(A) Jesus prays that His people may be sanctified
“Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth.” (John 17:17)
It is a prayer that the Father would make HIs people more holy, more spiritual,
more pure, more saintly in thought and word and deed, in life and character. The grace of God had done something for the disciples already – called, converted, renewed and changed them. Now Jesus prays that the work of grace may be carried higher and further, and that His people may be more thoroughly sanctified and made holy in body, soul and spirit – in fact more like Himself.
More holiness is the very thing to be desired for all servants of Christ. Holy living is the great proof of the reality of Christianity.
Holy living trains Christians for heaven.The nearer we live to God while we live, the more ready shall we be to dwell for ever in His presence when we die. Our entrance into heaven will be entirely by grace, and not of works, but heaven itself would be no heaven to us if we entered it with an unsanctified character. Our hearts must be in tune for heaven if we are to enjoy it. Christ’s blood alone can give us a title to enter the inheritance. Sanctification must give us a capacity to enjoy it.
(The above sharing is taken from the “Day by Day with J.C. Ryle”)
Those who walk most closely with God are those who walk with Him most comfortably: to be in the presence of the Holy God and yet continue to be defiled in our life and character would invite God’s judgment and displeasure.
So it is God’s mercy, love, and grace that prepare us to be ready for heaven and to be in His presence with joy – our life on earth is like a ‘rehearsal’, getting us ready to enjoy His presence and fellowship eternally.
This rehearsal and preparation may be different for different believers in some ways – however, it is the similar process of making us holy and to be like the Master. And it would include sufferings, moulding, struggles, and pain in various degrees as God ‘removes’ the impurities, the ‘ugliness’, the defilement that plague our lives. But all this is done with much love and grace from Him; it is never to ultimately hurt or destroy – it is always to help put off the ‘old man’ and to put on the ‘new man’ such that Gods’ people collectively can be a beautiful and pure “bride” for His Son.
So let us not reject the loving hand of discipline from the Lord as He seeks to make us more like the Son; let us affirm that “the Lord disciplines those He loves, and He chastises everyone He accepts as His child” (Heb. 12:6b).
Let us not lose heart when He rebukes us; instead, let us endure hardship as discipline – for God is treating us as His children – God disciplines us for our good, that we may share in His holiness, although discipline can be painful. Let us be certain that none of us can claim that we need no further dealings from God as if we are already ‘pure’ and ‘perfect’. All of us, with the exception of Jesus, need to be sanctified, and Jesus’ prayer is not just for His apostles but it is also for all subsequent believers.
So when God lovingly puts His hand upon our lives and we feel the pain, let us not dwell in self pity and bitterness – let us instead be thankful that He is treating us as His children, and He intends to make us worthy to be His people in the new heaven and new earth. Let us welcome His work of grace to make us more thoroughly sanctified.
(B) “I will make you perfect – the promise of glory”
Sometimes, we wonder why Jesus prayed for our sanctification (John 17:17). It is safe to tell the pure in heart that they shall see God, for only the pure in heart wants to. Love, by definition, seeks to enjoy its object. Hence, ultimately, the chief aim of man is to love God and to enjoy Him. But we cannot truly love God and enjoy Him if we are not pure in heart, that is, if we are not sanctified.
Hence, when Jesus prays for us to be holy, to be pure, to be sanctified, He has, in His heart, our interests and true pleasure – such that we can truly see the Triune God and truly want to love Him and to enjoy Him (for which we are created).
God’s promise to make us ‘perfect’ and to share His glory is almost incredible – imagine filthy sinful creatures like us made ‘perfect’ and fit to share His glory!
It is only possible by the work of Christ, that we shall actually survive the examination at the final judgment, shall find approval, shall please God (which is a real ingredient of divine happiness)…to be loved by God, not merely pitied, but delighted in as an artist delights in his work or a father in a son or daughter – it seems impossible, yet true, to be able to share His glory, and to enjoy His love and pleasure eternally.
