The Dismantling Work of Sanctification
11 facets of sanctification from the first 11 verses of Colossians 3
Below are my teaching notes that serve as an inexact transcript for the talk above. My apologies for the length!
Sanctification as Spiritual Renovation
Tonight and next week we are largely going to be talking about sanctification, because that is what Paul talks about in chapter 3 of Colossians. But before we jump in we need to be on the same page of what we are talking about with the Christianese word, "sanctification."
Sanctification is the process of becoming more and more like Jesus. To be sanctified is to be conformed into his image. And that is what Paul talks about in chapter 3 of Colossians which are we are going to take a couple weeks to walk through.
I think this chapter is one of the most helpful in the entire Bible for Christians desiring to grow in Christlikeness. If we want to be more like Jesus, Colossians 3 is a really helpful blueprint.
And what Colossians 3 shows us is that sanctification is one process made up of two parts. There’s two sides of the one coin of sanctification. Let me try to get at them this way:
Imagine humans are like houses. Outside of Christ, due to sin, humans are broken down, mold infested, rotting dumps of houses (Slide). When a person is saved, due to none of their own doing, their market value skyrockets to the trillions and beyond. These little rundown shacks now because of Christ are worth what he is. They’re priceless. That’s justification. And yet, they still look like dilapidated shacks.
Sanctification is like house renovation, it’s the spiritual flipping of fixer uppers. And in house renovation, you don’t just build new stuff. You don’t just take a cruddy shack and just start building new stuff onto it. You won’t get a new, nice house that way. Usually, the first step is demolition. It's always a necessary part of house renovation. You have to tear some stuff down. Before you can really build and improve, you have to dismantle some stuff.
And the same is true in sanctification. There are two aspects of sanctification in the Christian life, two phases; though, unlike home renovation, they occur simultaneously. Sanctification includes both tearing down and building up. It involves taking away and adding to. It requires complete demolition sometimes, so that the new can be built in its place. Sanctification means dismantling and assembling.
Tonight, I want to read the entire text that we will be in this week and next week and then give you 11 things Paul says about sanctification in the first 11 verses that mainly deal with the dismantling side. If you’re able, please stand with me while I do.
11 Things About Sanctification from 11 Verses
So, now 11 things Paul says about sanctification from the first 11 verses. The first four verses are kind of the preamble, the preface to what he is going to say in the rest of the chapter. He says some big picture, foundational things and then turns to the dismantling side of sanctification in remaining 7 verses. That’s the layout, let’s see what he says.
Sanctification is only a process for Christians, v.1a
This is verse 1a, "If then you have been raised with Christ..." Everything else Paul is going to say hangs on that first word, IF. If someone has not been raised with Christ, nothing that Paul says in the remainder of this chapter applies to them.
And this raising is not at the end of our lives. He says, if you HAVE BEEN, past tense, raised with Christ. So Christians are those who have been raised along with Christ in Christ's own resurrection. When we were saved we were raised from spiritual death to spiritual life. And it is that saving and reviving act that sends us on our journey of sanctification. And every person who has been raised with Christ has embarked on it.
Seek things that have to do with Christ, v.1b
The word for seek in verse 1 is same word for "search." So, what Paul is saying, is that if we have been raised with Christ, what we search after, what we are trying to get our hands on is now totally different than it was the moment before we were raised with Christ.
If we have been raised we have been raised onto a new plane of existence spiritually, and therefore we need to seek the things that have to do with Christ. He is our great treasure and joy, we have been united to him, and therefore anything having to do with him , anything that is "above where Christ is," should be what we are seeking after.
What goes in our heads shapes our hearts, v.2
Look at verse 1 and 2. Notice in verse one it is "seek the things that are above", here in verse two it's word for word the same except for "set your minds" on instead of "seek." In other words, Paul us saying the same thing but gives more detail on what this seeking looks like.
We seek not by actually physically searching for something. We seek by what we set our minds on. By what we put into our brains.
This is one of the most neglected aspects of sanctification. What are you putting into your head via your eyes and ears–shows, music, content on social media, etc? What are you dwelling on–? What voices are you letting speak to you? What is your mind feeding on?
If, as we learned in our Knowledge of the Holy series, what we know about something affects our love for that thing, then our minds and hearts are incredibly connected and it's the head that takes the heart by the hand and leads it. Which means what goes into our minds is affecting our hearts in some way whether realize it or not. What we set our minds on is what we are giving our hearts to be shaped by.
This is why Paul in Romans 12:2 says, "Do not be conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewal of YOUR MIND." Transformation in the Christian life, sanctification flows largely from what we set our minds on. What we set our minds on is how we seek with our hearts. So pay attention what goes into them. Because whatever does will make its way to our hearts and will either fuel or stunt our growth in the faith.
We are dead to the world, v.3
The reason we have been raised with Christ and now seek and set our minds on things above and not things on earth, is because we have died, that's verse 4. The only way to be raised with Christ is to die with him. By faith in Jesus, we are united to him and everything that is true of him becomes true of us. His perfect life: now ours. He dies to sin, we die with him. He rises to life, we rise with him.
