As the Lord Commands
We have reached the end of the book of Exodus. Our reading today marks one year since the great throng of people fled their taskmasters and ventured through the Red Sea. A lot has happened for these men and women during this first year. They have experienced God personally and dramatically. They have been invited to partake in His work and they have been reprimanded for their rebellion. Now, all their hard work and offerings are being set in place and dedicated to the Lord. This is the formal beginning of their life as a nation ruled by a Heavenly King.
Throughout just today’s reading, the phrase “as the Lord commanded Moses” is repeated no less than eight times. In the entire retelling of the final days of building, it is repeated nineteen times. Everything was done “as the Lord commanded Moses.” The tabernacle and the priesthood were copies of heavenly principles. Because of their importance, they had to be correct, but more than that, because they were consecrated for godly work, they needed to be holy. I love that word: holy. We are told repeatedly to be holy because we belong to a holy God, but what does it mean to be holy? While English has many words that are synonymous with holy, Hebrew had only one: qados. There truly is no degree of holiness. In English we separate holy into consecrated, sanctified, blessed, divine, sacred, saintly, devout, religious, pious, virtuous, pure, and the like. However, with God, there are no degrees of what He means when He calls us to be holy. The Eerdmans Bible Dictionary defines it as a separation from mundane existence and for the service and worship of God, or “wholly otherness”. It also goes on to make the important distinction, “In every instance, whether with things or people, it was the presence of God that imparted holiness.”
If we are to be holy, we must do everything “as the Lord commanded”. We cannot pick and chose which of His laws we agree with, and why would we? What motivates us to water down our religion? Are we afraid of offending the sinful? Do we fear causing waves or losing friends? Those things will happen. I recently lost a friend because I chose to mentor a new Christian whom this other woman felt was not worthy to come to Christ. She wrote me and said, “Good, solid, biblical theology does NOT welcome all.” Though my heart breaks for her, I cannot compromise the truth I know from God’s word for the truth she desperately wants to believe. I have to stand on verses like 2 Peter 3:9 that tell me God is “not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.” I have to believe verses like Romans 8:1 that tell me, “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” The God who welcomed sinners, changed murderers into apostles, forgave prostitutes and gave new life to cheaters and swindlers does not play favorites. To be holy means we are separate from anything that is not exactly “as the Lord commanded”. We humans like to twist scripture to fit our desires or feed our insecurities. That is not holiness. That is weakness.
To be holy means we cast aside the mundane aspects of this life. Not that we no longer do the simple tasks of life like going to work or washing the dishes. Rather, it means that the desires and cares that this world so desperately wants to distract us with grow faint and fade into background sounds. What we meditate on, what we allow to consume our thoughts and motivate our steps is what the Lord has commanded. No matter what we feel, no matter what we desire, we do not belong to ourselves. We were purchased at a very high price by our Redeemer. We are holy because we no longer live ruled by the things of this world. We live for our God. Holiness is not easy. It isn’t meant to be. What we need to remember is that one day we will stand before the Judge of this world and answer for our words and our actions. In that moment, it won’t matter if the person standing next to us was offended by them. It will only matter if we did it all as the Lord commanded. Yes, we are saved through Christ, but whether or not we are holy is completely up to us. “Therefore be holy because I am holy.” 1 Peter 1:16
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