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THE PROMISES OF GOD
How to Be Holy John 17:17
In a word association game, if you are given "holy," what is the first word that comes to your mind? More than likely, it is not "dirt." In fact, that is probably one of the last words that you would associate with "holy." When we think of holiness, we think of something that is totally pure, completely clean, without any defect-morally or otherwise. And holiness can, at times, convey that connotation. But dirt-and many other things-can also be holy. How is that possible?
Do you remember when Moses met with God for the first time? He approached the presence of God in the burning bush and was told to remove his sandals because he was standing on "holy ground." Why was that particular place holy? Wasn't it just like all the other parts of the mountain where Moses stood? How far away from where he stood did the ground become "unholy" again? Good questions, all of which are answered by the meaning of "holy": the word means "set apart." The dirty ground where Moses stood didn't suddenly become clean. Rather, instead of it being just a common cleft in the side of a mountain, it was now set apart as a meeting place for God and Moses. For that moment, it was holy ground, a holy place. Anything set apart for God's purposes was holy: the Sabbath (Exodus 16:23), Jerusalem (Nehemiah 11:1), and furniture in the tabernacle (Exodus 30:27-29). So, holy means "set apart for special service or purpose."
In the New Testament, "sanctify" means to make holy. And Jesus prayed to the Father asking him to sanctify the disciples in the truth of God's word (John 17:17). We would at first think that the word of God itself is holy, but Jesus is asking that the word be used to make us holy. How? By setting us free from the common and profane in order that we might be set apart to that which is special for God (John 8:31-32).
Only the truth can set you free from slavery to sin. Once free in Christ you are set apart for God's special purpose for your life. You are made holy by the truth.
God's Promise to You: "I see you as holy if my truth has set you free."
RELATIONAL SPIRITUALITY-PART 6
Loving Others Compassionately
Christ's Resources Are Our Resources
Just as Jesus knew who He was, where He came from, and where He was going, so all who have put their trust and hope in Him should know the same. But few do. It is only as we frequently renew our minds with the spiritual truth of the Scriptures that we will move our thinking into alignment with the reality of who we are in Christ. Like Christ, we have dignity and power; every spiritual blessing has been given into our hands (Ephesians 1:3, 19; 3:16, 20-21). We also have significance and identity; we have become the children of God (Romans 8:16; 1 John 3:1-2). And we have been given the security and destiny of knowing that nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ (Romans 8:18, 35-39). These limitless resources meet our deepest needs and overcome the human dilemma of loneliness, insignificance, and meaninglessness.
When these truths begin to define our self-image, they make us secure enough to love and serve others without seeking our own interests first. Because of our security and significance in Christ, we do not need to be controlled by the opinions and responses of others. We have nothing to prove because we know who and whose we are. Rather than trying to impress and manipulate people, we can do our work with excellence as unto the Lord (Colossians 3:23). The more we are concerned with what God thinks of us, the less we will be worried about what others think of us. And when we are no longer enslaved to people's opinions of us, we are free to love and serve them as Christ loves us-with no strings attached.
The Risks and Rewards of Relationships
As these truths about what God has already accomplished for us become clearer in our thinking, we grow in awareness of our true freedom in Christ and desire to express this freedom and security in the way we approach relationships. Instead of one-upmanship, we can actually enjoy our membership in "the order of the towel" by taking pleasure in putting others first. Our identification with Christ leads to and is the basis for our imitation of Christ. This is precisely what Paul invited the Philippians to do when he told them to "Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of mind regard one another as more important than yourselves; do not merely look out for your own personal interests, but also for the interests of others" (Philippians 2:3-4). The apostle then used the servanthood of Jesus as the model for the mindset that we as His servants should embrace in our service to others (see 2:5-8).
But it is one thing to exalt the virtues of being a servant and another to be treated as one. It requires the sufficiency and security of a growing realization of our identification with Jesus Christ to minister with other-centered concern to people who misunderstand us and may never respect us. We will frequently need to review the truth that our performance and our acceptance by other people has nothing to do with our dignity and value, since this is determined by God and not by the world. When we suffer rejection and indifference, the pain will be very real, but it need not destroy us, since we have made the radical decision to look to God and His resources alone for our true and unchanging identity and worth.
