Christ Sanctuary 13 August 2023
The holiness of God is one of the most neglected attributes of God There seems to be a certain measure of hesitation / or reluctance
But if we don’t understand the holiness of God several problems arise
* we will have a deficient view of Who God is
* we will be desensitized / to the decadence of sin
* we will have little or no motivation for repentance
* we won’t be growing Christlikeness in our life
won’t attain to spiritual maturity
It’s most vital / that we understand God’s holiness
Just what is holiness?
The Hebrew word in the Old Testament is the word “qadosh” (קדושׁ)
It means “to be set apart” / “to separate”
The Greek word in the New Testament is the word “hagios” (ἅγιος)
It means “to cut off” “to separate” “to be distinct”
A thing is holy / if it is “consecrated” for some sacred purpose
In Scripture we find certain people / things / places
were deemed to be “holy”
* the ground around the burning bush / is holy ground
* The land of His people / is called “the holy land” Zech 2:12
* God dwelling place is called a holy habitation / Deut 26:15
* Jerusalem is called “the holy city” Rev 21:2
* His foundation / “is in the holy mountain” / Psalm 87:1
* His work is holy / Psalm 145:17 / His arm is holy / Psalm 98:1
* The promise God makes / is “his holy promise” / Psalm 105:42
* His law is holy / His commandment is “holy”
* His apostles are called “holy apostles”/ Eph. 3:5
* God’s Word is called “the holy scriptures” / 2 Timothy 3:15
You get the drift / someone / something / some place is deemed holy
But supremely / it is God Who is holy
Job calls Him “the Holy One” / Job 6:10
Isaiah refers to Him as “the Holy One of Israel” / Isa. 1:4
Moses says of God: “Who is like You among the gods
. . . glorious in holiness” / Ex 15:11
Hannah / in her song of thanksgiving / says:
“There is none holy like the LORD”
And David says “Holy and awesome is His name” / Ps 111:9
In our passage / one seraphim called out to another
“Holy Holy Holy / is the Lord God Almighty” / Isa 6:3
The word “Holy” there is repeated three times
It is a trinitarian reference / but it also / a Hebrew literary device
to emphasize the point / that God’s holiness is perfect holiness
Isaiah senses that he is standing in the heart of God’s holiness
And he’s devastated by his own impurity
He cries out / “Woe is me”
If we understand the language of his day
we’d be shocked by what he’s saying here
He’s actually calling down the curse of God on his own head
The cry / “Woe is me” / is a cry of anathema / of judgment
Isaiah is in pure moral anguish
See / he’s probably the most godly man in the land And yet before the gaze of a holy God / he feels utterly filthy Should anyone of us be tempted to think we are holy
Isaiah’s response is a good test / of where we stand
Now / thinking about God’s holiness / its easy for us to think of His holiness
as simply another one / of the many attributes of God
So just as we have the justice of God / the mercy of God
we speak of the holiness of God
But technically speaking / holiness is not an attribute of God
Holiness is the character of God / rather than a characteristic of God
You could say / holiness is the sine qua non
the indispensable / essential / part of the being of God
God’s holiness is not a quality / It is His very essence
God’s holiness is Who He is
Thomas Brooks says: When angels and saints fall
they lose their holiness / but they keep their natures
For them holiness was a quality / it wasn’t their essence
But with God / holiness is not a quality
It is His very essence
Think of God’s holiness permeating / infusing and marinating all His other attributes
So God is righteous because He is holy / God is merciful because He is holy
He is just because He is holy / He is loving because He is holy
He is faithful because He is holy / God is compassionate because He is holy
You may say His mercy is holy mercy / His love is holy love
His justice is holy justice / even His wrath is holy wrath
Someone has rightly said / that if God’s many attributes
could be thought of / as the various facets of a diamond
then holiness would be the combined brightness
of all those facets shining out in radiant glory
* Thomas Watson said:
“Holiness is the most sparkling jewel of God’s crown
It is the name by which He is known”
* And Charnock the English Puritan divine / said:
