"Woe is Me"

In reflecting on holiness and grace this week, I have been thinking about what it means for us to be holy. Yesterday I expressed that we cannot become holy without God's saving grace and refining strength.  Today I read a passage that beautifully describes our need to recognize our lack of holiness, for that is the beginning of holy living.

Devotions for Lent
Keith Potter
Holy God

"In  the season of Lent we remember the great sacrifice that Jesus Christ made, the forgiveness that was paid for with his life. We confess that our sins have gotten in the way of a relationship with God.
    However, our confession will be thin and hollow unless we understand how great and holy God is. We are forever underestimating the seriousness of sin and its effects, making us unlike God and unfit for his good fellowship. Our efforts as forgiving ourselves and others will be thin and hollow as well unless we understand how God's grace completely covers us through Jesus Christ, makins us righteous in God's eyes and fit for his good fellowship.
    So in this season, we meditate on God's holiness and wonder what it would be like to be filled only with loving intentions and healthy movtivations, like our God.
    In Isaiah 6, we discover the story of the great prophet starts with a grand vision of God on his throne, surrouned by angelic beings. Day and night, these attendants cry out "Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord of Heaven's Armies! The whole earth is filled with his glory! (Isaiah 6:3)
     Isaiah's response?
    "It's all over! I am doomed, for I am a sinful man. I have filthy lips, and I live among a people with filthy lips. Yet I have seen the King, The Lord of Heaven's Armies."(Isaiah 6:5)
      Seeing God gave Isaiah the eyes to see himself. Unclean. Badly acculturated in the filth of his surroundings. Anything but holy.
      So God touched Isaiah. He enjoyes forgiveness and cleansing and a new readiness. God calls out for a human agent.
    Isaiah response, "Lord, I'll go! Send me."
     That can be our story. In light of God's holiness, we come undone. "Woe is me! I'm an unclean person among unclean people. Now that I really see you, Lord, I see myself. Help!"
    And God does help, with a grace greater than our sin. If his holiness is great, his grace is somehow overarching, for it covers every sin of ours that must offend the purity of his holiness. "Come, let us tell of the Lord's greatness; let us exalt his name together." (Psalm 34:3)

Wow. Before we can start to become holy, we must recognize how truly unholy we are. When we compare ourselves to how holy God is, we are but filth.  I have to wonder though, the more we allow God to touch us, to change us, to refine, how much more will we begin to recognize how holy He truly is? I pray that we would never cheapen our view of God, that our hearts will always be willing to cry out "Woe is me! For I am unclean!" and that we keep in persepective how amazing His grace really is.