Sanctification - The Mark of the Christian Life
Forgiveness Challenge • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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Grace, peace, and mercy be unto you all in the name of Jesus, the Risen Christ!
This morning we are wrapping up our sermon series on the Forgiveness Challenge. We started with a discussion about sin, our confession of sin, the absolution God gives us in forgiving sin, and last week Pastor Randy walked us through how God restores us. This morning we wrap up the series by looking at sanctification.
Sanctification is a theological term that refers to how the Holy Spirit brings us to faith and thus how we are made holy or set apart. Theologians refer to that as sanctification in the wider sense. This morning, however, we are going to look at sanctification in the narrow sense—that is how the Holy Spirit works in our lives to live out a forgiven, redeemed, and restored life.
Sanctification is how we live out the Christian life.
Sanctification is living fully alive in God’s grace.
A good way of remembering our Forgiveness Challenge series is to look at the acronym SCARS.
Full Slide on SCARS
Sin…Confession…Absolution…Restoration…Sanctification
For me, scars remind me of the wounds that sin leaves—especially unresolved sin.
Did you know that fresh scars when exposed to the sun’s light create a dark pigment on the skin? I learned that out the hard way from my first knee surgery 31 years ago when I was a junior in high school. While I was recovering from that particular ACL reconstruction, I spent time outside in the summer and the sun’s light darkened that scar—and it is still darkened to this day.
For me, that darkened scar reminds me of what happens when sin is unresolved. Sin exposed without forgiveness, and absolution, and restoration is destructive. A sinner living outside of God’s grace is doomed, in despair, ruined.
When Rachel had her open-heart surgery 17 years ago, we were introduced to a special medicinal cream called Mederma.
Slide picture of Mederma.
Mederma is for scar treatment. It smooths out the scar. It lessens its visibility. It evens blends the color to blend in with the rest of your skin.
For me, Jesus is the ultimate theological Mederma for our scars of sin. He addresses our need for the treatment of sin and gives to us His grace and invites us to abide in Him and live an abundant life by being fully alive in His grace.
There is another thing about scars. The marks of scars tell a story.
Sometimes those scarred marks on our bodies are from accidents.
Sometimes those scarred marks on our bodies are from intentional wounds.
Sometimes those scarred marks on our bodies are from surgeries.
When my sons were growing up, and they saw the many scars on my body from injuries, accidents, and surgeries, they would ask how they got there. They wanted to know the story of the mark of that scar.
One such mark was from when I was teaching my sister Amanda how to shoot a bow and arrow. Now, if you remember, this was the same sister who I taught to drive a car. I guess you could say either she or I or both of us didn’t learn our lesson of the teacher and the student!
As we stood outside one winter day with snow on the ground I taught—or tried to teach her to shoot a bow and arrow. Frigid temperatures. Me in my shorts and sweatshirt in sub-freezing weather in the upper Midwest. And as I stood next to her, she pulled back the string and let it go. And I looking ahead to see where the arrow went, I saw nothing. Where did it go. I turned my head to look at my sister who was just standing there white as a ghost. And I took a step toward her to see what I was wrong, and as I did so, my right leg bumped into the arrow that was lodged into my left knee. With the cold, freezing weather I never felt it. But, boy, what a scar it left and what a story it tells!
By the way, my Dad just pulled the arrow out. Put sugar in the wound. Covered it with bag balm—cow udder cream. And, used super glue and steri-strips to keep it closed. Yes, I am amazed I ever survived my youth!
Yes, a scar leaves a mark on our bodies.
And, sin leaves a mark on our lives.
But, this morning, we’re going to talk about leaving a mark in a different context. You see, people often want to leave their mark in this world.
But, the greatest mark you can leave in this world is to use your forgiven, redeemed, and restored life to help someone else experience the freedom God has for them.
Slide picture of a tombstone.
Such a mark like that can be found on the mark of a tombstone…a mark of a dash between two dates—the date of birth and the date when life on earth ceases and eternity begins.
The dash on a tombstone—a simple mark—has such a significant story. How one lived. How one experienced life.
For the person who does not abide in Christ—who is not fully alive in God’s grace—that mark tells a certain story of how one lived…how one experienced life. Such a life like that may look like this...
Slide picture of a tombstone with despair…
When one is not fully alive in God’s grace, sin abounds…fear abounds…guilt abounds…shame abounds…despair abounds…hopelessness abounds…judgment abounds…
However, as our Forgiveness Challenge teaches us, God has sent His Son to bring us forgiveness and absolution and redemption and restoration.
2 Corinthians 5 tells us that because of Christ, with faith in Christ, being saved by grace through faith in Christ, we are a changed people. We are not a people dead in sin and dead to sin. No, we are a new people…a new creation…the old has passed and the new has come!
