Christ Our Sanctification #1 — Ed Miller

So, I look forward to getting to fellowship with you. Well, we've come to see Jesus, haven't we? I know we've been singing it and praying it, and our brother Maynard just prayed it, but I'd like to say it again.

The Holy Spirit Reveals Christ in Scripture

As we come to the study of this precious book, there is a principle of Bible study that is absolutely indispensable, a principle we cannot take for granted, we can't live without. With all of our helps and aids and assistances, our commentaries and concordances and word studies and atlases and books of sermons and all the rest, with all the scholarship, the only way we're going to get to the heart of God is by the Holy Spirit of God unveiling the Lord Jesus to our hearts, and there is no substitute for that.

And He's promised if we would come with our mouths open wide that He'd feed us, as dry ground that He'd rain fresh water upon us. He's revealed these things to babes. He's hidden them from the sophisticated and the wise and the prudent, and He's far more anxious that we see Him than we are to see Him.

And so with those few thoughts in mind, let's once again now just commit our time unto Him, and let's just claim His revelation. Our Father, once again now, we just wait upon Thy Spirit, and how glad we are that You have inspired this precious book, every part of it, and now we'd ask You to breathe again upon Your Word.

Give us life, give us spirit, show us in a fresh way our Lord Jesus, and we claim it in the all-prevailing name of our Lord Jesus. Well, let's get right to it. The revelation of the Lord Jesus that has been recently burned afresh on my heart is the Lord Jesus as our sanctification.

Romans 6–8 and Christ Our Sanctification

And I don't fall away when I announce the text, because obviously it's always going to be this text, Romans 6 to 8, okay? Say, oh no, not again. Now there's a couple of reasons, I'll ask you to turn to Romans 6 if you would.

There's a couple of reasons that I hesitate to share with you from this text, but then there's a couple of reasons I don't hesitate, and they won. So that's why we're going to look at it. I hesitate to share from these three chapters because they're so well-known, and they're so beloved by God's people, and it seems like everybody digs in here and gets such a banquet.

And because they're so well-known and so loved, they have been studied inside out. You don't have any problem finding books, works on these marvelous chapters. And because of the wonderful content of Romans 6 to 8, every individual or every body or every group or every denomination that has ever even touched upon the victorious life or the abundant life or the faith-rest life or the Christ life or the crucified life or the exchange life or the spirit-filled life or the surrendered life or the new covenant life or whatever you want to call it, they all run the Romans 6 to 8.

And because there are so many different groups and individuals coming to these chapters, and there's so much in these chapters, everybody gets their proof text from these chapters. And honestly, brother, and I'm not telling you anything new, but there's an awful lot of controversy connected with Romans 6 to 8.

And it's difficult to come to a clean text. It's difficult to come to these marvelous chapters uncluttered because we have so many ideas and we come and we just sort of slap it on the Scriptures. Everything depends on your approach to these chapters.

It depends on where you're coming from. Some have come from some rather strange angles. I think one reason that it's so loved is because there's that cry in our hearts, we want to be like the Lord Jesus.

We want to be holy. We want to be pure. And if you come, you know, you not only see what's in front of your eyes, but what's behind your eyes affects what you see, too. And I'm talking about preconceived ideas.

And sometimes we get these preconceived ideas. For example, and I don't care really, we're not getting into these controversies, but if you believe that justification is different than sanctification and that you experience them at a different time, you're going to approach these chapters a certain way.

And if you believe that sanctification is just a blossom of justification, that there's only one salvation and there's not two and it's the seed and then it's fully developed, then you're going to approach these chapters another way.

If you believe that man has two natures and one is an unfallen nature and when the Lord Jesus comes in there's another nature and these two natures are everlastingly antagonistic, you're going to approach these chapters a certain way.

If you believe man doesn't have two natures, he has one nature and God is conforming that nature to the image of the Lord Jesus Christ by a progressive unfolding of Christ through the Spirit's revelation of Him, you're going to come another way.

If you believe man has no nature at all, but that he's a vehicle that expresses life, either Satan or God, you're going to come another way. Now, I'm not pretending that we're going to answer any of these mysteries.

I don't even want to try. We're not even going to get into them. What I'm trying to suggest is that I come a little bit fearful because if I'm coming a little different, I don't want to say, oh, forget it, turn me off or something like that.

I think it takes a miracle of God to come to any passage objectively with an open heart, any passage in the Word of God. And I think on a weekend like this, we ought to really pray that we can come purely to see the Lord, purely to see Christ.

