Holiness: The Heart God Purifies

by Nancy Leigh DeMoss

Book Overview

Tu experiencia m?s plena con Dios solo ocurrir? cuando tu vida sea santa y tu coraz?n puro. La autora ofrece principios pr?cticos para vivir una vida santa y un coraz?n encendido para Dios. Muchas... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0802412793
• ISBN13: 9780802412799
• Release Date: August 2005
• Publisher: Moody Publishers
• Length: 224 Pages
• Weight: 0.55 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.5" x 5.0" x 7.6"

Customer Reviews

Great Book!

This book was really convicting and practical. It was also written humbly which I appreciate. It was a good reminder and something all christians in America could read.

My favorite Nancy Leigh DeMoss book

This book really strengthened my faith and helped me see how important I am to God and how much He has done for me. Anyone who is seeking to understand the big plan God has for each of us and who wants to gain a greater love for God needs to read this book.

Biblical Holiness

If people could see your inner thoughts and desires, would they find that you are a holy person? Jesus is returning for an unblemished bride. Are you prepared for his imminent return? In her final installment of the Revive Our Hearts Trilogy, Nancy Leigh DeMoss unpacks biblical holiness. I say biblical because many people have a mental picture of what it means to be holy that is contrary to how the Bible describes holiness. Picture in your mind a holy person. Is she joyful? Is she loving and gracious to others? Does she enjoy what is good? Do you enjoy being around her? If your answer is "no" to any of these, then your definition of holy is not biblical. A somber, judgmental woman who is burdened by her own unattainable ideal is not the biblical picture of a holy woman. DeMoss begins with a biblical defense for holiness. It's gotten a bad rap, so to speak, and DeMoss sets out to demonstrate, using scripture and the example of her father, that a holy life is the most splendid life one can live. To understand holiness, DeMoss explains the two facets of holiness. To be holy means "to be set apart, to be distinct, to be different." God wants us to be holy because He is holy. If we are His, then He has set us apart for Himself. To be holy also means to be morally pure, free from sin, like God. She writes, "Yes, holiness involves adherence to a standard, but the obedience God asks of us is not cold, rigid, and dutiful. It is a warm, joyous, loving response to the God who loves us and created us to enjoy intimate fellowship with Him. It is the overflow of a heart that is deeply grateful to have been redeemed by God from sin. It is not something we manufacture by sheer grit, determination, and willpower. It is motivated and enabled by the Holy Spirit who lives within us to make us holy." The scriptures she uses teach how holiness makes a Christian glad and joyful. Likewise, a half-hearted pursuit of holiness ends in regret and disappointment. True holiness is a spiritual work that originates in our hearts and minds through the work of God's Spirit. While it is God's work, that does not mean we should have relaxed attitudes about growing in holiness. The Bible provides several motivations for us to pursue holiness. DeMoss underscores seven powerful incentives to motivate her readers to pursue holiness: because God is holy, because holiness is God's stated goal for every believer, because Jesus died to deliver us from sin, because we are saints, because our intimacy with God depends on it, because we are going to live eternally in a holy city, because the well-being of others depends on it. In addition to these motivating factors, DeMoss warns of the power of sin to lead us astray and wreck our lives. Too many professing Christians treat sin as if it were not that big of a deal, as if we can stop it before things get out of hand. The idea that a certain amount of sin is tolerable is one of the many lies Satan uses to decei

You will be moved

If you get through this book and walk away unchanged then something is wrong. Nancy puts things in such a way that the concept of holiness will finally click for the reader. She helps us realize that becoming holy isn't easy but it can be done... with the Holy Spirit, of course.

Holiness

"...I am often more bothered by others' failures than by my own shortcomings. I tend to minimize or rationalize in my life certain offenses that disturb me when I see them in others." (pg. 20) As I read these words I realized that they easily could have come from my own journal. This is a struggle I face daily, as I clearly see the sins and shortcomings of others, but fail to see, or address them, in myself as faithfully. Nancy Leigh DeMoss, in her book Holiness: The Heart God Purifies, says: "The message of repentance and holiness needs to be proclaimed, heard, and heeded among God's people in every generation. It must become more than a theological tenet that we politely nod agreement to; it needs to transform the way we think that the way we live." (pg. 21) This book does just that. It clearly proclaims the message of holiness, and its importance in the life of the believer. But, it also gives the reader opportunity to make it personal - to transform sinful patterns in their own lives, and passionately pursue holiness. In chapter one, she lists several of the misconceptions surrounding holiness: -Somber, straitlaced people with outdated hair and clothing styles -An austere, joyless lifestyle based on a long list of rules and regulations -A monk-like existence - "holy" people talk in hushed tones, spend hours a day in prayer, always have their nose in the Bible or a spiritual book, fast frequently , hum hymns under their breath, and have no interest in "normal" life activities -People with a judgmental attitude toward those who don't accept their standards -An unattainable ideal that has more to do with the sweet by-and-by than the real world, which is right here, right now (pg. 28) But, as this book reveals, this caricatured version is not what true holiness is about. Instead, "it is a warm, joyous, loving response to the God who loves us and created us to enjoy intimate fellowship with Him." (pg. 37) But, too often we do not see holiness for what it truly is, because we do not see sin for what it really is. "Somehow, the evangelical world has managed to redefine sin; we have come to view it as normal, acceptable behavior - something perhaps to be tamed or controlled, but not to be eradicated and put to death. We have sunk to such lows that we can not only sin thoughtlessly, but, astonishingly, we can even laugh at sin and be entertained by it." (pg. 75) In chapter 4, "The Face of Holiness," DeMoss gives us a vivid picture of what holiness can, and should, look like in our lives, as it was lived out in the person of Christ. As DeMoss describes Christ's holiness, she reminds us that, "the call to holiness is a call to follow Christ. A pursuit of holiness that is not Christ-centered will soon be reduced to moralism, pharisaical self-righteousness, and futile self-effort." (pg. 103) In the Foreward to this book, Randy Alcorn similarly notes that "God is the reason that we should be holy. But He's also the empowerme