In our defiled world, how refreshing and attractive is God’s purity and moral excellence.
When the Bible says God is holy it means he is morally pure. Not 95 percent pure, nor 99 percent pure, nor 99.99 percent pure, but 100 percent, absolutely, perfectly pure in every way, every action, every thought, every intention, every emotion. He is moral excellence.
Ethically, God is as clean as sunlight, as pure as fire.
“Far be it from God that he should do wickedness, and from the Almighty that he should do wrong” (Job 34:10).
Daniel had this vision of God: “As I looked, thrones were placed, and the Ancient of days took his seat; his clothing was white as snow, and the hair of his head like pure wool; his throne was fiery flames; its wheels were burning fire” (Daniel 7:9).
Mark writes, “Jesus took with him Peter and James and John, and led them up a high mountain by themselves. And he was transfigured before them, and his clothes became radiant, intensely white, as no one on earth could bleach them” (9:2–3).
John writes, “God is light, and in him is no darkness at all” (1 John 1:5).
God’s purity in what he loves and hates
In holiness God loves, enjoys, and finds infinite delight in what is pure. He loves his own righteous ways and delights in doing good. His pleasure is in justice.
Likewise, he rejoices to see goodness in us. God promotes what is morally clean, teaching people his ways. He honors and rewards people for being clean, pure, and good.
The flip side of that is, in holy purity, he has absolutely no pleasure in moral evil. He has no evil desires. God has never had an evil thought. He cannot be tempted by evil, and he tempts no one (James 1:13).
Not only does he have no pleasure in evil, he hates, abhors, and abominates it. For example,
There are six things that the LORD hates, seven that are an abomination to him: haughty eyes, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood, a heart that devises wicked plans, feet that make haste to run to evil, a false witness who breathes out lies, and one who sows discord among brothers. (Proverbs 6:16–19)
God reacts to evil the way we react to the worst smells. He recoils from evil the way we recoil from the smell of dead animals, dung, or rotten food in a dumpster.
God testified concerning Jesus, “You have loved righteousness and hated wickedness” (Hebrews 1:9).
Not only does he hate evil, he condemns and burns it. He is never complacent about evil, but sooner or later takes action to purge it from existence. He is absolutely pure, and this is his universe, so despite his great patience, mercy, and love, eventually what is evil and defiled must perish in flames (Revelation 21:8). Because God is the pure, clean housekeeper of the earth, what is corrupt and defiled is doomed.
God’s purity washes the unclean
God taught Israel over and over again in his law and in the procedures of worship in the tabernacle that his holiness meant being clean.
The Tabernacle provided a crucial object lesson:
You shall also make a basin of bronze, with its stand of bronze, for washing. You shall put it between the tent of meeting and the altar, and you shall put water in it, with which Aaron and his sons shall wash their hands and their feet. When they go into the tent of meeting, or when they come near the altar to minister, to burn a food offering to the LORD, they shall wash with water, so that they may not die. They shall wash their hands and their feet, so that they may not die. It shall be a statute forever to them, even to him and to his offspring throughout their generations. (Exodus 30:18–21)
Because God is holy, as pure as sunlight, he told the priests that one of their most important jobs was “They shall teach my people the difference between the holy and the common, and show them how to distinguish between the unclean and the clean” (Ezekiel 44:23).
The law divided food into the categories of clean and unclean, and therefore into what could and could not be eaten.
Even Israel’s soldiers had to pay attention to cleanliness:
You shall have a place outside the camp, and you shall go out to it. And you shall have a trowel with your tools, and when you sit down outside, you shall dig a hole with it and turn back and cover up your excrement. Because the LORD your God walks in the midst of your camp, to deliver you and to give up your enemies before you, therefore your camp must be holy, so that he may not see anything indecent among you and turn away from you. (Deuteronomy 23:12–14)
Knowing God’s nature firsthand, Jesus said, “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.”
Finally, knowing all this, the apostle Paul wrote, “Let us cleanse ourselves from every defilement of body and spirit, bringing holiness to completion in the fear of God” (2 Corinthians 7:1).
Our ways versus God’s ways
Our ways: Fallen humans can be tempted by and find pleasure in evil, in thinking about it, doing it, and experiencing it vicariously through books, movies, gossip, music, and the real actions of others.
God’s ways: God delights in purity and recoils from corruption. There is no shadow in him, nor moral indifference, only holiness as intense as fire.
That being the case, here is good news:
Christ has entered, not into holy places made with hands, which are copies of the true things, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God on our behalf (Hebrews 9:24).
We have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all (Hebrews 10:10).
You were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God (1 Corinthians 6:11).
What a relief! Thank you, Jesus! Only he can make us holy enough for our holy God!