See it God’s way: Live in Holiness

Last week we talked about seeing it God’s way. Even in our identity, we have to see ourselves as God sees us. Many, as a result of not seeing themselves as God sees them, have allowed people to give them identities contrary to what God has given them, putting them lesser than what God has made them. Some others see themselves purely by the identity that their companies have given them, e.g. cleaners, messengers etc., believing that that is what they are and will always be. See yourself the Lord sees you. Others have been defined by their education, and as a result the society has put them down.

When we get to heaven, no one will ask us about academics, if we have papers; it will be all about if we are born again. Do not see yourself as the society has labeled you. What have you allowed yourself to see yourself as, as the society has labeled you? See yourself as God sees you. Refuse those identities. When you see yourself the way God sees you, God delights as He knows that the blood that His Son shed was not in vain, but that you are embracing what Jesus paid for. When you see yourself the way God sees you, the work of the cross comes into manifestation into your life.

It is your and my responsibility to see ourselves the way the Lord sees us. When you see yourself the way the Lord sees you, you will surrender for Him to do in you that which He wants. The ages of Abraham and Sarah were not a limitation. All that mattered to Abraham was what God promised, and He believed it, allowing Himself to see things the way God saw them. Because of this, Abraham was called a righteous man, by believing in God. When Abraham saw things God’s way, all the promises of God came to pass, which is why we are of the lineage of Abraham today. What is it that God told you? Keep on believing.

Moses saw deliverance of the children of Israel, right when they were in front of the Red Sea. The children of Israel could see the Egyptian army, but Moses could see the Lord’s deliverance. Joseph saw himself as king, seeing his family bow to him, spoke it, and it came to pass. Joshua and Caleb, of the 12 who went to spy on the land of Canaan, are the only ones who saw themselves as well able to take over the land. The other 10, with a grasshopper mentality, did not see it God’s way and thus missed out.

Today we talk about how to see it God’s way, by living in holiness. If we have to continuously live it and see it the way God sees it, we have to continue to live in holiness. Let us be a people who will forever want to shine for Jesus, by living in holiness. We have to live a life that God can use us at any time and any place.

People who live in holiness experience the presence of God at all times. This is why the devil shakes up so much when he knows that you have determined to live in holiness, to say no to sin. If you are not one who habitually sins, then you are one to live in holiness. We can all fall once in a while, and repent. However, there are people who continue to sin, such that it becomes a habit, which becomes classified as living in sin. We have to be quickly aware when we miss the mark, and repent.

Search your heart, and that which you see the Lord convicting you, you need to let go of it and allow yourself to be sanctified by the blood.

People who live in holiness experience the presence of God at all times, and are thus thankful. When everything else goes wrong, they quickly turn to God while others are complaining and murmuring. People who have the presence of God with them at all times have insight (see things you are in differently), foresight (seeing things that are ahead differently) and oversight (seeing God as above everything else, seeing the big picture).

For us to have all these, then the presence of the Lord cannot dwell in a dirty vessel.

Genesis 6:9

This is the genealogy of Noah. Noah was a just man, perfect in his generations. Noah walked with God.

When everyone else was indulging in sexual immorality and idolatry, Noah was walking with God. Walking with God is not similar to walking with the president, you can’t even compare this. Noah walked with God such that he had a foresight of what was to come, of the destruction that was coming. While everyone else was making money, Noah was busy walking with God, making an ark and walking in obedience, for 120 years. Finally, the flood came and God saved Noah and his family, and all that was put inside the ark, when everyone else and everything else was being destroyed. God swore that He will never destroy the earth with water again, but we have to be warned that Jesus is coming back. While people are busy going on with earthly activities, Jesus is still coming back and when we walk with God, we will not see it as the world sees it, the coming of Jesus will not take us by surprise. We will be ready when the Son of God comes to the world.

