Thou art of purer eyes than to behold evil

Habakkuk 1:13

Thou art of purer eyes than to behold evil, and canst not look on iniquity…

We all understand that the Lord hates and despises iniquity, and has a deep and great detestation for sin. God is holy. God is pure. God is of purer eyes than to behold evil! He doesn’t want to see it, or look upon it, or have to behold the wretchedness of mankind and His depraved errancy. But the Lord in His mercy passes over iniquity, and the transgression of the remnant of His heritage. He does not keep His anger forever! And this is amazing in light of the fact that God cannot even look on wickedness and sin. We sometimes allow sin to creep in and we permit impurities to mar our sanctification. But still—but still! Our Lord loves us and is patient, and is kind, and is generous, and casts our sins into the depths of the sea, as Micah so perfectly symbolizes. They are gone! As far as the east is from the west, so far hath He removed our transgressions from us! He cannot look on inquiry, yet He looks on us, because the righteousness of Christ has been imputed on our account! He does not look on us, but on the atoning and propitious blood of Christ which covers and cleanses every sin.

He cannot look on iniquity! And if this is the case, then neither should we desire to look on it either. We should passionately, and ardently, and earnestly desire all sin to be eradicated from our lives. Be ye holy; for I am holy, says the Lord, and says Peter in the New Testament. We should diligently and faithfully seek to rid ourselves of those things which displease the Lord. If we are to be created in His image, and to mirror His character by being changed to be like Him, then we must have a distinct and definite hatred for all sin in our lives. Now, one thing must be said by way of reminder: we should hate the sin in ourselves first and more furiously than we do the sin in others. Cast the beam out of thine own eye! For then thou shalt see clearly to cast the mote out of thy brother’s eye. For sin is a cloudy cataract, it is a great and inflicting obstruction. It is a barrier, an inhibitor, a blockade to seeing properly. And it is an inhibitor of the blessings of God as well. Let us hate sin in our own lives, brethren, and then we shall begin to remove it from those places around us where it may rear its most ugly head. We often have that backwards and reversed. We talk about the sin in others, but are all the while ignorant to the blaring sin that emanates from ourselves. May God deliver us from this!

Now, dear one, let us think and consider this morning. Let us say a giant “Selah,” and just pause for a moment, asking the Lord to root out and dig out and purge out the old leaven, that we may be a new lump. For Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us! Let us therefore keep the feast, not with old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness; but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth. Let us cast out all sin, and seek to live purely and holily and unblameably in His sight. And do not start with others, with fellow Christians, or with the heathen. Start with you! And then, once you have been duly purged, God may work through you to bring cleansing, purity, and holiness to a crooked nation and to a backslidden people. But dear friend, start with yourself, and let the Lord make you holy and pure in His sight, as He Himself is holy and pure.

“Father, the true desire of our hearts is to be pure and righteous and clean in your holy sight. We know that the blood of Christ covers our sin, but how shall we assume ourselves to be holy if we do not seek to be sprinkled from an evil conscience ourselves, and do not allow our bodies to be washed with pure water? If you cannot even look on iniquity, may you give us the same hatred and abhorrent repugnance toward any and all sin. And may it begin in our own hearts. Make us holy before Thee, we sincerely ask. And these things we pray in Jesus’ name, Amen.”