Sanctification – beholding God’s glory
Series: Holy – Holy – Holy | Bible text: John 17:20–26; 2 Corinthians 3:18
In the Bible we are challenged again and again to be holy. To live holy means to live a truly fulfilling life. People are then in the process of sanctification when they live more and more according to the conferred status of «saint». The more we contemplate the glory of God, the more we see the mighty love and the more we become holy.
The Lord says: «You shall be holy, for I am holy»(Exodus 19:2 LUT). Is «being holy» even worth striving for? Or is it old-fashioned, outdated, incompatible with a modern world? Unfortunately, the word is devalued in our linguistic usage and has negative connotations. To live holy means first of all: to live according to our nature and our destiny. I do not have to be holy to please God, but I may find a holy life to be happy as God is. In His holiness, God possesses the highest, most joy-giving and inspiring quality of life. This is the life he wants to share with us and for this reason he calls us to enjoy the freedom of holiness. Nathan Söderblom: «Saints are people who make it easier for others to believe in God.»
Through touch
People who follow Jesus are called either disciples, Christians or saints in the New Testament. With the expression «saints», the Bible wants to make it clear to us: We have become completely different through the decision to follow and through faith in Jesus Christ. Something completely new has begun, because by the grace of God we have become able to live a new, different life than before. In the famous prayer for his disciples, Jesus says: «You don’t belong to this world any more than I do»(John 17:16 NLB). To be holy means to be in this world but not to belong to it.
The call to sainthood means to live more and more according to the conferred status of «saint», to bring the available horsepower to the ground. In total, we find these words as a direct call in the Holy Scriptures, five times in the Old Testament and three times in the New. One of these calls is in the Sermon on the Mount: «But you shall be perfect, as your Father in heaven is perfect» (Matthew 5:48 NLB). For the Jewish listener it was clear that Jesus was referring to the demand from Deuteronomy 19:2 to be holy. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus sets a very high standard for his followers, so that the reaction can almost only be: I’ll never make it!
Immediately after this teaching unit, Jesus reveals the secret of becoming holy through a story. At the time of Jesus, it was forbidden by law to touch a leper. Anyone who did so was himself considered a leper and excluded from the community of the healthy, at least for a time. At that time, the lepers had to live outside the town limits and be called out with the exclamation «Leprous, leprous» to draw attention to themselves when someone approached them. The pure was not allowed to touch the impure. When the leprous man asks Jesus for healing, Jesus summarily overturns the rule: «Jesus touched him. «I will do it,» he said. «Be well!» And in an instant the man was healed of his illness»(Matthew 8:3 NLB). Jesus is the human face of the holy God. Through touching Jesus, a person becomes whole, whole, complete and holy. Sören Kierkegaard: «The aim is to get as close to God as possible.»
Through love
Shortly before his death on the cross, Jesus prayed: «I pray not only for these disciples, but also for all who will believe in me through their word»(John 17:20 NLB). Jesus prays not only for His friends who are present, but for all who put their trust in Him in the future. «I pray for them all to be one as you and I are one, Father – that they may be one in us, as you are in me and I am in you, and the world may believe that you have sent me. I have given them the glory you gave me, that they may be one as we are one – I in them and you in me, that they may all be perfected into unity. Then the world will know that you have sent me and will understand, that you love them as you love me.» (John 17:21–23 NLB).
Jesus mentions two keys to sanctification in his prayer: Glory and love. It is almost unbelievable, but true: God loves all followers of Jesus – in quantity and quality – exactly in the same measure as He loved His only Son Jesus! When we believe in Jesus Christ, God loves us not as we deserve, but as Jesus deserves.
Martin Lloyd Jones once said: «There are many problems and difficulties in the Christian life. More and more it seems to me that most of them arise from the simple fact that we do not recognise, understand and appreciate what the real truth about us Christians is.» Or to put it another way: If we really grasp the truths of the Bible in the depths of our hearts, our whole lives would be revolutionised. That God’s love for us is infinite, eternal, infallible and unchanging is not merely an abstract truth, but can become a life-changing force.
