I opened this up last week looking at the sense that I had
of the Lord, that in this new season, in this new term time,
that's there was an invitation from the Lord to go deeper.
And if you recall, I shared with you a picture the Lord gave me
of the splash park at Saint Albans Verrillanian Park and the
sense that we can enjoy the splash park just as children do.
But there comes a point where there is an invitation to go
into the swimming pool, into the deep, and I think for some of us
we're looking for more splash park apparatus to tickle our
fancy. And yet there is an invitation
from the Lord to go deeper and we can get caught up in the trap
of splash parks. It's not to say splash parks are
wrong. Splash parks have been created
for children, but we are too mature in the in the faith.
That isn't to say that we should not be childlike in our walk.
As Paul says, we need to move progress from from milk to meat.
And I I believe it is the call of the Lord for us as a people
to to take a step back and say, Lord, what?
What are you calling me to? And what does the deep look like
for my life and my world? And we kick things off by
looking at the story where Jesus called the first disciples and
the story of how he and Simon Peter were in the boat.
And we're going to, we're going to read that in a moment.
And I said that the first call before we called to something,
we are called to someone before we called to do, we called to.
Well done. You were listening.
I'm very proud of you that before we get busy, we should
get being. And the temptation in our lives
is always right. I've got to get doing.
In fact, as I said last week, when you meet someone, they're
like, well, what do you do? We hold our identity and our
doing. We we are defined by our doing,
but that's not actually what it should be.
We should be defined by our being, by our identity with
Jesus in the boat. And we unpacked that last week.
And if you missed that, then could I encourage you to catch
up? You can do so on our YouTube
channel. And with that, I'd like to say
hello to all you YouTube watchers and across our other
platforms. Hit the subscribe button and hit
that bell notification to get important updates as they come
through. Thank you very much.
And so I said to you that there were three calls that we read in
this story. The call to be and then the call
to walk in holiness, the call to be with Jesus and the call to
walk in holiness. And that therefore is what we
are going to look at this morning.
But it's going to be part one of the call to walk in holiness.
I mean, let's be honest, the reality is I could preach for
the rest of the year on holiness and still not have done a very
good job of it. I I was preparing this talk this
week saying to the Lord Lord how on earth doesn't me, me, a mere
human, convey Your Holiness. And the reality is I will not be
able to do a good enough job. But I have faith and trust in
the Lord that he will breathe on my words and hit you where it
needs to be hit, so to speak, because this is a living,
breathing word. You know, Paul said, I don't
speak with the eloquence of man, but it is the power of the
messages. And he says in Rome as well, I'm
not afraid of the gospel because it is the power of God unto
salvation. And I believe that today is a
day of salvation. I believe that none of you are
here by accident, whether you're in the in the room or online,
and that God wants to speak to you this morning.
So with that way of introduction, let us turn
together to our text that we have been looking at, which is
in Luke, chapter 51 to 11. And as I said to you, there are
the three calls that we find in here.
So let's read this together. Be on the screen, in the room
and on your device at home. Let me read it on one occasion
while the crowd was pressing in on him.
That's Jesus, to hear the word of God.
He was standing by the lake of Gnessarat, which is also the Sea
of Galilee, and he saw two boats by the lake.
But the fishermen had gone out of them and were washing their
Nets, Getting into one of the boats, which was Simon's.
He asked him to put out a little from the land.
Remember that? And he sat down and taught the
people from the boat and when he had finished speaking, he said
to Simon, put out into the deep and let your net down for a
catch. I'm an answered master.
We toiled all night and took nothing and the reason they did
so at night was that's when you went fishing at night time.
That's what the professionals knew.
But you non fisherman professional, I put that in
that's that's not actually in the scripture at your word.
I will let down the Nets. And when they've done this, they
include a large number of fish. And their Nets were breaking.
They signaled to their partners and other boats to come and help
them, and they came and filled the boat so that they began to
sink. But when Simon Peter saw it, he
fell down at Jesus's knees saying depart from me.
For I am a sinful man, oh Lord. And we're going to look at that
part next week. For he and all who were with him
were astonished at the catch of fish they had already taken.
And so also where James and John, sons of Zebedee, who were
partners with Simon and Jesus, said to Simon, do not be afraid.
From now on you will be catching men.
And when they had brought their boats to land, they left
everything and followed him. I read there that Jesus said,
let's put out a little from the land.
There was something that occurred in that moment that is
a prophetic type for what we're going to look at this morning.
Because holiness, I don't know about you, but you don't often
hear preaches or talks on holiness.
