Holiness

Isaiah 6:1-8; Exodus 15:11; 1 Samuel 2:2; 1 Peter 1:15-16; Revelation 15:4

If you were to name the top five people in the Old Testament (OT) based on their impact and influence, who would you choose? The top three should probably include Moses, Abraham, and David, and probably in that order. But who would the next ones be? If you were to ask for my opinion, I would probably choose Isaiah.

Isaiah wrote the fourth longest book in the Bible and the third longest prophetic book, second only to Jeremiah and Ezekiel. More importantly, the New Testament (NT) quotes or refers to Isaiah’s writing a lot. Christ quoted from Isaiah more than any other OT book besides Psalms, and Paul quoted from Isaiah more than any other OT book, period. Altogether, Christ and the NT apostles refer to 42 of the 66 chapters in this book.

In many ways, Isaiah was a lot like us. God has blessed him with access to a good education, a family (a wife and two sons), a good job (as a historian and record keeper in the royal court and palace of Jerusalem), and close access to important people, such as the kings of Israel. He also lived a long and productive life, both humanly and spiritually.

Of his book of prophecy, called “Isaiah,” one commentator (James Smith) calls it “the Mount Everest of Prophetic Literature” due to it’s grand and majestic descriptions of God.

This book gives two important, closely related messages. First, Isaiah urged people to repent from their arrogance, idolatry, injustice, self-reliance, and sinful ways and turn to God in faith and trust. Second, he announced and explained how God would provide the world with a Savior who would save them from their sins and provide a righteous and everlasting kingdom for his people.

From Isaiah’s experience, it seemed (as it does for us today) that whether in positions of power or not, all people were sinful and unreliable for good. Of the kings that he knew and served, there were four – Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah. Jotham and Ahaz were bad kings who disregarded God’s ways and led Israel in a selfish, unjust way. Hezekiah began well, but disobeyed God in some serious ways later in life. And Uzziah, he also began well but became arrogant later in life. As a result, he disobeyed God in a significant way, to which God responded by giving him leprosy and requiring him to relinquish is kingship to live in a leper colony for his final years.

Another problem at that time was that the growing, powerful Assyrian Empire invading and taking over nations and they were nearing Israel, threatening to take over Israel, as well. This would mean the destruction of the northern part of their nation, taking Israelites away into slavery, financial devastation, and more. Eventually, another empire, the Babylonians, would do the same to the southern part of their nation where Isaiah lived.

That’s where the passage we are focusing on today begins, “in the year that King Uzziah died” (Isa 6:1). From what we can tell, Isaiah had a close relationship with King Uzziah and was personally impacted by his death. When we read Isa 6:1-8, we’re reading about a moment much like what you may be experiencing today. You are living a generally good and comfortable life. But you are increasingly grieved and saddened by the failures, sins, and injustice of people around you – and even those who you once considered close are dying and going away. And you are saddened – perhaps even frightened – by the rising turmoil, violence, and warfare in the world. Who can you turn to? Who can you trust?

When people go away or let you down, you realize then more than ever that you need someone to turn to, someone to trust in who will never let you down, who is entirely reliable, and who is greater than anyone else you know. That person is the Lord.
In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord. (Isa 6:1)

Today we are focusing on hearts on a quality of God that we dearly need to understand – that God is holy. What does it mean to be holy, and how should the holiness of God affect our lives today?

To be holy is to be set apart – transcendent.

When people use the word holy today, it’s ironic that they often use the word in a flippant way which I will not repeat for you. But people also know that the word is a generally religious word, one that many associate with a careful, strict lifestyle, focusing largely on how a person will not participate in a variety of what may be sinful or worldly behaviors.
But the word holy is so much more beautiful and impressive than that. It’s a difficult word to describe well, but the best way I can describe it for you today is to say that it means something like “majestic morality.” It describes someone who is so good and so unique – so different and better than anyone else – that it blows your mind.

What moments in your life have been most mind-blowing to you? For me, the answer would include experiences like my wedding day, holding my own child for the first time, viewing New York City from the Empire State Building, and looking out over the Grand Canyon or the brim of Mount St. Helens. But how would these experiences compare to seeing God? That’s the thing. They don’t even come close.

