Sermon – Today is Holy Day
Exodus 31: 12-18; 1 Peter 2: 4-10
11/1/2026
Have you noticed that as a culture our standards have dropped and dropped and dropped for so many things. Entertainment, food and dining, customer service, durable goods, politics, maybe even churches. The world has become more disposable, more about appearances, more about automation, more about cheaper to make or to produce, and more about emotion than actual thought. Quality is not what it once was for so many things, and you are probably dismayed as I am with how things, that once were a given in terms of quality, now require an extra charge, if available at all.
Take (for instance) health care: my dear wife and I intentionally opted into the Presbyterian Church’s health care program back in our seminary days in the late 90s when the PCUSA ran its own insurance coverage. Back then, whatever out-of-pocket we spent in the fourth quarter of one year rolled over and counted for the out-of-pocket deductible for the FOLLOWING year. We had our first child in seminary, and the total cost to us of having a baby was between $800 and $900 dollars, which covered all visits through the pregnancy and the delivery and everything. I do not recall what year the PCUSA decided to go with a separate, professional insurance provider, but you know that it was because of convenience and costs. Today, we use BC/BS, and I am deeply grateful for the good coverage, but it is far more expensive for the church and for me, and you know the actual coverage is not what it once was. I tried to put together what it might cost today to have a baby with our plan, and it looked like it was at least three times as much, with a quarter of births nationally costing five times as much. That is the world in which we live. I’ll tell you, friends, there are things for which you get better value and more quality today, but much seems to have gone the other direction because this is what our world decided.
Now that I have raised your spirits, understand that the one standard that has NEVER dropped is actually for you and me. We might not expect as much from one another these days, but God expects nothing less from us ever. Yes, God’s standard, God’s expectations are unchanged. And it turns out that God’s bar for us is VERY high, as our Eternal and Almighty God has always demanded that we be HOLY. This is what God has asked from the very beginning, and that is a very high standard. Nothing in this world has that kind of requirement. We are to be more than nice, good, kind, and committed; more than sharing, forgiving, and even generous. All of that is good and great – we all do really need more Mr. Rogers in the world, but God wants us to live into holiness. Yes, actual holiness.
To be even more honest, I did not realize just how far back this expectation went until I was working on this message today. Yes, Adam and Eve are expelled from the Garden for defying God’s one, big rule. And the whole known world at the time seems to get a reset because of rampant wickedness at the time of Noah, but in the book of Exodus, we are introduced to a level of holiness that the Bible had not seen before. For the first time since the garden, human beings are in the presence of our holy God. Moses almost loses himself when he dares to step on holy ground with shoes on. Then, when the people of God are brought into God’s Law, they are given the very requirement that is at the center of today’s message. YOU ARE TO BE HOLY. Leviticus 20, Deuteronomy 7, and14 all state this very plainly, but Exodus 31 gives us a sense of why holiness is so important. God is holy. This is something about God’s very nature. God is just different from us in this very simple way. The presence of God is perfect, so perfect that nothing imperfect can be in God’s presence. Defying God or doing disrespectful things toward God bring us lower. They move us away from God, at least in our perspective. Some actions are so far from God’s nature and intent that they even come with a death sentence. This is a standard for us all that was established from the very beginning of our being God’s people. We need to be holy.
Now, how well do you think we did with that? Obviously, very poorly. We have abjectly failed to live holy lives or to be holy people. Back in the days of the Bible, our failure was fixed with sacrifice, but even sacrifice could only go so far. Quality went down and down and down; holiness slipped further and further and further from our hearts. Eventually, people quit caring so much.
The funny thing, though, is that today is All Saints Day. Another word for that is Hallows Day. Ever prayed the Lord’s Prayer and said “hallowed by thy name?” Hallowed means holy. Of course, God is holy and God’s name is holy, but how can today be All Saints Day? Who can those saints be?
Yes, this day does speak to those who have gone on to glory after living lives of faith. All the faithful who have gone on before us to join the great company of the saints in light are in this group. In other words, those who have died. We will shortly recognize several names from our own church family who have embraced the life eternal in the grace of God through Jesus Christ our Lord, but it would be wonderful if somehow this could also connect to us today and not just to those who are no longer with us.
Remember what I said about God’s standard, God’s requirement, God’s expectation for us that has never wavered? I was serious. God expects us to be holy today, each of us and all of us. God expects you and me to be holy because God is holy and we are God’s holy people. You heard that in 1 Peter. We are meant to represent God in this world here and now. It is hard to represent something perfect if we look anything but.
You should feel the tension here. You should feel the weight and burden that is on us. We are meant to be God’s holy people here and now. If only we had someone among us who was honest to goodness holy and righteous and faithful and perfect. Yes, friends, we have Brother Jesus. All through the Bible, God is giving the people a sense of God’s holiness, and they squander it, forget it, distort it, and defy it. When there was no hope for us to ever live up to that standard, God became the standard. Jesus is God’s holiness given to us. Where we fail, Jesus succeeds. Where we falter, Jesus perfects. Where we fall, Jesus rises, and he takes us with him. We are absolutely meant to be God’s holy people today, to live as God’s holy people today in every way, but where we are less than holy, the grace of our Lord lovingly and faithfully holds us in our brokenness and reminds us that we are holy in him.
When God looks at us, he sees Jesus. Or maybe, he sees us through Jesus-tinted glasses. God still sees us for who we are, but his heart for us is directed through our Savior, our Brother, and our Friend.
This does not get us off the hook. It actually makes us more responsible. In at least 11 different books of the New Testament, the people alive in that time were called the saints. Paul writes to people in letter after letter and addresses them as the saints, and then he tells them just how much they are called to live bigger and better lives in faithfulness and love. They are responsible for living into God’s holiness because it has been given to them. This is for us, also. Today is holy day because it is also our day.
I love the fact that we are called to stand up for the grace of God in Christ that we have been given. I love the fact that I am a child of God who is also called to be a saint. No, I will never earn that or deserve that honor. I will never achieve the end result this side of glory, but just like in our support groups, it works like this – one day at a time.
The fancy word for this is satisfaction. We are on a process of growing in God’s holiness which means we are growing in Christ. There is an actual goal, an actual path, and actual trajectory. We are not wandering aimlessly through the world and all of our experiences, even if it feels that way sometimes. I like to think of us as “saints-in-training.” We have a ways to go, and we make plenty of mistakes along the way as we learn the ropes, but if we keep trying – if we want to get there – we will see results. We will find blessings. We will know goodness in more beautiful ways. If we stick to it, we will understand what those who have gone before us also know. We are God’s holy PEOPLE; we are GOD’S holy people; we are God’s HOLY people. Today is our day. To our holy God be the glory. Amen.