At several points in my Christian life, God has stirred me from relative slumber to greater zeal for glorifying and enjoying Him. As recently as seven months ago, God was pleased to provide such a jolt for me. I had begun reading Dr. R.C. Sproul’s The Holiness of God and found that the topic of God’s holiness arrested my attention like never before. It felt as though some crusted dullness was being chipped away from my conscience and the Holy Spirit was not just nudging me in a right direction, but rather grabbing me by the nap of the neck and throwing me onto the path on which I would develop a deep regard for the majesty of my Father in Heaven.
A quote from John Calvin provided some clarity as to what was happening: “Hence that dread and amazement with which, as Scripture uniformly relates, holy men were struck and overwhelmed whenever they beheld the presence of God… Men are never duly touched and impressed with a conviction of their insignificance until they have contrasted themselves with the majesty of God.”
When I encountered that quote on the first page of the fourth chapter, “The Trauma of Holiness,” I wrote a short note and began using that note as a bookmark. The note read: “When the Lord began to work savingly in me, my eyes were opened to my state as a sinner and my need for a Savior. But I had not appreciated the wretchedness of my continued disobedience until later when I began to understand more of the holiness of God, and by simple contrast I was moved to radically alter my practical life to conform more to His Word. Since then, I find that when my failings increase, I have left off more and more giving regard to the awe-inspiring God who gave me life and extended to me sonship through Jesus Christ.”
In a later chapter of Sproul’s work, he mentions an anxiety-stricken man who is “abnormal because he has lost the defenses that enable us to ignore the clear and present dangers that surround us every day.” This sort of abnormality is easily likened to the holiness to which Christians are called. The lost are dull to the clear and present dangers of disobeying God, while those who have been granted eternal life have lost the ability to ignore those dangers. The people of God are unable to remain dulled in their senses toward sin vs. righteousness. Our abnormality, our “other-ness” or separation from the world, is that God has spoken and He has given us ears to hear. We are no longer blind and deaf toward His rule. Let us walk in a way which reflects our love and admiration for our holy God.
All praise to the true and living God; may His holiness stir us often to greater zeal for glorifying and enjoying Him.
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