“The greatest miracle that God can do today is to take an unholy man out of an unholy world and make that man holy and put him back into that unholy world and keep him holy in it.” – Leonard Ravenhill1
“Holiness, as taught in the Scriptures, is not based upon knowledge on our part. Rather, it is based upon the resurrected Christ in-dwelling us and changing us into His likeness.” – A. W. Tozer
“We are not only to renounce evil, but to manifest the truth. We tell people the world is vain; let our lives manifest that it is so. We tell them that our home is above and that all these things are transitory. Does our dwelling look like it? O to live consistent lives!” – Hudson Taylor
“It is a great deal better to live a holy life than to talk about it. We are told to let our light shine, and if it does we won’t need to tell anybody it does. The light will be its own witness. Lighthouses don’t ring bells and fire cannon to call attention to their shining—they just shine.” – Dwight L. Moody
“Holiness does not consist in mystic speculations, enthusiastic fervors, or uncommanded austerities; it consists in thinking as God thinks, and willing as God wills.” – John Brown
“Although we become Christians instantaneously by faith in Christ, knowing God and developing faith is a gradual process. There are no shortcuts to maturity. It takes time to be holy.” – Erwin W. Lutzer
“Holiness is not something to be received in a meeting; it is a life to be lived and to be lived in detail.” – Martyn Lloyd-Jones
“Holiness has love for its essence, humility for its clothing, the good of others as its employment, and the honor of God as its end.” – Nathanael Emmons
“The holy man is the most humble man you can meet.” – Oswald Chambers
“It is time for us Christians, to face up to our responsibility for holiness. Too often we say we are “defeated” by this or that sin. No, we are not defeated; we are simply disobedient. It might be well if we stopped using the terms victory and defeat to describe our progress in holiness. Rather we should use the terms obedience and disobedience.” – Jerry Bridges
“Holiness is another word for wholeness of soul and life.” – Charles. H. Spurgeon
“The true Christian ideal is not to be happy but to be holy.” – A. W. Tozer
“Study universal holiness of life. Your whole usefulness depends on this, for your sermons last but an hour or two, your life preaches all the week. If Satan can only make a covetous minister a lover of praise, of pleasure, of good eating, he has ruined your ministry. Give yourselves to prayer, and get your texts, your thoughts, your words from God. Luther spent his best three hours in prayer.” – Robert Murray McCheyne
“The secret of Christian holiness is heart occupation with Christ Himself.” – H. A. Ironside
“A baptism of holiness, a demonstration of godly living is the crying need of our day.” – Duncan Campbell
“… the pursuit of holiness must be anchored in grace; otherwise it is doomed to failure.” – Jerry Bridges
“Everything in Scripture has in view the promotion of holiness.” – A. W. Pink
“Study universal holiness of life. Your whole usefulness depends on this.” – E. M. Bounds
“Don’t take the holiness of God lightly, for it is the very essence of His character.” – Billy Graham
“If you don’t delight in the fact that your Father is holy, holy, holy, then you are spiritually dead. You may be in a church. You may go to a Christian school. But if there is no delight in your soul for the holiness of God, you don’t know God. You don’t love God. You’re out of touch with God. You’re asleep to his character.” – R. C. Sproul
1 All of these quotes are from the websites below:
Holiness-Quotes, Devotionals, Illustrations | Precept Austin
Thanks Curt.
It’s been a minute or two. I’m rusty and dusty.
The topic stimulates the hellion in me to categorize the topic, just cuz I can, and probably cuz I should.
Personal holiness: the goal of ordinary, daily Christian calling in this present life. Curt’s source material supports that emphasis strongly, especially where it stresses lived consistency, obedience, humility, grace, and holiness “in detail.”
So: Personal Holiness Is Not Private Theater.
Personal holiness is not religious image-management, emotional intensity, or moral posing. It is the daily, Spirit-shaped life of a Christian who belongs to God and is being taught to think, choose, speak, and live in ways that reflect Christ in the real world.
Apologetics:
1. Personal holiness begins with God’s work in us.
It is not self manufactured virtue. Christ indwells, the Spirit convicts, and grace trains the believer toward obedience.
2. Personal holiness is practiced in the details of daily life.
It is not only a sermon topic. It shows up in words, appetites, habits, thoughts, honesty, humility, and self-control.
3. Personal holiness is the visible proof that faith is alive.
A believer will not live sinlessly in this life, but he is called to live distinctly, repentantly, and increasingly like Christ.
When Christians speak of holiness, many people imagine something stiff, joyless, and artificial, as if holiness were a religious costume made of rules, bad coffee, and facial tension. But biblical holiness, especially personal holiness, is not theatrical severity. It is the lived condition of a person who belongs to a holy God and is therefore being changed from the inside out.
That is the first point to get straight. Personal holiness does not begin with human willpower. It begins with God. Curt’s source sheet makes that plain by citing Tozer: holiness is not based on our knowledge alone, but on the resurrected Christ indwelling us and changing us into His likeness. That matters because
Christians do not become holy by gritting their teeth and acting impressive. Holiness is not cosmetics for the soul. It is the fruit of union with Christ. God saves the sinner, places His life within him, and then begins the long, exacting work of making him resemble Jesus.
But because the work is God’s, it does not become passive. That is the second point. Personal holiness must be practiced. It is worked out in the details of ordinary life, which is irritating, because most people would prefer holiness to remain abstract and ceremonial.
Martyn Lloyd-Jones, quoted in Curt’s document, says holiness is not something received in a meeting but a life to be lived, and lived in detail. Exactly right. Personal holiness appears in what a man does when no one applauds him, in what he watches, how he speaks, what he tolerates in his imagination, how he handles money, how quickly he repents, how honestly he deals, and whether he obeys God when obedience costs him something.
That is why personal holiness can never be reduced to public religion. A man may attend church, quote Scripture, and still be inwardly proud, lustful, bitter, greedy, and false. Jesus never mistook outward polish for inward purity, and neither should we.
Personal holiness is first inward, but never inward only. It includes the hidden life of thought and motive, but it also produces visible fruit. Dwight Moody’s lighthouse image from Curt’s source gets it beautifully: light does not need to advertise itself, it simply shines. A holy life carries its own testimony.
There is also a hard edge here that Christians should not dodge. Personal holiness requires obedience. Jerry Bridges, also quoted by Curt, cuts through sentimental language when he says we often call ourselves defeated when we are simply disobedient. That stings because it is often true. Not every struggle is rebellion, but many excuses are. Personal holiness means learning to stop renaming sin as weakness, temperament, stress, or personality. It means calling it what God calls it, turning from it, and walking again in the grace that trains us to deny ungodliness.
And that leads to the apologetic force of personal holiness. It gives credibility to Christianity. The world may argue with doctrine, but it has difficulty dismissing a believer whose private life has been steadily altered by Christ. A man who tells the truth when lying would profit him, who refuses impurity in a corrupt culture, who forgives when wounded, who remains humble when praised, and who repents when wrong, offers a kind of evidence no slogan can match. Personal holiness is not perfection. It is a recognizable transformation.
So the holiness Christians are to espouse in this life is not mystical detachment, legalistic posturing, or polished hypocrisy. It is personal holiness: the humble, steady, grace-anchored obedience of a life being conformed to Christ. It is an inward truth made outward in daily conduct. And while it will never be flawless on this side of glory, it must be real. 🕯️
Leave the Tip:
A Christian who speaks much of grace but refuses personal holiness is not defending the gospel. He is advertising a counterfeit.