Doctrine #21: Holy

God is Holy. What does "Holy" mean? In the New Testament, the Greek word was Strong's #40 - hagios. It meant "a most holy thing" and was even translated as the word "saint". Ultimately, "holy" means "of one substance". This was the cause, the effect of this definition is that the "holy" thing is "clean and pure". Notice, using "clean and pure" doesn't do this definition justice because we use the words "clean and pure" for something that still has even the smallest amount of impurity. When you use the word "clean" do you mean that there isn't any dirt at all, even microscopically? Here was another verse that helps us understand the extent to which God is "Holy"...

The disciple John's main message was that God is light and in Him there is no darkness/obscurity/impurity AT all, not even one atom that is different from the rest of God! This is why it is impossible for God to lie. He doesn't have the causes in Him that would result in the effect of lying...not even one atom that is not the same substance as the rest of God. If God could lie, then He would be unclean and un-pure, and if He was unclean AT all, then He would not be Holy; He would not be God. This would be contradictory! God cannot have contradictions. Man can attempt to live with contradictions because man is wrong.

The word for saints in this passage was Strong's #40 - hagios. These were purified believers who had died. It appears that all uncleanness is removed from those who are saints. These believers had faith and pleased God. They thought like God. Do you have the faith to believe that God could raise people from the dead? It was not only Jesus that was risen from the dead, it was these other believers. In fact, we all have an opportunity to be raised from the dead; we have a choice in this life if we are going to be a part of God's causes, as these believers were. We have seen this begins as our responsibility, specifically with whether we choose to think like God or not. Let's look at the Old Testament passage that explained this veil in the temple...

The veil separated the holy place from the most holy place. In this passage, the Hebrew word for "holy" was Strong's #6944 - qodesh. It meant "sacred", "separated". The root of this word was Strong's #6942 - qadash, which meant to be clean... pure. Now we can see why this was translated as "holy". The implication being that it was set apart from everything else because it was more pure and more clean than the regular pure and clean place.

The demons called Jesus "the Holy One of God". The demons blatantly asked Jesus a WHAT question. They were asking Jesus for understanding because they didn't have understanding. Demons only have facts and experience, this is what we learned about animal thinking. Their belief did not create with a HOW/WHY, it is only focused on WHAT/facts. No wonder their second question was in regards to their survival!

The Bible called God's Spirit "the Holy Spirit". David spoke a revelatory word that was wisdom. This was rhema. Clearly, this word was holy because it was from the Holy Spirit.

The Bible called the angels that come with Jesus "the holy angels". God is totally clean and pure, so these angels must be clean and pure as well. Look at what Jesus said about His words in that passage.

Herod recognized John the Baptist was a holy man. If you look at the story of John's life, it may not seem that he had lived the life that we would consider glamourous. He lived out in the wilderness, wore goat hair for underwear, and ate locusts and wild honey. He must have been physically dirty, but he was spiritually pure and clean. Again, this spoke more to how John the Baptist thought than his appearance. Clearly, God looks on the inside, not the appearance as man does. God's measures are much different than man's measures.