WEBVTT 00:00:01.181 --> 00:00:02.504 Exodus, chapter 3,. 00:00:02.504 --> 00:00:04.288 We're going to read two texts this morning. 00:00:04.288 --> 00:00:12.922 I have to be honest with you and tell you in a way we are almost outside of the perimeters of this series. 00:00:12.922 --> 00:00:22.606 But I have to obey the Spirit of God and I can't get away from this attribute of God called holiness. 00:00:22.606 --> 00:00:35.125 And because of that I've just been parked here and I have been praying and saying, okay, it's time to move on to a different attribute of God, and I felt constrained by the Spirit to not be able to do that. 00:00:35.125 --> 00:00:38.432 So I'm going with what the Holy Spirit's putting on my heart. 00:00:38.432 --> 00:00:42.408 And this is two verses in Exodus 3, and we'll read in 1 Peter 1. 00:00:42.408 --> 00:00:46.164 Familiar words, verse 1 of Exodus 3,. 00:00:46.746 --> 00:01:04.052 Now Moses was keeping the flock of his father-in-law, jethro, the priest of Midian, and he led his flock to the west side of the wilderness and came to Horeb, the mountain of God, and the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush. 00:01:04.052 --> 00:01:10.871 He looked and behold, the bush was burning, yet it was not consumed. 00:01:10.871 --> 00:01:18.132 And Moses said I will now turn aside to see this great sight while the bush is not burned. 00:01:18.132 --> 00:01:20.102 And the Lord saw that. 00:01:20.102 --> 00:01:27.522 He turned aside to see God called to him out of the bush, moses, moses. 00:01:27.522 --> 00:01:29.707 And he said here I am. 00:01:29.707 --> 00:01:50.745 Then he said do not come near, take your sandals off your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground, and kindly turn to the New Testament, to the book of 1 Peter and the first chapter of 1 Peter, beginning in verse 13. 00:01:50.745 --> 00:02:04.010 I really, really hope these are not new verses to you, but if they are, i pray that the weight of these words would be upon every man and woman hearing my voice. 00:02:04.010 --> 00:02:06.123 Verse 13 of 1 Peter 1,. 00:02:06.123 --> 00:02:20.282 Therefore, preparing your minds for action and being sober-minded, set your hope fully on the grace that will be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ. 00:02:20.282 --> 00:02:28.257 As obedient children, do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance. 00:02:28.257 --> 00:02:36.412 But as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct. 00:02:36.412 --> 00:02:46.022 Since it is written, you shall be holy, for I am holy, father. 00:02:46.022 --> 00:02:56.822 This morning we hear these words thundering in our ears and we are reminded that you are the holy one of God And Father. 00:02:56.822 --> 00:03:12.683 This morning, our hearts tremble at this declaration by your servant, peter, that not only are you holy, but you have called us with a holy calling to be holy in all of our conduct. 00:03:12.683 --> 00:03:39.133 Lord, i'm sure this morning there are a lot of men and women that are wondering how to make ends meet, wondering how to raise kids properly in this environment, struggling with financial burdens and other things, marital tensions, physical maladies, and maybe this morning they came and the farthest thing from our mind was the call on your people to be holy. 00:03:39.133 --> 00:03:55.665 But I pray this morning, father, that my words, by your anointing, would awaken us to our call to be holy and we would even see that in responding to this call is the answer to everything else we need. 00:03:55.665 --> 00:04:02.328 We ask it in Jesus' name and everyone said Amen. 00:04:07.620 --> 00:04:30.930 Most of you are familiar with my personal testimony how God saved me as a young Jewish man in Miami, florida, in 1971, swept into the kingdom at the heyday of the charismatic renewal after God had transformed my brother, who was a drug addict and who was instantaneously touched by God's power and delivered from years of drug addiction. 00:04:30.930 --> 00:04:47.891 What you might not know is, after receiving the gospel, I immediately joined a small Pentecostal church in Miami Beach, one I helped start and then my brother helped start, and one that after four years I would become, by a miracle of grace, the pastor of. 00:04:47.891 --> 00:04:57.685 One of the things I thank God for in those early days is I learned that believers were called to be different from the world. 00:04:57.685 --> 00:05:12.680 This call to be holy was sounded out in my church And I grew up with teaching that reminded us constantly that we were to live separate lives from the world, different lives. 00:05:12.680 --> 00:05:14.363 And good thing. 