"Therefore, with minds that are alert and fully sober, set your hope on the grace to be brought to you when Jesus Christ is revealed at his coming. As obedient children, do not conform to the evil desires you had when you lived in ignorance. But just as he who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do; for it is written: ‘Be holy, because I am holy.’" (NIV)
One of the greatest problems, I believe, that the Western Church has faced in the past two centuries is our schizophrenic approach to the doctrine of positional holiness or righteousness. Positional holiness says that we are holy and righteous in the presence of God, not because of what we have done or will do, but because of what Christ has done by imputing His own righteousness to us. "It is because of him [God] that you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God—that is, our righteousness, holiness and redemption. Therefore, as it is written: ‘Let the one who boasts boast in the Lord.’" (1 Corinthians 1:30-31 NIV).
Because of this doctrine, there has become a kind of resigned surrender to the idea that we will never stop sinning. And since we can’t stop sinning, we might as well continue to sin with impunity, not even trying to dig our sinful ways out of our habit patterns. I can remember talking to a woman on the Internet who basically said that, until the Lord forcibly changed her, she would continue on with who she was, faults and all. We, in fact, often make light of our faults, simply embracing them as eccentricities rather than acknowledging that they are sins that God hates! And in the process, we have created an anemic Church that is hated by the world, not because of the Spirit who dwells within us, but rather for the hypocrisy that we live.
The decline of righteous living in the Church is something that has been observed and noted by church scholars for more than a century. And yet, as a Church, we don’t seem quite motivated to do much about it. It seems that rather than digging in to find out where we displease God, we have created doctrines that allow us to simply "be ourselves" and demand that God love us however we are. My own pastor, Larry Brown, often says, "God loves you as you are, but He loves you too much to leave you the way you are." God’s plan was never for us to continue in the mire and muck of sin, but rather for us to reach above the darkness and step into His glorious light in this life! The apostle Paul, in Romans, writes:
"What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? By no means! We are those who have died to sin; how can we live in it any longer?" (Romans 6:1-2 NIV).
Peter gives us four steps in moving from the darkness that is sin into the light of righteousness that is Christ and all of these steps are things we are to choose to do in this life:
(1) Be alert
The KJV actually translates this "gird up the loins of your mind." Paul uses an idiom here which is one associated with both long travels and going into battle. In the days where men wore long robes, they would "gird up their loins" by pulling up those robes around their waist and holding the robes there using a belt. The point was to free their legs so that they had easier movement for the task ahead. The meaning of the idiom, when used with the mind, is that "the Christian is to have his mental powers alert in the expectation of Christ’s coming." Everything we do is to be done within the interactive relationship that we have as believers with our Lord. Our choices, our behavior, our plans all are to be centered around what it is that Christ wants for us to do.
We have become so used to just doing what we want because "we live in a Christian nation" that we have failed to develop the discipline needed to actually live in a relationship with the Lord Jesus. We talk about that relationship a lot, but we don’t actually even know how to live it. We fail to study the Word. We fail to pray. We fail to live lives pleasing to the Lord. We talk the talk, but we don’t walk the walk, and then we wonder why the world despises us so. We aren’t being persecuted for being Christians; we are being persecuted for failing to be Christians! The world actually wants us to be Christians. They want us to be holy and righteous. They want us to love as Jesus loves, to reach out as Jesus did, to become His hands to them. But we have become content in our sin, leaning on a doctrine that says Jesus will forgive us regardless of what we do! And by doing so, we have continued to go on sinning, believing that we do so with impunity.
We need to become alert in our lives, believing that we could face the Lord Jesus in our next breath! What kind of life can we give Him as a gift? What would please Him? My dear friend, Dawn, who went home to be with the Lord this year, stood in front of a group of Native American youth and said, "I’ve been given nine days to live. What would you do with your life if you knew you only had nine days to live?" That is the question for all believers. How would we choose to live if we weren’t guaranteed tomorrow? I think we would choose to live righteously, not only ready to follow His command at a moment’s notice, but actually following His commands each moment. We need to learn to be alert to His will.
