We Believe: The Doctrine of Sanctification
Just as last week Pastor Joel spoke of the church, it is the Holy Spirit and the church of Jesus Christ that truly help to apply the Scripture so that we might be set apart to God in every way - a process called sanctification.
Sanctification is not an immediate event but an ongoing process.
It is ongoing because it begins at conversion and continues until the day we die.
It is cooperative because God has a part and we have a part.
And it’s a process because no one looks like Jesus at the moment of conversion.
It takes time, effort, and massive quantities of grace to reflect a little of his likeness.
Conversion should invariably lead to changed behavior.
If there is no change in the life and character of a person who has professed Christ, it is doubtful that the person has experienced a true conversion.
1 John 3:9 ESV
“No one born of God makes a practice of sinning, for God’s seed abides in him; and he cannot keep on sinning, because he has been born of God.”
Therefore, sanctification is the testimony that a work of grace has really happened in our hearts.
Doctrinal Statement: We believe that sanctification is the process, beginning at regeneration, whereby God conforms his people to the image of Christ through his Word and Spirit. By grace, Christians grow in holiness and love for God and others throughout their lives as they submit to Jesus, obey God’s Word, and walk by the Spirit in fellowship with other disciples.
God conforms believers to the image of Christ.
Believers grow in sanctification throughout their lives.
Believers grow in sanctification by grace.
Believers grow in sanctification with other believers.
Believers grow in sanctification through spiritual disciplines.
God Conforms Believers to the Image of Christ
1 Thessalonians 5:23-24 ESV
“Now may the God of peace himself sanctify you completely, and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. He who calls you is faithful; he will surely do it.”
*Wayne Grudem defines sanctification as “the progressive work of God that makes us more free from sin and more like Christ in our actual lives.”
Sanctification contrasts with justification.
Justification is a one-time work of God that provides us with the legal standing of perfection in God’s eyes.
**Therefore, the level of justification is the same in every believer.
Justification is the work of God alone; we cannot justify ourselves.
*When we are justified, it is as though a doctor has just administered a sure and certain remedy for a fatal disease. Though the patient may still endure a temporary struggle with the residual effects of his illness, the outcome is no longer in doubt. The physician pronounces the patient cured even though a rehabilitation process must still be carried out.”
-Martin Luther
Sanctification is not a one-time event like justification but one that is continuous throughout our lives.
*Therefore, every believer is at a different level of sanctification.
Sanctification is the work of God, but we must cooperate with him.
Both parties have distinct roles in the process, with the goal being the image of Christ.
God is at work in us to conform us to the image of his Son, and our confidence is in God’s power to accomplish it.
But we have an essential role to play in the process.
In the I Thessalonians passage, Paul emphasizes God’s role in conforming us to the image of Christ.
*He has just finished a lengthy section concerning sexual purity, brotherly love, respect for leaders, love for other people, rejoicing, prayer, and concern for public worship.
*All of these are necessary for sanctification.
But Paul identifies the power behind that process: God himself will sanctify you completely.
He is faithful, and he will surely do it.
Believers Grow in Sanctification Throughout Their Lives
Romans 6:19 ESV
“I am speaking in human terms, because of your natural limitations. For just as you once presented your members as slaves to impurity and to lawlessness leading to more lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves to righteousness leading to sanctification.”
Sanctification begins at regeneration.
Theologians call this Positional Sanctification.
It is the gift God gives us at conversion.
When we are born again, something significant changes in our lives.
Many old sinful habits, patterns, and choices no longer control us.
This power keeps us from practicing sin, and we are no longer enslaved by it.
This is why the Bible occasionally refers to us as already sanctified.
Paul said to the Ephesian elders,
Acts 20:32 ESV
“And now I commend you to God and to the word of his grace, which is able to build you up and to give you the inheritance among all those who are sanctified.”
The Greek expression “are sanctified” implies a completed past activity and a continuing result.
1 Corinthians 6:9-11 ESV
“Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.”
Sanctification increases throughout life.
Theologians call this Progressive Sanctification.