Slide of 2 Corinthians 5:17-21
Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation. Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
Because of God’s grace…because we are a new creation in Christ…our life story is different…our mark that has been left is different…the mark on our tombstone means something different…
Slide of a tombstone with hope…
You see, living fully alive in God’s grace is a life where forgiveness abounds…grace abounds…mercy abounds…peace abounds…blessings abound…contentment abounds…favor abounds…joy abounds…love abounds…trust abounds...freedom abounds…
All of those things are the evidence of living fully alive in God’s grace. All of those things are evidence of the Holy Spirit living inside of us and connecting us with what Jesus has given us in an abundant life that He has invited us to live. All of those things are the sanctified life.
This is what the mark of a sanctified life looks like…
Slide of a tombstone of the sanctified life…
Remember in the wide sense, the sanctified life is when the Holy Spirit brings us to faith, and in the narrow sense, the sanctified life is how the Holy Spirit works in our lives so that we live out a forgiven, redeemed, and restored life.
It is a life marked by being brought to faith in conversion. It is a life marked in baptism. It is a life marked in confirmation. It is a life marked in taking first communion. It is a life marked by continuing to receive the Lord’s Supper. It is a life marked in losing the daily battle to sin but being a recipient of Jesus’ being victorious in the war against sin, death, and the devil. It is a life marked by loving God with all of our heart and soul and mind and strength. It is a life marked by loving our neighbor as ourselves. It is a life marked by sharing our faith. It is a life marked by sharing our hope. It is a life marked by finishing the race well until Jesus calls us home to be with Him.
My friends, that is the mark of the sanctified life.
My friends, that is the gift of the sanctified life—of the Holy Spirit connecting us to the work of Jesus so that we would be empowered by the Spirit to live out the life Jesus wants us to have.
Listen to these words of Jesus as He prays to God the Father concerning our sanctified life in this world as He prophesies His death, resurrection, and ascension to come:
Slide of John 17:13-19
But now I am coming to you, and these things I speak in the world, that they may have my joy fulfilled in themselves. I have given them your word, and the world has hated them because they are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. I do not ask that you take them out of the world, but that you keep them from the evil one. They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth. As you sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world. And for their sake I consecrate myself, that they also may be sanctified in truth.
Just as we read earlier from 2 Corinthians that we are a new creation in Christ, here in the Gospel of John, Jesus prays to God the Father that we would be sanctified in God’s truth.
Here is the truth…Our sanctified life of living fully alive in God’s grace is marked by trusting in the Lord. Proverbs 3:5-6 tells us this about the sanctified life...
Slide of Proverbs 3:5-6
Trust in the Lord with all your heart,
and do not lean on your own understanding.
In all your ways acknowledge him,
and he will make straight your paths.
Here is the truth…Our sanctified life of living fully alive in God’s grace is marked by walking in the Truth. 3 John 1:2-4 tells us this about the sanctified life...
Slide of 3 John 1:2-4
Beloved, I pray that all may go well with you and that you may be in good health, as it goes well with your soul. For I rejoiced greatly when the brothers came and testified to your truth, as indeed you are walking in the truth. I have no greater joy than to hear that my children are walking in the truth.
Here is the truth…Our sanctified life of living fully alive in God’s grace is marked by a life of love. You see our sanctified life is our loving others because God loved us. 1 John 4:15-19 tells us this about the sanctified life...
Slide of 1 John 4:15-19
Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God. So we have come to know and to believe the love that God has for us. God is love, and whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him. By this is love perfected with us, so that we may have confidence for the day of judgment, because as he is so also are we in this world. There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love. We love because he first loved us.
Here is the truth…Our sanctified life of living fully alive in God’s grace is marked by a life of keeping our eyes on Jesus. Hebrews 12:1-3 tells us this about the sanctified life...
Slide of Hebrews 12:1-3
Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.
Consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself, so that you may not grow weary or fainthearted.
Last week we heard about Peter being weary because he was wrestling with the shame and guilt of denying Jesus that is until Jesus forgave him and restored him and charged him…charged him to feed Jesus’ sheep. What Peter did after that point, after having been restored by Jesus—the life he lived, the Gospel he witnessed, the truth he walked and talked—that is the mark of the sanctified life. The life that Peter modeled upon his restoration is the abundant life that Jesus invites us to live—being fully alive in God’s grace.
In closing, we all need to grasp that the mark of the sanctified life is not a life absent of trouble, but rather it is a life of assurance in the midst of the presence of trouble. We can live fully alive in God’s grace running or crawling or even limping, energetic or bed-ridden, with health and vigor or with bodily frailty and aging constraint because of the assurance of the hope that we have. Regardless of our condition or situation, living in the assurance of the hope found in Christ is the solidifying of our sanctified life.
The sanctified life is living fully alive in God’s grace regardless of whatever situation or circumstance we face because we have the assurance of forgiveness, the assurance of absolution, the assurance of redemption, and the assurance of restoration. My friends that is the sanctified life. And, it is ours to live at the invitation of Jesus by grace with faith in Him.
So, by the grace of God through faith in Christ, what mark will you leave? What will the mark on your tombstone mean?
To God be the Glory. Amen.