That’s what the word transcendent means. It means that something is so far superior to other things that it doesn’t even come close. And that’s what holiness means. It means “to be set apart.” It means that something is different, very different, in a very good way. It means something is so much better, so much more impressive, so much more amazing, and so much more wonderful than anything else you could imagine.

For Isaiah, this would have meant that when compared to the kings of Israel, including the better ones like King Uzziah, God was so much better, so much more wonderful, so much more amazing in every way. But it took Uzziah dying and going away for Isaiah to understand this.

Let me ask you, what good and special people are standing in the way of you seeing God for who he really is? Who do you respect, who do you love, who do you look to, who do you look up to more than God? For some, that person may be a close relative, a close friend, a celebrity personality, a spiritual leader, an exemplary person or influencer, or even a government official – as it was for Isaiah. But then he saw the Lord and let me tell you what – seeing the Lord changed his life forever.

Holiness describes God’s nature – his majesty and purity.

Let’s look closely at what Isaiah saw when he saw the Lord.

I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lifted up… (6:1)

Isaiah saw the Lord sitting on a throne, a symbol of kingly, royal authority and power, revealing his sovereignty over all things. How do you feel when you are brought into the presence of an important, popular, or powerful person? How would you feel if you were brought into the throne room of God?

and the train of His robe filled the temple. (6:1)

He also saw a royal robe (or train) filling the throne room. At that time, the size and length of a king’s royal robe served as a symbol of his majesty and greatness – the bigger the more impressive. It would have been richly decorated and have a distinctive royal border. In this case, Isaiah says God’s robe didn’t just lay around the base of the throne or run down the length of the steps to the throne. His throne filled the entire throne room. Wow. Not only was this impressive, but it also meant that no one else could enter that room because there was no space for anyone else to stand there.

Above it stood seraphim; each one had six wings: with two he covered his face, with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. (6:2)

So, while no one could stand in the throne room, Isaiah did notice other angelic beings there. He describes them as “seraphs,” which means “fiery ones.” Their appearance was blazing, fiery, and full of light – and they positioned themselves above the throne rather than on the ground. They flew, it seemed, above the throne, perhaps like a swarm of hummingbirds. Each had six wings – using two to cover their feet, two to cover their face, and two to fly. Why cover their feet and their face? To shield themselves from the brightness and overwhelming splendor of God’s majesty.

And one cried to another and said: “Holy, holy, holy is the LORD of hosts; The whole earth is full of His glory!” (6:3)

As they flew vigorously around the throne, they called out to each other loudly. That they “cried out” means that they were crying out continuously, so Isaiah describes something like a continuous chant or shout, back and forth. They were saying back and forth, “Holy, holy, holy is the LORD of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory!”

What a statement. First, we see that they described God as perfectly and completely holy, entirely distinct, separate, and set apart from all things in his majesty. Nothing anywhere comes close to equaling or rivaling his majesty.

They also called him the “Lord of hosts,” which describes him as the all-powerful commander of countless angelic armies. There is no army so large and powerful as his angelic army, not even close. The Assyrian army stood no chance against God’s armies. This is the might of our majestic God.

They also called out, “the whole earth is filled with his glory.” By saying this, they remind us of what we take for granted. Like people who grow up in the shadow of the Rocky Mountains or live on the shoreline of the ocean, they forget the grandeur of what they see every day all around them. They fail to appreciate why people travel from throughout the United States and the world to see once what they see every day, to stand in awe with mouths wide open of those sights which they yawn at daily.

As Psa 19:1 says, “The heavens declare the glory of God.” And Rom 1:20 says, “Since the creation of the world His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead.” Friends, the jaw-dropping wonders of Earth and the vast grandeur of the galaxies are filled with the eye-popping glory of God. His majesty fills the Earth, not just his throne room.

