Artist: shai linne & Timothy Brindle
Song: Holiness of God
Album: Grassroots

Just for a moment today, I want to touch again on the issue of holiness within the Body of Christ. Previously, we looked at how holiness relates to us in the fact that God calls His people to be holy because He is holy. But the question remains, just how holy is God? If we look through Scripture we find several examples, especially in the Old Testament of just how holy God really is. It is this holiness that we need to keep in mind when we are worshiping the Lord and honoring His name.

So, how holy is God? Let's take a look at some examples from the Old Testament, and then let's bring it back to relate it to us. Now, during the time of Moses, the people chose to not hear from God themselves, but asked for a mediator between the two (Moses), and as a result God established the temple system and had them build the ark of the covenant, which would house the Commandments and other artifacts; this ark was to serve as a physical representation of the presence of God in the lives of the children of Israel. With that in mind, let us continue.

We can start first with the sons of Aaron, Nadab & Abihu; these two, along with the rest of the levitical line were called to be God's holy priests. Well, Nadab & Abihu offered a sacrifice that went against what God had prescribed and they were killed by God because of it. What about Uzzah? David and his people were transporting the ark to another location and during the journey the ark was about to fall over; to keep it from hitting the ground, Uzzah touched it with his hand (which was forbidden because God is holy) and was immediately killed by the Lord. Or what about Uzziah who decided that he wanted to offer up incense to the Lord? He was stricken with leprosy for the rest of his days.

Those are just a few examples, but you can get the idea of just how holy our God is. Without Christ paying the penalty for our sins and being made holy through Him, we are sinful beings that have no right to even begin to enter into the presence of God. We can't be like Uzzah, who thought that he was cleaner than the dusty ground; we have to realize who we are and how unholy we are before a holy God. We also can't get so prideful and think that we can just offer up any old praise to the Lord and think that it will be acceptable to Him, just look at what happened to Nadab, Abihu, and Uzziah. Even though God probably won't strike us down today for those same infractions, He is still the same holy God that we find in the Old Testament and we need to honor Him as such. Just like we are told in 1 Peter 1:15-16, God is holy, and we are to be holy too.

Too often, in this day & age, we play with God, thinking that He is not really as powerful as Scripture says He is. Just remember that God is not mocked, and that we will ultimately reap what we sow. Let us work towards holiness and give God all the honor that He deserves; let us worship Him as God and Father, the Creator of the universe, instead of a homeboy or buddy. Amen? Amen.