Holiness has been on my mind for a couple weeks. As a Christian, I am called to be holy. To be seperate from the normal, seperate from the profane. To desire holiness is to want to be set apart for Godly purposes. Holiness is really a vast process and thankfully my holiness isn't dependant upon me. God has set me apart, God has made me a saint, and He calls me to choose Him. When I choose Him, I consecrate my life in service to my creator. It's a little as if call Christians have a part in the Nazarite vow (read Numbers 6) not, necessarily the hair growing and some of the regulations for a Nazarite - but the consecration and being set apart. I have a friend, Ryan, who took a Nazarite vow for an entire year - didn't cut his hair or beard and followed all the other regulations from Numbers 6 - except he took the communion grape juice every Sunday. I don't know if Ryan reads this, but if he does, could you share some of your thoughts on holiness you may have gleaned from that experience. Anyone else - what are your thoughts on holiness?
This song has kept running through my mind for the past couple weeks as well:
Holiness, holiness is what I long for,
Holiness is what I need,
Holiness, holiness is what you want from me,
So take my life and form it,
Take my mind, transform it,
Take my will, conform it,
To yours, to yours, O Lord.
Posts
An Exciting New Opportunity
4 years ago
3 comments:
A couple more thoughts - In the OT Holiness is contagious. All the holiness comes from God and the things that he chooses to touch become holy, then those holy things can pass along the holiness. Conversely, the category of uncleanliness is also contagious so that unclean things make clean things unclean by contact.
A lot of times we tend to focus on holiness being either an absence of sin or the facade of being sinless (a.k.a. holier than thou). God's view of holiness has more to do with relationships than with actions. Which relationships have the most influence on us?
Great point James! How can we be consecrated when we are constantly influenced by relationships that drive us further from God. That is why you will always be Alpha Chi in my heart.
I don't just mean human relationships - in our relationships with those who don't bring us closer to God the question to ask is: who is influencing who? But we have relationships with things like movies, music, tv, books, etc. all of which influence our relationship with God.
Post a Comment