Be Holy As I Am Holy

God doesn't give us a set of rules to live by like with Israel; they had rules for holidays and sacrifices; how to make contracts, what to eat, how to clean mildew out of a house (Lev. 14!!), and what to wear to the tabernacle/temple.  God has changed His tone with us; He strikes more at the heart of the matter, because the heart is what matters!
   Peter tells us in I Peter 1:13-15 to "be holy, for God is holy."  This is a quote from Leviticus, when God was giving Israel the law to  follow and guidelines for living; He paused several times to say, "Be Holy as I am Holy."  This theme from the OT is carried forward into the NT, so we don't get to write it off!
   What does it mean to be holy?  Conforming to God's standards; totally devoted to God in everything; set apart from anything worldly; thinking the thoughts of God. God didn't give us rules under His new covenant for how to clean our houses or even what to eat; He didn't give us lots of structure to help us see for ourselves how to be holy, but He did come out again in the NT telling us to do it.  So what do we see that can help us?
   The root of this Hebrew word means "to be clean, ceremonially and/or morally."  Why?  Why does it matter so much to God that we are clean?  As a parent of young children, I was always ready with a wet washcloth or wipe to keep my girls clean; after playing outside in dirt or with the neighbor's dog I was always ready for a bath.  Why?  I wanted to make sure they were free of any germs they might have picked up and brought with them. I didn't want them getting any sickness from something dirty they had encountered.  What if - dirt was something we were allergic to in our house?  What if it was absolutely imperative that we not touch anything with dirt on it?  Then my girls would have had to change their behavior - I could not have enjoyed the bubble-blowing fun or building dirt volcanoes with baking soda and vinegar.  We could not have enjoyed cutting flower bouquets or braiding them into wreaths for our hair.  The dogs would have been totally unwelcome!!
   I suggest this is the relationship God has with "dirt." He is holy, and by His very nature cannot be around unholiness of any kind.  When He tells us to be holy, it is because He cannot come near if we are not.  He knows how bad that is for us.  One of my favorite illustrations of this principle at work comes from a science project we did in elementary school.  We discovered that if you sprinkle pepper onto a bowl of water, and then you take a bar of real soap and let it touch the water, the pepper runs away.  It cannot stay near the soap; the soap cannot be made to touch the pepper.  Picture you with pepper on your soul, and God the soap trying to be near to you because you are His beloved.  He cannot do it.  It is impossible.  He is too Holy.
   An example of this in scripture, I believe, is found in God's dealing with Moses.  He comes to Moses and recruits him to be the spokesman for Israel to Pharoah.  After being convinced, Moses sets off for Egypt.  On the way, Exodus 4:24 that the Lord met him and sought to kill him.  Whaaaa??  Isn't Moses doing what God asked?  The answer is in the next few verses - Moses had failed to circumcise his own sons in the way God had established for His people way back in Gen. 17.   Fast forward to Ex. 19.  When God is instructing Moses in how to tell the people to come near to Mount Sinai, He says in v22 "tell the priests who come near to consecrate themselves, or the Lord will break out against them."  In other words, God said He could not be near them unless they were consecrated, which was also one purpose of circumcision.  Perhaps Moses' neglectfulness of his son's consecration almost cost him his life.
    So how do we achieve holiness?  One key is found in Paul's words in 2 Cor. 10:3-5.  Paul says we are at war, but our weapons are not physical.  He says we are to destroy fortresses (NAS) or strongholds (NIV) or obstacles (NLT) that are human, and we take captive every thought for Christ.  That suggests that my thoughts are naturally for something other than Christ.  It suggests they didn't come to be on Christ's side on their own.  They have to be taken captive.  Why?  Because we live in a world that tries to steal our thoughts.  According to this passage, our thoughts are where we are to start our warfare.  People who are unbelieving are described as having corrupt minds (Titus 1:15:, as those who lie awake making evil plans (Micah 2:1).
