But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. I Peter 2: 9
Holy is something we become when we gave our lives to Jesus. Holy means we have been consecrated or set apart to serve God which is why Aaron and his sons had turbans with Holy to the Lord on a gold plate attached to them (Exodus 28: 36 – 37). They had been set apart to serve God as priests and were consecrated to him for this honour.
We too are a holy nation, a people belonging to God. We have been separated out from the world and have been consecrated to him. This is a great honour but there is more – we have been separated from sin. According to Psalm 93: 5 in the Amplified Bible ‘holiness is apparent in separation from sin’. Not only have we been separated unto God, we have also been separated from sin.
Paul says ‘We died to sin, how can we live in it any longer?’ (Romans 6: 2). He goes on to explain that when we become Christians, the old ‘body of sin’ (6 : 6) died and we are created anew to live for him now. He exhorts us ‘to count yourself dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus’ (6: 11). Sin no longer has any right or control over our lives and Paul encourages us ‘Do not offer the parts of your body to sin …. but rather … offer the parts of your body to him as instruments of righteousness (6: 13).
The truth is we are holy – set apart to God and separated from sin. Too often Christians regard holy as meaning morally superior or good and then look down on those struggling with sin. We are not better than anyone – we are forgiven and by God’s amazing grace we have been made holy. This is nothing to brag about as if we had some part to play in it but definitely something to be humbly grateful for.
Christ’s righteousness was given to us when we put our faith and trust in him. We have no business considering ourselves either unworthy or superior – we have been made righteous and made holy through Jesus. It is a wonderful gift. Our part is to offer our bodies every day as living sacrifices to God for him to use.
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