....NO ONE WILL SEE THE LORD

As I was preparing my lesson for my Wednesday night ladies class about 'PEACE", I came across this verse.  

Make every effort to live in peace with everyone and to be holy; without holiness no one will see the Lord. 

Hebrews 12:14

I had read it many times before, but the last part really stuck out to me:  Without holiness no one will see the Lord.  I believe this verse is talking about a Christians' own holiness....that without holiness WE won't see the Lord, but also that without our holiness we can't help bring others to Christ and THEY won't see the Lord through us.

WITHOUT HOLINESS NO ONE WILL SEE THE LORD! 

It reminded me of a quote I had seen earlier in the day:  May your life preach more loudly than your lips. (by William Ellery Channing).  

Now let's turn that phrase around and make it say:  WITH HOLINESS ONE WILL SEE THE LORD.  I like that, don't you?!  What a wonderful thought that ONE WILL SEE THE LORD - perhaps by seeing holiness within you.  Perhaps many 'someones' will see the Lord because of seeing holiness in you. Not that your example saves anyone, of course, but that your example might lead someone to salvation - only through Jesus Christ. Your life's example could ultimately affect where someone will spend eternity!

How we live our lives from day to day matters.  How we conduct ourselves, how we speak, how we deal with others all matter.  Choices we make matter. Yes, at some point we must open our mouths (or type on our laptops/etc. and write a blog post!) and tell others about Jesus.  We must tell others about salvation....about God's plan.....about His Word and His church.  But, our words won't matter if we're not living what we say we believe.  No one will care about our words, if they don't see our words evident in our own lives.  It's just that simple.

We must strive to live holy lives. That is how the world will see Jesus - by Him living in us.  We are lights of the world.  The moment we became a Christian, we became a light.  That is our job.  The problem is that sometimes we don't want to be a light....or we don't want to shine too brightly.  But we must.  Living a holy life means we must shine brightly.  The world needs our light!

Our motivation for shining brightly shouldn't be from duty or obligation, but because we love Him so much, we want to live holy lives because we want to be like Him.  We want to imitate Him in all ways.  And we want to share His love with others.  

Someone you know is looking for Jesus.  They may not realize it, but they're craving a close relationship with Him and their Father in heaven.  God may be trying to use you to reach that person.  Maybe no one else could.  Without holiness no one will see the Lord.  Perhaps that person is seeing the Lord in you.  What a wonderful thought!