And whatever our background is, I pray that we'll touch on common denominator truths. And let's just come and just come to see the Lord Jesus. Now, when I say that your hearts are to be open to Him, you realize Christians are never to be narrow-minded.

They're to be open-minded to Christ and close-minded to everything that's not Christ. So, you're to be open-minded and close-minded. We're not suggesting that as we come to this, that you take a particular approach.

We want to see the Lord Jesus. I fear with this passage, let me get all of this out. I fear that there's a possibility you say, I've heard it all before. Romans 6, I can almost quote the whole three chapters.

Romans 6, 8, I've heard all this before. There's nothing fresh here. I've been nourished from these chapters by the finest chefs. And God has served this beautiful meal over and over again. Why didn't you just take the same truth and illustrate it from Naomi or Chronicles?

And then maybe we could get into it. But these familiar passages made the Lord deliver us from that human proverb, familiarity breeds contempt. Familiarity might work the other way. There might be some brother here struggling in the ways of God and longing for some light, some word from God, some revelation concerning holiness and sanctification.

And maybe you've heard about these marvelous chapters and said, oh good, Romans 6 to 8, finally I'm going to listen and I'm going to take down a formula and I'm going to nail it down this time. A, B, C, 1, 2, 3, we'll get it all under our belt.

You take notes like crazy and get everything down so that now you'll have liberty and so on. Well, you're not going to get any principles and you're not going to get any formulas and you're not going to get any easy way to victory and all that kind of thing.

Our approach this weekend, God gracing us, will be very Christ-centered. Sanctification, as we're going to look at it, it's not an experience. It's not a process. It's a person. And we're going to look at it that way.

It's our dear Lord Jesus Christ. And the only formula, God gracing us, that you're going to see is our lovely Savior. We want to see Him in these marvelous chapters. And so, let's pray together that we'll not be confused by these chapters or put to sleep by these chapters or expect more than Him because that's all that we're going to see.

Now, that's why I was a little hesitant to share. The reason I'm not hesitant to share, I'm not presumptuous and pretending that I'm in competition with any other brothers who've ever touched on these marvelous chapters.

My, there are some edifying things written. Godly men have opened up the truth in these marvelous passages. And I don't suggest that I see anything as clearly or I can explain it as clearly or something like that.

But I stand before you in all because I've seen Jesus. I stand before you in this text because I've seen Him here as my sanctification. And that's why I'd like to share with you. And I just pray that whatever there is about Romans 6 to 8 that has any kind of reaction in us, that God would overrule that and that together, as a body, we'd see Him.

Romans as the Message of the Complete Savior

Why Romans chapter 6? Now, let me just set it in its context and then we'll look at it. And very soon you'll be able to see where we're heading. The message of the whole book of Romans, for years I thought it was threefold salvation.

Justification, sanctification, glorification. The message of Romans is not threefold salvation. The message of Romans is a complete Savior. The Lord Jesus Christ. And when you see Him as a complete Savior, you will enjoy salvation in all its penances.

You will enjoy justification and sanctification and glorification. In a very general way, the first five chapters present the Lord Jesus as justification. Chapters 6 to 8, in a general way, present the Lord Jesus as sanctification.

Chapters 9 to 11 present the Lord Jesus as glorification. And then the end of the book, 12 through 16, show the kind of life, the outworking. If I'm seeing a complete Savior, what will my life look like?

And the answer is, I'll be a complete Christian. So that's pretty much Roman. In this short weekend together, we're going to look at chapters 6 through 8 and center in on the Lord Jesus as our sanctification.

Here's a couple of verses. 1 Corinthians 1 .30. He is made unto us wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, redemption. Dr. Andrew Murray, in his book Holy in Christ, made this one comment. My, what a comment it is.

He said, When God calls us to holiness, He calls us to Himself and His life. He makes us holy by possessing Himself. Christ Himself is our holiness. And so, in that way, we'll look together to see Him.

If we come to learn some secret of victory, we'll come away dry. Holiness is not the goal. It's the byproduct. Being delivered from the flesh is not the goal. Whether He delivers us from sin or sinning, that's not the issue.

The issue is the Lord Jesus. I'll tell you, brothers, the surest way to miss victory is to put your eyes on victory. You're going to lose it that way. The issue is to know Him, and may He grace us to see Him.

The Unfinished Work in Romans 6–8

Alright, Romans 6 to 8. Let me give you a little outline the way we'll follow it. Just a few suggestions to hang your thoughts on. I'd like to call these three chapters the unfinished work. The unfinished work.

Because certainly, because it deals with present tense sanctification, unless there's somebody here that would like to say that their sanctification is finished, I think we can all agree on this. We're not yet conformed to Jesus, are we?

We haven't finally arrived. We're not sinless, are we? There are revelations still of God to be seen. There are depths of sin that He has yet to expose. I'm sure there are gifts and graces to be experienced.

When you receive the Lord Jesus, you receive a complete Savior. And that's based on a finished work. And so you might think, I have a complete Savior. I trust the finished work. Why didn't He just whisk me up to heaven the moment I got saved?

Because there's an unfinished work too. He's not yet finished. And Romans 6 to 8 deals with that unfinished work. Chapter 6. Chapter 6 presents the finished part of the unfinished work. If there's an unfinished work, there has to be a finished part to it.

What is the finished part of the unfinished work? Chapter 7. Well, that's really chapter 6 -1 technically to 7 -6. Chapter 7 gives us the unfinished part of the unfinished work. And then chapter 8 tells us how God is going to finish the unfinished part of the unfinished work.

Do you follow that? That's chapter 6 -8. And this evening I'd like to home in on the finished part of the unfinished work. If that was confusing, then chapter 6 is what Christ has done. Chapter 7 is what I can't do.

And chapter 8 is what the Holy Spirit does. And still it takes us in the same direction. Well, you come to a passage of Scripture. And I don't believe what I'm about to tell you. I'm playing with you a little bit here.

I don't want you to turn me off too quickly. But you come to a passage of Scripture and say, how am I going to understand this? And the hermeneutics tell us you've got to get a clear outline. If you're going to understand, you need to see a clear outline so that you can systematically approach it and analyze it.

Freedom from the Old Self, the Old Master, and the Old Husband

Alright, so let's have our clear outline. You don't have to work too hard in chapter 6 to get a clear outline because the Holy Spirit has given three tremendous illustrations in this first section, the finished part of the unfinished work.

Chapter 6, 1 -11, free from the old self. In verse 6, it's called old self. I have a New American Standard. In the margin, it's called the old man. King James, I think, calls it the old man. Wyss calls it the old unregenerate self.

Free from the old man. And then chapter 6, 12 -23, free from the old master. Verse 12, sin reigning as king. 14, sin shall not be master over you. 16, slaves of sin. 20, slaves of sin. 22, freed from sin.

Free from the old man. Free from the old master. And then chapter 7, 1 -6, free from the old husband. Almost everybody who approaches these chapters have seen those marvelous illustrations. Chapter 7, 1, the law has jurisdiction over a person as long as he lives.

Verse 4, you were also made to die to the law. Verse 6, now we've been released from the law. The old self, the old master sin, and the old husband, the law. There. Wasn't that good? Now you're free. See how easy that was?

You say, well, anybody can spot an outline in a chapter. It's one thing to say, free from the old man. Free from the old master. Free from the old husband. But where's the reality of that? How come I don't seem to be so free from the old man?

And how come that old master still has sway in my life? And how come I'm still under that condemnation of that old husband? You know, we glance at the verses. I'm not going to read the text. I pray that you'll read that, but I'll isolate certain verses.

So easy to say, verse 2, dead to sin. Verse 6, crucified with Him. Verse 11, dead to sin. In what way? Verse 13, alive from the dead. 18, slave of righteousness. 22, enslaved to God. Oh, that's wonderful.

How so? It's easy to read. Verse 3 of chapter 7, free from the law, joined to Him that was raised from the dead. 6, released from the law, having died to that by which we were bound. Somehow, brothers, in this first chapter, over and over again, in fact, 15 times, the Holy Spirit sounds the same keynote.

You're free. You're free. You're free. You're free. Verse 7, free from sin. 18, 22. 6, 23, the free gift of God. Somehow your heart knows. Not only because of what you've heard, but as you read this chapter, somehow the liberty bell is ringing.

Somehow there's some glorious music here. There's an emancipation. There's liberty. There's freedom. But quite honestly, an outline doesn't do it. I think I need a little more than an outline. And so someone comes along and says, You know what you need, brother?

If you're going to enter into the riches of this, you ever do word studies? See, that's what you need. You need word studies. Because with each illustration, the Holy Spirit has given two verbs. And so He says, You're free from the old man.

