Psalm 99 - Holy

Psalm 99 emphasizes the Holiness of God throughout.

The Lord reigns, let the peoples tremble;

He is enthroned above the cherubim, let the earth shake!

The Lord is great in Zion,

And He is exalted above all the peoples.

Let them praise Your great and awesome name;

Holy is He.

The strength of the King loves justice;

You have established equity;

You have executed justice and righteousness in Jacob.

Exalt the Lord our God

And worship at His footstool;

Holy is He.

Moses and Aaron were among His priests,

And Samuel was among those who called on His name;

They called upon the Lord and He answered them.

He spoke to them in the pillar of cloud;

They kept His testimonies

And the statute that He gave them.

O Lord our God, You answered them;

You were a forgiving God to them,

And yet an avenger of their evil deeds.

Exalt the Lord our God

And worship at His holy hill,

For holy is the Lord our God. (Psalm 99: 1-9, all, NASB)

There are three specific references to the holiness of God. Each concludes the three strophes of this psalm.

V. 3 “Holy is He”

v. 5 “Holy is He”

v. 9 “For holy is the Lord our God”

The topic of holiness can be confusing. We are called to be Holy as God is holy, and yet that seems impossible. None of us would have the audacity to call ourselves holy as God is holy. 

So in this study, the approach is to pose a series of questions whereby we might learn how God wants and expects us to imitate Him in holiness. 

What is holiness? 

The Hebrew word “qadosh” BDB, 872c, 1a, means “of God, as separate, apart, and so sacred, holy; exalted on a theophanic throne; heavenly throne; in victory.”

What does it mean that God is holy?

God is holy in the sense that He is separated from sin. God simply does not sin, nor does He do anything wrong. He makes no morally evil choices.

If God is holy, how does that impact us?

God wants us to be holy as He is holy, that is, without sin. Sin is the stain that our choices make that are contrary to the will of God.

God created us with the freedom to make choices. The free will of man was not something that surprised God in the garden. God did not throw his figurative hands in the air and cry out, “Look what they have done! Now, what will I do?”

Evil existed in the garden before the choice of Adam and Eve and the fall. The serpent also lived in the garden and was free to move around. He talked with Adam and Eve. Did God know that the serpent was there? Of course, He did. Did God know that the serpent was talking with Adam and Eve? Of course, He did. 

In the garden was the tree of the knowledge of good and evil [tov vara'], of which God told Adam and Eve not to eat its fruit. The tree existed before the choice of Adam and Eve, meaning that evil existed before the choice. 

God allowed evil to exist. He permitted the serpent to live in the garden, and even let the serpent tempt Adam and Eve to choose evil.

God deciding to reconcile humans with Himself is the beauty of the gospel. He entirely paid the penalty for our sin by substituting the second person of God for our payment.

So did God sin by allowing evil to exist in the garden in the form of the serpent and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil? No, He did not. God allowed evil for personal choice to exist and provided the solution to the problem of sin before humanity's first choice. Therefore the problem of evil was not really a problem. The solution existed before the problem ever came to be.

For He was foreknown before the foundation of the world, but has appeared in these last times for the sake of you who through Him are believers in God, who raised Him from the dead and gave Him glory, so that your faith and hope are in God. (1 Peter 1: 20-21, NASB)

If God is holy, when doesn’t He just destroy us?

There is a sense in which He will. Everyone will appear before the judgment seat, and those without faith, those who have not appropriated the payment of God for themselves, will be judged without that payment. They will be found guilty with no appeal possible.

The grace of God is demonstrated in the love which God expressed by becoming the payment Himself.

But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from the wrath of God through Him. For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life. And not only this, but we also exult in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received the reconciliation. (Romans 5: 8-11, NASB)

Why is it important to think correctly about the holiness of God?

The Knowledge of the Holy by A.W. Tozer (NY: HarperCollins. ©1961) is one of the classic works about the holiness of God. It begins by stating that what we think about God is the most important thing about us. If we have a correct view of God, then we have an accurate picture of reality. If we have an incorrect understanding of who God is and how God is, then we will not have a correct understanding of reality - the way things really are.

Chapter 1: “Why We Must Think Rightly About God”

What comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us. (op cit, p. 1)

If God is holy, should we be holy?

Yes, we should.

As obedient children, do not be conformed to the former lusts which were yours in your ignorance, but like the Holy One who called you, be holy yourselves also in all your behavior; because it is written, “You shall be holy, for I am holy.” (1 Peter 1: 14-16)

Is it possible to be holy? No, it is not.

They have all turned aside, together they have become corrupt;

There is no one who does good, not even one. (Psalm 14:3)

Is it possible to be made holy? Yes, it is - and no, it is not.

1) Yes, it is - in the sense that ultimately we will be without sin. When we transition from life through death to life, we will end up before the Lord with glorified bodies in a sinless state in His presence.

2) Yes, it is - in the sense that we may participate in His holiness as we move through our lives. We do not become perfectly holy because we cannot become sinless. Our thoughts and our actions betray our sinfulness every day. But we can participate in His holiness, meaning that with the Holy Spirit residing within us, we can choose not to sin. We can choose not to participate in the deeds of darkness, which cause us to feel a separation in our relationship with our Father. Whether such a separation actually exists or not is debatable, because God never changes. Once the offering for sin has been made by God in Christ and accepted by us at our salvation, God’s relationship with us never changes. However, our relationship with Him can feel different because of guilt and shame when we sin.

God wants us to participate in His holiness. 

Now may our God and Father Himself and Jesus our Lord direct our way to you; and may the Lord cause you to increase and abound in love for one another, and for all people, just as we also do for you; so that He may establish your hearts without blame in holiness before our God and Father at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all His saints. (1 Thess. 3:11-13, NASB)

3) Yes, it is. God will discipline us so that we will become more like Him in holiness.

It is for discipline that you endure; God deals with you as with sons; for what son is there whom his father does not discipline? But if you are without discipline, of which all have become partakers, then you are illegitimate children and not sons. Furthermore, we had earthly fathers to discipline us, and we respected them; shall we not much rather be subject to the Father of spirits, and live? For they disciplined us for a short time as seemed best to them, but He disciplines us for our good, so that we may share His holiness. (Heb. 12: 7-10, NASB)

4) No, it’s not. Most evangelicals hold that while we strive to become more like Christ as we mature in discipleship, the goal of holiness is simply that: a goal. It is not something we can attain because our sin nature, while changed, does not disappear at salvation, nor in maturity. It is still there, and we must regularly deal with it.

However, as much as it might be a battle for us, we are encouraged by Paul’s struggle.

I find then the principle that evil is present in me, the one who wants to do good. For I joyfully concur with the law of God in the inner man, but I see a different law in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin which is in my members. Wretched man that I am! Who will set me free from the body of this death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, on the one hand I myself with my mind am serving the law of God, but on the other, with my flesh the law of sin.

CHAPTER 8

Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death. (Romans 7:21 - 8:2, NASB)

God is utterly different from us in this regard - He is without sin. He does not struggle as we do with our sinful nature. However, one of the comforting truths of the incarnation is that God took on human form. Jesus felt many of the same things that we feel, and in fact, was tempted as we are. His temptation was much more enticing than our temptations. Have you ever been shown all the kingdoms of the world and been offered control over them? Neither has anyone else. So Jesus knows what temptation is and what it feels like, even though he did not succumb to that temptation.

Psalm 99 is a call to remember the holiness of God, one of God's attributes. It is an eternal truth about God and is connected with justice and righteousness, also mentioned in this psalm. (v. 4).

Though He is holy, He chooses to involve Himself with people. In verses 6-8, we see Moses, Aaron, and Samuel mentioned by name. Verse 7 explains that he communicated with Moses and Aaron directly in the pillar of cloud. He gave his laws to people and communicated His expectations for how we are to live with Him.

So in His holiness, He chose to connect with us, who are unholy. He continues to do that today. When we come to faith in Christ, the Holy Spirit and Christ Himself indwells us. We are connected directly to God, even though we are unholy and sinners. But we are only connected because the sacrifice of Jesus has removed our sin and nailed it to the cross.

When you were dead in your transgressions and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He made you alive together with Him, having forgiven us all our transgressions, having canceled out the certificate of debt consisting of decrees against us, which was hostile to us; and He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross. (Colossians 2: 13-14, NASB)

So, yes, as unholy, sinful people, we can be connected to the Holy God. God has paid the penalty for sin once for all on the cross. Thus he canceled our sin with a “paid in full” stamp across our account.

Should we, therefore, continue to sin? As Paul says, “may it never be." Instead, we should try not to sin. We should try to be holy. And we should acknowledge the holiness of God when we worship.

Exalt the Lord our God

And worship at His holy hill,

For holy is the Lord our God. (Psalm 99: 9, NASB)