The Spirit of Holiness
The God controlled person longs to see only the will of God done in and through him on earth. There can be no true
holiness without being obedient to the will of God. It is His will that we be
renewed in His own image by the His Spirit and become lovers of His holiness.
The work of the Third Person of the
Trinity is to make God's holiness ours. The Spirit of God is pre-eminently “the Holy Spirit.” God is
holy. Our Lord Jesus Christ was “holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from
sinners, and made higher than the heavens” (Hebrews 7:26). The Holy Spirit,
being the Spirit of Christ, is the Spirit of holiness. Without holiness, no man
shall see God (Heb. 12:14).
God is holy; His Son is holy; the Holy Spirit is holy.
God's holiness stands apart, by itself, unique, unapproachable,
incomprehensible, and unobtainable to all of His creatures. That is God’s
standard, and “in Him is no darkness at all” (1 John 1:5).
A. W. Tozer chose his words carefully and accurately when
he wrote: “God is holy with an absolute holiness that knows no degrees, and this
He cannot impart to His creatures. But there is a relative and contingent
holiness which He shares with angels and seraphim in heaven and with redeemed
men on earth as their preparation for heaven. This holiness God does impart to
His children. He shares it with them by imputation, and by impartation, and
because He has made it available to them through the blood of the Lamb, He
requires it of them. . . ‘Be ye holy, for I am holy. He did not say, ‘Be ye as
holy as I am holy,’ for that would be to demand of us absolute holiness,
something that belongs to God alone” (Knowledge of the Holy, p. 113).
It is the work of the Holy Spirit to set us apart to God.
He works in us to set us apart from sin and everything that is in opposition to
the will of God. But He also works to set us apart to all that pleases God and
conforms us to the character of Christ.
The work of making us holy is the work of the Spirit of
holiness. God’s goal is that we should become more like Christ every day. He
puts in our heart a hunger and thirst for the righteousness of God.
God the Holy Spirit dwells within the temple of the
believer’s body (1 Cor. 3:16; 6:19; 2 Cor. 6:16). Since He dwells within the
believer that
person is thereby clothed with the presence and power of the Hoy Spirit. His
indwelling presence empowers the Christian.
Moreover, Christ dwells within men by His Holy Spirit. Christ is not a great
example; He is the living Lord. Christian faith does not copy Christ; Christ is
reproduced in the heart of a disciple by the Holy Spirit.
All of the Christian's life is made holy
because the Holy Spirit transforms it. The Holy Spirit does not work
on us; He lives in us. This is the supreme difference between the works of
the flesh and the fruit of the Spirit. Works denote sweat and toil; fruit
denotes life and growth. Works belong to men; fruit comes from God. Holiness
makes our lives fruitful because a holy life abides in the living Word and
thereby full and free availability is given to the Spirit of life. The presence
of the Holy Spirit
makes our hearts clean, our minds pure, our faculties to work at their full
capacity, and our lives thereby fruitful to the glory of God.
Selah!
Message by Wil Pounds (c) 2006
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