Developing holiness begins with the fear of the Lord. To fear God means that you don't want to do anything to displease Him. It means you care more about how God feels than how man feels.

If you don't want to displease Him, you'll desire to walk in integrity in every area of your life. God wants us to live differently from the world. He wants us to live differently than how we lived our past.

If we allow Him to, God will deal with each of us in areas He wants us to change to be more like Him. He may deal with you to give up television, listening to certain music, or reading certain things. He may speak to you about your love walk, forgiving others, or letting go of your past.

Whatever He speaks to you about, keep this in mind—He will deal with you about things that may be different from how He deals with your spouse or your friend.

Holiness Is A Process
Let's look at holiness in 2 Corinthians 7:1,

Having therefore these promises, dearly beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God.

God said that we need to perfect holiness in our lives. We are not at the level we should be. Holiness is something we have to pursue continually. We will never be in a place where we have "arrived." There is a process we must go through to achieve holiness.

How do we develop and grow in the process of holiness? Let's read a passage in 2 Chronicles:

Then all the people of Judah took Uzziah, who was sixteen years old, and made him king in the room of his father Amaziah...And he did that which was right in the sight of the LORD, according to all that his father Amaziah did. And he sought God in the days of Zechariah, who had understanding in the visions of God: and as long as he sought the LORD, God made him to prosper.
(2 Chron. 26:1,4-5)

Here, King Uzziah did what was right in the sight of the Lord by seeking the Lord, and God caused him to prosper. Seeking God by spending time in His Word is one way we can pursue holiness.

If you go on to read verse 16 you will see that when Uzziah prospered, he began to feel strong in his own might, and his heart was lifted up in pride. But we see that his prideful attitude brought destruction.

What does this mean for us today? Read Isaiah 6:1:

In the year that king Uzziah died I saw also the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up, and his train filled the temple.

In order to live holy, we see in this verse that something must die. God's glory will manifest when His children pursue holiness. People change in the presence of God's glory, but it only comes when His people are living holy.

In order for holiness to come, pride must die. Pride grows when we refuse to humble ourselves before God. It also occurs when we don't recognize that everything we have is from Him.

Be Honest With Yourself
To keep your heart right before God and stay away from a prideful attitude, remember these four points:

1. In and of yourself, you are nothing. ["For if a man think himself to be something, when he is nothing, he deceiveth himself."]
   (Gal. 6:3)
2. In and of yourself, you know nothing. ["And if any man think that he knoweth any thing, he knoweth nothing yet as he ought to know."]
   (1 Cor. 8:2)
3. In and of yourself, you have nothing. ["For who makes you different from anyone else? What do you have that you did not receive? And if you did receive it, why do you boast as though you did not?"]
   (1 Cor. 4:7 NIV)
4. In and of yourself, you can do nothing. ["I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing."]
   (John 15:5)

When pride is dead, a person is ready to be used by God. God wants to purge you, or cut pride out of you. But you have a part to play in the purging process. You have to have a willing heart, and allow God to speak to you about pride or anything else that needs to be cut out of your life.

Once He speaks to you about pride, then you must apply the Word of God to your situation. Once you are purged and clean from pride, you can stay clean by lowering yourself daily in the presence of God. He wants you to stay clean so you can be used by Him.

Control Your Thoughts
Not only does pride have to die to live a holy life, but you also have to control the thoughts you have in your mind. You have to bridle those thoughts and choose to think on the things of God.

How do we bridle our thoughts? Paul tells us in the book of Romans:

I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.
(Rom. 12:1-2)

Bridle your thoughts by renewing your mind and transforming yourself to God's will. To renew your mind means to renovate it. Renovate your thinking. Take out what doesn't belong by stripping it off and then putting on a new man that is renewed (Col. 3:1-10).

Strip off the old thoughts and think on love, goodness, and honesty. Being transformed means there is a change that takes place through a process. Renewing your mind is a daily process of stripping off your old thoughts and replacing them with God-thoughts from the Word.

Seeking God through His Word, purging pride, and renewing your mind are three ways to live a holy life. A fourth way to live holy is seen in 2 Corinthians 3:17-18:

Now the Lord is that Spirit: and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.

Another way to live holy is by spending time in the presence of God. When we spend time with Him, He will visit us and change us. He cuts out the things that need to be removed from our lives when we open our hearts to Him.

In His presence, He changes our natural thinking to thoughts of His supernatural power, His love, and His compassion.

Living holy is a continual process. We will never be perfect, but we can grow and look to perfect holiness in our lives. To perfect holiness, we must continue in God by hearing and doing the Word (James 1:25).

We must daily present our bodies as a living sacrifice and tell God He can use us. When our hearts are open to hear what He says in His Word and in His presence, we will be holy people set apart and ready to be used for the kingdom of God.

Faith Family Church
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