I. Introduction

A. Illustration – Don Aycock writes, The pastor walked into the church alone and felt an overwhelming sense of God's holiness. He went to the front, knelt down at the altar rail, and began to beat himself on the chest, crying out, "Oh Lord, I am nothing!" A few moments later, the minister of music entered the church. He too felt the overwhelming presence of God and, seeing the pastor at the altar, went and knelt down beside him. He also began to strike his chest and say, "Oh Lord, I am nothing. I am nothing." It happened that the whole staff, one by one, began coming in. The minister of recreation, the minister of education—eventually, the whole staff, all kneeling at the altar bemoaning their "nothingness" before the Almighty. A little while later, the church custodian came in and got caught up in the revival, as well. He knelt beside the ministerial colleagues and began beating on his chest, adding to the refrain, "Oh Lord, I am nothing. I am nothing." At that moment the pastor looked up, saw the janitor, and nudged the minister of music. "Well, well," he said. "Just look at who thinks he's nothing!" (as cited on PreachingToday.com)

B. This pastor had one not so little problem. He failed to connect the holiness of God with real life, so he became prideful. It’s kind of funny how we tend to be most prideful and least selfless when we disconnect the holiness of God from our daily lives. Without a doubt there is a huge disconnect between American Christianity and God’s holiness. That’s why we’ve got to work so hard to get that sense of God’s holiness back. Jesus shows us how in Matthew 22:35-40, and I’ll be reading from the New Living.

C. Matthew 22:35-40 from the New Living – One of them, an expert in religious law, tried to trap him with this question: 36”Teacher, which is the most important commandment in the law of Moses?” 37 Jesus replied, “’You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind.’ 38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 A second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ 40 All the other commandments and all the demands of the prophets are based on these two commandments.”

D. Jesus understood the truth that God’s character is holy love. Jesus taught that God’s holiness would manifest itself in us through God’s love. The more filled to overflowing we are with God’s love, the greater the grip His holiness has on our hearts and lives. And the less His holiness has a grip on our hearts and lives, the less we will be filled to overflowing with God’s love.

II. Holiness vs. Legalism

A. During the first two Sundays of this month we learned a lot about holiness, God’s desire for it in our lives, and how to ask God to make us holy even as He is holy. To help us learn how to live a life of holiness before God, we’ve got to understand a few things that holiness is and that it isn’t.

B. Holiness is practical, not practiced. Anything that requires us to live rehearsed lives so that we make sure all the rules are followed regardless of what God wants is legalism. Holiness applies to every part of our lives. It is living a life that is guided each moment by the Holy Spirit. I know that sounds a little out there, but it’s true and very practical. Galatians 5:25 says, If we are living now by the Holy Spirit, let us follow the Holy Spirit’s leading in every part of our lives. The problem boils down to our motives. If our motive is fear or a desire to look good or any other variation of the two, then we’re being legalistic. If our motive is love for our Lord and a pure desire to please Him, them we’re seeking holiness. When we love God with everything we are, we will love others with His love. Legalism kills. Holiness brings life in its fullest. Holiness does seek to fulfill all of God’s laws and commandments, but love is the motive. Holiness is practical, not practiced.

C. Holiness is not sinless perfection. Anything that insists that the moment we sin we lose our holiness, our sanctification, for good is legalism. If when we sin we repent and confess to Jesus we are forgiven. 1 John 1:9 – 2:1 says, But if we confess our sins to him, he is faithful and just to forgive us and to cleanse us from every wrong. 10 If we claim we have not sinned, we are calling God a liar and showing that his word has no place in our hearts. 2:1 My dear children, I am writing this to you so that you will not sin. But if you do sin, there is someone to plead for you before the Father. He is Jesus Christ, the one who pleases God completely. Powerful passage! If we swallow our pride and confess our wrongdoing to God, we go right back to being filled with His Holy Spirit and His love, because He forgives us. Legalism wants us to keep paying and paying for our sins, because we’ve violated the rules. After all, the right way to deal with wrongdoing is punishment, right? By dying on the cross, Jesus Christ took our punishment on Himself and made it possible for us to be filled with His Spirit completely and holy through and through. Holiness is not sinless perfection, but a way of the heart that impacts every part of us.