It is such a shame for any Christian to be taken by surprise by any event in their lives, as God promised that nothing will catch us by surprise, that the revealed things are for us and our children, while the hidden things belong to Him. When we walk with God, He reveals things to us.

When we walk with God, we have to keep away that which is dirty.

1 Corinthians 6:15-20

Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ? Shall I then take the members of Christ and make them members of a harlot? Certainly not! ¹⁶ Or do you think that he who is joined to a harlot is one body with her? For “the two,” He says, “shall become one flesh.”

¹⁷ But he who is joined to the Lord is one spirit with Him. ¹⁸ Flee sexual immorality. Every sin that a man does is outside the body, but he who commits sexual immorality sins against his own body. ¹⁹ Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own?

²⁰ For you were bought at a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s.

If we have been born with such an expensive price, we have to know our value. And because we have been bought at such a great value, we will not play with it, we will handle with care, and submit to the Lord. Live to please the Lord. It does not matter what you are going through, what your body is going through. Whatever you cannot do in public or in the church, do not do in the bedroom. The church has become so polluted that it has become fashionable for people to commit immorality, to an extent that pastors fall.

Check whatever you entertain in your mind. What you entertain in your mind will cook feelings in your body, and you find yourself calling up people to meet them, to satisfy your body desires. If you have been living in sexual immorality, repent and purpose that you will not habitually sin. Without holiness, we will not see God.

1 Peter 2:9

But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should shew forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light:

I’m not saying that sexual immorality is the only sin; seeking divination, lying etc. are all sins. If we have been called from the darkness into the marvelous light, having been made a chosen generation and a royal priesthood, let us not take ourselves back to mud, back to darkness. Our lives have to align themselves to what God has prescribed. I pray that from today the Spirit of God will convict us of sin, righteousness and judgment, that we say no continually to sin. For us to see ourselves the way God sees us, we have to live in holiness. We have to make a deliberate choice, that nothing is taking us back. If everyone else is compromising and bribing at the work place, we have to make a choice to stand.

Galatians 5:16-21

I say then: Walk in the Spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh. 17 For the flesh lusts against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; and these are contrary to one another, so that you do not do the things that you wish. 18 But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law. 19 Now the owrks of the flesh are evident, which are: adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lewdness 20 idolatry, sorcery, hatred, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissensions, heresies, 21 envy, murders, drunkenness, revelries, and the like; of which I tell you beforehand, just as I also told you in time past, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.

It is fleshly to feel hungry, but we usually control hunger. If we control hunger, we better learn to control our fleshly lusts to sin. Not many people want to sin, but they continue to walk in sin as they cannot control these desires. For us to control the flesh, we have to walk in the Spirit.

For us to inherit the kingdom of God, we have to refrain from the things listed in verse 19-21. May the Lord help us that being in the church, then these things come out of us.

Walk in holiness. Holiness is being clean and pure. 


Scriptural References

• Colossians 3:1-10
• Leviticus 20:7
• 1 Peter 1:14-16 (ESV)
• 1 John 3:6-10
• 2 Corinthians 7:1
• 1 Thessalonians 4:7
• 2 Timothy 2:21
• 1 Thessalonians 5:23
• Philippians 4:8
• 1 Corinthians 6:9-11
• Psalm 51:10-12
• 3 John 1:11
• Romans 12:1
• 1 Peter 4:7
• James 1:21
• 1 Thessalonians 4:4
• 1 Peter 2:12
• 1 John 2:29
• 1 Corinthians 6:17
• 1 John 3:3
• Colossians 1:22
• Romans 6:1-23
• 1 John 1:16
• Colossians 3:1-10
• Ephesians 5:8-11
• 1 Corinthians 6:20

  

-- Pastor Mary Mugo. 



(10/11/13 Sunday Service Sermon, Africa Transformation Mission. Pramukh Plaza, 6th Floor) 

Pastor Mary Mugo is the Administrative Pastor at Africa Transformation Mission, a ministry under Christ Harvesters Ministries.