He got me. He got me real good. It was with pinpoint accuracy that He struck me, right between the eyes. A real life David and Goliath moment, except part of my theology was Goliath and God’s word was David’s stone. A nugget of God’s truth smashing through a pagan mind set.
“For He chose us in Him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in His sight.” (Eph 1:4 NIV)
Now don’t get me wrong, this is not the first time I’ve read this, but come on, have you considered the implications of this?
– While the world was still dark and formless and before God uttered those defining words, “Let there be…”, He chose you to be: Holy and blameless.
– Before your parents, whether as part of a responsible, planned pregnancy or in a moment of self-serving human lust came together to conceive you, He chose you to be: Holy and blameless.
– While you were in the middle thoughts or actions that stand completely contrary to the holy, eternal nature of God, He had already chosen you to be: Holy and blameless.
It’s safe to say that God has always had a plan and part of that plan is to see you and I sitting, at the right hand of the Father, in Christ, holy and blameless. Am I labouring this point? Yes, yes I am. You see, I have struggled with this. I love God and I want more of Him in my life. I want to see Him breaking in and through me. I want to see the world shift around me in accordance to the shift I have experienced within me. So my belief has been that in order for me to see more of the Spirit moving in me, I have to be better, more holy and more pure.
But you can’t be ‘more holy’! You can’t be ‘more pure’! Holy is holy, pure is pure. Holiness is not a dial that goes from 1 to 10. It’s a switch that is either off or on. And if you’ve given yourself to God, it is on! You are holy! No person, force or event can point a finger at your right standing.
Too long have I lived a Christian life with a dial notion of holiness. I have strived to live with my holiness dial sitting at 10. Or at least hovering around the 9 mark. However, on a dial that goes to 10, God exists and operates at level that cannot be described by a human numbering system. It is simply impossible to attain that holiness. Our only salvation lies in accepting His holiness.
But then what? What does this mean to me and how should I now live it out? I still want to see God breaking in and through me. I still want to see the world shift around me. I want to taste God. I want to hear Him more and more. If the issue is not with who I am in Christ (and I pray that as you’ve read this article, that question is being settled) then what needs to change? Let me ask you this. How much does the taste of your tea or coffee change after you’ve eaten some jam on toast? Has the coffee or tea changed its taste, or has your perceived taste of it changed? Who has changed? The answer is simply, your taste has changed.
Now before I go on, please, do not hear the legalist talking. The legalist wants to get in on this conversation, but don’t let it. That is not me. And neither should it be you. But the question has to be asked, when we strive and contend to hear God, to taste of His goodness and to partake in His holiness and it falls short, what has changed? Surely not God! The answer is simply, you and I have changed. What are we watching, tasting, hearing and partaking of that is altering our part and pleasure in a divine relationship?
“But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His wonderful light”. (1 Pet 2:9 NIV)
We have been called out. If you didn’t know that, you know now! We are not called to blend in, to watch the same things as the world, to read the same things, to speak the same things, to worry about their things. You see, like salvation, we don’t work for holiness. We walk from holiness. We are holy, in Him.
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