God's Will for You: Be Holy

People do not drift toward holiness. Apart from grace-driven effort, people do not gravitate toward godliness, prayer, obedience to Scripture, faith, and delight in the Lord. We drift toward compromise and call it tolerance; we drift toward disobedience and call it freedom; we drift toward superstition and call it faith. We cherish the indiscipline of lost self-control and call it relaxation; we slouch toward prayerlessness and delude ourselves into thinking we have escaped legalism; we slide toward godlessness and convince ourselves we have been liberated.

Citation: D. A. Carson, quoted in “Reflections,” Christianity Today (7-31-00)

I’ve titled this Sermon, “God’s Will for You: BE HOLY” and the way we will be dissecting our passage is by answering three questions.

What? - What is God’s will for the believer?

Why? - Why should believers pursue Holiness?

How? - How do believers abstain from sexual immorality?

Let us pray for God’s guidance as we begin.

I’ve often asked God for his will for my life. Wanting to know at different times things like who I will marry, what career to pursue, where to live, etc… Perhaps you’ve done the same. God’s will is sometimes hard to discern but then we read passages of scripture like ours today and find it to be quite clear.

WHAT is God’s will for the believer?

God’s will for the believer is:

To pursue Holiness

To abstain from Sexual Immorality

This is what he desires for His chosen people. Before we dig into our passage, we have to spend sometime with these terms, Holiness and Sexual Immorality. If Paul is saying God’s will for me is to be Holy, we need to know what that means?

Holiness & Sanctification

The word Holy and Sanctification in our passage are actually the same greek word “hagiasmos” so the bible uses Holy and Sanctified referring to the same greek word which means to be set apart. There are two sides to the concept of Holiness in the Bible. There is our STATUS of being Holy where God has declared us Holy and righteous, he has set us apart from the world because of Christ’s payment on the cross. Christ has paid our debt and we are now declared not guilty, free from condemnation, AND we are now called new creation, co-heirs with Christ, ambassadors for God. He has set us apart as His chosen people, in doing so we can say that He has made us Holy, we are now set apart by Him. Paul uses this kind of language to describe believers, for example in 1 Corinthians 6:9-11

1 Corinthians 6:9–11 ESV

9 Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, 10 nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. 11 And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.

Paul is writing to believers and saying that you were dead to sin, but in Christ you are now washed, and SANCTIFIED. In Christ we have a new status of Holy because he declares us Holy.

This truth, has lead to a modern heresy of “let go and let God” meaning, that we have a passive role in sanctification. That’s not accurate because there is the other use of the word “hagiasmos” and that is to pursue Holiness or sanctification.

Wayne Grudem has a helpful illustration in regards to Sanctification.

At the point of conversion, we begin to be sanctified, meaning we grow in Christian Maturity. Paul in his writing talks about growing in maturing, for example in Colossians 3:10

Colossians 3:10 ESV

10 and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator.

When we are born again, meaning we have placed our faith in Christ for salvation, we are BEING RENEWED. This is an ongoing activity and one that we can’t sit idly by. Hebrews 12:14

Hebrews 12:14 ESV

14 Strive for peace with everyone, and for the holiness without which no one will see the Lord.

We are to strive for Holiness.

You see, we have a human responsibility in sanctification. This is the PROCESS use of the word where we pursue holiness. It is both/and, we are made Holy when we place our faith in Christ for salvation and we pursue Holiness as His chosen people set apart from the world. We bring Glory to our God and King when we act like His chosen holy people by not being like the world. We set ourselves apart by devoting our selves to God and His desires. We set ourselves apart by not following the course of the world, but instead following the instructions of our King and fulfilling His desire of bringing the good news of the gospel to all people and living in holiness.

Going back to the image from Grudem, in that middle section you’ll notice that the line goes up and down, meaning, we sometimes make some progress in growing in the likeness of Christ and sometimes we fall back, but if you look at the trajectory, it is an upward trajectory until we see our Lord face-to-face.

