Valley View Church

1 Peter 1:13-16 | Be Who You Were Meant to Be

September 03, 2024 • Valley View Church

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Sunday Morning | September 1, 2024 | John C. Majors | Louisville, KY

In his sermon titled "Be Who You Are Meant to Be," Pastor John delves into 1 Peter 1:13-16, emphasizing the importance of mindset and conduct in shaping our true identity. He begins by discussing the three essential aspects of mindset: preparation, sobriety, and hope. Drawing from Exodus 12:11, Ephesians 6:14, and Luke 12:35, he highlights the need to be mentally prepared for action. Pastor John then discusses the characteristics of a sober mind, quoting Josephus to illustrate the strength that comes from remaining composed under adversity. Finally, he speaks on the hope rooted in the grace of Jesus Christ’s resurrection. Moving to conduct, Pastor John urges us to reject conformity to worldly patterns and instead, imitate the holiness of God as outlined in Leviticus 19:2 and echoed in Revelation 4:8. By focusing on these principles, we can become the people God has called us to be.

You can join us on Sunday mornings at 11 AM for worship. We are located at 8911 3rd Street Road, Louisville KY 40272.

Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery trial when it comes upon you to test you as though something strange were happening to you. But rejoice insofar as you share Christ's sufferings, that you may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed. Well, good morning, Valley View. It's great to be with you today while we continue in our study of First Peter. We've been working through the first chapter of First Peter. We're going to continue in that chapter today. And it was about 30 years ago or so that I was driving out here down Old Third Street. I had a old pickup truck at the time, and we lived nearby here, so I was often traveling this road, went to church here, and one of the places I would stop in there used to be a little gas station right here, right next to the Dollar General. Now it's I don't know, it changes every week. It's a vape shop or an event center or a food mart or who knows what's going on there. But at the time, it was a gas station, and I'd stop in there, here and there. One day in particular, I was it was one of those days you've probably had these. I hope it's not today where you just are starting slow. You know what I mean? Where you're waiting for the brain to catch up or the body to catch up, and they're not syncing up, and you're just hoping that you get the day rolling at some point. You might seek out extra sources of caffeine at that point. And that's what I was doing. I pulled in there, still trying to get the day going, not fully engaged, not all the synapses weren't firing yet. So pull in there, I think. Let me get a a Coke or a coffee. I go in the store and while I'm standing there waiting to pay, I just look out into the parking lot and I see two guys pushing my truck back into the parking lot, and I thought, that's strange, I, I parked it up by the front of the of the building and they're pushing it in. And so I just let me just keep watching them see what they do. They push it all the way up, right up into the parking spot, and they kind of dust off their hands and give each other a handshake and start to walk off. And so I've at that point had paid for my beverage. I walked outside and I said, hey, guys, what happened with that truck? You know, I didn't want to admit that it was mine yet. I wanted to find out what happened first. And they said, well, it was just out in the middle of Third Street. So I had it was a stick shift. I had failed to put it into gear when I pulled into the parking lot, and it had just rolled right back out into the street, and I said, well, I'm sure whoever owns it appreciated you putting it back up here. Have a good day. And I waited till they walked off before I got into it and drove off. But I thought, man, you have those days where you're just not fully engaged. You're not fully aware of what's going on yet. You haven't taken the initiative yet to get fully engaged. And I think there's times in life where we feel that way, whole seasons where you feel like I'm not fully there, I'm not fully engaged with what God has for me. In fact, we've been looking for the last few weeks in verses three through 12, Peter, who's all about action, doesn't start the book with action. He starts the book with worship. And in that section he says, here's how God intends you to live. Here's what he has for you. And yet we don't always live it out. So today we're going to look at how Peter is calling us to be who we're meant to be. Verse three through 12, this is who you're meant to be. This is who you are in Christ. Here's how we get there. This is what we're going to see today as we look at verses 13 through 16 in First Peter chapter one, we're going to see in particular five ways to be who you are, five ways to become who you were meant to be, to be fully engaged, to be there fully not still asleep, but fully engaged. So turn with me to First Peter chapter one. If you don't have a Bible, we'd love to put a copy of Scripture in your hands for you to keep, to be able to turn with us and follow along as I read. If you have a church Bible, the page number is on the screen. It'll be on page 953 in that Bible. But we're in first Peter chapter one. I'm just going to read our section for today, verses 13 through 16. Therefore, preparing your minds for action and being sober minded, set your hope fully on the grace that will be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ. As obedient children, do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance, but as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct. Since it is written, you shall be holy, for I am holy. So here we have in this section today we're going to see five ways to become who you are. If you know Christ, there are truths about you that they are meant to be true of you. And yet sometimes we're not fully engaged in those yet. How do we get there? Peter has been giving us worship, but now he's going to enter into the commands. Peter is all about direction. He's all about action. He's all about commands. And we're going to see five ways. And the first one here is just in this very first sentence, therefore, preparing your minds for action. The first step in how we become who were meant to be, is to be prepared, is to prepare your minds for action. That's the first one, the first in our list of five. Prepare. Now, what's interesting about this phrase? It doesn't say that in the original language. It doesn't say preparing your minds for action.