00:05:14.363 --> 00:05:40.791 Another good thing was our church saved us the bother of trying to figure out what that meant, because our pastor would constantly give us a series of prohibitions, things we shouldn't do if you're holy Don't smoke, don't drink, don't have premarital sex, don't party and actually don't bowl. 00:05:40.791 --> 00:05:42.495 I don't know why bowling was evil. 00:05:42.495 --> 00:05:45.620 I learned later. 00:05:45.620 --> 00:05:49.112 As the bowl goes into the gutter, it releases demonic power. 00:05:49.112 --> 00:05:59.853 So bowling was forbidden, and I grew up believing that all of these prohibitions was what holiness was about. 00:06:00.995 --> 00:06:05.831 And it became obvious to me that you do these things or you don't do those things. 00:06:05.831 --> 00:06:11.884 You avoid certain things in order to gain God's approval, to get God's favor. 00:06:11.884 --> 00:06:14.435 And our church was characterized. 00:06:14.435 --> 00:06:22.898 It became evident to me after being there for a couple of years that we prided ourselves on what we didn't do. 00:06:22.898 --> 00:06:29.956 Yet I observed a strange thing in my own breast as well as in the heart of others who were in the church. 00:06:29.956 --> 00:06:37.555 I observed that while we prided ourselves on what we didn't do, we sure wish we could have. 00:06:37.555 --> 00:06:52.403 In other words, our Christian life for the most part was focused on externals the things we were told not to do and the things we were told to do. 00:06:52.403 --> 00:07:01.774 Rarely, if ever, did I ever hear an emphasis on the need for the heart to be changed by God's holiness. 00:07:01.774 --> 00:07:12.701 I learned that while God was certainly interested in my outward deportment and the behaviors of my life, i never heard that. 00:07:12.701 --> 00:07:24.781 I can remember consciously that all of that, the outward expression of Christian living, must be the result of an inward transformation which only the grace of God could do. 00:07:24.781 --> 00:07:46.038 It would be years later that I would learn that the call to holiness was correct, but that there was a gospel way of transformation that didn't just clean men and women up on the outside and leave them inwardly defiled, but was inward in that it first radically transforms the heart. 00:07:47.180 --> 00:07:55.113 Now we are in a series called a God-worth knowing, and we have been slowly and I think the name is a little misleading because we really have been. 00:07:55.113 --> 00:08:07.923 Now this is the third week we will be parked around this attribute of holiness, and last week we saw that God gave a vision to Isaiah of his holiness in chapter 6. 00:08:07.923 --> 00:08:14.761 We spent two weeks in chapter 6, and that is God declares to Isaiah his holiness. 00:08:14.761 --> 00:08:18.130 Which we saw was God's separateness. 00:08:18.130 --> 00:08:30.435 It led Isaiah to a second vision, which we call the inward vision, and Isaiah is undone before the Holy One of God. 00:08:30.435 --> 00:08:36.793 He sees the holiness of God and he cries out in agony and pain woe is me. 00:08:36.793 --> 00:08:51.024 This prophet, who was so powerful in declaring holiness to his people and indicting them, now turns on himself and he is terrorized in God's presence. 00:08:52.549 --> 00:09:09.691 What I want to ask you this morning is a question which the answer will tell you a lot about what you understand about holiness, and it is this why did Isaiah react to God's holiness in this manner? 00:09:09.691 --> 00:09:16.600 Why was he so pained when he saw the Holy One of God? 00:09:16.600 --> 00:09:40.533 And there is one answer and it is most important answer that will lead us into this message this morning, and it is simply this Isaiah was pained because he understood that God intends for all those who know him to share in his holiness. 00:09:40.533 --> 00:09:44.722 That is what Peter is informing us of. 00:09:44.722 --> 00:10:00.381 In 1 Peter, he is saying be holy in all your conduct, for there is a God and Peter quotes from Leviticus, i think it's chapter 11, there is a God who said you shall be holy, for I am holy. 00:10:00.381 --> 00:10:21.816 What we learn in theology is holiness is an attribute of God that is part of a number of attributes of God that are called communicable attributes of God, things that God not only is but intends for his people to share in, and one of them is holiness. 00:10:21.816 --> 00:10:43.350 God's communicable attribute of holiness says whenever men and women are drawn into holiness, god intends for them to be holy, and Peter makes no mistake about it when he says that God has called you and I to nothing less than holiness in every aspect of our lives. 