Finding God in the every day

Week 9 Day 1

Week 9 Day 1

Finding God in the every day

Leviticus 19:2 “Speak to the entire assembly of Israel and say to them: ‘Be holy because I, the Lord your God, am holy.

Hebrews 12:14 Make every effort to live in peace with everyone and to be holy; without holiness no one will see the Lord.

            The symbols above are from the Greek alphabet and are called alpha and omega. They represent in Christian understanding a self-description of Jesus often translated “I am the alpha and omega. (Revelation 1:8) At the very beginning of the scriptures we see God settling his own holiness upon his creation through the establishment of a holy sabbath. The whole of creation at that point was in a state of holiness. However, as soon as sin entered the created orld through the disobedience of the first parents Adam and Eve what is clearly demonstrated is that the whole concept of Holy Ground is diminished until Moses stands before God and is commanded to “take off  your (his) sandals for the place where you are (he was) standing  is(was) holy ground” Exodus 3:5

            If we track the idea of holiness throughout history, we can follow in Israel’s struggles the very same struggles happening within the Church which is still being built by Jesus Messiah. The sense, the desire for holiness in the lives of the people of God have ebbed and flowed over the centuries as worldly influences have invaded, inveigled, and not surprisingly dampened our hunger for the holiness of God by asking the very same question that the serpent asked Eve in the garden; “Did God really say?” Genesis 3:1

            The unfortunate reality is that for the few who over the years have struggled to seek God with “all our heart”  (Jeremiah 29:13) and having found his heart of holiness have become rather reactionary toward others who do not appear to be as close to God as they feel themselves to be. The result of this has become at times rather like a “class” war within the Church. As in any war the responses and adaptations to a cause are many and varied. Some in the whole holiness conflict have moved farther and farther along the continuum of what is acceptable behavior and what is not. Still others have followed the path of the 1^st Century gnostics claiming by word and deed that they are in a superior position. Many others literally blaspheme the Holy Spirit of God by claiming the “overwhelming” evidence that those “Pentecostal powers” ended with the age of the apostles.

            While many have staked out their positions in this “class war” The scripture still stands. “Without holiness no one will see the Lord” .I am reminded here of one of my college professors who in teaching a class called Holiness Doctrine recounted the agonies of John Wesley and many others down through the years who, desiring the holiness of God believed they would literally perish if God did not move and make possible the state of holiness which they were seeking. As a young student I struggled with this idea until one day in our Church services the above scriptures were shared with the congregation. At one point in the message the speaker fixed his eye directly on me in the midst of a crowd of several hundred people. He pointed directly at me and said, “Do you think God would command what he would not make possible?”