Set Apart – Fighting for what I believe in….

Several years ago my denomination and the way I choose to live came under attack in a greater way than I have ever seen before, and it’s no small attack – it’s an attack that I personally feel at every level. It’s an attack that has tried to make me bow my head and back up in a corner for my faith, my beliefs, and my standards. It’s not an attack on just a local level, it’s coming from all across the country. This article will be about why I live like I live. This article is not about any other religion or denomination. It’s not an article with any ill motives, nor to try to prove who is right, or who is wrong, it’s simply an article to stand up for what I personally believe in.

I refuse to bow my head to the attacks of world fighting against what I believe in.

I was raised in a home that was a wonderful, happy home. We didn’t have a lot of monetary things by the worlds standard’s, but in my eyes we had everything we needed. Our home was a peaceful home and I never questioned my safety or if my parents loved one another. Throwback to my Dad’s childhood, he was raised in a complete opposite home. I won’t share the extent of his story, but if you was looking for someone who had a chance at life it wouldn’t have been my Dad – most would say watch out for him because he will probably follow in the same footsteps as his family, but that changed when he showed up at a little Baptist Church and gave his heart to God around the age of 11. After my Dad got his license his Dad wouldn’t allow him to go to church so to respect his Dad’s wishes he would go and set in the parking lot of a little Holiness Church called The Mission while church was going on to get as close to church as possible, but still obey his Dad. His Dad eventually allowed him to go to church at the Mission and my Dad purposed in his heart to live for God, and to change the course of his life and it be different from what he knew growing up. My Dad met and married my mom who was raised in the Holiness faith, and they both chose to raise their children that way. Yes, there were many that thought they were living such commons lives, and that it was so unnecessary to live that way. Growing up I never felt I was living under bondage to a religion. I never felt threatened by anyone to live or dress conservative. My parents instilled a deep faith in me, and I believed in the way we lived. I watched my parents live it at home and my Dad lived it in his business ( he believed you run your business like a Christian, it wasn’t separate) I always felt they acted like Christians. Growing up I seen my parents be wronged and hurt, but they never reacted wrong. I remember one night someone had hurt my mother so deeply by words and she went home and prayed all night for God to give her grace to handle it right, and God gave her grace. She would read her bible about forgiveness, and they always forgave. God answered so many prayers for us growing up that I knew living for God really worked. I never questioned our conservative lifestyle, or felt I was missing out on something in life. I eventually married and I continued to believe in and try to live the way I had been raised. I fought many battles during the space of several years and drifted from God in so many ways, and at times I felt I barely had a grip on God. I had to search out many things for my own self, but I always felt God lead me back to how I was raised. I had seen God move for me so many times on a personal level in my own life that I knew there was something real in it. I wasn’t just living it because it was a way of life, but I seen God’s people in desperate situations and I seen Him move and work for them. I experienced great heartache in my life. If you’ve read my other blogs posts, or if you know me then you know my story. I’ve been through nothing compared to so many people, but I have had a few heartaches in life. By the age of 28 I had buried my first husband and firstborn son, they are both lying in the graveyard beside our church. My sons loss was due to him having Down syndrome which caused severe heart issues and he died a day or two before he was born with congestive heart failure, my husband was murdered in the driveway of our home. I can hear some say wow, God really has been faithful and good to you to allow those things to happen to you, and yes, you are exactly right, despite my heartache God has been so good and faithful to me. God has worked for me and performed so many miracles in my life and moved for me since the loss of my husband in 2008. I have many miracles I could share, but some are personal to me and time would fail me to try and share all of God’s goodness to me. I would like to share one testimony. I never returned to the house I lived in after the death of my husband because I didn’t feel I could live there and have a normal life after him being shot and killed there. My son and I ended up living with some of my family members and after several months I knew I needed to find us a place of our own. I really wanted to live in the same area of the church I attended and close to the same area I currently lived, but coming across property in our area wasn’t easy. I remember walking out of our church one Sunday and my Pastor telling me he had some property he wanted to sell me, I was ecstatic, and let me tell you why. The property connected my twin sisters farm, and it was also only a quarter to a half a mile down the road from where my son and I was living at the time. We were recently with our former Pastor and his wife and he mentioned the property to me, and he told me this story. He said he was setting in a little local store here in our community when a cousin of his walked in and said Davin I’m going to sell my property – Davin said lets go look at it – he said they got up right then and went and looked at it and he bought it. He said Chera that property never was meant for me, it was meant for you all along, it just passed through my hands to get to you. You see, when he bought the property I had no idea I was about to be a widow and that I would be needing a piece of property, and he didn’t know either, and even had I of known it I didn’t have the means to buy any property at the time, but God knew there was going to be a widow one day that needed some land for her and her son to live on and he orchestrated it to where these two cousins would end up at the same place at the same time. You may say what in the world did any of these stories or testimonies have to do with fighting for what I believe in? For me it has so much to do with it because the life I have chosen to live, and the faith I have in God has worked for me! I believe in the way I live – why would I not fight for something that has worked for me! 

