Psalms 24:3-4. Who shall ascend into the hill of the Lord? or who shall stand in his holy place? He that hath clean hands, and a pure heart; who hath not lifted up his soul unto vanity, nor sworn deceitfully.

The Presence of the Lord

The hill of the Lord could symbolically be representative of the presence of the Lord, for the Christian.  In order to be in the Lord’s presence, we must meet certain requirements.  God is a holy God and whenever we come into His presence, we must make sure we have a right heart.  First of all, it requires that we have clean hands.  The hands should be used for work, but often are used for sin.  The hands pick things up and move things around.  They can grasp and hold things.  When we touch unclean things with our hands, we defile the body.  Next, we need a pure heart.  The heart is deceitful and can be hard to figure out.  The only way to truly know your heart is to compare it to the right standard, the Word of God.  When we do that, we can correct heart problems and make sure we are ready to come into God’s presence.

Holiness is Needed

Holiness is needed if we are going to be in God’s presence.  God is not for this “come as you are” modern generation.  In order to be holy, we need to make sure we have not lifted our soul up to vain pursuits.  Some things in life profit very little, and more often than not, can draw us away from what we should be doing for God.  The soul is affected by what is done with the body. When we do things that are vain, they only serve to make us feel good or inflate our ego.  Whatever we do, we need to ask ourselves, “How is this drawing me closer to God?  Is this going to help my spiritual growth?”  If it is not helping us, it may be hindering us.  Last of all, we should not be deceitful.  Often people lie with a certain end in mind.  They are trying to get something.  It may just be that they are trying to draw attention to themselves, but often they are trying to cover their tracks so they don’t look bad.  We should not deceive.  If we can overcome these four areas, we can come into the presence of the Lord with a clean heart and worship Him in spirit and in truth.