HOLINESS PRECEPT, PROMISE AND PRACTICE ‘Preacher, don’t tell me how to live. I am born again, but I don’t need any preacher to meddle with my life. Saved and secured. I can at least make heaven with the skin of my teeth.’ Many profess to be saved or born again who do not seem to see the importance and the centrality of holiness both in the Scriptures and in the Christian’s life. There are many commands in the Scriptures concerning the fact that the Lord has called us to be holy. The precept is clear and unmistakable. THE PRECEPT “For the Lord thy God walketh in the midst of thy camp, to deliver thee….. Therefore shall thy camp be holy: that He see no unclean thing in thee, and turn away from thee”. (Deuteronomy 23:14). If the Lord is thy God walking in the midst of thee, then there is no escaping the issue. THEREFORE SHALL THY CAMP BE HOLY. How will the camp be holy if every delivered or redeemed person has to sin every day? How will the church be holy when it is the second nature of members to hold grudge and keep malice? How will the Lord not see an unclean thing in the fellowship group when members lust with the heart and lie with the lips? God is holy. If He sees any unclean thing in you, He will depart. Deuteronomy twenty-three, fourteen, says so and Judges sixteen, twenty, confirms it. God is not a liar. It is the devil who says “thou shall not surely die” when you commit sin who is a liar. Samson lusted with the heart, lied with his lips “and he wist not that the LORD was departed from him”. Hey, walk by faith and not by sight or feelings. If you walk by faith in the Word of God, you will know that God will do what He says He will do. He says He will leave you if He sees any unclean thing in you. He said what He meant and meant what He said. Is that the only place where holiness was commanded? “Worship the LORD in the beauty of holiness” (Psalm 29:2). I love that, don’t you? I had some sisters in the Christian groups I used to help who would worship in the beauty of jewellery, modern mini and slacks and with beautifully powdered faces! “In the beauty of holiness”. You mean holiness is beautiful? Oh, I can not describe it. What bride is more beautiful than the bride of Christ adorned with the ripen fruit of the Spirit for her Bridegroom? Loved by God, appreciated by Christ, ministered unto by the Spirit, honoured by angels, feared by devils, they are the very beauty of heaven rather than the streets of gold in New Jerusalem. Are you a worshipper? See the Command: “Worship the LORD in the beauty of holiness”. Brethren, in holiness. Many times, the sound of drums, the clapping of hands, the melody of singing, the shouting of praises and the emotions of dancing and rejoicing replace the essential thing. HOLINESS! Liars and hypocrites can clap and dance all they want to, but is that worship? HOLINESS! Let’s come back to reality! Worship in holiness. Is that an advice, a suggestion? A command! A command is to be obeyed. The devil accepts any worship but worship can only be acceptable to God when we worship Him in the beauty of holiness. It is written, be ye holy; for I am holy”. (1 Peter 1:16). When the devil tempted Jesus, He whipped the devil with “IT IS WRITTEN”. When the devil makes you doubt the fact of being holy resist him and refuse his insinuation by “IT IS, WRITTEN, Be ye holy; for I am holy”. When he tempts you, don’t weep’ don’t pine, don’t run, don’t yield, take your sword out, throw it at him, thrust it into him, IT IS WRITTEN. What is written? “Be ye holy, for I am holy” That is the precept. Don’t tell me the Lord asks you to do what He knows you can not do. Don’t tell me you know human weaknesses more than He knows. He knows infinitely more than you know. He says, be holy. Don’t tell me your temptations are so special. He knows and He says be holy. Don’t tell me the devil is powerful. That is the devil’s lie. “Greater is He that is in you, than he (the devil) that is in the world” (1 John. 4:4). You have no excuse and the only doubts you have are unreasonable ungodly doubts; doubt your doubt and “Be holy”. But is there any help? Any promise to rest upon? I can show you more promises than you need on holiness. Without holiness, no man shall see the Lord” and without the Lord no man shall see holiness. It is not by trying, it is by trusting. THE PROMISE “Then will I sprinkle clean water upon you (that’s not Water Baptism, God does not baptize in water, it is a man who baptizes in water by God’s Command) and ye shall be clean”. When God cleanses you, you will be clean. If you are not clean, then God has not cleansed you. You want to tell me that when you wash a cloth clean, a lizard will make it dirty the very next moment? Are you saying that the dirty devil will not allow the cleansing work of the holy God to abide on me? You can not bring any doubt into my heart. Hear what God says. “Then will I sprinkle clean