Sanctification should increase in our lives, but it rarely grows in a steady, upward direction.
There are ebbs and flows throughout life.
But the general trend should always be forward.
Philippians 3:12-16 ESV
“Not that I have already obtained this or am already perfect, but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own. Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. Let those of us who are mature think this way, and if in anything you think otherwise, God will reveal that also to you. Only let us hold true to what we have attained.”
Sanctification is completed at death and when the Lord returns.
Theologians call this Perfect Sanctification.
Although we can get increasingly more like Jesus, we will never be sanctified entirely in this life.
The apostle John said,
1 John 3:2 ESV
“Beloved, we are God’s children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is.”
That knowledge produces in us a yearning for continuous sanctification.
1 John 3:3 ESV
“And everyone who thus hopes in him purifies himself as he is pure.”
Believers Grow in Sanctification by Grace
Philippians 2:12-13 ESV
“Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, so now, not only as in my presence but much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.”
The phrase “work out your own salvation” has created many misunderstandings throughout church history.
Various religious traditions have claimed that it proves we must add works to our faith to attain salvation.
But Paul does not say, “work for your salvation.”
He says, “work out your salvation.”
There is a vast difference between those two ideas.
The term “salvation” is a broad one encompassing everything God has done for us to deliver us from our lost condition in sin.
It includes regeneration, justification, sanctification, adoption, and glorification.
In this passage, sanctification is the emphasis.
Again, sanctification is a cooperative process, and our text underscores that idea.
God works (as we saw in I Thessalonians 5:23-24), and we work.
This does not mean we have equal roles in sanctification.
Certainly, God’s work is more significant.
But it does mean that we have a role in the process.
*And that role is mainly a responsive one.
“When the Holy Spirit infuses the grace of God into the soul, one’s love for God and others is made pure, and their lifestyle must increase in virtue and loving, selfless actions.”
-John Wesley
When Paul says God is at work in us, he uses a Greek world that conveys the idea of God actively and continually putting forth his energy to support and strengthen our obedience.
The energy is his grace.
It works on our will first, creating a holy desire to please God in all things.
Then it energizes and motivates us to work for his good pleasure.
“The whole life long triumphant offensive called ‘operation sanctification’ - by which we wage war against all the remaining corruption in our lives - is sustained by the supply line of the Spirit that comes from the secure, unassailable home base of justification by faith alone. And it will be a successful operation - but only because of the unassailable home base.”
-John Piper
Believers Grow in Sanctification With Other Believers
1 Thessalonians 3:11-13 ESV
“Now may our God and Father himself, and our Lord Jesus, direct our way to you, and may the Lord make you increase and abound in love for one another and for all, as we do for you, so that he may establish your hearts blameless in holiness before our God and Father, at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all his saints.”
The New Testament regularly speaks of sanctification in the context of community.
For example, Jesus petitioned the Father concerning his disciples:
John 17:17 ESV
“Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth.”
And then he prayed:
John 17:21 ESV
“that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me.”
Jesus linked their growth in sanctification with their growth in their relationships with one another and himself and the Father.
We need to let go of the unbiblical idea of personal, private spirituality.
This is never an esteemed concept in Scripture though people try to live this way today, to their own detriment in the Lord.
The church is important because it is God’s mechanism to produce not just flashes in the pan, but lifelong disciples of Jesus Christ in a multi-seasonal, multigenerational (and when possible mutli-cultural, ethnic and national) context.
(This is contrasted with people who are zealous for God for a short season of their lives as a result of some sort of relationship, help or convenience, only to fall away when the environment or circumstances change - I’ve seen this far too often.
This is also that about which Jesus warned us in the parable of the sower - Matthew 13).
**The truth is that you may be able to survive as someone with intellectual faith on your own, but mark this - you will never fulfill GOD’s purposes for your life on your own because God desires to accomplish something bigger than you, with your participation, in and through the church.
The reality is that there is also limited sanctification without relating to others both in and outside of the church.