00:10:43.350 --> 00:10:48.301 Now I'm wondering this morning something how do you respond to that? 00:10:48.301 --> 00:11:05.837 Really, really, really deep within your breast, what do you think of when you hear this statement from Peter and hear me read it that God has called us to holiness? 00:11:05.918 --> 00:11:12.254 Typically in the church, there have been one of two responses to this call to holiness. 00:11:12.254 --> 00:11:19.089 One is legalism and the other is licentiousness or license. 00:11:19.089 --> 00:11:20.071 I'll explain both. 00:11:20.071 --> 00:11:38.666 Legalism means that we interpret the call of holiness to focus our attention primarily on our behavior, so that holiness becomes largely about external behaviors. 00:11:38.666 --> 00:11:47.350 What I learned in my church as a young believer what to do and what not to do, what games to play, what games you should not play. 00:11:47.350 --> 00:11:51.679 Some of what I learned in my church was not legalism, it was biblical. 00:11:51.679 --> 00:11:56.256 We learned sexual purity and I thank God for that because that is biblical. 00:11:56.256 --> 00:12:03.780 But then it began to bleed into other areas where we were told not to bowl or go to the movies or stuff like that. 00:12:03.780 --> 00:12:11.144 Maybe there's some wisdom in that advice, but I found out there's a whole host of church rules that aren't in the Bible. 00:12:11.144 --> 00:12:14.918 If you haven't found that out, you will Hang around the church. 00:12:16.269 --> 00:12:35.451 But other people respond to the call of holiness by licentiousness, which essentially means that we lessen, minimize the demands of holiness and tell ourselves God loves me and we're under grace. 00:12:35.451 --> 00:12:41.023 So really, man, it doesn't matter how I live, it really doesn't matter. 00:12:41.023 --> 00:12:43.854 In other words, we take one of two positions. 00:12:43.854 --> 00:12:51.421 We either look at the standard of holiness and shrug our shoulders and say, get real, this is 2011. 00:12:51.421 --> 00:13:00.023 Or else we break into a sob and look at the demands of holiness and say, no way, i can never do this. 00:13:00.023 --> 00:13:06.037 Let's take a moment and look at both for a minute, because it's critical that we understand the difference. 00:13:06.096 --> 00:13:18.705 Let's start with licentiousness, a fancy word that implies this I'm going to get out of the demands of holiness all my life. 00:13:18.705 --> 00:13:24.899 I'll choose to dismiss it as an impossible standard. 00:13:24.899 --> 00:13:42.224 When a man called me this week from another state to confess to me that he was struggling with internet porn, if I was a licentiousness pastor, i would have said look, man, this is 2011. 00:13:42.224 --> 00:13:47.359 God understands, he's gracious, he understands. 00:13:47.359 --> 00:13:53.836 He can't expect you to live a pure life in such an impure world. 00:13:53.836 --> 00:14:01.298 You can be under licentiousness when you hear, when you say to yourself you know, marriage is hard. 00:14:01.298 --> 00:14:06.696 God can't possibly mean that I'm supposed to stay married to my partner for life. 00:14:06.696 --> 00:14:10.692 That's what he originally meant, but this is 2011. 00:14:12.565 --> 00:14:33.929 What we do when we're living, when our response to holiness is licentiousness, what we are doing is we are distorting grace by lowering the standards to justify our lifestyle, and one of the ways we do that is we suggest that, because we're loved by God, it doesn't matter how we live. 00:14:33.929 --> 00:14:59.297 Incidentally, there are books of Scripture written to correct this error, books like Jude, which opens with these words beloved, although it was very eager to write to you about our common salvation, i found it necessary to write to appealing you, to you to contend for the faith that was once for all delivered for the saints. 00:14:59.297 --> 00:15:06.817 For certain people have crept in unnoticed, who long ago were designated for this condemnation. 00:15:06.817 --> 00:15:18.410 Ungodly people who pervert the grace of God into sensuality and deny our only master, the Lord Jesus Christ. 00:15:18.410 --> 00:15:22.250 Notice Jude's indictment. 00:15:22.250 --> 00:15:29.251 They creep in and they pervert the grace of God in order to hide their sensuality. 00:15:29.251 --> 00:15:33.355 So let me tell you licentiousness is not a new problem. 00:15:33.355 --> 00:15:36.013 The early church dealt with it as well. 00:15:36.725 --> 00:15:49.217 Rather than change and call people to change, people have, for two millenniums, been lowering the standard so that I can fit in, and we do it under the banner of grace. 