   In Matthew 5:21-22, Jesus says sin does not start as an act of murder; it started with anger and angry thoughts.  Mark 7:18, 20-23 tells us that from inside man's heart come evil thoughts, and those are first in a list of sins.  He says in v 18 that what goes into a man does not defile but what comes out.
   That brings in another idea  - Jesus says what goes in does not defile, but what comes out.  James 1:14 says our own desires cause us to be tempted, nothing outside.  That starts with our thought life.
   Maybe being in the world but not of the world, having the thoughts of God to be holy like He is holy - maybe it is as simple as only letting our minds have good things going in.  Then there would be less bad to come out.  Phil. 4:8 gives us good advice - the things we should dwell on (NASB) and think about (NIV) are things that are true, honorable, noble, pure, admirable, lovely - Paul tells us the key to having a pure thought life, to helping us take our thoughts captive - is keeping our thoughts on things that God would think about.
   Jesus said that what goes in does not defile; this means that I Cor. 6:12 is also true - all things are lawful, but not all things are good (profitable - NASB; beneficial-NIV).  Paul says watching a TV show with gay characters is lawful; listening to music that glorifies sexual immorality is permissible (NIV); watching movies that glorifies selfishness are allowed (NLT); but they are not all good for me.  What comes out of me defiles me, and feeding the fleshly nature means it grows stronger.  If you watch things or listen to things that cause you to think less than the thoughts of God, you need to turn those things off.  Paul said it is not good.  Why would you waste the time you have on something not profitable?  Paul goes on in Eph. 5:1 to tell us to imitate God, like dearly loved children imitate their parents.  Have you ever seen a little girl wearing her mother's shoes?  Carrying a play phone up to her ear?  She is imitating her mother who loves her dearly; she wants to be like her.
   Scary feeling as a mother - but that is what children who feel loved do.  Paul says we are to imitate our Father just like that.  Later in vv 15-17 he challenges us to be "careful how you walk, making the most of your time (redeeming the time - NASB, NIV) because the days are evil."  You don't have time to waste on things that are unprofitable!  Time is short, and satan wants to make sure you waste a lot of yours in unprofitable things.
   Remember satan is prowling like a lion (active hunter) seeking who he can devour (I Peter 5:8).  God warned Cain back in Gen. 4:7 that sin was crouching at his door, and Cain needed to subdue it and be its master.  He could not slay it, but he just needed to subdue it.  It is an interesting side note that Peter pictured the enemy as the same animal that Christ is pictured as - they are both compared to lions.  Christ of course is the lion of Judah - the leader and protector of His people.  However, we know satan loves to imitate truth, and this picture of him reenforces that.
   We cannot pretend that sin is not present - that the devil is not crouching at our door waiting to devour us - that simply leads to us fading away, as Casting Crowns points out so poignantly in their song, "Slow Fade."  We are to give God our physical selves as a living sacrifice (Rom. 12:1) and avoid looking like the world (v 2) by letting God transform the way we think.  Transformation is not a small change - it is metamorphosing (metamorphoo in Greek).  This word is the basis for our description of  a caterpillar into a butterfly.    He will change your character (which is not in line with His on its own - remember we must take it captive) to be as different from your natural self as a butterfly is from a caterpillar.  He is not after just another color caterpillar - He wants butterflies.
   We see basically 2 choices:  to conquer evil with good or to be conquered.  If we aren't choosing to redeem our time by putting our minds on the right things, by letting God's ways of thinking transform our way of thinking, then we are not conquering evil with good.  There is no 3rd choice of ignoring it or pretending it doesn't affect us.  God doesn't leave that option open.  If we are engaged in activities that are not beneficial, then we are engaged in activities that are destructive.  There is no neutral.  If you are not trying to go somewhere on purpose, you are going somewhere else.

