Holy. Holiness. Righteous. Set apart. 

Holiness is a pillar of the Christian life, just as it is one of the primary aspects of the nature of God. More than this, it’s *who* he is. He embodies holiness. He exudes holiness. He imparts holiness. I want to take a couple of weeks and write on a few aspects of what holiness means to the believer. 

First, what holiness *isn’t*. Holiness isn’t the sum total of all the actions you don’t do. It used to be that our definition of holiness changed with whatever “buzz sin” was going through the church at the moment, whether that was smoking (which incidentally wasn’t looked down upon until the 50’s), movies, women wearing jeans, hemlines above the knees, makeup, drinking, looking at a tavern the wrong way (jokes), etc. The practice of relegating holiness to a simple formula of dos and don’ts both trivializes holiness and cheapens it in the same sweeping move. 

More often than not, we have mistaken holiness for sinless perfection. They are not the same thing. 

Holy: Consecrated to God or a religious purpose; sacred. 

Holiness: The state of being holy “a life wholly devoted to God”. 

Holiness is a mindset that produces a holy lifestyle. 

“As God’s obedient children, never again shape your lives by the desires that you followed when you didn’t know better.

For Scripture says: “You are to be holy, because I am holy.””

1 Peter 1:14, 16 TPT

It is the intense, determined desire to honor God with every fiber of your being, to become as like him in your behavior to the fullest extent in order to show the world the most pure representation of the love of Christ possible. It is not a litany of pet sins and fear-based rules, it is the posture of a submitted heart that longs to be like God. 

Sometimes, that looks like “what I won’t do”. More often, it looks like “what I will do”. Being set apart and consecrated is less about a lifestyle you’re no longer affiliated with and more about the Kingdom lifestyle you now lead. Holiness is reaching out to your neighbor, it’s feeding the poor, it’s taking care of the sick, it’s reaching out to the orphan and widowed. If we have a list of “don’ts” that is longer than our “dos”, we don’t have holiness, we have legalism. We have a system that tells us that what God desires primarily is good behavior, not a Great Commission. Jesus came to live in a way we could never live (perfect) so we could return to relationship with the Father and preach a Gospel (good news) we were born to preach and live. 

This in no way minimizes our responsibility to live the way that the Bible preaches. Rather, my hope is that if you’re reading this, you’ll be challenged to remind yourself that our primary responsibility to the Father is to tell others about what he has done and that He can do the same for them too! Part of that telling is living a life that is devoted to looking like him. 

Be Blessed

Joel Ecklund

Generations Pastor