SANCTIFICATION
Sanctification is a significant Bible principle. The basic idea behind it is "to set apart", and "to make one holy". With those two thoughts in mind we believe that three aspects of sanctification are clear from the Bible.
First, the idea of being "set apart" is tied to what happens when a person is "born again" according to the Scriptures. At that time, the person is "set apart" for God - set apart to fellowship with God, to live for God, set apart for God's purposes. In this sense we have a "positional sanctification" in that something happened at a single point in time - that God set apart a person for His own purposes. There are some who believe that sanctification is entirely a one-time event which occurs subsequent to salvation - with that position we take exception (please see "entire sanctification").
Second, the idea of "being made holy" is linked to God's intent that we be "conformed to the image of His dear Son" and to God's ultimate dealing with sin whereby we will, in the future, be free from the guilt, the power and the very presence of sin. This is sometimes referred to as "ultimate sanctification" in that there is a designated end (designated by God) that those who belong to Him will be free from sin. It is in this sense, and this sense only, that we at BibleTruthforToday DO believe in "entire sanctification". However, that will not happen on this earth in these mortal bodies, contrary to what is believed by those who teach that "entire sanctification" is sinless perfection and is achievable here on earth in this life.
Third, in between positional sanctification and ultimate sanctification is progressive sanctification - that is, the PROCESS whereby we gradually are conformed to the image of Jesus Christ. How does this occur? God uses various means: He teaches/instructs us and expects us to learn and obey; He allows circumstances, events and people to enter our lives in order that He might show us that which we need to learn in order to grow in grace and in the knowledge of Him; and He bears fruit in our lives as we yield our stubborn and selfish wills to His. The more time we spend with Him, the more we learn from Him and desire to be like Him, the more we will find ourselves looking more like Him - and this is what the world needs to see, Christ in us!
Please note that Biblical sanctification has nothing to do with the "saintification" practiced by Roman Catholicism and others. All who have been Biblically born again are saints, Biblically speaking. Want to know more about how you can be sanctified? Click on the links provided below or feel free to contact us.
Additional Links:
Entire Sanctification
www.christinyou.net/pages/sanctification.html
www.carm.org/questions/justification.htm
Sampling of Scriptures (NKJV) relating to sanctification:
1 Cor. 1:2 "To the church of God which is at Corinth, to those who are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints, with all who in every place call on the name of Jesus Christ our Lord, both theirs and ours:"
Heb. 10:10-14 "By that will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. Christ’s Death Perfects the Sanctified And every priest stands ministering daily and offering repeatedly the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. But this Man, after He had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down at the right hand of God, from that time waiting till His enemies are made His footstool. For by one offering He has perfected forever those who are being sanctified."
Rom. 6:1-4 "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."
John 17:17-19 "Sanctify them by Your truth. Your word is truth. As You sent Me into the world, I also have sent them into the world. And for their sakes I sanctify Myself, that they also may be sanctified by the truth."
2 Cor. 7:1 "Therefore, having these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God."
Gal. 5:22-25 "But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law. And those who are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit."
Eph. 4:20-24 "But you have not so learned Christ, if indeed you have heard Him and have been taught by Him, as the truth is in Jesus: that you put off, concerning your former conduct, the old man which grows corrupt according to the deceitful lusts, and be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and that you put on the new man which was created according to God, in true righteousness and holiness."
Eph. 5:25-27 "Husbands, love your wives, just as 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."
Heb.12:10 "For they indeed for a few days chastened us as seemed best to them, but He for our profit, that we may be partakers of His holiness."
2 Cor. 3:18 "But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord."