 Okay, recording is on. Let's pray together, then we will get this class on Holiness. PC 209 started. Could somebody please lead us in prayer together? Okay, can I pray for Sir? Go ahead, Lysha, go ahead. I hope you find that once again, we praise you and thank you for the gift of life that you have granted us this morning. Father, we pray, commit ourselves into your mighty hands again. We pray for guidance, we pray for direction, we pray for understanding in the mighty name of Jesus. Father, do you continue to bless us through past ashes that our lives may be pleasing unto you as we strive to live in holiness? In Jesus' mighty name we pray. Amen. Amen. Thank you. All right, Simran, I see your question. Can I pray in Hindi? Yeah, maybe I guess it's okay, but there will be people who will not understand Hindi. So, somebody will have to interpret. But anyway, let's see, maybe you can do it. All right, so welcome to BC 209. We started this class last week. We had one lecture. It was maybe kind of given introduction and overview of what we are going to journey through in this course on holiness. So, basically, just to quickly review, we have three sections. The first is really to get a revelation of the holiness of God and to see God's desire in having His holiness reproduced in us. That's the first part. The second part we're going to talk about is repentance as a process of recovery and restoration and just to emphasize that as we seek to pursue God in our journey into holiness, our repentance is very important. And if you don't take that seriously or if you don't do it rightly in our lives, it's going to short circuit. Basically, it's going to keep us from entering into that place of our life of holiness before God. So, repentance is very important in this journey. And the reason we are highlighting that in section two is because perhaps in the church today, repentance is almost, at least in some circles, it's almost a bad word. And I'm not trying to put anybody down, but if you go back to the 1950s, there was this... Dr. Robert Shuler was founded the Crystal Cathedral in California, and he brought in, in one sense, a feel-good Christianity. Now, he was highly successful. He probably was one of the leading voices in those days. The pioneer, so to speak, of this whole feel-good Christianity, meaning his preaching was more on trying to build up people's self-esteem and, you know, you're really good and so on. And there was hardly any mention of sin and repentance. But he was extremely successful. And, you know, we're going back in the 1950s, and he had a global ministry. And at one point, his TV program, The Hour of Power, was like the most highly-watched Christian program because it really made people feel good. It was, you know, a feel-good message. But it was Christian. Can you repeat his name? Okay. Dr. Robert Shuler. I don't want to put him down. But I'm just mentioning where this thing all started in. But he was very successful in the ministry and very influential. A lot of people were listening to him and so on. But this was the downside of the whole approach to that kind of preaching. And from then, you know, from then on, there's been a lot of offshoot, meaning from then after that, subsequently came Willow Creek, which was very secret sensitive. And then from that came all the other modern movements who were influenced in some way, directly or indirectly by that approach to ministry to the point where today, you know, in some circles, not all, but in some circles, repentance is almost unused. It's a word that's hardly mentioned. But repentance is so integral to not only us getting saved, but to our ongoing Christian journey. We will see that in scripture. And so we want to, in that section two, we want to talk about that. And then we talk in section three, is how to live the overcoming life as believers. So God's called us to a life of holiness, but he's also equipped and empowered us to enter in practically into a life of holiness. And that's the third section to live as an overcome. Right? So let's get in now to chapter one in this first section where our goal is to get a revelation of the holiness of God and what that means, right? And we're trying to do our best to communicate in words something that is very, very awesome, very, very majestic and something that, you know, even our minds are, you know, it's so hard to fully understand and comprehend, but let's do our best, right? Let's do our best to try to communicate in words, you know, an understanding of the holiness of God. So the revelation of a holy God. So in this chapter, we're just zeroing in on the fact that God is holy and what does that mean to us? Psalm 99 verses five and nine, some says exalt the Lord our God and worship at His footstool. He is holy. Verse nine, exalt the Lord our God and worship at His holy hill for the Lord our God is holy. So the call to worship, the call to exalt God happens in this place of recognition of Him being a