Bible Teaching

Calvary Temple Teaching Library

The Holiness of God Pt.1

How are you doing this morning? What a wonderful time in the presence of the Lord! Amen? Just to be able to come and worship Him in the beauty of His holiness. That's what we want to talk about today. We want to talk about the holiness of God, just refresh ourselves in the beauty and the splendor of our Lord.

In fact, you can turn over to Psalms, chapter 86. We'll start off the study there. Take a look at the holiness of our God first and get a glimpse of that in the Scriptures. And then move on today to take a look at how we participate in that holiness and how we become holy vessels to the Lord, sons and daughters that He's pleased to dwell in. But here in Psalms, chapter 86, starting at verse 8, this really captures the essence of the word, "holiness." If you study out the word, "holy," or "holiness," and you begin to study out where this word actually came from, it has two tangents, two facets to its meaning. And the first facet that we know and understand is a separation, a cutting off. It is a separation from all that is common, a separation from all that's unclean or evil, and so when you say, "God is a holy God," you're really saying, "God is a separate God." He's in a category, He's in a class, and He's in a distinction all to Himself. There's nothing, nobody that can even come close to being like Him. And that's a distinction that we'll see here in a moment in the life of Moses that we need to be careful to preserve in our own hearts and minds.

Here in Psalm 86, verse 8, He says, "Among the gods there is none like unto thee, O Lord..." "Among the gods, there is none..." He's distinct, He's separate, nothing can compare to His power, nothing can compare to His majesty, nothing can compare to His glory. "...there is none like unto thee, O Lord; neither are there any works like unto thy works." What's the result of this holiness? The result is, "All nations whom thou hast made shall come and worship before thee, O Lord; and shall glorify thy name." Verse 10, "For thou are great, and doest wondrous things: [and this last phrase really encapsulates the meaning of holiness] thou art God [and what's the last word?] alone." He is alone. Nothing, nobody even comes close to the infinity of His perfection. Nothing can compare to Him and who He is.

Now turn back, if you would, to Exodus chapter 3 and we see these distinctions begin to be made throughout the Scriptures. Exodus chapter 3-this famous encounter between God and Moses-starting at verse 1, "Now Moses kept the flock of Jethro his father-in-law, the priest of Midian: and he led the flock to the backside of the desert, and came to the mountain of God, even to Horeb. And the angel of the Lord appeared unto him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush: and he looked, and, behold, the bush burned with fire, and the bush was not consumed. And Moses said, I will now turn aside, and see this great sight, why the bush is not burnt."

I've always loved verse 4. The first part of verse 4 has always stood out to me. I really believe it should stand out to you too. "And when the Lord saw that he turned aside to see..." Makes you wonder, what would have happened if Moses didn't turn aside? If he said, "Hey, I'm too busy. This sure does look pretty curious, I don't know what's going on, but I got this flock I've got to take care of. We're on a tight schedule, tight budget. I don't have time-gotta get to work." How many times during the day, I wonder, does the Lord call us? And we just kind of shrug it off. "That can wait until I get to prayer tonight. That can wait till later. Yes I hear you Lord, but I'm just too busy, too preoccupied, I'm doing something I really enjoy doing, I'll catch you later." The Lord takes note of that. During those times, when you know the Lord is touching your heart and wooing you and calling you, what is your response? Do you turn aside to see? How easy is it to just shrug it off? The Lord's watching, and the Lord is watching for those people that will turn aside to see and don't just keep going with what they're involved in. "When the Lord saw that he turned aside to see, [then] God called unto him..." What if Moses had never turned aside? Kind of interesting to ponder.

He called to Moses, and Moses said, "Here am I." And in verse 5, "And He said, Draw not nigh hither: put off thy shoes from off thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground." Interesting things here.

"Draw not nigh hither." Don't come any closer. A line was drawn in the sand and God was saying, "Moses, you're different from me. There's a distinction here." Now, remember that this was the man that communed with God face to face. This was a man who had a relationship with the Lord. This was a man that ascended the mountain. So many parallels we can draw in our own life.

In our own life, we take great joy, and we should absolutely, take great joy in the fact that we're sons and that we're daughters. And that we can come and lay our head on His bosom and that we can call Him, "Abba Father" and that He's brought us into the intimacy of the Holy of Holies. And we should never stop rejoicing in that. But even in that intimacy, there's always a line that's drawn-always. And here He's drawing a line for Moses. We can never become so comfortable that the presence of God, His holy presence, becomes common to us. We must never forget that we are separated by eternity, that He is the Creator, we are the creatures. That He is holy and that His might and His power are of such terrible awesomeness that it causes men to fall down as dead before Him.