Originally, the phrase went like this:

gird up your loins for action. That's a good kind of Old Testament King James phrase right there, isn’t it? Gird up your loins for action. Gird up the loins of your minds In fact, is what it says. Now what does that mean? Gird meant fasten, buckle, and loins is your waist. And if you think back to the felt boards when you were in elementary school, maybe if you weren't, but you seen images of people from ancient times, men oftentimes wore robes. That would have been the attire of that times. But if you needed to do something physical, if you needed to do something, some work, if you needed to run, if you needed to do something active, those robes were going to get in your way. And so what they would do is they would gather them up and tuck them into their belt so they would be ready for action. Gird up your loins, get your fabric out of the way so that now you're ready to run, to lift something heavy, you're ready for action. In fact, one image of this I think it's real helpful comes, comes to us from Exodus chapter 12, verse 11. It's going to be on, on the screen. This was the setting of the very first Passover. They know they're about to leave Egypt, head to the Promised Land. And here's how they were to prepare to eat the meal, how they were to be physically ready to eat the meal. It says this in this manner you shall eat it with your belt fastened, which means having your clothing out of the way to be ready to move your sandals on your feet and your staff in your hand. You're to eat it in the way, to be ready to go, to be ready to be on the move, to be ready for whatever God calls you to do. Of course, there was the physical ready aspect that they were talking about in Exodus, but what we're talking about today is how do I prepare mentally? How do I get fully engaged mentally? How do I make sure my mind is ready for action? Now, I've thought of tried to think of some instances where this happens in life. What are some times when you really gear up your mind for action? In fact, one of the ways this is translated in some Bibles is roll up the sleeves of your mind, right? We don't usually gird up our loins anymore, but you know what I'm talking about. We say I’ve got to get my sleeves rolled up. I got to get ready to do some work, to to be engaged, fully roll up the sleeves of your mind. When I thought about, when do we do that in our lives? When do we really want to make sure my mind is fully engaged? A couple of things came to mind. One might be a job interview. If you know you have a job interview coming up, man, you're researching that company. You're you're maybe stalking the owner of the company online, learning all you can about them. What team do they cheer for or not? What soft drink do they like? You're you're really engaging. You're trying to put yourself in as pleasant of a state of mind as possible. You want to come and be cheerful and kind and happy. You're doing all you can to fully engage your mind. Another instance might be, if you're going out on a first date with someone, you're making sure I'm going to put my best foot forward. I'm trying to think, what are some interesting things I can talk about with this person? How do I seem more interesting than I really am today? Fully engaged? Or if you have a test coming up or here's another one. If you have a hard conversation to have with someone and you're thinking it through, have I really... am I really coming to this having thought this through, am I in the right place? Are my motives pure? Is is my heart after the right things, or do I have selfish motives here? You're making sure my mind is fully engaged, fully active, fully there. And this is what Peter is saying to us. If you want to live out everything that we said was true of us, prepare your mind. Prepare your heart for the action to come. Be there, not just a passive participant to to make sure I'm fully prepared. Gear up. Now, I think two practical ways to do this we see in Scripture. In fact, there's two passages in particular I want to point you to.

The first is in Ephesians 6:

14. And I love that passage because that's the whole Armor of God section. How do we practically gear up our minds for action? Buckle the belt of truth. That's a paraphrase of the translation put on the belt of truth. So if you want to have your mind ready for action, envelop it in God's Word. Have your mind saturated in God's Word. There's no better way to prepare your mind for what he may bring. The second comes from Luke 12, and I want to turn to that passage. It's on page 819 in the church Bible, but turn to Luke 12. This is Jesus teaching to his disciples, and he's talking about the importance of being ready. And this is in verse 35. Look at how he starts this sentence. And it's actually I'm pretty sure it's the exact same wording. If some of your Bibles may have a footnote, let your loins stay girded. It's the exact same wording, but it's translated stay dressed for action and keep your lamps burning. Be like men who are waiting for their master to come home from the wedding feast, so that they may open the door to him at once when he comes and knocks. Blessed are those servants whom the master finds awake when he comes. The setting here is servants waiting for the master to come. Eagerly expecting him to come. Ready. They're not off just doing whatever they want. They're watching. They're. They're anticipating his arrival. They're eager to see him. They're ready. They're prepared. Their minds are fully engaged. They're alert. They're on the lookout even. And the context here is, if you want to be ready for action, to have your loins girded up for action is to know where you stand with the master. Be ready for his arrival, be anticipating his arrival, and know that when he comes, I'll be ready to know that when Christ comes back, there will be a day when he comes back. It may not be in our lifetime, but there will be a day when you meet him and you stand before him. Are you ready for that? I'm not talking about, are you, do you have everything in your life figured out? Are you perfect? That's never going to happen. But have you said yes? I will follow you. I'm submitting my life to you. Now, I know I won't be perfect. I know I won't have it all figured out. By the way, he doesn't require that you don't get cleaned up before you go take a shower. You come to him first, and then he changes your life. You come to him broken. You come to him admitting that I'm messed up. I've tried it myself. I've messed up my life trying to figure it out myself. You come broken, you come eager and you say, Lord, I don't know how to live this life. I need you to take it over. But you know where you stand. You know that when he comes looking for his. That he's going to be looking for you. That's one of the ways we prepare for action, is to know where we stand with him. And if you don't know where you stand with him, man, I'd love to talk with you about that. After the service today. Come find me. Come find one of the people who were standing down front here. We would love to talk about what it means to follow Christ, to know him, to confess your sins, to repent of your sins, to put your trust in him fully. So prepare your minds for action. That's the first way we move towards who are we meant to be? How do we live out fully who we're meant to be? The second way here is in the verse. Turn back to First Peter, preparing your minds for action and being sober minded. And the second way is to sober up. And I thought about this phrase. There's a clear distinction between those who are sober and those who are intoxicated. It's usually quite obvious. What are some of the characteristics of the sober minded person? Obviously it's obvious physically when people are intoxicated, but what about the sober minded person? A few things came to mind. We're going to put a few of these up on the screen. First, the sober minded person lives in reality. Usually, if you're intoxicated, you're seeking to escape reality. You don't want to deal with reality. You're trying to get away from reality. But the sober minded person says, I may not like reality, but here it is and I'm going to deal with it. I'm going to press into it. I'm going to trust Christ, but I'm not going to try to escape from what is happening around me. Second characteristic of a sober minded person is they are attentive, but the intoxicated person is not attentive. They aren't sure what's happening around them. They depend on others to guide and direct them and to help them see what's going on. But the sober minded person is attentive. They're watching. They're aware of challenges. They're aware of something that may be awry. When I've been in places that are sketchy with my family. We were on a family vacation recently, and we were in the city and sketchy part of town, and my eyes are just constantly scanning around for any trouble. And if I see a sketchy person, I'm kind of subtly nudging my family in a slightly different direction, trying to get between them and that person and or maybe putting the least favorite child out front toward them at that time. You know it, whatever it takes to protect us all, they can take it for the team, whatever it takes. But I'm attentive on what you're watching. And if you've served in the military or in law enforcement, you're one of those people that you sit in the corner of the room so you can see and scan the whole room, and you're watching every crazy person that walks in. You've given them all names and numbers. You know who every one of them are in the room. You're attentive. A sober minded person is also attentive to what the spirit is doing. Aware. God is at work. God is moving. I heard them say something, and behind that, I know there's more to that story. God is working in their lives. They're attentive. Number three-- spiritually sensitive. The sober minded person is spiritually sensitive. Sensitive. They're they're listening for the spirit to to speak to them. Their senses aren't dulled to the place, to where they they can't hear from the Spirit. In fact, just a few verses later in chapter four, he says, be sober minded for the sake of your prayers. Your prayer life is affected by the nature of your mind. Is your mind intoxicated not just by beverage but by the world? Or is it spiritually attentive? And then, number four, the sober minded person adjusts quickly to adversity. And here's what I mean by this. I'm going to read a quote. Don't put it up yet, but I'm going to read a quote to you from a guy named Josephus. I've mentioned him a number of times. You need to become familiar with him because I'm going to keep talking about him because he was an ancient Jewish historian. He he was a contemporary of Jesus. So was another Jewish historian, Philo. I quote from them a lot, because these guys lived around the same time as Jesus and they were historians. They captured a lot of the history of that era. That's how we have learned a lot about what life was like then. And Josephus wrote in Greek. So when he uses a Greek word and the New Testament’s in Greek and he uses a word and it's the same word, we learn more about how other people would have used that word at that time. So there's a lot to draw from with Josephus. He also, interestingly enough, was a general in the Jewish army and led part of the army against the Romans in an uprising that eventually led to the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 A.D. So he was heavily involved in the history of the of of the Israelites, of the Jewish nation at the time. But here's what he said when he was describing a warrior using the same phrase sober minded. What makes a good warrior? Go ahead and put that quote on the screen and you'll see what he said. Here's a good warrior.