"Ascribe to the LORD the glory due his name. Bring an offering and come before him; worship the LORD in the splendor of his holiness." - I Chron. 16:29

Have you ever been around somebody that has done such great things you feel like a slacker?

It's like pulling up next to a Ferrari in your beat up Honda. It's a bad hair day when everyone around you seems to have such nice shine, volume, and styling. We know what it feels like to feel like less. However, it seems that sometimes we casualy approach God like we have it all together. We come to God with what we think is a great offering, or a job well done. We come to God how we like, when we like, and with little to no reverence. This would all change quickly in your heart if you understood God's Holiness. That's when you would truly know what it feels like to feel like less

Job 15:15-16 began's to show us the gap between God's Holiness and us; "..God can't even trust his holy angels. He sees the flaws in the very heavens themselves, So how much less we humans, smelly and foul, who lap up evil like water?" (MSG) God's Holiness is an absolute purity like the whitest of whites that we have never seen because all we are capable of is a dingy gray.

Revelation 4 depicts a heavenly scene of Cherubim angels worshipping God. Even in their angelic sinlessness these angels cover their eyes and their feet with wings in the presence of God. They sing night and day, "Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty!" In the ancient Jewish culture you only said something 3 times if it was absolutely true. This was not done lightly. God's holiness is beyond perfection, it is an unfathomable "otherness" that none can approach lest they be consumed. "God is an all consuming fire", Paul writes in Hebrews.

Fire is a force of power in nature, one you must respect and revere. God often used fire in scripture to describe his holiness. Without proper respect and a proper response to the power of fire it will destroy you. A. W. Tozer says, "the holiness of God confronts the sinner." There is no one pure, no one who is sinless. Even the best we have is still dirty, dingy, and filthy in the sight of God's holiness! Will you try and approach God on your own? Will you try and earn a good standing before a God that requires absolute perfection and a holiness that you can never attain?

There is only one way that you and I have a chance at worshipping, relating with, and approaching the Holy God. Jesus Christ is the way, the truth, and the life. By his sacrifice to appease the holy wrath of God for our sinfulness we are offered an audience before God by faith. In the righteousness of Christ we can stand by grace in front of a Holy God and worship at his feet. This gospel must not be taken lightly. Salvation is not an ordinary cheap gift, it is the power of God for the salvation for everyone who believes!

It is an understanding of God's holiness that brings us to both a humbling prostration at his feet in unworthiness, and a jubilant exultation of worship before his goodness and grace! Think about that this week.

-Josh