"Draw not nigh hither." Yes, we come as little children and we rejoice and we come and get as close to Abba Father as we possibly can, but our hearts, in our hearts, there should always be a shudder, a fear at His awesomeness. There's a line; there's a distinction. He's not on our level.

"Draw not nigh hither." Just remember that His greatness and His might and His awesomeness is of such a magnitude that our minds can't even comprehend it. Our minds can't even comprehend infinity-can't comprehend eternity. Just remember that His majesty goes beyond anything that we could ever dare to think or dream, or try to imagine. The greatness of our God-we have no idea. We have little glimpses, we have little hints, we read the Scriptures, we think we understand-we have no idea. At best, we're seeing through a glass darkly, through this eye of faith.

One day we will see Him face to face and one day we will have a much better understanding, but while we're here in these bodies on this earth, we need to daily remind ourselves of the greatness, the holiness, the awesomeness of our God. And we need to remind ourselves that we know nothing in this body, in this timeframe, we know nothing as we should and we know nothing as one day we will know. We're just seeing through that glass darkly. There's a line. "Draw not nigh hither."

He goes on and He says, "...put off thy shoes from off thy feet..." The same principle is used here as in when Jesus washed the feet of the disciples. The shoes, the feet: The tracking through the earth, the picking up of the dirt, the filth of the world; and God is basically saying, "Don't track that dirt into My presence. Don't bring it in with you." So there's carefulness and we're going to see this again in just a few chapters later on. There's a carefulness with which we approach the presence of God. Don't bring your filthy thoughts and your impure motives and your selfishness into the presence of God. Be careful what you bring in. "...put off thy shoes from off thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground. Moreover he said, I am the God of thy father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. And Moses hid his face; for he was afraid to look upon God."

We nuzzle up to Abba Father as close as we can get, but God help us if there's not that shudder, that trembling that comes over us when we get close enough to hear His heartbeat and we begin to get glimpses into His awesome holiness. There should be that shudder. There should be that tremble, as we tremble at His Word that the Scriptures speak of.

Look over, just a few chapters, at chapter 19 of the same book. We see this aspect of carefulness, of distinction. God is distinct. And in a society today, how many discrimination lawsuits are there and special interest groups? And everybody's crying for equality and they really don't want equality, they really want supremacy. They want to be treated special. They have no interest in equality. That's just the word they use to get it approved by others. They want to be better than everybody else. It's the pride; it's the haughtiness. And the pride and the arrogance of man creeps into our heart as believers every now and then and we begin to forget how uncommon our God is and how holy and separate He is.

They begin to see this here in Exodus, chapter 19 in the giving of the law up upon the mount. Let's jump in at verse 9 and see where we end up in this chapter. He said, "And the Lord said unto Moses, Lo, I come unto thee in a thick cloud, that the people may hear when I speak with thee, and believe thee for ever. And Moses told the words of the people unto the Lord. And the Lord said unto Moses, Go unto the people, and sanctify them..." The principles of holiness and sanctification in the Scriptures are very much synonymous. Holiness: A separation, a setting apart, a separation from anything that's common or unclean. Sanctification, meaning very much the same thing: a setting apart. So, He's saying, "Go unto the people, and sanctify them today and tomorrow, and let them wash their clothes..."

It's a ceremonial cleansing. It's an outward cleansing that's taking place here, symbolic of the inward cleansing. We know that everything in the Old Testament, much of what's written in the Old Testament is a type, is a symbol for us and it's for us to learn and not only learn, but it's for us to live by. And He's saying here, "I want them to wash their clothes. I want the filth gone. I want the dirt gone. I want them to sanctify themselves [For how many days?] Two days." Now, if they were going to sanctify themselves for two days before they came into the presence of God, I want you to think about the carefulness. And I want you to ask yourself the question this morning, "Am I that careful when I come into the presence of God whether it be here in this sanctuary or whether it be a home in my prayer closet? How careful am I with what I bring in to the presence of God?"