“Power is His hand or arm / omniscience His eye,
mercy His bowels / eternity His duration
(but) His holiness is His beauty”
In fact / God singles out His holiness / as defining His very Being
Have you not noticed that whenever God takes an oath
He takes an oath / not by His mercy / not by His justice
but by His holiness
Amos 4:2 / “The Sovereign Lord has sworn / by His holiness”
Psalm 89:35 / “Once have I sworn / by My holiness”
God swears by His “holiness” because His holiness
more than any other single attribute
is the fullest expression of Who He is
But God’s holiness is most clearly seen His infinite moral purity
God is sinless perfection / He is flawless / pure and undefiled
Habakkuk says of God: “You are of purer eyes than to see evil”
Job says: “Far be it from God to do wickedness
and from the Almighty to do wrong” Job 34:10
Zephaniah says He is righteous / He does northing unjust / Zep 3:5
Nahum says “God is good / and does only what is good / Nah 1:7
He is perfectly truthful / He cannot lie / Titus 1:2; Heb 6:18
He is perfectly loving / Deut. 7:7-8
He delights in all that is worthy / He stands for all that is upright
He is impeccable / without moral blemish or stain
Now / if you’ve got to have a reason / for why hell should exist
See / if God is morally perfect / He’s got to be capable of wrath
A God Who is incapable of an infinite hatred against sin
would be morally deficient
The existence of hell / is proof of God’s moral perfection
Hell reveals God’s passion for His holiness
Hell exists because cannot exonerate sin
Hell incriminate sin and vindicate His holiness
Many people are troubled by both the intensity and the duration / of punishment in hell
But the enormity and brutality of hell’s punishment / only reveals
the awesome weight and magnitude of God’s holiness
Hell is furious / because God is holy
Hell is unbearably tormenting / because God is outrageously holy
Hell is insufferably long because God’s holiness is infinitely precious
Now / if God is holy in the essence of His being / then it follows
that we are never going to be holy / the way God is holy
If you and I are holy / we’re holy only because God forgave us
and made us holy / Our holiness is “derived” / Its “derivative”
Because our holiness is derived it is possible for us to be “unholy”
This is the reason God urges us / again and again / to be holy
* Lev 19:2 / “You shall be holy, for I the LORD your God am holy”
* Lev 20:7 / “Sanctify yourselves / and be holy”
* Deut 18:13, “You shall be blameless before the LORD your God”
* I Pe 1:16 / “You shall be holy / for I am holy”
* Heb 12:14 / “Strive for holiness without which no one will see the Lord”
* 1 Thess 4:3 / “It is God’s will that you should be sanctified”
In none of these verses / is God merely “suggesting” that we be holy
He’s exhorting / imploring / urging us to be holy
You can’t read Heb 12 / and not notice that the language
the writer uses there / smacks of exhortation / admonition
“lift up your drooping hands” / “strengthen your weak knees”
“make straight paths for your feet” / “strive for peace”
“see to it that no one fails” / so v.12 “strive for holiness”
In Romans 8:13 when Paul says “Put to death the deeds of the body”
the verb “put to death” is in the imperative mood
That should tell you that it’s a command
Further / the call to be holy is a call to be holy in every part of our lives
Paul prays: “May your spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless”
The spirit must be consecrated / the body must be cleansed
and the mind dedicated / to God’s purpose” / 1 Thess 5:23
Now at this point I want to make a major shift / And it’s this:
The call to holiness does not sit well with the average Christian
There is little appetite for holiness in our time
And among people of the Reformed faith / there is this huge chasm between our passion for the gospel / and our pursuit for holiness
We think that because we embrace a Gospel-centered theology that we don’t really need to worry about rules or commands
But as Kevin deYoung rightly observes:
the imperatives of God’s Word are as important as the indicatives
You’ll remember your grammar
The indicative is simply a statement of fact
The imperative is a command
“I am justified” is an indicative - a statement of fact
“Be holy” is an imperative - its a command
