Moral Absolutes

The Holiness of God: Why Moral Absolutes Exist

What’s the connection between the holiness of God and moral absolutes

The holiness of God defines what is right & wrong.

God is the source and standard of goodness, and because is unchanging and eternal, these standards are unchanging and eternal.

The holiness of God refers to the absolute moral purity of God and also the absolute moral distance between God and His human creatures.

The holiness of God reveals that humans are not holy.

The holiness of God is the central marker of man’s dependence upon Him in both his lost and redeemed state.

The holiness of God exposes our spiritual poverty.

Circumcision symbolized the consequences of our sin and rebellion against God.

The holy of holies could only be entered by a proper representative who had made the proper sacrifice which would serve as a substitute on behalf of the sins of the people. (see Lev. 16)

In the New Testament, the Holy Spirit brought holiness to His people, is the mark of holiness and enables His people to participate in the holiness of God personally.

Eph 1:13.

Ephesians 1:13 ESV

In him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit,

The holiness of God is the basis for justice and mercy.

God’s holiness marks out the ethical consequences of actions, dividing righteous actions from evil actions.

Justice is an essential attribute of God, but the condition upon which justice depends to be served is the holiness of God.

God’s holiness demands that sin be punished and that mercy towards sinners be extended. This was satisfied in the atonement of Jesus.

Not all the vials of judgements that have or shall be poured out upon the wicked world, nor the flaming furnace of a sinner’s conscience, nor the irreversible sentence pronounced against the rebellious devils, nor the groans of the damned creatures, give such a demonstration of God’s hatred of sin as the wrath of God let loose upon His Son. - Stephen Charnock, “The Existence & Attributes of God.

While the mercy of God was and is underserved, it is also entirely just since the punishment and penalty for sin has been paid in full by Jesus. Divine justice was not obliterated by divine mercy, but neither was His mercy impeded by His justice.

The holiness of God is what makes immoral acts offensive

there is no such thing as morally right or wrong, says atheist, Alex Rosenberg. Individual human life is meaningless and without ultimate moral value (“The Atheist’s Guide to Reality”)

The fact that people are created in the image of God is the fundamental reason we find the mistreatment of people offensive. While not everyone acknowledges that people are made in God’s image, our offense by injustice and abuse is never-the-less grounded in the imago dei.

Gen 1:26-27.

Genesis 1:26–27 ESV

Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.

That people are created after the likeness of God, connects the nature of personhood to the holiness of God. When the image of God is violated, the holiness of God is violated. The inseparable connection between the image of God and His holiness is why there can be no moral absolutes without God, or to put it another way, moral absolutes do exist because God exists.

Truth, Freedom and Restrictions

Claims

Christians believe we have absolute truth and everyone needs to believe it and obey it.

Many believe that claiming there is absolute truth is contrived and oppressive.

Many believe that truth claims can be used to limit or even destroy freedom.

Many believe that true freedom is the absence of restrictions.

No freedom without truth or restrictions

Gal 2:4-5.

Galatians 2:4–5 ESV

Yet because of false brothers secretly brought in—who slipped in to spy out our freedom that we have in Christ Jesus, so that they might bring us into slavery— to them we did not yield in submission even for a moment, so that the truth of the gospel might be preserved for you.

We have freedom in Christ because of the truth of the gospel. In other words, freedom comes from truth.

Fish in the grass analogy

Freedom is not the absence of restrictions or the presence of restrictions, but the presence of restrictions that reflect what is true about people.