We should have that trajectory in our lives, when we look back to our Christian Walk we should be able to see how we have grown in maturity and in Christlikeness. Let me encourage you to to reflect on this by considering your faith has permeated every area of your life. The way you treat your children or your parents, your work ethic as an employee.

This is God’s desire for you, to be Holy. Know that he has declared you His, set apart, Holy, and that he wants you to pursue holiness.

Sexual Immorality

Paul gives us one example of pursuing holiness and that’s by abstaining from sexual immorality. It is interesting that up to this point we have seen so much praise from Paul to this church. 1 Thess. 1:7-8

1 Thessalonians 1:7–8 ESV

7 so that you became an example to all the believers in Macedonia and in Achaia. 8 For not only has the word of the Lord sounded forth from you in Macedonia and Achaia, but your faith in God has gone forth everywhere, so that we need not say anything.

They are exemplary Christians and out of all the examples he could have used to drive home the idea of being Sanctified, he makes a point to mention sexual immorality. What is sexual immorality? I know this topic can be a sensitive for many reasons but what better place to learn about sexuality than from God’s own word.

I understand that this topic could bring about some significant feelings for many of you. Feelings of anger, or fear, or shame, but know this, God can and does redeem us from these things when we confess them to Him. He takes the shame and guilt. Our God is so gracious that you can bring your anger and bitterness to Him and he does not condemn you for it , and my goal is not to single out anyone, but to point us to God for redemption, of which we ALL need.

Just like we did for Holiness, let us build a working definition of Sexual Immorality which is pretty simple really. The word for Sexual Immorality is “porneia” which means fornication from which we get our word for Pornography. When the Bible talks about Sexual Immorality it is talking about sexual activity that is not pleasing to God, this includes, sexual activities outside of marriage between non-married people (fornication) or someone who is married and having an affair with someone else (adultery). These activities are often mentioned in scripture alongside other evil deeds.

1 Corinthians 6:9–10 ESV

This is the opposite of being Holy, but notice how all of these things are listed together and this isn’t the only time this happens, sexual immorality is often found in within a very similar list like this one in scripture.

Why would Paul choose to mention this? There is no evidence that this church was struggling with sexual immorality from anywhere else in this letter. Why mention it at all?

“The Thessalonian Christians lived in a world where people did not see fornication as a sin, but as part of normal life.”

Morris, L. (1984). 1 and 2 Thessalonians: An introduction and commentary (Vol. 13, p. 79). InterVarsity Press.

This is not so different from us today. Our society encourages sexual laxity. Things like the hook-up culture we are living in or the promotion of homosexuality as a practice to be not only accepting but a promoter of it, or the high number of porn users and downloads in our country are all things that I’m sure most of us if not all us have had some interaction with. Sexual Immorality is not hard to define really, we all know and understand what God has called sin but knowing does not translate to doing, which is why I think Paul makes note of it here.

WHY should believers pursue Holiness?

So we have defined the what, but let us put on our child-like hats and ask “but why!” Let us know dig into our text and see all that it has for us and answer the question why?

We pursue Holiness to PLEASE God

1 Thessalonians 4:1 “1 Finally, then, brothers, we ask and urge you in the Lord Jesus, that as you received from us how you ought to walk and to please God, just as you are doing, that you do so more and more.”

Paul says, Finally, but technically he still has 2 chapters left, all of chapter 4 and 5! This word finally can be treated more like a transition word than a concluding thought. This part of the letter is a transition from Paul reminding and encouraging the church for their example, he reminds them of how the apostles came to nurture their faith, he reminds them how their church was established through their ministry and how he is filled with joy to hear of it growing, and now, we transition in this book to Paul exhorting the church. So when he says finally, it’s not because he is done but because he has finished with the praise and moving into exhortation.

We pursue holiness to please God, everyone pleases someone, many live to please themselves but as believers we realize that our lives receives a higher calling from God and we also like Paul say, Philippians 3:7-8

Philippians 3:7–8 ESV

7 But whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. 8 Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ

Our desire to please God comes from the surpassing worth of knowing Christ. (he is more precious than anything else)

I remember in college my parents saying to me often, when we die there won’t be much for you and your brother from us, but what we will give you is an education. My parents paid for my college and I had other family members and church members help without prompting from us who helped me attend bible college and graduate debt free. I purposed myself to do well in my classes because I knew the sacrifice my parents, family members and church were making and I wanted my work to be pleasing to them. Perhaps you have a similar experience where someone stood up for you or got you out of a tough spot, you know what it’s like to want to show your thankfulness to them by pleasing them or doing something for them. How much more should we desire to please our God when we know and understand the price of our redemption.

We pursue holiness to please God.

We pursue Holiness to OBEY God

1 Thessalonians 4:2-3 “2 For you know what instructions we gave you through the Lord Jesus. 3 For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you abstain from sexual immorality;”

The New King James and New American Standard Bible replace the word instructions for commandments. The greek word there actually means “charge” which is a military word. The apostles had given a charge or command to the church to walk in a manner that pleases God. When we walk in manner that pleases God we walk according to the authority of Scripture, which are our marching orders. The church already had their orders, Paul did not write to them to reveal new instructions for the church, they had all they needed to obey and please God.

Think of that Sunday School song, “I am in the Lord’s Army” (yes sir!). That’s right! We are all members of the Lord’s army and we have our marching orders. We are to be Christ’s ambassadors (2 Corinthians 5:20), we are to make disciples of all nations (Matthew 28:19).

Being part of the Lord’s army means fulfilling the will of the one who called us to himself. Pauls says in 2 Timothy 2:4

2 Timothy 2:4 ESV

4 No soldier gets entangled in civilian pursuits, since his aim is to please the one who enlisted him.

We want to please our God and we do so by obeying and fulfilling his will and this is God’s will for us, to be sanctified and to abstain from sexual immorality. We’ve defined these terms already but here Paul introduces them in this letter. Our obedience is demonstrated in these acts. These are serious things for us to obey. Look at how serious the believer should take sexual immorality.

Ephesians 5:3–6 ESV

3 But sexual immorality and all impurity or covetousness must not even be named among you, as is proper among saints. 4 Let there be no filthiness nor foolish talk nor crude joking, which are out of place, but instead let there be thanksgiving. 5 For you may be sure of this, that everyone who is sexually immoral or impure, or who is covetous (that is, an idolater), has no inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God. 6 Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience.

These are serious words! These things must not be named among saints! Paul also gives instructions as to how we should treat someone who is called a believer but living in this sin.

1 Corinthians 5:9–11 ESV

9 I wrote to you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral people— 10 not at all meaning the sexually immoral of this world, or the greedy and swindlers, or idolaters, since then you would need to go out of the world. 11 But now I am writing to you not to associate with anyone who bears the name of brother if he is guilty of sexual immorality or greed, or is an idolater, reviler, drunkard, or swindler—not even to eat with such a one.

Don’t even share a meal with these people!

I want to point out that both of these passages are pointing out how serious it is for someone within the church to be living this way unrepentantly, this is not the instruction for how we should treat non-believers. Jesus ate with evil people with the purpose of bring the message of salvation to them, but he used very different language for example with the pharisees who were not pleasing God. we are to take our sexual purity very seriously by obeying our Lord and King.

We pursue Holiness to GLORIFY God

1 Thessalonians 4:4-5 “4 that each one of you know how to control his own body in holiness and honor, 5 not in the passion of lust like the Gentiles who do not know God;”

Do you see the contrast between the follower of Christ and the Gentiles (those who are not following Christ). As his holy people, set apart, we bring glory to the Father in not following the course of this world. We bring glory and honor by being different from the the world and that entails a clean break from sexual immorality.

The charge in verse 4 is to know how to control your own body. Our bodies our described in the bible also as God’s vessel. 2 Timothy 2:20-21

2 Timothy 2:20–21 ESV

20 Now in a great house there are not only vessels of gold and silver but also of wood and clay, some for honorable use, some for dishonorable. 21 Therefore, if anyone cleanses himself from what is dishonorable, he will be a vessel for honorable use, set apart as holy, useful to the master of the house, ready for every good work.

God is glorified through us when we are most useful to him. We are most useful to Him when we surrender and bring our sins to Him and ask for forgiveness and no longer practice sins of sexual immorality like the those mentioned already. We must not fall into the passion of lust. Interesting enough, we move from the practice of these activities to lust.

It is possible to obey God and not bring Him glory! I think of Jonah after he obeyed God and Nineveh repented Jonah was upset, he did not bring glory to God when he saw God act in the miracle of bringing a whole town to repentance. Although he obeyed Him, Jonah did not bring glory to God. May we not be this way, our thoughts and the desires of the heart are not to be taken lightly, we need to bring those to Him as well. Keeping those thoughts and immoral desires to yourself while practicing obedience is not what brings Him glory. That being said, God can and does use imperfect people to do His work, but our desire to pursue Holiness as He commands, should also be rooted in our desire to bring Him complete glory, and we do so by presenting ourselves as useful vessels (bodies) in the hands of the our God.

We pursue Holiness to ESCAPE JUDGEMENT from God

We arrive to the end of our passage with a warning

1 Thessalonians 4:6-8 “6 that no one transgress and wrong his brother in this matter, because the Lord is an avenger in all these things, as we told you beforehand and solemnly warned you. 7 For God has not called us for impurity, but in holiness. 8 Therefore whoever disregards this, disregards not man but God, who gives his Holy Spirit to you.”

“that no one transgress and wrong his brother in this matter” there is no sexual sin that does not wrong someone else. Whether that be pornography or casual hook-ups or the practice of homosexuality, God’s word teaches us that these practices result in wronging someone else other than just yourself. I’ve heard people when confronted about sins of this matter respond, “that’s between me and God” NO IT’S NOT! It affects the parent or parents of the person you are committing the acts with. It involves the children or spouse of the person you are committing these acts with. It involves your church family as we are called to keep each other accountable. This kind of sin is not an “only me” sin, it it wronging against others as well. Do not be deceived by this narrative from the world, let us be different so that we may escape the judgment that is to come. Paul here gives a bit of a foreshadowing of what’s coming later in this letter about the coming of our Lord but He mentions it here for us to consider. We do not need to avenge ourselves, you have a father who will avenge you when He brings judgement to those who reject Him and commit these sins. Our warning is to abstain from these activities and let God be our avenger.

There are two prepositions in these last verses that are telling of our identity, both found in 1Thessalonians 4:7 “7 For God has not called us for impurity, but in holiness.”

The contracts between impurity and holiness is pretty obvious, impurity being the opposite of Holy, but notice the prepositions. For and In. We are not called for impurity. God has not set us apart to do acts of impurity. Whereas, Paul says we are called to in holiness, this is a state of being, not an activity. Notice the difference? For example, if it said, for holiness, we would conclude that we do holy acts, but because it says IN holiness, we conclude that we have been given a state of holiness, that is, we have been set apart by our Heavenly Father. Similarly, it doesn’t say that we are not called by God to be in impurity, but it says for impurity. These two small words I think carry the most hopeful message for the believer who is struggling with sexual immorality. The God who has called you, who has saved you, does consider you acts a change of your status, they are acts of offense that must be dealt with, but they are not acts of that lead to relinquishment. The God who has called you to be Holy sustains you and keeps you, your acts of sin against him, although have consequences, if you are a true believer who is bringing your struggles to with a desire to please, obey, and glorify God, he does not leave you out to dry, you remain His child. God has not called us for impurity, but has called us IN holiness!

Those who disregard or reject this command of pursuing holiness, is not rejecting Paul, they are rejecting God Himself. God in His mercy made a way for us, a sinful group of people not deserving of His grace. He paid the price and then sent the Holy Spirit to us and continues to give us the Holy Spirit, it dwells in us and when someone comes to faith, their are sealed by the Holy Spirit. Our God did not do such a marvelous work of saving us through the cross to then not engage with us. He is still active today.