holy God. He is holy. So let's think about that. Let's, you know, just meditate on that. We know God is love. So, you know, we feel loved, yes, secure in His love. And He also calls us to walk in love. We know God is good. So we believe that He's good to us. He's called us to walk in goodness or mercy, kindness towards others. We believe God is almighty. Therefore, we expect Him and believe Him to do powerful things in our lives. And we expect His power to be released through us to bless others. We similarly know God is wise, all knowing. So we look to Him for wisdom and we rest in the fact that in His wisdom He's working things out in our lives. And then we also seek to help others through His wisdom. Similarly, God is healer. So we trust Him to heal us. We also trust Him or pray for His healing for other people. So there are many aspects of God that we relate to. You know, we get a revelation of that and then we relate to it. We worship Him. We desire that to be in us. We desire that to be expressed through us. So in all of this, God is holy. And so we must desire for a revelation of His holiness. But this revelation of His holiness is not purely an intellectual academic thing. It's a revelation of the Holy Spirit. That means the Holy Spirit has to open our eyes to understand the holiness of God. In Ephesians 1 and verse 17, and we are familiar with this verse of scripture where Paul is praying for the believers and Ephesians. He's asking them, asking for them, asking the Lord to give them the spirit of wisdom and revelation so that they can know Him in the knowledge of Him. So for us, how are we going to know God? How are we going to know the holiness of God? Which is the focus in this right now. How are we going to know the holiness of God? Get a glimpse of it and understanding of it. How are we going to do it? It's going to come as the Holy Spirit gives us the wisdom and revelation. So the revelation of God, the holiness of God more specifically, is going to be given to us by the Holy Spirit Himself. He's going to open our understanding to know God in His holiness. So we are going to be yielded and open to the Holy Spirit doing this to us. Now, as the revelation of God comes to our hearts, there is a response towards that, towards that revelation. As we say, God, this is who you are, you're holy. But then we also understand that He invites us to have that nature reproduced in us and revealed through us. So it's not only, it doesn't stop with us knowing God as a holy God. We receive revelation, then we respond to it. And then we also yield because He says that He wants His holiness to be in us and to be revealed through us. It's not just, it doesn't stop with revelation. It goes beyond that to seeing His nature revealed and expressed through us. So a correct revelation of God's nature will get the right response from us. So that His nature can be reproduced and revealed in us. Now, why do we emphasize correct revelation? Because sometimes if we are misinformed or wrongly informed about God, then our response would be wrong. And if you're trying to relate to God in a way that He is not, and then you will not have His nature reproduced in us. Example, if we are presented with a very frivolous God, you can do what you want, God doesn't matter. God doesn't care. Then what our response to God be? Our response to God will be very frivolous. So you have preachers who will swear and curse and all those things. Usually you're talking about preachers, I'm talking about preachers of the gospel. They don't mind using filthy language because they think it's okay. Now that's their revelation of God. But what kind of a response has it brought from them? They're very, very, very frivolous in their life. And so people around them, that means their congregation and members also are like that. And then eventually what is reproduced? Not the true nature of God, but something that's actually an aberration of who God really is. Now I'm not making this up. This is happening in the church. Why? Because it all starts here. There's a misrepresentation of God, a wrong revelation of God's nature. Where somehow the holiness of God has been so diluted or so dispensed away with that the response has been so light. Nobody cares about what language you use and what you do. And ultimately his nature, his pure nature, his actual true nature is not reproduced in us and not revealed in us. People see something different because of an incorrect revelation. But somebody read Proverbs 9 and verse 10 for us, please. Fear of the Lord is the beginning of the wisdom and the knowledge of the Holy One is understanding. Thank you. Now, in the way most Psalms and Proverbs are written, it's very interesting that this is something to keep in mind the way poetry or Proverbs are written. The same truth is repeated in two parts, but in different ways. So really, you've got a sentence here, but the same truth is repeated twice. Okay, now there's a technical word