Leadership Letter #9

Does Holiness Matter?

Recently my wife and I were out for a lunch with long-standing friends and colleague’s.  During the course of catching up on family news the musing question, “Does holiness still matter today?”gave a reflective pause to our animated conversation.  Internally, I had an immediate visceral reaction along the lines “Of Course It Matters!!!”  Now I recognize when a question pushes a button and the response is more adrenalin-driven than wisdom-driven it is likely an important question.  So important in fact, that a quick response is not appropriate, but nonetheless a response is needed, even if it for my own clarity of thinking.  
 The question also implies that holiness as a word is not much in vogue in most conversations, at least in the context in which we were talking, our adult children’s generation.  If holiness or holy are used, they are biblical words that tend towards a floating, ephemeral definition; and floating definitions may be used positively or negatively-it often depends on the context.

 The context of our children’s generation would take the broad concepts of holiness more along the lines of holiness being Doing Justice-Loving Mercy-Walking Humbly with God.  If that were the context of holiness then broadly speaking our children’s generation are deeply concerned about holiness, but in a much broader secular framework than in a religious one.  Hence justice for all sorts of social, environmental and global issues has definitely produced an activist stance.  Such a posture challenges us as Christians, because many of these social issues are not even on our radar.

Justice as a  mindset in the broader culture often appeals more to social common sense than it does to a biblically-grounded worldview.    
 What a ripe field to re-cast the Biblical narrative in a more salvation-shalom-holistic  framework using the wave of social concern to tell good news.  To do so would require of us a holiness of intent that transcends our restrictive, exclusionary propensities.  I do not think we can regain much moral high ground without getting our hands dirty with the cares of this world, including creation.

I recently read J.I. Packer’s book on holiness, Rediscovering Holiness.  While I admired Packer’s breadth of knowledge and practical insight (most of which I agreed with) the over-all sense I had from reading this good book is a dated puritanical pietism.  This is not meant as a criticism since my own internal compass of pietism is what is being exposed and described. 
 Holiness for me feels  “dated” and rooted in the past, a bit in the now, in the future only as  when-I get-to-heaven.  This is a tragedy.  Therefore, to move forward on this important topic is not by nostalgia for what was, nor an avoidance for what is; rather this requires a whole new level of creativity.  It is grappling in this area that we do not just need to innovate, but relearn how to re-frame our stereotypes concerning holiness into new patterns of character and purpose.   In a worthy to pursue way, to be holy requires of us courage to look at ourselves through the lens of scripture and then yield to the Spirits enabling.  God’s Grace, the energy that proceeds from the relationship of the Trinity, is the means of us being transformed into Christ’s likeness, a holy task.   Perhaps God is more at work to accomplish this than we realize.  It is only when we have new eyes to see and new ears to hear that the path of learning our way into the future is possible.  The globalization of our world begs for moral leadership in this important topic.  The kind of leadership like Jesus advocated, those who can serve in such a way that holiness becomes visible to one and all.  Modeling trumps telling.

During another recent conversation a life coach observed that currently the hot topics that our culture are concerned about when it comes to religion and faith are the 3 Hs, Homosexuality, Hermeneutics’, and Hell.  Homosexuality because the broader culture is more tolerant, more loving and accepting, more unconcerned about sexual orientation than the standard view of a Christian worldview.  Hermeneutics because who has the authority, the right, and the wisdom to interpret what the Bible really says?   Hell because sinners-burning-in-eternal-flames as God’s punishment for not-believing in God seems totally unlike Jesus.  Perhaps this topic of Holiness, already an alliterative serendipity, fits into this list of postmodern concerns.

All my relations……..especially, those who have gone on before me!

Lent, 2014