Sanctify them for two days, wash their clothes, "And be ready against the third day: for the third day the Lord will come down in the sight of all the people upon mount Sinai." We see the same thing here in verse 12 that he told Moses earlier, "Draw not nigh hither." There is a separation; there is a boundary. "You and I are not on the same level." And He says here in verse 12, "And thou shalt set [what? Boundaries or] bounds unto the people round about, saying, Take heed to yourselves, that ye go not up into the mount, or touch the border of it: whosoever toucheth the mount shall be surely put to death." How many of you know-capital punishment, is that the highest form of punishment there can be? Sure it is. You can't pay any more than with your life. Look how serious God takes His presence. Look how serious God takes the purity of His presence. And He is saying, there's going to be priests there, there's going to be people that are zealous for the presence of God. And in verse 13, they're going to be watching and anybody that would dare presume upon the holiness of God, He said, "There shall not an hand touch it, but he shall surely be stoned, or shot through; whether it be beast or man, it shall not live..." Don't presume upon the holiness of God. They came down, the presence of the Lord came down, the glory of the Lord came down, the people feared and trembled, the mount shook and God came down and began to give His law to Moses. Verse 21, "And the Lord said unto Moses, Go down, charge the people, lest they break through unto the Lord to gaze, and many of them perish."

Look over at Ezekiel 39. I think here as God begins, as God is dealing with Israel; not beginning, He has been for a while at this point. Ezekiel 39, verse 7, I think, gives us a real clue into this holiness, because like anything else, the holiness of God becomes real to us by revelation. It's nothing that you can glean by reading out of a book; the fear of His holiness is nothing that you can glean by doing a Bible study on it. If God doesn't speak to your heart and reveal His holiness to you, and to me, we're hopelessly lost. It's much like speaking about the Trinity, or speaking about the love of God, or speaking about some attribute of God and it's gibberish, it makes no sense to the carnal mind, to the natural mind. This is something that you must receive from the Lord. It's like repentance; it's like grace. It's like faith; it's a gift from God. And He says here in Ezekiel 39:7, He says, "So will I make my holy name known in the midst of my people Israel; and I will not let them pollute my holy name any more..." "...I will not let them pollute my holy name any more..." When? When His holy name is made known.

I'd encourage you this morning, if there were not a fear of God, if there's not a reverence for His holiness, if your heart doesn't shudder at His awesomeness, then you need to fall on your face before God this morning. And you need to cry out and say, "Father, make your holy name known to me." Just listening to my voice this morning won't change you a bit. Listening to what I've prepared and what I've studied won't teach your heart to fear His name. The only way that this fear will begin to come and the only way that you'll be blessed with the gift of fearing His holiness, is when He makes it known to you. When you receive it straight from His mouth, straight from His heart, when the Holy Spirit illuminates your heart and gives you that glimpse into His awesomeness and holiness. So, if what I'm saying sounds like gibberish and it sounds like a Bible study, then you need help and I need help and we need to ask God to make His holy name known to our hearts.

I want you to look over at Leviticus chapter 20. Throughout the Scriptures, and we'll see it here in Leviticus 20, you see many different references to people and priests and objects and tools being hallowed or being made holy, being set apart for the service of God. A bowl, or a vessel of some sort, that might have been used in the temple worship, the priests just couldn't take that vessel home and eat cheerios out of it before he went to bed that night. That vessel, that bowl was holy. It was set apart from common use and it was set apart for God. And we see here, this distinction and this difference.

He says, Leviticus chapter 20, let's read 7 and 8 and then we'll jump down a little bit further. In verse 7 He says, "Sanctify yourselves therefore, and be ye holy: for I am the Lord your God." We see there, sanctification, holiness in a lot of ways being synonymous. Set apart, not only from the filth of the world, but set apart unto God. Set apart unto service. Set apart unto purity. "Sanctify yourselves therefore, and be ye holy: for I am the Lord your God. And ye shall keep my statutes, and do them: I am the Lord which sanctify you."

Let's go down, oh say verse 22, and here we're going to pick up a theme of holiness that we'll talk about later, probably tonight. As we talk about our own individual personal lives, how do we walk in the holiness of God? Verse 22, "Ye shall therefore keep all my statutes, and all my judgments, and do them: that the land, whither I bring you to dwell therein, spew you not out." That land was God's gift to them. That land was holy land, it was God's land that He had set apart for them. And He says, "And ye shall not walk in the manners of the nation, which I cast out before you: for they committed all these things, and therefore I abhorred them. But I have said unto you, Ye shall inherit their land, and I will give it unto you to posses it, a land that floweth with milk and honey: I am the Lord your God, which have separated you from other people." There's that theme of holiness: Separation. I've separated you from the other people, from the whoredoms from the sins that they committed. You're supposed to be a chosen treasure unto the Lord, a people that are clean and holy. Verse 25, "Ye shall therefore put difference between clean beasts and unclean..."

