Hello and welcome to the Middletown Baptist Church podcast,
where we are proclaiming the truth to the world.
In this podcast series, we're going to be looking into biblical
words that have great significance to our faith.
The name of this series is called the Word of the Week, where
once a week we will dive deeper into these words that we are
familiar with in scripture.
So come along with me, let's study the Word of the week.
Pastor Josh here with another word of the week.
The word of the Week this week is holiness.
What does it mean when we say that God is holy?
The holiness of God refers to his perfection, his sinlessness,
his blamelessness, the fact that he is completely and utterly
pure in every way.
There is no sin found in Him.
We see a few different occasions in Scripture, one in the
Old Testament and one in the New Testament where it says holy,
holy, holy three times.
You see that word holy describing our Savior.
We're going to look at the one here in Isaiah, because I want us
to study here this week what holiness is in the context of who
God is.
And then also what does that mean for us?
What does God's holiness mean for us as believers?
And so, uh, here this week, I'd like us to start here in the
Book of Isaiah.
You can follow along with me here.
And this is a description of Isaiah and his experience with the
Lord and his recognition of the holiness of God.
And so we see In Isaiah, chapter 6, verse 1, it says, in the
year that King Uzziah died, I saw also the Lord sitting upon a
throne high and lifted up, and his train filled the temple.
Above it stood the seraphims.
Each one had six wings, and with twain he covered his face, and
with twain he covered his feet, and, and between he did fly.
And one cried unto another and said, holy, holy, holy is the Lord
of hosts.
The whole earth is full of his glory.
And the post of the door moved at the voice of him that cried.
And the house was filled with smoke.
And so here we see the proclamation of God's holiness, His.
His all powerful nature, his all knowing nature, his omnipresence,
all of his attributes that we believe according to scripture, all
of his attributes are tied to his holiness.
We know that God is loving, but we know that he is completely
loving and perfect in his loving nature.
That's his holiness there.
He's forgiving, but he's completely forgiving in his nature.
And so one would say that holiness is the defining element
of who God is and, and, and what his character is all about.
There's so many Other things that we could talk about.
When it comes to God's character, He is infinite, right?
He's beyond us.
His thoughts are above our thoughts.
His ways are beyond our ways.
But I think it's important for us to understand the holiness of
God in contrast to the.
The sin that we are characterized by as human beings.
And so I want us to see Isaiah's reaction here in Isaiah
chapter 6 to the recognition of the holiness of God.
And it says in verse number five, then said I, woe is me, for
I am undone because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the
midst of people of unclean lips, for mine eyes have seen the
King, the Lord of hosts.
And.
And then so we go a little bit further here.
So, so he recognizes his moral failure in the sight of God's holiness.
And I think that's one of the things that we have to understand
because in our life, sometimes we are tempted to think that we are
good people, that.
That we are people that are inherently good.
And what the Bible says, that in and of ourselves and our flesh,
we are sinful, we are flawed.
And even later on in the book of Isaiah, it says that our, our
sin, our, excuse me, our good works are like filthy rags.
And therefore, even if we think that we are good people and
we are earning our.
Our worth and our goodness and our morality, we still fall short.
And so it says in verse six of Isaiah, chapter six, then flew one
of the seraphims unto me, having a live coal in his hand, which
he had taken with the tongs from off the altar.
And he laid it upon my mouth and said, lo, this hath touched thy
lips, and thine iniquity is taken away and thy sin is purged.
And so what we can ultimately see here in this passage is that
we all are in desperate need of the Holy One to offer forgiveness
to us, offer cleansing to us.
And so the fact that God is holy refers to the fact that he is
different, that he is distinct.
And so literally, holiness refers to something or someone that
has been separated from the common you so set aside for a specific
purpose.
And so in this case, we know that God is set apart from us in
his holiness and his perfection.
Now we're going to look later on in the study about how we as Christians
are called to be holy.
Later on the New Testament, it says, be holy, for I am holy.
And so we're going to talk about how we as believers can walk
in the path of righteousness, how we can understand the holiness
of God.
But before we do that, we must understand God's character and his
holiness.
And so God is different in every way.
God is eternal.
He's all powerful.
That's omnipotence.
He's omniscient.
He knows everything.
He's omnipresent.
He's everywhere.
That that is what makes God different than the creation that
we deal with today, with our humanity.
And He.
He is distinct in that.
And so God's holiness is in his difference, in the fact that
he is different in all those ways, but also different in the fact
that he is not flawed by sin, that he's not marred by sin like
we are as well.
And so in.
In this passage, in Isaiah and in other passages of Scripture, we're
just reminded about how much we are falling short of the glory
of God.
That doesn't mean that we can just throw our hands up in the air
and quit and just say, you know what?
I'll never be like God, so I can live the way that I want to live.
No, the Bible shows there the need for our salvation, the need
for our reliance on the Holy One to extend holiness to us.
And so one of the responses to God's holiness and understanding,
understanding his sinless nature, because by the way, the Bible
does say that God is the same yesterday, today, and forever.
We know that he does not change.
And so just as he is holy back here in the Book of Isaiah, so he
is holy today.
And we have to understand that.
So one of the results of understanding God's holiness and
believing in God's holiness is that we fall short of that holiness.
And we need a Savior.
And, and we know the message of the Gospel is that Jesus Christ
came.
And the Bible says in Second Corinthians, Chapter 5, he who knew
no sin became sin for us.
And so the Holy One gave Himself for us so that we could understand
forgiveness, so that we could understand his holiness.
And so it brings us to a recognition that we need more, we
need a Savior.
We need something else in our life other than our own good works.
And so holiness brings us to a place of a need for a Savior.
But also God's holiness brings us to a place of stirring our heart
to praise and adore our Savior, to.
To understand that he is worthy of our worship.
There's a lot of things in this world that we worship that are
not perfect.
They are flawed.
Whether it be a person or a product or just a lifestyle, we worship
these things that don't deserve worship.
And so what we're really told in Scripture is the only thing that
we are to worship is the Lord.
The only person that we are to worship is the Lord.
And so the holiness of God stirs our heart to worship.
It stirs our heart to praise him for who he is and his perfection
and how he offers that gift of salvation to us.
And so we should not shy away from the fact that the Bible clearly
states that we must rest in the holiness of God.
That's the standard.
Now, none of us can be completely holy in the way that we
act in our daily walk.
The Bible does say that one day we will have the opportunity
to live with the Lord and be freed from that bondage of, of sin
forever.
Now, even in our salvation, we're free from the bondage of sin.
So I want to be clear about that.
We, we no longer have to sin because we are redeemed.
But the Bible does say that we are still wrestling with the flesh.
But the Bible says also that one day we will be with him and we
will no longer have that sin nature, and we will live in eternity
in perfection with Him.
But in the meantime, as we are living on this earth, we are called
to continue to trust in his holiness.
And so we are called to be holy, which we're going to be looking
at more next week.
In First Peter, chapter one, there is that challenge that we should
be holy because God is holy.
But what we're learning here this week is that God is holy.
And that brings us to a place of understanding that we are inadequate,
we are insufficient, and he is the only one that brings that adequate
sufficiency and that salvation and that hope.
And so I hope that that's something that we can all recognize
in our life, that none of us can earn that through our own holiness.
But ultimately it is the holiness of God that we are to rest
in and trust in and know that he has offered His Son as the perfect
sacrifice for us.
And so holy, holy, holy.
We, we know that in the New Testament, in the book of Revelation,
we see the same praise extended to the Lord.
And, and I think it's important to note that.
So we started in Isaiah and we'll end in Revelation, Revelation
chapter four.
We, we go to a place there where it is essentially the folks
there worshiping.
And it's a revelation, four, eight.
And the four beasts had each of them six wings about him, and
they were full of eyes within.
And they rest not day and night, saying, holy, holy, holy,
Lord God Almighty, which was and is and is to come.
And so there is this worship, this eternal worship, worshiping
God for His holiness, worshiping him for his eternality,
worshiping him for his all powerful nature, Holy, holy, holy
Lord God Almighty, which was and is and is to come.
And I think that as a believer we must rest and understand his holiness
today.
And that drives us to live lives of holiness in our own lives.
And so next week we'll look at what it means to be holy.
It doesn't necessarily mean to be sinlessly perfect in every way,
but it does mean that we are set aside sanctified for a specific
use.
And so we'll talk more about that next week.
When it comes to the topic of holiness, well, remember, God is
holy, God is perfect, God loves you, he's worthy of our worship.
And God has extended that gift of grace to you in, in the, in the
work of the gospel and salvation.
So I pray that this is something that we can think about
and grow in here this week.
And we look forward to talking to you next week when we talk about
the holiness of God imparted unto us.
So thank you so much.
God bless you.
We will come back to you with another Word of the Week next week.
Hey, I really appreciate that you listen to the Word of the Week
podcast.
If you have any questions about the podcast or about our church,
Middletown Baptist Channel Church, you can find more information
about us on Facebook or YouTube or you can find the podcast
on NBCpodcast.org you can contact me directly at Josh Massaro
at middletown baptist church.org Stay tuned for future
Word of the Week episodes where we dive deeper into words that
impact our life according to scripture.
Thank you so much.
God bless.
We'll talk to you soon.