Be Still & Know

4 God is Holy SCRIPTURE MEDITATION And they sing the song of Moses, the servant of God, and the song of the Lamb, saying, Great and amazing are your deeds, O Lord God the Almighty! Just and true are your ways, O King of the nations! Who will not fear, O Lord, and glorify your name? For you alone are holy. All nations will come and worship you, for your righteous acts have been revealed. Revelation 15:3-4 PRAYER Heavenly Father, there is none like you. You alone are high and lifted up and worthy of my worship. Indeed, you are holy, holy, holy. As your child, I ask now that you would tune my heart towards yours and shape my mind by the power of your Word. Would you be pleased with the meditation of my soul, I pray, in Jesus’ name. Amen. IN BIBLICAL PERSPECTIVE Can you think of a time when you have been the stranger? Or maybe you might be able to think of a time when you have felt completely different from other people? Similarly, God is altogether different from us. He is in complete control; we are not. He is perfect and righteous; we are not. He is God; we are not. The holiness of God points to two specific elements of God’s character. First, it points to the fact that God is fully set apart and different from anything and anybody else. Second, it points to the fact that he is morally righteous in his manifold perfections. In Genesis 2:3, God set apart the seventh day as “holy,” which means it was to be different from all the other days. In Exodus 3:5, God tells Moses that the ground on which he stood was “holy” ground, which means that it was set apart and different. Paul tells Timothy that whoever is cleansed from sin is “set apart as holy” (2 Tim. 2:21). Being holy, in the first place, then, means that God is altogether different and set apart in glory, power, wisdom, righteousness, authority, goodness, love, truth, grace, and knowledge. But holiness also refers to God’s perfect righteous character. A. W. Pink writes, “The sum of all moral excellency is found in him.”3 No other purity comes close to the purity of God. He holds the full measure of all that is good and right. Every act, thought, and intent of God is completely righteous and perfect. He does not err, fail, nor does he act unjustly toward his creation. God’s commandments, too, are holy. They are perfect, right, and true. They are different from the law of man for they are derived from a holy and righteous God. In Isaiah 6, the prophet records the seraphim calling out, “Holy, holy, holy is the LORD of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory” (Is. 6:3). Likewise, the apostle John writes of the heavenly courts of praise: “Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord God Almighty, who was and is and is to come” (Rev. 4:8). The repetition is the superlative—as in high, higher, highest. That the biblical writers attest to the thrice-holy God is an explicit reference that there exists no one like God. He is altogether different and set apart, while manifesting the full sum of moral perfection. Not only is God holy, but he calls us to holiness—perfect moral obedience (Lev. 11:44; 1 Pet. 1:15). Many people today think that God simply wants us to try our hardest. But that is not a biblical concept of the Christian life. God calls us to perfection and holiness. “But there’s no way!” you might be saying. Ah, but there is a Way—the Way, the Truth and the Life (Jn. 14:6)! While we are called to perfect holiness, we have fallen short of this glory of God (Rom. 3:23) and the wages of our sin is death (Rom. 6:23). Because God is holy, he must punish sin. Sin cannot stand for one second before a holy and righteous God. In fact, the most fundamental question of life is: “How can an unholy person stand in the presence of a holy God?” But God, who is rich in mercy, sent his only Son into this world to become our substitute (Eph. 2:4). All of our filthiness, sin, blemishes, and unholiness was placed on Christ and he nailed it to the cross, thereby cancelling the record of debt that stood against us (Col. 2:14). In return, the perfect record of Jesus’ obedience—his righteousness—was credited to our account. By faith, we are so unified with him that when God looks upon us, he sees the righteousness and the holy record of his own Son, Jesus Christ. REFLECTION QUESTIONS In Revelation 15, the apostle John imparts a vision of heavenly worship around the throne. The heartbeat of this worship is the “song of the Lamb.” Why do you think the sacrificial lambs in the Old Testament (c.f. Leviticus) had to be “without blemish” to (temporarily) atone for the sins of God’s people? How do those Old Testament “unblemished lambs” point to the Lamb of God, Jesus Christ? How does God being “just and true” (v. 3) relate to God being holy? How does God’s “righteous acts” (v. 4) relate to God being holy? When you think of God being holy, what comes to your mind about yourself? Does the thought of God’s holiness evoke any immediate response in your heart? Throughout Paul’s epistles, he calls various Christians, “saints,” which in the Greek literally means holy ones. If we are not—in and of ourselves—holy, then how can Paul call imperfect, unholy, believers “holy?” DIGGING DEEPER • Other Scripture passages on the holiness of God include Exodus 15:11; Leviticus 11:44; 2 Chronicles 20:21; Isaiah 6:3; Psalm 30:4; 89:35; 110:3; 145:17; Mark 1:24; John 6:69; 1 Peter 1:15; 1 John 1:5; and Revelation 4:8. • The sacraments are one example of something that is holy that we partake of in the Christian life. In fact, part of the word “sacred” is derived from an understanding of holiness. • Another clear example of something set apart is the Bible, God’s holy Word. God’s Word is unlike any other book. It is fully inspired by the Holy Spirit and, therefore, comes ultimately from a divine author (2 Tim. 3:16; 2 Pet. 1:21). Being “holy” would appropriately refer to it being wholly different, set apart, true, and right. • See also R. C. Sproul, The Holiness of God (Carol Stream, Illinois: Tyndale House Publishers, 2000) and Stephen Charnock, The Existence and Attributes of God (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 1996).