. It is a free will offering.
2. Tribute: payment owed to a higher authority. It is a requirement e.g. by kings. Taxes are modern day form of tribute. If you don't pay tribute, you are offending the sovereign e.g. state. It is compulsory.
3. Sacrifice: surrendering something that has value. It is costly to the giver. It is given to show deep love and honor.

Fruit: 

1. Produce: something that has been grown. It involves work and effort. Has resulted from growth and/or development. Your work is your fruit. It is what you produce as a result of your effort.
2. Reward: payment received for work done e.g. fees, commissions, salaries, bonuses.
3. Increase: investment income, interest, capital gains etc.

Cain's offering was from the fruit of the ground. It was the fruit of his handiwork. "This is the fruit of my labor." Abel gave of the firstborn of the animals/flock and their fat. Both gave an offering that was the fruit of their labor. So, if both gave legitimate offering, why is one accepted and the other rejected?

God Demonstrates His Love

God shows [demonstrates] his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
Romans 5:8

Notice that "demonstrates" is present tense and "died" is past tense. God demonstrates His love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

The present tense implies that this demonstrating is an ongoing act.

The past tense implies that the death of Christ happened once for all and will not be repeated.

Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God.
1 Peter 3:18


...suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame...
Romans 5:3-5

(The goal of everything God takes us through is hope. He wants us to feel unwaveringly hopeful through all tribulations).

Suffering >> Endurance >> Character >> Hope

How is that possible?
...because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.
Romans 5:5

God's love has been poured into our hearts.
The tense of this verb means that God's love was poured out in our hearts in the past (at our conversion) and is still present and active.

God did demonstrate his love us in giving his own Son to die once for all in the past, for our sins. But he also knows that this past love must be experienced as a present reality if we are to have patience and character and hope.

Therefore, he not only demonstrated it on Cavalry; he goes on demonstrating it now by the Spirit in our hearts. He does this by opening the eyes of our hearts to taste and see the glory of the cross and the guarantee it gives that nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus.