Living a Holy Life

I asked everyone in our fellowship “How does one live a holy life?”

answers received:

1. By abiding by the word of God and glorifying God.
2. only through the spirit living in me that I can possibly attempt to live in a manner that is set apart. now waliking in the spirit on a regular basis is more of a challenge.I have to pray,be in His word and set time apart for Him daily.
3. We first need to realize that in order to live a holy life, we need to be empowered by the Holy Spirit. We need to live our lives in a way that glorifies God and reflects Him to others around us. We can live a holy life by listening and discerning the voice of God and being obedient to what He tells us. We should be following  the 10 commandments as our guide to live the way God expects us to live.  Living a holy life includes praying, worshiping, and being in the word. Always being willing to learn more about who God is, his character, and the promises that he has for us. Encouraging others, loving others, and sharing our faith/testimony with others as well as being thankful for all the blessings that he bestows on us.
4. obedience 2 God & His word. making our experiential sanctification match our positional sanctification
5. I will send answer later, I still owe you an answer, and … I never got the answer LOL

Let’s prime the pump with some scripture

Ephesians 6:12 King James Version (KJV)

12 For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.

1 Pet 5:8-9 

8. Be sober, vigilant, because your opponent the devil, as a roaring lion, walks about, seeking whom he may swallow up,
9. Resist him, standing firm in the faith, because you know that the family of believers throughout the world is undergoing the same kind of sufferings.

2 Cor 10:3

For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war according to the flesh,

for the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh, but divinely powerful for the destruction of fortresses.

We are destroying speculations and every lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God, and we are taking every thought captive to the obedience of Christ,

1 Tim 1:18

This command I entrust to you, Timothy, my son, in accordance with the prophecies previously made concerning you, that by them you fight the good fight,

2 Timothy 4:7

I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.

1 Timothy 6:12

Fight the good fight of the faith. Take hold of the eternal life to which you were called when you made the good confession before many witnesses.

In Eph 6:12

4097   [3823]   πάλη, palē, n. struggle, wrestle, personal contending

In 1 Pet 5:8 1729   [1594]   ἐκνήφω, eknēphō, v.  [1666 + 3768]. to come to one’s sense, become sober

In 2 cor 10:3
5129   [4754]   στρατεύομαι, strateuomai, v.  [5131]. (mid.) to serve as a soldier; to wage war, fight, battle

1 Tim same word used for fight 

5127   [4752]   στρατεία, strateia, n.  [5131]. warfare; fight

5129   [4754]   στρατεύομαι, strateuomai, v.  [5131]. (mid.) to serve as a soldier; to wage war, fight, battle

We are in a battle whether we want to face that fact or not.

We are called to engage daily in battle. Personal, intense, mental battle that requires us to come to our senses and stay focused on the purpose and prize.

The question is: “will we fight well or poorly?”

(Much of that depends on how well we understand the nature of the battle)

(Gif of karate)

(A fantastic and inspiring example an art form, discipline, exercise, confidence builder ?) 

However, the original purpose or usefulness of karate is self defense in hand-to-hand combat

(Much like the word “wrestle” in Eph 6)

He will never be able to defend himself with this no matter how good he feels about himself (sad truth)

A method of surviving attack has been interpreted into a series of moves that have no external effect. (His torso moves perfectly along with the muscles controlling the limbs, but he cannot punch or kick.

Many people calling themselves christians do the same thing.

We want to (or tend to) focus on our list of do’s and do not’s. 

Reducing the battle to the same do’s and dont’s (and some can make it look impressive)

But is it really effective or just doing karate without hands and legs ?

James 2:18 say “I will show you my faith by my works since faith without works is dead”

And we read this and focus on the works to demonstrate that we have faith.

Notice in this verse, the words “is dead” ?  

What is the writer saying could be dead (the works or the faith) ?

It is the faith that generates the works (not the works generating the faith)

In John 14:15 Jesus says. “If you love me you will keep my commandments”

Does he say “keeping my commandments will cause you to love me”

Or does He say “loving me will empower you to keep my commandments” ?

Which causes the other ?

We have a figure of speech “putting the cart in front of the horse”

Trying to make the result create the cause.

In christianize “ holding a grape up in the air and expecting a vine to appear”

 Abiding (John 15:1-14)

1 ¶ “I am the true vine, and My Father is the vinedresser.

2 “Every branch in Me that does not bear fruit, He takes away; and every branch that bears fruit, He prunes it so that it may bear more fruit.

3 “You are already clean because of the word which I have spoken to you.

4 “Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in Me.

5 “I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing.

6 “If anyone does not abide in Me, he is thrown away as a branch and dries up; and they gather them, and cast them into the fire and they are burned.

7 “If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you.

8 “My Father is glorified by this, that you bear much fruit, and so prove to be My disciples.

