Holiness of Life

[Thompson, Darryl]

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Ellen G. White Estate, Devotional for March 14
Visit us at http://www.whiteestate.org
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Holiness Of Life

Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man shall see
the Lord. Heb. 12:14.

No one who claims holiness is really holy. Those who are registered as
holy in the books of heaven are not aware of the fact, and are the last
ones to boast of their own goodness.

It is not a conclusive evidence that a man is a Christian because he
manifests spiritual ecstasy under extraordinary circumstances. Holiness
is not rapture: it is an entire surrender of the will to God; it is
living by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God; it is doing
the will of our heavenly Father; it is trusting God in trial, in
darkness as well as in the light; it is walking by faith and not by
sight; it is relying on God with unquestioning confidence, and resting
in His love.

No one can be omnipotent, but all can cleanse themselves from filthiness
of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of the Lord.
God requires every soul to be pure and holy. We have hereditary
tendencies to wrong. This is a part of self that no one need carry
about. It is a weakness of humanity to pet selfishness, because it is a
natural trait of character. But unless all selfishness is put away,
unless self is crucified, we can never be holy as God is holy. There is
in humanity a tendency to suspicious imagining, which circumstances
quicken into lively growth. If this trait is indulged, it spoils the
character and ruins the soul.

God requires moral perfection in all. Those who have been given light
and opportunities should, as God's stewards, aim for perfection, and
never, never lower the standard of righteousness to accommodate
inherited and cultivated tendencies to wrong. Christ took upon Him our
human nature, and lived our life, to show us that we may be like Him. .
. . We ought to be holy even as God is holy; and when we comprehend the
full significance of this statement, and set our heart to do the work of
God, to be holy as He is holy, we shall approach the standard set for
each individual in Christ Jesus. 

>From Devotional: Our Father Cares, pp. 74, 75.