Do you see what this passage is about? It is about holiness. It is about separation…We have allowed ourselves to think that the future of Christianity and the future of the church is to become like the world. We flaunt our liberties. We are so frightened of being different, different from the world, that we have run into the world and become like the world. In many respects we cannot be distinguished from the world…If the kingdom of God is going to survive, grow, and attract others into it, it must be different from the world. It must be Christlike.
Derek W. H. ThomasBe ye holy as I am holy.1
1 While Ezra prayed and made confession, weeping and casting himself down before the house of God, a very great assembly of men, women, and children, gathered to him out of Israel, for the people wept bitterly.