OUR GOD By Octavius Winslow, 1870.

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Never did Divine holiness appear more beautiful and lovely than at the time our Savior's countenance was most marred in the midst of His dying groans. This Himself acknowledges in that penitential psalm (Ps. xxii. 12), when God turned His smiling face from Him, and thrust His sharp knife into His heart, which forced that terrible cry from Him, "My God, my God, why have You forsaken Me? But, You are holy." Such an impressive view of God's holiness the angels in heaven never before beheld, not even when they saw the non-elect spirits hurled from the heights of glory down to the bottomless pit, to be reserved in chains of darkness and woe forever.

But it will be asked, Wherein did lay the great proof that God was holy in the soul-sorrow, bodily suffering, and ignominious death of Jesus? We answer– It is found in the fact that He was the innocent One dying for the guilty, the holy One dying for the sinful. Divine justice, in its mission of judgment, as it swept by the cross, found the Son of God impaled upon its wood, beneath the sins and the curse of His people. Upon Him its judgment fell, on His soul the wrath was poured, in His heart the flaming sword was plunged; and thus, from Him, justice exacted the full penalty of man's transgression- the last farthing of the great debt.

Go to the cross, then, my reader, and learn the holiness of God.

Contemplate the dignity of Christ's person, the preciousness of the Son of God to His Father's heart, the sinlessness of His nature; and then behold the sorrow of His soul, the torture of His body, the tragedy of His death, the abasement, the ignominy, the humiliation, into the fathomless depths of which the whole transaction plunged our incarnate God; and let me ask, standing, as you are, before this unparalleled spectacle, Can you cherish low views of God's holiness, or light views of your own sinfulness?

But look at this mediatorial representation of the Divine holiness in two or three particulars. The PARDON OF SIN exhibits the holiness of God. How is sin pardoned? By the atoning blood of Jesus alone. "In whom we have redemption through His blood, even the forgiveness of sin." There is no remission of any sin but by the atoning blood of Christ; while, by that blood-shedding, there is the remission of all sin in those that believe. That which cleanses us from all sin, must itself be free from all sin. The slightest taint of sin in Christ would have invalidated His whole sacrifice, and have rendered His atoning blood totally inefficacious in the canceling of our guilt. But we are "redeemed by the precious blood of Christ, as of a Lamb without blemish and without spot."

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And herein God's holiness appears so conspicuous, in that He provided a spotless victim, a sinless sacrifice, a holy Savior; thus, while securing the rights of holiness on the one hand, on the other cleansing and effacing, fully and forever, the deepest stain of man's transgression. And now, because God is so holy, and because He has vindicated, to the utmost, the righteousness of His moral government, behold Him "waiting to be gracious," "ready to pardon" the vilest, the guiltiest, the very chief of sinners, casting himself, in penitence and faith, at His feet. And in thus extending to that penitent sinner a full and free forgiveness, He receives and magnifies His own holiness in the eyes of angels and of men. Thus the apostle puts it; "For God sent Jesus to take the punishment for our sins and to satisfy God's anger against us. We are made right with God when we believe that Jesus shed his blood, sacrificing his life for us. God was being entirely fair and just when he did not punish those who sinned in former times."

Hesitate not, then, to cast yourself upon God's pardoning mercy in Christ Jesus, since, in the very act of conferring upon you the forgiveness of all sin, His holiness will appear all the more illustrious. Oh, the marvelous love of our God in providing such an expedient as can efface every, and the darkest spot, and the foulest stain, and the deepest dishonor of sin, presenting the sin-cleansed soul to Himself "whiter than snow," and yet the sinner's sins appear all the more sinful, and His holiness all the more holy. "But with you there is forgiveness; therefore you are feared."

JUSTIFICATION equally secures and illustrates the holiness of God. Our justification- in other words, our acquittal from all blame and consequent condemnation- could only be secured on the footing of the perfect holiness of God's government. But the obedience of the Lord Jesus to the law on behalf of the sinner was so complete, yes, so magnifying of the holiness of that law, and so honorable to the character of the Lawgiver, that now it becomes proper, on the part of God, to "justify the ungodly." He can do this without the slightest compromise of His divine and essential purity.

