Daily Devotional For Monday, April 7, 2025

Merry Monday Southside! What is that you fear? Some people fear snakes, spiders, roaches, taking tests and death. Most people have something or someone they fear. To me, there are two basic fears:

1. A fear for your health or life. This can come from some sickness such as cancer or from someone actually trying to harm you. This is a fear I never want anyone to experience.
2. A second kind of fear is one I call the fear or respect. Growing up, I “feared” or “respected” my mother because I loved her. I never questioned if my mother loved me. I had this respect for her even when I did not always agree with her or see or point. To me, this is the kind of fear we should have with God. This is the kind of respect we should have with God. 

To be honest, in the church, I really do not see this kind of fear. Many so-called Christians today use profanity like non-Christians do. Many “Christian” today get drunk like non-Christians do today. Many “Christian” sleep around or live with a partner they are sexually involved with at this time of their life. No fear of God. No respect for God. And no love for God. They have this false assumption that since their lives are not worse than others, then God is not bothered by their lifestyle choices. Look at 1 Peter 1:15-17:

“But like the Holy One who called you, be holy yourselves also in all your behavior; (16) because it is written, ‘You shall be holy, for I am holy.’ (17) If you address as Father the One who impartially judges according to each one’s work, conduct yourselves in fear during the time of your stay on earth” (NASB).

We are called to be holy as God is holy. The Hebrew Old Testament word for holy is [קֹ֖דֶשׁ, kadosh] and the Greek New Testament word for holy is [ἅγιος; hagios]. Both words in both languages mean the same thing – “to set apart.” Our God is set apart from other gods because they really do not exist. They are fabrications of people. We are to be set apart – meaning – we are to mirror Jesus Christ and not the anti-christs in this world. We have this reverent fear that one day we will stand before the Lord and give an account of our lives. In fact, we will be rewarded on how committed we were to be holy for the Lord.

Hebrews 12:28 says, “Since we are receiving a Kingdom that is unshakable, let us be thankful and please God by worshiping Him with holy fear and awe” (NLT). See the word “unshakable?” We’ve all had something happen that shook us to our very core. We knew a positive outcome was beyond anything we could accomplish on our own, and we turned to the Lord in desperation. We were consumed with the need to bring the situation to the Lord and beg for His help. Our minds were filled with prayers and pleadings. 

We searched our Bibles for scriptures that offered hope. But what did we say when He intervened with the positive outcome that we had asked Him for? “It would have turned out okay in the end.” “That treatment worked after all.” “All my hard work finally paid off!” Let’s learn to acknowledge the supernatural intervention of God, and then be thankful for it. Let’s show Him our gratitude and our reverence with the same intensity with which we make our requests.

I don’t know if the angels can see us, but it might be an unshakable experience for them if they saw us consistently striving to be holy. To me, to be holy means we have this reverent respect for who God is that is fueled by a growing desire to bring Him glory with our lives. I think the reason so many Christians choose not to be holy is because they do not have any fear or respect of the Lord. When you love someone, you also respect them and you want to please them in a godly way. I like what Reuben Archer Torrey says below:

“Some years ago we often sang the hymn, "Take Time to Be Holy." I wish we could sing it more these days. It takes time to be holy; one cannot be holy in a hurry, and much of the time that it takes to be holy must go into secret prayer. Some people express surprise that professing Christians today are so little like their Lord, but when I stop to think how little time the average Christian today puts into secret prayer the thing that astonishes me is, not that we are so little like the Lord, but that we are as much like the Lord as we are.” (Source: Reuben Archer Torrey in The Best of R. A. Torrey. Christianity Today, Vol. 39, no. 9).

To me this means as disciples of Jesus Christ in this world, we must be like Jesus in this way – Jesus desired to be holy more than He desired to be happy. We must have that same attitude as well. I close with this – an article from the Associated Press about our our Duke University Medical Hospital:

“There was quite a mix-up at the Duke University Hospitals in Raleigh and Durham, North Carolina. Sometime in November 2004, maintenance workers had drained hydraulic fluid from the hospital elevators into empty detergent drums and then didn't get rid of the drums. Through a strange series of events, the drums were mistakenly redistributed to the people who clean surgical instruments. It took two months and 3,800 surgeries before anyone figured out something was wrong.

Washing the instruments in hydraulic fluid was not an effective means of sterilization. The biggest question is, what kind of damage has been done to the patients? No one was sure what the petroleum residue might do to people. The hospital's head honcho assured the public, "We want to give people the message that we care about our patients," and no doubt they do. But if their instruments weren't safe, they were a threat to their patients no matter how much they cared” (Source: Associated Press, 6-13-05).”

A church careless about holiness is like that! We may care about our people, but we're a danger to them nonetheless. It isn't enough to share the gospel with the lost; we must also be sure we act in holy ways and teach holiness as a way of life, lest we harm the people of God. We serve an all-powerful King who rules over an unshakable Kingdom, and we should respond to Him with humility, gratitude and holiness.

Questions To Consider

1. What are you afraid of most? How can you apply the truth of 1 John 4:18?
2. When it comes to this issue of holiness, how would the Lord say you measure up and why?
3. No disciple of Jesus Christ would deny His holiness. Why? Where in your own life do you need to be more like Jesus in His holiness and why?
4. The example above of the horrible mistake done by Duke University Hospital shows us that if we are not holy, we are not only harming ourselves but other disciples of Jesus Christ. How is this true? What harm is your lack of holiness doing to others in the body of Christ? What is the Lord telling you to do to help and not harm His church and your witness?

Scripture To Meditate On: Leviticus 20:7, “You shall consecrate yourselves therefore and be holy, for I am the Lord your God” (NASB).

Prayer To Pray: “Heavenly Father, I humbly thank You for Your love, provision, promises, and abundant blessings of peace. I am so grateful for Your forgiveness through the cross, Your life and strength, Your wisdom, and Your authority to overcome every attack of the enemy. I am in awe of the victory that is mine through Jesus. Please help me to be holy as You are holy so that I do not hurt other disciples nor my witness.  In His name, Amen.”

I love you Southside!--Pastor Kelly