Friday night at Home Bible Study we looked at the topic of temptation and how Jesus dealt with it when He was tempted by the devil. I'll save some of the details of the lesson for another day's post, but the attribute that we see of God when we talk about temptation is that God is holy.
I wish I could get a grasp on the holiness of God. He has absolutely no tolerance for sin. He does not allow the smallest, most seemingly insignificant sin to go overlooked. Uzzah touching the ark of the covenant to keep it from falling, caused him to die. Adam taking a bite out of a piece of fruit caused a world of trouble - just taking a bite! Giving to the church, but claiming that they gave a greater percentage than they did, caused Ananias and Sapphira to be killed. Some children mocking the prophet of God because of his bald head, caused God to bring two bears to kill the children.
Some of those examples, we would see as being so ridiculously insignificant. I mean, really, so some people make a joke about one of God's men - and He has them killed? (Um, maybe I better watch what I say about any preacher - not just the ones I like.) God is pure from absolutely any sin. He is not the author of sin, and He will never allow sin in His presence! So much that He even turned away from His Son when Jesus bore all of my sins on the tree. Thank You, Jesus for that.
I think we could all take a step back, consider those things which God hates, take a look at our lives and find some stuff to clean up. And you know those little things, that you know aren't right, but they're just small... well, they're not small in God's eyes. Those little things caused Jesus to go to the cross as much as the big. I mean really, it was simply a bite of fruit that required it. How "small" is your sin compared to that?
"Be ye holy, for I am holy."
Just a thought...