(2) Be sober
We are a society that is addicted. We are addicted to heightened chemicals in our brain that come when we do things that please our lustful natures. For many of us, we don’t even realize that we’re addicted. We simply "have to have" our coffee, our chocolate, our TV programs, our exercise workout, our daily sex, our after-work shopping trips, our . . . whatever! Even if we don’t drink alcohol (which many believers do now), smoke (which a number also do), or become involved in illegal drug usage, there are things in our lives which either we have to have or which we can’t live without to assuage the emotional or physical pain. We have no idea that we’re addicted, but we are. We are the opposite of sober!
The Greek word nepho means "to be free from the influence of intoxicants" (Strong’s G3525). Can we live without our video games, without our social networking, without our comfort food? Whatever we feel we need to live (to either exist another day or to enjoy life) has become for us an intoxicant.
Merriam Webster defines "intoxicate" as "to excite or elate to the point of enthusiasm or frenzy." Think about the things you long for that bring you to this kind of point. Have we, as Christians, become self-aware enough to know when we are crossing the line from happy to intoxicated? Perhaps the best measure is that point when we would prefer not to stop whatever it is we are doing. And yet, if we can’t stop, then we aren’t able to move into ministry if the Lord were to call us to do so at that moment.
We are called as believers to live sober lives. The point isn’t to live in such a way that we are sad or serious all the time, but rather that we are able to respond to the Lord’s call on our lives at every moment in time. We are to be sober so that we can be obedient.
(3) Be obedient
Obedience isn’t a word that we use much anymore. As a public school teacher, I’ve been taught to talk to students about being appropriate or respectful, but not necessarily about being obedient. We don’t even hear our pastors talk much about obedience. It’s like, as a Church, we are afraid to even mention that there are a set of rules that we should obey.
We don’t much want to comply with rules anymore anyway, particularly if a rule doesn’t make sense or doesn’t conform with what we want to do. If we’re late and in a hurry, we may choose whether or not to obey the speed limit. When filing our income tax return, we may choose whether or not to report income that hasn’t been 1099'd. It’s definitely clear that our society rarely wants to obey, but seems to make up the rules as it goes along.
Peter tells us that as obedient children, we are not to conform to our evil desires. But how do we do that? In order to know what to obey, we need to become knowledgeable in what scripture actually says. We need to recognize that the opposite of obedience is sin. We need to realize that we have the full ability to live sinless lives. Why? Because we have the Holy Spirit living within us. The Holy Spirit gives us the power to resist temptation; God has promised that can endure through it and come out on the other side sinless.
"No temptation has overtaken you except what is common to mankind. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can endure it." (1 Corinthians 10:13-14 NIV).
When we sin, it isn’t because we can’t live sinless lives, but because we choose to sin! We need to take responsibility where it lies. If we chose to be obedient, we wouldn’t sin. Peter tells us clearly to be "obedient children" by not conforming to our evil desires.
(4) Become knowledgeable
Peter relates "evil desires" with ignorance. The Greek word is agnoia (Strong’s G52) and means lack of knowledge, especially of divine things, and moral blindness. Paul told Timothy that there were three things from which the choice to obey commandments came: "a pure heart, from a good conscience, and from sincere faith" (1 Timothy 1:5 NKJ). The kind of knowledge that we need as believers isn’t as much about learning facts as it is about learning what God wants from and for us. It is the knowledge that results in a pure heart and grows our faith. And that knowledge comes directly from the Word of God. Paul, in Philippians, wrote this:
"Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things." (Philippians 4:8 NIV). Think about such things. We need to actively filter what comes into our minds. Do we need to think about this or that? Is it pure? Is it lovely? Is it true? There is so much garbage out in the world. We would learn an infinite amount of things about what’s going on around us, but would knowing those things make us more loving and kind and gentle?
"The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit." (Galatians 5:22-25 NIV). It is fully possible for us to live by the Spirit, to be holy as He is holy. We need to become alert, looking every moment for His return. We need to be sober so that we can be sensitive to the move of His Spirit. We need to be obedient to the commands of scripture in our lives and we need to become knowledgeable about His will through focusing on His Word. In these ways we will become holy as our Lord is holy.
© 2015 Robin L. O’Hare. All rights reserved. Permission granted for nonprofit and church groups to use this article in its entirety (including this notice). For other uses, please contact servinggodalone@yahoo.com.
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