Without a robust affirmation of
the holiness of Christ, it and all that that means, calls to holiness, however
stirring they may be, will inevitably devolve into a form of man-centered
pietism.
If all make the claim to be
something, there is perhaps good reason to question the value of the term.
If Christians can have any
enjoyable communion with God, it must be a holy enjoyment based on both
parties.
If we have any
interest in Christ, we must emulate Him in
His Holiness.
John
1:16
16 And from his fullness we have all received, grace
upon grace.
Hebrews
5:7-10
In the days of His
flesh, He offered up both prayers and supplications with loud crying and tears
to the One able to save Him from death, and He was heard because of His piety.
8 Although He was
a Son, He learned obedience from the things which He suffered.
9 And having been
made perfect, He became to all those who obey Him the source of eternal
salvation,
10 being
designated by God as a high priest according to the order of Melchizedek.
Hebrews 2:18
18 For since He
Himself was tempted in that which He has suffered, He is able to come to the
aid of those who are tempted.
CHRIST THE CENTER
1
Peter 1:16
16 because
it is written, “You shall be holy, for I am holy.”
Leviticus
11:44
For I
am the Lord your God. Consecrate yourselves therefore, and be holy, for I am
holy. And you shall not make yourselves unclean with any of the swarming things
that swarm on the earth.
Leviticus
19:2
“Speak
to all the congregation of the sons of Israel and say to them, ‘You shall be
holy, for I the Lord your God am holy.
Leviticus
20:7
‘You
shall consecrate yourselves therefore and be holy, for I am the Lord your God.
2
Corinthians 13:14
14 The grace of
the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy
Spirit, be with you all.
Col 1:1-29
Paul,
an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God, and Timothy our brother,
2 To the saints
and faithful brethren in Christ who are at
Colossae: Grace to you and peace from God our Father.
3 We give thanks
to God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, praying always for you,
4 since we heard
of your faith in Christ Jesus and the love which you have for all the saints;
5 because of the
hope laid up for you in heaven, of which you previously heard in the word of
truth, the gospel
6 which has come
to you, just as in all the world also it is constantly bearing fruit and
increasing, even as it has been doing in
you also since the day you heard of it and
understood the grace of God in truth;
7 just as you
learned it from Epaphras, our beloved
fellow bond-servant, who is a faithful servant of Christ on our behalf,
8 and he also
informed us of your love in the Spirit.
9 For
this reason also, since the day we heard of it, we have not ceased to pray for you and to ask that
you may be filled with the
knowledge of His will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding,
10 so
that you will walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, to please Him in all respects, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in
the knowledge of God;
11 strengthened
with all power, according to His glorious might, for the attaining of all
steadfastness and patience; joyously
12 giving thanks
to the Father, who has qualified us to share in the inheritance of the saints
in Light.
13 For He rescued
us from the domain of darkness, and transferred us to the kingdom of His
beloved Son,
14 in whom we have
redemption, the forgiveness of sins.
15 He is the image
of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation.
16 For by Him all
things were created, both in the heavens
and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or
authorities—all things have been created through Him and for Him.
17 He is before
all things, and in Him all things hold together.
18 He is also head
of the body, the church; and He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead,
so that He Himself will come to have first place in everything.
19 For it was the Father’s good pleasure for all the fullness to
dwell in Him,
20 and through Him
to reconcile all things to Himself, having made peace through the blood of His
cross; through Him, I say, whether
things on earth or things in heaven.
21 And although
you were formerly alienated and hostile in mind, engaged
in evil deeds,
22 yet
He has now reconciled you in His fleshly body through
death, in order to present you before Him holy and blameless and beyond
reproach—
23 if
indeed you continue in the faith firmly established and steadfast, and not
moved away from the hope of the gospel that you have heard, which was proclaimed in all creation under heaven,
and of which I, Paul, was made a minister.
24 Now I rejoice
in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I do my share on behalf of His
body, which is the church, in filling up what is lacking in Christ’s
afflictions.
25 Of this church I was made a minister according to
the stewardship from God bestowed on me for your benefit, so that I might fully
carry out the preaching of the word of
God,
26 that is, the mystery which has been hidden
from the past ages and generations, but
has now been manifested to His saints,
27 to whom God
willed to make known what is the riches of the glory of this mystery among the
Gentiles, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.
28 We proclaim
Him, admonishing every man and teaching every man with all wisdom, so that we
may present every man complete in Christ.
29 For this
purpose also I labor, striving according to His power, which mightily works
within me.
CHRIST'S LIFE OF FAITH
To neglect Christ as our pattern of holiness is
"evil and pernicious."
To be holy is both to
look to Chris's work of reconciliation(i.e., impetration) and to labor after
conformity to His image.
Ephesians
1:4
4 just
as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we would be holy and blameless before Him. In love
Romans 8:29
For those whom He
foreknew, He also predestined to become conformed
to the image of His Son, so that He would be the firstborn among many brethren;
There was room for real
advancement in [Jesus's] human nature.
Hebrews
12:2
fixing our eyes on
Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the joy set before Him
endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of
the throne of God.
Isaiah
50:8
8 He who
vindicates Me is near;
Who will contend
with Me?
Let us stand up to
each other;
Who has a case
against Me?
Let him draw near to
Me.
Romans
4:5
But to the one who
does not work, but believes in Him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is
credited as righteousness,
1 Timothy 3:16
16 By common
confession, great is the mystery of godliness:
He who was revealed
in the flesh,
Was vindicated in
the Spirit,
Seen by angels,
Proclaimed among the
nations,
Believed on in the
world,
Taken up in glory.