The fruit of the Holy Spirit is meant to be cultivated and borne in relation to God and others.
When Jesus said, "Sanctify them by the truth. Your word is truth” it would be the Holy Spirit that would lead us into all truth as found in the Word of God.
*But it is the biblical teachers and community found in the church that hold you accountable to that truth to see you set you apart to God.
In fact, God intends the church to be a pillar and buttress of the truth in society, which means it is within that community, not solo, that we are able to hold to that truth and defend it.
1 Timothy 3:15 ESV
“if I delay, you may know how one ought to behave in the household of God, which is the church of the living God, a pillar and buttress of the truth.”
Jude 1:3-4 ESV
“Beloved, although I was very eager to write to you about our common salvation, I found it necessary to write appealing to you to contend for the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints. For certain people have crept in unnoticed who long ago were designated for this condemnation, ungodly people, who pervert the grace of our God into sensuality and deny our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ.”
*When we lose the truth, we lose our sanctification, being set apart to God for his pleasure and purposes.
Matthew 5:13 ESV
“You are the salt of the earth, but if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled under people's feet.”
But Jesus has other plans.
Matthew 5:14-16 ESV
“You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.”
In the I Thessalonians passage, Paul prays that the Thessalonian believers’ love for one another would grow abundantly.
As a result, God will establish their hearts blameless in holiness.
*When believers grow in their love for one another, they also grow in sanctification.
At the end of the same letter, Paul prays again,
I Thessalonians 5:23
“Now may the God of peace himself sanctify you [plural] completely…”
Paul’s prayer for the entire church comes after he has urged them to grow in their love for one another (3:12, 4:9), encourage one another (4:18, 5:11), build one another up (5:11), and do good to one another (5:15).
Sanctification happens in community.
Paul exhorted Timothy to:
2 Timothy 2:22 ESV
“…flee youthful passions and pursue righteousness, faith, love, and peace, along with those who call on the Lord from a pure heart.”
We flee evil and pursue sanctification with other Christians’ aid.
The concept of our sanctification apart from the community of faith is a foreign concept in the New Testament.
*Sanctification requires community.
*We cannot become more like Jesus without walking in relationship with others.
How are your relationships with others aiding your sanctification?
What practical steps could you take to increase that process?
What hindrances do you face that tend to hold you back from engaging the kind of relationships that increase your sanctification?Why?
What can you do to change that?
Believers grow in sanctification through spiritual disciplines
1 Timothy 4:7-8 ESV
“Have nothing to do with irreverent, silly myths. Rather train yourself for godliness; for while bodily training is of some value, godliness is of value in every way, as it holds promise for the present life and also for the life to come.”
The spiritual disciplines are scriptural practices designed to strengthen our relationship with God and make us like him.
We can learn these activities and cultivate them through diligence, but like all training, they begin as a decision and should continue as a lifelong habit.
The disciplines are not a means to attain righteousness: that is a gift from God.
Instead, these activities are channels for God’s power to transform us into his image.
It is the Holy Spirit who initiates, energizes, and maintains the spiritual disciplines in our lives.
*However, he does it in partnership with our continuous choices to discipline ourselves.
The disciplines can quickly degenerate into works of righteousness, but the Holy Spirit is a safeguard against that possibility.
*The Word of God is the primary instrument of sanctification.
Again, Jesus prayed that the Father might “sanctify them in truth; your word is truth.”
Paul told the Ephesian church that Christ
Ephesians 5:25-26 ESV
“....gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word,”
Peter told the scattered believers in Asia Minor that God’s exceedingly great promises would make them
2 Peter 1:4 ESV
“…partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire.”
Adding a disciplined life of prayer with the Word of God produces a powerful means of sanctification.
Jesus told his disciples before he we to to the cross,
Mark 14:38 ESV
“Watch and pray that you may not enter into temptation. The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.””
The disciples saw the power of prayer in the life of Jesus, and they asked him to teach them to pray (Luke 11:1).
If we train ourselves for godliness through the spiritual disciplines, we will look more and more like Jesus daily.
