THE GARDEN PATCH OF HOLINESS

They will be like a well watered garden - Jeremiah 31:12

A small garden patch in our back yard is waiting for the arrival of spring.  We will plant an abundance of glorious  flowers and possibly some select herbs for cooking.  The patch looks empty and dormant now, but it contains this amazing potential for new life under the right conditions.  With some preparation, the patch will flourish with amazing results. Glory to God! The same may be said of the garden of social holiness and the excitement of growing saints.  

Growing saints is not an inaccessible idea when seen through an ecological lense.  Saints, holy people, are grown.  The process is organic.  God uses the fertile, nutrient rich soil of sanctified, holy others in whose company the seed of an individual’s life in the Spirit is entrusted.  God then produces the fruit of faithfulness and obedience.  Jesus made it clear when he declared, "If you remain in me and I remain in you, you will bear much fruit" (John 15:5).  In short, God establishes garden patches where in the company of others new life in Christ sprouts up. It is nurtured into maturity and fulfills God’s intended plan of sanctification.  He trusts the patch to us all to the glory of the Father.  The garden patch of social holiness is his way of growing saints.  Thanks be to God!

They will be like a well watered garden . . .

Jeremiah 31:12

REFLECTIONS ON HOLINESS

  I've been doing much reflection on holiness.  It is at the very heart of my Wesleyan faith tradition as a Salvationist (The Salvation Army is my church home).  This past week as I've been putting my thoughts into writing another book, I wrote the following: Not many years ago there lived a revered retired professor of New Testament at Asbury Theological Seminary, George Allen Turner.  I came to know Dr. Turner in the last years of his life.  In his book, The More Excellent Way, he wrote “While the terms associated with “holiness” stress the contrast between Jehova and humanity, bridged by an act of cleansing, those associated with ‘perfection” point to humanity’s kinship with God and the possibility of fellowship.”  That one sentence was pregnant with the idea of the social-relational nature of holiness.  The ideas of cleansing and perfection speak to a loving, restorative work of God in a person’s life beginning at the cross and going on beyond the resurrection.  Cleansing suggests purity of heart and life making possible holy love and intimacy with God. Kinship with God suggests the hallowed, social setting of family; our adoption and inclusion into an ongoing, close knit, intimate relationship with the three persons of the Godhead. Finally, the possibility of fellowship with God implies an ongoing, interactive relationship with the our Father, and the Son by the Spirit.  Holiness is social, relational, personal and intimate with God. 

     Diane Leclerc* puts it this way.  “Only God is holy.  Yet God commands, ‘Be holy as I am holy.’”  Leclerc makes the case for “derived holiness” in which humanity derives holiness from its relationship with God and the quality of that relationship. It involves imparted righteousness dependent on a social, relational connection with God.  Such a relationship makes possible God’s multiple acts of grace including forgiveness of sin, reconciliation with God, initial sanctification, continuing (synergistic) sanctification, the progressive restoration to the likeness of Christ, and ultimately entire sanctification all to the glory of God. 

Sanctification ultimately is God’s cleansing that leaves a pure heart, makes possible inward holiness and outward righteousness, and continuing growth in grace.  Holiness is reflected in profound holy love of God and a profound love for others (Mark 12:30-31). It reflects an inner moral transformation that is expressed in holy love made possible not only to some, but to all.  Most simply defined, holiness is Christlikeness, the unfolding of Christ’s own character in the life of the believer who devotes time and attention to remaining in a sanctified context.  That context is God’s presence and the presence of holy others making possible spiritual growth, formation, and Christlikeness, and ultimately an infilling of the Spirit and a cleansing of the heart, soul, and mind.

Create in me a pure heart, O God, 

and renew a right spirit in me . . .

Psalm 51:10

*Diane Leclerc, Discovering Christian Holiness: The heart of Wesleyan holiness theology, (Kansas City, Beacon Hill Press), 2010.

DISTRACTIONS OLD AND NEW

Just the other day I was having breakfast with my son-in-law and grandson at a Lexington,Kentucky Cracker Barrel.

 On our table was one of those old games with fourteen golf tees and fifteen holes in a triangular piece of wood.  To achieve the highest score, you had to eliminate thirteen tees but one. Its like playing checkers.  I gave up after two tries, but a moment of insight came to me as I looked around the restaurant.  The game is a great distraction and it interferes with conversation.  It takes you away from meaningful interaction with the other people at the table.  Then I realized that’s exacting what texting does!  Both short circuit the potential enrichment of a meal together and frankly the distraction diminishes the opportunities to affirm and learn from the other(s) at the table.

Remembering the post resurrection story of the disciples on the road to Emmaus and the dinner scene, can you imagine one of them playing the golf tees and holes game or texting at the table instead of watching Jesus break the bread and reveal his identity as Lord and Saviour?  Too often we get distracted and miss sacred moments in the company of others who are means through whom God wishes to share his grace and reveal his identity.  Or we are his means of grace, his human agents who are too busy with the trivial to be of any divine good.  Whether it is an old or new form of distraction, stay attentive.  Remain alert.  We become the company we keep and/or the channel God is counting on.

