Daily Devotional For Monday, March 18, 2024

Yesterday, we looked at holiness and what it means to be holy. The Apostle Peter quoted from Leviticus 11:44-45; Leviticus 19:2 and Leviticus 20:7 when he wrote these words in 1 Peter 1:16, “For the Scriptures say, `You must be holy because I am holy’” (ESV). I do not know about you, but have you ever wondered why we have a problem with being holy and living a life of holiness? I certain have. I think there are several reasons we struggle with this.

First, I think the we have the wrong attitude towards sin. We do not want to define sin as God does; rather, we define sin according to our own feelings and beliefs. This means we tend to be more self-centered than God-centered in our approach to sin and even our victories over it. I appreciate how Jerry Bridges puts it:

“We are more concerned about our own “victory” over sin than we are about the fact that our sins grieve the heart of God. We cannot tolerate failure in our struggle with sin chiefly because we are success-oriented, not because we know it is offensive to God” (Source: Jerry bridges, The Pursuit of Holiness, p. 17).

When we sin, it is committing idolatry and adultery against God. Idolatry? Yes. We are choosing another god over Jesus Christ. Adultery? Yes! We are the bride of Christ. We water our sin down so as to justify and rationalize our sin so that we do not have to believe that we have broken the heart of God just like a spouse who commits adultery breaks the heart of their spouse when discovered.

W. S. Plumer puts it this way:

“We never see sin aright until we see it as against God....All sin is against God in this sense: that it is His law that is broken, His authority that is despised, His government that is set at naught....Pharaoh and Balaam, Saul and Judas each said, ‘I have sinned’; but the returning prodigal said, ‘I have sinned against heaven and before thee’; and David said, ‘Against Thee, Thee only have I sinned’” (Source: William S. Plumer, Psalms (1867; reprint edition, Edinburgh: The Banner of Truth Trust, p. 557).

Yes, God wants us to be victorious over sin but He wants us to be obedient more. Why? Obedience is God-directed; victory is self-directed. Let me explain. I believe this is more than just splitting hairs over words. The subtle difference makes all the difference between a self-centered life and a God-centered life. Please do not misunderstand me. God wants us to experience victory over sin, but only as a by-product of obedience to Jesus Christ — not something we get prideful or boast about. 

A second reason I think we have a problem with holiness is we do not understand nor internalize what it means for the believer “to live by faith.” This was the Apostle Paul’s main theme in Galatians 2:20, “I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me” (ESV). 

The Apostle Paul in Romans 6:1-14 expounds on this. Since we have been crucified with Christ, and we are no longer calling the shots, Christ is, then we are living in obedience by faith:

“What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? (2) By no means! How can we who died to sin still live in it? (3) Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? (4) We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life. (5) For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. (6) We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin. (7) For one who has died has been set free from sin. (8) Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. (9) We know that Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again; death no longer has dominion over him. (10)_ For the death he died he died to sin, once for all, but the life he lives he lives to God. (11) So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus. (12) Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, to make you obey its passions. (13) Do not present your members to sin as instruments for unrighteousness, but present yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life, and your members to God as instruments for righteousness. (14) For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace” (ESV).

John MacArthur says this:

“The true Christian life is not so much a believer’s living for Christ as Christ’s living through the believer. Because in Christ “all the fulness of Deity dwells in bodily form” (Col. 2:9), the fulness of God also dwells in every believer, as “partakers of the divine nature” (2 Pet. 1:4).” — (Source: John MacArthur, The MacArthur New Testament Commentary, “Galatians,” p. 60).

Listen to the words of J.C. Ryle, who was Bishop of Liverpool from 1880-1900:

“Is it wise to proclaim in so bald, naked, and unqualified a way as many do, that the holiness of converted people is by faith only, and not at all by personal   p 18  exertion? Is it according to the proportion of God’s Word? I doubt it. That faith in Christ is the root of all holiness...no well-instructed Christian will ever think of denying. But surely the Scriptures teach us that in following holiness the true Christian needs personal exertion and work as well as faith” (Source: J. C. Ryle, Holiness, p. viii).

The truth is no one can be accountable for personal holiness than that person. So, whether your sin is gossip, lying, cheating, or some sexual sin, only you through faith in Christ and by Christ’s power can put that sin away. A third problem we have is that while we may take certain sins seriously (ex. Murder, adultery, and etc.), we have a tendency to not take seriously some of our own personal sin.

We call sin, sin because God does and we do not commit it because God forbids it. To call sin anything else is to refuse to live a life of holiness. Sin is missing God’s mark of perfection:

“Eight-year-old Aryanna Schneeberg was playing in her backyard near Milwaukee, Wisconsin, when she was struck in the back with an arrow. A neighbor was attempting to shoot a squirrel, but his weapon missed its intended target and instead penetrated the child’s lung, spleen, stomach, and liver. She bears the scars that come with surviving such an injury.

We ought to think of Aryanna every time we hear a preacher explaining the Greek word for sin, hamartia, as “missing the mark.” Like most pulpit clichés, this one points to something that’s partly right. The problem, though, is that … we think of a bucolic setting where we are shooting our arrows toward a target on a bale of hay. The metaphor is almost comforting: We see ourselves not as criminals or rebels but as being off our game now and then. We reach into our quiver for one more chance to get it right. BUT, that is now who God nor the Bible defines sin. When it categorizes sins, it consistently does so in terms that imply both perpetrators and victims: enmity, dissension, oppression of orphans and widows, adultery, covetousness. In that light, sin is less like target practice on some isolated piece of countryside and more like loosing arrows on a city sidewalk in the midst of a pressing crowd. All around us are bodies, writhing or dead, struck down by our errant arrows” (Source: Ted Olsen, “The Collateral Damage of Sin,” Christianity Today, pp. 25-26).

Questions To Answer

1. Will you begin to look at sin as an offense against a holy God, instead of as a personal defeat only? 
2. Will you begin to take personal responsibility for your sin, realizing that as you do, you must depend on the grace of God? 
3. And will you decide to obey God in all areas of life, however insignificant the issue may be?
4. To live a life of holiness, we must call sin what is it is — sin. Will you call your own sin what God calls it — sin? Will you quit making excuses for your sin? Stop rationalizing it and stop playing it down?
5. Will you strive for a life of holiness? 
6. Will you attempt to feel how God’s heart is broken when you commit spiritual adultery against Him as the bride of Christ?
7. Will you strive to let Christ live through you as striving to live for Christ?

Scripture To Meditate On: 1 Peter 1:16, “For the Scriptures say, `You must be holy because I am holy’” (ESV).

Prayer to Pray: “Dear Jesus, I know that I break your heart with my sin. I am so sorry that I do not take my sin seriously. I act like it is no big deal when it is a huge deal. I want Christ living through me in faith rather than me striving to live for Christ in faith. I want to crucify my flesh and my sin so I can bring glory to Christ. In Jesus’ name, Amen!”

I love you Southside!