A Relationship with God Changes Everything!

Most folks don’t think of themselves as holy.  It is too much of a pure and sacred term for us sinful humans.  But God calls us to be holy in word and deed.¹  We are made holy through the cleansing blood of Jesus.  The term holy involves being distinctive and set apart from the world because of our relationship to God.  God makes things in relationship to him holy.  God is holy, and thus things which are close to God must be holy.²

A quick survey of the Bible shows how being in a relationship with God changes everything.  When the common becomes holy because of its relationship to God, nothing is the same.

• The 7th Day was crowned holy because the Lord rested from His labors of creation and dedicated it as a day of rest for Israel under the old Law (Gen. 2:3; Ex. 20:8,11).
• The desert ground became “holy ground” that caused Moses to remove his sandals because God was speaking from a burning bush (Ex. 3:1-5).
• A forgotten people overcome by Egyptian slavery come out of bondage to receive a holy law on a holy mountain so they can offer holy sacrifices ordained by holy priests, so they can be a holy people.  The entire Mosiacal law and system was designed to remind Israel of their holy and distinctive status in the world.
• The temple was ordinary wood, stone, and gold that became a holy place of worship.
• Jesus came as the Holy One of Israel (Luke 4:34).  He healed the sick and forgave the sins of the repentant.  He took two pieces of scrap wood and some mangled thorns and made them sacred and holy for all time.  His empty tomb became holy.
• The church was established as sinful men and women were able to become the holy nation of God (1 Pet. 2:9-10).  The church will be presented to God by Christ as “holy and without blemish” (Eph. 5:27).
• A man and woman exchange some vows and rings before witnesses and are united by God in holy matrimony. Marriage is holy because God decrees it sacred and unites two people together.

All of these examples through scripture show the simple true that a relationship with God changes everything.  God makes us holy!  But the most amazing part of this study is that we can be changed!  We can become holy because of our relationship with God.  We are ordinary.  We are sinful, but God can make us holy!  Paul says that he chose us that we should be “holy and blameless before Him in love” (Eph. 1:4).  Because we have been changed to be holy, we must allow God’s cleansing to change everything about us.  We are to live holy, act holy, think holy, and thus be holy for our God is holy!

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¹  Eph. 1:4; 1 Peter 1:15-16

²  Lev. 11:44; 1 Pet. 1:15-16