Conversion x / Sanctification
Therefore, my dear friends, as you have always obeyed—not only in my presence, but now much more in my absence—continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfil his good purpose.
(Phil.2:12-13)
We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.
(Rom.6:4)
His divine power has given us everything we need for a godly life through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. Through these he has given us his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature, having escaped the corruption in the world caused by evil desires.
(II Pet.1:3-4)
One of the earliest signs that God has done a saving work in us is our growing hatred of sin, and love and longing for the holiness we see in Christ. In terms of Biblical religion, it is simply inconceivable that we could be united to Christ and not share in a relentless striving for ‘the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus’ (see Phil.3:12-15, coming as it does in the context of Paul’s celebration of justification). Our induction into the life of God, and the inaugurating of the Spirit’s work of transforming us into the image of Christ is fundamental to our experience of being a Christian (Eph.4:24; Col.3:10). It isn’t just that it is linked to our salvation. It is our salvation. We are saved to bear the image of Christ (I Cor.15:49). ‘It is God’s will that you should be sanctified…’ (I Thess.4:3).
The word, ‘sanctification’ is one of those words you almost feel you should be intimidated by on principle. It holds together two concepts for us. The first, and most fundamental, meaning is the idea of being set apart. In this sense anything could be sanctified, and in books such as Numbers, we even find things like shovels and bowls being ‘sanctified’ (i.e. ‘holy’, see e.g. Num.4:7-15). This isn’t to suggest they have a moral quality, but rather simply that they are set apart. But the second concept captured by the word is to do with the purpose for which things and people are set apart, which is the service of the thrice-holy Lord. When this is applied to redeemed humanity, then it does take on a moral dimension. We are set apart to serve the Lord, to become holy (II Cor.6:16-7:1). This explains why the Bible can speak of ‘sanctification’ both as a completed act (e.g. Heb.10:10) and as a continuing and progressive process (e.g. Heb.10:14).
It is perhaps helpful to think of (most likely) four stages in our experience of sanctification. The first is it’s definite and completed beginning in our regeneration (e.g. I Cor.1:2, 6:11; Acts 26:18). The second is the ongoing experience of being made like Christ that characterises our earthly pilgrimage (e.g. II Cor.3:18; Eph.2:8-10). Third is our spiritual sanctification that is already accomplished, but which will be a qualitatively different experience after death when our body of sin is returned to dust (e.g. Heb.12:23; Phil.1:23). Fourthly and finally will be our total sanctification when we inherit our resurrection bodies at the return of Christ (e.g. I Jn.3:2-3; Phil.3:21). The only exception to this pattern will be those Christians who are still living when Christ returns (I Cor.15:51-53; I Thess.4:15-18). It was for this in its entirety that Christ sanctified Himself to the cross (Jn.17:19).
Our inevitable involvement in this development is so intrinsic to our faith, that the Apostle John establishes it as a test of saving faith (e.g. I Jn.1:7-9; 3:6; 3:14; 4:17). Indeed, without such holiness it is impossible to see the Lord (Heb.12:14). The same indwelling Spirit who regenerates us, seeks to make us holy. Or put another way, we cannot be united to Christ in His crucifixion, without being united to Him in His resurrection (Rom.6:9-11). This how the Lord closes the gap between what the Father declares us to be in our justification, and who we are in terms of our lived being and behaviour.
It is the outworking of His jealous covenant love that expresses itself in the desire that we forsake all other competing claims and loves, and through which He strips us of our idols. It is the goal of His redeeming us (Titus 2:14). It is the course by which He leads us to love Him with all our heart and soul, mind and strength, as indeed He has loved us (Jer.32:41). It is a ‘dynamic reality as well as an objective fact’ (Letham, 87). And without participating in such a ‘dynamic reality’, we have only the most dubious of claims to salvation.
Questions
Practically speaking, how can we grow in holiness? What do you think hinders our progress? And how can we overcome it?
If the first question focusses our attention on our role and responsibility in the process of sanctification, what would you God’s role in it is?
Would you agree that there is a connection between our orientation toward sanctification and our experience of prayer? How would you explain it to someone? What passages from the Bible would speak to this question?
Read Rom.8:1-13
How can Paul write of ‘no condemnation’ when he also describes so adamantly the Christian’s ongoing experience of sin (Rom.7:14-25)? What difference does it make to us that we know we will never face condemnation?
What is ‘the Law of the Spirit who gives life’ (8:2)? How does it differ from the ‘law of sin and death’?
What was Jesus able to do that the Law was powerless to achieve (8:3-4)? How does this shape your thinking about your relationship with God?
What do you think the Spirit desires (8:5)? What does it mean to have our minds set on that? How would a mind ‘set on what he Spirit desires [and] … governed by the Spirit’ differ from a mind set on and governed by ‘the flesh’? Why is your mind so important here?
What does it mean to be in the realm of the flesh? Why can someone here not please God? And by contrast, what does it mean to live in the realm of the Spirit (8:9-10)? What difference does this make to how you live?
Do you feel the sense of obligation Paul refers to in 8:12? How do you ‘put to death the misdeeds of the body’ (8:13)?
Memory Passage:
As God has said: “I will live with them and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they will be my people.” Therefore, “Come out from them and be separate, says the Lord. Touch no unclean thing, and I will receive you.” And, “I will be a Father to you, and you will be my sons and daughters, says the Lord Almighty.” Therefore, since we have these promises, dear friends, let us purify ourselves from everything that contaminates body and spirit, perfecting holiness out of reverence for God.
II Cor.6:16-7:1
For further reflection:
Not only is it integral to our experience of salvation, but the desire for sanctification is symptomatic of genuine spiritual life and health. The more we are conformed to the life of Christ, the more sensitive we become to the extent of our sinfulness, and the more we recoil from it, longing to be freed from it. The deeper our intimacy with God’s holy love the more fully we will love holiness and crave likeness to Him; and the more we will strive to cleanse ourselves of anything that hinder our pursuit of Him (Heb.12:1-2).
Yet growth in likeness to God, will mean a diminishing of our likeness to our world (I Jn.2:15-17). Such separation from the world is not an end of itself, as if holiness could be reduced to a vapid list of all the things Christians don’t do. It is the disentangling of our relationship with sin and of the way that sin interconnects us with a world at variance with God’s goodness and vision for life. Sanctification will mean we feel increasingly discordant with the assumptions and the ambitions of the world we live in, and estranged from the patterns and pleasures that characterise our culture. This will set us at odds with so much that surrounds us, and as such, sanctification demands of us a sense pf priority that values it above all else. The battle within, and without is such that only those who are genuinely captivated by the ‘beauty of holiness’, and who are willing to sacrifice all else to possess it and be possessed of it, are likely to attain it. If our heart is set on anything else, we will find ourselves unable to surrender that (whatever it might be) for the righteousness that is our birth right, and that can be ours only through the Spirit of Christ.