I’ve tried to work out my own salvation with fear and trembling like Philippians  2:12-13 tells us to do. After I got older I had the freedom to change the way I looked, and the way I lived, and there were things I done that were contrary to the way I was raised, but when I would get serious about seeking God I would always feel God draw me back, and He personally dealt me with and gave me my own personal convictions – to be honest I am in a daily pursuit of Him and what He wants from me. Living for God is definitely a journey, and a daily leading from Him. There is no argument that the Bible teaches a woman to be modest, and that means modest in every area. We can cover our whole bodies but have a spirit of adultery in our hearts, and our modesty mean nothing. I do believe what I wear matters. 1 Timothy 2:9-10 In like manner also, that women adorn themselves in modest apparel V 10 but (which becometh women professing godliness) that’s not me talking, that’s the Bible and I believe as a woman I am to be modest in every area, no that doesn’t only mean the way I dress, but my conduct is just as important. My body isn’t meant for the world to see. Why did Adam and Eve suddenly feel convicted for their nakedness and try to cover their bodies with leaves when she ate the forbidden fruit in the garden?  My denomonation believes a women should wear dresses and/or skirts. We do believe clothing sets men and women apart and I do have my own personal conviction that as a woman I should wear dresses. In Deuteronomy 22:5 it states the woman shall not wear that which pertaineth to a man, neither shall a man put on a woman’s garments. Up until the mid-19th century all women wore dresses, but now we can be looked at as weird or strange for choosing to wear only dresses. When I’m at a public place and I need to use the restroom I look for the little sign by the doors, one sign has a dress, the other has pants, why is that? It’s because for centuries women wore dresses, and men wore pants but yet people can think I’m weird or strange for simply wearing what women have always worn. A woman’s long hair is her glory. The Bible does state it in 1 Corinthians 11:15 that if a woman have long hair it is a glory for her: for her hair was given to her for a covering. Many times when I’m out in public I have people approach me about my long hair. I’ve had many say I want long hair like that, and they will ask me how do you get it to grow so long – I don’t cut it – If God gave me my long hair for my glory, then I don’t believe I should cut it off. If you know me well, and have been around me much then you know I don’t go around harping about my standards or try to shove the way I live on others, if you change for me, then you’ve done it for the wrong reason – I try to live what I believe in front of others.

I believe in the Holy Ghost with the evidence of speaking in other tongues. Acts 2:38-39 I will paraphrase – Repent, be baptized and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost. For the promise is unto you, and to your children. Acts 2:4 And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and began to speak with other tongues, as the spirit gave them utterance. I have personally received the Holy Ghost and I spake with other tongues. It was a powerful experience and it continues to be a comfort and guide in my life. 

What about people in my denomonation who have wronged people? When we are true Christians we will treat others right. God’s salvation produces love toward our fellow man. There are those who profess to be christians, but do not have any fruit. The Bible says in Matthew 7:20 Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them. I’ve known people that claimed to be good christians that would cuss you out in a heartbeat or not treat you right in many areas and because of those things we can label an entire congregation or denomination based off of that one person, but again, it’s in every.single.denomination. I’ve heard it said those Pentecostal Holiness people won’t treat you right, I’m sorry to say I’ve seen some that don’t, but if you go to a different church there will be that same person there, just a different face, it’s everywhere.    

                                                                                God’s salvation produces righteousness and holiness. I heard a preacher make a statement that it doesn’t matter what religion or denomination you are, or identify with at the end of the day you must be holiness, and he wasn’t meaning Holiness as in a denomination, or a name over your door, he meant it like the Bible says in Hebrews 12:14, Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man shall see there Lord: what does the word holiness mean? To be “set apart” or separated from the common and unclean for God’s special purpose, encompassing both absolute moral purity and unique, transcendent excellence. It refers to God’s essential, incomparable nature as well as the sanctified state of His people. God’s Nature: God is uniquely “holy, holy, holy,” set apart from all creation, and morally perfect (reference to Isaiah 6:3) 

Set Apart (Separation) Holiness involves being distinguished from the ordinary or the world to belong to God. (Why I live set apart)

Moral Purity: It signifies freedom from sin and conformity to God’s standards, loving what He loves, and hating what He hates. 

Position and Practice: Believers are “positionally” holy in Christ (sanctified) and called to “practically” live out that holiness through obedience ( referencing 1 Peter 1:16)

Sanctification: The process of being made Holy.

Consecration: Setting something or someone apart for a holy purpose.

Righteousness: Often used alongside holiness, referring to moral uprightness.

Purity: Referring to being undefiled.

Separateness: The literal meaning of being distinct from the common.

The way I dress does not save me. My long hair does not save me. My conservative lifestyle does not save me. I could look like I look and have a rotten heart. The way I choose to look could mean nothing more that just a lifestyle and a tradition for me with nothing behind it. I could only look like I look to please others. I must be born again and walk in the Spirit. James 2:17-20 Even so faith, if it hath not works is dead, being alone. Yea, a man may say, Thou hast faith, and I have works: shew me thy faith without thy works, and I will she thee my faith by my works. Thou believest that there is one God; thou doest well: the devils also believe, and tremble. But wilt thou know, O vain man, that faith without works is dead? James 2:26 For as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also.

Many may say that I live way too conservative, and I give you the right to say or think that, but what if you’re wrong? I choose to err on the side of caution. 

I love the church I attend, and I love the people I fellowship with. I’ve seen God move in so many great ways! Today I choose to stay with what I believe, because I believe in it, and it has worked for me. I believe God’s people are scattered all over this World in every race, and every nation, and not everyone looks just like me. God is coming back soon for a glorious church and I want to be a part of it!

The lyrics to this song by The Blythe Family is my prayer –

Set Apart, sanctified, pure and holy in Your sight, take this vessel Lord and make me more like You, let your anointing fall on me for I want the world to see, that I’m not ashamed to be set apart. 

Chera Guthrie