The Holiness of God

Dear friends and neighbors, brothers and sisters. Because of my last two blog’s I desire to make clear that I do not believe that God takes pleasure in the destruction of the wicked. You may be asking your selves why He destroys the wicked if He takes no pleasure in it?  It is because of Holiness. At the beginning of this journey into the attributes of God, I said that all attributes had to be displayed equally, that one attribute did not take precedence over another. When it comes to holiness, however, I think I have to change my thinking a little. The Seraphim in heaven do not fly around the throne of God singing, Love, Love, Love, is the Lord God almighty. The Seraphim do not sing, Wrath, Wrath, Wrath, is the Lord God almighty. NO, the Seraphim fly around the throne of God singing, Holy, Holy, Holy, is the Lord God Almighty, who is and was and is to come. Holiness is the defining attribute of God. Holiness demands that all of God’s attributes be displayed to the elect so that we can more fully know Him. Holiness is why God’s wrath is stored up for vessels of wrath prepared beforehand and at the same time, God does not take pleasure in their destruction. God’s wrath and God’s love must be equally displayed. God’s anger at sin and His love must equally be displayed. Because all of God’s attributes are equally holy, one attribute cannot take precedence over another. Holiness is the attribute that makes this balance possible and makes God the one true and holy God.

I have read that love is God’s defining attribute but, if God’s love were not controlled by God’s holiness, we might have a God blinded by love, unable to move against sin. Locked in fear of losing one of his creation and not the Holy God of the scripture. If God’s wrath were not controlled by holiness, we would have a tyrant god, much like the man-made gods of old. However, this is not the God we have.  We have a holy, loving, merciful God who is also righteous, just, and filled with wrath against sin. His decrees will be carried out untarnished by unbridled emotion, but instead controlled by God’s holiness.

The primary biblical definition of Holiness: Separate; Other or Different; Higher or Superior.

The secondary definition: Personal righteousness and purity.

The secondary definition is holiness as applied to Humans,

“since it is written, “You shall be holy, for I am holy.” (1Peter 1:16).

But it is the primary definition that we are concerned with. The Separate, Different, Higher, Superior God. Defining God in this way helps to understand why we cannot understand God’s Holiness. The reason why we sound to some hard and unforgiving when we discuss issues like God’s wrath being saved up for vessels of wrath prepared beforehand.   We almost always get the response that God takes no pleasure in the destruction of the wicked. To which we should always respond amen because there is no disagreement in these two statements. God is Holy and because His ways are not our ways, for Him, both can be true. We should not judge God based on our understanding of how emotions work, because our emotions are illogical, unthought messes. God is Holy and Righteous and true and because He is Holy all of his attributes must be equally weighed. All of His attributes must be equally displayed. One attribute of God cannot outweigh the other.

The disciples, after having watched Christ's displays of power in healing, believing that His prayer life had some effect, asked Him to teach them how to pray. Jesus responded.

 "Pray then like this: 'Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil,'" (Mathew 6:9-13).

Christ is not here proclaiming that God’s name is Holy or he would have said, hallowed is your name. No, instead He said ‘hallowed be your name.”  We need to be praying every time that we lift our voices to God that God’s name would be held as Holy on earth as it is in heaven. Then we can ask that His will be done and that His kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven. There is divine order in this prayer that Christ instructs, not just His first-century followers, but he instructs us to pray.

There are so many privileges and honors in being part of the elect of God. What was said in the first half of this blog may sound confusing, or incomprehensible to those who are not elect It may sound this way to those who are elect but have been under false teaching their whole lives. It may sound this way to newborn elect, who haven’t had the benefit of proper teaching or time to read and study God’s word. To you, I say pray for God’s wisdom.  It is contained in the word of God and imparted by the Holy Spirit of God. To those who are simply not of the faith at this time but feel like you want to know more, find someone to help you, to pray with you. Most importantly seek Christ and do not stop until you have the assurance that you belong to Him.

I hope that I did some justice to God’s Holiness. If you want to no more, R C Sproul has a 5 or 6 video series on The holiness of God on YouTube. I highly recommend it. As always I will continue to pray that God uses this blog, and for those who are not believers, that God would give you hearts of flesh, ears to hear, and eyes to see. For those who are believers I will pray for God to increase your understanding, and for wisdom.

May God have mercy on our eternal souls.