We need to understand what the bible says about leading a holy life.
Are we living for God all day every day?
It isn’t enough just to call ourselves Christians. We have to live it 24/7. It’s not about wanting a bit of Jesus in our life – It’s about us giving our ALL to Him. We have been bought for a price – we are not our own.
Revelation 3:15–16
15 I know all the things you do, that you are neither hot nor cold. I wish that you were one or the other!
16 But since you are like lukewarm water, neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth!
Do you try to fit Jesus into your schedule? Or do you work your schedule to fit Jesus?
What does that mean? Do you pray and seek the will of God with everything you do? What’s your aim in life?
Do you do what you want to do – or what God leads you to do?
When thoughts come to mind, do you just go with them no matter what they are?
Don’t let your flesh live any way it wants to live. You crucify it. When it wants to do or say things it shouldn’t do or say, you say, “Body, shut up. You are not going there. You are not doing that. I don’t even want to hear that.”
Here is the mindset we should have:
Romans 6:11
11 So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus.
Any time we face temptation, we should say, “I’m dead to that! That was part of my old life! I am a new creation in Christ!”
2 Corinthians 5:17
17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.
To live a holy life, to separate ourselves from sin, we must see ourselves as God does – as born again children of the Most High, clothed with the righteousness of Christ.
The world is changing for the worse.
Obeying the Word is the same today as it’s always been. Sin hasn’t changed, God’s commandments haven’t changed. The world, society and what is deemed acceptable is always changing.
It used to be scandalous to get a divorce. But hearts have hardened over time. Likewise, same sex marriages are not in Gods plan, but it has become more and more acceptable socially – even in the Church. Just because things are viewed differently in the world doesn’t mean the Word of God has changed.
To be holy is crucial to living the Christian life, and without holiness, no one will see the Lord.
Hebrews 12:14
14 Work at living in peace with everyone, and work at living a holy life, for those who are not holy will not see the Lord.
When there is loss of understanding of the holiness of God, it will result in unholiness within the church. We need to know who God really is and who we are in relation to Him. If we depart from the truth found in the Bible, there will be a lack of holiness in our lives and the lives of other believers. Although we might think of holiness as actions we take on the outside, it actually begins from within the heart of a person as they encounter and follow Jesus.
A holy life starts with an inner change which then begins to affect the rest of our life outwardly.
Romans 12:1
1 I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship.
A holy life doesn’t fit the pattern of this world.
It is a life that longs to desire the things of God and not the things of the world.
Romans 12:2
Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is – his good, pleasing and perfect will.
The desires that are not from God can be put to death and have no power over the believer. If we are in awe and reverent fear of God, we will look to Him rather than to the things in the world and in the flesh that entices us. We will increasingly want to do the will of God rather than our own. Our life will look different from the culture that we find ourselves in, marked by new desires from the Lord as we repent and turn away from sin, wanting to be purified from it.
2 Timothy 1:9
For God saved us and called us to live a holy life. He did this, not because we deserved it, but because that was His plan from before the beginning of time – to show us His grace through Christ Jesus.
Don’t stop. Keep living a holy life.
It’s mind boggling to think of Paul who wrote quite a bit of the New testament, being a Godly man wrote the following verse:
1 Corinthians 9 v27
27 But I discipline my body and keep it under control, lest after preaching to others I myself should be disqualified.
It’s amazing to think that after all Paul was doing and had done, he still saw that unless he kept a very tight reign on what he thought and spoke and did, he may not see the kingdom of God!