The reason Paul gives for our not seeking things on earth is that we have died with Christ. He says, "Set your minds on things that are above not on things on earth. FOR or BECAUSE, you have died." Christians are dead to the world. Sometimes when someone has burned us we say, "they're dead to me." Now, literally they are not. But the saying means that they might as well be, they are as good as dead to me because I will have nothing more to do with them.
And that is how Paul wants us to see ourselves in regard to the world and our former ways. We have died with Christ. We are as good as dead to the world, and the world is as good as dead to us. We have no use for it. We have nothing to do with it. It has ceased to matter to us. We have died with Christ. Our lives are not like everyone else's anymore. They are hidden, tucked away with Christ in God. They aren't the worlds, they world can't get to them. We have died and our lives are hidden with Christ in God. Why then would be seek after and set our minds on what is dead to us?
The Christian life is war, v.5
Paul says in verse 5, put to death. In greek it’s just a one word, NEKRAHO and its command: KILL. Not fight, or battle. KILL. This is crux of the dismantling side of sanctification and it can be summed up in this phrase in verse 5: “put to death what is earthly in you.” Kill those things in you that are not part of or flowing from your raised life with Christ. Because you have died to them, put them to death them. Kill, slaughter, terminate, put to death the sin Jesus has conquered on the cross. This is the seriousness that Paul has for this side of sanctification. He isn’t playing games here, he’s talking about killing.
Why this level of severity? Because of what happens if we don’t. The Puritan John Owen said it this way in his book on this topic The Mortification of Sin, "Kill sin, or sin will be killing you."
Or here is how Paul says it in Romans 8:13, “if you live according to the flesh you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.”
In the Christian life, when it comes to sin, it really is kill or be killed. We kill sin, we put it to death because if we don’t it will kill us, it will make us die. Now listen, John Owen and Paul do not mean sin can undo a believer’s salvation. No, sin kills not in taking your salvation, but in robbing you of the fullness of life you have been raised for. Sin in the life of the believer doesn't kill in the sense of making us unsaved. You can't undue what Christ has accomplished for you. Sin kills by stealing the full life Christ has purchased for us, by keeping us from the full joy Christ wants us to have in him. And so the options on the table are, kill sin, or sin will be killing you.
The Christian life is a call to a lifelong war on sin which would rob us of the full joy and pleasure Christ has raised us into with him. And there can be no truce. So the Christian life is serious. It's a war. It involves killing those things in us that are not of Christ.
But there is a danger here. The danger anytime a command in Scripture is given, especially a command to kill sin, is that we will slip into thinking our standing before God is in some way affected by how well we follow the command, or how successful we are at killing sin. We hear this command, and want to obey it, and by the Spirit's power we do to some extent, but because we are human, we fall and fail and fumble. And we become discouraged and can even question our salvation because the Bible says "kill" and there are things in us we haven't yet or can't seem to.
Paul is aware of this. Go read Romans 7 sometime to see his own wrestle with the fact that he still struggles to do what he should. So, knowing this about us and to guard us against discouragement and legalism, Paul says. "Put to death THEREFORE". Now what is the therefore referring to? What he has just said in verses 1-4. That we have already died and been raised with Christ.
Christ has already conquered our sin. Its penalty and its power are vanquished. The sin we are called to kill, though it feels incredibly strong, actually has no power over us. It can’t make us sin. The enemy can’t make us sin. It may be a very ingrained pattern from our former way of life, but it’s power over us has been broken. Its seeming power now is a mirage. And any hold it does have on us because of how ingrained it’s become in us is nothing compared to the power of the Holy Spirit who dwells in us and empowers us.
In our being saved we have been drafted into a war on those things that rob us of the full life Christ has raised us into. And the good news is that Christ has already won the war in his life, death and resurrection. We just need to chase down and slaughter the fleeing enemy of sin. And this is our marching order: Put to death what has already been put to death in the death of Christ.
Even for believers, God’s wrath is still a motivation to fight sin, v.6
God is a God of justice. Sin incurs a debt that must be paid. And so it will be. God's grace is not saying that the debt is just canceled. God's mercy is not saying, "you know what, I will just turn a blind eye toward it."
God's grace and mercy are that he has paid the price of the debt so that those who are united to Christ by faith do not have to. The debt is still paid. God's wrath is still poured out on sin. It's just that, for those who believe, Christ drinks the cup of wrath for us.
God's wrath is coming to punish sin. The only question is, who will taste it? And the only options are those who hold onto their sin, or Christ who gladly takes it from them and the punishment that comes with it.
As Christians, we aren't under threat of God's wrath coming for us. Christ has paid our price and paid it in full. It's a done deal. He knew every sin we would ever commit and paid the cost of IT ALL. So why does Paul bring it up here? 1) Because there may be people hearing this letter read at the church in Collosae who aren't Christians. They are at all the Christian functions but they themselves aren't saved. That was my story for 18 years of my life. And I needed to hear this verse as a bucket of cold water to wake me up.