But when we hear the word holiness, what do you think
about probably right living? I mean, there is so many
scriptures. Are they not in the in the Bible
a command to abstain from fleshly lust?
Make no provision for the flesh. Love not the world or the things
of the world. Flee immorality.
Throw off the old man and put on the new.
Think on what is good and what is true.
Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly present ourselves as
a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God.
Lay aside or evil and malice, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera.
There is embedded within the message of the gospel this call
to holiness. But here is, I think, where we
get unstuck. We we are, we hear that and
we're like, what do I do with that?
And the questions that I want to answer this morning are the
questions that I have and I suspect you may have or have had
at some point, which is this? What does holiness actually
mean? Don't be embarrassed.
If you wondering what does holiness really mean?
Why is this important? Why is there this call for
holiness? And how on earth can walking in
holiness be achieved? And how on earth that was
intended? How on earth can this be
achieved? And therefore that is what I
want to do with the remainder of our time.
The remainder of the 2 1/2 hours that I have with you on the
tour. Lock the doors.
What does it mean that God is holy?
Have you ever wondered that? I mean, we sing it.
We sang it this morning. Such wonderful refrains of holy,
holy, holy. We read it in Revelation when
the Seraphine and and the creatures were were proclaiming
holy, holy, Holy is the Lord God Almighty who was and who is and
is to come. We pray it.
Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed Holy be your name.
But what on earth are we singing?
What on earth are we praying? I'm glad you asked me that
question. If you haven't, then you should
ask me that question. The whole the word holy comes
from the Hebrew word kadosh, which actually means to cut.
And you see what holy means. The root of holy means to be cut
off or another way, to be separate from from everything
else. Being holy means to be cut off,
to be separate from everything else.
Or or to put it another way that you might have heard this
phrase, it means other than other than completely separate,
separate, and transcendent. Transcendent means trans means
above and beyond, completely transcendent from us, completely
separate. And so you see, God is distinct,
separate, transcendent, other than from anything else and
anyone else that has ever been or ever will be.
He is in his own class of his own.
He's above and beyond the range of our normal and physical human
experiences. He is a super natural God.
You know, in the 19th century, theologians on the back of the
Enlightenment try to reduce God to nature and in so doing remove
the holiness of God. You know, Adam McKinnon, and I'm
Adam, was leading worship this morning.
We're speaking this week and I love the phrase we're talking
about worship songs and type of worship songs, he said.
You know, there's the Father, the Father's house songs and
there's the throne room of God's songs kind of like that.
Because I think that that speaks to the reality and the paradox
that even though God is other than that he is holy, that there
is a throne room that he calls us to know him and to be known
and to be our Father. Someone say Amen.
Don't leave me hanging people. We are in danger when sometimes
we reduce God to our best mates and a dad that will bend over
backwards for us. And in so doing we remove the
holiness of God. Now clearly you cannot remove
the holiness of God and how you relate to God.
You can do so. We need to understand that he is
holy and transcendent and other than and separate from us, and
yet at the same time he wants to be known and calls us to
Himself. The second part of Kadosh is
also moral purity. It's entirely and completely
morally pure all the time and in every possible way.
And so it has those two anchor points to that word that God is
transcendent and other than and in a class and a distinction of
his own, and he is therefore morally pure.
Why He doesn't attain a level of standard.
He is the standard. We don't like that fact because,
you know, a lot of people would justify themselves based on
their comparison with other people.
Well, I'm a good guy. You should see Fred down the
road. He's terrible.
People would justify themselves not by the blood of Christ but
by a comparison of works. I'm sorry to say, as Paul says,
all our righteous. These are but rags.
I, I, I went over the speed limit this morning.
Yeah, by about 1 1/2 mph. Just to clarify, this is
documented. I'd like to say for the police
that might be watching this, that it was for only a few
seconds and like, but I sinned. That is a sin because Paul calls
us to obey the civil rules and regulations that we're in.
I'm sorry, you don't. You wake up and you sin before
you probably even brush your teeth.
Sorry if I there's a few bubbles in my apologize.
But God, you see, is holy. He is other than and he is
morally pure. And you know it says an Exodus
1511 who is like you. Oh Lord, among the gods there is
no one other than you. You're not worshipping somebody
like yourself. You're not worshipping something
that we have created. We are worshipping the creator,
someone that created us. And you know when the enemy said
to if you can be like God, he was trying to scrub out the
holiness of God in that very moment.
What a As if we can. And I want to say, God's
holiness isn't just the character trait the God turns on
and off at will. God is holy.
He is holy. In justice, in love, in mercy,
in power, in sovereignty, in wisdom, in patience, in anger,
in grace, in faithfulness and compassion.