Love seeks to enjoy the object of its love: for God to enjoy us and to be pleased with us, and for us to enjoy Him and to love Him fully ‘demands’ that we be holy, pure and sanctified – for only the pure shall see God and only the pure in heart shall stand before Him.
But the other important point to note: although God, in the long run, will not be satisfied with nothing less than absolute perfection, He will also be delighted with the first feeble, stumbling effort we make to do the simplest duty. Just as an earthly father is pleased at the baby’s first attempt to walk: no father would be satisfied with anything less than a firm, free, manly walk in a grown-up son. In the same way, God is easy to please, but in His love, He is hard to satisfy – as far as making us perfect and able to share His glory ultimately.
It is as if Jesus is saying: Whatever suffering it may cost you in your earthly life, whatever inconceivable purification it may cost you after death, whatever it cost Me, I will never rest, nor let you rest, until you are literally perfect – until my Father can say without reservation that He is well pleased with you, as He was well pleased with me.
This is Jesus’ desire for us who are His children – this is His prayer in John 17:17, and it is only because He truly loves us and desires the very best for us to share with Him in the new heaven and new earth. This is what Jesus can do and will do – and He will not do anything less because we are His beloved children and siblings.
Jesus’ prayer would certainly be answered although it will take a long process and time (from our perspective): let us not make it unnecessarily long and painful because we do not share His perspective and we forget that all He allows in our life (including the pain, the sufferings, the distress) are part and parcel of this loving process that has its source and root in the wonderful, loving and gracious heart of God!!
(C) When we are provoked and under pressure
We have been considering holiness and purity of heart. Holiness means, among other things, forming good habits, breaking bad habits, resisting temptation to sin, and controlling ourselves when we are under ‘attack’ and provoked.
To form the Christlike habits which Paul refers to as the fruit of the Spirit, we must deliberately set ourselves to do the Christlike thing in each situation. In practice, it does not prove to be so simple. However, the principle is clear: The Spirit is with us to empower us, and we know that Christlike behaviour is now in the deepest sense natural to us (because we have been born again and and to walk with Christ in the path of holy discipleship is the life for which the hears of Christians truly long for). The regenerate heart cannot love what it knows God hates. So Christians are behaving unnaturally when they are occupied in activities against which their own inner nature revolts.
Nonetheless, an uncontrolled self is a deadly force. It wills to defy or ignore God and tries to take the place of God. Idolising, exalting, celebrating, and indulging oneself as one’s god is the root cause of all the shame, folly, decadence, and moral blindness.
When Jesus declared that the two greatest commands are that we must love God with all our heart, soul, strength, and mind, and love our neighbour as much as we love ourselves, both of these commands attacked this human idolatry of self in a way that shows us how we are to transcend and overcome it.
If we direct our whole being toward love of God, and if we give as much value to our neighbour as to ourselves, the process of gaining self-control of self is well under way.
A self that knows itself and has embraced self-denial and given itself to God’s control can become a powerful force for good. Indeed, this is the kind of gift that God asks of us as we present our bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is our spiritual worship (Rom. 12:1).
Self control actually operates from a position of strength. A strong understanding of oneself, a strong sense of selfhood, even of self-worth (under God’s governing), is entirely proper and even necessary for fruitful life in Christ. When we recall Jesus dying on the cross, some may look at it as a manifestation of weakness, but in reality, it takes a great deal of self-control and strength to remain on the cross and to finish the task given Him by the Father.
We have noted that one facet of the fruit of the Spirit is LOVE; now the other facet so very important to exercise love as God requires is SELF-CONTROL.
With love and self-control, joy, peace, gentleness, goodness can prevail in our lives as we exercise long-suffering, meekness (humility) and kindness (notice that all these constitute the fruit of the Spirit).