This is what God commands of His people, to be Holy and to Abstain from Sexual immorality. We pursue Holiness because we should desire to please our Savior, we should want to obey our King, we bring Glory to our Heavenly Father in acting like His children, and we have a hope of Him bringing eternal justice and bringing us home to be with Him.

We have looked at the What, the Why but we have the How left. How are we to have any hope of pursuing Holiness when we know that we are prone to wander from His command. How are we to defend ourselves from the desire of the flesh, or the temptation to fall into the narrative of our society? How are we to fight the battle of porn addiction or of lust? How do we do it. I just made an argument that it is not a “let go and let God” situation, where we have a passive role in our sanctification. Our passage gives us a the how.

HOW are believers to abstain from Sexual Immorality?

Before we look at it, let me say that this isn’t a quick fix kind of answer to your sin. If you are struggling with homosexuality, or with an addiction to porn, or with having lustful thoughts. Our passage gives us the strategy to defend ourselves and it can help you today to win the battle of this kind of sin, but it also has the potential to kill the sin as I have experienced this myself and I know many of you have as well.

The How is found in 1 Thessalonians 4:4-5 “4 that each one of you know how to control his own body in holiness and honor, 5 not in the passion of lust like the Gentiles who do not know God;”

What’s the difference between those who are “in holiness” and those who reject God and are living in sin? They DO NOT KNOW GOD! Now I know what you are thinking, there have been seminary professors, and evangelical pastors who have come out as those who have been living in this sin. You could say, “they know God and are living in sin!” It is true, I think of the list of pastors from the Southern Baptist Convention who have been guilty of sins like these who probably hold master degrees in theology and they probably read the Bible every day and the same for the theologians who live in unrepentant sin. To that I say the following with as much humility as I can demonstrate and with the authority of scripture, they do not know God.

The only response a person can have when they understand and experience the Love of God is a desire to follow Him, to please Him, to obey Him, and to bring Him glory! Not that we don’t fail, we do, but we must not live IN sin, we must confess it to Him, we must seek out help from others when needed. You see as we grow in the knowledge of God, our love for Him should grow and our hatred for sin should also increase.

Let us conclude by asking one more question: know what about God? The following three concepts we should know about God come from an article written by John Piper on the subject of sexual purity.

Know the patience of God

Know the power of God

Know the preciousness of God

As you pursuing Holiness and grow to know God more, may you know that God is patient. We mentioned the story of Jonah, do you remember what Jonah said to God when God forgave Nineveh? Jonah 4:2

Jonah 4:2 ESV

2 And he prayed to the Lord and said, “O Lord, is not this what I said when I was yet in my country? That is why I made haste to flee to Tarshish; for I knew that you are a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and relenting from disaster.

God is patient with us and we can experience His patience when we turn to Him for reconciliation from our sin.

Know the power of God

Job 42:2 - “I know that you can do all things, and that no purpose of yours can be thwarted.

Ps 33:9 - For he spoke, and it came to be; he commanded, and it stood firm.

Ps 135:6 - Whatever the Lord pleases, he does, in heaven and on earth, in the seas and all deeps.

Is 43:13 - Also henceforth I am he; there is none who can deliver from my hand; I work, and who can turn it back?”

We also see Jesus doing all kinds of miracles and nature obeying His command. Those are demonstrations of His omnipotence and of His ability to forgive. Like in Mark 2:5-7 when Jesus says to the paralytic, “your sins are forgive” and the scribes doubt His ability, Jesus then response with healing the paralytic. Know that our God is powerful!

Lastly, know that preciousness of God

Paul knew God’s preciousness as we read in Philippians. David also knew God this way, when he writes Psalm 16:11

Psalm 16:11 ESV

11 You make known to me the path of life; in your presence there is fullness of joy; at your right hand are pleasures forevermore.

Knowing God is knowing how precious it is to have access to our creator, it is experiencing the fullness of joy and the hope of an eternal life with Him.

So church, let us seek sexual purity and pursue Holiness with all of our might by knowing God’s patience, power and preciousness.

Let us pray

“Lord, give us one pure and holy passion. Give us one magnificent obsession. Give us one glorious ambition for our lives: to know and follow hard after you… “

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