Again, we'll talk about this more tonight, but the process of holiness in our lives most of the time; it's a process of discrimination. Judging, discriminating, approving those things that are excellent, as Philippians says. And He says here, He talks about this distinction. When He told Moses and drew the line and said, "don't come any closer." This is what He's talking about. There's a difference between clean and unclean and I want you to put a difference and make a difference in your own hearts between clean and unclean. How much of a difference are you putting in your heart? As we go through the day, and you pass through this life, and you watch the world going on around you, is your heart grieved at the unclean? Does your soul make a difference between clean and unclean? When you come in here to the presence of God, can you sense the clean? Can you sense the pure? Does your heart rejoice to be here? And then when you walk out into the world and you see the way the nations react and see the way the nations live, is there a grief at the unclean? Is there a distinction in your heart? Is there any difference? Or is it all the same to you?

Dear God, hopefully there's a difference. Hopefully your heart is pricked. Hopefully your heart grieves. Hopefully your heart rejoices at the pure. He said, "You shall make a difference." And watch what He says here. He goes on and He says, "...and ye shall not make your souls abominable by beast or fowl, or by any manner of living thing that creepeth on the ground, which I have separated from you as unclean." Verse 26, "And ye shall be holy unto me: for I the Lord am holy, and have severed you from other people, that ye should be mine." "Ye shall be holy...I have severed you from other people..." It doesn't mean that you get to go in tomorrow morning and quit your job. That's not at all what it's talking about. You all have been taught well enough to know that. But even though you're there among the people, you should never be of the people. You shouldn't think the way they think. You shouldn't have the same motives of heart that they have. You shouldn't act like them. There should be a marked difference. There should be a distinction.

He says here, look back at verse 25, "Ye shall therefore put difference between clean ... and unclean ... and you shall not make your souls abominable." In your life, in your Christian growth, in your maturity, we're supposed to be progressing in holiness, and if you're not progressing in holiness, if you're not putting a difference between clean and unclean, you're making your soul an abomination to the Lord. And when you come in here to pray, you won't sense His presence. It'll be rote, it will be religion, but God won't meet with you because your soul's an abomination. When you come in to pray with self-righteousness and selfishness and pride, that's an abomination and you haven't put a difference between clean and unclean. Your soul's an abomination. When you believe that you're right and you have no sin, your soul's an abomination to the Lord. He won't hear your cry. And you'll go out having another time of religion. But your heart will never have touched the heart of God.

Now, what He's really asking for is that you make a difference, you put a difference, and you mark the difference. He's not saying that when you come in here you have to be absolutely pure. You just have to mark the difference. You don't have to be free from all contamination, because you come in here to receive cleansing from the contamination. You just have to mark the difference. You have to come in and say, "Father, I know I'm corrupt. I know I've been vexed, I know I've been contaminated. I know this motive of my heart is ugly. I know pride and selfishness has been really controlling me in these certain areas lately and I know how ugly I am and I'm sorry. And in my confession and in my repentance to You, I'm marking a difference and I'm saying that in these areas, 'I'm not right.' And I need your cleansing."

Now, with that type of brokenness and repentance, God meets with you and your soul's not abominable, because you marked the difference. But when you come in, in self-righteousness and pride, and think that you know better and think that you're okay, and you're lukewarm and you don't see how much you need God, and you haven't marked the difference between clean and unclean, or if you just come in casually, with an apathetic attitude, thinking, "God has to love me. God has to accept me," and you don't mark that difference and you don't come in and tremble at His word, then you make your soul abominable to the Lord. How careful are you when you come into the presence of God? That's what He's speaking to us.

I want you to see a second aspect of the holiness of God. Look over at Exodus, chapter 15, verse 11. Remember, when we started I said there were two difference aspects to the holiness of God as you begin to study out the word and study it's meaning. And the first aspect is that aspect of separation. God is separate. There is no one like Him, awesome in power, great in His wonders, magnificent in His judgments. But then a second aspect that is just as evident, just as real in the Scriptures, is this aspect of purity. God is perfect in His purity. And just like His greatness and the terribleness of His power, just like we can't comprehend this, again this is something else that our natural mind can't comprehend. We get glimpses of it through the eye of faith. But I want you to understand the purity of the Lord.

