Hold them with Holiness
As you think about all your relationships this year, what do you want to leave people with. Here is a resolution worth considering, hold them with holiness. By holiness, I am referring to our moral purity. A Christian is one who is separated from the world and its ways unto God and his ways. Therefore, as we connect and rub shoulders with people, we should shock them by how distinct we are. Not by our dressing (though that matters) or music (though that also matters). But by our moral excellence. Thus, resolve to hold them with holiness.
2 Peter 1:5-8
For this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love. For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they keep you from being ineffective or unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.
The promise is that if we grow in faith, virtue, knowledge, self-control, steadfastness, godliness, brotherly affection, and love, we will not be ineffective in knowing Christ, and thus, in being ministers for Christ. The point is, grow in God and you’ll make a difference in people’s lives.
Robert M’Cheyne once said, “My people’s greatest need is my personal holiness”. Our holiness matters more than any other thing that we might want to portray to people. Paul told young Timothy to keep a close watch on his life and his doctrine (1 Timothy 4:16). “Persist in this”, he said, “for by so doing you will save both yourself and your hearers”. People do not want a cultural Christianity; they are tired of that. They want and need a conspicuous Christianity that changes lives and transforms communities. The gospel is not bad and without effect. Our hard hearts and double lives are that which compromises the witness of the gospel. Hence, one of our problem is that we have not done a good job of modeling Christian faith in our private spaces, homes, communities and work area.
The one indispensable witness of the gospel before a watching people is a godly and mature Christian, who is holy in their entire conduct. Personal holiness is not the key thing that makes others to be Christians. It is God alone who saves. But make no mistake, the promise of 2 Peter 1:5-8 is as true as ever. If we are holy, we will be fruitful. So, do not strive to be cool or to gain status. Just be yourself, a sinner saved by grace and living in grace.
Grace to the Nation 