It doesn’t take long for people in Haiti to figure out that I’m a foreigner. For starters, I’m not the same color. Add to this my funny accent and clumsiness when it comes to social protocols and etiquette. No matter how well adapted I could become to Haitian culture, there will always be something about me that reveals the fact that I’m a foreigner. I’m just different.
Christians too are foreigners in the world (1 Pet. 2:11). Christians are supposed to be different. This is what holiness is all about.
We’ve got the wrong idea if we think that our faith is all about us. Jesus does a work in our lives not for our own sake, but for his. God forgives us and transforms our very nature as proof that he lives. This is why holiness is so important for believers. Christianity is not about just being forgiven, it’s about being a witness to the fact that God can transform a life. When Christians are no different than other people in the world, then something is very wrong.
God not only saves us for his own sake, but also for the sake of others. He also does a work in our lives for the sake of others. In a phrase, he saves us to use us as agents of redemption in his epic mission to set the creation back on track.
In John 7:38, Jesus says, “Let anyone who is thirsty come to me and let the one who believes in me drink. As the scripture has said, ‘Out of the believer’s heart shall flow rivers of living water.’” The text goes on the say, “Now he said this about the Spirit, which believers in him were to receive; for as yet there was no Spirit, because Jesus was not yet glorified.”
Normally when we think of our faith and salvation, we think of the deep joy and happiness that comes with being reshaped into the image of Christ. This brings nourishment to believers. At the same time, and as is clear in this text from John 7, our Spirit-enabled service is also a source of nourishment and life to others. As sanctified people, we have within us an eternal source of fresh, living water for a broken world. We have been entrusted with the only balm that can bring healing to the world.
We have to get it out of our mind that sanctification is about us. First, it’s about Jesus. After that, it’s about others.
This is best illustrated in Jesus’s earthly ministry. He healed people, cast out demons, fed people, and brought people back to life. Jesus’s life was a source of nourishment for the people around him. New creation life of the Spirit is supposed to flow out of the church like we see in Ezekiel’s temple vision. Once again, what God does for us in salvation is just step one. Of equal importance is what God does through us.
