The Bible tells us God is love, the Bible also tells us God is holy. Love embraces, brings closer and unites, but holiness separates, divides and detaches. These two attributes of God seem to contradict one another, but they coexist in God.
It is great wisdom to know these two aspects of God well. The New Testament teaches us, “God is love”, and this love is perfectly revealed through the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. The New Testament is a perfect textbook about the love of God. Yet before this perfect revelation of His love came, God trained his people on his holiness for thousands of years.
If a person knows the love of God without knowing holiness, this person may not cherish and respect that love. Instead of holding on to God’s love as a precious gift, this person may trample over it by taking it for granted.
An interesting observation in the Christian life is that, some Christians respect people very much, they would not be late when they go to meet with their bosses or their customers, but they would be late when they go to meet with God at the church service time. If this person meets with a government officer, they dress well and prepare in advance, but when they go and meet with God who is much more noble and important, they don’t prepare and just go and just meet.
Christians who have knowledge in God’s love and are ignorant of His holiness lose greatly in their faith. In Exodus chapter 3, God teaches this lesson to Moses.
When the Lord saw that he had gone over to look, God called to him from within the bush, “Moses! Moses!” And Moses said, “Here I am.” “Do not come any closer,” God said. “Take off your sandals, for the place where you are standing is holy ground.”
God tells Moses not to come closer. He commands separation. He told Moses to distinguish the place as a holy place.
There are a few things we can do to train ourselves in fearing God and distinguish God as God.
First, to distinguish time. The time to worship God is the most important time in our lives. We should set aside the time of worship as holy, cherish it, strive to keep it and offer it to God as the most important time.
Second, to distinguish spaces. The place to worship God – the church- is the most holy place, the place for bible study is also precious. We should revere the places dedicated to God in reverence of God Himself.
Third, to distinguish objects. Even the items we use to serve God, such as the Bible, the pulpit, even the chairs inside the church, should be valued and kept holy.
Fourth, to distinguish people. Even though all people should be respected, we should give special respect to the ones who preach the Word of God, respect the pastors and spiritual leaders as those sent by God and retreat them as holy, for God’s sake.
Keep the Church Service well is the best way to train ourselves to fear God and regard everything belongs to God as holy. If we lose this holiness, we will become self-centered and treat God recklessly. Instead of keeping the service time, we will attend according to my convenience. We treat church space as we treat any other place, we recklessly use the items in church and lose respect to our spiritual leaders in church, which eventually leads to our downfall.