Oh, reckon. You're free from the old master. Yield. Obey. You're free from the old husband. Bear fruit unto God. Serve God in the newness of spirit. So what you need is a word study. If you study know, if you study reckon, if you study yield, if you study obey, if you study bearing fruit, then you'll enter into all of these truths.

And so we studied all those words, and our heart comes back and says, There's got to be another way. An outline, as clever as it is, and word studies, you get into all the meanings of the word, I need to know more than that.

The Greek Aorist and the Finished Work

And I'll tell you what you miss. Greek. As you know, this chapter was written in the wonderful Greek language. And as you move from one language to another, you know you lose. Not only in individual vocabulary words, but in the Greek they have a tense that is not in the English.

And when the translators come to this unique tense, since there's nothing to translate it into, they have to choose the closest in the English. And I'm referring to that great heiress tense. And so we don't have an heiress.

And so they translate it either past tense or imperfect or perfect. Scholars describe the heiress tense. Bear with me on this. I'm heading someplace, I promise. Scholars describe the heiress tense as point action in the past.

That is, something happens once, it's finished, it'll never have to be done again. It's point action in the past, finished, complete, over and done. For example, Romans 3 .23, For all have sinned. Well, see, in the English it says, have sinned.

And so we think that means everybody sinned sometime. All have sinned. But in the Greek, that's in the heiress. And that's not referring to everybody sinned sometime. That means once, in the past, at one time, all sinned.

It's referring, of course, to Adam, the fall. All have sinned in Adam. One time, in the past, finished, forever, done. Heiress. You say, well, why are you giving us this Greek lesson? I'm giving you this Greek lesson because the Holy Spirit can't get out of the heiress tense in this chapter.

He's locked in. He can't get out 24 times. In this chapter, He uses that strange tense because He's trying to tell us something's finished. Point action in the past. Once done, forever finished, never having to be done again.

In the first 11 verses, 11 times, the Holy Spirit uses that tense. Just glance at these verses. Verse 2, We who died, heiress tense. Verse 3, two times, have been baptized. Verse 4, have been buried. Verse 4, Christ was raised.

All heiress. Verse 6, old self was crucified. He who has died. Verse 7, we have died with Christ. Verse 8, verse 9, having been raised from the dead. Verse 10, two times, he died, he died. What is He declaring by that tense?

Something is finished. He is not declaring what shall be. Look at verse, for example, when He talks about we're dead in verse 11, dead to sin and alive to God. He's not saying God will set you free from the old man.

Something's finished. You are set free. Now you will be. From the old master, He says it's finished. From the old husband, it's finished. He doesn't say set free if. If I pray, if I study, if I surrender, if I confess, if I repent, if I thirst, if I abide, even if I believe.

He said something's done. Something's done. Not will be done. It's done. Not will be done if. It's done. Not ought to be done. He's not saying you ought to be dead to sin. Somehow, it's done. He's saying you are once finished over through complete.

Okay brothers, with that wonderful outline and those words and that Greek lesson, we can go out and not sin. Sanctification. You know, you know where I'm heading. It takes more than an outline and it takes more than word studies and it takes more than Greek.

A Revelation of Christ Rather Than Christian Self-Effort

It takes a revelation of our Lord Jesus Christ to understand this passage or any passage. You can see this outline as I have and study these verbs as I have. Know, reckon, yield, obey, bear fruit, serve God in the spirit and rather than entering into a sweet liberty in Christ that ought to be produced here.

Sometime it goes the other way. You know, I'll just pull it out of my own life. For years as I wrestled with some of these concepts, I went through phases, you know, where I would try to crucify myself and get into some kind of works where you'd end up saying He said I'm supposed to be crucified so I'll try to crucify myself and then get into these rules and regulations and all.

Or else as I have done when that doesn't work and you read these things and they look so good and your heart's crying, I want that. Then you try to ask God to give you what He's already given you. And as our brother Watchman Nee said, can you imagine the frustration of trying to get into a room in which you're already standing?

And there's a frustration in that. And to ask God to give what He's already given. And then I went through another phase where I thought I could believe these things true. And if I would believe hard enough then they'd become true.

You're crucified with Christ. Alright, I'll believe that hard enough. And if I really believe it hard enough, it becomes true. Truth is true because it's true. Not because you believe it. Your faith doesn't make it true and your unbelief doesn't make it untrue.