00:15:49.217 --> 00:15:54.409 Now let me give you something that will help you for the latter part of this message, but I'll speak it right now. 00:15:54.409 --> 00:16:03.926 Settle this in your heart Grace does not mean that God doesn't have any standards anymore and He just overlooks everything. 00:16:03.926 --> 00:16:07.028 Are you with me? 00:16:07.028 --> 00:16:15.517 In fact, grace can only be understood where the highest ethical standards exist. 00:16:15.517 --> 00:16:20.095 Grace doesn't lessen those standards, as we will see. 00:16:20.095 --> 00:16:29.432 It allows us, by empowering us, to live out the demands of holiness in a totally different way than being under law. 00:16:29.432 --> 00:16:34.794 But the standards of holiness are God's and they never can be messed with. 00:16:34.794 --> 00:16:45.727 But most of us in this room thankfully, hopefully, do not fall into the licentious camp There's probably some. 00:16:47.345 --> 00:16:52.554 Most of us make a different error in approaching the matter of holiness. 00:16:52.554 --> 00:17:01.092 What we do is say I heard your message on holiness, now I have to do something about it. 00:17:01.092 --> 00:17:05.977 I've got to go and clean up my act before God will receive me. 00:17:05.977 --> 00:17:18.636 The thinking is and the problem with that is not that we don't need to change, that's true enough But the problem is we're not approaching holiness from a biblical perspective. 00:17:18.636 --> 00:17:21.714 We think of it as an act of our willpower. 00:17:21.714 --> 00:17:23.852 I, now Jesus, did it all. 00:17:23.852 --> 00:17:27.615 Now I have to respond and clean up my act and do something. 00:17:27.615 --> 00:17:39.075 And the problem with this is we are approaching it as if holiness is simply a matter of willpower alone, that if I have enough willpower I can change. 00:17:39.075 --> 00:17:49.070 And, by the way, one of the results of this thinking has been the victorious Christian life syndrome. 00:17:49.070 --> 00:17:50.827 I'd like to refer it to that. 00:17:50.827 --> 00:17:52.811 Somehow one day. 00:17:52.811 --> 00:18:02.631 One day, i'm going to be victorious And we have a bunch of Christians running around and they go to altar call after altar call rededicating their dedication. 00:18:02.932 --> 00:18:07.094 This is the day And remember in our Pentecostal church I probably told you this. 00:18:07.094 --> 00:18:09.371 We had a wonderful service every Tuesday night. 00:18:09.371 --> 00:18:11.830 We called it condemnation night. 00:18:11.830 --> 00:18:21.131 That's where the preacher beats you up for your failures and you ran to the altar and said I will rededicate my dedication. 00:18:21.131 --> 00:18:39.459 But it doesn't happen And the result is there are many men and women sitting in this room who are walking around condemned because they haven't reached some plateau of victory they have been told they should reach. 00:18:40.105 --> 00:18:48.833 Now I'm not suggesting that will our wills do not play an integral part in the process of sanctification, of being made holy? 00:18:48.833 --> 00:18:49.334 for they do. 00:18:49.334 --> 00:19:17.692 The problem is, before your will can be engaged in the process of being made holy, you first, and I first, have to realize that, just like justification, holiness or sanctification is a provision God gave us in Christ, which means it can only be obtained by grace, through faith, and there are multitudes of scriptures that make this clear. 00:19:17.692 --> 00:19:22.413 It is untrue to say justification God did. 00:19:22.413 --> 00:19:28.954 Sanctification is all my work, and it's true that sanctification demands a cooperation. 00:19:28.954 --> 00:19:53.180 But listen to God's word And because of him you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption, so that, as it is written, let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord. 00:19:53.180 --> 00:20:02.098 And so this Paul includes holiness, sanctification, as being gifted to us in Christ Jesus. 00:20:02.625 --> 00:20:04.089 Look at this scripture or listen to it. 00:20:04.089 --> 00:20:04.853 We won't turn there. 00:20:04.853 --> 00:20:14.673 It's in 1 Corinthians 611, after Paul lists all the wickedness in the culture and then he says and such were some of you. 00:20:14.673 --> 00:20:18.854 You were just like this, but you were washed. 00:20:18.854 --> 00:20:29.955 You were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of God. 00:20:29.955 --> 00:20:40.978 Another word for that is you were washed, you were made holy in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of God. 00:20:40.978 --> 00:20:59.214 Both these texts and there are more that I could cite, but we won't Both of these instruct us that holiness first, like justification, is a provision of God given to us by the gracious work of Christ. 