The righteousness in which the believing sinner stands, is emphatically denominated the "righteousness of God." Consequently, it must be a holy righteousness, since not only is it a righteousness of God's appointing, and of God's accepting, but it is the righteousness of Him who was God, and who is God. In contrast with this, how impure appears our own obedience, how filthy the rags of our own righteousness! And, if we accept this righteousness of God, how entirely must we cast away from us the imperfect, sullied, worthless garment of our own righteousness, and enfold ourselves within that divine robe of the "righteousness of God, which is unto all and upon all those who believe."


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REGENERATION, or the spiritual renewal of the soul, is a not less, in some respects, it is a more, striking illustration of the Divine holiness. It is so, in point of fact, since it is the restoration of man to the image of God, and, consequently, the manifestation of God's holiness in man. How clearly the apostle states this: "And that you put on the new man, which, after God, is created in righteousness and true holiness." "And have put on the new man, which is renewed in knowledge after the image of Him that created him." The writer already quoted thus pointedly puts this; "As election is the effect of God's sovereignty, our pardon the fruit of His mercy, our knowledge a stream from His wisdom, our strength an impression of His power, so our purity is a beam from His holiness."

The great, the grand end, the accomplishment of which is the design of God in our spiritual regeneration, is our restoration to holiness. Thus, God designs more than our happiness, since, in making us holy, He makes us happy; in restoring us to holiness, He restores us to happiness– the one including the other, as the effect involves its cause, the shadow its substance. God might have assimilated us to His love, or to His mercy, or to His power, or to His wisdom, and yet, leaving our nature to the uncontrolled power and dominion of its innate depravity, we still would have been miserable. But, in assimilating us to His holiness, He assimilates us, in a measure, to His happiness- the highest happiness of heaven being its highest degree of holiness. The perfection of glory is the perfection of grace, and the perfection of grace is its perfect assimilation of the soul to the holy image of God.

It will, I think, be obvious to the mind of the spiritual and intelligent reader, that in this view of the Divine holiness we include the Godhead in its Triune personality– the holiness of the Father, the holiness of the Son, the holiness of the Spirit- the Three Persons constituting the One Holy Lord God. Christ was essentially holy concerning His Deity, and He was perfectly holy concerning His humanity. How remarkable the words of the angel announcing Christ's birth to Mary! "The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the baby born to you will be holy, and he will be called the Son of God." Yes, Christ, who was "holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners," and because He was thus without sin, and "knew no sin", His atoning, precious blood, "cleanses us from all sin."

Equally holy is the Spirit. Therefore He is emphatically designated "The HOLY Spirit," "the Spirit of holiness." The Spirit is the Sanctifier of the church, the Divine Author, Sustainer, and Finisher of all that is holy in the regenerate, to whom belongs the work of fitting their souls for the inheritance of the saints in light. Hold fast with unswerving faith this essential doctrine of salvation- the doctrine of the Trinity. Its belief is essential to our being saved, its experimental acquaintance is indispensable to our being holy. And may "the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit," be with all those who believe this doctrine simply, who live it holily, and who earnestly contend for its truth as for the faith once delivered unto the saints!


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But we must conclude this subject, thus briefly and imperfectly discussed, with some deductions drawn therefrom.

It supplies us with THE REASON OF MAN'S NATURAL OPPOSITION TO GOD. The sinner hates God because He is holy! "For the sinful nature is always hostile to God. It never did obey God's laws, and it never will." Sin can never be enamored with holiness, nor can holiness ever hold fellowship with sin. There must therefore ever be– until divine and sovereign grace interpose– a wide and impassable gulf between God and the sinner, God's holiness loathing the sinner, because of his sin; man's sinfulness hating God, because of His holiness.