D. Holiness is transformation, not conformation. Holiness is being transformed from the inside out by the power of the Holy Spirit and filled to overflowing with His love. Conformation is legalism, because all it looks at is whether or not we’re following the rules. Following the rules is the right thing to do, but only when we do it out of a pure love of God. Following the rules just to follow the rules, or out of selfishness or fear, brings hypocrisy, which is what the Pharisees and other religious leaders of Jesus’ time were so guilty of doing. Holiness is about who we are, about being transformed into the character of God. It’s not about becoming a clone of God – it’s about allowing God’s character to bring the unique aspects of our talents, temperaments and personalities to what they were created to be. We were created for holiness, to be transformed into the character of God, but we settle for legalism, for conforming to rules and standards. Why? Because it’s easier to do than it is to be. It’s easier to busy ourselves with activity than it is to become who God created us to be from the inside out. Holiness is transformation, not conformation.

E.Holiness is a lifestyle of complete surrender brought about by a moment of complete surrender. It is not a once for all lifetime event. That would be like saying that since we fed our kids this morning, we don’t have to feed them anymore. Legalism would have us believe that, since we had that moment of complete surrender, all we have to do is follow the rules and we’re holy. We can’t rest on what happened a few seconds or minutes or hours or days or even years ago. Past commitments and surrenders only count if they are used as stepping-stones to greater maturity and a better grasp of how to live out this life of holiness. We can’t rest on what we’ve done in the past. That would be kind of like refusing to fix a leak in the roof because we put a new roof on eight or nine years ago. Or refusing to change the oil in our car because it was new oil when we bought the thing. I know that sounds ludicrous, but it’s the same thing as trying to stay holy and surrendered by merely following the rules. Remember: rules without relationship brings rebellion. Relationship without rules brings license. Following His rules because of our deep love for Him and His holiness brings growth in holiness and in His love. Holiness is a lifestyle of complete surrender brought about by a moment of complete surrender.

F. Holiness is an outward manifestation of the inward life. It is not an outward imposition on the inward life. Holiness does not come about by merely enforcing behavioral rules and standards. That can only bring outward conformity. You could even call it a form of Christian political correctness. You can also call it legalism, because that’s what outward conformity is. Holiness is a making clear of what God has done on the inside by what we do on the outside. In other words, holiness is allowing our behavior to show what God is doing in our character. We may conform to the same standards as legalism, but it will be clear to everyone that we’re doing it because we love God and we love people with all we are. We can try to fake that all we want, but people can spot a phony a mile off, and that form of hypocrisy is what the Church is criticized most for. It does matter that you do the right things, but it matters more that you do them for the right reasons. Holiness is an outward manifestation of the inward life, not an outward imposition on the inward life.

G. Illustration – James Emery White, in his book Long Night’s Journey into Day, writes, To be filled with the Holy Spirit means that we allow him to occupy and control every area of our lives…How much of you does the Holy Spirit have? When teaching this to my seminary students, I bring two glasses of water and two packets of Alka-Seltzer to class. I drop a packet of Alka-Seltzer, with the wrapper on, into one glass. Then I plop an unsealed packet into the second glass, and watch it fill with fizz. I say to my students, "Both glasses have the Alka-Seltzer, just as all Christians have the Holy Spirit. But notice how you can have the Holy Spirit and not his filling." Our goal is to live in such a way as to unwrap the packaging around the presence and power of the Holy Spirit within us (as cited on PreachingToday.com). Do we want holiness, or do we want legalism? If we truly want holiness, we’ll do whatever it takes to allow the Holy Spirit to completely fill us and sanctify us.

III. Holiness: A Humble Calling

A. Micah 6:8 says, No, O people, the Lord has already told you what is good, and this is what he requires: to do what is right, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God. Doing what is right is good, but loving mercy and allowing it to impact every decision you make is better. And best is walking humbly with our God, because if we’re walking humbly with God, we will love mercy and treat people lovingly and justly and mercifully. We can’t walk humbly with God until and unless we’re completely filled with His Spirit. We can’t truly love mercy until and unless we’re completely filled with His Spirit. We can’t do what is right until and unless we’re completely filled with His Spirit. How do we know if we’re completely filled with the Holy Spirit? If we’re walking in holiness that flows from our heart, then we know we’re completely filled and made holy. Holiness shows itself in how we treat other people. If we’re not treating others with justice, mercy, humility and love, we’re not sanctified.

