Grace and Holiness

For many years I have struggled to reconcile the ideas of Grace and holiness. I am by nature a black and white personality. I see everything through this lens including the issue of grace and holiness. For many years I had no concept whatsoever of what grace looks like and how to accept it. I lived as if it was up me and my ability to earn the favor and grace of God. Like I owed it to him to be the best I could be. I also believed that I was to look like the perfect Christian in order to somehow protect God’s reputation. I am to be a “light in the dark” after all, right? So how do we reconcile these seemingly opposing ideas?

 

Well, for me it began with who I believed God to be. See, I was very much unaware of the fact that I believed he was an angry , punishing God who was waiting for me to prove my unworthiness as one of his followers. I believed unknowingly that I was responsible for not only my own salvation but the salvation of those who were around me. I lived in constant fear of losing my salvation due to my own inability to live a perfect, sinless life. Now, I am sure that reading that statement you are thinking, well duh! Only Jesus was able to do that right?? Well, I bet that if you really thought about it, there are areas in your own life that you are trying to live up to an unreasonable standard that you have placed on yourself… am I right? I bet you are you own worse critic. Well, I know of a lot of people who live as if they are expected to be perfect. What I am coming to realize though is that Yes, God is holy and we are called to be holy as he is, however, He calls us to be holy because he is our loving groom who wants nothing to hinder us from loving Him with out shame and guilt. See, if we can wrap our minds around the fact that He is holy and that because of this, no unholy thing can survive His presence… and He longs for us to be in His presence, because we are in love with him, not because we want to earn his love. We already have all of His love. He knew us all while we were or are at our worst and still sent His son to die in our place so that we could be with Him. Before we ever did a single “good” thing, He already loved us. That is so powerful. Can you wrap your mind around this concept? The Bible says that His burden is easy , his yoke is light. In comparison, the Pharisees imposed a man made burden of legalism or works based thinking. To quote from one of my favorite books, “Purifying the prophetic” by R. Loren Sanford.:

 

“It is time to lay it all down. The Striving. The human effort. The legalism. Freely we have received. Now let us freely give. Let us recover the Gospel, received by grace in the wonderful river of the Father’s love and then selflessly shared. It is all there in the cross and the blood! We need only to plumb the depths of it.”

 

Now about holiness. We are called to be holy if we are Christians. We are to be set apart. However what many people fail to realize is the fact that it is a process. It is called sanctification which is essentially being made into the image of Christ. We are not saved and then immediately we are sin-free. If fact, the closer I am to Jesus, the more keenly I am aware of my own lack of holiness. He is a Holy God. When I am looking at myself in the light of who He is, I will fall short…very short! However, gold is still gold even if mixed up with other alloys. I am still loved and still accepted by Him, because of Jesus. He is my righteousness. This goes back to gazing on who He is. We must know who he really is and who we are in Him. We must meditate on this truth, to become like Him. I have spent a lot of time and hard work, trying to learn the truth of who He is. He is not like my father, or my mother. He is not like any person that I know. He is perfect. He loves me despite my inadequacies. He is making me more like Him every day.

 

Because I tend to be an either or person, I have to constantly remind myself that it is not by my own strength that I can live a holy life. My responsibility is to “remain in Him” , to gaze upon His holiness so that He can transform me. I will never be perfect on this side of Heaven, but I can and should be constantly changing to be more like him. By gazing at Him, I will become more holy. My heart will change. It will become more like His heart. Then my “actions” will come out of the overflow of my love for Him instead of a feeling of fear of punishment or some striving to earn his love.

 

There is a song which I love by Misty Edwards called “Come break the Chains” that says this:

 

“Come break the Chains, that hinder love, all that remains of yesteryear, come break the chains that pull me down, Come break the chains and draw me near. Let your fire burn, consuming me, come let your jealous flame come take away everything, let your fire burn, consuming me, let your jealous flame come and write your name on my heart till all that remains is the light of your countenance and I will be satisfied when I awaken as a lover of You.”

 

This is my prayer, and I hope that you will make it your own in your journey to find balance in this area!