From the TeachingtheWord Bible Knowledgebase

Part twelve of a series. Read part eleven.

Scripture tells us that there is a vast difference between living a good moral life and living a sanctified life.

An All Too Common Misconception

Many Christians seem to have a misunderstanding of the Bible's teaching about God's will for the believer in the area of holiness and sanctification. Many Christians seem to think that sanctification is the same as leading a good moral life. The fact is, the two things are vastly different. Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones put it this way:

We must always be careful to define sanctification not only in terms of our moral state and condition, but of our moral state and condition in relationship to God. That is absolutely vital. People can be highly moral but that does not mean that they are sanctified. The word must always carry with it this conception of our relationship to God, our standing in His presence. So sanctification is not morality and purity in and of itself. It is all that in relationship to God. There is, therefore, an essential difference between the best moral person that the world may put forward and the Christian who is being sanctified.[1]

Sanctification is inseparably connected to, and originates in, the believer's saving relationship to God the Father by faith, through the atoning work of Jesus Christ, by the regenerating work of the Holy Spirit. Morality that is not the product of regeneration by the Holy Spirit is nothing more than the "filthy rags" righteousness of Isaiah 64:6.

Paul's Testimony

The Apostle Paul said that "concerning the righteousness which is in the law" he was "blameless" - amemptos, meaning that he had "zero defects" (Philippians 3:6). But that was before he was saved! After he was brought to saving faith, Paul looked on that kind of morality in an entirely different way:

But what things were gain to me, these I have counted loss for Christ. Yet indeed I also count all things loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in Him, not having my own righteousness, which is from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God by faith; that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death, if, by any means, I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.

Not that I have already attained, or am already perfected; but I press on, that I may lay hold of that for which Christ Jesus has also laid hold of me. Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended; but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.

Therefore let us, as many as are mature, have this mind; and if in anything you think otherwise, God will reveal even this to you. Nevertheless, to the degree that we have already attained, let us walk by the same rule, let us be of the same mind." (Philippians 3:7-16)

To understand this change in the thinking of the Apostle Paul - which should be the change in thinking of every blood-bought child of God - we need to understand four things about sanctification.

Sanctification: Two Aspects

First, sanctification has two distinct but related aspects. One is complete at the believer's conversion, but the other is a life-long process. The first is usually termed positional, definitive, or imputed sanctification - the new believer in Christ being set apart, once for all, for God's holy use, just as we are declared not guilty, once for all, in our justification. The second aspect is progressive or imparted sanctification - God's working in the believer to make him fit for His holy uses.

In definitive or imputed sanctification, believers have a new standing before God in Christ. They are set apart, just as the vessels of the Old Testament tabernacle were set apart, once for all, for holy use. The Christian is set apart for God and for His service. That is the essence of our new, restored relationship to God. With that new standing in relationship to God comes a new standing in relationship to sin. The Scriptures speak of this aspect of sanctification in terms of our being dead to sin, and liberated from the slavery of sin, because of Christ's finished work. Therefore the believer is spoken of in New Testament Greek as ho hagios, a "saint" or "holy one." And so Paul writes,

What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? Certainly not! How shall we who died to sin live any longer in it? Or do you not know that as many of us as were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death? Therefore we were buried with Him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. For if we have been united together in the likeness of His death, certainly we also shall be in the likeness of His resurrection, knowing this, that our old man was crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves of sin... And having been set free from sin, you became slaves of righteousness (Romans 6:1-6, 18).

Progressive or imparted sanctification is God's work of conforming each and every true believer more and more to the image of Christ, and it is a process that continues until the day we see Christ face to face. On that day we shall be completely sanctified, freed not only from the power of sin but also from the presence of sin, and "we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is" (John 3:1-3). Numerous passages speak of this aspect of sanctification, and how God accomplishes it in us:

As newborn babes, desire the pure milk of the word, that you may grow thereby. (1 Peter 2:2)

Grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To Him be the glory both now and forever. Amen. (2 Peter 3:18)

I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God. (Romans 12:1-2)

Therefore, having these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God. (2 Corinthians 7:1)

Therefore put to death your members which are on the earth: fornication, uncleanness, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. (Colossians 3:5)

And this I pray, that your love may abound still more and more in knowledge and all discernment. (Philippians 1:9)

For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you should abstain from sexual immorality; that each of you should know how to possess his own vessel in sanctification and honor, not in passion of lust, like the Gentiles who do not know God; that no one should take advantage of and defraud his brother in this matter, 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. (1 Thessalonians 4:3-7)

As He who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, because it is written, "Be holy, for I am holy." (1 Peter 1:15-16)

Sanctification Is By the Word

Secondly, sanctification in both its aspects - imputed and imparted - is through God's Word. It is through the preached Word that human beings come to saving faith in Christ and are thus set apart for God:

How then shall they call on Him in whom they have not believed? And how shall they believe in Him of whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear without a preacher? And how shall they preach unless they are sent? As it is written: "How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the gospel of peace, who bring glad tidings of good things!" (Romans 10:14-15)

It is through the Word that believers are progressively sanctified as well: "Sanctify them by Your truth. Your Word is truth" (John 17:17).

Sanctification Requires Regeneration

Third, as the foregoing passages declare, sanctification requires regeneration. It is the regenerating work of the Holy Spirit that establishes the believer's relationship with God. It is the indwelling work of the Holy Spirit, illuminating Scripture, that brings about the believer's growth in holiness. These things are impossible for the person who is outside of Christ:

These things we also speak, not in words which man's wisdom teaches but which the Holy Spirit teaches, comparing spiritual things with spiritual. But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned. But he who is spiritual judges all things, yet he himself is rightly judged by no one. For "who has known the mind of the Lord that he may instruct Him?" But we have the mind of Christ. (1 Corinthians 2:13-16)

Sanctification Leads to Glorification

Fourth, the believer's sanctification leads to glorification in the life to come:

Behold what manner of love the Father has bestowed on us, that we should be called children of God! Therefore the world does not know us, because it did not know Him. Beloved, now we are children of God; and it has not yet been revealed what we shall be, but we know that when He is revealed, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is. And everyone who has this hope in Him purifies himself, just as He is pure. (1 John 3:1-3)

And may the Lord make you increase and abound in love to one another and to all, just as we do to you, so that He may establish your hearts blameless in holiness before our God and Father at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ with all His saints. (1 Thessalonians 3:12-13)

Pursue peace with all people, and holiness, without which no one will see the Lord. (Hebrews 12:14)

...Christ also loved the church and gave Himself for her, that He might sanctify and cleanse her with the washing of water by the Word, that He might present her to Himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that she should be holy and without blemish. (Ephesians 5:25-27)

A Vast Difference

There is indeed a vast difference - an eternal-life-and-death difference - between the unsaved person who leads the best moral life he can muster, and the regenerated saint set apart by God's grace and growing in holiness.

One of the most scrupulously ethical men I have ever known was an atheist who refused to recognize God's claims upon him. There will be millions upon millions of moral people in Hell for eternity. But only blood-bought saints - regenerated, justified, sanctified, and glorified by the grace of God through Christ - will have a glorious inheritance in the new heavens and new earth.

Next: What Are "Good Works" in the Eyes of God?

References:

1. D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Great Doctrines of the Bible (Wheaton, Illinois: Crossway Books, 2003), pages 195-196. Emphasis added.

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