The process that God uses to get us to godliness is sanctification. This daily devotional concludes the review of how sanctification isn’t an immediate fix but a lifetime of learning to follow Him.
To read devotions in the Redo for Godliness series, click the appropriate button below.
Sanctification can be a difficult topic to understand for some. Let’s put it this way.
- We are doing the redo for godliness so that we can improve. That improvement equates to successfully completing the Sanctification Road. Our goal is to be “… pure and blameless for the day of Christ” (Phil. 1: 10 ESV). That will lead to perfection. We get there through prayer, love, knowledge, and discernment (How Do We Overcome the Original Corruption of Bad Thoughts?).
Let's Put It into Context
Sanctification is the transformation of mind, body, and soul, which begins with regeneration, gradually changes our nature and morals through the promptings of the Holy Spirit, and ends with perfected state of spiritual wholeness or completeness.
- Regeneration is being changed from spiritually dead to spiritually alive and the internal requickening in us that God brings about through the work of the Holy Spirit to give us new character.
- Spiritual death is the separation from God that occurred as a consequence of Adam and Eve’s original sin. The spiritually alive are those who have ABCDed, so they are no longer separated from God.
- Perfection means we reach a state of maturity because the combination of the spiritual graces form, when all are present, spiritual wholeness or completeness — holy, sanctified, and righteous.
- Spiritual graces are worldly morals that have been submitted to God to further His kingdom instead of enhancing this world.
- Sanctified means to be set free from sin.
- Righteous means we are free from sin because we are following God’s moral laws.
The ABCDs of Salvation
If you have not become a believer in Christ, please read through the
Plan of Salvation and prayerfully consider what God is asking you to do.
A – admit our sins
B – believe His Son Jesus is our Redeemer
C – confess God as Sovereign Lord
D – demonstrate that commitment by making any changes needed in our lives to
live the way in which God has called us
The Disciple’s Job Description
Glossary
Gaining God’s Character through Sanctification
- We have to be sanctified up to His character. Mankind’s character is not enough. What the worldview sees as good enough isn’t because the worldview character does not have God in it (Focusing Our Thoughts on God).
- If we are not seeking God, there is no way He can sanctify us. We are definitely not working at our salvation (Focusing Our Energies on God).
- If we are taking the easy way out with the least amount of work possible, we won’t find God (Focusing Our Energies on God).
- We know that we can find that which our soul hungers for, but we must yearn to know God. That is, we must want it badly. The only way to do that is to be diligent in seeking God (Focusing Our Energies on God).
- We can’t be idle and quit examining where we are in our journey and what we need to do to become more in line with what God wants (Focusing Our Energies on God).
- God grows us and opens up new opportunities for us. To get us to move where He wants us to be, He starts sowing the seeds of want more or different (Final Thoughts on Setting Our Affections on Things Above).
- I think a good way of switching our affections back to God is seeing covetousness for what it is. It is an indulgence. It is a self-gratification where we lack moderation. It becomes a luxury and a tolerance(How Do We Switch Our Affections in Our Redo for Godliness?).
- God will not share worship with anything we make into a god.We need to switch to rely on God’s provision, so we don’t have to put a wrong focus on earthly things (How Do We Switch Our Affections in Our Redo for Godliness?).
- If some of the spiritual graces are absent, our character is defective. Reputation and character are two different things, but both are important (How Do We Set Our Thoughts Above?; Don’t Slander Our Good).
- We are ministers for Jesus and God, so we should not boast of ourselves. It isn’t our goal to have world-wide fame. Our goal is to be different from the world (Jn. 15: 19 ESV) (The Focus of the Ministry; We Are All Ministers).
- Studying the Scriptures cleanses the bad thoughts. We cleanse our thoughts when return to having a strong relationship with God. Our thoughts play a role in salvation as our faith begins in our mind. That is where it starts before we get it to the heart level. They also play a role in returning us to our first love. Unfortunately, many times we lose our first love through thoughtlessness (How Do We Overcome the Original Corruption of Bad Thoughts?).
- Meditation is a big part of achieving sanctification. What is meditate? It is to think about it, reflect on it, deliberate, and engage in it. Meditating on God helps us in the sanctification process. Our journey on the Sanctification Road includes sanctification of our thoughts. That means that we can learn to control them. Meditation should include evaluation that leads to accountability. Our thoughts help us to evaluate ourselves. If our thoughts are wandering all over kingdom come, it is harder to corral them to take an in-depth assessment of how things really are. We either don’t start or give up before we get ours reconciled with God (How Do We Set Our Thoughts Above?; How Do We Overcome the Original Corruption of Bad Thoughts?; Controlling Our Thoughts through Meditation).
- Meditating stabilizes our hearts and minds and calms us as we think about the love of God (Controlling Our Thoughts through Meditation).