00:20:59.214 --> 00:21:15.410 That means beloved, that if you and I are ever to achieve holiness, faith must first lay claim to what God did in Christ in setting us apart and making us holy through the death of His Son on Calvary. 00:21:15.410 --> 00:21:29.126 And it is the reality of what was done for us by grace that breaks the power of sin in our lives. 00:21:29.126 --> 00:21:38.997 Now our text this morning instructs us in this very thing in a powerful picture way. 00:21:40.384 --> 00:21:48.569 Here's Moses minding his own business, leaving his flock on the backside of the desert, and he sees a strange sight. 00:21:48.569 --> 00:21:53.290 Have you ever considered why God appears to Moses in this manner? 00:21:53.290 --> 00:21:56.215 Strange sight He sees a bush burning. 00:21:56.215 --> 00:22:06.784 It's not unusual In a hot summer day in the Sinai wilderness to see a bush that had been ignited by the blazing sun. 00:22:06.784 --> 00:22:09.886 That didn't attract Moses in itself. 00:22:09.886 --> 00:22:17.551 What attracted him, we are told, is he saw this bush burning, yet not consumed. 00:22:17.551 --> 00:22:32.772 What is interesting and helpful for you to know here is the Hebrew word for bush in this passage in Exodus 3 is Sena, which literally is a thorny bush. 00:22:32.772 --> 00:22:35.807 It grows in that part of the world. 00:22:35.807 --> 00:22:43.070 You can still see them today, the thorny Achesia bush, and it's thorny and it's, i guess it's prickly. 00:22:43.070 --> 00:22:47.548 I've never seen one, but it is literally translated, if you translated properly. 00:22:47.548 --> 00:22:54.828 He saw a thorn bush ablaze with fire and not being consumed. 00:22:54.828 --> 00:23:05.371 I wonder this morning if you immediately thought of something when you realized that the bush that Moses saw burning was a thorn bush. 00:23:06.240 --> 00:23:10.851 What is the first instance of the word thorn in the Bible? 00:23:10.851 --> 00:23:19.180 Anybody In the fall of Adam, god judges the ground and you remember what he says to Adam and Eve? 00:23:19.180 --> 00:23:27.213 he says by the sweat of your brow, you will toil and thorns and thistles, the ground will yield. 00:23:27.213 --> 00:23:41.964 Instead of cooperating with you, adam, now the ground will resist you and instead of producing fruitful harvest which it will, but it also you will have to glean that harvest from the thorn of the earth. 00:23:41.964 --> 00:23:53.548 And so the picture of thorns is a picture of the cursed earth which God pronounced in Genesis 3, immediately after the fall. 00:23:53.548 --> 00:24:02.047 Not only were Adam and Eve fallen, the world was fallen, the ground was cursed, and the evidence of the curse is it produces thorns. 00:24:02.047 --> 00:24:11.051 Here you have a thorn, bush, the perfect expression of cursed and fallenness. 00:24:11.051 --> 00:24:13.586 And now you have the fire of God. 00:24:13.720 --> 00:24:19.031 By the way, fire is an emblem of God's holiness throughout the entire Bible. 00:24:19.031 --> 00:24:23.651 Wherever fire is, it portrays God in His awesome holiness. 00:24:23.651 --> 00:24:34.544 And here the bush, which is a picture of the cursed earth, is consumed with fire, yet it's not consumed, it's not burned up. 00:24:34.544 --> 00:24:36.300 How many know? 00:24:36.300 --> 00:24:50.989 God's holiness in a fallen world will always judge and consume that which is cursed, but when Moses sees a tree, it's not consumed. 00:24:50.989 --> 00:24:57.388 This can only mean one thing What an incredible picture of grace. 00:24:57.388 --> 00:25:01.346 The fire of God's holiness should consume it, but it doesn't. 00:25:01.346 --> 00:25:20.031 And it is this, unlike Isaiah, it is this which draws Moses, this grace picture, this fire of God that should destroy, that is not consuming. 00:25:20.031 --> 00:25:25.710 It's this that is used by God to draw Moses to holiness. 00:25:27.720 --> 00:25:32.005 I couldn't help it When I knew this was the thorn bush. 00:25:32.005 --> 00:25:36.373 I also realized, or thought, of something else. 00:25:36.373 --> 00:25:55.574 I thought of the one who wore the thorn, the crown of thorns, on our behalf, who took into his own person the fire of God's wrath for sinners, who consumed it in his own person. 00:25:55.574 --> 00:25:59.990 We who knew no sin became sin for us. 00:25:59.990 --> 00:26:13.579 Christ was made I'm quoting from Galatians a curse for us, so that we might be the righteousness of God. 00:26:13.680 --> 00:26:21.525 All of this, and the reason I took time to explain it to you this morning, leads us to this lesson. 