“You shall be holy, for I the Lord your God am holy.” Leviticus 19:2

As we approach holy week my thoughts return not so much to the services and events which will fill that time, but to the people … YOU … who will come to be a part of worship during this time. 

“You shall be holy…”

That is, you are “blessed” by God.

Throughout the story of the scriptures the idea of “blessing” is linked to the people’s primary identity as God’s people. The promise of God to Abram in the 12th chapter of Genesis includes the promise that not only would Abram be blessed by God but through Abram (eventually Abraham) God would bless the world.  

This does include the promise of provision, that God’s people would receive from God manifold blessings all we need, as Luther put it so well, “to support this body and life.”

That is, you are “set apart” from others and the world.

But the notion of holiness has more to do with being “set apart” from others and also from the world. From the beginning, God’s people were not to be like others but were, rather, supposed to be unique from among all the peoples of the world.

A whole host of commandments recorded in both the Old and New Testaments are designed by God to make sure a person can be known as a child of God simply by the way she or he lives each day.

A sanctuary is a holy place. That is, it is set apart for a special and unique purpose. There is nothing all that different about a sanctuary. Like most buildings it has a roof and four walls … often highly ornamented or designed in a specific way … but it is essentially the same as other buildings. Except for its purpose: worship and prayer, the gathering together of God’s holy people.

That is, your life should reflect the one who calls you to be His own.

The notion of holiness that is evidenced in the behavior of a person comes from the idea, that holy people should always reflect the God in whose name we gather. We are holy because God is holy. Our day-to-day activities are important mostly because we are always witnesses to the Lord in whose name we gather, namely Jesus the Christ.

We stand forgiven before God because of the work of Jesus Christ for us. We are included in those who are God’s people not because of anything we have done or even will do. None of our actions, no matter how good and righteous, can earn us a place in God’s heaven.

Our actions, therefore, are mostly about being a witness to the God who calls us and saves us. When people see us, they get an idea of who God is. When people interact with us, they get a glimpse, albeit incomplete, of God’s nature.  

We are holy because the Lord our God is holy.