Have you ever watched a “waffle-artist” at work?

I know this may be not what you expect to be reading on a blog such as this one, but think about it for a minute.  These people have breakfast decoration down to an art form.  They may have a few squares dedicated butter and a few to various flavors of syrups.  The more daring may even strategically have a few squares set apart for peanut butter.  However you slice it (no pun intended) these confectionery concoctions (nice use of alliteration) are sure to give the “waffle-artist” a plethora of tastes all in one waffle.

But I appear to rambling, so back to the series.

The first step in understanding what radical holiness is would be defining the word holiness itself.  A compilation of online dictionaries gave me this exhaustive definition:

Holiness, or sanctity, is the state of being holy or sacred, that is, set apart for the worship or service of God or gods…spiritually whole or sound; of unimpaired innocence and virtue; free from sinful affections; pure in heart; godly; pious; irreproachable; guiltless; acceptable to God.  It is most usually ascribed to people, but can be and often is ascribed to objects, times, or places.  The word holy is related to the word whole.

I hope to use this entire definition in this series of posts but for now I want to pull out the last sentence.

“The word holy is related to the word whole.”

I think this sentence truly changes our modern definitions of holiness.  A related word here would be integrity.  Integrity has as its root the word integer which is a whole number in math language (in which I am much less than fluent).  So the idea is that integrity is who you are wholly or completely.

In essence, the gospel is “holistic”.

Have you ever noticed how good you are at putting the things of your life in neat little compartments?  I mean who you are around these people may be drastically different than who you are around those people.  One location may dictate your actions, words and even mannerisms that would be totally different at another location.  We have almost become “waffle-ized” in that we can place various toppings in each of our little squares without having them overlap.

In my opinion, we need more “pancake Christians”.

Like a pancake becomes saturated with syrup or whatever topping you choose, a “pancake Christian” becomes saturated in the gospel of Jesus Christ in that it directly affects every aspect of his or her life.  There is nothing in the life of a “pancake Christian” that is off limits to the dynamic life-changing power of the gospel.

It affects how you act.

It changes how you speak.

It alters how you think.

Everything changes.

That’s what Jesus wanted for us anyway, right?

Grace and peace,

Rick