Everyone, then, who professes to be a Christian should ask himself, “Is there evidence of practical holiness in my life? Do I desire and strive after holiness? Do I grieve over my lack of it and earnestly seek the help of God to be holy?”
Yikes! Talk about a little self-examination. . . As I read those questions, one after another, in Jerry Bridges’, The Pursuit of Holiness, all I could think about was that clown bag when we were kids. You know what I’m talking about? Remember, those plastic punching bags that were about three feet tall, filled with air, sand in the bottom. As you punched (this is probably not allowed today – too violent) the clown face (or another character) the thing fell over and because of the weight in the bottom and the air in the top, it popped back up. Sometimes quickly, sometimes slowly, all depending on the amount of air and the power the punch packed.
Is there evidence of practical holiness in my life? Ugh! Down I go. Up I come.
Do I desire and strive after holiness? Ugh! Down I go. Up I come.
Do I grieve over my lack of it and earnestly seek the help of God to be holy? Down again. Up again.
See what I mean? Whack. Whack. Whack. First of all, I don’t even know if I completely understand what holiness is. Do you? It’s kind of like I think I know what it is, but I’m not sure I can explain what it is. Well, let’s pray God’s wisdom and dig in. Since the Lord said be holy as He is holy, it’s kind of important.
Holy is translated from the Greek word hágios which means different, unlike, special, distinguished, distinct. Holy for a follower of Christ means in the likeness with our Lord, different from the world, set apart by or for God, dedicated or devoted to the service of God. So far so good.
For I, the LORD, am the one who brought you up from the land of Egypt, that I might be your God. Therefore, you must be holy because I am holy.
Leviticus 11:45
God told the Israelites, they must be holy because He is holy. We are to be like Him. He called them out of Egypt to be a holy nation, to be unique, set apart. (Sound familiar?) They were headed to Canaan, a pagan and worldly nation. He told them, you can either conform to the world, or conform to Me. Be like Me or be like the world. You are either obedient to the world, or obedient to Me. You must throw away your idols and worship only Me. You must turn from sin. You must be holy. (Sound familiar?) The message to the Israelites has been the same message down through time, hasn’t it?
So, if holy means we’re to be different, distinct and dedicated to God, what does that look like in my everyday life? First, just like the Israelites, in order to be holy, we must be spiritually different. That spiritual difference should bleed into every aspect of our life, it should be who we are, not just a part of who we are. Our holiness should be evident in our decisions, our actions, our speech, and our thoughts. But, we can’t be holy on our own. Christ’s death and resurrection make our holiness possible, nothing else.
But now, by means of the physical death of his Son, God has made you his friends, in order to bring you, holy, pure, and faultless, into his presence.
Colossians 1:22
Friends stay close together. Being holy is not simply about separating ourselves from this world we live in. It is about staying close to God. We cannot be holy as He is holy if we are not close enough to Him to know what holy is, what it looks like. It’s not only about separating ourselves from something but separating ourselves to something, to someone, to Him. Not from but to. If we spend all our time and energy on the from, we won’t have time and energy for the to.
But whenever someone turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away. For the Lord is the Spirit, and wherever the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. So all of us who have had that veil removed can see and reflect the glory of the Lord. And the Lord—who is the Spirit—makes us more and more like him as we are changed into his glorious image.
2 Corinthians 3:16-18
The veil represents the spiritual blindness and hardness of a heart that prevents us from seeing the truth, the Good News. In days gone by, brides wore a veil on their wedding day with a blusher. The blusher was a piece of the veil made of thin netting that covered the bride’s face. When the two were pronounced one, the blusher was pulled back, that part of the veil was taken away, removed, and the bride and groom could freely see each other.
Before we knew the Lord, the veil separated us from Him. It covered our minds and our understanding of Him. Now that our hearts have been unveiled we are no longer separated from seeing and experiencing His holiness and His glory. The veil is stripped away. The barrier gone. Now that we see Him clearly, we can clearly reflect His holiness. Now that our minds have been unveiled we are to be like Him.
So, let’s look at those questions again:
Is there evidence in my life that I am daily more like Christ and less like the world?
Do I want to be more like Christ and what am I doing to become more like Christ?
Does it bother me when I’m not wholly devoted to God and do I ask Him to help me be different?