Will I ever be holy?

 Will I Ever Be Holy?

I am the LORD, who makes you holy.

EXODUS 31.13

Make them holy by your truth; teach them your word, which is truth.

JOHN 17.17

May the God of peace make you holy in every way, and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless until our Lord Jesus Christ comes again. God will make this happen, for he who calls you is faithful.

1 THESSALONIANS 5.23-24

Have you ever been given a task that seemed too big for you? Did you think to yourself, If it is up to me, I will never get this job done?

When we understand that God wants us to be holy like he is, it can be very discouraging. We know ourselves and our weaknesses too well to think that we can do this job on our own. So some of us just give up on it altogether.

Fortunately, God gives us the ability to become what he commands us to be, and to do what he commands us to do. When God revealed himself in the Old Testament as “the LORD, who makes you holy,” he was talking not only about his divine nature but also about his divine help. The same God who makes us right in his sight by paying for our sin and giving us Christ’s righteousness is at work in us to renew our thinking and clean up our motives and capture our affections. His grace not only covers our sin of the past; it also gives us what we need to make headway in overcoming our sin, now and in the future. He is in the process of making us holy like he is.

The good news about God’s desire for us to become holy is that he doesn’t leave it up to us to accomplish this big job on our own. He is at work in us, chipping away at our selfishness, our lies, our hardened hearts. Holiness is not something that happens instantly. It’s an ongoing project that God is doing in us.