“He is the best warrior who is of a sober mind...” There's that phrase being sober minded.“...under misfortunes...” And misfortune happens. If you have sober mind, here's what will happen--“...that he may continue in that temper and cheerfully recover what had been lost formerly.” It's a mouthful, but here's what that means-- a sober minded warrior can take adversity and bounce back. And you know what I mean. There are those who the slightest little things happen, and there are days maybe where we all are there and you're unraveled. You can't handle it. Someone tapped their brakes too quickly in front of you, and that's it. That's the end of the day. It's all over. Can't recover. But the sober minded person says, no big deal. I can absorb that, and I can recover and I can get back into the battle like that. It seems like we're under attack. It seems like it's all over. I'm back and engaged. The sober minded person is attentive, can adjust quickly, and can get back in the battle, whereas the intoxicated person is slow to react, can't tell what's going on, is easily put aside and derailed. Now last. Lastly, I want to point out the last one. Number five. And this is probably the essence of sober mindedness is abstinence. The sober minded person abstains from that which dulls the senses. And of course, that's true of intoxicating substances physically, whether it's alcohol or drugs. But spiritually, what dulls the spiritual senses? What things do I allow into my life that dull the spiritual senses? Some of those are absolutes that will dull everyone's spiritual senses. Some things might dull yours and not others, and we need to be honest about that. I can't let that into my life that pulls me away from Christ. What we want. Is to be away from those things. In fact, there's a word you might hear someone who has been through recovery, shout out Theresa, what you want. Say it again. Louder. So that's where we're headed is freedom. Freedom from those things that enslave you. We want freedom. Sober mindedness is freedom. That's how we begin to become who we are in Christ. So be sober minded. That's the second phrase in here. How are the ways we come to know who he is? Be prepared, who we are. Be prepared. Be sober minded. Now, here's why. This sets us up for this action. To be able to, look back at verse 13, be prepared in your minds for action. Be sober minded so that you can set your hope fully on the grace that will be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ. This is the third way we become who were meant to be. Set your hope fully. Hope in grace fully. Now, that word hope we've talked about before. But I'll bring it back up again because we tend to use the word hope differently than the Bible uses the word hope. We use it. Not sure if it will happen or not. I hope it doesn't rain today. I hope they include me in their will. I hope people will come to Wednesday Night Supper. By the way, we're having Wednesday Night Supper start up again this week. Thank you. All seven people who are excited about that. New menu. We're doing, like a Taco Nacho Mexican bar this week. Others are very excited about all four of them, but point being, I hope people will come. But here's the difference with biblical hope. Let me put this quote up on the screen. This is from Paul Tripp. Biblical hope is different. Biblical hope is “a confident expectation of a guaranteed result,” rooted in what it says here in verse 13, the revelation of Jesus Christ. Our hope is that he will come and that is rooted in a guaranteed result because he already rose from the dead. It's not crazy to think that Jesus will come back when he rose from the dead. You see this? We, the hope we have right now. It's rooted in a guaranteed result. It's a confident expectation of a guaranteed result. Now, the key word in this, there's two key words. Set your hope fully-- it's set, and fully. Set your hope fully in the revelation of Jesus Christ. Here's what we're going to talk about. I'm going to illustrate this with a prop. If you've ever set a fence post, which I have, although I promise never to do it again, this may be one example why. You can see this is not the kind of fence post you want to use, although I might be tempted to do that. If you go to set a fence post in the ground, it's not about your effort in setting it. Look, I can all day long put great forth effort in setting this fence post here. I could spend the whole day doing my best to set this fence post right here. It's not about my effort. When I set my hope fully in something, if you want this fence post to be set fully to not move, do not fall over. When I just let go, I need to set it in a substance that's strong. I need to put it in concrete and then let it dry and cure and be ready and strong. It's not about my effort to set. It's about the focus of the substance in which upon I set my hope. You see, if I can set my hope all day long in my ability or what might happen, or someone here who I'm trusting. Let me get this out of the way before I injure myself. I could do that all day long, but my hope needs to be set in Christ. He is the... It's about how strong he is, not how great I am at hoping and setting. Put your focus fully, and that's the other word, fully. If my hope is set even partially on anything else, it's going to fail. It's not going to endure. It's not going to stand up. I could have half concrete, half mud. It's going to fall over. Set your hope fully in Christ. That's what's going to prevail. That's the third way that we continue to grow into who we're meant to be, set our hope fully on the resurrection of Jesus Christ to come. The grace that will come through that. Now, the interesting part of these first three commands, we're going to get into the next two. But these first three are really mostly about our way of thinking. You know, before he really tells you to take direct action, his first step is make sure you get your thinking right, because how you think is how you live. You got to get your mindset right. If you're gearing up to do something big, man, I got to get my head around it first to get fully engaged, to get my heart fully engaged. But as you know, and if you've been in these seasons, the theme of the whole book of First Peter is finding joy in suffering. And if you've been in those seasons of suffering, you've got to get your head engaged. But there comes a point where you got to take action. There comes a point where action needs to happen, and he's going to turn the corner here with our last two ways that we become who we are. Look at verse 14 and 16,