Can anything present a more just and melancholy view of the awful condition of the natural man than this- hating God because He is holy! Unconverted man, this is your state! Your carnal mind is hostile against God, and will continue its hatred and rebellion, unless converting grace changes you; or until your spirit stands before Him in judgment. And then you will wake up to the awful discovery that all your life long you have been fighting against God; but that it proved an unequal, as it was an unholy, contest; and that at last God proved stronger than you, and has gotten the victory; consigning you to a righteous and an endless condemnation.

In view of this statement what is your proper and immediate course? In one word would I state it- throw down your weapons of rebellion, submit and be reconciled to God. To hate this holy Lord God, whose name is love, is the deepest crime! To fight against Him who is infinite in power and omnipotent in strength, is the deepest madness. Think of the appalling consequences! Think of Him who has power to cast both soul and body into hell. Think who it is you hate and against whom you rebel– the God who made you, who preserves you, who has fed and clothed you, who has lavished upon you every blessing, who has poured in ceaseless flow, the tide of His mercy around your every path, who has never wronged you, or injured you, or done you harm, but has always blessed you with nothing but good!

And yet, instead of love, you return Him hate; instead of obedience, you meet Him with rebellion; instead of submission, you offer Him defiance; instead of His heaven, you prefer His hell! For in your present state you are utterly unfitted for heaven! It is written with the pen of the Holy Spirit, "Without holiness no man can see the Lord." Heaven, therefore, would be too holy for your enjoyment. You would have no moral fitness for the place, no sympathy with its enjoyments, no love for its inhabitants, and would long to escape as from an atmosphere too pure in which to breathe, from employments in which you would have no taste, and from the fellowship of beings with whom you had nothing in sympathy.

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Oh, fall down before God in penitence and prayer. Throw down your weapons at His feet, submit to His scepter, and cast yourself upon His pardoning mercy in and through Christ Jesus. Lo, He waits to be gracious to you. Listen to His affecting language, "All day long have I stretched out my hands." And in His infinite patience, in His unwillingness that any should perish, that hand is stretched out still. "Why! will you die? " "Be reconciled unto God."

But others of another class may scan these pages. The weeping penitent, through his blinding tears, will search for one word of promise from which he may extract assurance and hope that such a sinful, guilty soul may find forgiveness, acceptance, and salvation with this holy Lord God. Yes, there is forgiveness, there is acceptance, there is salvation, oh, humble, penitent sinner, in Christ Jesus, the Savior of sinners, for you! His blood cleanses from all sin, His righteousness justifies from all things; so that, in default of any holiness and merit in yourself, Jesus supplies you with all that God demands and that you require, and thus, in the strong language of the apostle, "You are complete in Him."

One word of caution in this connection. Beware of putting sanctification in the place of justification. Many are so doing, and the consequent effect is, they are ever striving after that which they can never in this way attain– a clear sense of their acceptance in Christ. It is not for a holiness wrought in us that God accepts us, but for a righteousness wrought outside of us; not on the ground of the Holy Spirit's work of sanctification, but on the ground of Christ's work of justification. Thus, to look at our holiness for Divine acceptance, instead of at Christ's work, is to substitute sanctification for justification, the Spirit's regenerating work for the Savior's atoning work. This will never give you peace and joy and hope, since all your own strivings after holiness- on the ground of which you are in vain looking for salvation- will prove but sad and repeated failures; while one believing sight of Christ, as "made of God unto us wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption," will bring a blissful tide of peace, joy, and assurance unto your soul. Cease, then, your strivings after holiness in order to win the favor of God; and set yourself upon the great yet simple, the mighty yet easy, work of believing- believing in Jesus- and thus, "being justified by faith, you will have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ."

And still, it must be our aim to be holy! But how is this to be attained? We cannot be holy and be of the world. We cannot be holy- it were a contradiction of terms- and live in any known sin. We cannot be holy and pamper the flesh, and love the society of the ungodly, and so walk after the course of this world. What does the apostle say? "Stop loving this evil world and all that it offers you, for when you love the world, you show that you do not have the love of the Father in you. For the world offers only the lust for physical pleasure, the lust for everything we see, and pride in our possessions. These are not from the Father. They are from this evil world."

