Introduction
After years of service the Lord, the Prophet Isaiah was in for a shock one day. In Isaiah chapter 6, the prophet speaks about a vision he had of the Lord. In this vision, Isaiah caught a glimpse of the holiness of God. When Isaiah saw God’s utter holiness, his mind instantly turned to his utter unholiness. In pain, he cries out, “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!” (Isaiah 6:5)
When Isaiah saw the cleanliness and the spotlessness of God, he was undone. He quickly came to the realization of his blackened heart and total depravity. The very man who was God’s main prophet, and likely thought of as the holiness man alive, stood ashamed of his sin at the moment he came into contact with the holiness of God (in a vision).
If we compare ourselves to the “really bad” people around us, we might think pretty highly of ourselves. Until we can see ourselves as compared to God’s holiness, we are unlikely to be very disturbed by our own unholiness. The world typically addresses sin only is if impedes on the comfort level of other people. How many times have you heard phrases like:
- “It’s ok as long as it doesn’t hurt anybody?
- “What consenting adults do behind closed doors is not my business.”
- “Nobody’s perfect. We’re only human.”
We tolerate imperfection and unholiness as a society. We don’t have any expectation that people will always do the right thing. We are not usually surprised if:
- Our politicians stretch the truth in order to win a few more votes or
- If a car salesman forgets to mention the defects in the vehicle or
- If a college professor seems to love liberal ideology more than good scholarship or
- If a motorist steps on the gas as soon as they pass the traffic camera.
I went to traffic school once (because I had been caught speeding). It was “comedy traffic school.” The first joke of the day was to ask who in the class was caught doing the highest speed. One motorcyclist was caught going around 100 miles per hour on the California freeway. There were lots of “oooooo’s” when admitted his offense. It was a mix of being a little judgmental while also being impressed all at the same time. “I can’t believe he tried to go that fast… at least I’m not as much of a law-breaker as that guy.”
We have laws to protect ourselves from other people’s sins. As a culture, we have made laws to deal with the fact that people often act in sinful ways. If they are left to their own devices, they will eventually make everyone else around them uncomfortable and possibly even unsafe. We write these laws to protect ourselves and we usually don’t give it much more thought than that.
Until we begin looking into the holiness of God. I am not qualified to fully appreciate God’s holiness and neither are you. We are going to try to approach it today while realizing that utter perfection is impossible for us to grasp. We’ve never seen a perfect thing…ever! Everything we know is either tainted with sin or existing in the context of sin.
To even begin to comprehend God’s holiness, we have to cut a whole new channel through the sin-encrusted desert of our minds. God’s Word is infallible and true. Outside of His Word, there is no context we currently know in this fallen world that can contain the purity of God’s truth without contaminating it. Even our own minds will often take in the pure truth of the scriptures and twist them around to make them something they are not.
We can’t grasp the concept of pure holiness by just imagining something that is really pure and then raising it to the highest degree of purity that we can think of. God’s purity is infinitely more than what we can imagine. God’s holiness is not simply like the purest thing we know, but just a whole lot better.
We don’t have a file for holiness like God’s. We know nothing like it. Isaiah was undone by just a glimpse of God’s holiness because it stands apart unique, unapproachable, incomprehensible and unattainable. We may be able to fear God’s unlimited power and even admire his infinite wisdom, but his holiness is something much more difficult for us to comprehend.
God exists in holiness
God is holy. He is not conforming to a holy standard – He IS the standard of holiness. He is absolutely holy and His holiness knows no end and no bounds. He is incapable of being something other than holy and pure.
The common Hebrew word for holy (Lev 11:45,) is the word qadowsh (ka-dŌsh). It means “Pure, Clean, free from defilement of crimes, unclean or profane things.
God has made holiness the moral condition that is required for the health and well-being of the universe. Where unholiness exists, the universe begins to suffer. In our present day, we can see very clearly how the effects of sin and unholiness have created a great deal of suffering. Whereas what is holy is healthy, what is unholy is sick, destructive and even deadly. Evil is a moral sickness that God will eventually root out of his creation for the good of His creation. But… that creates a bit of a problem for us in our current condition…
People exist in unholiness
God will rise up to put a stop to the disease of sin that is polluting His creation. Before the world destroys itself in an utter moral collapse, he will intervene. In order for God to wipe out the very thing that is polluting and destroying his creation, he would need to destroy us along with every other impure thing that exists. His intervention and removal of sin is sometimes referred to as God’s anger. It’s a righteous anger that seeks to destroy whatever is ruining His universe.
The holiness of God, the wrath of God and the health of His creation are all intimately intertwined. What we call God’s wrath is simply his utter intolerance of anything that degrades or destroys what He has made. God hates sin much like a mother hates the disease that is trying to take the life of her baby.
