In Leviticus the law is being given.  It is important to God that his people obey his law.  So God moves to a new revelation of Himself, the Holy One, the God who wants holy people and the God who will make his people holy.  He is Jehovah-M’Kaddish, the God who sanctifies.

This name, Jehovah-M’Kaddish, is not used in English Bibles, so it is sometimes overlooked as one of God’s Jehovah names.“Sanctify yourselves therefore and be ye holy: for I am the Lord your God.  And ye shall keep my statutes, and do them: I am the Lord which sanctify you” (Lev. 20:7,8).  As he gives the law, he periodically punctuates his commands with the serious command “Be ye holy..”  (11:44; 19:2; 20:26;)

But how can that be?  Another look at the verse, shows that we ourselves have a part to do with our sanctification, but, thank God, we have his assurance that he is the sanctifier.  He is our foundation for holiness.  Paul says (I Thes. 5:23) “…the very God of peace, sanctify you holy…”

Jehovah-M’Kaddish indwells his people and empowers them to be pure in spirit, mind, and body.  The questions of when, how, who, etc. are distractions that take away from the simple fact that God wants holy people and he is willing to help them become holy.

A few years ago, I served as a volunteer chaplain at the County jail.  A newly confessed Christian there asked our chaplain how he could know for sure that he had been saved.  The chaplain replied, “give yourself a couple of weeks, and you will know” meaning if there was no change in your life then you’re not a Christian.

That comes across as harsh and crude to most of us who have been bouncing around like rubber balls trying to answer how, who, when questions.  But if a sinner becomes a new creature (as the Bible says), surely his behavior and/or attitude toward his behavior will become apparent upon his becoming a holy child of a holy God.  Jesus continually intercedes for us.  When a Christian sins, he should quickly come to Jesus, confess that sin and receive Christ’s forgiveness.  Keep clean!

There is a saying about our bringing the fish to Jesus and He will clean them.  But how does he clean them?  Isn’t it by the preaching of the Word and the modeling of Christian behavior?   Church, quit stalling; preach  and live holiness.

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