God Is Sinless

You shall be holy, for I am holy.
–1 Peter 1:16

This week, we are looking at four signposts that represent four essential truths you must acknowledge if you are on the road to Heaven. Signpost #1 is: We have a sin problem.

Signpost #2 is: God is sinless. The word in the Bible for that is “holy.” No fewer than six times in the Bible, God said, “Be holy, for I am holy.” That word “holy” means “different, separate, above.” God is different than we are. We are sinful. God is sinless. Many people do not understand that. They say, “Why is God so judgmental about sin? Why can’t God be more like me? I find it easy to overlook the faults of other people, and I surely find it easy to overlook my own faults. Why can’t God be as tolerant as I am?”

The fact that you and I can overlook sin in other people and in our lives is not because we are so like God; it is because we are so unlike God. We tolerate sin in our lives and the lives of other people because we are sinful. But God is not like we are. Habakkuk 1:13 says about God, “Your eyes are too pure to approve evil, and You can not look on wickedness with favor.” God has zero tolerance for sin because He is holy.

When you couple this truth with the first signpost–we have a sin problem, and God is sinless–you can get pretty discouraged pretty easily.

For example, let’s say you are on a road trip from Oklahoma to Winnipeg, and you see a sign on the highway that says, “Winnipeg 1,300 miles.” You think, “That is a long way to go, but with perseverance I can get there.” Then you look at your gas gauge and notice that it shows you only have a quarter of a tank of gas left. “No problem,” you think, “I will just pull into the gas station.” You pull in, but as you reach into your wallet, you realize you have no cash and you have no credit card. It does not matter that you have a quarter of a tank of gas–that is not enough to get you to Winnipeg. You get pretty discouraged. You think, “I guess all I can do now is make a U-turn and try to make it back home.”

The same is true for us. On our journey to Heaven, none of us has enough spiritual gas, or goodness, to get into Heaven. Now some people have a quarter of a tank, some people might have a half a tank, some people might have seven-eighths of a tank full of goodness in their own life. But none of us has enough righteousness to get to Heaven. That is why Romans 3:23 says, “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.”

Today’s devotion is excerpted from “Who Will Be In Heaven?” by Dr. Robert Jeffress, 2016.

Scripture quotations are taken from the NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE®, Copyright © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. (www.lockman.org)