water upon you, and ye shall be clean”. Oh God, sprinkle it on me, the water and the blood from my Saviour’s side which flowed. Cleanse me and I will be clean thoroughly. “From your filthiness and from all your idols, will I cleanse you”. That’s enough, I am satisfied. “From all your idols”. Since I started to rely on God the Almighty, I have long forgotten the walking-stick of man’s making. What weight can the opinions of men have on me when the promise of God is so clearly set before me. He promised to cleanse you “from filthiness and all your idols”. That doesn’t need struggling. Just go to Him and clean. Some say, ‘I wish it were easy to be clean in this dirty world’. But just how hard is it to be washed and cleansed by Another? “Behold, there came a leper saying, Lord, if Thou wilt, Thou canst make me clean”. Poor leper, saying, “if Thou wilt”. Don’t ever put an “if” or a “but” or a ‘may be’ in a prayer for holiness and cleansing. What else is His will if what He promised to do is not His will. “And Jesus touched him, saying, I will; be thou clean. And immediately his leprosy was cleansed” (Matthew 8:2,3). And immediately he was cleansed! Somebody said, I have been seeking HOLINESS for ten years. Hold it. You have not been seeking, you have only been hanging around the altar. “Seek and ye shall find…. For every one that asketh receiveth” (Matthew 7:7,8). “A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you”. “A new heart and a new spirit” – inside. God works from the inside. Man only whitewashes the outside, leaving the inside filled with dirty thoughts and defiling motives. “And I will take away the stony heart out your flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh” (Ezekiel 36:25,26). God is up to what He has promised. Has He promised? Then He will fulfil it, When? “Behold, I will do a new thing” That’s what you’ve been looking for. When? “Now it shall spring forth” (Isaiah 43:19). THE PRACTICE When we read about holiness, some are quick to ask whether there had ever been anybody who lived a completely holy life in this world. Is the question necessary or irrelevant? Many times such questions are prompted by the thought that we cannot do what others have not been able to do. Yet that is the devil’s method of holding us in captivity. When God made the Israelites to go on dry ground through the divided Red Sea, who had ever experienced that? When Moses, by faith, brought water out of the rock, which example could he have looked to for encouragement? When Mary was given the promise of a child, which virgin had she ever seen who brought forth child? Which human being had ever walked on water for Peter to see before he did at the command of Jesus? God’s promises and precepts are greater than examples. Even if nobody had ever lived a holy life, you can; because God says you must. What God says you must do, you can do. God provides adequately for whatever He requires from you. But has there been nobody who has lived holy through the history of mankind? Has the devil always had influence in the lives of all that had come to God since the world began? Has no man ever lived holy and pleasing to God? Multitudes have, and you too can. Paul, writing by inspiration, to the Thessalonians said, “Ye are witnesses, and God also, how holily and justly and unblameably we behaved ourselves among you that believe” (2 Thessalonians 2:10). The Holy Spirit inspired Paul to write that about himself and others. Did the Holy Spirit inspire a falsehood to be written? The Thessalonians were witnesses of his outward actions and God was a true witness of his inward state and standing. The witnesses of the people and God agreed in one. Paul and others lived “holy, justly and unblameably”. The seven churches of Asia were real churches of believers in the first century. The church in Smyrna had no blemish, spot or wrinkle to be reproved (Revelation 2:8-11). So also was the church in Philadelphia (Revelation 3:7-13). These whole churches were holy according to the testimony of the true Witness, even the Lord Jesus Christ. How wonderfully clean and holy must the life and heart of John have been when he wrote, “Herein is our love made perfect,…. Because as He is, so are we in this world”. (John. 4:17). “Without holiness, no man shall see the Lord”. Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God”. Are there people who have seen God? Lord? If there are, they must have been holy. “After this, I beheld, and, lo, a great multitude, which no man could number, of all nations, and kindreds, and people, and tongues, stood before the throne, and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, and palms in their hands. These are they which have washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. Therefore are they before the throne and shall dwell among them. They shall hunger no more, neither thirst any more; for the Lamb which is in the midst of the throne shall feed them…. And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes” (Revelation 7:9, 14-17). That is a multitude, rather, “a great multitude” of holy people who were washed in the blood of the Lamb by faith and clean. “For the promise is unto you, and to your children, and to ALL that are afar off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call” (Acts 2:39). “The oath which He swore…. That He would grant unto us, that we being delivered…. Might serve Him without fear, in holiness and righteousness before him, ALL THE DAYS OF OUR LIFE” (Luke 1:73-75). HOLINESS – DOUBTS AND OBJECTIONS Many there are who consider men’s words more than God’s. People who convince themselves that holiness of heart and purity of life are impossible experiences would rather learn from men than from God. Some persons consider their own hearts and lives to be the standard for every other believer and they think that no man can be holy in this life because they are not. This is as absurd an argument as to reason that because a lizard is unable to fly, nothing can. The “eagles” would prove the fallacy of such a conclusion (Isaiah 40:3). When God changes our vile nature and sin is gone, all things become new, impossibilities become possible and righteousness reigns in the happy saint who now “can do all things through Christ Who strengtheneth him” Have you ever heard an angel preach? Suppose an angel who is not blinded by denominational ignorance or prejudice should preach, would you believe his message more than man’s message? Can you catch the meaning of the angel’s message to Joseph? “Thou shalt call His name JESUS: for He shall save His people from their sins” (Matthew 1:21). That is different from the popular idea that redemption is nothing more than deliverance from hell and the gift of a home in heaven. It is deliverance from sin, deliverance from the power of sin, from the love and desire to sin, from the nature of sin and from the consequence of sin. Whatever men say, God says, “He will grant unto us, that we being delivered out of the hand of our enemies might serve Him without fear, in holiness and righteousness before Him, all the days of our life”(Luke 1:73-75) Objection 1: ‘But there are many holiness preachers and advocates who are not holy. Does this not prove that it is impossible to be holy’? Answer: Do you know that there are preachers and advocates of divine healing who are sick and sickly? What does that prove? That God cannot heal? That Jesus is no more the same yesterday, today and for ever? That it is impossible to be healed and kept healthy? We know better. In matters of experience, negative testimony is no testimony. Twenty men declare that they did not see Mr. D.M. shoot Mr. W.S and that they do not believe he did, but two men did see the shooting; the result is Mr. D.M. is convicted of murder. Joseph and Samuel of the Old Testament and John and Paul of the New Testament are positive examples and testimonies that God’s grace can make you holy. The failure of those around you to have and live the holiness experience may be because they do not ask, seek and knock earnestly enough (Matthew 11:12). Or they do not seek in faith but hope to attain by works (Acts 26:18) or they seek with improper motives (James 4:3). You seek and find that you may be an example to those who believe it in the head but do not have it in the heart. Objection 2: Some fellow confessed, ‘I have stopped seeking to be sanctified and holy after I was disappointed by those I felt were holy’. Answer: That is always the result of building your hopes on man. Christ is the example of any truly born-again Christian. Anybody can stumble over the backslider but true believers make steppingstones out of stumbling –stones. Friends, will you give up spending money because you were disappointed by the counterfeit? Are you to believe that there is no genuine money because there is a counterfeit? There can be no counterfeit without a genuine. It is natural that the more counterfeit money we discover, the more likely we are to distrust all money, but our distrust does not take anything from the actual value of the genuine. If you really want to please and love God, claim His promises and fulfil the conditions He set down in the Word and you will have the holiness He gives. Look away from men, “look unto Jesus”. Objection 3: Not on a few instances has mis-interpreted scriptures quieted some who have desired to be holy at the beginning of their Christian life. Consider this “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us” (1 John 1:8). Some point to that verse anytime you want to encourage them to be holy. Answer: This is not the only scripture that has been twisted in its meaning by people who are not well informed and enlightened in the Word of God. The seventh verse says “the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanseth us from all sin”. Do people ever read that? Should any say I don’t need the blood of Jesus to cleanse me from sin, that is why the eighth verse is there. Then the ninth verse also says God is “faithful and just to cleanse us from all unrighteousness”. Verse 8 points out that all have sinned and verse 7 and 9 points to the possibility of being cleansed from all sin and all unrighteousness. Every sincere Christian who reads through the whole Epistle will see that sin is nowhere defended and holiness is nowhere opposed in the Epistle. Let’s begin at chapter one and end at chapter five. “God is light, and in Him is no darkness at all. If we say that we have fellowship with Him, and walk in darkness, we lie. Walk in the light as He is in the light” (1 John 1:5-7). “My little children, these things write I unto you, that ye sin not” (That’s the purpose of writing the Epistle, to uphold holiness, not to defend sin). “We know that we know Him, if we keep His commandments. He that saith, I know Him, and keepeth not His commandments, is a liar. He that saith he abideth in Him ought himself also to walk, even as He walked” (1 John 2:1,3,4,6). “Behold, now are we the sons of God…. And every man that hath this hope in him purifieth himself, even as He is pure. The Son of God was manifested, that He might destroy the works of the devil. Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin; for His seed remaineth in Him: and he cannot sin, because he is born of God” (1 John 3:2,3,8,9). Greater is He that is in you than he that is in the world. Our love is made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day of judgement: because as He is, so are we in this world” (1 John 4:4,17). “This is the love of God, that we keep His commandments: and His commandments are not grievous. For whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world, even our faith. We know that whosoever is born of God sinneth not; but he that is begotten of God keepeth himself and that wicked one toucheth him not” (1 John 5:3,4,18). Any scripture that is interpreted to support sin and oppose holiness is mis-interpreted. “This is the will of God, even your sanctification” (1 Thessalonians 4:3). Your holiness and sanctification is the will of God. How can you quote a person’s word to oppose His will” “For God hath not called us unto uncleaness, but unto holiness” (1 Thessalonians 4:7). SCRIPTURAL CONFIRMATION Holiness is taught in the commands. “Be ye holy; for I am holy” (1 Peter 1:16). “Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord” (Hebrews 12:14). “Be ye perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect” (Matthew 5:48). “The end of the commandment is charity out of a pure heart” (1 Timothy 1:5). Be ye perfect, be of good comfort, be of one mind, live in peace: and the God of love and peace shall be with you” (2 Corinthians 12:11). Holiness is taught in the promises. “Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled” (Matthew 5:6). “If we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanseth us from all sin” (1 John. 1:7). “Whom we preach, warning every man and teaching every man in all wisdom; that we may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus” (Colossians 1:28). “Wherefore Jesus also, that He might sanctify the people with His own blood, suffered without the gate” (Hebrews 13:42). “To the end that He may establish your hearts unblameable in holiness before God” (1 Thessalonians 3:13). “This is the will of God, even your sanctification” (1 Thessalonians 4:3). “For God hath not called us unto uncleanness, but unto holiness” (1 Thessalonians 4:7). And He gave some, apostles; and some prophets; and some, evangelists; and some pastors and teachers; for the perfecting of the saints… till we all come in the unity of the faith unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ” (Ephesians 4:11-13). Holiness is taught in the Prayers. “For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with might by His Spirit in the inner man; that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height; and to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fullness of God. Now unto Him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us, unto Him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus” (Ephesians 3 14-21). “And the very God of peace sanctify you wholly: and I pray God your whole spirit and soul, and body, be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Thessalonians 5:23). “Now the God of peace, that brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, … through the blood of the everlasting covenant, make you perfect in every good work to do His will, working in you that which is well pleasing in His sight, through Jesus Christ; to whom be glory for ever and ever Amen” (Hebrews 13:20,21). From these passages, it is plain to you and every other sincere person that