Exodus 19

“And you shall be to Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. These are the words which you shall speak to the sons of Israel” (Exodus 19:6).

Have you ever considered the word, “Holy?” What does it mean? Why must our God be holy? Why does holiness separate from the unholy?

As we dive into the “Law” portion of the Book of Exodus we are going to get a special look into holiness. We will see the Ten Commandments, the Priests, the Sacrifices, and the Tabernacle. We will find all these things to be pictures of what is yet to come. In all, we will learn one very powerful lesson, our God is holy.

Holy means “sacred.” It is the idea of something untouched, not defiled, perfectly set apart. It is a different level of standard. If the world holds one standard of morality, it would only make sense that heaven would hold a far greater standard. This is holy. This is hat we will be looking into. As we look at holiness we will learn that holiness must be pure to stay holy. If it comes into contact with something lesser, or unholy, it compromises its standard. Holiness preserves its name, and remains holy. Think of it this way. If you hang out with kids who smoke, but you never touch a cigarette in your life, you are still going to be labeled someone who smokes. You will compromise your standard of living because you live in constant contact with their standard of living. Therefore the only way to protect yourself, is to set yourself apart.

God is holy. He cannot compromise His nature of being holy by hanging out with us. Therefore, instead of compromising, He is going to give us the law. This is His standard, which we must meet before we enter His presence. Notice that in this chapter, if the Israelites stepped foot onto the mountain of the presence of God, they would die. Holiness, when infringed upon, must take drastic action to remain pure. God could not be defiled, so He must wipe out. As we study the law we will see a lot of this. I want you to understand that it is not that God is unmerciful, but instead because God is holy.

What does holiness then mean to us? Well, we are taught to say that holiness means to be set apart. This is true, but it is only the beginning. Holiness, for the believer, means to be used of God. It is when you enter that place that God in His holiness can pick you up as His tool, use you, and put you back down without ever having to compromise His perfect nature. If you are not being used of God each and every day I would suggest you examine your life. In our theme verse we see God setting apart Israel to be this Holy Nation, His own massive instrument to showing the rest of the world Himself.

Now, understand that the law is not the answer to everything, however, a picture of heavenly holiness. Obviously, we cannot keep every letter of the law from now on. Therefore God sent His Son! Was this a blow to His holiness? No, instead a great testament to it. Remember, Jesus kept every letter of the law and remained on the heavenly standard while here on earth! He remained holy! This is why the Lord sent the law. He wanted to show us holiness. He gave Israel time to show how many ways they can mess up the law. Then He sent the Fulfiller of the law. Imagine if the law never came. Why then would we follow Jesus? We would have never been given the chance to obey the law ourselves; therefore we would have never accepted the fact that we could not have gotten to heaven ourselves. We would not even know what holiness was. We would not even know that we fall so short of it and need a savior to make us holy so we can enter a holy standard. This is why we study the law.