Just because we’re gospel-centered
doesn’t mean that we cannot talk about imperatives
Could you be neglecting the call to holiness / because you don’t
It is one thing to be justified / It is another thing to be sanctified
Justification deals the guilt and penalty / of your sin
Sanctification tackles the grip and pollution / sin has on you
Justification gives you a verdict of acquittal / declares you righteous
Sanctification breaks the shackles of sin’s grip on you and purifies you
It’s the distinction between positional holiness / and actual holiness
The only ground of your salvation / is the righteousness of Christ
Absolutely nothing else / contributes to our salvation
The one single offering Christ made has perfected you for eternity
* The shackle of sin over you has been broken
* You now stand righteous through His imputed righteousness
Positionally / you’re already made holy / in Christ
His death is your life / His resurrection is your peace
His ascension is your hope / His intersession is your comfort
DONE DEAL
Justification has freed you forever from having to keep the law
* You don’t get right with God / by being holy
* You’re saved by grace through faith / Ephesians 2:8
* You “have been sanctified / through the offering
of the body of Jesus Christ / once for all” / Heb 10:10
But that said / the Bible
exhorts us to live holy lives / and warns us against impurity
Why? Because fundamentally it is holy living
that confirms / that your faith is genuine
Yes / the righteousness of Christ is the ground of your justification
but your sanctification is the proof of that justification
There is an evidence of holiness / that is required of you
so that your justification may be authenticated
Your holiness is evidence that your faith is irrefutable
Didn’t Jesus say: “If you abide in my word
you are truly my disciples”/ Jn 8:31
The gospel / may be the ground of your justification
but holiness / is the fruit / of that justification
It is one thing to identify / what God has saved us from It is another thing to identify / what He has saved us to
* Paul says: “He predestined us to conform to the image of His Son”
Romans 8:29
* God has not called us to impurity but to holiness / 1 Thes 4:7
God redeemed you FROM sin / TO holiness
The faith that justifies / is also the faith that sanctifies
Now / what’s the upshot of this? / It is this: People who are
genuinely born of God / will not wilfully continue in sin
Not that they won’t fall into sin
But they have a stubborn resolve to fight for their personal purity
And they will fight tooth and claw for it / resolutely / doggedly
They know / if they’re justified they ought to be sanctified
They’re convicted that their practice / must match / their identity
Ryle is right: / “There is no holiness without warfare”
Perhaps the clearest verse that connects
“Since we have these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves
from every defilement of body and spirit,
bringing holiness to completion in the fear of God”
But isn’t this / what eternal security is / all told: that those whom
God justified / He will sanctify / and ultimately glorify
All right if we’re to be holy / just what is personal holiness?
People my age group / growing up / were told that holiness was
* men not growing long hair
* women not wearing jewelry / makeup / high heels and pants
For everyone / holiness was / not listening to rock & roll
not going to the movies / not watching TV / not dancing
not drinking / not playing cards / or smoking cigarettes
In short / holiness was a whole long list of other “no-no’s”
But there was also a list of “do do’s” as well
do read your Bible / do pray / do witness
do go to church every Sunday / do memorize scripture
If you didn’t do the “do do’s” / or avoid the “no nos”
then you weren’t holy / that’s it!
But that’s far too simplistic / that’s just check-list spirituality
Just because you’ve dealt with your temper / been regular at church read your Bible regularly / and memorized scripture
It is simply the case / that no one becomes holy
by following a set of rules
And the issue is / not how many sinless days you’ve clocked in
since your last fall
It is not the frequency / but the reality that matters
The bottom line issue is this: Is there reality in your life
to authenticate your justification / with your sanctification
How then / may I be holy?
