Garments transmitting holiness Ezekiel 44

When they to out into the outer court, into the outer court to the people, they shall put off the garments in which they have been ministering and lay them in the holy chambers; then they shall put on other garments so that they will not transmit holiness to the people with their garments. Ezekiel 44: 19

Well, this is an interesting passage. The priests were to minister to God in linen garments, as we studied a few blogs ago. No sweat, it said. But these garments were only to be worn in the presence of God. Even in the tabernacle or temple, in the outer courts where the common man was allowed to enter, they were not to wear these clothes. They were not to take God's holiness out to the people. Wow. If you are familiar with scripture, Moses was glowing after he came down from the mountain...he was emanating God's holiness. The priests were not glowing, but they were covered with God's holiness. Whatever they touched was made holy. They were to sacrifice to make the people holy. So why the command NOT to transmit holiness to the people through even the wearing of clothes? What is the mystery?

A few thoughts...and these are just my thoughts...

The next few verses tell the priests to impress on the people the difference between the holy and the profane. If nothing is set apart as holy, different, or sacred, then we treat them as common things when they are not. The trend, even in churches, is to get rid of the sanctuary and make multi-purpose rooms. We can be worshiping one minute and having a basketball game in the same space the next. Not to say that that is wrong, but it does send a message that the space is not just for worship. When we enter a sanctuary we do not think about running around. We know what it is there for – for worship. For meeting with God. For learning about God. It is not a gym or a place for common activity. We in our humanness can tell the difference. When we have to get the “worship” out of the way so we can do other things, there can be a disconnect. We may start to prefer the common and despise the worship. It is a danger in our hearts.

Then there is the idea of man transmitting the holiness of God to us instead of God Himself. Like the story of Gideon who made a holy vest for worship. When he passed on, guess what those foolish Israelites did? They worshiped the darn thing. I should used the word “damned thing” because it caused the fall of many in Israel. God had neither asked for this thing, and always warned of worshiping anything but Him, but they did it anyway. So we did not a repeat performance...the worship of the garment instead of the God it represented.

And then there is the idea that the common man did not have to do anything but touch the garment or be in the presence of the garment to be saved. The whole of the sacrificial system rested on the sins of the people being transmitted to the animal they were sacrificing. They sent their sins to the altar. It would have been easy for them to think that then the priest would bring them back the holiness. That is not how it works. The cleansing happened by the shedding of the blood (representing the future sacrifice of Christ) and not by the presence of the priest. The priest never made people holy. NEVER. God forgave their sins, not the priest. How the church has messed this up over the years. We rely on someone other than Christ to forgive our sins, to make us right with God. Some act, some sacrifice other than Jesus, something more than the saving blood. And that is also to be avoided.

God's holiness was there, tainting the garments to the point where there could be “accidental” holiness transmitted, and God wanted that to NOT happen. The sacrifices were set up so that someday the Jews could look back and see the sacrifice of the Lamb of God as the only road to holiness. No other way.

Having said that, should we or could we not transmit the holiness of God to others? Good question. And the answer was given to me yesterday.

We had Pastor Appreciation Sunday yesterday. At our church, we LOVE our pastor. We RESPECT our pastor. We HONOR our pastor. But we do not RELY ON our pastor to make us holy. Four men of the church got up and preached little sermonettes. Every one of them touched on their love and honor of the man who leads us, shepherds us, and holds us as dear. But every one of them pointed to the fact that Pastor had worked in their lives and the lives of the people in the church because he was not the authority, but God's Word was. This man sent people to the Word, preached the Word, the whole Word and nothing but the Word, because it is, in fact, the Truth, the WHOLE TRUTH, and NOTHING BUT THE TRUTH (my words). That is where holiness comes from. It comes from being saved by grace through faith in the Son of God, who takes away the sins of the world. And then we walk in the truth, confessing sin and communing with God on a daily basis. They pointed out that Pastor would be distressed if any transformation in their lives was credited to him, instead of to the God who spoke to them through the Word. He doesn't want John Sauser's holiness transmitted to any man, for that would be blasphemy, and a temporary fix at best. He knows we need God's Holiness, not man's, to transform and allow us to draw near.

We can reflect God's love and holiness, and plead with others to come to it, but we can not transmit it. The Word and the Spirit do the work. And that holiness is a wonderful, amazing, and mysterious thing.