14 through 16:

as obedient children, do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance, but as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct. Since it is written, you shall be holy, for I am holy. Two things here to highlight. First, don't be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance. Reject conformity. Now we looked at that word. Conformed. If you remember our study in Romans 12, as we looked at the habit series, that word can also be expanded. Translation would be something like don't let the world press you into its mold. That's what the world wants. It wants conformity to a a life that rejects Christ. The world wants you to press you into its mold, wants you to become like it, not like Christ, but hear what is pressing you into its mold. It's your your own passions that have been shaped by your former life. And how many times have you been in this situations, and you've seen others who are completely driven by their passions, their desires? They can't say no to their impulses. That's a two year old. They can't say, no, I'm not calling you two year olds, but you've been around. They call it, boys who shave, men who still are controlled or women. I'm not saying the women shave, but adults who are controlled by their impulses. They can't say no. They're constantly driven by whatever they feel in the moment, that they have no self-control. Reject that. That is a type of intoxication that is being driven by something else, rather than being sober minded, self-controlled. Instead, he says, do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance, but instead the picture here is as obedient children. That's how the verse starts “as obedient children.” I love that phrasing because it does a couple of things. It points to the nature of a childlike innocence, but it also points to the nature of our relationship with our Heavenly Father. I think there's nothing quite as strong in the heart of the child as their desire for their parents approval. Every kid wants their parents love, approval, attention. Even the kid who has gone off the rails, they're still looking for that. I know that's complicated. I'm not trying to pass a very clear parenting principle here, but you know what I'm saying? There's something in the heart of the child, and you could go to the most difficult prison, the most maximum security prison. And I bet if you went around and asked people, did your father ever tell you he loves you? You're going to hear no. Over and over again. You'll also hear, I didn't even know him. I don't even know who he is. And you take the meanest, the baddest, the toughest guy in there. And his dad calls that day and says, son, I'm sorry. I'm sorry I wasn't there for you. I'm sorry I wasn't around. I've done a lot of things wrong. I want to change my life. And I want you to know how much I love you. Man, I tell you, no matter how tough that guy is, he's going to weep like a baby, more than likely, to hear that from his father. What we all long for as obedient children. Don't be pressed into the mold of your former passions, but find delight in obeying your heavenly father as it was designed. As a child longs to delight in their father. Don't be conformed. That's the negative side of the actions here. But here's the positive side don't be conformed to the world. Instead, what should we look to?

