Holiness!! What Is THAT?! :)
8/9/2003
Saturday Evening, August 9, 2003
Generally, a western mind has been trained to think of “holiness” as a “lifestyle” that does not do bad things, and perhaps does good things—though primarily the former.
Biblically, “‘Be HOLY as I am Holy,’ says the Lord!” and many similar Commands may RESULT in turning away from certain choices—and, in fact, most certainly WILL have that net effect! And yet, holiness is NOT about that, in God’s heart and mind. Holiness ALWAYS involves a relationship between two or more. The Greek word means “Set apart FOR” and does not imply specific actions, per se!
“Holiness” is always about a relationship—not a lifestyle or action.
The Father and the Son have a perfectly “holy” relationship. Why? The Father and Son exist in unapproachable Holiness because the Father does all for the Son, and by the Son, and in the Son. “All things are created by Him and for Him.” And, Jesus does “nothing” apart from the Father. Nothing whatsoever is about “self” or “my agenda” or “my ministry” or any other “me, me, me” things—religious, “good” or otherwise.
Likewise, we are to be a Holy People, are we not?
What does that MEAN? Do-gooders? Always avoiding bad things? Perhaps some of that is the END result of holiness, but that is NOT what “holiness” means. It ONLY means “set apart FOR” and implies RELATIONSHIP—or nothing at all.
Therefore, there is no Holiness, in the Biblical sense, if we function independent of the Father, and Son, and Spirit, and His Body! No matter how “good” our actions may seem, if we are not intimately intertwined RealTime in dialogue and heart, our actions are not “holy” at all!
Whenever we function independently (no matter how “spiritual” our actions seemed), without connection and relationship to Head and Body, we have missed holiness. When we live “on our own” without acknowledging the living Jesus and those He lives within in Gift and Life and Love, we have missed holiness. If all things are not wrapped up in and for and through the Head and Body in the holiness of daily relationship, regardless of how spiritual they seem, “something has gone very dark,” to quote a man from Australia. Holiness is about relationship.
There is no Holiness, regardless of good deeds, when we are living life out on our own terms. His “Intent” is a Together-Life in and through the Son and His Body, in eminently practical and observable ways. There can be no holiness, no holy relationship, apart from the “daily” interdependence and intertwined and committed lives to Him and one another (Heb. 3:12-14; 1Cor. 12, 13).
“When you’ve seen them, you’ve seen me.” “We being many are ONE Body.” “Baptized by one Spirit into ONE Body.” Really? Do YOU live that way, or just talk about it and hyper-spiritualize it as some unfathomable ethereal “positional” thing, instead of the Reality of the observable Life of Christ? Don’t ever let a man “steal your crown” by selling you THAT!
“THIS is how all men will know you are MY disciples!” Hallelujah! : )
1) Some do ignore these truths and do their own thing, within their four walls at “home”—and then try to “add the Kingdom” by “attendance-based” religion. It is unholy to do so, for reasons of the very definition of the word Holy. 2) Some, also, have never known the Truth about Holiness and Life in Him, because it has been hidden from them. Now, we can see that this “holiness” is plain in the committed daily Life of Jesus together with the Twelve. There were no “sermons” or “bible studies.” They “rose up, sat down, and walked along the Way.” That was holiness, set-apartness, Together-Life! “Christianity” was not, and IS not, a “teaching session” or “worship session”…and “back to our own lives.” In Acts 2:42-47 with Jesus in the Spirit and one another, Holiness lives on! Some have genuinely not yet “SEEN” it, but in the last of the last days, and the manifestation of the Feast of Booths and Tabernacles, they will! 3) Some, unfortunately, “deliberately forget” these Truths, and twist them “to their own destruction.” They fool themselves and others. Underneath it all, when you touch them and they scream bloody murder, you will often find they do not WANT these Truths of Holiness and Life due to nearly totally hidden motives of ambition, or pride, or laziness, or greed for esteem, or lust for money, or fear of submission and love. They talk about concepts of Love and Truth and His Plan, but will not live it. Not so with you!
“HIS Intent is NOW, through the Church, to make known His manifested Wisdom to the principalities and powers!”
Whatever anyone else does, YOU “be Holy, as HE is Holy”—and live in the Son, by the Spirit, for and unto the Father, truly with the Saints—in daily Connectedness and Life with all! Be HOLY! It’s FUN and FREEING, not a burden!! Explore His daily Together-Life in the “power of an indestructible Life” that always was (in the Father and the Son) and always will be (in the Head and with and through the Body), by the Spirit!
This will, of course, involve a costly “daily” Cross for others…but we DID sign up for that, as I recall. : ) “If ANY man would come after Me….”
Whatever anyone else does, YOU can be Holy, AS He is Holy, in intimate relationship with all that is Him! : )
“Without holiness, no one will SEE the Lord.”
“He has made perfect forever those who are BEING made holy.”