Uh Hi, Nathan W. Bingham here, host of Renewing Your Mind. Will I see you at Ligoneer's 2026 National Conference in Orlando? April 9 to 11, we'll address some of the fundamental questions facing Christians today. Questions about God, our identity, and life in a hostile society.
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That address again is ligoneer.org slash 2026 and I'll see you for Crucial Questions, Ligoneer's 2026 National Conference. There are those moments when we contemplate the mystery of Christ. the greatness of God. The secrets of the workings and operation of the Holy Spirit. that it causes us to tremble.
There is something fearful about it. R. C. Sproul had one of those experiences not long after his conversion as a young college student. Little did he know the impact that would have on the direction of his life and future ministry.
Welcome to this Saturday edition of Renewing Your Mind as we spend time working through Dr. Sprohl's classic series, The Holiness of God. The team here at Renewing Your Mind and Liguan Your Ministries continues to receive letters, emails and messages on social media from people whose lives have never been the same after watching this series or reading the book. And until midnight tonight, we'll unlock access to the Holiness of God series, the extended edition of the Holiness of God, and we'll send you a 40th anniversary copy of the book. When you give a donation in support of Renewing Your Mind at renewingyourmind.org.
And if you already have the book, respond today and give your copy away.
Well here's Dr. Sprawl on the holy place. As we continue our study, Of the holiness of God, we remember that in our first segment of this series, I recounted a personal experience that was a crisis moment for me in my life back in the days when I was going to college and I had listened. to a lecture From the Writings of Saint Augustine. And if you recall, I mentioned how Augustine was opened up for my understanding a whole new dimension of the character of God.
And that I was Awe stricken. As I listened, the To Augustine explain The power. And the majesty and the and the holiness of God.
Well, Augustine himself wrote an interesting passage about his own personal experience with the presence of God. Here is what he said. What is that? which gleams through me and smites my heart without wounding it. I am both a shudder and a glow.
a shudder in so far as I am unlike it, A glow. Insofar as I am like it. Augustin had a tremendous gift Four. articulating his innermost thoughts and feelings, And here he talks about A question. He asked, What is it?
that smites my heart. Without wounding it. Do you see the contrast between those images?
Something that pierces him.
something that strikes him, something that hits him with enormous force. Yet doesn't harm him. doesn't wound him. leaves no scar. But as Augustine reflects on this question, he expresses An attitude of ambivalence.
About it. There is something that is at the same time attractive to him about this that smites his heart. And yet there is something that frightens him. about it at the very same time. He says At the same moment, I feel a shudder.
and a glow. What does he mean by a shudder? That it's a shuddering experience. an experience that causes him to tremble. We remember the old spiritual.
Were you there? When they crucified my Lord And the refrain goes sometimes It causes me to tremble Tremble. Tremble. And I think we can identify with that, can't we? There are those moments in our own experience when we contemplate the mystery of Christ.
The greatness of God The secrets of the workings and operation of the Holy Spirit. But it causes us to tremble. There is something fearful about it. Early in the twentieth century, a German theologian who was also an expert in the field of sociology and anthropology. wrote a small book that had an enormous impact.
on the thinking of his generation. His name was Rudolph Auto And his book, when it was originally published, had a very short and crisp title simply in German, Das Hi Laga. which literally means The Holy When it was translated into English, the English title for this book was called The idea of the holy.
Now Otto didn't carry any brief or traditional conservative evangelical Christianity. He was examining Not simply something about God, but he was perhaps even more interested in. People. His study was a study on how human beings. React.
and respond to whatever they consider to be holy. It may be the feelings and reactions of people in primitive tribes to animistic spirits that frighten them. It may be a priest. in a temple. It may be a Christian in prayer.
And he said, how do people Respond emotionally. intellectually and psychologically to a sense of the presence of the holy. And basically He said that the normal human response. To the holy. is ambivalence.
But that which is sacred attracts and repels at one and the same time. There is something about the Holy that draws us to want to step more closely to it. to find out what it's about, and yet there is something so mysterious, so different about it. that we want to run from it. Otto used a technical term to describe this sensation of the holy.
which he called using the Latin phrase The Mysterium Tremendum. The tremendous mystery. Or the mystery that produces tremors. Trembling within us. Have you noticed in our own day and in our own culture how people seem to be fascinated with the occult?