There are always those in Christian communities who actually aren't believers. And so they need to hear that God's wrath is coming for sin but that if they will let him, Christ will gladly take their sin off their hands and take the punishment instead.
2) Second reason is because Christians need all the motivations they can get their hands on to battle sin. When you are tempted to sin, what you need are a list of motivations not to. Of course, what we want is for our love for Christ to overwhelm us in those moments and that be the reason we refuse to buckle to sin. But when that fails, we fall back onto motivations. So take me for EXAMPLE.
Christians need as many motivations as they can find to use like levies against the rising tide of temptation. And one of the motivations we should have, even though we are saved from it, is not to partner in what God's wrath is coming on. We kill our sin because it is what God's wrath is going to be poured out on and we want not part in partnering with it.
Christians still struggle with sin and will until Christ's return; while comforting, that should not yield complacency, v.7-8
Isn't it encouraging that Paul is writing this to Christians and he says these two things about them, look at verse 7: 1) you once walked in these sinful ways and 2) but now you must put them all away? Like it'd be one thing if he was writing to nonChristians or a group largely made up of them. But he's not. He's writing to a group of Christians. And he says, "these things incur wrath, y'all used to walk in them, now you need to put them aside."
He's telling Christians that they need to put off or away the things they used to walk in. In other words, they haven't done so yet. He says in the same breath, you USED to walk in them and you need to NOW put them away. AKA, The Colossian Christians are still struggling with their old ways. These old ways no longer define them, and yet they still are struggling with them and need to do away with them. And Paul doesn't say, "what is wrong with you, you should be over these things by now." He just reminds them of the good news that they USED to WALK or LIVE or HAVE THEIR EXISTENCE DEFINED BY THEM, but NOW they don't, they are in Christ. And now that they are, they just need to put them away.
That encourages me so much because that is my experience. I have not arrived. I still am drawn to the ways I used to walk and live in and, brace yourself, sometimes I give into them. And so did the Colossians.
It should encourage us that Paul is writing to CHRISTIANS and still has to tell them to put off their old ways. We need to accept that we have things we need to put off and always will, just like the Colossians. We need to see it as the normative Christian life, not be freaked out or discouraged by it, and we need to just put them off by the power of the Spirit. And when we have and they rise up again, we put them off again. And when we experience victory over one and another rears its head, we put that one off. And on and on until we go home.
We live in the tension of the Old and New Self, v.9-10a
Christians are strange creatures who are at the same time new while carrying in them marks of the old. They have been given new hearts that love God, and at the same time still bear “the flesh” that hates him.
And so the Christian life is the process of going up and further into the new self we have been made into while at the same time putting to death the old self that has been conquered in the cross of Christ.
Renewal comes by knowing Jesus more and more, v.10b
This is along the same lines of what we saw earlier with knowledge informing our hearts which results in transformation. So we won’t spend a lot of time here. But I just want to show again that this is how transformation in the Christian life works. We are renewed more and more into the image of God by greater and greater knowledge of him.
Here’s how Paul says it in 2 Corinthians 3:18, “And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another.”
So, the more we look at Jesus. The longer we stare at him. The more we get to know him, the more we ourselves are transformed to look like him.
Every Christian of all backgrounds is in the same boat, v.11
This is not a Titanic situation. There aren't some first class Christians getting into boats and the others having to swim for it. There aren't classes of Christians at all. Every Christian has died and risen with Christ. Every Christian has been drafted into the same war on sin. Every Christian has sin they need to be killing and putting away. Every Christian lives in the tension between the old self and new self.
That is what Paul is saying here. He isn't erasing these distinctions. He isn't saying that if you become a Christian your ethnicity goes away by saying there is neither Jew nor Greek. What he is saying is that in Christ, in the new self, these distinctions count for nothing. We are all, regardless of background, in the same boat. We all were sinners, we all died and were raised with Christ, and we are all on the journey of becoming more like him.
Christ is all, v.11
So after everything Paul has said in these 11 verses about sanctification, and following immediately on the heels of saying all Christians are in the same boat, he ends by saying Christ is all and in all. Christ is all and in all.
I’ll leave that to you all in your discussion groups to think together over what he’s saying by that and why he puts it here.
Conclusion
So this is the first side of sanctification. One side of the coin of sanctification involves putting off and putting away. Of tearing down. Of demolition. Of dismantling. Sanctification, on this side of the coin, is a war that requires killing.
This is what we have been called into. We’ve been drafted. Called up. While we don’t bring the ultimate victory about, we are called to the frontlines all the same.
Christ is in the process of transforming you into a dream home. You’ve already been justified. Your market value is off the charts. You’re priceless before God. And yet, you need some work. Some touching up in some places, in others a complete demo job is needed. And he’s given your the grace of letting you play a role:
By seeking. By setting your mind. By killing. But putting away. By putting off. Or, in short, by entering with him into the dismantling work of sanctification.