Hajja Salesjana - Oct-Dec 2021

Holiness Unfolded When we separate holiness from Christ himself, the pursuit of holiness inevitably becomes mechanical or individualistic — the solution to a spiritual equation or the effect of my brute will. But genuine holiness is neither mechanical nor individualistic: it is, in the first place, relational. And so, when Paul turns the corner from Colossians 2 to Colossians 3, he shifts our eyes from the futility of self-sanctification to Sanctity himself: “If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God.... For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.” (Colossians 3:1, 3) Your life — your true life — is hidden with Christ, the Holy One. Your union with him now makes you holy (Colossians 3:12). But in order to live out that holiness here, you must “seek the things that are above, where Christ is” 22 H AJJA S ALESJANA (Colossians 3:1). In other words, holiness is the flower of our union with Christ, and it unfolds through our communion with Christ. Then, and only then, does Paul command the Colossians to put specific sins to death (Colossians 3:5– 11), suggesting that the only people who can truly kill their sin (and not just replace one with another) are those who are preoccupied with Jesus. We are lepers who become clean only as he lays his hand upon us, paralytics who rise only as he gives the command, blind people who see only as he touches our eyes. J.I. Packer draws out the conclusion: “The holiest Christians are not those most concerned about holiness as such, but those whose minds and hearts and goals and purposes and love and hope are most fully focused on our Lord Jesus Christ” (Keep in Step with the Spirit, 134). Holiness Begins in Intimacy with Jesus by Scott Hubbard Editor, desiringGod.org This article continues from the last issue of Óajja Salesjana June – September 2021