Romans 6: 1-2
One of the 64,000 thousand dollar questions in Scripture is, what is meant by
II Corinthians 6:14 ff.: “Don’t team up with those who are unbelievers. How can goodness be a partner with wickedness? How can light live with darkness? What harmony can there be between Christ and the Devil? How can a believer be a partner with an unbeliever? And what union can there be between God’s temple and idols? For we are the temple of the living God. As God said, ‘I will live in them and walk among them. I will be their God, and they will be My people. Therefore, come out from them and separate yourselves from them, says the Lord. Don’t touch their filthy things, and I will welcome you. And I will be your Father, and you will be My sons and daughters, says the Lord Almighty.’”
On the surface this may seem like a pretty simple teaching--until we begin to ask some questions. What does it mean to “...come out from among them and be separate...”? Who are “they”, and what do “they” do that we shouldn’t do? Does that mean we don’t drive cars because they do? Should we not live in houses or wear clothes like they do? Should we not get jobs and provide for our families? They do. Where do we draw the line? Should we not play in any sports because it is a waste of our time? What about television and movies? They are about as worldly-minded as you can get. Should we dance or not dance, and should we dress ourselves differently so that we stand out in the crowd? Should we not smoke or drink or take other types of drugs because it is hard on our bodies, which are the temple of the living God here on the earth? What think ye?
Paul concludes his questions to the Corinthians by saying, “Because we have these promises, let us cleanse ourselves of everything that can defile our body or our spirit. And let us work toward complete purity, because we fear God” (II Corinthians 7:1). God wants our lives to be a reflection of the Christ Who lives in us. He wants people to be able to look at us and see an example of Who Christ is. The only Christ many people will ever get to see is the Christ they see in us.
We have just finished a chapter in which Paul has laid out the basis for God’s abounding grace. His grace is never ending. It’s like the waves that wash in on the shore hour after hour, day after day, without ever ceasing. His grace is infinite. But there were those in the church who said, “That’s too easy! That’s cheap grace! It doesn’t mean anything unless we have to work for it.” Paul would agree that we cannot presume on God’s grace and make a mockery of what Christ did for us on the cross. Anyone who would do that has not really presented himself to Christ as a living sacrifice, which is the least Christ asks of us. But on the other side of the coin, if we were able to present ourselves holy before God by our own works, it would take away the need for God to work in our lives. It is the joy of the Father to present us to His Son as a spotless bride because of His work in our lives. “He begins a good work in us and keeps right on performing it until His work within us is finished on the day Jesus Christ returns for us” (Philippians 1:6). It is a terrible thing to do anything that would take away from the work Christ did on our behalf when He suffered on the cross to take away our sins. God moved to save us because He wanted us to be holy men and women, revealing His own Spirit within us to overcome sin and death.
The work that God does in our lives is often referred to as sanctification because Jesus said we would be sanctified through our understanding of the truth (John 17:17). Paul prayed that the Thessalonian Christians would be “sanctified through and through” (I Thessalonians 5:23). Webster says that sanctification is simply “...the process by which something is made holy or without sin.”
It is amazing how man can take something so wonderful as God’s work in our lives and distort it to make it something guilt-producing and enslaving. Sanctification was talked about every Sunday during my growing up years. But at the risk of being redundant, I need to remind you again that it was taught as a “second” work of grace that happened instantaneously and was completed action. The precise wording in Wiley’s Theology 101 states that “...sanctification is a second work of grace in which the old sinful nature is totally eradicated and a person lives in a state of sinless perfection where they never sin again in thought, word, or deed.” As I have said many times before, the only way a person could live up to that definition is to redefine sin. And yet, that is why Christ begins a process in our lives of helping us come to the place where we are a reflection to the world of the Christ Who lives in us. God does desire that we live a life free of sin. Christ came to earth to free man from the vicious circle of sin and death.
As God works in us, there should be a continual change in our thoughts and our actions. We ought to be “more and more like Christ” (II Corinthians 3:18). But if we are continuing to sin so that grace can abound, we have missed the whole point of our salvation. God wants to show to the world that His power is greater than the power of sin and Satan, and He wants to present a spotless bride to His Son. To continue to sin so that grace could abound would be to make a mockery of both of the above statements.
Let’s look at a couple of words from our “churchology” vocabulary. Justification refers to the work Christ did on the cross for us when He offered Himself as a sacrifice for our sins. He did for us what we could not do for ourselves. He paid the penalty for our sin. Our justification is meant to lead us to sanctification, but justification is not sanctification. The process of sanctification begins the moment Christ comes into our lives, and it will continue until the day we die. It is the process whereby Christ molds and shapes us into His own image. The Christ Who lives in us takes more and more control of our lives until we are an accurate reflection to the world of Who He is. It means we love like He loves, and we lay down our lives for others the way He laid down His life for us.
