Sunday Sermons
Choosing Holiness
Choosing Holiness
If you are a man or woman who is blown away by what God's amazing grace has done in your life, and if you are a person who, because of your profound gratitude for the difference God has made in your life, and deeply love God, I know something about you. I know you are a person who absolutely hungers and thirsts for righteousness. In other words, you are a person who craves holiness. You see, the word “holy” means to be “dedicated to”. That makes sense, for why would anyone want to subject themselves to the sacrifices involved in holiness, if he or she was not "dedicated to" honoring Him with his or her life? The root idea in the idea of living a holy life, is to live in a way that is “special, different from the norm and unique”. Unique? You can say that again! One cursory look around our present culture, and you'll see how rarely holiness is pursued. And just what does lack of holiness look like? Often it can be as simple as tossing God's words aside, in favor of going along with the crowd, and to conform, like everyone else, to whatever is politically, socially or morally trendy (Romans 12:1), lest they somehow lose coolness or in some other way miss out. Isn't it ironic that the very people secretly wanting to be unique or special and are willing to attain that even if it means living apart from God, in the end, will become like almost everyone else.
Holy to the Lord
To be holy means to be separated from the defilements of the world in order to be dedicated, and useful to the Lord's eternal purposes. To be set apart for a unique and beautiful relationship with Him. We see this when God gathered Israel to Him at Sinai and made His heartfelt intentions clear:
- “Now then, if you will indeed obey My voice and keep My covenant, then you shall be My own possession among the peoples, for all the earth is Mine. And you shall be to Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation” (Exodus 19:5-6).
When God created His new nation— the new, spiritual Israel of which the first, physical Israel had only been a shadow—the church of Christ (Rom. 16:16), God had the same glorious intent:
- “But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God’s own possession, so that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who has called you out of darkness into His marvelous light; for you once were not a people, but now are the people of God; you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy” (1 Peter 2:9-10).
Indeed, what God mandated to Israel in the wilderness, “You shall be holy for I am holy” (Leviticus 11:44; 19:2) is likewise directed to Christians in the New Testament (1 Peter 1:14).
God Himself noted that a relationship with Him is like a marriage. Israel was God’s bride in the Old Testament and the church is His bride in the New (Ephesians 5:23). That is one reason why the Ten Commandments start with, “You shall have no other gods before Me” (Exodus 20:3). In other words, God is saying, “You shall have no other lovers. I am your husband. You are mine and I am yours”. “That’s how we need to understand holiness—as stepping into a marriage with God (2 Corinthians 11:2). On my wedding day, the preacher asked me, ‘Do you take this woman to be your lawful wedded wife, to have and to hold from this day forward, for better or worse, for richer or poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, till death do you part?’ And I spoke two words that changed my life forever. ‘I do’. In that moment, did any of the guests think I was a killjoy because I had just turned down love with other women? Or because I had just made a promise to love her even when I didn’t feel like it? ….The same is true for holiness. We have to say no to all sorts of things, but we do so in order to say yes to life with God” (Loveology, John Mark Comer, p. 114).
“Because I am Holy”
Not only is this statement given as the reason for why God expected His people to do or not do certain things (Leviticus 19:2), equally repeated in the book of Leviticus is the other beautiful reason for choosing holiness: “I am the Lord your God” (18:1,4,5,6). We need no other motivations in addition to these two, and yet there are countless secondary reasons and benefits that result when we dedicate ourselves to God and abstain from evil:
- Such will result in a vastly better life: 1 Peter 3:8ff
- We will avoid many of the natural negative consequences of choosing evil.
- We will find happiness and deep fulfillment in the process of living the way the Creator designed us to live.
Again, the primary motivation in the above verses is that we are to live dedicated, separated, consecrated and special lives, because that is the way that God Himself lives. In other words, God is essentially saying, “Your quality of life must reflect My character. This is what I require of you because this is what reflects Me. This is what I Myself would do” (Christopher Wright). So, for example, when God says, “Obey and honor your parents” (Leviticus 19:2)— and we find Jesus doing exactly that when upon the earth (Luke 2:51), this reflects the peace and love and selflessness that typifies the character of God Himself. Or when we are told to respect the marriages of other people (Leviticus 18:20)—that is exactly the way that Jesus lived and we gained the walking example of God's faithfulness, kindness and self-control. When we live God's way we show others how appealing godliness can be, and attract others to Him.
