Sanctification

Gospel-Driven Sanctification

/ Dennis Griffith / Leave a comment

by Jerry Bridges

Early in my Christian life I heard someone say, “The Bible was not given to increase your knowledge but to guide your conduct.” Later I came to realize that this statement was simplistic at best and erroneous at worst. The Bible is far more than a rulebook to follow. It is primarily the message of God’s saving grace through Jesus Christ, with everything in Scripture before the cross pointing to God’s redemptive work and everything after the cross–including our sanctification–flowing from that work.

There is an element of truth in this statement, however, and the Holy Spirit used it to help me to see that the Bible is not to be read just to gain knowledge. It is, indeed, to be obeyed and practically applied in our daily lives. As James says, “But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves” (James 1:22).

With my new insight, I prayed that God would use the Bible to guide my conduct. Then I began diligently to seek to obey it. I had never heard the phrase “the pursuit of holiness,” but that became my primary goal in life. Unfortunately, I made two mistakes. First, I assumed the Bible was something of a rulebook and that all I needed to do was to learn what it says and go do it. I knew nothing of the necessity of depending on the Holy Spirit for his guidance and enablement.

Still worse, I assumed that God’s acceptance of me and his blessing in my life depended on how well I did. I knew I was saved by grace through faith in Christ apart from any works. I had assurance of my salvation and expected to go to heaven when I died. But in my daily life, I thought God’s blessing depended on the practice of certain spiritual disciplines, such as having a daily quiet time and not knowingly committing any sin. I did not think this out but just unconsciously assumed it, given the Christian culture in which I lived. Yet it determined my attitude toward the Christian life.

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What is Now True Because of Jesus

/ Dennis Griffith / Leave a comment

The Apostle Paul notably quipped:

“I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes…” (Romans 1.16)

The “gospel” is the message – the “Good News” – about the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus and of the Kingdom in and over which he reigns.. Paul is saying that the message has power – life-giving and life-transforming power to all who believe the message. Bible scholars will point out that the construct of the Greek word for “believe”, and the context within the sentence, express that the word carries a connotation of “on-going belief”. In other words, the aspect of salvation that we call “justification” occurs the moment one believes; and the on-going effect of salvation, the process of salvation we call “sanctification” occurs by the same power, and by on-going belief in the same message.

Properly speaking, the gospel message is about Jesus; but the fruit of the gospel becomes evident in those who are believing. The gospel is the power to change us. Certain things become true because of the gospel – because of Jesus. Here are a handful of passages describing what is now true because of the gospel:

John 5.24 – Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life. He does not come into judgment, but has passed from death to life.

2 Corinthians 5.19 – In Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation.

Romans 5.1 – Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Romans 8.1 –  There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.

Romans 8.2 –  For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death.

Ephesians 1.5 – …he predestined us for adoption to himself as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will…

Ephesians 3.16-19 – …that according to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being, 17 so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith—that you, being rooted and grounded in love, 18 may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, 19 and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.

Colossians 3.1-4 – If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. 2 Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. 3 For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. 4 When Christ who is your[a] life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.

1 John 4.7-12 – 7 Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. 8 Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love. 9 In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. 10 In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. 11 Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.12 No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us.

Revelation 12.10-11 – 10 And I heard a loud voice in heaven, saying, “Now the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God and the authority of his Christ have come, for the accuser of our brothers has been thrown down, who accuses them day and night before our God. 11 And they have conquered him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony, for they loved not their lives even unto death.

Shaped Through Suffering

/ Dennis Griffith / Leave a comment

“The suffering that comes to us is not random. It is not just the flow of chance events that careen along without a plan. It is not crazy coincidence. It is not haphazard and undirected. It is easy for us to see suffering as blind chance, or bad luck, or what others are doing to us. It is not karma, bad thing are not coming to us, because we have been bad to others. God makes it clear that all suffering comes according to God’s purposes in our lives. God is at work even when we cannot see him at work.”

~ Tedd Tripp

Spiritual Chrysalis

/ Dennis Griffith / Leave a comment

Chrysalis

In preparation for  this past Sunday message from Galatians, I again marveled at the insight and passion of Martin Luther concerning our Union with Christ:

“So far as justification is concerned, Christ and I must be so closely attached that He lives in me and I in Him. What a marvelous way of speaking!

Because He lives in me, whatever grace, righteousness, life, peace, and salvation there is in me is all Christ’s; nevertheless, it is mine as well, by the cementing and attachment that are through faith, by which we become as one body in the Spirit.

Since Christ lives in me, grace, righteousness, life, and eternal salvation must be present with Him; and the Law, sin, and death must be absent. Indeed, the Law must be crucified, devoured, and abolished by the Law—and sin by sin, death by death, the devil by the devil.

In this way Paul seeks to withdraw us completely from ourselves, from the Law, and from works, and to transplant us into Christ and faith in Christ, so that in the area of justification we look only at grace, and separate it far from the Law and from works, which belong far away…

But faith must be taught correctly, namely, that by it you are so cemented to Christ that He and you are as one person, which cannot be separated but remains attached to Him forever and declares: ‘I am as Christ.’

And Christ, in turn, says: ‘I am as that sinner who is attached to Me, and I to him. For by faith we are joined together into one flesh and one bone.’

Thus Ephesians 5.30 says: ‘We are members of the body of Christ, of His flesh and of His bones,’ in such a way that this faith couples Christ and me more intimately than a husband is coupled to his wife.”