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How earnest and touching the language of the apostle, "And so, dear Christian friends, I plead with you to give your bodies to God. Let them be a living and holy sacrifice—the kind he will accept. When you think of what he has done for you, is this too much to ask? Don't copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will know what God wants you to do, and you will know how good and pleasing and perfect his will really is." And yet again how precious his prayer for the Thessalonian saints, "Now may the God of peace make you holy in every way, and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless until that day when our Lord Jesus Christ comes again."

And is this our desire, this our aim, and this, in some degree, our real attainment? Are we hungering and thirsting after righteousness? Do we long and pant after holiness, with a deepening conviction of the "exceeding sinfulness of sin," and a growing spirit of self-loathing and sin-renunciation? Oh, then, we have the truest, the strongest evidence, that we are God's true saints, His holy ones; that we are regenerate, have passed from death unto life, and are born again from above, our bodies the temples of God, through the Spirit.

There exists not a stronger evidence- and without it, our religion is vain- of our being partakers of the Divine nature than this one- our desire and aim after sanctification of heart, leading, as it inevitably will, to holiness of life. "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God."

But in all our failures in our strivings after holiness- and failures many and sad there will be- let us repair to the "Fountain open for sin and uncleanness," and wash, constantly, daily, ceaselessly wash, and be clean. It is only thus that we shall be kept from a spirit of bondage, yes, from a spirit of despair. A simple looking off ourselves- off both our successful and our unsuccessful attempts after holiness- to Jesus, must be our constant habit, if we would walk at peace and in fellowship with God. To His atoning blood let us bring all our holy things, that they may be cleansed and purified.

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Sin taints, impurity mars, imperfection traces, all we do for God. Thus, the most holy service in which we engage, the most heavenly mind we cherish, the most spiritual and useful day we spend, needs the atoning blood of Jesus to cleanse, purify, and present it without fault, holy, and acceptable unto God, sweetly incensed with the fragrance of His own most precious merits. How expressive is the typical teaching of this truth- referring to the mitre on the head of Aaron the priest- "Aaron will wear it on his forehead, thus bearing the guilt connected with any errors regarding the sacred offerings of the people of Israel. He must always wear it so the Lord will accept the people." Exodus 28:38. Thus Christ, our true Aaron, puts away the iniquity of our holy things by the cleansing of His precious blood.

See that your holiness is evangelical. Not the holiness of human merit, not the holiness of pious duties, not the holiness of ceremonial observance, not the holiness of ritual, but the holiness of the Gospel, the holiness that flows from faith in Christ alone, from love to God, and by the grace and power of the Spirit in the soul. In a word, the holiness that springs in looking away from self in every shape, from duties of every kind, believingly, simply, unto Jesus, embodied and expressed in obedience to Christ, under the all-commanding constraint of His love.

In the light of your personal holiness, interpret all the disciplinary dealings of God. All your trials, afflictions, bereavements, adversities, are sent as corrections of your heavenly Father but to promote your profit, that you might be a partaker of His holiness. "For our earthly fathers disciplined us for a few years, doing the best they knew how. But God's discipline is always right and good for us because it means we will share in his holiness. No discipline is enjoyable while it is happening—it is painful! But afterward there will be a quiet harvest of right living for those who are trained in this way." "Then, Lord," you are ready to exclaim, "if this is the great end of Your discipline- if it be but to conform me to Your will, to expel sin from my heart, to imbue it with Your Spirit, and to mold me to Your Divine image, kindle the flame, fuel the furnace, use the flail, refine Your gold from the dross, and winnow Your wheat from the chaff- and let Your will, and not mine be done."

Anticipate the coming of the Lord, for "we know that, when He shall appear, we shall be like Him; for we shall see Him as He really is." O blissful thought, perfect and eternal freedom from sin!

"And now, may the God of peace, who brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, equip you with all you need for doing his will. May he produce in you, through the power of Jesus Christ, all that is pleasing to him. Jesus is the great Shepherd of the sheep by an everlasting covenant, signed with his blood. To him be glory forever and ever. Amen." Hebrews 13:20

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Our literature is public domain—use it in any way you desire.
No monetary donations accepted. "Freely you
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