HOLINESS

A. J. McSeveney

Luke 1: 35; 1 Peter 1: 15, 16; Romans 5: 5; Hebrews 12: 9, 19; Ephesians 1: 3–5; Revelation 21: 2–4

I would seek grace to say a word as to holiness. When you come to think of it, holiness is an integral part of Christianity. As receiving Christ and receiving the Spirit we become part of a holy priesthood, we can be regarded as holy brethren, and we also have a holy calling. So holiness is really an integral part of Christianity. More than that, it is an essential part of Christianity. In the epistle to the Hebrews it says, “holiness, without which no one shall see the Lord” (Hebrews 12: 14). That seems to suggest that it is something we should give attention to, and one would seek to use these scriptures to say something about holiness. They are not the only scriptures where holiness is mentioned but I think they convey to us how we arrive at the thought of holiness.

I think it is well, before we turn to them, to define what holiness actually is. What do we mean when we speak about holiness? Mr. Darby very helpfully has said that holiness really involves a nature that is formed within us that delights in what is good and that hates or shrinks from all that is evil (Collected Writings Vol. 34, p. 428). Well, dear brethren, how attractive that is and as in every feature that God looks for in His saints, we have to begin by turning to Christ.

When we come to Christ we come to perfection. Every feature that God is looking for in His saints can be seen in perfection in our Lord Jesus. How wonderful that is. Of course there is one important distinction between holiness in Christ and holiness in us. Holiness was in Christ intrinsically. If we arrive at holiness it is through a process of formation. In relation to our Lord Jesus, in Luke 1 the word was “the holy thing also which shall be born shall be called Son of God”. What it must have meant for Mary to hold that Babe in her arms! The only babe that there has ever been which was intrinsically holy. Not only as to His soul, not only as to His spirit, but even as to His body He was intrinsically holy. As He grew up into a young boy and as a young man, one feature that characterised Him in whatever situation He found Himself was the feature of holiness, delighting in what was good and shrinking from all that was evil. When one thinks of Him growing up into His teenage years one is impressed with the feature of holiness that must have been seen in Him. When we look back at our teenage years I think the last word we would use to describe ourselves is holy, and yet there was a young Man who was holy in everything that He did and every thought that He had.

How wonderful He is!

As He moved out into public service holiness marked Him in the way He handled things; whether in John 3 with Nicodemus, speaking to him in the night or whether the woman in John 4, speaking to her when the sun was at its highest. Whoever it was, what distinguished Him in His service was holiness. He thus becomes the divine standard for service. Peter saw that, and he said from experience that He was the holy One of God (John 6: 69). Well, He moved on in His service and went to the cross and one thing which characterised Him personally as He hung on the cross was absolute holiness. When He

uttered that cry, “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” (Psalm 22: 1), it was the holy cry of a holy Man shrinking from evil, shrinking from all that was involved in being made sin. How He shrank from it! Yet, when He said, “And thou art holy, thou that dwellest amid the praises of Israel” (Psalm 22: 3), it was also the cry of a holy Man delighting in all that was good. How God saw and appreciated the holiness that was seen in that blessed Man.

In whatever aspect of the cross you look at Him personally, the thing that marks Him is absolute holiness. Even as He went into the grave the word was “neither wilt thou allow thy Holy One to see corruption” (Psalm 16: 10). He was three days and three nights in the heart of the earth and yet absolute holiness marked Him there. Well, He rose from the dead. He ascended up far above all the heavens; He sat down at the right hand of God and even there He can be regarded as the Holy, the True.

Not only is holiness seen in Christ where He is, it is to be seen at present in His body on earth. Each one of us, as individuals; has an obligation, according to where we read in 1 Peter 1, to be holy as God is holy. Peter is quite simply moved by the Holy Spirit to put it upon the brethren to be holy as God is holy. As entering into the practical details of life (for that is what the word would convey there) we are to view things and do things in the same way as God would do them. That is an obligation lying upon every soul that has received Christ and received the Holy Spirit. Peter is not only speaking to gifted men, he is not only speaking to older men, he is speaking to every Christian, and he is laying the obligation on them to be holy as God is holy.

Well, dear brethren, that is the obligation but I believe in the other scriptures we have read, particularly in Romans, Hebrews and Ephesians, we get the process by which we arrive at holiness. We have been helped by Mr. Darby and Mr. Stoney to see that holiness is not by faith. We are made righteous through faith, but we do

not become holy by faith. Holiness involves a process in our lives and is related to our enjoyment of the love of God. As we enjoy that, there is something formed within us of the divine nature that delights in what is good and shrinks from what is evil.