for it, but I don't remember it often. Okay, so the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. The same truth is repeated again. The knowledge of the Holy One is understanding. So you can actually put them as parallel statements. The fear of the Lord, what is it? It is the knowledge of the Holy. The fear of the Lord, what are we talking about? We're talking about knowing the Holy One. So our reverence for God, really, is birthed out of a revelation of His holiness. Why is there no fear of the Lord? Because there is no knowledge of the Holy One. For us to walk in the reverence that God deserves, we must know Him as the Holy One. We need a revelation of His holiness. And interestingly, in this place of reverence and in this place of knowing God in His holiness, knowing the One who is holy, in this place the wisdom and understanding begins. That means we're talking about true wisdom and true understanding begins in this place of reverence for God, where there is the knowledge of the Holy One. So think about it. The fear of God, the reverence for God, is birthed out of a revelation or a knowledge of the Holy One, knowing God in His holiness. And it's in that place true wisdom and understanding begins. And so we could say that in our knowing God and knowing the facets of God, we must not ignore knowing Him as the Holy One. Like we said, we know Him as the God of love, the God of mercy, the God of compassion, the God of heals, the God of power. We know God in all of these. But it's bringing us to this place of saying, when we know God as the Holy One, that's where reverence for God begins, the fear of God. Now, I just made this statement in passing, something to think about, that sometimes our theology, that means the things we preach and say about God can actually misrepresent God to us. Sometimes. I'm not saying all the time, but sometimes. Just think about it. I don't want to beat on this too hard, but sometimes, you know, what happens or what would happen if what we are preaching and teaching about God is actually misrepresenting God to people. So they end up with a wrong idea about God. You know, they have the wrong ideas and notions and pictures about God that are really not true. And this could, I'm not saying always, but this could create idols because it's taking the place of the real God. You know, could create idols in the minds of people. They have a wrong picture of God. They think God is like this, but he's not like that. And so we have to be careful. There's just a side note, something to think about as we talk about the holiness of God. So in as much as we talk about the goodness of God, the love of God and every other facet of God, we must not neglect to talk to people about a holy God, the holy one. Otherwise they may end up with an incomplete or a wrong idea about God. But we need to talk about him as the holy one. Let's just go forward a little bit more and then I will take up questions. I think somebody has a question. Could somebody read for us? Isaiah chapter six was one to eight. And here we want to just focus in a little bit on one man. In this case, Isaiah encountering the holiness of God. What happened? What actually happens? And this is a very beautiful passage. Many of us may have read it, where Isaiah encounters the holy God. What happens? So we just want to kind of look at that and draw some insights from it. Could somebody read Isaiah chapter six? What is one to eight for us, please? Shall I read it, sir? Go ahead, please. In the Isaiah six, one to eight, in the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lifted up, and the train of his robe filled the temple. Above stood Seraphim. Each one had six wings. With two he had, he covered his face, with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. And one cried to another and said, Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts. The whole earth is full of his glory. And the post of the door was shaken by the voice of him who cried out and the house was filled with smoke. So I said, war to me, oh is me for I am undone. Because I am man of unclean lips and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts. Then one of the Seraphim flew to me, having in his hand a live call which he had taken with the tongs from the altar. And he touched my mouth with it and said, behold, this has touched your lips. Your iniquity is taken away and your sin purged. Also I heard the voice of the Lord saying, whom shall I send and who will go for us? Then I said, here am I, send me. Thank you. Thank you. So let's just look at this passage and look at Isaiah's encounter with the Holy God. So he sees God as sovereign. So there are two things he sees here. He sees God as sovereign. Adonai, he says. And he also sees God as Lord. That's Jehovah, the Covenant God. He's seeing God sitting on the throne and there are these angelic beings. And how are they worshipping God? They're crying out, holy, holy, holy. Holy is the Lord of hosts. So the one attribute, and we will talk about this again a little later. The one attribute of God that seems to be so, that is mentioned every time we see this vision of heaven, whether it's Isaiah or John, is that God is being worshipped with these words, holy, holy, holy. You know, we could have had angelic beings saying, love, love, love, or wise, wise, wise, or power, power, power, whatever. You know, any other attribute of God. I'm not saying those attributes of God are not important, but it's very outstanding or notable that when people have a vision of God, whether Isaiah or John, and they're seeing angelic beings worship God, they are hearing this attribute of God being mentioned in worship. Holy, holy, holy. And so you can imagine, you know, Isaiah looking at God, he's seeing the sovereign God, he's seeing this great God, Jehovah, God was in charge of all the hosts. And what's he hearing? He's hearing the angelic being saying, holy, holy, holy. God is perfect, God is righteous, God is pure. I mean, this is an environment and a place of holiness. And he's seeing the whole place filled with the glory of God, and his reaction is, I am undone. You know, it's, I am undone. And the word undone there is kind of interesting when you look at it. It means I have nothing more to say, and I'm as good as dead. I can't do anything more. It's like, God, I can't utter a single word. I'm undone, nothing to say. And I am as good as dead. So our response when we get a revelation of the Holy God, or God's holiness is God, nothing more to say, nothing I can do. I'm undone. In that encounter, it is God who imparts holiness to Isaiah. So you have the Seraphim, you have the angelic being who goes and touches, brings the life cold and touches Isaiah's mouth. It's an act of God. God is doing this, saying, look, I'm taking away all your unfitness, everything that makes you unfit to be in my presence. I'm taking it away. In my words, I'm giving you the quality, and I'm giving you the ability to be in my presence. And we will expand on this later. That really our ability to be in God's presence is something he endows us with. He gives to us. And then from that comes the commission, the call to serve God, which is such a powerful thought, there are two things I want to mention here, is this holy God invites us to be his representatives or to partner with him in ministry, in his work, which is an awesome thing, that the holy God would call us to be his partners. But he makes us fit for that. He gets us ready. He does the work. The second thought, and I don't want to make it a rule, but I think it's very important is, our call to ministry must be birthed from this revelation of God's holiness, that we must know who is the one who's called us and sent us. He is the holy Lord. He is the one who called us, and he is the one who sent us. We should never forget it. And we are representing such a holy God. He's really himself made us fit and invited us to represent him. And so we, as his ministers, should walk with that sense of I'm representing a holy God. And that's why when you follow the book of Isaiah, when you go through the book of Isaiah, you find that many times, 27 times, he's talking about God, whom he's preaching for, and he's referring to God as the holy one. He says, you know, hey, the holy one says this. He says, you know, the holy one's speaking. The holy one is speaking to you. That means he hasn't forgotten who called him, the God whom he saw being worshiped as. Holy, holy, holy. And so in his messages to the people, he's referring to this holy God. And so we should never forget that. The revelation of God as ministers of God, Isaiah is a great example for us to look at. Now, what we have said is that normally does God want us to have a revelation of his holiness because that's where reverence for God begins. But he also wants his nature to be reproduced in us. I will share this thought and then let's pause and take up questions. So just as, you know, God says, the Bible says, especially in John, God is love, so we walk in love. God is holy, so he wants us to be holy. And this is true in both the Testaments, old and new. Sometimes we think, you know, holiness is an Old Testament concept, New Testament. We are under grace so we can do what we want. Well, it is true. The Old Testament is a law and the New Testament is grace. That distinction is there. But in both Testaments, it's very clear. God says the same thing. He says, you be holy because I am holy. So God has not changed. And what he calls us to has not changed. So he wants his holiness to be reproduced in us. So that's what we're going to journey into. That is to receive a revelation of his holiness. And from there, let everything flow. Our reverence for God coming out of that place of holiness. Our ministry to God coming out of that place of holiness. So that when we communicate like Isaiah, people will also get a sense of the Holy One. So the question I want to just