In fact, have you turned to Exodus 15? Look over at I John and you can get both of them in your hands. And let's look at I John first because that will help us with Exodus 15. The book of I John, chapter 1. I John, chapter 1, verse 5. "This then is the message which we have heard of him, and declare unto you, that God is light, and in him is [what?] no darkness at all." No darkness! Now, see, to us, we can't imagine that, NO DARKNESS. "...God is light and in him is no darkness..." It's like that song that we sing. Even the good that we do is stained with our carnality, so many times, isn't it? We do well, we got everything working and operating fine, and even the fundamental motive of our heart is good. We're doing it to serve God and to please God, but how many of you have noticed that in your doing good; you've checked your heart, and your motive's okay? But even then in the process, impure thoughts of pride or self-righteousness, or "Gee, this will make me look good," little things like that even still, start to creep in. So, what we're always dealing with is a mixture. We don't know what it's like to be all light with no darkness at all because so many times, we're fighting that mixture of light and darkness within our own selves. And it's because in our members there dwells no good thing. In our members there is the power, that power of sin that resides there and works unless we keep it under. So, it's hard for us to imagine the purity, absolute purity, of no darkness-never an impure thought, never an impure motive, never an impure word, never an impure action. From eternity to eternity, absolute perfection of purity. We can't even begin to imagine what that's like. But that's our God.

Now, back in Exodus 15, verse 11. In this song here, Israel's been rejoicing, they've just been delivered, and in verse 11, He says, "Who is like unto thee, O Lord, among the gods? who is like thee, glorious in [what?] holiness..." There is a glory about His holiness. And that glory-what does "glory" mean? Glory just means the outshining, the shining forth, and the light. There is a glory of His holiness in which there is no darkness, the purity of which no man can stand before. And He's glorious in His holiness. His holiness shines forth as that light that He is. No darkness. He's "...fearful in [what?] praises..." "...Fearful in praises..." When was the last time in praise, as you were praising and worshipping God, you became afraid, and it terrified you? You were magnifying Him, you were declaring His goodness, declaring His greatness, you were declaring how wonderful and how big and how majestic your God was and in the midst of that praise as you were worshipping Him, listening to the words that came out of your mouth, what was coming out of your mouth just scared your socks off, because you realized, it became real to you how big He is, how awesome He is, how great He is. He's a God that's fearful, in praises. "...Doing wonders?" Infinite perfection of purity, a purity that we can't comprehend.

Let's move on because we're running out of time this morning. Look over at I Samuel chapter 2, verse 2. Another aspect that you begin to see about holiness in the Scriptures is that God alone is the source of all purity and perfection. He's the standard; He's the rule. It's not like there's a yardstick of holiness and there's this standard and you take this yardstick of holiness and hold it up next to God and say, "Yup, He's holy! He measures up!" He IS the standard. By Him, all other things are compared and judged. And here in I Samuel, chapter 2, verse 2, "There is none holy as the Lord..." That's why He says, "...be ye therefore perfect even as your father is perfect." He's the standard; He's the rule by which everything else is judged. There isn't any yardstick of holiness that could ever hope to measure Him. He's the source of all purity, the source of all perfection.

Look over at Revelation, chapter 15, verse 4. "Who shall not fear thee, O Lord, and glorify thy name? For thou only art [what?]..." He's the only standard for holiness. That's why we're not to compare ourselves by ourselves. He alone is the standard and the rule. He didn't say, "Be ye holy as brother Joe is holy sitting next to you this morning." He said, "Be ye holy, even as your God is holy." Because there's only one standard, there's only one rule of holiness. Jesus said, "Why do you call me good? There is only one that is good." And we know what Jesus was saying there. That was a testimony of Jesus' deity, but yet at the same time, Jesus was making a point. There's only one that's good. It's God. There's only One that's holy. Besides that, there is no holiness outside of Father. So if He tells you, "Be ye holy," then you're going to have to become holy with the holiness of God. There is no righteousness or holiness that you can produce that will meet the requirements. Only His holiness will do. He's the standard. He's the rule. He's the source of all purity and perfection, and it's His holiness that must be at work in our lives. Let's look at a couple other things here.

