Daily Verse

Monday, February 5, 2007

raising the bar

I Peter 1:16 “Be holy because I am Holy”

For past several months I have been enthralled in capturing God’s vision for our men’s ministry and laying the foundational ground work for His process us to get there. As a growing church with great vision God has set us on a transcendent course to impact our community like no other time in the History of our church. It is no secret that Satan has become agitated and increasingly threatened by the number of lives that have been changed through the grace of God and the ministry of our church as satan has waged war on the men of our church and their families.

Without question we have within our Brotherhood a stronghold of Godly men who are leaders in ministry, home, and the work place. Yet the numbers are few and the need is great. So I find myself asking the timeless question “where are the men”?

You see, the Vision God has set before our men is one of “Personal Holiness”.
PERSONAL HOLLINESS. It is within the heart of those two words that the answer lies to the timeless questions of “where are the men”? As unfortunate as it may be, I believe the bar on personal holiness has fallen and now rests on the rung of “Christian Nice Guy” when it was God who called us to “Be holy because I am holy”. It is the very few that first, fundamentally understand God’s holiness and second impart it’s importance on their lives.

It is the bar of Holiness that must be elevated and captivated within the lives of our men if we truly strive to be Godly Men. To be holy is to be set apart, to be completely separated from sin. God’s holiness is complete moral perfection; His eyes can not even look on evil with any kind favor. Moses couldn’t so much as wear sandals in the Lords presence in
Exodus 3:5 “for the place where you stand is holy ground.” I know, I know, “wow is that a high bar”, but it’s God’s bar and it is within His context of holiness that we then can build a foundation upon His call in Leviticus 11:44 “I am the LORD your God; consecrate yourselves and be holy, because I am holy.” For how can we consecrate ourselves as men we have not embraced the true Holiness of God.

We have to guard ourselves from gauging our bar of Personal Holiness against what seems holy compared to the world we live in. God’s standards of holiness are eternal and do not rise and fall on interpretation, trends, or morality.

It is with true personal holiness that we must start. As leaders once God’s standard has been set and the vision captured, we can then lay the framework for guiding our men to that place of Consecration.

I hope to share with you over the next few months the framework that the Lord has laid out for the men of our church in our pursuit of Personal Holiness.

God is our Mighty Warrior!


Credit: Al Houck - Inspiration

3 comments:

Barry Hughes said...

That's great! Perfect timing for me. We'll be asking Wed. evening for everyone to "raise the bar" when it comes to being "set apart" or sanctified. Thank you!

HOOKM14 said...

Bro, every word of that post was aimed right back at me. Like Significance, Holiness is a journey not a destination and what a tough but true journey it is.


Can't waite for Wednesday.

Rob said...

Dude this is good stuff. I just stumbled across this reading my brothers blog and saw hookem and thought who the heck is that. I started reading and was very intrigued and encouraged by it. I can't wait to see what you post next. Thank you for taking a stand and being an example. Oh yeah sweet pic.










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