I Am a Saint (2)

We are continuing to look at our identity, where do we value from. How should we see ourselves.

We are sinners; at our core we are totally depraved.

If all we ever speak of is how we are sinful, how is it that we obtain a positive view of ourselves.

Some say it’s all depressing thinking of how we are sinful.

2 Corinthians 5:14-17

We have died to sin

Making us free to live for Jesus.

Therefore, you are now a new creation in Jesus.

Biblical terms for this is a saint.

You Are A Saint

If someone approached us and called us a saint, we might fall out of our chair.

Some have wrongfully elevated the term of saint to those who are super power Christians. This isn’t right.

Paul writing the whole church in Philippi writes:

Philippians 1:1 ESV

1 Paul and Timothy, servants of Christ Jesus, To all the saints in Christ Jesus who are at Philippi, with the overseers and deacons:

These aren’t super power Christians. They are Christian, who are new creations, and whom God sees as saints.

What is a Saint?

The Greek word is i-oo-s. Meaning to be separated, set apart.

The fundamental idea is being separated to the service of God.

Simply put a saint is one who is holy.

Once again, we might fight against that saying, “the pastor is called to be holy, maybe some of the others…not me.”

Old Covenant View on Holiness

Let’s look in the Old Testament and see what God has to say about holiness.

Isaiah 6

v.1-5

Isaiah’s reaction is one of Awe, one of fear!

I AM UNDONE!!

He recognizes the holiness of God, and that he isn’t.

How many people don’t see this today. That God is holy…that we are undeserving to come into His presence.

We are lacking a fear of the Lord.

v.6-7

Isaiah recognizes his sin, and the distance that is between him and God because of it.

We symbolically see here, Isaiah’s sins being atoned for. Making it so He could be in the presence of God.

This, is what Jesus has done for us.

Atoned for our sins, so we are clean and can be in the presence of the holy.

You who are unworthy, if you are in Christ, have been made into a new creation, that can have fellowship with God.

We are to reveal who we serve

Leviticus 19:1–2 ESV

1 And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, 2 “Speak to all the congregation of the people of Israel and say to them, You shall be holy, for I the Lord your God am holy.

Israel being God’s people, were supposed to show the glory of God to the rest of the world.

They were to be holy, separated, distinct.

This was the point of the civil law that God had given them.

So they wouldn’t be like the nations around them.

New Covenant View on Holiness

Fast forward to after the cross.

We read already that we are a new creation in Christ Jesus.

1 Peter 1:14–16 ESV

14 As obedient children, do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance, 15 but as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, 16 since it is written, “You shall be holy, for I am holy.”

We looked at last week how we are called to be obedient children.

We are not to be conformed to our former ignorance.

You are a new creation, don’t get sucked into the stuff that your old self would fall into.

Even though you are a new creation the desire to sin will still be within you so you will need to war against it, but through Christ you will be able to conquer.

v.15

God is holy, our conduct is to be holy.

Because we are set apart for God, we are being sanctified and thus we are holy.

Realizing you are a saint is definitional in your life!!

The very fact that God has set us apart makes us holy.

Because we are set apart by God, if we do not live as people who are set apart, we contradict the very essence of what God has called us to be.

Realizing you are a saint is definitional in your life!!

To live as someone who is holy, to live as a new creation, we must adapt the lifestyle of dying to ourselves and living to God. We must turn from our idols and follow the one true God!!

Some believers have the mindset, “it’s alright for the pastor to be holy, but I really don’t have to be.”

1 Peter 2:4–5 ESV

4 As you come to him, a living stone rejected by men but in the sight of God chosen and precious, 5 you yourselves like living stones are being built up as a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.

When we are in Christ, we are now a holy priesthood.

All of us are priests!! All of us have been set aside. All of us have access to the very presence of the living God; through Jesus now that the veil has been torn down.

Their is no double tier standard, where some Christians are saints and have greater access.

We are all saints when we are in Christ.

This Week:

Don’t get pulled into your former way of thinking.

You are a saint if you know Jesus, you must live like it.