Help from Godly Teachers and a Puritan

Three sources have been helpful to me recently in building a better understanding of sanctification. This subject has caused me concern, because I have never felt like the reality I saw fit completely with my understanding of the Bible, so I knew my understanding must be off somewhere. I understood that little by little, I was being changed to become more like Christ. I was to work out my salvation with fear and trembling, while at the same time God would be working in me to will and act according to His good purpose. I was to fight the sin that so easily entangles and obey God's Word, and the Holy Spirit would gradually make me more like Christ. The work would not be complete in this life though -- not until I faced Jesus would the work be finished. To me, this sounded as though the effect should be cumulative: My understanding was that, as I worked out my salvation, these sins should be decreasing and plaguing me less and less.

In the early days following my salvation, that seemed to fit my experience, and I did see myself becoming what I thought was better and better, taking on good habits like going to church, reading the Bible, controlling my temper and lusts, serving others, and letting go of sins I had enjoyed, such as flirtation, indulging in excesses and making work and achievement my god.

But as I went on in life with Christ, I began to perceive correctly the depth of my sin. The motives I had thought were pure, were not totally pure. There was sin mixed into everything I did. I could see that some sins still were lurking, ready to flare up in a moment, like my self-exaltation, jealousy and selfishness. Although I had learned to fight them and seemingly conquer them, they could still rise up horribly, seemingly without warning. I could see that sin was not just "doing," but "being". I was tortured as I became more aware of just how deep the sin issue went. The more I learned about the holiness of God, the more aware I was of my own lack. I actually seemed more aware of my sin and more plagued by it 17 years after salvation than I had been 5 years after it.

A passing comment by John Piper caused me to wonder about my assumptions on sanctification. At a speaking engagement he briefly said something to the effect that he used to think that sanctification had a cumulative effect, that after 30 years, he would be 30 years less impatient. His point was that this was not the case, but he didn't elaborate, so I was left to wonder what he meant. Why wouldn't he be 30 years less impatient after 30 years of working it out with fear and trembling?

Recently, I heard John MacArthur preaching on "At the Same Time, Just and Sinner." He painted this picture: At salvation, you are justified before God, declared righteous (justification). But you are still a sinner. You are like a dung-heap covered in snow. You have been declared righteous on the basis of the righteousness of Christ. But you are by no means righteous. You have been given a "new man," a new nature,(regeneration) that is able to fight the sin. But nothing has been taken away. Sin still hangs on you, pervading everything. It is like a rotting corpse strapped to your back, polluting all that you do, and issuing bile and poison that will kill you if you are not constantly working to kill it, slash it, rip at it. He said that the "new man," given by God's grace, is what enables you to fight, giving you a desire for the righteous and a hatred for sin. But the putrid sin is still there.

Then I read Puritan John Owen, and more of the picture seemed to come together. The sin remains for one purpose: to conform you to the image of Christ (sanctification). You fight sin by building the godly trait that opposes it. So you fight pride by cultivating humility. You fight selfishness by cultivating selflessness. Maybe pride itself NEVER decreases (although sometimes it does). But either way, your arsenal of humility grows and grows and you win more and more battles. And when you see Christ, and that wretched load of prideful sin drops off, all that is left is the humility, the selflessness. We are supposed to fight sin as though we could root it out. But we realize that the real goal of the battle is to be conformed to the image of Christ. It is like the man commanded to push against a 1,000-pound boulder everyday for 10 years. At the end of 10 years, maybe the boulder has not moved, but the exertion has produced muscle in every inch of his body.

This explanation of sanctification has brought me such joy in the battle. The topic is vast, and I will always be learning more, but I praise God for these wise teachers helping me along in my understanding and freeing me to fight the sin and recognize its depths without despair.