The Original Intent
Obviously, holiness was not a concept that God added to His expectations of man years after his creation. The very fact that we were made in the image of God from the get go (Genesis 1:26), shows we were supposed to seek to be like God's good qualities all along—and yet each of us has opted to allow sin to distracted us and make us common sinners. The good news is that God has created a way that we can reclaim that image. It is in the healing relationship we have with Jesus Christ that we are given another precious opportunity to reflect the character of God in our lives (Ephesians 4:23-24; Colossians 3:10) when we “put on the new self who is being renewed to a true knowledge according to the image of the One who created him”).
The Challenge
It is no news to you that as a society we are moving away from holiness. One indicator is that “The word "legalistic" is fast becoming a moniker for anybody with the guts to call out sin. We are tired to being different from the norm. We want to fit in and be cool. We want to show the world you don’t have to be a social oddball to follow Jesus, and we are willing to do anything to prove it” (Comer pp. 115-116). Israel in the Old Testament as well as the early Christians both faced this same temptation. At one point we find the Israelites saying, “Now appoint a king for us to judge us like all the nations” (1 Samuel 8:5). In fact, every new generation faces this same test: Will we become like everyone else morally and in our world views, or will we remain distinct and unique as the people of God? It is not for the weak, this expectation of the Lord that we resist the temptation to morally fit in—never know when we'll be ridiculed for being different. When we value above all else God's estimation of us, such calls us to a measure of indifference with regard to the world's opinion of us. “Keep your behavior excellent among the Gentiles, so that in the thing in which they slander you as evildoers—”(1 Peter 2:12). Do you see how this is certainly nothing new? These Christians were being slandered and attacked for being pure and holy (2:11). If you've suffered for being a Christian, you are in very good company.
Joy and Holiness
- The world tells us that happiness is found in doing your own thing, and on the surface it's easy to see how one could be fooled into thinking this to be the case, yet the opposite is true. You'd think self-absorption with wild abandon would be the ticket to happiness, and yet, for example, secular study after study shows that the people with the best sex lives on the planet are married heterosexual couples who had few or no partners before marriage. And the people who report the lowest levels of sexual satisfaction are promiscuous singles. Does it come as a shock that Hollywood has it all wrong? The fireworks are found with the couple married for years, while frustration and grief is found among the singles who are sleeping around. We are built to flourish when we live according to the Creator's instruction manual. The Bible. Holiness/sanctification is all about respecting God and others. In fact, when anyone has a sexual relationship with anyone than one's spouse, they are, in God's eyes, taking something that does not belong to them. We are stealing. “For this is the will of God, your sanctification; that is, that you abstain from sexual immorality….and that no man transgress and defraud his brother in the matter” (1 Thessalonians 4:3-6). Even in sins outside this realm, when you or I sin, especially when it involves another person, I am still stealing from them: I am stealing from their purity, self-worth, sense of well-being, peace, earthly happiness and ultimately their eternal happiness. The word “defraud” means to “take advantage” of another person.
I know you don't want that. You don't want to abuse God’s kindness and mercy: Romans 6:1. When you are tempted to sin, remember, you don't want to be the kind of person who steals from God’s source of joy, the joy of others or even your own joy. Don't defraud yourself of what God so deeply wants for you. And if you are a man, I plead with you to treat women as what they truly are: an eternal soul (1 Timothy 5:2). Determine to see all unbelieving women as potentially your sisters in Christ. See Christian women as your sisters. Be a protector, not a predator, and desire above all the best for her both in the present and in her eternity.
Mark Dunagan | mdunagan@frontier.net
Beaverton Church of Christ | 503-644-9017
www.beavertonchurchofchrist.net
