Holiness is the manner... love is the essence.
There is no biblical attribution parallel to “God is love.” People with man centered religion who are proud of holiness rather than accepting it as God’s manner, tend to overlook this.
Man made religion tends to look at God as they wish He was rather than how He reveals Himself. They overlook His holiness justice and mercy for a desire to be personally loved. But God's love is expressed in the light of His eternal uncompromising justice. Even the Gospel has been corrupted by the sentimentalist hope in a false Christ. The "everlasting Gospel" that is revealed by the angle in heaven to be preached to those who dwell on earth is "Fear God and give glory to Him, for the hour of His judgment has come; and worship Him who made heaven and earth, the sea and springs of water." --Revelation 14:7 Some would find all that fear and judgement unloving, but I will worship God how he has revealed Himself in the Word and not how I wish he was.
Psalm 99:3 Let them praise Your great and awesome name -- He is holy.
Psalm 99:5 Exalt the LORD our God, And worship at His footstool -- He is holy.
Psalm 99:9 Exalt the LORD our God, And worship at His holy hill; For the LORD our God is holy.
Isaiah 5:16 And God who is holy shall be hallowed in righteousness.
1 Peter 1:15-16 ... but as He who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, 16 because it is written, "Be holy, for I am holy."
Revelation 3:7 " And to the angel of the church in Philadelphia write, ' These things says He who is holy,
Zechariah 9:9 Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your King is coming to you; He is just and having salvation,
Numbers 14:18 'The LORD is longsuffering and abundant in mercy, forgiving iniquity and transgression; but He by no means clears the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and fourth generation.
1 Thessalonians 4:6-7 because the Lord is the avenger of all such, as we also forewarned you and testified. For God did not call us to uncleanness, but in holiness.
It is not the holiness of man that saves him, but the holiness of God alone. That holiness required sending Christ to impute to us His righteousness and to have our sins imputed to Him on the cross. In response we fear and love the God who first loved us by doing all that we can with the help of the Holy Spirit to live a holy God-pleasing life, including the abhorrence to sin.