In this short devotional titled “Preparing Our Hearts,” music pastor Rick Lee James of First Church of the Nazarene (Springfield, Ohio) explains the Sunday theme “Holy.” He clarifies that holiness is not a human achievement but a divine attribute that God bestows on believers when they are in His presence. James contrasts the cultural notion of beauty—focused on outward appearance—with the biblical view that true beauty and holiness are deep, God‑given qualities. He illustrates this by describing how God sees believers as a beautiful bride, and how His holiness makes them holy. To reinforce the point, he altered the lyric of the hymn “Take My Life” from “Holiness is what you want from me” to “Holiness is what you want for me,” emphasizing that God imparts holiness to His people. The message concludes with an invitation to worship the following Sunday, contact information for the church, and links to his personal website and Twitter.
Chapters
Holiness, holiness is what I long for. Holiness is what I need. Holiness, holiness is what you want for me. Hello and welcome to Preparing Our Hearts for Worship. I am Rick Lee James. I'm the music pastor at First Church of the Nazarene in Springfield, Ohio. Our theme for this Sunday is Holy, and when we're talking about holy, we're talking about the holiness of who God is. Not so much the holiness of who we are. It's interesting because we are in the Church of the Nazarene from what you would call part of the holiness tradition, and yet there's been a big misunderstanding through the years as far as what holiness is, what holiness means, and the source of holiness. We do not produce holiness of ourselves. God is the one who is holy. God is the one who brings holiness. It's being in the presence of the holy that we are made holy. Think of it this way: in God's standards, in God's terms, if you think of the word beauty, which is actually a word that's very much associated with the word holy, in our culture we would think of beauty as, well, the way a person looks, or, you know, that person is just beautiful. And you'll see commercials about CoverGirl or, you know, Revlon or some other, you know, makeup commercial, or the clothes we wear, the appearance appearance that we put on, but oftentimes it's just the appearance. But if you think of in terms of how God sees it, beauty is not the outward. Beauty is something so much deeper. Beauty is something that is bestowed upon us. It's something given to us. Beauty is something so much more than just the terms of the world. In God's eyes, Beauty is something much deeper. He sees a beauty in us that no one else can see. We can be the ugliest person on the planet by the world's terms, but we can be very beautiful to God. Think of holiness in those terms too, because as God sees us as his beautiful bride, it is his love that makes us beautiful. As he sees us as sinful people, it is his holiness that makes us holy. It is not our holiness. We don't produce this of our own. To be holy is to be separate, to be other, to be different, to be revered, to be in awe. And so we want to be in awe of the Lord, and we want that type of holiness in our lives. But as we're going to sing tomorrow, I've changed one word in the original lyrics to the song that I was just singing called "Take My Life." Instead of singing the original words, which is "Holiness is what you want from me," we're actually singing "Holiness is what you want for me." And so we are hoping to experience the holiness of God together tomorrow as we worship, that we would be in his presence and that his holiness would be very real, very present, that he would actually impart his holiness upon his people. That we could be a part of his beautiful plan, being made beautiful in his world, being made holy, and being what he would call us to be. You can find out more about our church by visiting our website at homerodenas.org. You can follow me on Twitter @rickleejames or go to my website at rickleejames.com. And hopefully we'll see you Sunday. 901 East Home Road, Springfield, Ohio 45503. First Church of the Nazarene. Thank you, and thank you for preparing your heart for worship this week as we come together.