Look over at II Chronicles, chapter 20. You see that phrase throughout the Scriptures, "The beauty of His holiness," and His holiness is a beautiful thing to behold. That holiness is the light that we were talking about, and in that light is no darkness. That holiness is what adorns the new city, the heavenly Jerusalem, and you can read there in Revelation, and just begin to imagine how beautiful that city is. And here, they're getting ready to worship the Lord. Jehoshaphat's giving instructions, and look at what he says in verse 21. "When he had consulted with the people, he appointed singers unto the Lord, and that should praise the beauty of [what?] holiness..." The beauty of holiness, the beauty of that perfection, the purity, the light in which there's no darkness. And there's something about the beauty of His holiness that should cause spontaneous praise to erupt out of your heart. It's much like standing and looking at a natural wonder, or standing and looking at some scenery and the landscape. Or standing and looking at something and you're just awestruck. You think, "Man, look at that!" It evokes, it inspires a reaction from you and you verbalize the beauty and the majesty of what you're standing before. Does the presence of God do that to you?

Look over at Psalms 96, the glimpse of His holiness, looking at His awesomeness. Psalms 96, let's just take time, read from verse 1 say down to verse 9. "O Sing unto the Lord a new song: sing unto the Lord, all the earth. Sing unto the Lord, bless his name; show forth his salvation from day to day. Declare his glory among the heathen, his wonders among all people. For the Lord is great, and greatly to be praised: he is to be feared above all gods. For all the gods of the nations are idols: but the Lord made the heavens. Honour and majesty are before him: strength and beauty are in his sanctuary."

When you come to prayer, do you see that honor and majesty? The psalmist did. Do you see the strength and the beauty? Are you here just counting the minutes, doing your time? Or is there a relationship? Do you, through the eye of faith, really see the beauty of His throne?

"Give unto the Lord, O ye kindreds of the people, give unto the Lord glory and strength. Give unto the Lord the glory due unto his name: bring an offering, and come into his courts. O worship the Lord in [what?] the beauty of holiness..."

When you see how beautiful His holiness is, you can't help but worship Him if you're a child of God. It just-it evokes everything within you from your innermost being. From your belly, those rivers of living waters will begin to rise up in praise and worship. It stirs you from the very center of your being and you begin to look upon His beauty and you respond accordingly in worship and praise.

"...fear before him, all the earth." We know the glimpse into the heavens that we see in Revelation; I believe its chapter 4, where the angels cry out, what? "Holy, holy, holy." It says that they cease not day or night crying what? "Holy, holy." How holy is the Lord? How pure is He in all of His ways? How beautiful, majestic, and splendorous are all of His ways? How great is His throne? And it just evokes the praise and worship of all creation.

Let's look at this last point we want to cover this morning. Look over at Isaiah chapter 6. Remember when we talked about Moses back in the beginning. It said there that Moses hid his face. He was afraid to look upon God. This holiness of God, it opposes and it condemns anything that is unclean or unholy. That's why that if anything touched the mount it had to be put to death. And here in Isaiah, chapter 6 verse 1, "In the year that king Uzziah died I saw also the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up, and his train [His glory] filled the temple. Above it stood the seraphims: each one had six wings; with twain he covered his face, and with twain he covered his feet, and with twain he did fly. And one cried unto another, and said, Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts: the whole earth is full of his glory. And the posts of the door moved at the voice of him that cried, and the house was filled with smoke."

And this is that response that we should have. Every time, when we receive that visitation from the Lord, there should be that dual reaction. The one reaction of praise, and the other of, "I am undone." Undone. Naked, nothing left to prop up before this holy God. Nothing can compare to His holiness, the fire of His glory. Nothing is hidden. Everything overturned; no secret, every secret laid bare. "...I am undone [before Him]; because I am a man of unclean lips..." It doesn't matter how righteous you think you are living, when you come into the presence of His purity and His holiness, you'll cry out, "I'm a man of unclean lips."

There's a reason why out in the world, when they go out on dates, they go to a restaurant that's dimly lit. "Oh, it's so romantic." No. It's to hide all the flaws. Even an ugly person looks good if the light's that bad, right? You know it's true. And I want to tell you something, you can puff yourself and feel good about how righteous you've been living, but you get in the presence, in that light in which there is NO darkness, NO shadows that you can hide in, and you'll cry out, "Man! I'm a man of unclean lips. I'm undone." Because in the light in which there's no darkness, nothing is secret. And your innermost thoughts are made plain and clear. And you fall, trembling before Him filled with wonder and filled with praise because He is so beautiful and yet at the same time afraid of your life, trembling before Him, afraid to look at His face. And this was the reaction of Isaiah here.

