SANCTIFICATION

Sanctification is a very interesting concept and word in our Bible.  Sanctification means to make holy or to set something apart for a special, sacred purpose. While the term is primarily used in Christian theology to describe the ongoing process of growing in holiness and becoming more like Christ, the root concept applies universally to dedicating something to a higher use.

In theology, sanctification is the process of shedding sinfulness and producing the fruits of the Spirit. It is generally broken down into three phases:  The Fruit of the Spirit (9) are the keys to both hearing our LORD and what we are to give unto others, Gal.5:22-23.
Positional Sanctification: A one-time event at the start of faith where a believer is declared holy and set apart for God’s purposes.
Progressive Sanctification: The lifelong, ongoing work of God’s grace to free a person from the power of sin. Believers actively participate in this by pursuing spiritual maturity through prayer, studying scripture, and obedience.
Ultimate Sanctification (or Glorification): The belief that God will one day perfect believers, completely removing all of the presence of sin when their earthly lives are over.

In my initial experience of coming to Jesus as LORD, the church I became joined to one that believed in a one time event when a person was saved.  And basically, as a member, it was to find a comfortable space where you felt good about yourself when going to church.  Sort of like, what you don’t know can not hurt you.  After a few years it got really boring and I found myself mostly sleeping through the sermons.  But had a guy working for me who went to another church who was feeling I needed to be sanctified like he was.  One day he was working on completing a model home for me as a contractor and he was standing on the roof, applying nails to the facia with a 32oz. framing hammer and leaving waffle marks along the fascia.  I hollered at him, he lost his focus and came down on his thumb which was very painful. Slammed his hammer into the roof and was cursing to the top of his lungs.  And I thought, so much for his sanctification?  Tossed the hammer back up on the roof and that was the end of his pushing for my sanctification.  So I did not feel really comfortable in my church or in his.  So as it to really changing the heart, it had to come from the inside out, not the outside in.

About 10 years later, I was actually running to do something and caught my right knee cap right in the center on my T340 cat tread which tossed me to the ground in pain without thinking, I yelled out “Praise The Lord, Thank you Jesus” I was stunned at what I had just said and the pain left immediately.  Simply, from the washing of the Word of God over the years. But I was still being attacked by the enemy in a lot of other areas.  In 1967,  a painter gave me a bid on painting my home that I was building and it was a big house.  The painter was a strong Christian, Marvin Langenberg, and he started talking to me about the Baptism in the Holy Spirit to help me in my walk with Jesus.  I really liked the guy and as the painting was a bid it made no difference to me how much time he took in  talking while painting my house.  And I began to see what he was talking about in Holy Scripture and began praying about it.  One day going to work I was singing in my truck, it was big and set really high so I was very much alone, I forgot the words, started filling in with what ever came to mind and after awhile it seemed like a language that I did not know.  And it felt good and was fun to do.   Later on Marvin invited me to a prayer meeting at his church and as I came in the door he asked if I would mind if the folks prayed for me.  Why not? I can use all the prayer I can get.  But then he asked me to come and kneel down in the middle of the room, and that felt a little uncomfortable, but I did it anyway.  and then about 15 people came and laid hands on me and prayed over me with such fervor and it felt like about 600# on my back.  I thought, if I don’t do something, they are not going to let me up.  So I started saying the words that I used for singing in the truck and that made them all really happy and they let me up.  But then I felt deceitful, and had to mention that I had been singing that language in the truck for many weeks now.  And they did not know what to say, but I felt that I had conformation that it really was the Baptism in the Holy Spirit.  So my experience is that when we begin to make Jesus LORD that is the beginning of the process of our Sanctification. We really need the power of the Holy Spirit in that commitment to help make the sanctification happen, Rom.8:13.   Paul tells us in 2 Corinthians 5:17 “Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.”  And it takes our faith and God’s grace to make it happen.  1 Corinthians 15:47-49 “The first man was from the earth, a man of dust; the second man is from heaven.  48  As was the man of dust, so also are those who are of the dust, and as is the man of heaven, so also are those who are of heaven.  Just as we have borne the image of the man of dust, we shall also bear the image of the man of heaven.” 

When Paul summarizes what happens to the person who believes in Yeshua (Jesus), he uses a breathtaking phrase: “new creation.” He could have simply said “saved,” and that would have been true. But Paul chooses language that is far more expansive. He is not describing a better version of the old life, a repaired heart, or a revised story. He is announcing the arrival of an entirely new order of existence breaking into the present world.  The Greek phrase is “kaine ktisis” (2 Corinthians 5:17). Kaine does not merely mean new in the sense of recent; it means new in kind, something qualitatively different from what existed before. Ktisis refers to creation itself – the created order, the cosmos spoken into existence by God. Together, these words proclaim far more than personal transformation. They declare that the new creation has already begun, and everyone who is in Christ Jesus, the Messiah, is part of it, and is growing in the fruit of the Spirit, Galatians 5:22-23.

Don’t allow yourself to be defined by the person you started out to be or by the struggles that still surround you.   In Christ Jesus, you can be, kaine ktisis — a new creation — and the very life of His Kingdom of righteousness can become alive in you if Jesus is really your LORD.  Learn to yield to your new nature in Christ Jesus. The same Spirit who raised Yeshua from the dead can now dwell in you, not to polish the old life but to reveal a new one. So stop measuring yourself by the standards of a world that is broken and passing away 1 John 2: 15-17.  Begin walking in the reality that God’s  Kingdom has broken through, 1 John 4:16-17.  That the old no longer has the final word over your identity, future, or purpose. Every step that you take now in faith will be a declaration that God’s Kingdom is here, that resurrection life is real, and that this new Jesus, Gen.1:26,  creation can also be unfolding through you, like Jesus,  until the day it fills  the whole universe with our Creator God’s love as Jesus did for us on earth.  This is sanctification.  We are in a hot house of spiritual growth that can bring us into God’s Holy eternal family.  Or, our choice of Pride and Rebellion can send our eternal soul, with total recall, into outer, eternal darkness without a body, Jude 13.