Holy and Holy-Making
| Consecrate yourselves and be holy, because I am the LORD your God. Keep my decrees and follow them. I am the LORD, who makes you holy. (Leviticus20:7-8) |
There are numerous passages that speak about the holiness of God.
What is holiness?
It is righteousness, purity, justness.
It is to be free from malice, pettiness, jealousy, insecurity and falsehood.
It is moral excellence and internal consistency.
God is all of these things. This means that we can trust Him completely.
Our passage, however, takes it further:
His holiness is so full and good that it calls us, draws us and demands of us to be holy too.
We strive to be holy because of who He is.
We walk in His ways to become like Him: His holiness should be attractive to us.
Unfortunately we are broken and cannot emulate God's holiness by ourselves.
But the passage takes us further still!
Not only is God Holy, and not only does God's holiness call us to be holy, but God will make us holy. The name we give to this process of holy-making is "sanctification." And from the outset God has sanctified us so that we can experience His presence.
Initially, the sanctification was outward and provided ceremonial/symbolic holiness:
- God gave animal skins to naked Adam and Eve.
- The burning of sacrifices and the blood of sacrifices cleansed worshippers' consciences.
- The practice of ceremonies and rituals and the keeping of law shaped lives from the outside.
Although God gave us these avenues to be holy, we kept failing...
But God had something even more beautiful in mind:
The whole of the OT pointed to Someone who would take away our guilt in one day and then send His Holy Spirit to renew us from the inside out. And so Christ came - the Holy Son of God who died to take away our unholiness and give us His Spirit so that we could become holy from the inside.
What an amazing God! Holy and making holy!