Romans 5 relates how God is towards us. At the end of chapter 4 the Lord Jesus was delivered for our offences and He was raised for our justification. When we come into chapter 5 we see that we are justified persons before God in Christ and God is towards us. As being justified we have been brought into a wonderful realm of favour, and we look forward to the public outshining of God in the world to come. We boast in hope of the glory of God and what we learn is that God is not only towards us in justifying us but He is towards us in the tribulations that we pass through. When we pass through tribulation it is not because God is against us; it is rather because God is for us. Through tribulations there is something worked out in our lives that will eventually end in the formation of holiness. That is why we are passed through things, dear brethren. Oh, they are painful at the time—anyone who has passed through them would accept that—but there is an end in view even in tribulations. So, tribulation works endurance, and that leads to experience, and experience eventuates in hope, so that again there is something further for the Christian to look on to. Hope does not make ashamed; it is a wonderful support and more than that, the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit. We often take that verse of Scripture and use it in the preaching and take it away from its context. That is fine for the preaching, but to get its full benefit we should take it in context.

I believe it works out practically like this. Suppose a young person leaves school and goes into the workplace. Very soon, unconsciously, you become imbued with the spirit of the workplace. Yet a crisis point comes when you need to confess Jesus as Lord,

and when you do that you are saved. You are saved practically by confessing Jesus as Lord.

But, along with salvation there is also tribulation. As soon as you identify yourself with a rejected Man it leads to tribulation; but God is towards you in that. You find then that what you lack in help and affection from your workmates, God will make up to you by giving you a special sense of His love, and the compensation that God gives greatly surpasses anything you have had to forfeit. How great it is to know, in situations like that, that God is for you!

He gives you a sense of His love through the Holy Spirit, and as you delight in the preciousness of God’s love, holiness is formed in your being. You begin to shrink from all that is obnoxious to God in the workplace. It has a practical end in view; so if you have left school and are in the workplace, and you are finding things difficult, God has an end in view in it all; that you might know His love and that you might shrink from all that is evil in the workplace. I give that as an example, but I believe that Romans gives us the general principle that holiness is not by faith but, rather, it is linked with the enjoyment of God’s love. How wonderful that is, dear brethren.

What is brought before us in a general sense in Romans is developed in detail in Hebrews and Ephesians. The Hebrew saints were a worthy company. They were commended by the writer for the way they had ministered to the saints, and were still ministering. Yet they had come to a certain crisis in their lives, where a decision had to be made. They could either go on, or they could go back. To go on would lead to glory; to go back would lead to apostasy. What was the problem? Well, the Hebrew saints had a weakness for the religious system they had left. They had a desire in their hearts to go back, but the wonderful thing is that the Father saw that and came in through discipline in order that they might make the right decision.

Where there was a tendency for them to go back, the Father took them up on that very same point, and He allowed them to be

persecuted by the very system they had a weakness for. All they could see was outward persecution and outward difficulty in their circumstances. The writer to the Hebrews traces it right back to the Father’s hand in discipline. He points out to them that they are not passing through that because the Father is against them, but, rather, they are being disciplined because the Father loves them. Not only that, but if there had been nothing by way of discipline there would be a question mark over whether God was really their Father. Well, as the Hebrew saints would read this, and see what the position truly was, they would see that the only way forward for them was to get into the Father’s presence and say with an Old Testament saint, “If it be so, why am I thus?”, Genesis 25: 22. Whatever other persons may be passing through by way of discipline is between themselves and the Father, but it is for me as an individual to say, Why am I thus? The Father is so gracious that He very soon tells us.

You know, dear brethren, He is not austere, He is not against us; He is for us. If we are passing through something from the Father’s hand it is because He loves us. If we get into His presence and ask why we are thus, He will tell us and when we find that out we have to accept that the only way forward is to subject ourselves to the Father of spirits and live.

When we pass through discipline, the spirit of the believer is the great battleground. The danger is that we may become bitter. We all know that. How easy it is to become bitter, but the only way forward is to subject ourselves to the Father of spirits and live. The Father of spirits is a wonderful title. He is seeking to form something within us. He has an object in view in everything we are passing through. Things do not happen by chance. There is an object in it all. The Father is working something out in each one of our lives and the only way forward for us is to subject ourselves to the Father of spirits and live. Well, as we subject ourselves and desire to do what is right, we realise that we cannot do that in our own strength.