Galatians 3:13
3 Christ redeemed
us from the curse of the Law, having become a curse for us—for it is written,
“Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree”—
The
life of holiness is therefore the life of faith. The way we begin the Christian
life is the way we continue in the Christian life until we get to heaven, where
faith becomes sight. If that was required for the sinless Lamb of God, how much
more so for us, who have remaining indwelling sin?
John
15:10
“If
you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love; just as I have kept My
Father’s commandments and abide in His love.
Hebrews
10:38-39
38 But My
righteous one shall live by faith;
And if
he shrinks back, My soul has no pleasure in him.
39 But we are not
of those who shrink back to destruction, but of those who have faith to the
preserving of the soul.
This verse applies not only to
believers, but especially to Jesus Christ.
Hebrews
2:13
13 And again,
“I will put My trust
in Him.”
And again,
“Behold, I and the
children whom God has given Me.”
Acts
15:9
9 and He made no
distinction between us and them, cleansing their hearts by faith.
THE SPIRIT AND CHRIST
Luke
2:52
52 And Jesus kept
increasing in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and men.
Isaiah
11:2
2 The Spirit of
the Lord will rest on Him,
The spirit of wisdom
and understanding,
The spirit of
counsel and strength,
The spirit of
knowledge and the fear of the Lord.
THE SPIRIT IN THE BELIEVER
Though faith(which we call the
condition on our part) be the gift of God, and the power of believing be
derived from God; yet the act of believing is properly OUR ACT. . . Else it
would follow, when we act any grace, as faith, repentance, or obedience, that
God believes, repents, and obeys in us, and it is not we, but God that does all
of these.
—Flavel
WCF CHAP. III.i. - Of
God’s Eternal Decree
1. God from all eternity, did, by the most wise and holy
counsel of His own will, freely, and unchangeably ordain whatsoever comes to
pass: (Eph. 1:11, Rom. 11:33, Heb. 6:17, Rom. 9:15,18) yet so, as
thereby neither is God the author of sin, (James 1:13,17, 1 John 1:5) nor is
violence offered to the will of the creatures; nor is the liberty or
contingency of second causes taken away, but rather established. (Acts 2:23,
Matt. 17:12, Acts 4:27–28, John 19:11, Prov. 16:33)
Ephesians
1:11
11 also
we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to His
purpose who works all things after the counsel of His will,
Romans
11:33
33 Oh, the depth
of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His
judgments and unfathomable His ways!
Hebrews
6:17
17 In
the same way God, desiring even more to show to the heirs of the promise the
unchangeableness of His purpose, interposed with an oath,
Romans
9:15
15 For
He says to Moses, “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have
compassion on whom I have compassion.”
Romans
9:18
18 So
then He has mercy on whom He desires, and He hardens whom He desires.
James
1:13
13 Let
no one say when he is tempted, “I am being tempted by God”; for God cannot be
tempted by evil, and He Himself does not tempt anyone.
James
1:17
17 Every
good thing given and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the
Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shifting shadow.
1 John 1:5
God Is Light
God Is Light
5 This is the
message we have heard from Him and announce to you, that God is Light, and in
Him there is no darkness at all.
Acts
2:23
23 this
Man, delivered over by the predetermined
plan and foreknowledge of God, you nailed to a cross by the hands of godless
men and put Him to death.
Matthew
17:12
12 but
I say to you that Elijah already came, and they did not recognize him, but did
to him whatever they wished. So also the Son of Man is going to suffer at their
hands.”
Acts
4:27-28
27 “For
truly in this city there were gathered together against Your holy servant
Jesus, whom You anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with the
Gentiles and the
peoples of Israel,
28 to
do whatever Your hand and Your purpose predestined to occur.
John
19:11
11 Jesus
answered, “You would have no authority over Me, unless it had been given you
from above; for this reason he who delivered Me to you has the greater sin.”
Proverbs
16:33
33 The
lot is cast into the lap,
But its every decision is from the Lord.
Heresy and error always have
practical consequences.
Failure to
exhort people to good works is a practical affirmation of the view that Christ is the subject of spiritual activity
in the believer.
Mark
12:31
31
“The second is this, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.”
1
Thessalonians 5:25
25 Brethren, pray
for us.
2
Thessalonians 2:15
15 So
then, brethren, stand firm and hold to the traditions which you
were taught, whether by word of mouth or by
letter from us.
James
4:7
7
Submit therefore to God.
Resist the devil and he will flee from you.
God's work of holiness does not
bypass the moral faculties of the believer, but rather RENEWS them and purifies
them(by faith in the power of His Spirit) in order for the believer to use his
own God-given (and now God-restored) faculties.
Psalm
51:10
10 Create in me a
clean heart, O God, And renew a steadfast spirit within me.
Romans 8:13
13 for
if you are living according to the flesh, you must die; but if by the Spirit
you are putting to death the deeds of the body, you will live.
We have not been deprived of our wills; rather, the
Spirit makes our hearts and minds able to do God's will.
Philippians
2:13
13 for it is God
who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure.
To blur the distinction between
impetration and application, and so make Christ totally responsible, not only
for our imputed righteousness, but also for our imparted righteousness,
obliterates human responsibility, replacing it with Christ's "responsibility."
In Galatians 2:19-20 the word "I" appears
more often than the word "Christ."
19 “For through the
Law I died to the Law, so that I might live to God.
20 “I have been
crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me;
and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God,
who loved me and gave Himself up for me.
