What Holiness Is
Last time, we cleared away the fragments—the half-truths and hollow definitions that made holiness sound like a purity contest or a moral treadmill.
We ended by saying holiness must fit human skin.
Now let’s see what that looks like when it breathes, walks, and heals.
The Wholeness of God
Holiness means wholeness.
To say that God is holy is to say that He is whole—radiant wholeness, overflowing life that transforms what it touches, now shared with us in Christ.
God was holy long before there was sin to avoid. His holiness isn’t the absence of stain but the presence of life. He is unbroken, undamaged, unfallen—utterly complete within Himself. The Father gives, the Son embodies, and the Spirit indwells; together they are a living current of divine love.
Holiness is not fragile purity. It is dangerous goodness—the kind that burns away decay without destroying what it touches. When Isaiah trembled before God’s holiness, the coal didn’t consume him; it cleansed him. That’s what holiness always does—it heals what’s wounded and restores what’s lost.
Not Distant but Different
God isn’t set apart because He’s unreachable, but because He’s perfectly whole.
And the miracle of grace is that His otherness no longer excludes us—it indwells us.
The first impulse of holiness isn’t retreat but restoration. The Holy One moves toward what’s broken, not away. When Jesus touched the leper, He didn’t get infected; holiness spread. When He sat at a table with traitors and drunks, He didn’t blush—He blessed the food. When He spoke to a woman with five husbands, He didn’t condemn her thirst; He gave her living water.
That’s holiness in motion. It keeps its distinction from sin while closing the distance to sinners. Its distinction isn’t maintained by distance but by wholeness. Sin represents brokenness; holiness embodies completeness. It doesn’t shy away from the unclean; it runs to redeem.
If your 'holiness' keeps you from the table where Jesus eats, it isn’t holiness—it’s hygiene.
Holiness, then, isn’t borrowed perfection; it’s divine life taking human form.
The unholy pull back, worried they’ll get smudged;
the holy lean in, knowing grace leaves better stains.
Holiness That Fits Human Skin
Holiness doesn’t erase our humanity; it fulfills it.
When divine wholeness fills human limits, we don’t become less human but more truly so. It becomes a fulness of humanity as God designed it to be.
Saints and prophets weren’t marble statues—they were living previews of what God’s life looks like in flesh and frailty. Jacob shows us that holiness may walk with a limp but keeps walking. Paul shows us that holiness may get flogged and battered but keeps walking. It looks less like halos and more like healed relationships.
We’re not called to glow in isolation but to live as luminous people—neighbors, parents, co-workers—through whom the extraordinary wholeness of God quietly seeps into and permeates even the most ordinary places.
Becoming Whole
Jesus said, “Be perfect,” and He meant be whole.
He wasn’t asking for a superhuman performance; He was inviting us into integration—hearts, minds, and actions aligned in love.
We redefine perfection and holiness into utter impossibilities—defying the very scriptures we claim to believe—and then feign humility by admitting we can never attain perfection or holiness in this life. We keep trying to earn holiness like a badge. But holiness isn’t a status to hide behind; it’s a life to grow into. It is not a state of existence to attain, it is a simple reality of spiritual life we obtain by walking with God. The Spirit doesn’t hand out honorary titles—He gives new hearts.
Holiness isn’t pretending to be better; it’s becoming more whole.
And wholeness rarely looks heroic. It looks like honesty instead of image.
Forgiveness instead of quiet resentment.
Showing up for a friend when you’d rather hide.
Doing the dishes as an act of peace, not penance.
The sacred spills into the sink, the school run, the late-night hospital visit. Holiness fits human skin because God chose to wear it. Both when He became flesh and dwelt among men, and even now that He chooses to indwell you and me in this present world.
Living From Fullness
Because we are joined to the Holy One, we lack nothing. Scripture says we’ve been sanctified, made holy, perfected, and completed in Christ. The work isn’t to gain more of God but simply to live from the wholeness already given.
Holiness isn’t subtraction—it’s overflow. It's not an impossible endeavor to be sinlessly perfect while failing ever to be so; it's an expected experience that results from simple belief that He is and that He is a rewarder of those that diligently seek Him.
It’s not gritting your teeth to be good; it’s letting divine life spill into ordinary days.
It looks like kindness that costs something.
Like truth told gently.
Like rest that trusts God to hold the world together while you sleep.
A Helpful Way to Read the Word
Try this. Whenever you see the word holy in Scripture, read it a second time as whole and alive to help break through our mental barriers.
You’ll begin to see the gospel not as sin management but as life restored:
To the church of God in Corinth, to those complete in Christ Jesus and called to be whole.
Put on the new man, created to be like God in true righteousness and wholeness.
You are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a whole nation, belonging to God.
Let that truth soak in. You are already what He calls you to be—made whole in Him. The task now is not to prove it but to practice it.
The Everyday Shape of Holiness
Holiness isn’t a church word—it’s a kitchen word, a classroom word, a traffic-jam word.
It’s patience when you’d rather snap, grace when you’d rather win, quiet strength when you’re tempted to withdraw.
To live holy is to live whole—to love from abundance, not from fear.
Every time you forgive, every time you stay tender, every time you choose peace over power, holiness takes shape in you.
It’s not a glow you achieve but a life you receive—and then release into the broken world all around you, just as Jesus did. Be ye holy, even as He is holy.
Stop Calling God's Commands Impossible
Friend, that isn’t humility; it's unbelief with a church accent.
When you say (or behave as if) "Be holy" is an impossible ideal meant only to expose failure, you don’t honor grace—you hollow it out.
What that stance actually does:
- It accuses God of commanding what He will not supply (1 Pet. 1:16; 2 Pet. 1:3).
- It turns grace from a teacher into a taunter, as if Titus 2:11–12 were satire.
- It licenses resignation, letting sin squat in your life under the banner of “honest humility” which—in reality—is neither honest nor humble.
- It teaches your heart to make peace with what Christ died to kill.
"Perfect" and "holy" in Jesus’ mouth (Matt. 5:48) is not a cosmic prank; it’s the call to fullness—single-hearted love that acts like the Father’s love. Scripture aims for real obedience now: “that you may not sin” (1 John 2:1), “walk by the Spirit” (Gal. 5:16), “blameless in holiness” (1 Thess. 5:23–24). God never issues theatrical commands. He gives the very power He requires.
Total inability names our deadness apart from regenerating grace. Amen. But the Spirit does not regenerate us into permanent paralysis. Justification is God’s work alone; sanctification is God’s power at work in us—and we actually work (Phil. 2:12–13). Calling obedience “impossible” after Pentecost is not modesty; it is a quiet insult to the Spirit.
It's a real command that expects a real result, not a theatric aspiration that only serves to beat you down with an impossibility foisted upon your frailty.
Be Whole
You’ve seen the shadows; here’s the sun that casts them.
The call to holiness is not a declaration of distance, but a call for communion.
Live from the wholeness you’ve received, and the fragments will start to mend.
Let the porch light of your life burn warm and steady—inviting, healing, real.
That is holiness that fits human skin.
That is the beauty of wholeness made visible.