Doctrine of the Day: Sanctification

Ok, I confess I am a complete language geek. I am so geeky, I have created my own language and am translating the Bible into it. It has been an amazing exercise so far to learn how languages work and how to create new words by attempting to define terms. One word that I am especially happy with is the word in Thornic (my language) for sanctification – scárhvhil. This word is a compound of two words – scrub and mercy. I think is at the foundation the meaning of sanctification. From the moment we are saved, God begins cleaning us. Sometimes there is gentle rubbing, but a lot of the time there are moments of intense scrubbing; God removing all of the filth and sin from our lives in order for us to become more like his Son.


Now, this is an amazing idea if we stop and think about it for a moment. Once God saves us we are seen through the blood of Christ, we are seen as holy. So two questions emerge – what is the point of scrubbing, sacrifice and struggle and two, how does sanctification work? The answer to the first question is gratitude. We become more Christ-like because we are grateful for the salvation we received and one expression of this is to become more worthy of the title "adopted child of God." It is important to note that we do not become more sanctified in order to earn God's favor, rather we seek sanctification because we have already received God's favor. We become eager to become holy because we are priests, we do not become holy in order to become priests.


The answer to the second question is more difficult. How does one become sanctified? We must start with the fact that, as with salvation, it is not from our own strength. We can't simply white knuckle ourselves into holiness. We are made holy through Jesus (Hebrews 13:12 and 2:11). We are also sanctified through the Holy Spirit (1 Peter 1:2). Does this mean that we can simply wait for the Holy Spirit to remove sinful patterns and establish changes? Certainly not! But, it does mean that sanctification is not optional, nor is it dependent on us. God will accomplish those changes, we can be willing to submit or we can be driven to our knees. Our final position has already been decided.


Finally, as a last note, we must not make sanctification into a simple list of dos and don'ts. Obedience to a list is not the same thing as heart change. If we make it into a list of dos (have a quiet time, or give an offering) or don'ts (smoking, drinking, dancing etc…) we will ignore the fact that sanctification is to touch every aspect of our lives, not merely the big things and it is to change the heart, not merely the hands and head.