His Little Spark In The Dark: What is Holiness?

The other day, as I was reading the Bible I came across these verses.

Isaiah 52:10 “The Lord has made bare His holy arm. In the eyes of all the nations; And all the ends of the earth shall see The salvation of our God.”

Psalms 3:4 “I cried to the Lord with my voice, And He heard me from His holy hill.”

Psalms 5:7 “But as for me, I will come into Your House in the multitude of Your mercy; In fear of You I will worship toward Your holy temple.”

Revelation 4:8 “The four living creatures, each having six wings were full of eyes around and within. And they do not rest day or night saying: “HOLY HOLY HOLY Lord God Almighty, Who was and is and is to come!”

That caught my attention. Here was the word HOLY repeated over and over again. I was suddenly reminded of how all over the Bible it says in many, many places that Our God is Holy. So, I looked up the actual word Holy to understand its meaning better. The Merriam Webster Dictionary meaning is exalted or worthy of complete devotion as one perfect in goodness and righteousness. The other word meanings are sacred, pure, pious, devoted fully.

The Hebrew word for ‘Holy’ means “separate or set apart”. This is helpful as when talking about God’s holiness, we talk about His absolute purity. He is unstained by sin and evil. He is perfect in every way, and perfectly good all the time. – Bible Dictionary.

According to Mother Teresa “ Holiness consists of doing the will of God with a smile.”

Therese of Lisieux “Holiness consists simply in doing God’s will , and being just what God wants us to be.”

Jerry Bridges writes in his book ‘ The pursuit of holiness’: “Holiness is God’s crown. Imagine for a moment that God possessed omnipotence (infinite power), omniscience (perfect and complete knowledge), and omnipresence (everywhere present), but without perfect holiness. Such a one could no longer be described as God. Holiness is the perfection of all His other attributes: His power is holy power; His mercy is holy mercy; His wisdom is holy wisdom. It is His holiness more than any other attribute that makes Him worthy of our praise.”

Holiness in simple terms is to do what pleases God and to shun all forms of evil knowing that it would hurt the heart of Our Father God who gave us His absolute best to save us from eternal judgment. The HOLY Lord didn’t spare His Only Begotten Son Jesus for us and actually turned His face away from the Cross for a moment when the Lord Jesus bore all our sins on Himself. That was the Ultimate Rejection and Jesus cried out in agony “My God , My God why have You forsaken Me?” (Mathew 27:46) The Holy Father loved us so much that it pleased Him to bruise Jesus – Isaiah 53:10 God loved us so much that He just didn’t save us but it delighted Him to save us. Nothing magnifies the Glory of God like the Son of God embracing the Cross. A HOLY GOD who LOVES like no other! Hallelujah …we serve such a wonderful God.

Let us see some more verses about Holiness in the Bible:

1) Who may ascend His holy hill? Psalms 24:3-6 The one who has clean hands and a pure heart. Who has not lifted up his soul to any idol. Nor sworn deceitfully. Such a person will receive the blessing from the Lord and righteousness from the God of His salvation. This means that we too have a part to play and the Lord Jesus gives us His righteousness as a robe at salvation.(Isa 61:10,11)

2) The Lord commands us to Be Holy for He is Holy (Lev 19:2, 1 Peter 1:16)

3) In 2 Corin 6:17,18-7:1 we read God calling us to : “ Come out from among them and be separate says the Lord. Do no touch what is unclean, And I will receive you. I will be a Father to you and you shall be My sons and daughters….. Therefore having these promises, beloved , let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and the spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God.”

4) Jesus is now seated at the right hand of God making intercession for us. We read in Heb 7:26-28 that we have a High Priest fitting for us, holy , harmless, undefiled separate from sinners and has become higher than the heavens.The Son has been perfected Forever. He is the ONLY truly HOLY and RIGHTEOUS ONE.

5) It is the Lord who purifies us ( Isa 6:3-5) In the Presence of the Holy God Isaiah becomes so aware of His uncleanness and He cries out to the Lord ,"Woe I am undone for I am a man of unclean lips and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips." That’s when the seraphim is sent by God to touch his mouth with the live coal from the altar and his iniquity is taken away and sin purged.

In the New Testament, we see in 2 Corin 5:21 “For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.” Jesus became the Holy Lamb of God for us and was sacrificed once and for all so that by His blood we can go boldly to His throne of Grace and Mercy and plead forgiveness of sin.

It is the Holy Spirit that guides us into all Holiness. The same Power that raised Jesus from the dead dwells in us today. Rom 8:11

Let us thus rededicate ourselves to the Lord asking for His Mercy and Grace ‘to be holy as our Father is holy.’ Mathew 5:48 Charles Spurgeon “The saints shall preserve in holiness because God preserves in Grace.”

Sharing some beautiful songs on the Holiness of God: Hope you enjoy them.