My Joy and God’s Holiness: Friends or Foes?

Happiness and holiness are inseparable. True holiness is unattainable without true happiness. Happiness is part of holiness — even the essence of holiness.

But there’s an even deeper connection between our happiness and holiness, and it’s rooted in God’s holy character.

Many times, a sermon on the holiness of God will start with Isaiah 6:1–5, with a dramatic recounting of Isaiah, the priest, entering the temple in the presence of God’s flowing holiness. Angels cover their faces as Isaiah falls on his face and the temple shakes and tremors in the presence of the almighty, holy God.

The account is frightening, and the sermon is appropriately solemn and serious. It often ends with a grave prayer and silence. Such a sermon is vital for the health of the Church, and we need more of them.

But it also compels a follow-up sermon.

The awesome holiness of God that put Isaiah on his face becomes the holiness of God that puts the people of God on their feet — with hands raised in joyful praise.

This is an important connection to see as Isaiah unfolds, and Isaiah 12:6 is one good example: “Shout, and sing for joy, O inhabitant of Zion, for great in your midst is the Holy One of Israel.”

The majestic holiness of God evokes in God’s people a holy fear, yes. But it also evokes joy and happy confidence in God to overcome the greatest challenges of this world, a theme that echoes throughout the rest of the book (Isaiah 29:19, 41:14–16, 56:7).

The holiness of God generates happiness in God’s people, and this point echoes beyond Isaiah and throughout the Old Testament. Psalm 96 is entirely devoted to making this point, as are passages like 1 Chronicles 16:25–33, 1 Samuel 2:1–2, Nehemiah 8:10, Psalms 30:4–5, 33:21, 43:3–4, 46:4, 48:1–2, 65:4, 68:1–6, 71:22–23, 89:15–18, 97:12.

Here are a couple of brief examples:

“Rejoice in the Lord, O you righteous, and give thanks to his holy name!” (Psalm 97:12)

“Our soul waits for the Lord; he is our help and our shield. For our heart is glad in him, because we trust in his holy name.” (Psalm 33:20–21)

God’s holiness is his awesome strength and his unique beauty, his unwavering dependability and his reigning power. Only a holy God like this can ensure the safety of his people. Only a holy God can promise that all things will be put in order. Only a holy God can assure us every evil and sadness will be defeated in the end.

And so the people of God are glad and filled with exceeding joy, in the Holy One.

Succinctly put, here’s the point. The vision of God’s majestic holiness in Isaiah 6 provides the foundation for the happiness of believers in Isaiah 12:6 and elsewhere. The tremors of God’s holiness shake us to the core to unsettle everything false and fake and trivial in our lives in order for us to find genuine gladness in God’s Holy Name.

We do live in holy fear, but we don’t live facedown in the temple. We fear God in a way that leads us to raise our hands in joyful praise and glad confidence.

And yet just when we think we have a grasp of God’s holiness in the Old Testament, something stunning happens on the opening pages of the New Testament.

The Holy One emerges from the temple, implants in a virgin’s womb, and surfaces one dark night in history as an infant.

A child, called “holy,” the Son of God, is born in a dirty Bethlehem barn (Luke 1:35).

Immanuel — Holy God with us — an infant, a child, and later a man, of infinite holiness — has tabernacled among us (John 1:14).

The “Holy One of God” draws close, and brings with himself joy to the world.

When Friend’s Turn to Enemies

When malice, or envy, or suspicion, or evil surmising exists, no established reputation, no lack of evidence of guilt can “tie the gall up in the slanderous
tongue.” By a long and holy life Job had given incontestable evidence of the purity of his character. His friends could bring no proof of his criminality in
anything. Yet they charged him with cruelty, avarice and hypocrisy. Such wickedness has not yet left the earth. It is no new or rare thing for the best men
to be charged with the basest plans, principles or practices. It will be so until grace shall reign through Jesus Christ over all hearts. A propensity to evil
thoughts and evil speeches is among the last faults of character from which even good men are delivered.

7. If friends accuse us falsely and act as enemies, let us not forget to pray for them. Job set us the example: Job 42:8. Enmities arising between old friends
are generally more violent than others. “A brother offended is harder to be won than a strong city: and their contentions are like the bars of a castle.”
Prov. 18:19. But we must not yield to passion. We must forgive and seek blessings on those who falsely accuse us and cruelly treat us. It was not until
Job prayed for his accusers that God turned his captivity. Let us never carry a load of malice in our hearts. It is worse than any evil we can suffer at the hand
of man.

8. When our characters are assailed, we are at liberty to use Christian measures to remove an evil report. It is then best to leave the whole matter in the hands of God. Lawsuits for character may be lawful and sometimes expedient. But when bad passions are excited, no character is so unspotted that malice will not spew out its venom against it. We may deny our guilt; we may call for evidence against us; we may bring evidence of innocence; but with men of heated imaginations and strong prejudices, evidence never has its just weight.

What is the grief of each one? Is it poverty, poor health, loss of reputation, loss of spiritual comfort? Whatever it is, take for an example of suffering
affliction Job, the narrative of whose trials was written for our comfort. Like him, let each one say of the Almighty, “Though he slay me, yet will I trust in
him.” Job 13:15. Never was pious confidence in the Lord misplaced. Never did any trust in him and was confounded.
—William S Plumer ‘Job’s Trials and Mercies’