- Our thoughts are a good indicator of who we are. They reflect our character. True, a lot of our thoughts amount to nothing — they are just a waste of time and focus. The issue is “For as he thinketh in his heart, so is he …” (Prov. 23: 7 KJV). Our thoughts become who we are (Controlling Our Thoughts through Meditation; Guarding Our Hearts from Prideful Thoughts).
- Have you ever considered that sin generally comes from our thoughts? Even when it has a visual or auditory component, we have to consider whether we will give into the temptation (Controlling Our Thoughts through Meditation).
- We control our actions. We express ourselves through our actions. Our thoughts show our purpose. We can control our thoughts and feelings through meditating on God (Controlling Our Thoughts through Meditation).
- Humility helps keep prideful thoughts at bay (Guarding Our Hearts from Prideful Thoughts).
- We not only are faulty in how we see ourselves, but we also do not see the standard of character correctly (Guarding Our Hearts from Prideful Thoughts).
- When Satan pops an evil thought in our hearts, it is our choice whether we are going to cultivate and water it so it can grow or cut pull it out by the roots. If our will is right with God, the latter is going to happen. If not, break out the watering can (Guarding Our Hearts from Prideful Thoughts).
- It is our responsibility and obligation to be happy and content in life — regardless of the circumstances (Where Is the Balance?).
- Our lives become unbalanced when we become too righteous. We generally think of someone too righteous as someone who is an over-the-top religious person (How Does being Righteous Affect Balance?).
- We try to do our own self-help program. But remember God said we can’t do it without Him (How Does being Righteous Affect Balance?).
- It isn’t about our personal righteousness. It is about God’s righteousness, which we reflect (How Does being Righteous Affect Balance?).
- We even get out of balance when we evaluate ourselves. We bite on ourselves too much for the sins we commit. We keep biting on ourselves for sins God on which has already forgiven us (How Does being Righteous Affect Balance?).
- We are sweating the small stuff. We need to quickly respond to God’s call and totally choose to follow His ways on the meaty matters of life (How Does being Righteous Affect Balance?).
- Unfortunately, runaway righteousness gives itself away when it strives for standards of a character that is unattainable. The problem is when we try for something even more than what God is asking. I read it to mean we are trying to make us more godlike than God (How Does being Righteous Affect Balance?).
- Even though we are sinful in nature, God calls us to be perfect as He is (How Does being Righteous Affect Balance?).
- We ABCD. We think we are going to keep God’s laws and commandments perfectly, and — oops, we don’t (How Does being Righteous Affect Balance?)
- It is our duty to be perfect, but there is struggle in life as we try to be (How Does being Righteous Affect Balance?).
- We shouldn’t be overly concerned about what others think. We have to realize that worldview people are judging us on worldview standards, not God’s. We shouldn’t be concerned with worldview standards. We need to be concerned with what God thinks of us (How Does being Righteous Affect Balance?).
- We are safe because we are in God’s hands. There is no better place to be (Facing Death).
- We are to enjoy life. We are to find the joy that God gives (Living the Life).
- If God gives us this joy, peace, and hope, He isn’t going to want us to be blowing it with our pouty faces on — or worse. He wants us to exude a happiness of knowing Him (Living the Life).
- We are to enjoy a life free from sin (Living the Life).
- We strive to be the disciples God calls us to be. When we fail, we ask for forgiveness (Living the Life).
- The first thing we have to do is work out our own salvation. Next, God wants us to tell others about His love to expand His kingdom. He called us to do His work as we go (Living the Life).
- It is to our advantage that we come to salvation when we are younger. It helps when we are thrown into the trials of life — when “… the days of adversity …” (Ecc. 12: 1 CSB) come. Plus, even the young are not guaranteed a long life.
- When we are younger, asking Jesus to be our Savior helps build our character. The younger we are, the easier it is to form good habits. If the governing principle is at the center of character, we have to make a choice as to whether it will be good or evil. That choice will form our character (What Is Life About?).
- We know that the words that will do the most good to change us to be like God will be those that hurt the most (What Is Our Life About?).
- We need to be buried in God’s Word so that we may be close to His altar. Our lives are about praising Him and telling others (What Is Our Life About?).
- Our purpose is to have a relationship with God. It is about being right with God. It is about following God’s laws and commandments. It is about worshiping Him (What Is Our Life About?).
- We need to meditate on everything we think, do, say, or feel — everything. Our whole lives have to be given over to God (What Is Our Life About?).
- It seems like, in many instances, we leave the bulk of the work to only a few workers. We can’t do that. We need to step up and do our share (Focusing Our Labor on God).
- What is sad is when we don’t feel qualified in doing what God is calling us to do and we use it and other reasons to not follow through (Focusing Our Labor on God).
- We’ve got to do the work when God calls. God may give us a limited opportunity to complete it. We know Satan is going to do everything in his power to stop God’s work from going forward (Focusing Our Labor on God).
Father God. We look to You for making us to be what we need to be in Your sight. We know we cannot remake ourselves, because that would be works-based. We know whatever changes we need to make can only come from You. We look forward to what You will do in our lives. Amen.
What do you think?
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