Message Seven

Salvation in Sanctification

Scripture Reading: 2 Thes. 2:13-14; 1 Thes. 5:23;
John 17:17; Col. 1:27

1. From eternity past, God chose us “unto salvation in sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth”—Eph. 1:4; 2 Thes. 2:13:
   1. God’s salvation includes not only salvation from eternal perdition but God’s full and complete salvation—1 Pet. 1:5:
      1. In eternal salvation all the effects, benefits, and issues are of an eternal nature, transcending the conditions and limitations of time—Heb. 5:9.
      2. The full salvation of God is in three stages: the initial stage—the stage of regeneration; the progressing stage—the stage of transformation; and the completing stage—the stage of glorification—1 Cor. 6:11; Rom. 5:10; Phil. 3:21.
      3. God’s salvation includes the salvation from many things in our daily life, the salvation from suffering during the great tribulation, and the salvation of our soul, which will save us from dispensational punishment—1:19, 28; 2:12; Luke 21:36; 1 Thes. 5:9; Rev. 3:10; 1 Pet. 1:9.
   2. God’s salvation is in sanctification of the Spirit—2 Thes. 2:13:
      1. Salvation in sanctification means that if we would enjoy and participate in God’s complete salvation, we must be in the sanctification of the Spirit.
      2. The Spirit dwells in us with a unique goal—to sanctify us, to separate us entirely for God’s purpose—1 Thes. 1:6; 4:8:
         1. The Holy Spirit is moving, working, and acting within us constantly to sanctify us—Heb. 12:14.
         2. The Spirit is always sanctifying us, applying to us what the Father has planned and what the Son has accomplished—Eph. 1:3-14.
      3. God has placed us into the process of sanctification, which is a matter of transformation—1 Thes. 5:23; Rom. 12:2; 2 Cor. 3:18:
         1. God’s salvation involves a continuing process through which we are being made holy—1 Pet. 1:15-16.
         2. To be in sanctification is to be in the process of being made holy—1 Thes. 5:23.
         3. As saved ones, we are all in the process of being sanctified, and we are thereby enjoying God’s saving power—Rom. 6:19; Heb. 7:25.
      4. “The Spirit, the Holy” is for making man holy, that is, for making man God in life and nature but not in the Godhead—Eph. 1:4; 1 Thes. 4:8.
      5. God makes us holy by imparting Himself, the Holy One, into us so that our whole being may be saturated and permeated with His holy nature—1 Pet. 1:15-16.
      6. As the Spirit carries out His sanctifying work, He imparts God’s life into us; the extent to which the impartation of life will proceed depends on the degree to which the Spirit is able to sanctify us—Rom. 6:22; 8:2, 11.
   3. Salvation in sanctification is not only of the Spirit but also in belief of the truth, that is, in the word as the truth—2 Thes. 2:13; Col. 1:5:
      1. To be sanctified in belief, or faith, of the truth in 2 Thessalonians 2:13 corresponds to the Lord’s word in John 17:17, where He asked the Father to sanctify us in the truth and declared that the Father’s word is truth.
      2. In order to receive the sanctification of the Spirit, we must go to the Word.
      3. The more we see the truth, the reality, revealed in the New Testament, the more we enjoy sanctification—1 Tim. 2:4; 2 Tim. 2:15, 25.
      4. To be sanctified in belief of the truth is subjective; God’s salvation in sanctification is carried out not merely in our objective knowledge of the truth but in our subjective apprehension of the truth—John 17:17, 19.
2. God has called us to salvation in sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth through the gospel “unto the obtaining of the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ”—2 Thes. 2:14:
   1. Salvation in sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth is the procedure; the obtaining of the glory of our Lord is the goal—Heb. 2:10.
   2. The glory that the Father has given to the Son is the sonship with the Father’s life and divine nature to express the Father in His fullness—John 17:22; 5:26; 1:18; 14:9; Col. 2:9; Heb. 1:3:
      1. This glory the Son has given to His believers that they also may have the sonship with the Father’s life and divine nature to express the Father in the Son in the Son’s fullness—John 1:16; 17:2; 2 Pet. 1:4.
      2. God has called us unto the obtaining of this glory, the glory of the divine life and the divine nature to express the Divine Being—1 Pet. 5:10.
   3. Second Thessalonians 1:10 speaks of Christ’s coming “to be glorified in His saints and to be marveled at in all those who have believed”:
      1. Christ as the Lord of glory has been glorified in His resurrection and ascension, and now He is in us as the hope of glory to bring us into glory—1 Cor. 2:8; John 17:1; Luke 24:26; Col. 1:27; Heb. 2:9-10.
      2. At His coming back, on the one hand, He will come from the heavens with glory, and on the other hand, He will come from within His saints so that He may be glorified in His saints—Rev. 10:1; Matt. 25:31; 2 Thes. 1:10; Col. 1:27.
      3. For Christ to be glorified in His saints means that His glory will be manifested from within His members and that it will “transfigure the body of our humiliation to be conformed to the body of His glory”—Phil. 3:21.
   4. Second Thessalonians 1:12 says, “So that the name of our Lord Jesus may be glorified in you, and you in Him, according to the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ”:
      1. The grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ is the Lord Himself within us as our life and life supply that we may live a life that will glorify the Lord and cause us to be glorified in Him—1 Cor. 15:10; Gal. 6:18; Phil. 4:23; 2 Tim. 4:22.
      2. It is according to such a grace that the name of the Lord Jesus will be glorified in us and that we will be glorified in Him—John 1:16; 17:21-22, 26.