00:26:21.525 --> 00:26:22.663 The lesson is clear. 00:26:22.663 --> 00:26:35.291 The bush teaches us that the first step towards holiness is not to try to clean up our act so that if we somehow get it together, god will respond to us. 00:26:35.291 --> 00:26:43.498 Rather, it is first, as always, to see and apprehend God's provision in Christ. 00:26:43.498 --> 00:26:48.084 By grace for our holiness, god did it all. 00:26:48.084 --> 00:26:58.727 The bush is not consumed, and when we draw near to God, we're not drawing near to a God who's vengeful and angry and looking for an excuse to destroy us. 00:26:58.727 --> 00:27:10.087 We're coming to a God who, in Christ, is and has made provision for our holiness, and holiness is gifted to us just as justification. 00:27:12.400 --> 00:27:16.799 There is a picture of this in the children's version of Pilgrim's Progress. 00:27:16.799 --> 00:27:23.868 I don't know how many of you have read Pilgrim's Progress I've got to work And then the children's version of Pilgrim's Progress. 00:27:23.868 --> 00:27:28.945 The Pilgrims are on their journey and they discover a mirror. 00:27:28.945 --> 00:27:30.963 Remember the mirror they discovered? 00:27:30.963 --> 00:27:41.709 And when they look in the mirror on the front side, as they gaze at themselves in the mirror, it's an ordinary mirror and it gives them their reflection, warts and all. 00:27:41.709 --> 00:27:53.201 But when you look at the mirror from the backside, it has an image of the crucified Lord Jesus on the back. 00:27:53.201 --> 00:28:00.750 So anyone looking in that mirror from the front will see what he or she expected. 00:28:00.750 --> 00:28:08.374 You will see in that reflection your person, with all of your scars and all of your blemishes. 00:28:08.374 --> 00:28:09.742 The mirror never lies. 00:28:09.742 --> 00:28:13.590 It stares back at you and gives you an accurate portrait. 00:28:13.590 --> 00:28:25.544 But if you look at the same mirror from the rear, you would only see the glory of the Son of God, and this is God's. 00:28:25.544 --> 00:28:33.134 This demonstrates how it is that sinners are made holy in this life. 00:28:33.134 --> 00:28:44.070 Their holiness first of all, must never be something we view as achieving for God, but that which grace alone supplies through his personal, perfect work. 00:28:44.070 --> 00:28:57.828 Here's the amazing thing about that mirror image It portrays that grace is God's willingness to look at his people from the perspective that sees his holy Son in our place. 00:28:57.828 --> 00:29:11.625 You see, satan loves for believers to not view themselves from the back of the mirror but from the front, and then get busy on an elaborate works program to try to clean themselves up, so God will receive them. 00:29:11.625 --> 00:29:22.744 What we must be trained in, which is called faith, is understanding that God is viewing our lives from the backside of the mirror. 00:29:27.519 --> 00:29:32.103 Many years ago, philip Brooks came up with an acrostic How many have ever heard of it? 00:29:32.103 --> 00:29:42.190 G-R-A-C-E, and he called it God's riches at Christ's expense. 00:29:42.190 --> 00:29:48.789 God's riches at Christ's expense. 00:29:48.789 --> 00:30:07.207 And this acrostic beautifully illustrates the truth that the blessings which Christ alone deserves, the blessings that belong to him, are now ours, not because of achievement, but because of what he has done. 00:30:07.207 --> 00:30:13.821 And many believers start their Christian life with this, but then they get on the performance treadmill. 00:30:13.821 --> 00:30:20.827 I actually heard somebody say it recently Okay, jesus did certain things for you. 00:30:20.827 --> 00:30:30.903 Now he wants you to prove by an endless array of works that, by doing things, he's justified in keeping loving you. 00:30:30.903 --> 00:30:42.523 I call this performance treadmill, because it consists of a perpetual attempt to win God's favor. 00:30:43.799 --> 00:30:54.433 Now maybe you're thinking this morning Well, if I approach holiness this way, i would not trust myself. 00:30:54.433 --> 00:31:01.281 Neil, isn't a focus on God's unconditional love and the grace which makes us holy, don't I? 00:31:01.281 --> 00:31:11.851 aren't I in danger that if I focus on that alone, it will promote a lifestyle of anti-nomianism a fancy word that means against law. 00:31:11.851 --> 00:31:23.308 But for laymen here this morning, we are convinced that if we give ourselves to the grace and love of God, somehow we won't care anymore how we live. 00:31:23.308 --> 00:31:28.201 But that's not. 00:31:28.201 --> 00:31:33.269 That is not the picture presented to us at the bush. 00:31:35.880 --> 00:31:49.325 When Moses draws near to this picture of grace the fire of holiness not consuming that which should be judged There's a second response. 