Holiness for a Postmodern World

I am excited about Diane Leclerc’s new book, Discovering Christian Holiness. She does a good job of addressing key issues in the postmodern attempt to understand and live holiness.

Diane writes her new book from the perspective of Wesleyan-Holiness theology. She believes this theological tradition offers a distinct perspective that rises from the history of the Christian tradition and Scripture. The audience for the book, however, is our contemporary age. 

Early on, Diane argues for the relevance of the Wesleyan tradition’s understanding of holiness in this postmodern world. She takes her understanding from John and Charles Wesley’s argument that salvation is the gospel’s primary focus. She believes a Wesleyan approach to holiness can be optimistic: sin needs to reign no longer.

Diane bases the structure of her book on the Wesleyan quadrilateral. As a preliminary, she argues for the supremacy of love in biblical and historical understandings of holiness. Diane writes, “Love, for Wesley and his successors, should permeate every fiber of holiness and thus should be understood as the overarching theme of my entire book and not just the concluding chapter.” She also argues that “entire devotion to God is perhaps the best expression of our love for God and should be seen as a thematic thread” (30).

Holiness and the Bible

We all come to the Bible from a particular perspective and life experience. We all either explicitly or implicitly are convinced some ways of reading the Bible are better than others.

Diane argues that a Wesleyan way of reading the Bible emphasizes it as our most important lens through which we might see what God is like. The Bible is formative, and we can rely upon it for all things pertaining to salvation. It serves as a source for helping Christians in their devotional life.

Wesleyans examine Scripture and pick the grand themes in its pages. Like John Wesley, they affirm the purpose of Scripture is to reveal the God of love, who out of love saves the world (44).

Diane asks early on in the book a key question: “What does it mean to be holy?” She answers in this way:

    “We affirm that all holy acts come out of a holy heart and that God changes our desires and motivations from within when we fully devout ourselves to following Christ in faith and fellowship. We depend on God’s enabling grace everyday in our Christian walk. Holiness means much more than sinlessness. To be holy, we must love. And love is never finished because there are always new opportunities to practice love for God and neighbor. This is the heart of the Wesleyan message” (48).

In her exploration of holiness in the Bible, Diane uses the Wesleyan phrase, “the whole tenor” of Scripture. She argues that holiness is a central theme in the Old and New testaments.

Biblical authors present holiness in a variety of ways. Sometimes Holiness refers to God incomparability, other times God’s glory or jealousy. Sometimes Scripture suggests that human holiness is derived from God. Sometimes to be holy means being entirely devoted to God. Sometimes, holiness refers to a divine-human relationship. Other times to human obedience.

In the New Testament, biblical writers sometimes identify holiness with purity of heart. This purity expresses itself outwardly in actions. We also find biblical passages identifying holiness with the absence of sin, and others identifying it with the presence of good. According to the Bible, holiness is both an individual and corporate calling.

History and Theology of Holiness

Part two of the book addresses holiness from an historical perspective. Because she is an historical theologian, it comes as little surprise that Diane both appreciates and knows well major figures of the Christian tradition. These chapters provide dozens of sketches of important historical figures both predating John Wesley and following him. I learned some new things in these sections.

Diane titles part three of her book, “Holiness Theology for Today.” She begins by addressing the complex issues of how we talk about God. She affirms both the transcendence and immanence of God. “An understanding of God as holy, as transcendent, as immanent, and as relational,” she says, “finally brings us to the supreme affirmation that God is love.” She continues…

   “This love is what most exactly defines God’s holiness and most precisely modifies God’s transcendent and immanent relationship with the world. God’s holiness as love is not only the height, but also the very depth of all the Wesleyan theology affirms. The love of God expands both far and wide into all that it believes. This does not contradict the suggestion that at the heart of Wesleyan theology is soteriology, for God’s love is a love that reaches infinitely towards us in order to save. The ultimate expression of this love comes to us through the incarnation. Christ is love personified. As such, he reveals that the nature of love is an embodied servanthood willing to carry a cross” (142).

Diane spends a good deal of time exploring Jesus Christ as the revelation of God’s love. As the Son, he is the servant, model, savior, high priest, mediator, and the one whom God has resurrected. “Christ reveals that God’s love toward us is a gift,” she concludes, “self giving in nature and soteriological in purpose” (147).

The Holy Spirit plays an important role in sanctification, according to Diane. In this context, she addresses the Wesleyan understanding of prevenient grace. This grace is God’s loving presence that comes before, seeking to woo and draw us to God. Matters of the Holy Spirit also lead Diane to address briefly the question of how Wesleyans should think about religious pluralism. Finally, the Holy Spirit regenerates, sanctifies, and comforts individuals and the church.

I think it is important to note that Diane decides to talk about God’s love before she talks about humans as sinful. This reflects the basis of her Wesleyan optimism that God is greater than sin. But she does not shirk from addressing sin issues. Diane says God created humans, but they sinned against God. In fact, they now have a bent toward sin. She steers a path on the question of the original sin between the views of Augustine and Pelagius. The key to this path is the universal prevenient grace of God that provides the possibility for salvation to all by empowering them to respond to God’s gift of love.

The final part of these three sections addresses the death of Christ and atonement theories that have emerged in the life of the church. Diane argues for full salvation, and this leads naturally to her understanding of sanctification. She makes the following important claims:

Entire sanctification…

1. is subsequent to regeneration.

2. breaks the power of sin.

3. is characterized by entire devotion to God.

4. results in obedience and love.

5. has an element of both taking away and giving to.

6. is through faith (by grace) alone.

7. is (usually) followed by the witness of the spirit.

8. can be described by several metaphorical phrases.

9. requires subsequent growth, which must be intentionally nurtured.

10. involves growth in Christ-like character.

In this segment, Diane calls for a balanced interpretation of entire sanctification. This balanced view affirms the best of John Wesley’s theology and the best of the American holiness movement. It affirms holiness as both appropriated in a moment and developed over time through growth in grace. She calls for readers to retain the idea of secondness in sanctification, while allowing differences from person to person in how entire sanctification is experienced.

Holy Living for a New Century

Diane titles the final part of her book, “Holy Living for a New Century.” She devotes chapters to five aspects of holiness: purity, perfection, power, character, and love.

By purity, Diane has in mind the issue of morality. Holiness leads the Christian to live a moral life of avoiding sin. Being obedient to the God of love involves fulfilling the call of love. This involves following certain ways of living and rules. It is embodied holiness. Diane’s discussion of sexuality is particularly relevant for challenges that twenty-first century Christians face.

In her chapter on perfection, Diane argues that we are created to love God with our whole being and our neighbors as ourselves. Perfection does not mean becoming un-human. It does not mean we no longer make mistakes or have weaknesses. Perfection involves living the life of love. Such life includes avoiding sin but also acting in compassion and for social justice. Holiness as perfection entails perfect love.

In her chapter on holiness and power, Diane emphasizes the importance of God working in our lives to provide power for victory over sin. This does not mean that human give up a sense of self. Instead, Christians follow the self-giving love of Jesus Christ who, in kenotic love, lived a life sacrificing his own interests for the good of others.

Some of Diane’s best work resides in this chapter. In it, she considers deeply vital questions of human weakness, brokenness, suffering, and abuse. She concludes, “Out of our own courage at times to be our own unique selves despite the pain, God is able to lead us to be an instrument of powerful healing in others’ lives. God is indeed a redeeming God” (252).

In the chapter on character, Diane argues for not only loving in the moment and avoiding particular sins. Holiness also calls for Christians to become people with loving characters. The life of Christlikeness develops a particular kind of character in the Christian. Following certain practices — both within the church community and as individuals – is important for developing a Christlike character in a postmodern world.

Diane titles the final chapter of her book, “Holiness as Love.” Throughout her book, she had referred often to the central place love plays in a Wesleyan holiness understanding of sanctification. Love is the center. For Diane, this means holiness and love cannot be separated. It also means that a strong theology of holiness will care about the head and the heart, the intellect and feelings. Love makes a difference in the way we live our day-to-day lives.

Diane makes a special point to talk about our love for God as entire devotion. She says such devotion is the proper and fitting response to God’s love for us. It involves complete consecration and surrender.

Conclusion

The conclusion of Discovering Christian Holiness is a fitting conclusion to this review:

  “This then is the essence of holiness, the holiness to which we have been called. To be called unto holiness is to be called to kenotic love. Love at the center of it all. Love at the center of us all. Self- emptying love outpoured into the world: This has been our past; this can be our future” (286). 

I recommend Diane Leclerc’s new book!