Connected To So Many

I am often struck by how we all are connected to so many other people, even at our most independent. If I have a normal day, I have depended on the people who wove the cloth in my clothes, the people who built my car, those who made the light bulbs I used in my light fixtures, the people who put in my wiring and work to keep electricity flowing. I am indebted to those who work to keep us safe in our streets and over the seas,to those who work to provide water in our town, for those who built the roads I drive on, those who own and run gasoline stations so I can put more fuel in my car. Then there are all those who cleaned the public restrooms I used, mopped those hall floors at the office building I went into and the one that mowed the beautiful grass out in front. If none of those people did their jobs, my life would be amazingly different. I acknowledge that I pay most of these people for their work, but the fact remains that if they didn't work at their jobs, I wouldn't have any of those things. Of course none of these people knew me as the reason for their work, but they knew there would be people affected. Because of this simple fact, it is my duty as well as privilege to try to turn around and provide what I am enabled to those around me, to pass these blessings on. If I sit on my pile of blessings and only come out of myself when something is wrong, I am robbing the world around me. Daily I need to think about what I am here to do for others. Not just those under my own roof, but all those I contact: the check out girl in the post office, the sweet family who work the vegetable stand where I buy produce, and the UPS man trying to deliver a package with my dog barking his wheels down my driveway. This is the only way to live: connected with all the people I come into contact with. This is the only way to fully respect all as creations of My Lord.

God's Presence In Our Storms

I recently suffered an accidental injury to my left hand, my pinkie finger, to be precise. While opening a glass bottle of buttermilk, the glass shattered, and my left pinkie was sliced through pretty thoroughly. Both the tendons that control movement, the main nerve on the outside of my hand, and the little artery were all sliced on the glass. I immediately noticed that I could not control the finger; it did not move for me. Finding out the extent of my injuries while getting stitches at the ER, I began to feel a little faint when I realized I was headed for surgery. Now, I don't have blood pressure issues as a routine problem, but when I am under stress (including routine doctor's checkups!) it tends to soar. In the ER that Saturday afternoon, it was spiking a little higher than we wanted it to! One of the issues I faced over the weekend waiting for surgery to be scheduled was what would happen to my blood pressure during the stress of surgery! Second only to that, I had to puzzle out things like getting dressed one-handed (picture it ladies!!) and writing out checks/bills (yes, I am left-handed!!). From Saturday to Monday, I prayed for the surgeon, anesthesiologist, and the nurses on duty that Monday to be rested and focused, and for my body to submit to the surgery without complications and also for God to keep His eyes on me and help calm me. For the surgery, I chose to have a shoulder block injection to deaden my entire arm rather than having general anesthesia, which meant I would be fully aware and awake. When we arrived, the calm and peace I felt during the entire prep process was completely outside my capabilities. The surgery would take about two hours, and my poor husband was to wait in the waiting room without a thing to do to help me out save praying. During the trip to the surgery suite, I chatted with the nurses and the surgeon's assistants. Thanks to my sweet girl who shared her ipod While in surgery, I watched an episode of a favorite BBC drama and listened to praise music. I answered a couple of questions of the surgeon over the drape; I spoke with the nurse stationed at my head; I watched my vital signs. My blood pressure never topped 130/80 and my pulse never raced. I truly experienced the Peace That Passes Understanding throughout my whole day. Whenever I felt a twinge of anxiety, I prayed for my Father to hold my hand; He really has never been more Present to me than that day! The nurses remarked about my calm; they joked about passing ipods out to all the surgery patients! I was able to share with one nurse that I listened to praise music. The whole day was amazingly stress=free for me!! I came home with pain medicines and took one dose that night as the shoulder block began to wear off; I took one more dose the next day and never took any more. The rest of my experience has been amazingly pain-free!! What a gift from my Lord! I have praised Him since then for being my Rock and my Shelter. While healing is still in progress, I praise Him that I wasn't hurt worse; glass flew all over me and could have hit my neck, face, or even wrists. I am thankful it was me and not my husband who would have had to miss weeks of work with such an injury; I am so grateful it was me and not one of my children, which would be much worse to endure. He has worked in me a work of patience and humility which I needed, and I am grateful that I will only bear a scar on a pinkie as a reminder (and maybe a little slower typing skill!). I just wanted to share this experience of the Lord's direct work so that others can see what a mighty God we serve. Praise Him!!