An Air of Virtue

The chief assertion of religious morality is that white is a color. Virtue is not the absence of vices or the avoidance of moral dangers; virtue is a vivid and separate thing, like pain or a particular smell.
Gilbert K. Chesterton (1874-1936, British author)

2 Peter 1:2-3
Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord; seeing that His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness, through the true knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and excellence. NASU

I couldn’t say anything but “Amen” when I read the words of Chesterson this morning, for what he says is absolutely true. We as Christians do identify so many times the color white, but we identify this brilliance to God Himself, and not to how it applies to our daily lives. We know God is pure and holy and without stain or blemish, but we do not like the idea of striving to duplicate His Holiness to others.

Virtue for the most part is dead today. What is virtue? It is a trusted and honored handshake, a keeping of your word. It is the living outwardly of what is happening inwardly in you as God’s Holy Spirit works, in you and me daily. I do mean daily, for that is virtue, it is not a color, it is a belief, an honored and treasured idea that we are to live out our lives with a defined separation between us and a self-centered world.

God declares this to us clearly in His Word, in 2 Cor 6:17-18 “Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you, And will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty.” Now this is virtue, it is a different way that someone looks at you, a different air that surrounds the Child of God, which carries with it the fragrance and feeling of Heaven…God Bless.

Pastor William