Too Holy

 . . . who say, "Keep to yourself, do not come near me, for I am too holy for you."

 - From Isaiah 65

The prophet Isaiah, who was considered borderline insane, was kept at arms length from the community. People laughed about him, and at him. The cool people in old Israel did not associate with him. But his habits were not strange. They really were not outdated. His words were not hateful and divisive, not really. He simply reminded everybody what their grandparents tried to pass on to them, but that they ignore.

But Isaiah nudged the people, like the Holy Spirit does in almost every moment, to return to the teachings and practices that made Israel holy, special, and prosperous.

He was not strange . . . not really . . . but he made the people very uncomfortable. They had adopted habits that were fun, and that made them feel good. And once a good sensation, or feeling, has taken hold of a human (perhaps the most important tendency that separates us from beasts) they are loathe to let go of it. They may become cruel, evil, or violent, in order to keep the feeling (just listen to the music, watch the movies, and observe everything about modern pop culture, to see if feelings actually are the driving motivators behind us).

Isaiah was a Deplorable.

Feelings can make humans do crazy things. I'll bet that any crime committed . . . any evil deed, is rooted in some desire to feel something. But we do not like being reminded that we're being carnal, or selfish, or impulsive. So we put a nice covering of goodness around our new practices . . . or our new philosophy . . . or religion.

We veil our self-serving practices in the lingo of holiness. Impurity is thus cosmetically made to look like purity. It becomes the New Purity.

And then our separation from God is made complete, by separating ourselves from the Isaiahs around us, that ask us simply to consider what we're doing. We create that separate space in our social media groups, and in our associations. We even split families apart, in order to stay committed to our new religion. We unfriend people. In an instant. Friendships are made and destroyed, in an instant . . . in the time it takes to feel something pleasurable.

With our masks of goodness covering up our words and deeds . . . we finally convince ourselves that we are good, that we are better than God's perfect standard.

Christ says to "Go . . . " and to permeate the entire world with the Gospel. But God's enemies say "Leave me alone . . . I am too holy for you."

See what God just did there?