We need the Father’s help.

The wonderful thing is that He gives us His help. If we have confessed to something and repented of it, and we are clear with the Father, then He gives us His help to do what is right.

Where there is subjection and dependence, and where there is the practice of righteousness it leads to peace in the soul, for “the work of righteousness shall be peace”, Isaiah 32; 17. All these elements merge together to form the quality of soul that we enjoy when we are in the holiest. I believe that is what is in view here, the holiest. It is not exactly a place. It is a condition of soul that is formed within us as we go through this process and the result, as we are exercised, is that we partake of the Father’s holiness. How wonderful that is. There is an end in view. He is working out something and the end in view is that we might partake of the Father’s holiness. That is, that we might see things as the Father sees them, that we might feel things as the Father feels them, that we might think about things in the same way as the Father thinks about them.

What does it mean practically? I believe that holiness in this setting involves that we shrink from things that perhaps we had a weakness for. We all have weaknesses. We all have tendencies, but if we get the gain of the Father’s discipline, and are formed in the Father’s holiness, then we will shrink from these things. If it be moral evil, we shrink from it. It is wonderful to view that from the standpoint of how the Father views it. It is not a question exactly here of doing what is right, although that is involved, but rather in viewing things as the Father views them. How does the Father view these things? I would also have to say, in the context of what we are reading in Hebrews, that holiness involves that we shrink from ecclesiastical evil too. As we have said the Hebrew saints had a problem over the religious system they had left. If I am formed in the Father’s holiness, and I see things the way the Father sees them, I would never give any man a place in a company that is only rightly Christ’s. The Father has given that place to His Son, and I am glad to be with the Father in that. I also

would not link myself on with any system that involves derogatory doctrine as to His Son.

Why? How does the Father feel about any system that holds derogatory thoughts as to His Son? Beloved brethren, He shrinks from them, and as we are formed in the Father’s holiness and formed in an appreciation of His love, we shall shrink from them as well.

I believe the object in view in this chapter is that the chastening we go through leads to partaking of the Father’s holiness. However, you will notice that there is another phrase used earlier in the chapter that involves things that we pass through that are more severe than chastening. It says. He “scourges every son whom he receives” (Hebrews 12: 6). As long as we are in our present bodies we shall need chastening, and each one of us gets it all the time, but scourging is a different thing. Perhaps we may only need to go through scourging two or three times in our lives. Scourging involves painful experiences. The Father’s scourging—

what a thing it is! Perhaps you have never passed through that yet, but you will, for it says He scourges every son whom He receives. We can look back on things that are painful to remember, but it was not because the Father was against us that we passed through them. It was not because the Father had an issue with us. It was rather because the Father loved us.

From the moment we are born into this world we are tied down by moorings to this earth.

Some of them are legitimate in their place, but the moment we put our faith in Christ we become sons of God, and that involves being set in relation to another world. What is in mind here is that not only might there be a relationship, but that there might be a state that is suited to that relationship. That is why scourging comes in. There is so much in my life that would tie me to this earth, but the Father wants me to be related to another world where He is, where I can enjoy Him in His own circumstances. That is going to be my eternal portion,

but the time when I am formed in relation to my eternal portion is now. There will be no formation after the rapture. The time for formation is now, and the state that is proper to sonship is being formed now. How is it being formed? It is being formed by the Father detaching us from this world, through the painful experiences of scourging. Why does He do it? Because He scourges every son whom He receives. He wants to form us in the state of sonship. That is what He is doing in the most painful things that we will all have to pass through. He is seeking to set us in relation to that world, and that we might have a state that is suitable to sonship. Can we prove it from scripture? Well, that is why I read in Ephesians, to bring before us the state that enjoys the Father’s love.

The aspect of holiness that delights in what is good is found here in Ephesians 1, where it refers to those who are holy and blameless before Him in love. That is further than clearance; it is further than forgiveness; it is further even than justification. What is involved here is the state of soul which delights in what is good. That is what the Father is working for at the present time. The brethren will know that Mr. Raven and Mr. Stoney were two men who suffered a lot in relation to their ministry. If you trace their ministries through you will see that the whole point in it was that there would be a state formed in the saints that is equal to their standing. That is what they had in mind; and that is why it is so testing to read it. Well, the Father helps us on that line, and while much of what the dear brethren pass through is extremely painful, nevertheless there is a time coming when what has been formed in time will go into eternity in the unclouded enjoyment of the Father’s love. We prove so much of what He does for us down here, but what it is to be with Him in His own circumstances. Mr.

