Holiness in Practice Today: The Church’s and Our Greatest Need

[Kokavkrystallos]

by Joel Beeke, from Holiness​

Chapter 6:​

Holiness in Practice Today: The Church’s and Our Greatest Need ​

a. Its necessity and inducements​

These are at least ten in number for God’s people.

1. God has called you to holiness. “For God hath not called us unto uncleanness, but unto holiness” (1Th 4:7). Whatever God calls us to, is necessary. His call itself should induce us to seek and practice holiness.

2. Holiness evidences your justification and election. Sanctification is the inevitable outgrowth of justification (1Co 6:11). The two may be distinguished, but never separated. In and through Christ, justification gives God’s child the title for heaven and the boldness to enter; sanctification gives him the fitness for heaven and the preparation necessary to enjoy it.

Election too is inseparable from holiness: “God hath from the beginning chosen you to salvation through sanctification of the Spirit” (2Th 2:13). From God’s side, election is known first, for it is the cause of our salvation, just as sanctification is the evidence of our salvation. From our side, however, election is known last, for sanctification is the earmark of Christ’s elect sheep. That’s why election is always a comforting doctrine for the Church, for it is the sure resting-ground that explains the grace of God working within them. No wonder our Reformed forebears called election the “comfort of the Church”!

That’s also why Calvin was so insistent that election should discourage none, for the believer receives comfort from it, and the unbeliever is not called to consider it; rather, he is called to repentance. Whoever is discouraged by election, the Reformers so clearly taught us, is falling prey to a satanic misuse of this precious, encouraging doctrine.

3. Without holiness, all things are defiled. “Unto them that are defiled and unbelieving is nothing pure” (Ti 1:15). Through Christ, God sanctifies His child and makes his prayers and thanksgivings acceptable. As Thomas Watson has noted: “A holy heart is the altar that sanctifies the offering; if not to satisfaction, to acceptation.”

4. Holiness augments your spiritual health. As John Flavel quipped: “What health is to the heart, holiness is to the soul.” Moreover, this spiritual health of holiness God generally works through discipline. Through chastisement, child of God, you are profitably exercised by the Father (Heb 12:11), which results in genuine holiness, without which you cannot see the Lord (v. 14). Through Christ’s justifying power, you receive a clean slate before God; through His sanctifying power a clear conscience. Both are critical for spiritual health.

5. Holiness fosters assurance. “Ye shall know them by their fruits” (Mat 7:16). All Reformed divines are agreed that most of the forms and degrees of assurance experienced by true believers—especially daily assurance—are reached gradually in the path of sanctification through careful cultivation of God’s Word, the means of grace, and corresponding obedience. (Read the Westminster Confession, Chapter 18, and the Canons of Dort, Head 5, for our forefathers’ appreciation of the intertwining of holiness and assurance.)

The way to lose a daily sense of assurance is to daily forego the pursuit of holiness. Believers who live sloppily (i.e., treat sin lightly or neglect daily devotions and study of the Word) or inactively (i.e., don’t pursue holiness, but assume the posture that nothing can be done in the area of sanctification—as if holiness were something outside of us, except on rare occasions when something very special “happens” inside) are courting a recipe for daily spiritual darkness, deadness, and fruitlessness.

The godly farmer who plows his field, sows seed, fertilizes, and cultivates, is acutely aware that in the final analysis he is utterly dependent for an assured crop on forces outside of himself. He knows he can’t cause the seed to germinate, the rain to fall, the sun to shine. But he pursues his task with diligence anyhow, both looking to God for blessing and knowing that if he doesn’t fertilize and cultivate the sown seed, his crop will be meager at best!

Similarly, the believer who doesn’t pursue holiness with diligence will neither have much assurance nor be obeying Peter’s call to seek it (2Pe 1:10).

6. Holiness is essential for effective service to God. Paul joins sanctification and usefulness together: “If a man therefore purge himself from these, he shall be a vessel unto honour, sanctified and meet for the master’s use, and prepared unto every good work” (2Ti 2:21).

7. Holiness makes you resemble God. As Watson notes, “We must endeavour to be like God in sanctity. It is a clear glass in which we can see a face; it is a holy heart in which something of God can be seen.”

8. The God you love, loves holiness. Hence the intensity of His discipline! William Gurnall says it best: “God would not rub so hard if it were not to fetch out the dirt that is ingrained in our natures. God loves purity so well, He had rather see a hole than a spot in His child’s garments.”

9. Holiness preserves your integrity. It saves you from much hypocrisy, from resorting to a “Sunday only” Christianity. It gives vitality, purpose, meaning, and direction to daily living.

10. Holiness fits you for heaven. “Follow [literally: pursue]...holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord” (Heb 12:14). As John Owen writes,

There is no imagination wherewith man is besotted, more foolish, none so pernicious, as this: that persons not purified, not sanctified, not made holy in their life, should afterwards be taken into that state of blessedness which consists in the enjoyment of God. Neither can such persons enjoy God, nor would God be a reward to them. Holiness indeed is perfected in heaven; but the beginning of it is invariably confined to this world. God leads none to heaven but whom He sanctifies on the earth. This living Head will not admit of dead members.

Full message: Chapel Library