Continuing my 2020 Lenten Journey- with personal thoughts and commentary by Martha McDuff Wiggins on the book “Lord I Want To Know You” by Kay Arthur.
Day 32
Jehovah-mekoddishkem, The LORD Who Sanctifies You
By definition the word sanctify means:
—to set apart to a sacred purpose or to religious use. (Think Consecrate)
Or
—to free from sin. (Think Purify)
To be holy is to be perfect in goodness and righteousness. (Think Saintly)
In Leviticus 20:7-8, The LORD commands, “You shall consecrate yourselves therefore and be holy, for I am the LORD your God. And you shall keep my statues and practice them; I am the LORD who sanctifies you.”
Do you even think it is possible for you to be sanctified? If not possible, why would God bother to call us each to holiness? And, why would He want to sanctify us, for we are weak, and we live in wretched sinfulness.
In the Study book we read that the purpose of our redemption is to make us holy. Read that again… The purpose of our being redeemed by Christ on The Cross is to make us holy. And why do we need to be holy? Isn’t being a good person good enough?
The LORD has said holiness is not an option. And, Jehovah-mekoddishkem, The LORD Who Sanctifies You, wants you to be sanctified for one very important reason, because only holiness can abide in the presence of the Most Holy God. There IT is. You might want to read that again also. For, if we hope one day to see the LORD, to be welcomed into Eternal Life with Him, we must be made holy. A pretty tall order for most of us, right?
But I am Saved, you say; because I believe, because I have accepted Him, I am Saved.
God most definitely wants you to accept His Son as your LORD and Savior, and commit your life to Him. That is the necessary first step to being made holy. With that acceptance, though, comes a transformation (Think Makeover) of the heart and soul. When we accept Him and commit to Him we awaken a craving within to be more like Him. When we welcome His in dwelling Spirit, we change, not only on the inside, but outwardly too. We walk differently (Think With Purpose), we speak differently(Think With Intent), we even look differently (Think Healthy Glow), because we are different. We have become a new being (Think Born Again) through Jehovah-mekoddishkem, The LORD Who Sanctifies You. Remember, we are created in His image and likeness to reflect His glory!
When God calls us to be holy, He does so by laying out a path to holiness. We don’t become holy, we are made holy by Jehovah-mekoddishkem, The LORD Who Sanctifies You.
In Exodus 31, upon Mount Sinai, the LORD spoke to Moses: “…speak to the sons of Israel, saying, ‘You shall surely observe My sabbaths; for this is a sign between Me and you throughout your generations, that you may know that I am the LORD who sanctifies you. Therefore you are to observe the sabbath, for it is holy to you’… ‘It is a sign between Me and the sons of Israel forever: for in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, but on the seventh day He ceased from labor, and was refreshed.’ “
.After thus speaking, He gave Moses the two tablets of stone, written on by the finger of God. On those two tablets were The Ten Commandments, our path to holiness, to His sanctification of us. He stresses that we are to keep holy the sabbath, and that the whole purpose of the sabbath is to know (Think Keep Us Aware) that He is the LORD who sanctifies us.
If holiness then is not an option, if it is part of His perpetual covenant with His people, with Israel, and with His Church, we can say we are Saved, but to truly be Saved we must walk the path of holiness laid out in His Commandments.
The path to holiness is never a straight line. We try, we falter, we sin. We repent, we confess, we seek forgiveness, and we begin again; and through His mercifulness, again and again. Each and every time we turn back to Him, He welcomes us with wide open loving arms. Hopefully you are beginning to see that you cannot become holy on your own. You are made holy. You are sanctified.
How then does He sanctify us?
“By this will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. And every priest stands daily ministering and offering time after time the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins; but He, having offered one sacrifice for sins for all time, SAT DOWN AT THE RIGHT HAND OF GOD, waiting from that time onward UNTIL HIS ENEMIES BE MADE A FOOTSTOOL FOR HIS FEET. For by one offering He has perfected for all time those who are sanctified (Hebrews 10:10-14).
So, by His offering of Himself we are redeemed and sanctified through His Death, through His Body and Blood.
Just to recap: The LORD calls us to be holy; a necessity so that we may return to Him in Heaven at the end of our earthly life. It is in the Book of Leviticus that the LORD maps out for the people of Israel the path they (we) must follow to be made holy, so that they may be sanctified. Knowing full well our humanity, and how we will falter, he provides redemption, through His Son, Jesus Christ. Without redemption there will be no sanctification. Without sanctification there will be no Glorification. And, remember, He created us to glorify Him!
He is Jehovah-mekoddishkem, The LORD Who Sanctifies You. His is the name you call upon in order to be Redeemed, to be truly Saved.
Mental action to facilitate your Lenten Journey:
God has sent you a personal invitation to be Saved. It requires an RSVP. How will you respond?
🙏🏻💖
Further action if so inclined:
Read the two Scriptures below:
—Luke 22:14-20 When the hour came, he took his place at the table, and the apostles with him. He said to them, “I have eagerly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer; for I tell you, I will not eat it until it is fulfilled in the kingdom of God.” Then he took a cup, and after giving thanks he said, “Take this and divide it among yourselves; for I tell you that from now on I will not drink of the fruit of the vine until the kingdom of God comes.” Then he took a loaf of bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and gave it to them, saying, “This is my body, which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” And he did the same with the cup after supper, saying, “This cup that is poured out for you is the new covenant in my blood.
—1st Corinthians 11:27 Whoever, therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be answerable for the body and blood of the Lord.
Reflect on:
The day after this Last Supper, He was beaten and whipped to within inches of His life. They needed him alive enough to carry His own crucifixion cross up to Mount Calvary. They spat on Him and crowned Him with a halo of thorns as a spectacle to be seen by His followers. He faltered and fell to the ground three times because He was weak and the Cross was heavy. The Cross was heavy with the weight of every sin you and I have ever committed or will commit in the future; heavy with the weight of every sin ever committed since the first original sin by Adam and Eve. They drove nails into His Hands and Feet and then raised Him up to hang there on that cross of our sins unto His death. He died, was buried, and on the third day He was Resurrected to Life and Risen into Heaven. By His Death, by His Blood, we are Redeemed.
We all falter. It’s what we do after we falter that helps us travel the path of holiness. Repent, Confess, Accept Forgiveness, and be made holy so that you may be redeemed and then sanctified by Jehovah-mekoddishkem, The LORD Who Sanctifies You.
🙏🏻😇
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