The problem was that there were those in the early church who did not really wrap their minds around the concept of God’s sanctification of their lives. They understood justification, but they were not excited about Christ “...testing their faith like fire tests gold.” Their thought was that if they were saved by God’s grace and not because of anything they did, to try to then live a godly life and to live a life free of sin was to somehow detract or minimize the work of grace already accomplished by Christ. In other words, if we worry about sin in our lives, then we are trying to make ourselves acceptable to God by our good deeds. So why not enjoy sin and pleasure and just let God take care of our sins with their consequences? Why not sin so grace can abound?
The reality is that justification and sanctification are inseparable. They function like our minds and our bodies…one is completed in the other. God does not give “gratuitous righteousness” apart from a changed life. The writer to the Hebrews plainly says that “...without holiness, no person shall see God” (12:14). The process of being made holy begins immediately upon our justification, and if we do not begin to grow in our faith and begin to take on Christ’s characteristics, then we have a right to suspect that justification never really occurred. When Paul wrote to the churches, he almost always included an admonition for them to live a life worthy of the calling to which they had been called, which was a calling to live a holy life. To the Colossians he said, “I pray that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and may please Him in every way, bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God, being strengthened with all power according to His glorious might so that you may have great endurance and patience, joyfully giving thanks to the Father, Who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in the Kingdom of Light” (Colossians 1:10-12). And to the Philippians he wrote, “Conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ. Then I will know that you stand firm in one spirit, contending as one man for the faith of the gospel” (Philippians 1:27). To the Corinthians Paul said, “You have been bought with a price, so seek to honor Christ with your bodies and your spirits, which belong to Him” (I Corinthians 6:20).
We need to understand that our sanctification is not an option. It’s not a program God uses for exceptional students. If you have presented yourself to Christ as a living sacrifice, God has already begun a good work in you. It is the work of shaping you into His own likeness. It is the work of making you into a spotless bride (Ephesians 5:27) and a joint heir with Christ of the riches of Heaven. Paul told the Corinthians that when we receive a new life, we no longer live to please ourselves, but we live to please Christ, Who gave His life for us (II Corinthians 5:1). The very idea of thinking you can continue to sin because God will turn His head and look the other way is an anathema to God. He gave the life of His Son so that you could receive a new life. “Old things and the old way of life are gone, and everything is new (II Corinthians 5:17). If you are wanting to continue sinning, you have not committed your entire self to Christ as a living sacrifice.
That does not mean that you live in a state of sinless perfection. It means that the desire of your heart is to be everything that God wants you to be. When you fail in your Christian walk, you go to God and let Him know how broken your heart is that you did not correctly reflect to the world the Christ Who lives in you, and you cry out for the power of the Holy Spirit to help you live and act in such a way that others will notice the difference in your life; your love for God is so great that you would never presume on God’s grace; you would never say, “Oh, God doesn’t care if I sin. That’s just an opportunity for Him to pour out His grace.”
But like Paul you say, “I don’t mean to say that I have already achieved these things or that I have already reached perfection! But I keep working toward that day when I will finally be all that Christ Jesus saved me for and wants me to be. I am not yet all that I should be, but I am focusing all my energies on this one thing: forgetting the past and looking forward to what lies ahead, I strain to reach the end of the race and receive the prize for which God, through Christ Jesus, is calling us up to Heaven”
(Philippians 3:12-14).
The old guidance systems in airplanes used to have a little humming sound when the plane veered to the right or left of dead center on their approach to the landing field. “Lord, I pray that your Holy Spirit will give me a beep if I ever veer to the right or the left of Your will. Keep me in the center of Your will, Lord. Help me to be a true reflection of the Christ who lives within. Amen.”
-QUESTIONS-
1. What do you think Paul means when he says that “...we should come out from among them and be separate...”? Should we imitate the Amish? How “separate” should we be? What is the purpose of being separate?
2. Carefully study II Timothy 2:20, 21. Study the context in which it is given. Notice the results of separating. What are the gold and silver today, and what are the wood and clay? What does this say to you?
3. What is meant by “cheap grace”? How does God look at cheap grace?
4. What exactly do you picture in your mind when you read, “May the God of peace sanctify you through and through...”?
5. What do you think John meant in his first epistle when he said, “We know that anyone born of God does not continue to sin…” (I John 5:18)? Is this possible?
6. Discuss the following statement: “God does not give ‘gratuitous righteousness’ apart from a changed life.”
7. When God “begins a good work in us,” what do you think He has as His ultimate goal? Why is our sanctification so important to Him?
8. If my sins, past, present and future, were already paid for by Christ on the cross, why do I need to worry about my sin? Is it important that I acknowledge them or ask forgiveness? And in so doing, am I not saying that what Christ did on the cross was not enough?
9. Reread Philippians 3:12-14 and make application to your own life.