Being Holy before God NOW!

(1 Thessalonians 3:11-13)

Who wants to be established and unblameable in holiness before God the Father?

I don’t know about you, but that’s where I want to be. And if we continue to walk in Christ, we will all get there eventually because after the judgment when we live with Jesus Christ and God the Father, we must be holy.

But I’m not talking about some time way, way, off in the future. I’m talking about today. I’m talking about being holy before God NOW. OK, so now that I have your attention, read on to find out more about being holy before God NOW!

Are you a sinner?

Before we get into this, let’s look at the scripture I am reviewing today.

11 Now may our God and Father himself, and our Lord Jesus, direct our way to you; 12 and may the Lord make you increase and abound in love to one another and to all men, as we do to you, 13 so that he may establish your hearts unblamable in holiness before our God and Father, at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all his saints. (1 Thessalonians 3:11-13)

So the first question you have to ask yourself is this. Are you a sinner?

Before you answer that question, consider for a moment. Is a sinner holy?

Well, the answer to that one is a no-brainer. No. A sinner is not holy.

We know that “one day” Jesus is going to do away with all forms of sin in the world. Then we will all be holy because there would be no sin anymore. Right?

But what if it was possible to be sin-free today? If we could do that, then we would be able to be righteous, and being holy before God now would be possible too.

Well, there’s god news and bad news in this. Let me give you the bad news first.

No sinner will see God

The bad news is that no sinner will see God. And the scripture goes even further than that when it says:

5 You know that he appeared to take away sins, and in him there is no sin. 6 No one who abides in him sins; no one who sins has either seen him or known him. (1 John 3:5-6)

Look at those words. “No one who sins has either seen him or known him.”

So going back to my previous point, if you are a sinner, you have not seen or known God. That’s a pretty heavy statement! And add to that also, if you are a sinner your chances of being holy before God now are pretty much zero.

So, do you call yourself a sinner? Oh and by the way, that includes if you say you are a “sinner saved by grace” as so many Christians do, because you are still saying that you are a sinner.

How does it make you feel knowing that you are a sinner? How do you feel knowing that while you are a sinner you have zero chance of being righteous before God now?

Probably not so great.

But remember I said there was both good news and bad news? Well here’s the good news.

You don’t have to be a sinner! And if you are not a sinner, then being holy before God now becomes a possibility, even a reality!

Jesus came to take your sins away

Here is one of the best known but most overlooked aspects of why Christ came to the world. In fact it is the primary reason why He came.

Jesus came to set you free from sin. He came to take away your sins.

If you were watching closely when you read the last scripture I quoted above, you might have noticed these words.

5 You know that he appeared to take away sins, and in him there is no sin. 6 No one who abides in him sins; no one who sins has either seen him or known him. (1 John 3:5-6)

Jesus came to take away sins. He came so that your sins and my sins could be removed forever. That was the primary reason why He came. Look also at the words of John the Baptist when he saw Jesus walking out one day.

The next day he saw Jesus coming toward him, and said, “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world! (John 1:29)

So summing up these two verse, Jesus is the Lamb of God who takes away our sins, when we are IN Him.

So the good news is, we can be freed from our sins, but only when we are IN Christ. Which raises the next question: How can we be IN Christ?

Being IN Christ Jesus

If you want to be IN Christ, you must be baptised into Him. Water baptism is the key to being IN Christ as well as being set free from sin AND from the law too. It is important to be set free from the law because the law defines sin for what it is, and sin is the breaking of the law, or lawlessness.

It is by being baptised INTO Christ that we are set free from sin, as the scripture says.

2 By no means! How can we who died to sin still live in it? 3 Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? 4 We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life. 5 For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. 6 We know that our old self was crucified with him so that the sinful body might be destroyed, and we might no longer be enslaved to sin. 7 For he who has died is freed from sin. (Romans 6:2-7)

There is a wealth of powerful teaching in these few words. Let’s go through them.

In verse 2, Paul says that if we have “died to sin” how can we still live in it? Death is a gateway. Think about death for a moment. When a person dies on this world they no longer live in this world. They cannot be both dead and alive at the same time but have passed from this physical world to the spiritual realm when they die.

