February 7
Exodus 20:1-22:15
When I was a kid, I used to collect baseball cards. I specifically collected cards of Tony Gwynn, my favorite player. Whenever I received one of his cards I put it in a special binder set apart from all the others. In Biblical terms, they were holy. Holiness is most often used to describe people and not things and is meant to be an accurate description of us. God calls Israel, and the church, to be a holy people. The idea of holiness is simply the idea of being set apart for a specific purpose. Since God calls Israel to be holy, they must live in a way that is distinct from that of their neighbors. Therefore, God gives them a series of laws which we will read about in the rest of Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. Israel's adherence to these commands is one of the ways a distinction was seen.
In much the same way, the church is to be a people set apart for God and his purposes. We are to be people marked by a holiness that reveals itself in very concrete ways. The way we worship, the way we rest, the way we treat family and neighbors, the way we speak, and the way we think should be different than our neighbors who do not know God. Our thoughts, actions, and desires should be different, because we are a different people than the world. So let us be holy, as God is holy.
Father God, thank you for making me holy. Help me to reflect your calling of holiness on my life in the way I think, feel, and act today. Amen.
Where are you tempted to conform to the patterns of the world? How can you learn to be holy/set apart in this area?
When I was a kid, I used to collect baseball cards. I specifically collected cards of Tony Gwynn, my favorite player. Whenever I received one of his cards I put it in a special binder set apart from all the others. In Biblical terms, they were holy. Holiness is most often used to describe people and not things and is meant to be an accurate description of us. God calls Israel, and the church, to be a holy people. The idea of holiness is simply the idea of being set apart for a specific purpose. Since God calls Israel to be holy, they must live in a way that is distinct from that of their neighbors. Therefore, God gives them a series of laws which we will read about in the rest of Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. Israel's adherence to these commands is one of the ways a distinction was seen.
In much the same way, the church is to be a people set apart for God and his purposes. We are to be people marked by a holiness that reveals itself in very concrete ways. The way we worship, the way we rest, the way we treat family and neighbors, the way we speak, and the way we think should be different than our neighbors who do not know God. Our thoughts, actions, and desires should be different, because we are a different people than the world. So let us be holy, as God is holy.
Father God, thank you for making me holy. Help me to reflect your calling of holiness on my life in the way I think, feel, and act today. Amen.
Where are you tempted to conform to the patterns of the world? How can you learn to be holy/set apart in this area?
Recent
Archive
2025
January
January 1January 2January 3January 4January 5January 6January 7January 8January 9January 10January 11January 12January 13January 14January 15January 16January 17January 18January 19January 20January 21January 22January 23January 24January 25January 26January 27January 28January 29January 30January 31
2024
June
Categories
no categories
No Comments