(D) Judging by results
We have been considering ‘Holiness’ and ‘Sanctification’ with the elaboration on why God desires to perfect us, His people. We saw the encapsulation of the ten commandments in the two great commands, which include loving God with all we got, and loving our neighbours as ourselves (which include loving our enemies and doing good to them, and mortifying our anger and not hitting back; but this does not preclude taking action to defend a third party from murder by a homicidal maniac, or taking a stand to defend an innocent defenceless ‘victim’, etc in similar circumstances, when the motive is not egoistic retaliation but upholding justice and godly wisdom).
I found the following writings by C.S. Lewis from ‘Mere Christianity’ enlightening:
“If Christianity is true why are not all Christians obviously nicer than all non-Christians? …If conversion to Christianity makes no improvement in a man’s outward actions – if he continues to be just as snobbish or spiteful or envious or ambitious as he was before – then I think we must suspect that his ‘conversion’ was largely imaginary; and after one’s original conversion, every time one thinks one had made an advance, that is the test to apply. Fine feelings, new insights, greater interest in ‘religion’ mean nothing unless they make our actual behaviour better; just as in an illness ‘feeling better’ is not much good if the thermometer shows that your temperature is still going up. In that sense the outer world is quite right to judge ‘Christianity’ by its results….When we Christians behave badly, or fail to behave well, we are making Christianity unbelievable to the outside world”.
Christ told us to judge by results: ‘A tree is known by its fruit. In a war time scenario, often people are told that ‘careless talk costs lives’. Talk costs lives. It is equally true that ‘careless lives cost talk’. Our careless lives set the outer world talking and we give them grounds for talking in a way that throws doubts on the truth of Christianity itself.
If this is the case, our ability to articulate the ‘gospel’ in ‘evangelism’ becomes a mockery; this is the reason why training in methods of evangelism without the substance of a converted life in Christ is counter-productive in God’s eyes. I recall A.W.Tozer saying something like the following: If we plant an apple tree overseas and it yields oranges, it does not make sense to talk about spreading Christianity overseas when our Christianity at home is “suspect”.
The Lord God says, “You shall be holy, for I am holy” – this applies to all true disciples of Jesus Christ.
(E) Consecration is needful and essential for holiness
“For I am the Lord your God. Consecrate yourselves therefore, and be holy, for I am holy” (Leviticus 11:44). A similar call is also given in the New Testament from the writings of Apostle Peter.
Consecration and repentance are one. Repentance is a change of mind issuing in a change of life. Godliness has to be founded on repentance from the start. Repentance means a right-about-turn and a quick march in the direction opposite to that in which we were going before (familiar to those in National service?- We are ‘soldiers’ of Jesus Christ).
The original direction was the path of self-service, in the sense of treating yourself as God and seeking gratification for self accordingly. Take note that we can be involved in Chrisian service and yet be seeking self-gratification – we can crave for recognition from fellow believers for our ‘service’; we take offence when others ‘put us down’; we are prepared to put others aside as long as we can stand on the pedestal (treating ourselves as God).
The new direction is a matter of saying good-bye to all that, and embracing the service of God (from right motives, which please the Father).
Consecration is repentance renewed and sustained (sustainability is the buzzword today in our nation), and indeed the path to godliness and holiness is not just repentance, but repentance renewed and sustained throughout our Christian life. Just as repentance is consecration begun, consecration is repentance renewed and sustained – this is in fact the secret for sensitivity to God’s call and communication to us (see Romans 12:1-2) – this summons by Apostle Paul is to consecration and transformation which leads on to the pathway of discerning and finding God’s will in our Christian life.
If we are unrepentant and unconsecrated, we will not be in a position to hear God’s call and to discern His will at any point in our life and ministry.
That is why apathy and sluggishness with regard to ordinary obedience bring ‘deafness’ when God calls or speaks. Backsliding and apostasy often begin with being unfaithful in ‘small things’, and being indifferent to God in the daily outworking in our lives, even in apparently insignificant issues. If we continue to put ‘self’ at the centre of our lives, and if we yearn to take the place of ‘God’ in various situations we encounter, then it is surely an indication that repentance and consecration is sadly missing in our lives.