9 “Just as the Father has loved Me, I have also loved you; abide in My love.

10 “If you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love; just as I have kept My Father’s commandments and abide in His love.

11 “These things I have spoken to you so that My joy may be in you, and that your joy may be made full.

12 ¶ “This is My commandment, that you love one another, just as I have loved you.

13 “Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends.

14 “You are My friends if you do what I command you.

Christ and the Gospel are not 2 parallel things:

They are one in the same.

Rejecting the gospel is not rejecting a system of principles, or religion,

You are rejecting Jesus Christ Himself.

Not caring about holiness (if you call yourself a believer) is not caring about Christ who you claim to love.

What does abide mean ?

3531   [3306]   μένω, menō, v.  

1. to stay, remain, live, dwell
2. to be in a state that begins and continues, yet may or may not end or stop. 

Vitally connected

Positional sanctification

Experiential sanctification (Roman 12:1-2)

If you consider yourself a “carnal christian” or “lukewarm christian” you are still lost because neither of those two categories are found in scripture.

John 15 contradicts both of these states as being valid. (As does Rev 3)

Can a christian make mistakes, yes

Can a christian stumble, yes

Can a christian live a carnal lifestyle without fruit, no.

Is the believer experiencing communion with Christ in a growing, progressive way.

Progressive sanctification

• Faith
• Knowledge of the Word
• Fruit
• Repentance

D A Carson

“The image given by Christ regarding the vine, is stretched a little when the branches are given the responsibility to remain attached to the vine”

We must cultivate our dependence on the vine.

Consistent drawing from and depending on His life to be alive.

We cannot do anything apart from Christ

John 15:4 “Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in Me.

God demonstrates throughout the entire bible, a track record of first emptying men of themselves before he uses them.
Teaching them, and us, that we can do nothing on our own.

Joseph, Gideon, Moses, Peter

It was necessary that Peter fall before He could be used.

“Satan has demanded to sift you”

What is sifting ?

(Vigorous shaking to separate chaff from wheat)

Peter had a life-altering failure. Jesus warned that Satan would “sift” the disciple like wheat (Luke 22:31)— The Enemy wanted to shake Peter’s faith hard so that he’d fall away from Jesus like chaff.

Peter fervently believed the promise he’d made to Jesus: “Even though all may fall away, yet I will not” (Mark 14:29).

Satan knows a few things about the power of fear. And more, he realized that the disciple would be wounded by his own disloyalty. A man with tattered pride can’t help but question his usefulness.

When Satan sifts believers, his goal is to damage our faith so much that we’re useless to God. He wants us shelved far from the action of the Lord’s kingdom. 

Therefore, he goes for our strengths (our sources of pride)—the areas where we believe ourselves to be invincible, or at least very well protected. And when the Devil succeeds, we, like Peter, get demoralized and feel defeated, condemned, useless.

But we don’t have to stay that way.

God takes that defeat of our own strength and uses it to receive forgiveness, to understand it deeper, to pull us deeper into Him … relying on Him all the more instead of ourselves.

It has been said, “Jesus spent three years emptying His disciples, so that He could fill them in an instant in Acts 2.

The sifting process is meant by Satan for evil, but God allows it for good (removes “us” from ourselves”).  It Empties us of our self.

“Whoever saves his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it”

Matt 10:39, Matt 16:25, Luke 9:24-26

Speaks of a broader surrender our ourselves in order to receive Him.
(safe to say that we can’t surrender our very lives if we can’t even let go of self-reliance or pride)

His Word is crucial to abiding in Him, being in Him as He is in the Father.

(John 15: 7, 10,11,14)

We cannot surrender to Whom we do not know.

We cannot know Him without knowing what He said.

We cannot know what He said without reading what He said.

We cannot keep His Word without praying about what we read.

Prayer

John 14:13-14

13 “Whatever you ask in My name, that will I do, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son.

14 “If you ask Me anything in My name, I will do it.

James 4:2-8

2 You lust and do not have; so you commit murder. You are envious and cannot obtain; so you fight and quarrel. You do not have because you do not ask.

3 You ask and do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, so that you may spend it on your pleasures.

4 You adulteresses, do you not know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.

5 Or do you think that the Scripture speaks to no purpose: “He jealously desires the Spirit which He has made to dwell in us”?

6 But He gives a greater grace. Therefore it says, “GOD IS OPPOSED TO THE PROUD, BUT GIVES GRACE TO THE HUMBLE.”

7 Submit therefore to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you.

8 Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double-minded.

What do these verses tell us about prayer ?

Lord’s Prayer

Matt 6:9-13

Luke 11:2-4

Does the enemy know scripture ?

is the enemy afraid of us memorizing scripture ?

what might the enemy actually be trying to distract us from ?

 

Abiding in Him