God demands holiness from us
In 1 Peter 1:14-16, it says, “14 As obedient children, do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance, 15 but as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, 16 since it is written, ‘You shall be holy, for I am holy.’”
This creates a problem for us. No honest man can ever say, “I am holy.” When the Prophet Isaiah saw God, he could only see his unclean lips. Do we think we are holier that Isaiah? Yet at the same time, no student of the bible can ignore the Bible’s call to follow in God’s holiness. Hebrews 12:14 says, “Strive for peace with everyone, and for the holiness without which no one will see the Lord.”
We are in a dilemma! We could never measure up to perfection. We are destined to be destroyed right along with everything else that is polluting God’s creation. What are we to do? The Bible says that the broken and contrite heart, God will not despise. Psalm 51:17 says, “The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.” How does our heart begin to break? By looking at ourselves through the mirror of God’s Word.
Only the Holy Spirit can give us a glimpse of God’s holiness. He does so in the context of biblical truth. Just like electricity flows through copper wire, the Holy Spirit flows through truth. It is through the truth of God’s Holy Word that the Holy Spirit begins to illuminate the heart and open the eyes of the spiritually blind. Our faith is awakened by truth and that is why at Canyon we are so committed to being a church that is Bible-Saturated.
Romans 10:17 says “…faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ.” Theology is like the copper wire of the Spirit. It is the medium by which the Spirit can flow into the hearts of men, but still, theology is not enough. Truth must be met with humility:
- A humility that recognizes the holiness of God and the unworthiness of men.
- A humility that stops trying to work it’s own way to heaven and instead, puts on the holiness of Jesus
MARTIN LUTHER
In the 1500’s a fastidious /faˈstidēəs/ monk named Martin Luther was confronted with the overwhelming truths about God in the Bible that I just mentioned. He undertook the study of Romans and he couldn’t get past Romans 1:17 (KJV) where is says, “17 For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith: as it is written, The just shall live by faith.” After considering the truths of this text he wrote that he took first the phrase “the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith” to mean that God’s righteousness and holy anger compels Him to deal justly in punishing sinners. He said:
My situation was that, although an impeccable monk, I stood before God as a sinner troubled in conscience, and I had no confidence that my merit would assuage
One simple truth changed that monk’s life and ignited what we call “The Reformation.” Here is that truth: By His grace, God’s righteousness could become the sinner’s righteousness, through faith in Jesus Christ as Lord.
Martin Luther had always seen the righteousness of God as an attribute by which God judged sinners. He did not see it as an attribute that a sinner could ever possess themselves. However, in this verse, we see that those who live by faith, take on the righteousness of God. Luther’s theological breakthrough put an end to the Dark Ages. Read with me his next comment about this text:
Night and day I pondered until I saw the connection between the justice of God and the statement that “the just shall live by his faith.” Then I grasped that the justice of God is that righteousness by which through grace and sheer mercy God justifies us through faith.
Thereupon I felt myself to be reborn and to have gone through open doors into paradise. The whole of Scripture took on a new meaning, and whereas before the “justice of God” had filled me with hate, now it became to me inexpressibly sweet in greater love. This passage of Paul became to me a gate to heaven …
In Martin Luther’s day, many churches were teaching that if we have enough faith and we do enough good works, maybe we might someday earn our own way into heaven.
Martin Luther brought the church back to what the text actually says. Faith in Jesus is the only channel by which we can receive salvation.
Salvation is not the result of works but the result of faith alone, by grace alone in Christ alone. BUT… once we are saved, the natural result of acknowledging Jesus as both Savior and Lord is a willing and enthusiastic obedience to His commands. Some modern writers put it this way: Good works are not the root of our salvation but the fruit of our salvation.
Since Christians are saved (or justified) by faith alone, their standing before God is in no way related to their good works or personal merit. That’s good news because according to the Bible, even a so-called good man is condemned by God for his sin. Good works and personal holiness do not provide the basis or grounds for God to accept us. God received as righteous those who really believe that Jesus is their King.
He does not receive them because of any good thing he found in them apart from Jesus. He received them solely on the basis of Christ’s righteousness applied to their account. Very simply, when a person places their faith in Jesus as Lord, they come with a whole record book of sins. This record book contains every sin they ever have committed and ever will commit.
The book is huge and every single entry is deserving of the full measure of God’s wrath. But Jesus takes that book of sin and by his blood, he covers every one. The record of sin is erased, not because of our good merit, but because of the redeeming power of Christ’s righteousness. Christ’s righteousness is applied to my account so that every page that was formerly filled with the ugliness of my sin is now filled with the righteousness of Jesus Christ.
Our redemption comes as a work of God through the person of his son. Romans 4:5 states, “5 And to the one who does not work but believes in him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted as righteousness…” Those who place their faith in Jesus as Lord are declared by God as righteous.
