Holy Excuses

Reading: Job 1:1-12

"God has not called us to uncleanness, but to holiness" (1 Thess 4:7)

For every sin we commit Satan is ready to provide us with an excuse. But excuse is the most unprofitable item ever manufactured, especially in Christian life. Unless we stop making lame excuses we will only be walking with crutches. There are ten commonest excuses we give when we fail to walk holy before God. We will look at them today and the next four days.

Holiness is impossible!

This excuse paints God as a merciless dictator instead of a loving father. Which father will give impossible orders to his children or make impossible demands? The Bible and Church history abound with stories of men and women who did walk holy in their lifetime. A few examples: "Noah was a just man, blameless in his generation. Noah walked with God" (Gen 6:9). God Himself testified about Job, "There is none like My servant Job on the earth, a blameless and upright man, one who fears God and shuns evil" (Job 1:8). Concerning Zacharias and Elizabeth, Luke has recorded, "They were both righteous before God, walking in all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord, blameless" (Lk 1:6). Watching the lives of saintly men and women instead of the failures inspires in us a confidence that we too can make it.

Holiness is abnormal!

We not only think that holiness is for a special group of people but also that holiness is an above-average condition. We have become so subnormal that normal appears abnormal! The Epistle to the Corinthians was not written to a mature group of Christians but to a Church which had all the strife and sensuality as any Church in the world today. But in his very greeting the apostle Paul reminds the recipients of the Epistle that they had been "set apart in Christ Jesus, called to be saints" (1 Cor 1:2). This explains growth in holiness as a march from "positional" sanctity in Christ to "practical" sanctification in life. "He who is holy, let him be holy still" (Rev 22:11). Christian life means climbing God's holy hill (Psa 24:3). The moment we look behind instead of pressing forward we will begin to slide down (Phil 3:12-14). We must resist the temptation to settle down in mediocrity but stay sensitive to "the upward call of God in Christ Jesus!" Pastors should "strive" towards this end of making every member of their congregation "perfect" in Christ Jesus (Col 1:28,29).

No one is saintly enough to enter Heaven without Jesus;

No one is too sinful to be made holy by Him!

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Character: NextJan 5