B. Philippians 2:5-11 shows us what holiness in action looks like. Your attitude should be the same that Christ Jesus had. 6 Though he was God, he did not demand and cling to his rights as God. 7 He made himself nothing; he took the humble position of a slave and appeared in human form. 8 And in human form he obediently humbled himself even further by dying a criminal’s death on a cross. 9 Because of this, God raised him up to the heights of heaven and gave him a name that is above every other name, 10 so that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11 and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. Holiness means living in genuine humility. Legalism means living in proud pretension. There’s a certain lack of authenticity in legalism that repels others. There’s a certain lack of pride and of self-importance in holiness that attracts others. All of us can probably think of people we hate being around because of their proud and self-important attitude. And I would hope all of us can think of people who we love to be around because being in their presence is almost like being in the presence of holy love. I don’t know about you, but I’d rather be one of those folks, and allowing God to fill us completely with His Spirit and make us holy through and through is the only way we get there. If we can’t manifest holiness in our every day lives, our world will never come to see their need for Jesus. Instead, we’ll just be another bunch of “those hypocrites” who acknowledge Jesus with our lips on Sunday but who never experience the real power of God in our daily lives.

C. Illustration – Seminary professor D.A. Carson wrote, People do not drift toward holiness. Apart from grace-driven effort, people do not gravitate toward godliness, prayer, obedience to Scripture, faith, and delight in the Lord. We drift toward compromise and call it tolerance; we drift toward disobedience and call it freedom; we drift toward superstition and call it faith. We cherish the indiscipline of lost self-control and call it relaxation; we slouch toward prayerlessness and delude ourselves into thinking we have escaped legalism; we slide toward godlessness and convince ourselves we have been liberated (as cited on PreachingToday.com). We can’t expect holiness to just happen in our hearts and lives. It takes the hard work of building a daily intimate relationship with Jesus Christ. It takes the hard work of continually humbling ourselves before God. It takes the hard work of continually submitting ourselves to His will and His character. It takes the hard work of diligently repenting of and confessing all sins before they have a chance to get a foothold in our lives. It takes the hard work of no longer excusing our “little” indiscretions but seeing them as they really are, which is sin.

D. Illustration – G.K. Chesterton wrote, Men do not differ much about what things they will call evils; they differ enormously about what evils they will call excusable (as cited on PreachingToday.com). We can’t afford to excuse sin in our lives any longer. We can’t afford to allow our culture to dictate what behaviors and attitudes define sin, and what ones are “just having fun.” If we live this life of holiness, our character will transformed from the inside out, and as a result our culture will be transformed. As I said a couple of weeks ago, God wants to make His holiness real in our daily lives. We just have to ask and keep asking Him to clean us out, to fill us completely with His Spirit, to make us holy even as He is holy. Sometimes it takes a while to happen because He has to work us through areas of our hearts and lives that aren’t fully surrendered to Him. And sometimes He has to show us things about ourselves that we like a whole bunch, but that are not holy and that need to be gotten rid of. And sometimes He fills us through and through instantaneously. But if we keep asking, He will do it in His time. Let’s make sure we ask and keep asking Him to clean out every part of our hearts and lives and to fill us completely with His Spirit and to make us holy even as He is holy. After all, if holiness is to make a difference in real life, it’s got to start with us.

IV. Conclusion

A. Please bow your heads and close your eyes out of respect for each other’s privacy. What has God been speaking to your heart this morning? Let’s spend a few quiet moments listening to the Holy Spirit speaking to our hearts.

B. Again, what’s God been speaking to your heart this morning? If He’s telling you that you need to surrender to His will that you begin to live this life of holiness from the inside out, and that you need to allow Him to transform your daily life, now’s the time to make that surrender. Spend a few moments right now surrendering to His will that you allow Him to make you holy even as He is holy. Let’s pray.