There are really two very different approaches to be holy
The religious approach says: “If I keep myself holy / God will accept me”
So you behave / you try to keep yourself pure
But you’re making all that sacrifices
in order that God might accept you / and bless you
This approach is doomed to fail on two counts:
If you succeed / you’ll be very tempted to be smug
you’ll have a sense of self-righteousness
and trump your nose on other people who are failing
If you fail / it would crush you / you’ll plunge into despair
you’ll be condemning yourself
you’ll be grumpy / discontent and judgmental
If you’re trying to keep yourself pure so that / God will accept you
you’ll always be anxious and selfish
You’ll be anxious because you are never quite sure
how much holy living is enough holy living
how much obedience is enough obedience for God?
You’ll be selfish because every sacrifice that you’re making
you’re making to get something from God / for yourself
Bernard of Clairvaux said / if we look for a reward
to obey God / we love the reward / rather than God
But there’s a right approach to growing holiness
You’re saying “Because God so graciously accepted and loved me
I want to keep myself holy for Him”
You’re keeping yourself pure / out of sheer love for the Lord
You’re shunning impurity / out of the overflow of love in your heart
out of sheer joy of pleasing Him
You sacrifice some forbidden pleasure
just for His praise alone / just to His glory alone
Now this is the right motivation for holy living / It is love / not fear
Now here’s the great news / No matter how you've fallen
Did you not notice that after Isaiah confessed his sins
God did not leave him groveling there
One of the seraphs flew to him / with a live burning coal in his hand
And with it / he touched Isaiah’s mouth / and said:
“See / now that this has touched your lips
Your guilt is taken away / Your sin atoned for”
* the fiery coal / cauterized his impurity
* the holy fire / refined his heart
- to the point / that his heart was stung
with the conviction to serve God / “Here I am send me”
The very fire / before which Isaiah shrunk in terror
is the same fire that burned away his sin
God’s holy fire is also His refining fire
What he feared will destroy him
turned out to be the means of his deliverance
And this is the gospel
Although God is transcendent and holy
He is also immanent / and gracious
He may be lofty / But He is not aloof
He is compassionate and merciful
He does not come to destroy us but to redeem us
Yes / He thoroughly abhors sin and filth
But He also recognises a repentant heart when He sees one
And whenever people turn their back on sin / and turn to God
God / a loving Father / receives them readily
Acknowledge your sin / repent of them / weep over them
Ask for His forgiveness / and He will forgive you / He will
Tozer says “We must hide our unholiness in the wounds of Christ
. . . We must take refuge from God / in God”
The journey toward holiness is going to be long and tedious
What’s going to give you the grit and the gumption
to keep up the fight / for your holiness / is this:
* You’ve been elected / redeemed / and justified
* You now have the power
through the Holy Spirit to put sin to death
* Sin no longer shackles you
* The source of your strength comes from Your union with Christ
This / is what is going to give you the stamina to keep up
with your pursuit of holiness
Let me now close with an example of a man passionate for holiness
I’m talking about John Owen / Owen is probably
the greatest pastor-theologian among the puritans in England
* Packer refers to him as “the tallest among the Puritan redwoods”
* Jerry Bridges says John Owen’s treatises on The Mortification of Sin
is “the most helpful writings on personal holiness ever written”
* Keller tells us that he discovered John Owen in 1972
And this is what Keller says
of Owen’s book The Mortification of Sin
Keller says “I wouldn’t be in the ministry [today]
my life would be a shipwreck / if I hadn’t read that book”
See Owen was Oliver Cromwell’s chaplain a frequent speaker to Parliament
He was dean and vice chancellor in the University of Oxford
He served in churches in and around London
Tragically he lost his wife / and ten of his eleven children died young
and the last child died / when she was only a young adult
But what is amazing is that / in the midst of all his busy schedule
and personal tragedy / Owen’s passion
was not public performance / but personal holiness
He said: “My heart’s desire unto God and the chief design of my life
And Piper made a statement / that is an indictment to all of us
Reflecting on Owen / Piper says: “Not many leaders today
state the goals of their lives / in terms of holiness”
Will you? / Will you join me in stating the goals of our lives in terms of personal holiness?
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