Turn back to I Samuel, chapter 6. There's a story here that I really think would be good to end with this morning, just in that carefulness of coming into the presence of God; the understanding of His holiness. In I Samuel, chapter 6, it's really interesting to read through this segment of history. In chapter 4, the Philistines conquer Israel; they take the Ark of the Covenant captive. You probably remember the story of chapter 5, where the Philistines put the Ark of the Covenant next to their idol, Dagon, and they come in and they find Dagon fallen over, bowing before the Ark of the Covenant. And then in chapter 5, verse 6, it says, "But the hand of the Lord was heavy upon them...and he destroyed them, and smote them with emerods..." And so here they are plagued beneath the judgment of God.

And then in chapter 6 they said, verse 2, "...What shall we do to the ark of the Lord? tell us wherewith we shall send it to his place, [because it's making us miserable. All of these plagues and judgments are upon us because we stole the ark of the covenant] And they said, if ye send away the ark of the God of Israel, send it not empty; but it any wise return him a trespass offering...[And they come up with, verse 4] Five golden emerods, and five golden mice, according to the number of the lords of the Philistines..." And so they come up with this plan and in verse 7 we see the plan unfolding, how they're going to get rid of this ark and send it back to Israel. And he says, "Now therefore make a new cart, and take two milch kine, on which there hath come no yoke, and tie the kine to the cart, and bring their calves home from them." Okay, so these are mother cows, nursing calves and we're going to separate their babies from them and they're going to pull this cart that's going to carry the ark. Now they did this for a reason, because they know that if they put the Ark of the Covenant on the cart and if the cart heads back towards Israel, then they're truly being led and powered by supernatural power because the tendency of any nursing mother is to, what? Go back to their calf. And so, we know what happens here, we're familiar with the story.

It says in verse 10, "And the men did so; and took two milch kine, and tied them to the cart, and shut up their calves at home: And they laid the ark of the Lord upon the cart, and the coffer with the mice of gold and the images of their emerods. And the kine took the straight way to the way of Beth-shemesh, and went along the highway, lowing as they went, and turned not aside to the right hand or to the left; [They didn't go back to their calves.] and the lords of the Philistines went after them unto the border of Beth-shemesh. And they of Beth-shemesh were reaping their wheat harvest in the valley: and they lifted up their eyes, and saw the ark, and rejoiced to see it [The ark's coming back to us!]. And the cart came into the field of Joshua, a Beth-shemite, and stood there, where there was a great stone: [now watch what they did. They started off pretty good.] and they clave the wood of the cart, and offered the kine a burnt offering unto the Lord."

Good choice. That cart had now been hallowed. It had been in the service of the Lord. It would have been wrong and unclean for them to now take that cart which was new. It had never been used for anything else but carrying the ark of God. It would have been wrong for them to take that and now use it for any other purpose in farming or to carry something. This cart was set aside. It was hallowed for the Ark of the Covenant. And so they take it and they break it up and give it as an offering unto the Lord. "And the Levites took down the ark of the Lord, and the coffer that was with it, wherein the jewels of gold were [which was what the Philistines had put in as a peace offering]" And watch what happens here. I'm trying to find the place. They took down the ark, they took the coffer wherein were these jewels and it says, "...the men of Beth-shemesh [verse 15 still], offered burnt offerings and sacrificed sacrifices the same day unto the Lord."

Looks to me like they're doing everything right. They're rejoicing that the Ark of the Covenant came back, they're offering offerings to the Lord, they were careful with how they used this cart, right? Looks like they're doing pretty good. Then in verse 19, the Lord "...smote the men of Beth-shemesh, because they had looked into the ark of the Lord, even he smote of the people fifty thousand and threescore and ten men: and the people lamented, because the Lord had smitten many of the people with a great slaughter. And the men of Bethshemesh said, Who is able to stand before [what?] this holy Lord God?"