holiness is attainable and must be attained and maintained because: God commands us to attain it and He never commands impossibilities. God exhorts us to seek and obtain it, and God never wastes words exhorting us to seek impossibilities. God promises to give the experience to those who diligently seek it by faith. Any person who says God will not sanctify and make holy makes Him a liar. Both Jesus and the apostles prayed that the church might be sanctified, and God-inspired prayers are always answered. The message of holiness is seen throughout the scriptures. It breathes in the prophecies, thunders in the law, whispers in the promises, supplicates in the prayers, resounds in the songs, sparkles in the poetry, shines in the types, glows in the imagery and burns in the spirit of the whole scripture from beginning to the end. Holiness! Holiness needed! Holiness required! Holiness offered! Holiness attainable! Holiness – a present duty, a present privilege and a present enjoyment. All will agree that: God is holy. Angels are holy. Heaven is a holy place. Whatever pleases God in heaven pleases Him on earth. Holiness pleases Him. God made man holy. Nothing pleases God as much as holiness. Whatever is pleasing to God is good for us. Holiness is pleasing to God, therefore being made holy would do us good. “Wherefore, seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight,… looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith” (Hebrews 12:1,2). “Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: FOR THEY SHALL BE FILLED” (Matthew 5:6). Are you thirsty? Are you hungry? Are you desirous of holiness as hungry man is of food? Do you pant after holiness as a thirsty man pants after water? Suppose you give a man who is both hungry and thirsty, clothes, money, and other things without giving him food and water, will he be satisfied? He wants food and water, he cannot be satisfied with anything else. Therefore thirst and hunger – and you will be given the holiness your heart desires. “Ask and it shall be given you: for every one that asketh receiveth” (Matthew 7:7,8). “IT IS TIME TO SEEK THE LORD, TILL HE COME AND RAIN RIGHTEOUSNESS UPON YOU” (Hosea 10:12). Some there are who ‘take it by faith’ with no immediate evidence of actually receiving. Suppose the sick will simply accept that healing has been imputed, although he is not in the actual enjoyment of divine health. Such theory along the holiness line is a process of sheer make-believe, by which the deceived thinks that God will accept a fiction for a fact. Some shrink from this experience because of the wrong conception that holiness implies a negative attitude of living, and take the experience to restraint and bondage. Holy living is not negative but positive, not restraint but freedom, not mechanism but life. Can anything be more positive than love? Loving the Lord with all your heart, soul, mind, and all your strength and loving your neighbour as yourself? Can anything be more gloriously free than the liberty of an emancipated soul who is free and free indeed from the lust of the flesh and the carnality of the human nature? The grace that sanctifies lifts life above legalism and brings fullness, vitality and power. Holiness does not make people repellent, but radiant; does not make us sour, but sober; not touchy, but tender. Holiness people are people of singing hearts and shining faces. The experience brings perfect peace – peace without anxiety, without care. Children of God have no more right to worry than they have to get drunk. Present holiness experience does not hinder growth in the spiritual sense just as perfect health does not hinder growth in the physical sense. And to have health means to be free from disease just as to have holiness means to be free from inward or outward sins. Christ’s imparted holiness does not come by gradual, slow process any more than His healing virtue does not come by a gradual process. Must we be forever striving and forever failing when miracle-working Deliverer, full of grace and power, can heal our sin-cancer and do more than we can ask or think? But if we are holy and sanctified, and we are sure, will it not lead to pride and loss of humility? How can deliverance from the disposition to pride lead to the loss of humility? Was not our sinless Lord meek and lowly in heart? The blood that cleanses from all sin, cleanses from all forms of pride and the grace that implants the divine nature and imparts holiness also brings with the gift, lowliness, meekness and humility. Can God? God can. The resurrection of Jesus is the standard of measurement for the power of God. It is the example of what God can do. If He did that, He can do this. He is able. Call on Him NOW and be sanctified – made instantaneously holy by the blood of the Lamb.
Posted on: Wed, 15 Oct 2014 17:10:59 +0000
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