The definition of “holy”:
As defined by the dictionary: dedicated or consecrated to God or a religious purpose; sacred.
As defined by Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible: (Greek word 40: hagios): Ascribed in this word and context primarily “in Scripture to its moral and spiritual significance, separated from sin and therefore consecrated to God, sacred”. It is predicated of God (as the absolutely “Holy” One), in His purity, majesty and glory.
Holy. It’s a powerful word.
One I dare say, our 21st century culture has regulated to the back corner and told to sit there quietly like a petulant child.
As believers today, we have lost the vibrancy and the inerrancy of this mighty word, ascribed to a mighty and powerful God. We have allowed our understanding of 21st century culture, of our limited English language and a sinful nature, to dictate how we perceive a Holy God.
Because, dare I say it? We have regulated God to the back corner of our lives and told Him to sit there quietly like a petulant child. We have chosen the coziness of infiltrating sin over the holiness of a mighty and powerful God.
And many of us don’t even realize what is happening.
Sin is insidious and oh so delightful, would you not agree? It’s the caramel coated red apple in the store window, gleaming in the light and tempting us closer with it’s sugary aroma and promises of delicious sweetness we can already taste on our tongue and across our lips.
And while we know this caramel apple is really the bitterest of poisons, we still flirt with the idea, the desire and longing driving us closer and closer to that shop window, until we are inside the store and purchasing the very apple that we know will be the cause of our death.
That first bite is sweet, but with a bitter aftertaste that has us wanting to put the apple aside, but then the reminder of the sweetness at the beginning keeps us coming back until the aftertaste of bitterness is overshadowed by only the reminder of how sweet it is. We keep coming back for more, this time choosing something more daring than just a simple caramel covered apple, our purchases at the throne of the Evil One only getting bigger and bigger until we are in incredible debt to the Great Deceiver.
Yet, we keep inbiding. Keep coming back for more. Keep pushing aside our guilt and the whispers of the Holy Spirit, ignoring the bitterness of regret for the sweetness of quick fulfillment and easy happiness. And because sin never stays in it’s corner, playing with it’s own toys, it infiltrates every single aspect of your life like the greedy creature it is.
Some sin is quiet. Some sin is loud. All sin is deadly.
All sin separates us from a Holy and Righteous God.
Our entitlement culture has told us that we deserve salvation. That we deserve what Christ did for us on the cross 2,000 years ago and that we should collect our bag of goodies and go about our lives. Our entitlement culture has told us that we should be able to have our cake and eat it too. That we don’t have to give up the things that make us “feel good” or “seem right”.
Our entitlement culture has told us that God is love and that He wouldn’t want us to not be doing something that makes us feel good, worthy, loved, valued, treasured. Because surely if God loves us so much, why can’t we be with the person we want to be with? Why can’t we do the things that make us happy? Why can’t we pursue the lifestyles that we want to pursue? After all, God is love! And if God loves me, He should be happy for me! Right?
Right?
We have been sold a bill of goods and it is full of death.
We have forgotten that we has humans are created in the image of God, yes, and we are incredibly wicked.
The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it? Jeremiah 17:9
We are not worthy to stand before a righteous and holy God, our Creator and King. We are not worthy even with the greatest of attempts, to stand under our own strength, before a powerful and good God.
We have all become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous deeds are like a polluted garment. We all fade like a leaf, and our iniquities, like the wind, take us away. Isaiah 64:6 (other translations have “polluted garment” as “filthy rags”.)
We have neglected to remember that our place and purpose on this earth is not an expected result because we simply exist. But we have let entitlement tell us otherwise.
It is absolutely true that we serve a loving God. A loving and holy God. A God who does treat us as our sins deserve. Who has cast our sins as far as the east is from the west and does not repay us according to our iniquities. (Psalm 103:1)
But because our God is Holy, we are not righteous enough to stand before Him as we currently are. It is only through the saving power of Christ, as our mediary, are we able to stand blameless before God.
For there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself as a ransom for all, which is the testimony given at the proper time. – 1Timothy 2:5-6
In the presence of a Holy God we are unworthy.
A truth many of us do not wish to accept in light of the false belief that we are a “good person”. And truly, how then, could a loving God condemn someone who is “good”?
And yet, we already know, not one of us is good, for only God is truly Good and our best attempts, in comparison to a Holy God, are as the dirtiest of filthy rags.
In light of the momentary sweetness of sin, do we really want to stand before a Holy and Righteous God bragging on all we have seen and done? All the ways we have satisfied our flesh and made love with the sin of death?
On the day we stand before a Holy and Righteous God, I don’t think we will be arguing for equal rights, for satisfaction of our flesh and the justification of the empty pleasures of our flesh. However minor or major we may think they may be.
Because to stand before a Holy God is to be reminded of every reason why we shouldn’t be standing there. To come face to face with our depravity and fall on our knees in repentance and thanksgiving that it is not a place where we have to wallow any longer. That we have been forgiven and freed.
To stand before a Holy God is to know everything that is not holy.
To be in the presence of holiness is to know why there is a reason for judgment. Because sin has no place in His presence.
We have forgotten and ignored the power of our Holy God.
Yes, I will say it again: our God is loving. So incredibly loving. To have sent His only Son to die for our sins. To sacrifice that which is most precious to Him for mine, yours, the world’s, salvation. To look upon us as He looks upon Christ. What a gracious and loving gift.
But our loving God is also just and holy.
Entitlement culture has told us that we are entitled to God’s love, that it’s without question and asks no questions. It has painted God as a magical fairy godmother with a wand and a big grin, happy to give us anything our sinful hearts desire. Yet, why would a truly loving God, want to give us the very things that separate us from Him? The things that lead to death?
When we set aside the holiness of Christ for a walk of life that is sinful and perverse, we can expect God’s holy judgment.
How can we ask for anything less from a Holy and Good God?
Do not be deceived: God is not mocked, for whatever one sows, that will he also reap. – Galations 6:7
These are not popular opinions. These are not comfortable opinions.
These are not opinions at all.
This is the truth of our Holy God, our loving God, our majestic God, in whom we are created in His image. A God who does not want to have us spend eternity separated from His presence. A God who has made a way when there seems to be no way. A God who provides an escape from our sinful flesh and fellowship and communion with Him.
We do not earn our salvation. We are not entitled to it. It is a free gift of grace, extended from the very hand of the God who loves us fiercely enough to sacrifice His one and only Son.
A love that is fierce and mighty and Holy.
A love that sin cannot stand in the presence of.
A love that cannot be mocked.
H O L Y
