Majestic in Holiness

Exodus 15:11 “Who among the gods is like you, Lord? Who is like you— majestic in holiness, awesome in glory, working wonders?

This past small group Bible Study at our house was so jam-packed with biblical truth that it couldn't be unpacked in just one message post. I pick up here with the holiness of Almighty God.  The biblical concept of holiness is difficult to define in a few words, but it contains the idea of being separate. It suggests a separation between what is pure and what is unclean. For example,  hasn't everyone’s mother given the lecture to their child on “statistical morality”, where if everyone is doing something that is wrong, doesn't make it right. “If everyone jumps off a cliff, does that mean you have to jump off with them?” No, wrong is wrong. Thus you see the concept of separation.

1 Peter 1:14-16 “As obedient children, do not be conformed to the former lusts which were yours in your ignorance, but like the Holy One who called you, be holy yourselves also in all your behavior; because it is written, “You shall be holy, for I am holy.”

God, majestic in holiness, in sovereign grandeur, is separate from all that is evil or defiled. His character is the standard for moral perfection. Right is not what is “right” in our own eyes, or in the eyes of others, but in the eyes of our Creator and Lord. God says it; that settles it, because His Word is “holy ground”. The word holy and holiness are used approximately seven hundred times in the Bible. The idea of separation, being set apart by God, for God’s purposes, is affirmed over and over.

1 Peter 2:9-12 “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 you are the people of God; you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy. Beloved, I urge you as aliens and strangers to abstain from fleshly lusts which wage war against the soul. Keep your behavior excellent among the Gentiles, so that in the thing in which they slander you as evildoers, they may because of your good deeds, as they observe them, glorify God in the day of visitation.”

Consecrated is not a word that we hear very often today, but needs to be lively and growing in our culture, because the word means “Set apart as sacred and dedicated to God”. I wonder if we take the majestic holiness of God far too lightly in our world today? What exactly are we offering up to the Lord daily? Do Christians truly understand the holiness of the Lord and live their lives accordingly? Is Holy God’s presence real in our lives? Do we see His omnipotent hand at work in our lives and our world? Do we sense it? Do we see it? Do we feel it? And if His majestic holiness is missing in our life, why?

1 Corinthians 6:19-20 “Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own? For you have been bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body.

What God wants you to know is that you are made holy by the indwelling Holy Spirit, not by trying to keep the law. Remember that holiness comes from yielding to the Spirit and walking in the Spirit, rather than trying to control your flesh by a list of do's and don'ts. Reedeemed, “You shall be holy, for I am Holy.” 

In Christ, Brian