Declared righteous
Justification is the theological term used to describe how God declares an otherwise guilty person righteous through their faith in Jesus Christ. In order to remember the term, some people remember it this way: Justified is just-as-if-I’d never sinned before. I think that is a helpful way to differentiate the term from sanctification, but the concept of “just-as-if-I’d” never sinned does not actually go far enough. God’s grace is greater even than that incredible definition.
Justification by faith alone is a declaration by God that we are forever wrapped in the eternal, never-ending righteousness of His Son, Jesus Christ:
- His perfect record of righteousness is now our record of righteousness.
- His flawless merit before the Father is our flawless merit before Him.
God treats us as righteous in spite of our unrighteousness because he willingly poured his wrath on His own son and treated His perfectly righteous Son as unrighteous for our sake. 2 Corinthians 5:21 says, “For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”
If God had simply wiped out our record of sin (made the pages blank), we would be morally neutral before God – starting over from scratch. That would seem pretty good in itself, but God’s grace extends beyond neutrality. God clothes us in the everlasting righteousness of Jesus. Not only has God taken away the debt of our sin, but through Christ, he has also written a new record of righteousness for us that we didn’t earn or deserve.
(Illustration: Thumb through book. “I didn’t do any of these things. Jesus did this. God says, “well, you’re getting credit for it.)
A LITTLE THEOLOGY…
From a theological perspective, justification is a forensic or purely legal term. It describes what God declares to be true of a believer. It does not include what God is doing to actually change the believer. Justification is a declaration by God that legally, we are righteous and not guilty for our sins. His declaration changes our status and it carries with it the ramification that a truly justified person will show evidence of that shift in their behavior. (The ongoing shift in behavior is called sanctification. We’ll talk about that on a different day.) Forensic or legal decrees like this are fairly common in everyday life.
Court Room:
Until the jury pronounces a verdict, the defendant is referred to as “the accused.” The moment when the jury pronounces him guilty or not-guilty is the point in time that, in the eyes of the law, his position before the law changes. (He was “in accusation.” He changes to be either “in guilt” or “in innocence.”)
More than a pardon
In Biblical terms, justification is a not only a divine verdict of “not guilty” placed upon Christ’s disciples, but it is a declaration that the Lord’s disciples are fully righteous. (They are not “in sin, but “in Christ.”) Justification is a reversal of God’s attitude toward a sinful person.
- Where formerly the sinful person was fully condemned, now he is fully vindicated.
- Where formerly he was under God’s wrath, now he is under God’s blessing
More than a simple pardon, God justifies and it is said that he imputes (or credits) Christ’s righteousness over that person’s sinfulness. Romans 4:24-25 says, “…It will be counted to us who believe in him who raised from the dead Jesus our Lord, 25 who was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification.”
Christ’s own infinite merit becomes the ground by which the believer stands before God. (A believer stands before God “in Christ.”) Romans 5:19 says that we were heirs of God’s judgement because of Adam’s original disobedience against God but by Jesus’ perfect righteousness and obedience to God, believers are able to be declared righteous through Christ. Justification elevates a believer into a realm of full acceptance by God… AND… it grants the believer a portion of a divine inheritance that Jesus alone earned and truly deserves.
- A justified believer is perfectly free from the eternal consequences from sin. Everything up to this point today was to contextualize this one verse: Romans 8:33 says, “33 Who shall bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies.” God , who is perfectly holy, has based His standards of holiness upon himself. He wrote the Law and he stands as judge over that Law. If God has provided a way to satisfy his own requirement apart from our work, who else is left to accuse us? Will the very God who has justified us also condemn us? NO WAY! But God’s justifying work goes even further…
- At the moment of justification, a man or woman is plucked out of the household of Satan and placed into the household of God. Paul explains that Believers are no longer slaves to this world, but they enjoy a new unity with Christ himself. 1 Corinthians 6:17 says, “…he who is joined to the Lord becomes one spirit with him.” As a result, we can say that before we were “in the world,” but after justification we are “in Christ.” Galatians 3:27 says, “27 For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ.”
All of these truths flow out of justification. The doctrine of justification is a celebration of all of these new realities – now that our position has changed from “in the world” to “in Christ Jesus.”
Life Application
So how do we receive this incredible gift from God? Acts 2:21 says, “everyone who calls upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.” Anyone who heard the offer of the gospel and has the desire to receive it is saved. Theologians would explain that anyone who even has a desire to be saved has been given that desire from God himself.
God does not want to destroy you. He wants to save you. He’s given you every opportunity to come out from under the condemnation of sin and to be transferred to a new live as a son or daughter of the King. The offer is given freely to any who would receive it.
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