“And one cried to another and said:

‘Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts;
The whole earth is full of His glory!’”

Note: Verses 1-5 give the context — Isaiah saw the Lord sitting on a throne, the seraphim cried “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts”, the posts of the door were shaken and the house was filled with smoke. Isaiah said, “Woe is me, for I am undone! Because I am a man of unclean lips, And I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; For my eyes have seen the King, The Lord of hosts.”

Question: How do we get from “Holy, holy, holy” to “Woe to me”? We are familiar with, and probably relaxed, to hear songs about God’s holiness, but this is an earth shattering alarm of woe. What’s it all about? What does it mean to you?

No one can see God in His full glory and live

Bible references:
Exodus 33:20, “You cannot see My face; for no man shall see Me, and live.”
1 Timothy 6:15-16, “the King of kings and Lord of lords, who alone has immortality, dwelling in unapproachable light, whom no man has seen or can see”

While I can see that it would be impossible for us in our limited human state to comprehend God in His full glory, it’s the second part, that if we saw that glory we would die, which is a little harder to understand.

Why can we not see God and live?

I don’t think the bible clearly explains why, but we can conjecture why.

Already dead

Firstly, that if we found ourselves face to face with our heavenly Father, that could mean that we had already died, our earthy life had ended, and all our earthly plans and activities were now finished. But I don’t think that is what is meant.

Nature of holiness

Another possible explanation is to imagine that the nature of God’s perfect holiness is such that it has a powerful presence, that it is like the fierce “unapproachable light” of 1 Timothy 6:16, under which our flimsy fallen state of sinful life would just wither and die.

Unbearable guilt

To imagine this third view, I would invite you to think of a time when you suffered from acute regret, when you were aware of some particular thing you did that you knew was wrong, you wish you could undo it, but never can. It’s the kind of regret that is like a worm eating at you painfully from the inside. The agony of such unforgiven guilt can cause people both emotional and physical pain, and cause physical illness.

To see our heavenly Father in all His perfect holiness, means we would take on some of His vision of the world and of our own lives. We would not only clearly see the extent of human sin, but also feel it’s guilt with a conscience we had never previously possessed. In a personal way, we would take on the burden of seeing an unlimited number of those agonising sins for each and every day of our lives. That would simply be a physically unbearable burden, the pain would be instantly fatal for our mere human bodies. Yet that is the nature of the pain which Jesus took on himself on the cross, when He suffered death for our sin.

Personal Response

That agony of unforgiven sin can be an unbearable burden here and now, even without seeing God. But Jesus has freed us from that burden, freed us to live in a way that He wants for us. Instead of trying to excuse and justify the wrong I have done, which would only lead me further down those paths of wrong-doing, Jesus is ready to lift that burden from me. It becomes history when I receive His gift of forgiveness, and trust in Him to direct my path now and forever.

In this life I will not be able to bear the sight of God’s perfect holiness, but through Jesus I have been given the hope that one day I will live in the presence of God’s holiness, and see His face, all through Jesus’ gift of righteousness which He won for us on the cross.