Painting a Picture of Holiness
My husband and I are polar opposites as far as our personalities are concerned. He is quiet. I am so very not. He thinks before he starts something and plans the details. I often jump in and then ask if what I am jumping into is safe. His emotions are just below the surface. I am calm and patient. He can be comfortable in the chaos. I need order and structure. There have been many times when I thanked the Lord for our differences. We balance each other out. When we were first married, however; we had not yet learned how to navigate our different ways of thinking. Two months after we were married, we bought a cute little house in the country and thought we would do some remodeling to make it our own. The problem was, we thought like complete opposites. Many times, we struggle to understand what the other one was suggesting. Our solution: we drew pictures. I laugh now when I think about how many conversations we had that involved a pad of paper and a pen. We were committed to being partners for life and we couldn’t even understand each other.
When it comes to humanity and God, we often struggle to understand. Like my husband and I during our early years of marriage, we seem to be speaking different languages. God is perfectly holy. We… well, we try. To help us understand, God paints a picture of the holiness He desires for us. To do this, He used the life of the priests. Leviticus 21 draws a picture of holiness by giving rules for the priests. When the people needed to understand what God meant by holy, God’s plan was that they could look to the priests to see the representation.
Unfortunately, not all the priests painted such a good picture of holiness. However, if they had followed the laws God gave them, it would have helped the people understand what holiness was meant to look like. Now, the burden lies with us. Paul told Timothy, “Set an example for the believers in speech, in life, in love, in faith and in purity.” (1 Timothy 4:12) Timothy was a leader in the church. His role was to lead Christians in the ways of righteousness. As we sit under godly leaders, we are led down paths of holiness. As we follow, we also lead those around us. In Ephesians 5:1-4, Paul spoke to the rest of us when he said, “Be imitators of God, therefore, as dearly loved children and live a life of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God. But among you there must not be even a hint of sexual immorality, or of any kind of impurity, or of greed, because these are improper for God’s holy people. Nor should there be obscenity, foolish talk or coarse joking, which are out of place, but rather thanksgiving.” And in verses 8-11, he adds, “For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Live as children of light (for the fruit of the light consists in all goodness, righteousness and truth) and find out what pleases the Lord. Have nothing to do with the fruitless deeds of darkness, but rather expose them.”
The world can’t understand the ways of God. In fact, 1 Corinthians 2:14 tells us, “The man without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned.” What they can understand is the picture our lives paint. Be God’s hands and feet. Be the picture that helps the lost see the path of God.
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