Darby said at, a critical point, ‘Between the Father and me there is not a cloud’. Ah, dear brethren, in that realm there is no cloud between the Father and ourselves, and as we accept all that the Father passes us

through, we ought to look for the Father in His own world, in an area where sorrows never enter. There are no tears in that realm. What is there is the unclouded enjoyment of the Father’s love. Well, as I said, the relationship of sonship is formed through faith, but the state that is proper to sonship is formed through severe discipline by the Father, but there is an end in view.

We are here for three score years and ten, four score years by reason of strength, all in God’s will, but there is an end in view. There is an eternal relationship that has been formed in time, and God would have us to be in the enjoyment of it now. The great desire of the Lord Jesus in John 17 was that the love which the Father had for Him may be in us (John 17: 26). If that love is to be in us there is so much that needs to be displaced. The wonderful thing is that the Father helps us. The Father is helping us at the present time. We need to see that the Father is helping us in all that we pass through, in order that we might be formed in the state of sonship, and be formed for His own pleasure. Being holy and blameless before Him in love involves divine formation. It is not only love that is within us, how precious that is, but it is in love. It is an area of love. How wonderful that is! I think the hymn-writer referred to this when she wrote about the ‘circle of affections all divine’ (Hymn 207 verse 4). There is an area, the circle of the Father’s love, an area that is blessed because of the relationship we have been brought into; but we need to be formed to enjoy it, not only for our own blessing but for the Father’s pleasure. That is why we have been secured. What the Father is doing at the present time is that we might be conformed to the image of His Son. Not only associated with Him, blessed as that is, but that we might have a state that is conformed to the image of His Son. That is why He passes us through so much, dear brethren. Well, the Lord is coming and at any moment we could be transformed into our bodies of glory, and then for ever we shall enjoy sonship, and the Father will enjoy having us before Him with a state that is suitable to that relationship.

I just end with a reference to Revelation 21. How wonderful it is to see the end in view. The end in view is the holy city. As individuals we are associated with the Son of God, ourselves being sons of God, but also we form part of the assembly as an entity, and that is for the heart of Christ. How wonderful it is to see that there is an end in view in all that the Father is doing, including that there should be a vessel prepared for the heart of Christ. What a time that will be, and we are on the verge of that, on the verge of the unclouded enjoyment of the love of Christ. It is wonderful to think of what He has done for us down here. Paul says, “the Son of God, who has loved me and given himself for me”, Galatians 2: 20. But it is wonderful to think of our eternal portion, to be for Him as having part in the assembly. How worthy He is of our affections! It soon will be that there will be nothing at all to disturb or to detract from the enjoyment of the love of Christ.

That is why, in verse 4, we have God’s own personal service. How wonderful it is to contemplate it—“And he shall wipe away every tear from their eyes; and death shall not exist any more, nor grief, nor cry, nor distress shall exist any more, for the former things have passed away”. They will all go. God will see to it. If we have had painful experiences we cannot put out of our minds now, God will see to it then that there is nothing at all to spoil the enjoyment of our eternal portion. He Himself will wipe away every tear from our eyes.

The holy city really becomes the standard for us in our local assemblies. We were helped to see last week that recovery is not to Pentecost, but to Paul. It is very helpful to remind ourselves of that. However, there is another aspect and that is that whenever a thing fails responsibly God never sets it up publicly again, but He points us forward to the world to come. The holy city therefore becomes the standard for us in our local assemblies. Tomorrow morning we shall sit down at the Lord’s supper and what will govern us is the light of the

holy city. We shall see to it that there is nothing in our hearts that would at all detract from the enjoyment of the Lord’s supper. We shall prove ourselves so that we are qualified to eat, but not only so, as we proceed, we will enjoy all that the holy city is to the heart of Christ as the bride. We can touch that in our spirits now. It is not beyond us. Soon we shall have bodies of glory, but even now we can touch it in our spirits. How wonderful it is for us; how wonderful it is for Christ! Well, dear brethren, I feel very tested as to everything that has been said, but I would seek to pursue holiness. There are many things we could pursue at the present time, but the word for each of us is, pursue holiness. May the Lord help us, for His name’s sake.

Address at Grangemouth
6 March 2004