Holiness is top of the list

For any Christian – but especially those who have chosen to not attend a regular church – personal holiness is the key to thriving as a Christian.

When I talk about personal holiness I’m thinking about those things that you do each day that are directly related to your walk with Christ. This will include: prayer, bible reading, contemplation about God, deliberately using your gifts, searching your heart for sin and removing it. I guess you could say its anything to do with being a righteous person. In a nutshell it’s following Christ.

Now one of the mistakes a great number of people make is to confuse holiness with doing certain things. God does not hold back His support waiting for us to do certain things. Christianity has nothing to do with earning our place in God’s heart. God loves us as we are. We can no more earn a place in heaven than we could create a universe from nothing. When we undertake personal holiness we should do not because we love God and not out of any concept of earning rewards.

One of the teachers of the law came and heard them debating. Noticing that Jesus had given them a good answer, he asked him, “Of all the commandments, which is the most important?”
“The most important one,” answered Jesus, “is this: ‘Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one  Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘Love your neighbour as yourself.’  There is no commandment greater than these.”
“Well said, teacher,” the man replied. “You are right in saying that God is one and there is no other but him. To love him with all your heart, with all your understanding and with all your strength, and to love your neighbour as yourself is more important than all burnt offerings and sacrifices.”
 When Jesus saw that he had answered wisely, he said to him, “You are not far from the kingdom of God.” And from then on no-one dared ask him any more questions.
Matt 12:33ff

Also we don’t become holy because we do more stuff we become holier because we have contact with the one holy thing that exists e.g. God. The more we have contact with God the more His radience fills our lives and the more radience fills our lives the more holy we are.

If you find yourself without Christian fellowship make sure you get more time for your own personal devotions. Living as a Christian without fellowship is very tough the only way I know of making sure you don’t suffer as a result is to give priority to personal holiness (although perhaps we should all be doing this anyway).