Week 2 – Normalizing Holiness

What if the key to a thriving marriage isn’t fixing our spouse—but becoming whole ourselves? Tune in Sunday as we unpack what holiness really means and how it might affect you in powerful ways! EASY TO GIVE at Harmony, text any amount to (859) 459-0316 to get started (or give online @ my.harmonychurch.cc/give ). Get the fill in the blank bulletins my.harmonychurch.cc/bulletins. OPENING ILLUSTRATION: There are things I wish people would have told me about relationships before getting married - it’s the kind of stuff you never see in a RomCom… Like, no one ever told me that you are laying on your back playing with your baby - you know, doing the little airplane mode and that that baby had just eaten that you ARE going to get puked on.  And maybe a little bit of it is going to go into your mouth…  uck…  And not one tells you that when you call for your spouse that she’s going to grab the phone to take a picture instead of helping you…  Lol… No one warns you when you get pregnant with a kid that you are going to not sleep for the REST of your life! There’s no way of knowing when you are dating if the guy you are dating is the kind of monster who squeezes the toothpaste from the middle of the tube or not… Rom-coms don’t tell us the whole story when it comes to relationships.  -What do you do when the man you married is shut off and emotionless -What do you do when she nags at you and never sees the good you’ve done -what do you do when you wish there was someone else or you’d made a different decision What do you do when your whole story finally comes into focus and all you see are holes? b First, let me say, there is hope for you… Don’t give up, every good thing is hard…  b But if we are going to go from holes to whole, we are going to have to learn some things no one told us about relationships. There is this thing I want to bring up in a moment, but I need to debug it a bit because most of us have grown up with a picture of the word Here’s the word, are you ready for it? Holy What’s the picture when you hear someone say holy? -for some of you it’s a priest or someone who doesn’t ever do anything fun -some of you it’s a woman in a floral print button-down shirt, with a jean skirt on and a bible in her hand again, someone you perceive to not have any fun Telling someone to “be Holy” is the linguistic equivalent of telling someone to eat their vegetables in our culture. I need you to get a picture of that word in your mind so we can destroy it and rebuild it… 1 Peter 1:15-16 15 But just as he who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do;16 for it is written: “Be holy, because I am holy.”[a] Holiness is looking more like God than the world around you… I think the best way to put holiness is Holiness is wholeness… Holiness is when we walk and look so much like God that people see a reflection of Him in everything we do. ILLUSTRATION: What inevitably happens when someone hears a sermon is we think of someone who needs to hear it.  It’s kind of natural - we see others' weaknesses so much easier than our own - because if we had to live in full view of our own incapabilities we’d be crushed most of the time… Today, I’m going to ask you to do something to get beyond the Rom-Com way of thinking our world has handed down to us. b I’m going to ask you to stop thinking about your spouse and the holes they have and start thinking about what YOU need to be whole. b What would it look like for you to become holy? Because here’s what Holy offers… -Holy gives you a sense of your value that isn’t dependent on someone else telling you are worth something -Holy offers forgiveness that doesn’t justify your faults but redeems them -Holy dives into a deep lasting love that restores and conditions your heart to be gracious -Holy gives peace when chaos reigns I want to just for a few minutes take you into a passage and help you see something there that I hope will start to unlock how you can be holy like God is holy… Paul, in the book of Galatians, is describing what it looks like when we live apart from the holiness of God and what it looks like when we live in the Holiness of God - what comes out of us… Listen Galatians 5:19-26 19 The acts of the flesh are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery; 20 idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions 21 and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God. ILLUSTRATION: I’ve been a Christian long enough to know when I’m walking in the “flesh” if you don’t understand what he means by that, he means you're going back to the way of life that lived like there was no God.  For me, I can literally feel it in the way I think about people and talk to them - if I’m being super honest with you - I’m going to use a word that is not very church appropriate - I’m a butthole...  I am all these things that Paul is talking about.  My mind goes towards whatever will make me feel good without care for others unless they help me..  Honestly, it’s pretty dark for me… but listen to what Paul says the person who is living in God’s Holiness has: 22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. 24 Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. 25 Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit. 26 Let us not become conceited, provoking and envying each other. b How many of you would love a spouse that leads with love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control? b Let me ask a different question… How many of you want to BE that spouse? I mean really deep down in your bones, you’d do whatever you could to be that person? A person who is living centered on love, joy, peace, etc. is a whole person - wholly holy. b So, how do you get those things?  Do I just need to try harder?  Be a better person?  Is that the answer? CLOSING ILLUSTRATION: I think I’ve shared this story before but when I first came to know Jesus, I was trying really hard to stop cussing.  I had a mouth worse than a sailor's.  I was praying because I just kept failing trying to be good and thankfully Jesus spoke to me and I was tuned in to listen because He said to me “Stop focusing on your sin and focus on me, I’m the one who takes away sin”.  I stopped caring about if I cussed or not, I just wanted to know Jesus more than I knew anything.   I want to have them put up the end of that scripture again: 24 Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. 25 Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit. How do you get the fruit of the Spirit? You die to your old life that led to trash and you learn to step with the Spirit of God… What would it look like for you to walk into your home after church today, and when things get tense because you remember the mess or the bills or he acts like he didn’t hear a word that was said in the sermon instead of responding, what if you just paused and said: “God, where are you right now, cause I want to step with you.” I’ll tell you where He is, He’s going to be in love, He’s going to be in joy, kindness, etc. Step with the Spirit - Walk with Him, where He walks and you will end up walking right into Holiness… ------------------