YOU ARE HOLY - MAKE US HOLY!

In a few weeks I will be with forty or so Salvation Army officers for a whole day in a seminar entitled "Holiness Clarity."  In preparation, I took another look at Dr. Timothy Tennent's book entitled The Call To Holiness and rediscovered the lovely hymn written by his musically poetic wife, Julie Tennent.  Every line is worth pondering.  Here it is:

Make Us Holy

1 Peter 1:3-2:3

You are holy – make us holy! Let our lives reflect Your name;

By Your Spirit’s pow’r within us, be a sanctifying flame.

Not the work of human striving, but a change from deep within:

Redirect our core affections; free us from the bonds of sin.

You are holy – so our holy lives a shining light must be,

Purged from empty selfish living, filled with love that comes from thee.

Purged again of seed eternal, through the living Word of God;

Growing up in our salvation, tasting that the Lord is good.

You are holy, and You call us to be pure in all we do,

As your character is holy, so we would be holy, too.

Purified by true obedience, loving others from the heart;

Serving in the world with power which you Spirit does impart.

You are holy – may your church embody perfect holiness;

May the love of Christ compel us to bring forth true righteousness.

Let the strains of New Creation echo through your church today;

Sounding for the consummation of that glorious Holy Day.

-  Julie Tennent

May be sung to the tune of Beecher (“Love Divine, All love excelling)

or Ode To Joy (“Joyful, Joyful, We Adore Thee”)

Published in The Call to Holiness: Pursuing the Heart of God for the Love of the World,

by Timothy Tennent, (Franklin, Tennessee), Seedbed Publishing, 2014, pp. 73-74.

GETTING TO WHERE YOU DESIRE

For years I’ve been an avid fan of University of Kentucky basketball.  I am a UK alumnus (following my Asbury University days) and I derive great enjoyment watching the UK Wildcats each season.  But it is only recently that I’ve paid attention to how the coach, John Calipari, gets his job done.   Two principles resonate with truth in his coaching:  (1) His highly talented, highly sought after recruits are not perfect.  They are wonderfully talented, even gifted athletically, but not perfect in individual play nor as a team.  However, in the words of Coach Calipari, they are “being perfected.”  (2) Being perfected means “continuous improvement.”   It’s not a matter of flipping the switch and BAM, perfection.  It’s all about hard work on their part following the lead of the coach, listening to him, making adjustments, faithfully striving for improvement every day, continuously.  When he does his part as coach and they do their part, there is continuous improvement.  Being perfected requires it.  Calipari’s principles have powerful implications for so many areas of life, but never more than in a person’s spiritual journey.

It is a cliché, but life is a journey, a spiritual one. Under the coaching of the Spirit, we can experience continuous maturity and growth into the likeness of Christ. God is steadfastly faithful.  He will do his part, but asks us to do ours.  By the work of the Holy Spirit,  God can continually shape a life into the likeness of Christ, but only if we do our part is there continuous improvement. 

But there's more.  Being perfected and continuous improvement were principles that Jesus taught and practiced with his disciples as he coached them, and yet as they were being formed, there came a day when they were filled to the measure of the fulness of  God at Pentecost.  If the likeness of Christ and the fulness of God is what we hope for, we can be continually on our way to our heart's desire being perfected in holiness and righteousness.  Thanks be to God!

ELECTING HOLINESS AND HUMILITY

While the nation battles in the primaries to elect a new president, is anyone one looking beyond competence for leadership characterized by holiness and therefore humility?

Holiness directly implies that the president would be cleansed from all sin and endued with those virtues that were also in Christ Jesus.  Is that too much to ask? Holiness also implies that the president would be and remain so renewed daily in the Spirit in his or her heart and mind as to be “perfect as our Father in heaven is perfect.”

Does that sound impossible?  It sounds improbable, but not impossible.  Perfection in holiness is not being perfect in skill and abilities, understanding, knowledge, or health, but rather to be perfect in love for God and for all others, mature in faith, hope, and charity.  It is a perfection that is grounded in humility that understands that as a nation we are not sufficient in ourselves to solve our problems and achieve our hopes and desires.  Without the Spirit of God, we can do nothing.  Such humility is a right judgment of self by a president, an awareness of one’s sinfulness and helplessness, and of human nature extending beyond self to the culture.  Holiness in a leader at the level of the nation’s president implies humility that disregards honor of self because he or she knows him/herself and neither desires nor values the applause he or she knows they don’t deserve.  It implies a profound love for God and all others, and it implies that the true focus of all honor and glory is God who is able to raise up servants to do his good pleasure for the nation and the world.

Is that too much to ask?