John Owen, Dean of First Church in Oxford University, was convinced that we cannot transform ourselves through our own strength, through more intense effort, through will training. No one becomes honest, generous, forgiving or courageous by trial alone. Whenever we do something because we have to, we reap a superficial change that does not last. If a doctor admonishes the eager businessman to work less for health reasons, it will bear little fruit. The man remains a workaholic until he loves something more than money, success and power.
Certain people can hardly get over rejection or betrayal. Shame and anger come up again and again. As long as our reputation and human approval is the most important thing to us, this will not change. It only works when we start to love Jesus more. When we love Jesus more than money, we become generous. When we love Jesus more than power, we begin to serve. When we love Jesus more than our reputation, we will be able to forgive. In Israel, there had been a power struggle between politicians Netanyahu and Gantz for years. Now, after the terrorist attack, they banded together to stand united against the enemy. Something greater than their differences had to happen in order to find unity.
When God’s love really touches us, we no longer have to change or sanctify ourselves, but want it, we desire it with all the fibres of our being. Then it will happen permanently.
By looking
With the second key word in his prayer, Jesus shows us how we can receive this love: «Father, I want those whom you have given me to be with me, so that they may be my Glory can see […]»(John 17:24 NLB).
Glory comes from the Hebrew word kabod and includes the following range of meanings: weight, strength, power, ability, honour, glory, dignity, splendour. Glory is manifested holiness, the radiance and taste of holiness. Seeing Jesus in his glory transforms us abruptly into the perfect new creation: «My dear friends, we are already the children of God, and what we will be like when Christ returns we cannot even imagine. But we know that when he returns we will be like him, for we will see him as he really is» (1 John 3:2 NLB). Then it will be a full bath in God’s glory. But Jesus says that we can already see His glory in this life! «I have given them the glory that you have given me […].»(John 17:22 NLB). That is why John Owen says: «The ultimate goal of being human is to see His glory.»
We are sanctified when God’s love reaches us through beholding His glory. The glory of God cannot be seen with our natural eyes. For that, the eyes of our heart must be opened. It is a spiritual process in the power of the Holy Spirit. That is why Jesus prays for it. Paul does the same. He prays for the church in Ephesus to grasp the breadth, length, height and depth of God’s love (Ephesians 3:18). This is the basis for God’s work in us: «Through the mighty power that works within us, God can do infinitely more than we would ever ask or even hope for»(Ephesians 3:20 NLB).
Even marketing takes advantage of the fact that we ultimately want what we see. Our sanctification, the change into the example of Jesus Christ, progresses when we contemplate God’s glory. «The veil has been taken away from all of us so that we can see the glory of the Lord as in a mirror. And the Spirit of the Lord works in us so that we become more and more like him and reflect his glory more and more.»(2 Corinthians 3:18 NLB).
A well-known New York pastor told the story of C.H. Spurgeon, who experienced God’s love and glory so intensely that he sometimes had to ask God to take back His glory because he could not stand it any longer. And then the pastor said: «And if Spurgeon could experience that as a Calvinist, then we all can.«Calvinism is considered very rational and doctrinaire.
The more we contemplate the glory of God, the more we see the mighty love and the more we are changed. Gerhard Testeegen said: «To pray is to look at the omnipresent God and let yourself be seen by Him.» Looking at God is not wasted time, but the secret of personal transformation into His image.
The big question is: Do we take the time to look at the omnipresent God? A helpful offering is Pray23, which will take place next week in the Youth House lounge. We need to practise becoming still and looking at God’s glory for a long time.
Jesus» prayer in John 17 makes one thing clear: The access to these priceless treasures of God’s glory and love is Jesus. The promise of seeing His glory, experiencing His love and being changed into the image of Jesus is for those who «who believe in me»(John 17:20). Faith does not merely mean to think something is right, but to put the weight of one’s life on Jesus Christ. It’s the best thing you can do!
Possible questions for the small group
Read the Bible text: John 17:20–26
- What feelings does the call to be holy trigger in you?
- What does it mean to be holy? How do we become it?
- God loves Jesus» followers in the same quantity and quality as He loves Jesus. What does this mean?
- By beholding the glory of God, we experience this love. What does it mean to see God’s glory? What does it take? What happens through it?
- Pray for each other for the power of the Holy Spirit to experience the breadth, length, height and depth of God’s love!
