“Who shall we say You are
You’re the living God
Who shall we say You are
You’re the Great I AM
The highest name of all
You’re all You say You are
You are holy, holy, holy
God most high and God most worthy
You are holy, holy, holy
Jesus, You are
Jesus, You are”
I absolutely love the bridge and chorus of this song “Holy” by Matt Redman. They seek to describe our inability to understand or comprehend who God is, because of the sheer majestic holiness of His being. God is so holy and above us, that mere words are not enough to grasp the depth of His character. Even our most profound thoughts and wildest imaginations of how holy God is, are not enough to scratch the surface of His true holiness.
“Holy” is the only word in the Bible that describes God which is repeated three times in a row. In the book of Revelation, when John describes the throne room of heaven, he mentions four creatures that are in the midst and around the throne. “The four living creatures, each having six wings, were full of eyes around and within. And they do not rest day or night, saying:
‘Holy, holy, holy,
Lord God Almighty,
Who was and is and is to come!’”Revelation 4:8
There must be something extremely significant with the fact that God is supremely and eminently holy. I believe that trying to grasp this fact helps us understand the relationship between us and God. That although there is this closeness and intimacy with God, there is also a vast difference between who He is and who we are, that humbles us and brings us to our knees in worship, in acknowledgement of God as our sovereign Lord and King.
However, many times, I think it’s commonplace for us to lose sight of God as holy, holy, and holy. I think a big reason why we struggle so much in our walks with God is because we are quick to forget that God is holy. We treat Jesus more as a friend, and in focusing too much on that role of Him in our lives, we find it easier to brush Him aside or spend less time in conversation with Him. We find it easier to doubt God when we forget that He is the majestic Creator of the universe. Our prayers are stale, because we don’t really believe that God can answer them. We don’t own up to our faith or spread the gospel, because other people’s reactions and ridicule overwhelms the tiny god that we “worship”.
Matt Redman reminds us that God is the Great “I AM”. In Exodus 3, Moses asks God what he should tell the Israelites if they ask who sent him to lead them out of slavery from the Egyptians. “God said to Moses, ‘I AM WHO I AM. This is what you are to say to the Israelites: ‘I AM has sent me to you’” (Exodus 3:14). The powerful phrase “I AM” seems to embody the essence of a Being that needs no further explanation. No phrase or word can adequately and completely describe who God is.
God is utterly majestic, purely righteous, and perfectly worthy of our praise and adoration. He is holy, holy, and holy. May we come to this realization of the sheer magnitude of God’s holiness and allow that truth to completely saturate and transform our lives.
Author: Micah Shyu
*For further reading, I highly recommend A.W. Tozer’s The Knowledge of the Holy.