So too, if we are dead to sin then we can no longer live in sin. Sin is of the flesh, but when the flesh is dead, sin goes with it.

Moving to verse 3, Paul shows that when we are baptised, we are baptised INTO the death of Jesus Christ. And by that act of baptism we have entered INTO the death (and resurrection) of Jesus Christ.

This is where faith comes in. Once we have been baptised into the death of Jesus Christ, we must BELIEVE that we have died and are no longer in the flesh or in the world, but now walk as new creations in “newness of life” as it says in verse 4.

Through baptism we have died and been buried with Christ. And that death is to sin, as verse 7 shows, and it is also death to the law as we see in Romans 7:1-4. We die to sin and the law because both the law and sin are of the flesh. But after we have died, we are no longer of the flesh but of the Spirit. We live IN Christ and are seated at the right hand of God in Him, as the scripture says.

Death is the payment and punishment for sin. So when we have died our sins are paid for and gone. Sin does not pass through death because death pays the price for sin.

In the same way the law does not pass through death, as we see in the following verse.

12 and you were buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through faith in the working of God, who raised him from the dead. 13 And you, who were dead in trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses, 14 having cancelled the bond which stood against us with its legal demands; this he set aside, nailing it to the cross. (Colossians 2:12-14)

The bond that was cancelled was the law because only law can have “legal demands.” And as we see here, the law was nailed up with Christ and remained nailed there after Jesus died. Jesus passed through death and was resurrected, but the law remained nailed up and did not pass through death with Christ.

So having now died with Christ in baptism and by faith, we too are set free from sin and the law. His death paid the price and we enter into His death when we are baptised. And likewise we are resurrected with Him through faith to become new creations, leaving the law behind nailed where it cannot pass through death.

And by faith we need to change our thinking because we are now, already, with Christ. We are seated at the right hand of God in Christ Jesus and our lives are hid with Christ as the following shows.

1 If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. 2 Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. 3 For you have died, and your life is hid with Christ in God. (Colossians 3:1-3)

As Christ is seated at the right hand of God and we have died and entered into Christ, then so too our lives are hidden from this world as we too are seated at the right hand of God in Jesus Christ.

It requires faith to believe that this is where you are RIGHT NOW. If you have been baptised INTO the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, you must believe you are dead to this world, dead to sin, dead to the law, and therefore set free from sin and unable to break the law because you are no longer under it.

And if you believe these things God gives you the free gift of righteousness by faith. When you believe these things, God declares you righteous, just as He declared Abraham righteous when he believed God.

Being holy before God NOW!

And guess what? If you are righteous you are without sin. And if you are without sin, then being holy before God now is not just a possibility, it is a reality. God has declared you righteous by faith and given you righteousness by faith. But in that act you receive His holiness as well.

Look at what Peter had to say about being holy before God now.

14 As obedient children, do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance, 15 but as he who called you is holy, be holy yourselves in all your conduct; 16 since it is written, “You shall be holy, for I am holy.” (1 Peter 1:14-16)

And also as we see in this next scripture, that this is all dependent upon faith.

But you, beloved, build yourselves up on your most holy faith; pray in the Holy Spirit (Jude 1:20)

Are you STILL a sinner?

Regardless of how you answered before, I ask you again. Are you a sinner?

We have already established that those who sin have not seen or known God. And no sinner will stand in the kingdom of God.

But we have also established that when we enter INTO the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, our sins are taken away and we are set free from the law. And when we believe in faith that God has done these things, He gives us the free gift of righteousness by faith. So too if we are righteous by faith, then we are holy by faith too, and being holy before God now becomes a fact and a reality.

If you STILL call yourself a sinner, then you have missed the point of why Jesus came. In baptism He took your sins away so that you no longer need to consider yourself a sinner. You have been set free by the redeeming blood of Jesus Christ and now stand before God righteous and holy.

And if God says you are righteous and holy, who is there to say otherwise? The devil will try to fool you into believing otherwise, but who should you listen to, God or the devil?

Think about this and if you want to know more, there is a free eBook under the “Free eBooks” item in the menu above titled, “The Six Foundations Teachings of Jesus Christ.” Grab a copy of that as it goes into much greater detail about all of this and will help you see what this is, why it is, and how it works.

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