Anyone recognize this quote? I wrote it down several days ago, but failed to note where it came from.
“Because God is holy, God’s people are to be holy by being like God in the world. We can, therefore, do away with all the cartoon pictures of the sanctimonious holy person wearing a halo and a prudish glare. To be holy is not to be narrow-minded and primly pious; it is, rather, to imitate God. To be holy is to roll up one’s sleeves and to join in with whatever God is doing in the world.”
Update: Walter C Kaiser Jr on Leviticus 19 in The New Interpreterβs Bible (Vol. 1): General and Old Testament Articles; Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus.
Thanks to Charles Cameron for finding this.
Long-ing For Life 
sounds very “Willardish” to me…
It definitely fits in the realm of his topics. I was thinking that I haven’t been reading Willard lately, but I did pick up The Spirit of the Disciplines the other day looking for something in particular…
I don’t think he’s the source, but Brent Avery has said very similar things about holiness; specifically, “To be holy is to roll up oneβs sleeves and to join in with whatever God is doing in the world.” the statement about Pretty sweet.
Walter C Kaiser Jr on Leviticus 19 in The New Interpreter’s Bible (Vol. 1): General and Old Testament Articles; Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus.
From: The Christian Century | Date: 11/22/1995 | Author: Willson, Patrick J.
http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1G1-17829290.html
That’s right! And I was reading Kaiser in The New Interpreter’s Bible at the time…amazing. Did you simply recognize it or did you do some sort of search on the text?
I put the first sentence in quotation marks and searched for it. One of the results was the review of “The Interpreter’s Bible” (The Christian Century, 1995) in which the writer quotes this passage and states that it comes from Walter C. Kaiser Jr.
You can find my own notes on Leviticus at
(a) Leviticus 1-6 (first set of notes) There are seven posts in this series. http://charlescameron.wordpress.com/2007/05/11/leviticus-1-6-2/
(b) Leviticus (second set of notes) http://charlescameron.wordpress.com/2007/06/13/leviticus-second-set-of-notes/
I hope you find these notes of some interest.
The links to my notes on Leviticus won’t work now. Here’s a new link – Leviticus.