What Makes a Thing Holy?

(Today's reading - Numbers 10:1 - 11:35)
Today's reading takes us from the completion of the tabernacle, the setting apart the tribe of Levi and the arrangement of the camp to the beginning of the journey. The tribes are organized and the trumpets sound for the people to begin the journey to the promised land.
Just like my family on a long trip, it doesn't take long for the people to start complaining...I can just hear the child in the back of the wagon say "are we there yet?" :-). God hears the people complain and He hears Moses ask to die rather that deal with these people. God provides. He sends meat for feasting (more that enough) and tells Moses to appoint 70 elders to assist him in his tasks of leading the people.
Included in the reading is a verse that says "Then the Kohathites set out, carrying the holy things". We have seen the "holy" things discussed during our last several days of reading. My curiosity has been stoked; what makes a thing holy? What made the fruit of human hands holy? What made the ordinary materials, wood and metals, holy? What makes a thing holy? Let's remember these things had become so "holy" that if the wrong person looked at these things they would die. The same things that the people had owned and used in their daily lives, were now holy. What changed?
The Hebrew word in view here is "Qodesh". This word carries the idea of being set apart, something that is sacred with its' object being unto God. It is the idea of something or someone that is set apart or made sacred by God. It is God that has the ability or authority to make a thing holy. He set aside the seventh day and called it holy. He set apart Israel and made them a holy nation. His presence made any place holy. He could declare something holy and it was holy. With this in mind, we can understand that the items crafted by the Israelites became holy because He said so. The common became uncommon, the ordinary became extraordinary. Because these items were set apart for His use and because He had directed that they be made for His use, they were holy at His word.
I can decide to make something especially for God and declare that it is only for His use. The question is...does that make it holy unto God? Do I have the authority to make such a declaration. Can I pray over water and then claim it is holy water? Can I pray over a building and claim that it is now a holy building?
In the Old Testament, God dwelt in the tabernacle and the Temple. His presence made these places holy. He visited Moses through a burning bush, that made the ground there holy. It was Gods' decision that made the Sabbath holy, it was His declaration that made offerings holy. In the New Testament, He declares that His people are now His holy temple. "In him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord. And in him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit". (Ephesians 2:21,22) Together, Christians form a holy temple where God dwells.
And individually we become holy through the cleansing that Jesus provides.
"But now he has reconciled you by Christ’s physical body through death to present you holy in his sight, without blemish and free from accusation". (Colossians 1:22) It is God that makes a thing holy and only God can make you holy and me holy. He dwells within the believer and so we become "holy ground".
The next time you sing "This is Holy Ground", be looking deep into the eyes of a brother or sister in Christ. May we understand that we have been set apart and made sacred by God for His use (and only His use). You my brother, you my sister are a holy thing.