put forward before us is that when we communicate God to people, are they able to get a sense that the God whom we are representing is the Holy One? Or does it leave them with a sense that this God is everything else but holy? In Isaiah's case, it's very clear. His ministry began with this encounter with the Holy One. But you can see throughout his preaching, people got an understanding of God as the Holy One. So let me pause here and we will take up questions before we move forward. All right. Okay, I see two hands. Go ahead, Divya, and then go ahead and give me the questions, please. Thank you, Pastor. I was thinking of Isaiah's encounter as well as when we come to the New Testament, when Peter has this sudden realization of his sinfulness when he stands before Jesus Christ. So which tells that when we have that real encounter, we get a realization of our own sinfulness. So I'm thinking it's because we understand how holy God is. So when we discussed that verse, Proverbs 9, chapter 9 verse 10, where it says the knowledge of God is understanding. So this knowledge is it on an intellectual level, we can know God, but there is a knowledge that is experiential. So what is that knowledge representing? And also, if it is experiential, how can a person have that experiential knowledge? Because especially when you share the gospel to another person, maybe they can understand it intellectually, or may not even understand intellectually. But how can we help in that? Thank you. Yeah, so I think just what we said before that about receiving a revelation. So Paul prayed just before that in Ephesians 1.17 when we just read. He says, I'm praying that God will give you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of him. So that knowing him should come as a revelation. That means it's an unveiling to our spirit. So there is an intellectual thing. You know, okay, I know God is holy. Everybody knows. Everybody says God is holy. God has to be holy. If he's not a holy God, something wrong. That's an intellectual thing. We all agree intellectually on that. Or at least most of us would agree on that. But usually an intellectual understanding doesn't transform, doesn't bring transformation. But a revelation, the Bible emphasizes, the New Testament emphasizes revelation, meaning it's an unveiling to the heart of man. So he's talking about the knowledge that comes through revelation. It comes through an unveiling to the heart of man. That kind of knowledge is transformative. It's what changes the person. That's the experience. That means they are so gripped by that revelation that life changes. So that's the knowledge we're talking about. Also we just used the term revelation knowledge based on Ephesians 1.17. That when we get a revelation of the Holy One, that's where the fear of the Lord begins, reverence begins. And this is something the Holy Spirit does so that I can't force reverence, the fear of God into somebody. I can't. We can try to preach about hell and the fire and this and that and hope that they'll get the fear of God in them. Usually it doesn't happen. But when the Holy Spirit brings a revelation, an unveiling to the heart of the holiness of God, then immediately the fear of God comes. So really we're talking about revelation knowledge. Is that okay? Yes, yes. Thank you. Thank you. Maggie, your question, please. Welcome. Thank you, sir. My question is similar to what we asked Ilan. So to add to that, most of the holiness that we've been taught and most of the holiness that is being taught in the Church is based on cultures and what Paul wrote. And most of the time what Paul wrote to churches was he was correcting them but giving them correction on things that we're doing wrong and things that they were not supposed to do. Things like covering overheads, women covering their hair. That was the culture that was there before even Abraham. That was the culture that was there before Christen was born. Things like women sitting one side and separately. So if most of the things we know as holiness today has been influenced by cultures of the world, what can we do to change that? And if people don't, you taught us today that holiness comes from revelation. Knowing who God is, like Paul said, having the knowledge of him. So many believers today don't have that knowledge. So what's the danger facing the Church today and how can we do to change that? Thank you, sir. Interesting question. So there are two sides. Because in many places holiness is an exercise that is happening without the revelation of the Holy One. It has just been framed into a set of do's and don'ts which has been tailor made to the local setting, whatever the custom is. So you do this, you don't do this. If you do this and don't do these things, you're a holy person. So it's been watered down to that. There is really no revelation of God being holy. I better conform to these things so that I will be accepted as a holy person and known as a holy person in this