In all of his outworkings. He is always other than and
morally pure. You see the truth of God's
holiness. Listen guys, is the center of
the gospel of Jesus Christ. Without His Holiness, there
would be no moral law to which we are responsible for, and
therefore there would be no sin. Without the holiness of God,
there would be no divine anger towards and with sin.
Without the holiness of God, there would be no Son sent as
the perfect sacrifice for sin, that the holiness of God, there
would be no resurrection and no defeat of death.
Without the holiness of God, there would be no final defeat
of the Satan. And without the holiness of God,
there would be no hope of a new heaven and a new earth where
there will no longer be sin. You try and remove the holiness
of God, and you're trying to scrub out the centrality of the
good news of Jesus Christ. And we do so at our own peril
now. When we were at space on
Tuesday, it was the revelation of the holiness of God that
brought us to our knees. And next week, because I haven't
got enough time to do it justice.
And to be frank, I won't have enough time to do it justice
next week. But one of the things that we
don't like to talk about is this, the fear of the Lord.
But the fear of the Lord is the root of all wisdom and truth.
What happened? And I'll give you a teaser for
next week. What happened when Peter had a
revelation of God depart from me.
But I am a sinful man, O Lord. The revelation of God's holiness
is a revelation of who He is and who we are.
Can you believe, to use some North London vernacular?
Can you add him and eve it? Or is that East London?
Is that Cotney? I don't even know.
But sorry, East End, Sorry, EastEnders, it's not the soap.
Stick to the notes, Hal Virgin. Stick to the notes.
Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord of hosts.
Whole earth is full of his glory.
We're going to look at that next week.
There is freedom that comes from the fear of the Lord.
Doesn't mean being frightened of some kind of God that's going to
beat you over the head. It means an awe of an almighty
holy God. Wow.
Now the second part is this. If that is holiness, we get to a
point of a question which, had it not been for the fact that
it's in the Bible, would seem quite blasphemous.
Had it not been in the Bible, you would have accused me of
being a heretic. And it is this.
You are called to be holy, just like God.
Excuse me, Pastor, we are called to be holy.
Yeah, that's exactly what I said.
Leviticus 1144. God says he calls us to be holy
as he is holy. And indeed, we're going to read
later Peter, who quoted Leviticus in his call to say you
are called to be holy. The mind boggles, quite frankly,
But we are therefore called to be cut off from and separated
from, and to walk in moral purity.
To put it another way, we are called to be separated from sin
and from the world, and consecrated to Him.
That is the call to holiness, for us to be cut off, separated
from that which is not of God, and be set apart for him,
consecrated for him. That is what it means to be holy
and to be like our Father and live in moral Puritan.
That is the call of holiness. And I said that you see holiness
as a picture and type in this story.
We see it here. Verse 3.
Getting into one of the boats, which was Simon's, he asked him
to put out a little from the land.
What's happening there? There is a separation of Simon
Peter from the multitude. You see that?
Unless you think I'm making that up.
We can see in the Old Testament we see this same picture of
separation with Israel. God set apart Abraham and his
descendants to be what a holy nation, to demonstrate to the
world what it means to live holy and for God, it says in
Leviticus 1144, as I quoted before.
For I am the Lord your God. Consecrate yourselves,
therefore, and be holy. In other words, set yourself
apart from the ways of the world and the patterns of this earth,
and be consecrated to me. That is what it means for us to
be holy. There needs to be a separation
of our hearts from the things of this world, which we'll look at
in a moment and consecrated to the things of God.
Are we? Are we getting this?
Let's look at one pizza 114 to 16, as obedient children.
Do not be conformed to the passions of your former
ignorance. What does that mean?
He's saying. Listen before you were born
again by the Spirit and you became his child and we're in
the gospel series recently. I unpacked that over a number of
weeks. What that actually means, Before
you were born again of the Spirit you had out of ignorance,
passions, and lust of this world.
And he's saying this, do not be conformed to those again.
But as he who called you, that is God.
As he who called you who is holy, you also be holy in all
your conduct. Since it is written once again
quoted in Leviticus, you shall be holy for I am holy I.
We're going to get to the question in a minute of why are
we called to be, why are we called and how do we?
I mean it's such a massive subject.
But I think that one of the areas of of of Christian
teaching that we lack at the moment is this call to holiness.
I think what we major on is live your best life and excel in your
gifting and have fun and etcetera, etcetera.
And that appeals to us, does it not?
We love the the seeming, and I use that word intentionally,
seeming path of least resistance.