00:31:49.325 --> 00:31:53.472 He's drawn near to it because the beauty of holiness draws sinners to it. 00:31:53.472 --> 00:32:00.387 And then he stopped in his tracks And God says don't come any closer. 00:32:00.387 --> 00:32:11.144 Take your shoes off your feet, for the place in which you are standing is no longer cursed, it's holy ground. 00:32:11.144 --> 00:32:24.171 God drew him to holiness through love, and now holiness makes certain demands. 00:32:24.171 --> 00:32:35.432 Now we know that taking your shoes off was a respectful response to the presence of God. 00:32:35.432 --> 00:32:39.828 But how do you walk when your shoes are off? 00:32:39.828 --> 00:32:45.772 What's the word, the optimum word, to describe how you walk when you're walking without shoes? 00:32:45.772 --> 00:32:49.371 I used to in our West Knoxville home. 00:32:49.371 --> 00:32:53.723 We had a long driveway and I always insisted in taking the garbage out. 00:32:53.723 --> 00:32:58.387 With no shoes on, a 30 second trek became a five minute ordeal. 00:32:58.387 --> 00:33:10.007 Because when you walk with your shoes off, what's the optimum word that describes how you walk Carefully, you never know what you're stepping on. 00:33:14.799 --> 00:33:27.711 If you and I appropriate, by faith provided for by God's perfect work in Christ, the holiness which is ours, it will cause you to walk different. 00:33:27.711 --> 00:33:35.285 It will deliver you from that licentious notion that, wow, i'm loved by God, so it doesn't matter how I live. 00:33:35.285 --> 00:33:37.723 That is not how you will respond. 00:33:37.723 --> 00:33:47.028 If you're in Christ and you appropriate in Christ the grace which makes you holy, you will experience what God told Abram. 00:33:47.028 --> 00:33:53.172 He said I am Almighty, god, walk before me and be thou perfect. 00:33:53.172 --> 00:34:02.209 Now you may learn that you've been under a legalistic tendency to say that the Christian life is all about what I can't do, and I'm amazed. 00:34:02.209 --> 00:34:16.141 I am amazed at how Christians will fight over things like drinking, but they'll never address pride, lust, arrogance, know those things ever come into play and we focus entirely on externals. 00:34:16.141 --> 00:34:35.545 But when you are approaching this bush, which typifies God's grace, you will never walk the same, let me assure you this morning. 00:34:35.605 --> 00:34:43.806 For those who are concerned, resting in God's love and grace does not relieve us of holy obligation. 00:34:43.806 --> 00:35:09.422 Rather, it allows us to fulfill holy obligation, because what happens is grace so changes our hearts that we cease striving to love Him for our own benefits and we begin to manifest that selfless love which alone brings Him glory. 00:35:09.422 --> 00:35:13.985 You see, there's a profound difference. 00:35:13.985 --> 00:35:14.927 Listen carefully. 00:35:14.927 --> 00:35:28.773 There's a profound difference between our obedience being a grateful response to God's grace instead of being that which tries to bribe God to get Him to bless us. 00:35:28.980 --> 00:35:35.393 When I was debating the Judaizers last week in North Carolina, i said why are you focused on the law? 00:35:35.393 --> 00:35:39.851 They said because we want to be blessed and you're blessed if you keep the law. 00:35:39.851 --> 00:35:42.746 And we shouted out no, no, no. 00:35:42.746 --> 00:35:44.952 That is not where blessing comes from. 00:35:44.952 --> 00:35:51.202 That is a denial of the new covenant, and they love to hear that. 00:35:51.202 --> 00:36:18.380 You see, the pursuit of holiness then becomes a delight Rather than a chore that I must live out, and what we learn is that it is our union with Christ, rather than any merit of our own, which is the basis of holiness as well as our justification. 00:36:18.380 --> 00:36:27.335 And so what happens is true holiness always avoids the pitfalls that both legalism and license try to begin. 00:36:28.230 --> 00:36:35.860 Try to assert Legalists try they confuse true holiness by only focusing on outward performance. 00:36:35.860 --> 00:36:40.806 Now don't hear me to be saying it doesn't matter about anything outward. 00:36:40.806 --> 00:36:43.737 If you're truly holy, it will become outward. 00:36:43.737 --> 00:36:55.201 But what happens when you focus, as a legalist, on outward performance is we tend to gravitate towards rules and restrictions that overlook the real issues of the heart. 