“But Paul cried with a loud voice, saying, Do thyself no
harm: for we are all here.” –Acts 16:28
If
you are a Christian, then you are peculiar.
This is not to say weird or bizarre (though it may seem that way to
some), rather that we belong exclusively to Christ and have characteristics
that are unique to Christians. God’s
people have always been and will always be a peculiar people. We are separate from the world, we show love
when there should be hate, give when we should take, and at the center of our
life is not ourselves but Jesus Christ. The
characteristics of God are his alone and when they are in us, it makes us
exclusively His; we belong to Him.
Moreover, as he abides in us, so his characteristics abound if we let
them. These characteristics: love, joy,
peace, holiness, righteousness, good works, etc.; they are peculiar. Peculiar to God and peculiar to His
people. When the Holy Spirit is in us,
then Christ (God) is in us, and this is the light that he gives to us. A light to place on a candlestick and not be
hid.
In
the sixteenth chapter of Acts, Paul and Silas were beaten and unjustly thrown
into prison. While they were in this
predicament, they began to sing and praise God.
Soon, God showed up, a great earthquake broke the prison doors, and they
were free to go. The jailer, seeing the
doors open fell into a panic and was about to kill himself assuming that the
prisoners had fled. Right before he
could go through with it, “Paul cried
with a loud voice, saying, Do thyself no harm: for we are all here.” The jailer, undoubtedly moved by these
events, comes in before them and inquires, “What
must I do to be saved?” Consider the
peculiarity of these events. Here two
men sit in prison, but they are not sad or depressed, rather happy and joyful. Then, when the opportunity came to improve
their situation, they do nothing; further manifesting their contentment. Though they were chained in prison they were
not bound; though they were placed behind bars, they were free. When you are not sanctified, the
circumstances without dictate the character within. When you are sanctified, the character within
dictates how you react to the circumstances without. This makes for a peculiar people, because no
matter what comes your way, the joy is still there. The peace is still apparent; the love and
devotion to God and your fellowman remains consistent. The people of the world chase the lust
thereof; God’s people abstain from the world and follow Christ. This is why the way of a transgressor is
hard, because no matter how much you get and gain; the outward man can never
satisfy the inward man. Worldliness can
never be a substitute for Holiness, and Holiness is exactly what the human
heart needs. Somewhere along the line of
time words like peculiar, select, exclusive fell out of modern day
preaching. Perhaps because it did not
appeal to the masses or the masses do not understand their appeal. It is not that God wishes (or God’s people)
to forum a little holy club off to the side and bar the doors. In fact, it is the opposite, like a campfire
on a cold night; God calls for His people to be peculiar so that He might call
others through His people. So that he
might attracted the cold and lost world, those who are plodding along in the
dredges of complacency. Those who are
walking the fence of worldliness and Christianity. Those who are lost in sin looking for a
Savior.
God
calls us a peculiar people for His glory and our benefit. For us to dilute and absolve this election is
to dilute and absolve the very name of Christ.
This we cannot do, the thread of peculiarity is as much in the fabric of
Christianity as love, faith, and hope; because it is faith, hope, and love that
make us peculiar, separate, and apart from the world. Our desire to please God makes us separate from
the world. We are indeed of the world
but not in the world. Let us cast aside
the lie that in being peculiar we will exclude the world, and embrace that
calling of a peculiar people so that we might win the world.