Look back at Verse 15:

But as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct. As it is written, you shall be holy, for I am holy. The last way today we're going to look at the fifth way that we become who were meant to be is to imitate holiness, imitate the holiness of Christ, imitate the holiness of the Father. Now, what I want to point out here is what Peter does here. And Peter. And by the way, I know this about you guys. I know that you love it when the New Testament quotes the Old Testament. I love seeing that. I love digging in and seeing why did it quote here? What did it mean in the original context? Well, how is the author in the New Testament now presenting it? Peter's quoting from the book of Leviticus when he quotes this be holy as I am holy.

It's in Leviticus 19:

12. And Leviticus, that section of Leviticus is often called the Holiness Code. It's this whole list of laws about how Israel was to live, to set themselves apart from the country, the nations around them. They were to be set apart. We talked about that phrase when we talked about sanctification. Holiness is similar, meant to be set apart from everyone else around them. I've set you apart for a special purpose. Now, Peter, by doing that, he is quoting the Old Testament. He's doing a couple things. One, he is saying the Old Testament is a dependable authority. That's something you can trust in, but notice he doesn't then list off a bunch of those laws from the Old Testament. He says, be holy like God is holy. Imitate him in his character. Now, the hard part of that is this is also probably one of the most confusing parts of understanding scripture. I'm just going to wade into this briefly. How do I know what parts of the Old Testament to follow I mean, people want to talk about. See, you can't trust the Bible because it says not to eat shellfish. I saw you eating shrimp. Are you really a Christian? No, what parts of the Bible do you follow? What parts do you not in the Old Testament in particular? That is a complex topic. I'm going to point at just a couple of quick things to highlight. One is there are many laws in the Old Testament that were pointing forward to Christ. In fact, the whole Old Testament, the whole point of the Old Testament is to lead us to Christ.

Galatians 3:

24 says this. The law, it says, is a guardian. The picture there is of someone who didn't just teach their kid, they took the kid to the teacher. They were meant to usher a kid to school. You could almost say the law is like a school bus. It's meant to take you to the place where you really learn. The Old Testament was like that. The Old Testament law was meant to point us to Christ. And so it's not about the law in and of itself. It's not about how good we can keep whatever laws are listed. It's pointing us to find ultimately our joy and delight in Christ. Now, many of those laws ultimately then, as a result, were fulfilled in Christ. No one brought a sacrifice with him today that I can see. I don't see any animals bleeding. We hear lots of other noises, but we don't see any animals. I don't see any oxen. I don't see bulls, I don't see pigeons. I don't see sheep because that was fulfilled in Christ. His sacrifice was the final sacrifice. There's plenty of places in Scripture, plenty of Old Testament laws that were fulfilled in him. There were other laws that were meant just for Israel while they were under God's rule in their land. His government, when we lived overseas, the rule there was to drive on the left side of the road. I did that while I was there. I didn't say no. My my rule is that I drive on the right side of the road. That wouldn't have lasted very long. When I come back here, I switch back to the right side of the road. Foreign land, foreign government, foreign time. Some of those laws passed away because that. Ultimately all of this is pointing to the law of Christ following him, loving him, knowing him, pursuing him. And at his core is holiness. He is holy. He is perfect. Holiness is, at the, at its core, set apart from sin completely, entirely. I think a great place to look at for this is to turn to revelation chapter four. And it's so great that this morning we were singing Holy, Holy, Holy. Flip over just a few pages to Revelation chapter four. You know, one of the things I learned in seminary that I found really helpful, but surprising at first, is that of all the attributes of God that you study and you study all his different attributes that show up in Scripture. Yes, he is love, but he's also justice. He's also just; he's also jealous. He's holy. One of the things we learned that's really important is to never put any one attribute above the others. You don't say this is his one most important defining attribute when you do that, because the Bible doesn't do that. When you do that, you're making him in your own image. This is the thing I think he's really about. Yeah, it says God is love. So he's only love. Well, no, there's a whole lot more to his character. He's also sovereign. He's also omnipresent. He's also omniscient. I'm going to go out on a limb here. Okay? Don't repeat this to any actual theologians. Maybe the one attribute that could be most central is holiness. Maybe. And here's why. Because what happens in revelation four verse eight, the four living creatures. Creatures. This is a picture of the throne room. And there's four living creatures, each of them with six wings, are full of eyes all around him within and day and night they never cease to say, Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty, who was, and is, and is to come for all of eternity. These four living creatures are standing around the throne, and the word that repeating over and over again the thing they're most enamored with about him is holiness. He is set apart from sin. Again, strong caveat there. Maybe that is his essence of defining character quality. At the bare minimum, it's highly praised by those who are closest to him. The challenge for us when it comes to holiness, we don't have a positive view of holiness. Think of the last time you called someone holy. Maybe it was the Pope. That might be his title. Some people call him His Holiness. In general, when I call someone holy, it's usually more like he thinks he's holy. He's holier than thou, going around thinking they're holy and they're not. You really mean hypocrite. You really... you probably really mean annoying. We don't usually put holy. I think we think of God is holy and we think that's good, but how are we to imitate his holiness in a way that we value? I think what we want when we want holiness and this is what we all want. Whatever you call it, freedom from sin, that's what we all want. Every one of us. If you're here, you want freedom from sin. Some days you wonder because you find yourself falling back into it. But Christ is there guiding you. His Holy Spirit is guiding you, turning you away from sin. That's only going to happen when we set our hope fully in him, not in anything else. I was talking with a man recently. He gave me permission to share this. He said for years I knew God was after me. And I had this sense one day that he was saying to me I'm about done pursuing you. I just sensed that he was saying you need to turn soon. This isn't-- my patience won't endure forever. And he said, you know what, Lord? I hear what you're saying. And at first when he told me this, I laughed. But I'm going to share it with you and explain. You can laugh too if you want. I hear what you're saying, Lord. Will you give me one more year? Because I want to make sure that if I make this commitment to follow you, that I really mean it. I don't want to go into it half hearted. I don't want to just say it so that something bad doesn't happen. I really want to. I want to take this next year and really make sure I'm I'm really fully going to commit to following you. He said I was 54 years old. By the way, it's never too late to follow him. 54 is not that old, by the way. It's never too late to follow him. It's never too late. He can turn your life around. You can have a completely different life in a moment. And he said, I'm so glad that I can look back at that day at the end of that year, it was Mother's Day, and I told my mom, I'm committing to following Christ today. On Mother's Day. To walk in holiness. To walk in freedom from sin. To know Christ. There's no greater delight in life. And I pray if you don't know him, don't wait another day. Come to know him today. Come talk with me. Come talk with one of the elders. In fact, if you're one of the elders, would you stand so that others around you can see you? Go ahead and stand right now. Just for a second, you can see here's a couple of our elders here. One, two more upstairs. Come talk to one of us. Talk with my wife, Julie. She was down here praying with others. We'd love to talk with you about what it means to follow Christ. Let's pray. Jesus, thank you for your holiness. Thank you that through you we can come to know who we are meant to be in you. Jesus, help us to set our mind fully on the hope we find in you. Help us to prepare our minds for action, to walk sober minded in life. Would you go before us today and give us freedom in you? And if there's anyone here who doesn't know you. Jesus, would you speak to them today? Would they hear your voice like never before? Would you move in their life? Help each of us this week to long for holiness like never before. We love you, Jesus. Amen.