They'll rush to the movie theater to see films like The Exorcist. They're interested in reports of Satan worship. And yet there's something ugly about these things that is grotesque. from which we want to flee. But we're not quite sure.
We We're fascinated. We want to draw near. And it seems like that we will follow anything that gives us some hope of penetrating the barrier of the secular and of the profane, something that will open a gate for us. into the realm. of the supernatural.
It frightens. and fascinates all at the same time. I remember that when I was a boy. We used to listen to the radio. There w there was no such thing as television then.
I'm dating myself, I guess. But the difference between radio and television is that when we were restricted to Following our favorite programs by way of radio, that we only heard the story. we listened to the dialogue and the descriptions that were given to us by the narrator. We didn't see anything except the plain front of our Philco radio. And that left it to our imagination.
To fill in the gaps. We would visualize in our mind's eye Superman. or The Lone Ranger in Tonto. In fact, I can see certain advantages to that, for the developing of creativity, that we were forced. to use our imaginations.
Well, there are all kinds of different programs, soap operas during the day, adventure stories at night, stories of Western heroes like Gene Autry and The Lone Ranger and Roy Rogers and so on. But one of the most popular genres of radio programs in the 40s. Were the Mystery stories or the detective stories like Gangbusters or mister King, Tracer of Lost Persons, And they also had a program that was extremely scary called Suspense. But the scariest program of all programs on the radio that I recall as a child was one that was on in the evening. And the lead-in to the radio was the opening of the door of a vault in a cemetery, in a mausoleum.
This door of a crypt. swung open And we always spoke about The Creaking Door. And the sound of the creaking door was the lead in to this programme. And as the door would creak, you know, we would shiver. in fear as little children.
and then the voice of the narrator would announce the program. Inner Sanctum. Yeah, all I had to do was say it. inner sanctum, and we were terrified.
Now the thing that I'm fascinated now in reflection on that. Is that when I was a boy, I didn't know what inner sanctum meant.
Now I know that the words inner sanctum Mean Within The Holy And when I think back on it, I think it is astonishing. that the producers of radio programs in the entertainment world, when they were looking for something that would hold people spellbound, and evoke feelings of terror within them that they couldn't think of anything more mysterious, anything more frightening, To a human person Than to be close.
So close. To be virtually. Within. The Holy It's that kind of reaction that Rudolph Otto examined by looking at various civilizations and cultures. And he said When we're talking about the holy, We are talking about something that is one of the most difficult things.
In human experience to define with precision. and with clarity. In fact, Otto says that with respect to the holy, we're dealing with what he calls a certain Plus. The strange word to use, isn't it? Plus?
Whenever we use the word plus, we use it in arithmetic or in mathematics. It's a form that indicates some type of. of addition.
Something added on. is a plus.
Something That is extra. One of the most popular movies ever to be seen in the United States of America. Had perhaps the shortest title of any. movie ever. There was a movie I saw when I was a boy called She, S-H-E, that's pretty short title.
But this title It wasn't even a word, it was two initials. A P. E T. the whole country. fell in love.
With this strange visitor from outer space. What does ET mean? Extra Terrestrial E T is the abbreviation that we give. For one who is Alien. One who comes from outside our experience.
and our environment. One who is different. One who is Extra. He is a part. He is strange.
He is alien. One would think. That the title E.T. would even more suitably apply to God. Who is above?
and beyond. this terrestrial ball This sphere and environment. That is locked by this land in which we live. That God is the supreme. Alien.
The one who is supremely Extra. And so what Otto was getting at when he talks about the holiness of God. as communicating a certain Plus. He is talking about that sense. in which God is above and beyond anything that we experience on earth.
We may be made in his image. we may enjoy a certain likeness or similarity with our Maker. But beyond that likeness and beyond that similarity, Is the enormous difference, the dissimilarity. Between who God is And who we are. Again, let me go back to that statement I read to you at the beginning from Saint Augustine.