And the posts of the door were shaken by the voice of him who cried out, and the house was filled with smoke. (Isa 6:4)

Next, Isaiah describes how whenever a burning, fiery seraph cried out, “holy, holy, holy,” the doorframe at the entrance to the temple – through which Isaiah saw these things – trembled and shook as though there were a massive earthquake. This would have prevented him from entering in. To understand what this would be like, you can imagine a series of massive, oversized speakers with subwoofers pumping out the cries of the seraphs, shaking the building so strongly that you could hardly stand, what’s more stand to keep your ears open. What mind-blowing glory is this?

What’s more, the whole room was filled with smoke. Though this was not the case at the start of his vision, it became the case soon – but why? Was this a sign of God’s anger? Or something else? Before I answer, let me make one observation first.

We should be in awe of his glory.

When we comprehend God’s majesty – his greatness and glory – we should stand in awe. I think of the opening words to the traditional hymn, “I stand amazed in the presence of Jesus the Nazarene, and wonder how he could love me, a sinner condemned unclean.”

In a world of people who sling God’s name around like wheels on a dirt-bike throws mud, and in a world that explains everything by any other means but God, we can become desensitized and oblivious to God’s majesty. We fail to see his greatness, and we fail to be amazed by his glory. We are more impressed by lesser, flickering lights than we are of the one, true, greater light which never fades.

We should confess our sin and receive his righteousness.

But the greatness of God’s matchless glory should do more than amaze us. It should cause us to confess our sin and receive God’s righteousness by faith. Notice Isaiah’s response to the greatness of God’s majesty.

So I said: “Woe is me, for I am undone! Because I am a man of unclean lips, And I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; For my eyes have seen the King, The LORD of hosts.” (Isa 6:5)

Here, Isaiah realizes that in the presence of this majestic, transcendent God, he is entirely helpless and hopeless because of his sin. And that’s the other aspect of God’s holiness. He is entirely set apart from all other things by virtue of his majesty, but he is entirely set apart from all other things, also, by virtue of his total sinlessness and complete purity.

You see, we normally feel okay about ourselves because we learn through life to measure our virtue against the people around us, finding people we determine to be more sinful and less virtuous than ourselves, which makes us feel like we’re okay.

But when we see God himself, we realize that we fall infinitely short of true virtue. God is not only less sinful and flawed than any person, he is entirely sinless and flawless in every way. This is true not only in the OT but also in the distant future of the NT, too.

The four living creatures, each having six wings, were full of eyes around and within. And they do not rest day or night, saying: “Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty, Who was and is and is to come!” (Rev 4:8)

This never changes. And God is not only always and totally sinless, he is the sovereign King and Judge and the commander of an uncountable number of angelic armies. If you stand before him in judgment, you will stand no chance of any kind of survival.

And notice how Isaiah spoke of his own sinfulness. First, he didn’t speak up to call out the sinfulness of Israel’s kings or the sinfulness of his neighbors. Instead, he immediately spoke of his own sin. Now, remember, this is Isaiah, a generally good and happy man who did good work, served God, and spoke to the truth to people in power as well as in common places. But he immediately confessed the sinfulness of his lips.

You see, it is the sins of our lips which we so easily neglect. We persuade ourselves that if we refrain from egregious, flagrant sins, it’s okay if we tell an occasional lie, misrepresent another person, tell an off-color joke, laugh at an off-color joke, or use sarcasm and crude words at another person’s expense. But our words are so much more important than that and our holy God will judge us even for our words.

For every idle word men may speak, they will give account of it in the day of judgment. For by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned. (Matt 12:36-37)

By this standard and by the judgment of this perfectly holy God, who can stand? But wait. Remember my question about the smoke – where it had come from? That’s an important detail here. The smoke.

In this vision of Isaiah, the throne room of God is also his temple. So, not only was there a throne there, but there was an altar, too. And in those days, when people would come to the temple to worship God, they would bring a sacrifice as a substitute for their sin. That sacrifice would be killed and be burnt on that altar to signify the death and the judgment that we deserve to die, instead.

But here, Isaiah brought no sacrifice. And yet a sacrifice was offered for him, apparently by God himself. For now, there was smoke billowing from the altar, indicative of a sacrifice. Notice what Isaiah describes next as he was bowed before God in guilt and shame.

