Pastor Steve's sermon on Ezra 7-10 talked about God sending Ezra back to Jerusalem because God wanted the place to reflect His holiness, & Ezra (a scribe, a leader) was to help achieve that aim. God wanted the place to be holy, & for the people to love God & love other people.
The people (Israelites) were set apart to honour God, & they (the descendants of Abraham) were chosen by God to represent Him to this world. However, God's chosen people lost their identity as they did not want to become a separate holy nation. Therefore, they could not represent God. As a response to the people's failure to keep themselves holy, Ezra ripped his tunic & cloak & pulled his hair from his head. He must have felt such great sorrow & despair for the the people's sins, the failure to be holy, to have resorted to doing all that to himself. Those of you reading who personally know me, can you imagine me ripping my hair & clothes if I was angry at something - it would not be a very pretty sight, would it? Haha.
Anyway, the thing is, God wants holiness, & He will forgive us (if we repent of our sins), & we can then be part of God's solution. The people back then had to make a hard decision for the sake of holiness. So, we today have to be absolutely ruthless if we are to be holy people.
Pastor Steve then posed this question: Do we strive to be holy? God made hard decisions for the sake of holiness. He killed His Son Jesus so that we can become holy. He did that so that we can be transformed from a life of hopelessness to a life of holiness, so that we would stop living a life of sin.
So back to that question: Do we strive to be holy? I cannot answer that question in the affirmative. As mentioned in previous post (on sermon on Ezra 4-6), striving towards holiness is not something that is at the forefront of my mind. I have never given the topic of "holiness" much thought. A part of me thinks that holiness is such an impossible goal to achieve, that I'm not inclined to try hard to achieve that goal. Needless to say, I am sure I will hear more on "holiness" in the future. It is something I need to think more about.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
1 comment:
I think you're right that it's something you need to think more about. And not just think, but do.
If God wants holiness and killed Jesus so that you can become holy, shouldn't you be trying (a lot harder than you say you currently are) to be holy? Even if it's hard?
Praying that you will choose to live God's way rather than your own :)
Post a Comment