00:36:55.201 --> 00:36:59.677 Everybody, listen to me, this is not about outward externals. 00:36:59.677 --> 00:37:02.996 Primarily, it is a condition of the heart. 00:37:02.996 --> 00:37:07.237 It begins within and grace changes us at heart level. 00:37:07.237 --> 00:37:32.572 What Elfam happens to is when we're legalists, we tend to gravitate towards rules that aren't in the Bible, rules that arguably fall into Romans 14 categories Convictions that you can have that are fine as long as you don't make them commandments for others. 00:37:34.210 --> 00:37:38.239 I don't mean to suggest that there aren't external standards to uphold. 00:37:38.239 --> 00:37:48.958 It's just that, without the knowledge of what God did in Christ, the Christian life can become merely a matter of externalism. 00:37:48.958 --> 00:37:51.697 Take the issue of Bible reading and prayer. 00:37:51.697 --> 00:38:07.190 No one in this room believes it's more important than I do that we wake up and spend time in God's Word and prayer, but I have seen Christians make that a rule and an obligation that beats them over the head. 00:38:07.190 --> 00:38:10.681 So they come to the Bible every morning out of obligation. 00:38:10.681 --> 00:38:13.719 I got to read the Bible and prayer becomes a chore. 00:38:14.469 --> 00:38:27.994 Let holiness touch you in the core of your being by first seeing it as something God did in Christ, and your attitude towards prayer and Bible reading and other duties of the Christian life will be transformed. 00:38:27.994 --> 00:38:31.351 And you can know. 00:38:31.351 --> 00:38:43.382 You can know if you've fallen into the legalism approach to holiness, because you will soon begin to adopt the attitude of the Pharisee in Luke 18. 00:38:43.382 --> 00:38:47.980 I thank you, god, that I'm not like other men. 00:38:47.980 --> 00:38:50.592 Look at that slob. 00:38:50.592 --> 00:38:51.817 He's still blanks. 00:38:51.817 --> 00:38:52.800 He's still this. 00:38:52.800 --> 00:38:56.215 I thank you that I'm a better Christian than that. 00:38:56.215 --> 00:39:05.442 Or maybe you fell into the license camp when it came to holiness. 00:39:05.610 --> 00:39:10.641 All this talk about holiness it's not achievable in this life. 00:39:10.641 --> 00:39:13.295 The standards are impossible. 00:39:13.295 --> 00:39:17.157 So I'm just going to live any way I want and call it grace. 00:39:17.157 --> 00:39:33.498 You can call it grace, but a great German pastor, theologian named Dietrich Bonhoeffer, called it cheap grace, grace that never changes me at all, but just excuses any behavior. 00:39:33.498 --> 00:39:46.338 It's true that God has removed good works as a ground for our acceptance, but he has not removed righteousness as a requirement of this life. 00:39:46.338 --> 00:39:58.840 So what this morning is empowering you and I to be holy, is it legalism drumming you over the head this morning? 00:39:58.840 --> 00:40:02.378 May you have an awareness and an open heaven. 00:40:02.378 --> 00:40:14.541 May God open the scriptures to you to show you that holiness is first and foremost provided for by Christ Jesus and it's a gracious gift of God to you. 00:40:14.541 --> 00:40:18.038 You have been set apart in Christ already. 00:40:18.298 --> 00:40:31.635 If you're in Christ Or maybe you're in the license camp and you tried living by all the rules, maybe many of which aren't even in Scripture, and you gave up on it and the Christian life to you is just too hard, you know you can never live it. 00:40:32.349 --> 00:40:40.458 Repent of that this morning and find in Christ again the provision of everything you will ever need for real holiness. 00:40:40.458 --> 00:40:58.936 Brothers and sisters, it's all in Christ When Peter tells us God has called you to be holy in all your conduct, for it is written be holy, for I am holy. 00:40:58.936 --> 00:41:02.556 He is not woofin', he is not scaring us. 00:41:02.556 --> 00:41:21.695 He is inviting us to be separate from all that defiles to live differently, because at the core of my being I've been transformed. 00:41:21.695 --> 00:41:29.356 This is God's provision to you and I in Christ. 00:41:29.356 --> 00:41:35.492 You are holy if you're in Christ Before you try to live out holiness. 00:41:35.492 --> 00:41:52.155 Just as God is separate, so you have been separated, but please don't try to be holy by seeing it as a work you have to perform somehow to earn God's approval. 00:41:52.155 --> 00:41:58.222 Come this morning and be enticed by God Himself in grace. 00:41:58.222 --> 00:42:03.362 The fire burning that which is cursed and yet it's not consumed. 00:42:03.362 --> 00:42:08.661 What an incredible picture of what God in Christ offers us.