context. But do they really have a revelation of God as a holy God? No. So that is sad because then we have replaced the knowledge of the Holy One with do these things to appear holy to man, whether or not it's of any importance to God. And it's almost like what the Pharisees were doing in Bible times, but it's sad. So what should we do? We should come back to knowing the holiness of God, knowing that God is holy and then understanding how that holiness is expressed in where we live. And you will find that actually in Paul's writings, which we referenced, that his motivation in telling people what to do and what not to do was coming forth from this is who God is and this is how God would want us to relate to people in that situation. So for example, right? And I'm just making one reference. There are so many different scenarios, but one scenario is in Romans 14. He says, you know, if my brother is eating vegetables, and he's referring to those who are new to the faith, and he uses the word, I mean, the Bible in Romans 14, he uses the word, weak and faith. I mean, that means he has a new brother. He's new to the faith. He's still growing and he doesn't know very much. If he's comfortable and let's say, he's a vegetarian, he eats vegetables, but he's new to the faith. Paul says, if my freedom of eating meat, and he says, look, we are free to eat whatever you want, but if my freedom in eating meat is going to cause the weak brother to stumble, that means it's going to get him away from following Christ. Then he says, for his sake, I won't eat. So now it's not about I'm doing, you know, I should never eat meat or I should never, you know, only eat vegetables. It's not about that. It's about something higher. It's about how my conduct is going to help another person. It comes down to that, right? So it's not about do this, do this, don't do this. In that situation, I'd rather help somebody walk close to God rather than do something that's pushing them away from God. So now it's no longer about rules, but it's more about, how do I, you know, my knowledge of the Holy, my knowledge of God, how do I live it out in a way that will draw more people to God rather than push them away from God? So in that in mind, you know, we begin to relate to people in different contexts and so on. Okay. So to answer your question, if we can get people back to just understanding who God is, and then from that place of knowing who God is, you relate to people, you know, whatever the situation might be, whatever thing, you know, you relate to people. And ultimately our goal is, let's help people walk with God, you know, to what will facilitate that, what will help them, what's for their edification, rather than what's going to make me look holy, you know, which is the other group that we talked about. Does that help, Mangi, or give you, give some perspective? Thank you so much, Sir. You did help. Thank you. You're welcome. All right. So we are beginning our journey in getting a revelation of the holiness of God. And what we emphasized today was this revelation is given to us by the Holy Spirit. And this revelation of the Holy One is what creates reverence in our hearts. And then we took a look at Isaiah's encounter with the Holy One and how his whole ministry came out of that encounter. And so we're just challenging ourselves, saying, look, God has been very merciful to us. He's a holy God, but he gave us holiness, made us fit to be in his sight. And he also commissioned us to represent him. And so in all that we do and all that we communicate about God, people should also get an awareness or a recognition that the God whom we serve is a holy God. So if you've been following with me and you've kind of got these main points, key points, we're on track. We're going to pause here. We'll pick this up on Wednesday morning. Any questions before we wrap up? Fine. Let's close. I just invite somebody to please pray with a class and dismiss us. Somebody could pray. Thank you, Lord. Go ahead. Well, Father, we thank you, Lord, for teaching these precious truths this morning and granting us the revelation of your true holiness for the past few years. Lord, whatever we have received this day, let it go deep down into our hearts and spirits so that our lives will be transformed. Lord, we may cleanse ourselves from all the things of the world. We may be sanctified vessels ready for your use, Father. Lord, as we journey through this course, Lord, teach us more and more on the subject of holiness, Lord, so that we may come to the level that you expect from us, Father, as your children and as your ministers are. Bless us, Lord. For teaching us these precious truths to us, we thank you, Lord, for this class. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Amen. Amen. Thank you, everyone. We will meet again tomorrow in our other class. God bless you. Enjoy the rest of your day. See you again. God bless. God bless you, Father. God bless you. God bless everyone.