Then one of the seraphim flew to me, having in his hand a live coal which he had taken with the tongs from the altar. And he touched my mouth with it, and said: “Behold, this has touched your lips; Your iniquity is taken away, and your sin purged.” (Isa 6:6-7)

In response to his confession and his acknowledgement of God as Lord, God arranged for the sacrifice to be applied to Isaiah’s sins. “Your sin is purged.” And today, of course, we no longer offer sacrifices for our sins. We receive, instead, the one, great, once-for-all sacrifice for all sin, the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, the Lord God himself on the cross.

If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. (1 Jn 1:9)

Have you confessed your sin to God? Have you received Christ’s sacrifice for your sins by faith alone? Have you bowed before Christ as your God, your King, and your Savior? If not, will you bow before our holy God today and receive his complete salvation? This is the only way we can survive before out transcendent, holy, majestic, sinless God.

No one else can offer you such salvation as our holy God. He alone is set apart in majesty and purity. So, in this way, holiness describes God’s nature. But it also describes his purpose. He is not only set apart from sin, but he is set apart – devoted to – his glory.

Holiness describes God’s purpose – his glory.

Here is what Moses taught the people to sing and to say after God rescued them from centuries of slavery in Egypt through the ten plagues and parting the Red Sea.

“Who is like You, O Lord, among the gods? Who is like You, glorious in holiness, fearful in praises, doing wonders? (Exo 15:11)

Is that how you feel about God? Are you in awe of his glory like this? Do you sing about his greatness this way?

Because God is so holy – perfectly holy – and because he is our only hope for salvation from our sin, he is entirely and perfectly devoted to spreading his glory to all people. He does this, of course, through the grandeur and splendor of creation. But for people to be forgiven, they must also hear the life-changing message of God’s salvation.

Notice how after Isaiah confesses his sin and receives forgiveness, God immediately calls him to use the very lips and mouth which had sinned to speak for God instead.

I heard the voice of the Lord, saying: “Whom shall I send, and who will go for Us?” Then I said, “Here am I! Send me. And He said, “Go, and tell this people...” (Isa 6:8-9)

Like Isaiah, our response to the majestic, sinless holiness of God should be not only one of confession but also of mission. Like Isaiah, we should devote ourselves to spreading God’s glory. As Christ said in his final words before ascending back to heaven, “You shall witnesses unto me” (Acts 1:8).

If you read further in Isa 6, you see that people would not respond favorably to Isaiah’s message. But that is not what motivates us. We should not gauge the value of speaking for God and being a witness to his glory by whether or how many people respond favorably to our message. We should, instead, gauge the value of speaking for God on the basis of whether God deserves to be known for who he really is – and he does!

Friends, in Isaiah 6:1-8, we’ve seen the breathtaking vision of God’s holiness—His majestic, transcendent purity that shakes the very foundations of his throne room and temple and which leaves Isaiah undone before His glory. This holiness isn’t just an interesting, fascinating attribute of God; it is the very essence of who God is – set apart in unrivaled majesty and sinless perfection.

From the fiery angels’ unending cries of “Holy, holy, holy” to the smoke of the altar signaling God’s offer of forgiveness, we’re reminded that God’s holiness demands our awe and our confession. It reveals our sinfulness but also points to His grace, as He purifies us through Christ’s sacrifice to stand before Him. This vision calls us to see God as Isaiah did—as the sovereign King whose glory fills the earth, deserving our worship and trust above all else.

Let this truth stir your heart to feel deeply about God’s holiness—let it awaken an awe deep within you that humbles and transforms you. Don’t let the fleeting lights of this world dull your sense of His unmatched greatness.

Confess your sins daily – especially those sins you commit with your tongue – trusting in Christ’s sacrifice for your cleansing, then live as a daily, willing witness to His glory, sharing His message with boldness, as Isaiah did, regardless of how others respond. Let God’s holiness shape your words, actions, and purpose, driving you to reflect His purity and spread His fame. Today, may we bow before our holy God, and let His majesty propel you into a life devoted to His glory.