He asked the question, What is that which gleams through me and smites my heart without wounding it? I am both a shudder and a glow A shutter That is, afraid. Trembling Insofar as I am unlike it, A glow. Insofar as I am like it. And so Augustine roots this ambivalence of which Rudolf Otto speaks.
in the fact that there is some sense in which we're like God. We are made in his image. And because we are made in his image, and made for his glory, and made originally to have fellowship with him, Augustine, you recall, began his famous book on the confessions with a prayer in which he says, O God, thou hast made us for thyself. And our hearts are restless Until they find their rest in thee. E.
T. Wanted to go home. And we responded to that. He wanted to go. to his heavenly residents, we can understand that.
Because there's a sense in which we have built into our own nature as creatures made in the image of God. An eternal longing. For our residents In his presence. It's as if there is some kind of Empty void within us, a vacuum that haunts us in the depths of our soul. until we can reach out and embrace In a harmonious relationship.
The God who made us. And yet Because of our estrangement from God and because of the dissimilarity between who He is and who we are, we remain. A shudder. Whenever he intrudes, into our presence.
So that i intrusion, those precious moments, those pregnant moments where we do sense the presence of God. Are filled with this ambivalent reaction. Of attraction. And of fear. Let me read briefly to you what Otto says in description of this awful mystery.
He says the feeling of it may at times come sweeping like a gentle tide, pervading the mind with a tranquil mood of deepest worship. it may pass over into a more set and lasting attitude of the soul, continuing as it were thrillingly vibrant and resonant. Until at last it dies away and the soul resumes its profane. Non-religious mood of everyday experience. Can you relate to that?
We've all had those mountaintop experiences. That are thrilling. But inevitably they fade. And we return. To our earth bound, Profanity.
He says it may burst in sudden eruption up from the depths of the soul with spasms and convulsions, or lead to the strangest excitements, to intoxicated frenzy, to transport. and to ecstasy. It has its wild and demonic forms and can sink to an almost grisly horror and shuddering. It has its crude, barbaric antecedents and early manifestations, and again may be developed into something beautiful, and pure and glorious. It may become the hushed, trembling, and speechless humility of the creature in the presence of Home?
Or what? In the presence of that which is a mystery Inexpressible. And above Oh. Creatures. What he is describing here is what I call the human experience.
of holy Dread. A pervasive Chilling. Blood curdling sensation. That we associate. Withdrawing near, To the living God.
We need to explore that. and to explore it deeply. I want to leave you with this question. that you, I hope, will ask of yourselves. How do you feel?
How do you respond? When you have any sense of the presence of God. If you can think in those moments in your life. where you have sensed his presence. Did you want more?
Or did you want less? Did you want to come closer? Or did you want to fall back? and retreat Do you relate? to this sense of ambivalence.
of which Rudolph Otto speaks in his book. Does the presence of God Make you glow? Or does it make you shudder? Or perhaps like most of us. It does.
Both. Think about that. I think we're beginning to see why R. C. Sproul was so passionate to proclaim, teach, and defend the holiness of God in all its fullness to as many people as possible.
This is Renewing Your Mind on this Saturday. I'm Nathan W. Bingham. If you'd like to introduce someone you know to this often overlooked topic, the holiness of God, send them a text with a link to ligoneer.org slash holiness. There you'll find a short video we put together to commemorate the 40th anniversary of the book's publication.
along with links to other resources from RC Sprawl. That's ligoneer.org slash holiness. I'll be sure to have a link for you in the podcast show notes and in the YouTube description. You could also request your own copy of the fortieth anniversary edition of The Holiness of God when you give a donation in support of our mission here at Ligonia at renewingyourmind.org. We'll send you the book to thank you for your generosity.
Plus, will give you lifetime access to the original Holiness of God series and study guide, plus the extended edition as well.
So that's two series, a study guide, and a book. When you donate at renewingyourmind.org before midnight tonight. Who was King Uzziah?
Next time, R. C. Sprawl will consider what this Old Testament monarch can teach us about ourselves and the holiness of God.
So be sure to join us next Saturday here on Renewing Your Mind.
