God has declared us to be holy. And God is making us holy. “I am the Lord, who makes you holy.” (Nine times in Exodus and Leviticus)
What happens to us at conversion? The Reformed wing of the Church has done an excellent job of stressing the legal aspects of conversion—where God justifies the sinner and declares him/her to be righteous. However, this deals not with the actual, true condition of the sinner, but with their legal status (or standing) before God. Thus, following conversion, the sinner is judged to be without sin, but that is not their actual state (i.e. sinless); their actual state remains one of an unrighteous (immoral) sinner.
However, a change in our legal standing before God is not all that happens at conversion. Regeneration (new birth, new creation, etc.) also takes place. In this instance, not only are we declared righteous, but God actually works to make us righteous. God does this by granting us His Spirit, and by making us a new creation. The Christian now has a new godly nature, but the habits and practices of the old nature continue. And so, the Christian continues to sin, thus making him/herself “unrighteous” or immoral in reality, while still declared righteous in God’s (legal) sight.
Holiness, like the legal term “righteous,” is intended to relate to an actual state. When God calls for us to be righteous (or for that matter, holy), He is calling for an actual, real condition in the believer—not simply a legal one, but a practical one. Parallel, for instance, our legal term “innocent.” Innocence is a legal distinction, but one which is intended to parallel reality. Thus, we are frustrated when someone we “know” is guilty (take OJ Simpson for instance) is declared innocent—their legal standing does not match their actual state in reality, and we are frustrated because we expect there to be a correspondence between the legal standing and one’s actual state.
So it is with us as believers. We are legally righteous or holy, but that is to correspond to an actual condition of morality. God has made us to be “other” or “set apart” in the world, but he is also calling us to live holy lives. That is, He wants us to have our actual condition match our legal status.
God’s call for us to be holy relates not only to our calling to be “set apart” for a purpose, but also our actual, tangible transformation into beings which ARE set apart—set apart, not simply by our legal standing nor by our own efforts, but set apart from the world to be sanctified for His purpose by a real life change in our natures. We are not simply to act “set apart” nor are we only called “set apart;” through the process of regeneration, we actually are becoming “set apart” from the rest of sinful humanity.
God can set apart sinners for His purposes, but God’s call to holiness also entails His transforming sinners into an instrument appropriate for God’s use. And I, for one, can’t wait! To the Praise of His Glory! Henry