But we miss out the fruits of walking in holiness if we don't
incline our ear to the call of God to say you have an
obligation to walk in holiness and your conduct should be that
which honors God. But if I went and preached that
for six weeks in a row, I think the online views would probably
dip and I'd be like, where's everyone disappeared to?
And that's not a reflection on you, by the way.
I know your hearts and your pursuing God, and I love that
about this church. I'm saying in a general sense,
as we think about our walk, we miss out on the blessing that
comes with the call to holiness. So why are we called to be holy?
Well, I'll give you a few reasons for a starter because,
and I'll start with this one, Holiness gives us confidence in
prayer. You know, it says in one John,
if our heart condemns us, not in other words, if we are, if we're
listening to the conviction of the Holy Spirit to live a holy
life. You know what I mean?
Right. Don't say that.
I know you want to say that. But you oh, okay, you're going
to say that. Don't drink that extra.
You know, if you have okay, you've gone and done that.
Don't go. What's that thing?
If you turn that, oh, you're going to turn to, you know, we,
we. That's our conscience, that Holy
Spirit speaks to us. And what John is saying here,
it's not our heart if our heart condemns us, not in other words
if we respond to the conviction of the Holy Spirit and we set
our hearts to live a pure life. He says this.
Then we have confidence towards God.
And whatsoever we ask we receive of Him because we keep His
commandments and do things that are pleasing in His sight.
Let me rewrite this for you. If your heart condemns you, then
you will have no confidence with God.
And I wonder why we live in a world where and I'm I'm, I'm in
danger of this. The Saints, by the way, that
word St. means holy ones. That's us, all of us.
We called Saints for a reason. We wonder why we lack the power
to walk in that which God has for us, and we lack the
confidence to boldly claim at the throne of God his promises.
We wonder why, when we're walking in sin and we're not
pursuing a life of holiness, this is how serious it is.
Listen, if you want a life of victory, and I don't have to, if
I ask who wants a life of victory, you're probably all
going to put your hands up. Then I'm going to give you the
answer. Walk in holiness.
If you want to see blessings being pulled out, then walking
holiness. Okay, What else?
Here's the other part of this, the other the side of that coin.
We are called to be holy by God who loves us and knows what is
best for us. There's a quote, and I don't
know who this is from, but he said this human flourishing is
always a function of delighting in that which God delights and
desire in that which God desires.
Let me read that again. Human flourishing is always a
function of delighting that which God delights and desiring
that which God desires. My car flourishes when I follow
the the manufacturer's manual and put the right type of petrol
in the car. It does not flourish.
When I say I don't need to, I'll put my own thing in it, thank
you very much. We have been created to worship
a holy God and to be His children, and we flourish in
when we walk with Him in obedience to Him.
Sin leads to destruction, Sin leads to broken relationships.
Sin leads to difficulties. Sin has an effect.
It might taste good in the moment, and you you might love
it in that moment, but it will always breed destruction and
brokenness. Conversely, the call of holiness
to walk in holiness brings blessing.
And there's many other reasons, not least this I want to please
that which my father is pleased, I want to desire that which my
father does. I love it when my children want
to do things that will give a smile to my face.
And what's a copy, daddy? It's less now.
They're older, but you know, when they were younger, be
childlike. So that's why we're called there
is blessing there and we're called to have victory as we
walk in confidence. But here's the next question,
how do I become holy? And I think this is the kind of
crux of it, where I want to try and land in the next few
minutes. You see, I think when we think
of holiness, we think it's a one time event of becoming I have
become holy. Yesterday was a fantastical day
of holiness. You know, Wesley, before he
really encountered the Lord, he and his compadres in, I want to
say, Oxford or Cambridge. He set up the Holiness Club, and
their endeavor was works of holiness in order that they
contain Holiness. But he soon discovered that that
was not Holiness. You see the the answer is in the
title of the talk. We are called to walk in
holiness. We are called to walk.
It's a journey. You won't arrive at holiness
until the other side of glory in terms of complete.
Holiness okay, I'm going to just use 2 minutes to talk about
something. A cultural comment if you would
give me the leeway, you know the one of the sayings of the
Vineyard Church is this come as you are, but don't stay as you
are. Do you know the pressure to
remove the don't stay as you are.
You know the amount of conversations even with invented
pastors of is that still quote relevant?
Well, how can you be inclusive if you say don't stay as you
are? I'd say this How can you preach
the gospel of Jesus Christ without saying it?
I mean, if you want to scrub out what Jesus did on the cross,
then be my guest. If you want people to come in
and come as they are, but don't change.