If I had to choose one word to summarize the theme of the Bible from Genesis to Revelation, that word would be relationships. We have seen that God is a community of being-in the mystery of the divine Trinity, the three Persons of the Godhead enjoy perfect mutual love. We have also seen that God created us in His image as relational beings whose ultimate source of fullness and enjoyment should have been found in fellowship and intimacy with God. Through His loving initiative, God has overcome the alienation and separation caused by human sin by sending His Son into the world to pay for our guilt and to give us His life. The restoration of our vertical relationship with God that was made possible through Christ's atonement now becomes the basis for the restoration of righteous horizontal relationships with others. (Righteousness in Scripture is a relational concept, since it refers to good, just, and loving associations with God and others.)
As children of God through faith in Christ, we are called to a lifestyle of growing other-centeredness and diminishing self-centeredness as Christ increases and we decrease. While we are aware that in a sinful world, such a lifestyle makes us more vulnerable to the pains of rejection, indifference, demands, misunderstanding, and betrayal, we also realize that a wise person finds more joy in serving others than in pursuing possessions, power, performance, or prestige. Both the Old and the New Testaments resonate with this theme, and repeatedly tell us that a vital vertical relationship with the Lord is the key to quality horizontal relationships with others. The apostle Paul exemplified this wisdom when he described his Philippian readers as "my joy and crown" (4:1) and encouraged them to "Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice!" (4:4). The Lord should be the ultimate source of our joy and the continual source of our joy, whether our circumstances and dealings with people are positive or negative.
The more we take pleasure in loving and serving God, the greater our capacity to take pleasure in loving and serving people. Thus, Paul could write to the Thessalonians, "For who is our hope or joy or crown of exultation? Is it not even you, in the presence of our Lord Jesus at His coming? For you are our glory and joy" (1 Thessalonians 2:19-20; cf. 3:9). When we are secure in Christ, the rewards of investing our lives in people exceed the pains that people can cause. Paul not only saw people as a source of joy, but also as a reward, both in the present and in the future. When we love and serve people with eternal values in mind, there is great reward in being part of the process of people coming to Christ and growing in their character and relationships with their mates, children, and associates. There is joy in being used of God in encouraging, comforting, and building up others in our arenas of influence.
Jonathan Edwards observed that the ultimate good in life is to treat things according to their true value. The converse is also true, and we face the ever-present danger of treating the eternal as though it were temporal and the temporal as though it were eternal. The world system switches the price tags and encourages us to pursue things that will not last. "That which is highly esteemed among men is detestable in the sight of God" (Luke 16:15b). If we really want to be rich toward God (Luke 12:21), we must give our lives in exchange for the things God declares to be important.
The Inside Gatefold
ALL OF US ARE WORKERS TOGETHER
Imagine the Master Carpenter's tools holding a conference:
Brother Hammer presides, but several suggest he leave the meeting because he is too noisy. Brother Hammer replies, "If I have to leave this shop, Brother Screw must go also. You have to turn him around again and again to get him to accomplish anything."
Brother Screw then speaks up. "If you wish, I'll leave. But Brother Plane must leave, too. All his work is on the surface. His efforts have no depth."
To this, Brother Plane responds, "Brother Rule will also have to withdraw, for he is always measuring folks as though he were the only one who is right."
Brother Rule then complains about Brother Sandpaper: "He ought to leave, too, because he's so rough and always rubbing people the wrong way." And so goes the discord.
In the midst of all this discussion, in walks the Carpenter of Nazareth. He has arrived to start his day's work. Putting on his apron, he goes to the bench to make a pulpit from which to proclaim the gospel. He uses Brothers Hammer, Screw, Plane, Rule, Sandpaper, and all the other tools. After the day's work, when the pulpit is finished, Brother Saw arises and remarks, "Brethren, I observe that all of us are workers together with the Lord."