~ from Luther’s Works, Vol. 26: Lectures on Galatians, 1535, Chapters 1-4

Balance of Faith

/ Dennis Griffith / Leave a comment

Balance Act

A true, vibrant Christian faith is someting akin to a balancing act.

In a post this morning, Tim Keller suggested:

If we are going to grow in grace, we must stay aware of being both sinners and also loved children in Christ.

Keller’s paradigm reminded me of something Edward Payson – “Praying Payson of Portland” – wrote long ago:

True Christianity consists of a proper mixture of fear of God, and of hope in his mercy; and wherever either of these is entirely wanting, there can be no true Faith. God has joined these things, and we ought by no means to put them asunder.

He cannot take pleasure in those who fear him with a slavish fear, without hoping in his mercy, because they seem to consider him a cruel and tyrannical being, who has no mercy or goodness in his nature. And, besides, they implicitly charge him with falsehood, by refusing to believe and hope in his invitations and offers of mercy.

On the other hand, he cannot be pleased with those who pretend to hope in his mercy without fearing him. For they insult him by supposing there is nothing in him which ought to be feared. And in addition to this, they make him a liar, by disbelieving his awful threatenings denounced against sinners, and call in question his authority, by refusing to obey him.

Those only who both fear him and hope in his mercy, give him the honor that is due to his name.

Both Payson and Keller give credence to thw wisdom of Puritan Thomas Watson:

The two great graces essential to a saint in this life are faith and repentance. These are the two wings by which he flies to heaven.

Killing Me Softly: Putting Sin to Death

/ Dennis Griffith / Leave a comment

In Colossians 3.5, the Apostle Paul commands:

Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry.

Based on the language Paul uses it is clear that sin is in our hearts, and it will not just go away on its own.  We need to take an active role and kill it within ourselves, like any other form of heart disease – or like weeds from a garden.  And this list is suggestive, not exhaustive – a starting point, not a few last details.

In other words, we have a need to die to sin while we grow in grace.

But just how do we actually do this?

Puritan John Owen offered these profoundly helpful insights in his book, The Holy Spirit,

Determine that you will, everyday and in every duty abolish and destroy this ruling principle of sin.  it will not die unless it is gradually and constantly weakened.  Spare it, and it heals its wounds and recovers its strength.  Negligence allows sin to regain such power that we may never recover our former state as long as we live.

We are continually to watch out for the rising up of this ruling principle of sin and immediately subdue it.  This is to be done in all that we are and do.  We are to be watchful in our behaviour to others, watchful when we are alone, watchful when in trouble or joy.  We are to be particularly watchful in the use of our pleasure times and in temptations.

Determine that you will no longer serve sin  (Rom. 6:6).  See it as the worst service of which a rational creature is capable.  If you serve sin it will bring you to a dreadful end.  Determine that though sin remains in you, yet you will not serve it.  Remember, if the ‘old ma’ is not crucified with Christ, you are still a servant of sin, whatever you might think of yourself.

Realise that it is no easy task to mortify sin.  Sin is a powerful and dreadful enemy.  There is no living thing that will not do everything in its power to save its life.  So sin also will fight to save its life.  If sin is not diligently hunted down and dealt with by holy violence, it will escape all our attempts at killing it.  It is a great mistake to think that we can at any time rest from this duty.  The ruling principle of sin to be slain is in us, and so has hold of all our faculties.  Sin cannot be killed without a sense of pain and trouble.  So Christ compared it to ‘cutting of the right hand’ and ‘plucking out the right eye’.  The battle is not against any particular lust but against all sinful lusts which war against the soul.

Mortification arising from convictions of the law leads only to dealing with particular sins, and always proves fruitless.  True mortifying of sin deals with the entire body of sin.  It goes tot the heart of the matter and lays the axe to the root of the tree.  This is the mortification which the Holy Spirit drives the believer to do.

Mortification of particular sins arises from a guilty conscience.  But mortification arising from gospel principles deals with the whole body of sin in its opposition to the renewing of the image of God in us.

Looking Heaven-ward

/ Dennis Griffith / 1 Comment

“There are two methods which the Lord graciously adopts, in order to draw our heart away from this present world:

  • The first is by setting before it the attractiveness and stability of “things above:”
  • The second is, by faithfully declaring the evanescent [temporary] and shakable nature of ‘things of earth.’

… Now it is much better to be drawn by the joys of heaven than driven by the sorrows of earth.

The believer should not wait to be shaken out of the present things…There is no difficulty in giving up the world when we have, by faith, laid hold of Christ: the difficulty then would be to hold it.”

~adapted from C.H. Macintosh, Notes on Genesis (1879)

The Difference That Makes All the Difference

/ Dennis Griffith / 1 Comment

Francis Schaeffer, of his own testimony, writes:

“I became a Christian once for all upon the basis of the finished work of Christ through faith; that is justification. The Christian life, sanctification, operates on the same basis, but moment by moment. There is the same base (Christ’s work) and the same instrument (faith); the only difference is that one is once for all and the other is moment by moment…  If we try to live the Christian life in our own strength we will have sorrow, but if we live in this way, we will not only serve the Lord, but in place of sorrow, He will be our song. That is the difference. The ‘how’ of the Christian life is the power of the crucified and risen Lord, through the agency of the indwelling Holy Spirit, by faith moment by moment.”

An important -even essential – distinction. It’s not just for the sake of doctrinal precision. It makes all the difference in how we live out our lives.