And I don't know what I'm preaching because I'm told not
to be conformed any longer to the pattern of this world, but
be transformed. I mean, if you want to be
justified, which is justified being on the cross, and you want
to be right with God, but you want to, don't want to be
sanctified, then what am I preaching?
Come as you are, but please don't stay as you are.
And can I just say I don't think we do want to stay as we are?
In a way, I certainly don't. I had a shocking day yesterday.
I was really losing my temper a lot.
If I see you talking to Steph later, she's not going to answer
the question, what was Mark like yesterday?
Right. Or maybe she will, I don't know.
Oh, thank you, darling. Being authentically you, let me
clarify, is authentically you without sin.
Being authentic isn't devoid of God because you're in bondage to
sin and you'll never be authentically you.
Authentically you. Because we love that word
authentic, don't we? Oh, I don't want to change
because I'm authentically me. I think you might have misused
the word authentic. If you want to be how God
intended you and created you to be, then you better walk in
holiness because you won't be your true self unless you walk
in a holy walk. And the good news is this, that
we don't have to stay where we are and it's the process.
Here we go. Here's the good news, people,
because at this point you might be feeling worn out, maybe
feeling a bit battered and feel like, well, Mark, I've tried
probably my best, thank you very much.
Nothing you're telling me is new.
But I want to say this. It is the Spirit of God in us
who changes us from the inside out.
Holiness is not a manufactured work devoid of inward change.
Holiness isn't a good day of being good.
Holiness is inclined in your heart towards Christ and saying,
would you conform me to you, Jesus?
That is holiness. Holiness is a fruit of our
hearts. Are you hearing me?
It is not a manufactured work of our quote good deeds.
I mean, by the way, what's the first commandment?
Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your mind
and with all your soul. You can have good deeds and it
means nothing in terms of righteousness because our hearts
are not inclined to his. And so as we incline our hearts
to His and as we say, Lord, would you change me?
Thank you that you've justified me.
Thank you that when God looks at me, he looks at me as holy.
But now, Lord, you're calling me to walk in that holiness.
That's why it says work. Work out your salvation, not
work for your salvation. Big difference.
Don't work for it because you can't.
You want to lean into a salvation of works?
Then I'm sorry to say that is not the gospel.
The good news of Jesus Christ is that he did all the good works.
The good news of Jesus Christ is that all of his good works are
given unto us. The good news is that his purity
is given unto us so that when God looks at us, we can enter
the throne room of God to a holy God and have confidence.
That is the good news. But we are called to work out
that salvation, to walk into that holiness, to make a
decision to be other than to be set apart from the world, to
leave the multitude and consecrate ourselves.
Roman says this do not be conformed any longer to the
pattern of this world. But what be transformed by what?
The renewing of your mind. Then you can test and approve
God's pleasing and perfect will. That is your act of worship to
God. If you want to walk holiness,
don't strap yourselves up on the altar and die to yourself, man,
We don't hear preaching like this, do we?
And I'm not bigging myself up. Friends, please don't hear that.
I just feel the unction of the Holy Spirit on me to say this is
a message that we need to recapture, which is the holiness
of God and our obligation to walk in that.
Because in that is where there is blessing, and in that is
where we worship in spirit and in truth, right?
Why don't we invite the band up as I as I give you some
practical tips to do what I to walk in Eyeliness.
It's actually not that difficult.
It just means you need to make a decision and I want to give you
5 things. All right.
I'm just going to touch on these very briefly #1 make a choice to
surrender your will to his and to be with Jesus.
And it all starts with last week being with Jesus.
That is our call, our number one call to be with Jesus.
Make a decision to surrender your will to his and be with
Jesus. #2 Make a decision to take sin seriously #3 Listen to
the conviction of the Holy Spirit.
Don't do that. Don't say that.
Well done. Don't watch that.
Well done. Don't drink that extra.
Well done, #4. Repent.
I love what someone said about repentant, and I used it last
week. It's not my way, but your way.
I love that. I can't take any credit for that
whatsoever. Repentance is saying not my way,
but I'm going to turn towards your way.
That's repentance. It's not complicated.
It's making the decision to turn away from that which is not God
and turning towards that which is that is, what am I just
doing? I am separating myself.
I'm cutting myself off from that which is not God.
I'm walking towards your way, not my way, but your way.
And #5 set your eyes on being like Jesus and yielding yourself
to his spirit to change us from the inside out.
Those are the five steps or the they're not necessarily
sequential, but I hope that's helpful for you.
You can take that away and say Lord on your knees tonight or
when you get home and say Lord, I wanna walk in homeliness.
I wanna experience you and I'm gonna do these five things.
I'm. I'm making a choice now.
Early spirit, in fact. Let's stand church.