And see, this is some of the distinction. Remember I said before that the process of holiness in our life really is a process of discrimination, approving those things that are excellent and not just settling for the good but insisting upon the excellent. Not just settling for what's religious, but making sure that we have the heart and the mind of God. Many times, we could compare ourselves with these men of Beth-shemite. We do a lot of things right. They did some things right here too, but there was a lapse in their carefulness. There was a lapse in their pursuit and they ended up being slaughtered because they took the presence of God, the Ark of God, for granted and they treated it as common for that one brief moment. They did a lot of things right, but God doesn't take kindly to His holiness being defiled and His presence being treated as common. And He slaughtered them and they bore the judgment of God.

And in a community of people and in a church where we do a lot of things right, we need to be very careful with the presence of God and not take it for granted and not assume that because we do so many things right over here, that this will be accepted. No. We need to be careful with His presence. There always needs to be that fear and trembling at His awesomeness in our heart. There always needs to be that spontaneous praise as we behold His beauty. There needs to be that distinction and that marked difference between clean and unclean. And that's what we want to talk about tonight as we begin to work out some of these principles in our daily life. But remember the story of the cart and the Ark and the Beth-shemites. And remember how careful they needed to be and let it be a reminder for us when we come back tonight to service, how careful we need to be in His presence.

Let's stand before the Lord this morning. We'll pick this up this evening and look further into it. We may even start back with this story, I don't know. But your pursuit of God this morning needs to be with all of your heart. You can't make just a real good run at it, do some things right and then say, "Oh well, that's good enough. I can relax a little now. I've taken care of the cart. I've broken it up. I've offered it to the Lord..." And then your pursuit and your fear of Him begin to relax a little bit. It's much like that verse over in Hebrews, chapter 2 where he says, "We ought to give the more earnest heed, lest at any time we let these things slip from us." And I want to tell you something, if we're not careful with the presence of God, that's exactly what happens, it slips away from us. To give the more earnest heed, it speaks of holding something in your hand and holding it tighter and tighter and tighter and tighter. And it gives an implication that the moment you relax, and then what you possess will be taken from you. That's this wholehearted pursuit that is really a hallmark of this ministry as far as what's presented to you as a standard. And He's saying, "give the more earnest heed."

What is your pursuit today as compared to yesterday? What is your vision of His holiness today as compared to yesterday? Did you tremble more this morning at His word than you did last week, the forgiveness, the love, and the faith that He's gifted you with? Are you holding tighter to them today lest at any time they should slip out of your hands? The Beth-shemites, they gave heed, they were careful about some things, but then they were lax about others and their lives were taken from them and their rejoicing that the Ark of the Covenant had come home was turned to mourning. And it was all because they didn't mark the difference. They treated a holy God as common and they forgot the difference between them and their creator. Don't ever forget that you are the creature and He is the creator. Don't ever forget that you answer to Him. Don't ever forget that one day you will stand in that light in which there is no darkness and you will be judged according to the standard of His purity and it should cause a holy reverence and fear. It should cause you to fall on your face as though dead just as it did the apostle John.

Father, teach us Your holiness. And teach us to fear before You. And Father, there's nothing that we can do to manufacture this fear, there's nothing we can do to understand Your holiness. Our only hope is that You would show Yourself to us. And so, once again, Father, over and over and over again, we cry out to You to breathe upon these bones and cause us to live, to fill us afresh, to always keep the vision of You bright in our hearts and Father, we'll give You all of the praise and all of the glory for it. We thank You, Lord Jesus.

Oh, Father, how we worship You and thank You. We give You all the praise and all of the glory. Father, we do stand in amazement at Your greatness and at Your holiness. Father, when we see how great You are and how pure You are, we know there's nothing we can do to please You or satisfy Your holiness. So, we cry upon the blood of Jesus and ask for cleansing. And we ask that You would come and live in us and bear fruit in us that would be acceptable to Yourself. You are our only hope and our only life! And, Jesus, if You're not our righteousness, then we have no righteousness. It's only by You that we stand. We give You the praise and the glory.

Let's sing this together as Gary leads us. We praise You Jesus! Sing it again, "Create in me a clean heart." Oh, yes, Father! That's what we want, this morning! Sing it, "Cast me not away." Oh, Father, we praise Your name! We do cry after You! Father, we're so glad that You are our Father and we are Your children! We thank You for reconciling us to Yourself! Thank You for purchasing us with the blood of Jesus! We thank You for cleansing and washing us. Oh, Father, where would we be without the blood of Jesus! You've purchased us and called us Your own, and we are forever grateful and forever and ever we will sing Your praise. We thank You, mighty God. Amen. Amen. God bless You, we'll see you this evening.

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