Truth is true. And it's going to happen because it's true. And you're not going to stop the mourning from coming by wringing the rooster's neck. It's going to come because it's fact. It's true. And so we read these things.

We're dead to the old man and we're dead to the old master and we're dead to the old husband. And you can't believe them true. So what are you going to do? Well, here was the longest phase of my early Christian life.

I played a little game called Christian Corpse. You ever play that game? Verse 11. Consider yourself dead. I'm dead. Dead people are not affected by sin. You go up to a dead person and smack them in the face.

Well, he won't turn the other cheek, but at least he won't rise up in violence against you. Go up to a corpse and praise him. He won't get proud. Embarrass him. He won't blush. You can do anything you want to a corpse.

And so I played Christian Corpse. I said, alright, go ahead. Say anything you want. It's not going to affect me. I'm dead. You can do anything you want. I'm dead. The Bible says right there, I'm dead.

You know, when I was a child, I used to play Cowboys and Indians with my little cousin, Dickie. And I'll never forget it because he never played fair. And I used to run to my grandmother all the time with the same complaint, Dickie doesn't take his debts.

In my little game of Christian Corpse, I'm reading all of this dead to the old master. And I'd play, but the old master wouldn't take his debts. And the old man wouldn't take his debts. And the old husband wouldn't take his debts.

And I got all wrapped up in a big chunk of my Christian life in a game of pretend. Pretend you're dead. Make believe it's unvalid. Make believe you're a corpse. What is God saying? Is God saying, reckon yourselves holy in order to be holy?

My, that's a strange cure for a crook. Reckon yourself honest? Doesn't work. That isn't what God is saying. Imagine going up to a proud person and saying, reckon yourself humble. He's not humble. And I don't think the Lord in this section is telling us that.

That's that positive thinking idea. This visualization, you know. Picture it in your head and it's true in your life. Nonsense. God isn't saying that. God never tells you to reckon something true that's false.

He just doesn't do that. God does not call us to believe in something that doesn't exist. He's not mocking us. A sinner can't reckon himself a saint. Having it in your imagination is not going to turn you from the creature you are into the creature that you wish that you were or imagine yourself to be.

God doesn't call us to play games. And brothers, I played Christian corpse for many years. And I thought that's what it meant. Reckon yourselves to be dead. Dead to the pleasures of the world. Except the more I laid there dead, the more they kept with their influences and their pulls on me.

What kind of a Christian life would that be anyway? What kind of maturity and growth is that? Moving from a simple faith in Jesus Christ to a life of make-believe. To a life of pretend. To a life of fantasy.

That's not what God is talking about. Praise God. He is an invisible friend. But He's not calling us to play invisible friend and play some game with Him. I tell you brothers, we need something more than an outline.

Anybody can spout that off. Dead to the old man. Dead to the old master. Dead to the old husband. Anybody can study those words. No reckon, yield, obey. Bear fruit unto God. Walk in the Spirit. Anybody can spout off Greek.

And I know that that's a participle. And I know that's aristentic. We need to see Christ. We need the revelation of God in this and every passage. Or we're not going to begin to understand. Right now let's look at chapter 6.

Identification with Christ in His Death and Resurrection

And may God give us Christ. Notice how he begins. What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may increase? May it never be. How shall we who died this sin still live in it? Do you not know that all of us who've been baptized into Christ Jesus have been baptized into His death?

Brothers, bear with me on this. Put your hand on verse 3 please. Look at your hand. Notice it's dry. There's no water in verse 3. That's not baptism. Wet baptism. He's talking here about identification with Christ.

And he begins in verse 3 to talk about this identification. Now glance at these verses. Verse 4. With Him. Verse 5. United with Him. Verse 6. Crucified with Him. Verse 11. In Christ Jesus. Now don't expect anything new or deep or profound or mysterious here.

In the first five chapters of Romans, God told us that the Lord Jesus was our substitute for justification. It was a simple message. He died in our place. He represented us. He took our place. Why don't I have to go to hell, brothers?

I don't have to go to hell because I've already been there in the person of Jesus Christ, my substitute. Why don't you have to go to hell? Because you've already been there in the person of Jesus Christ, your substitute.

That's the first five chapters. Now He continues and in chapter 6 -8 He's saying, as He was your substitute for justification, He is your substitute for sanctification. He's your substitute. He died as your substitute.

He was buried as your substitute. He rose as your substitute. He ascended as your substitute. He sits exalted as your substitute. The reason Christians stumble in chapter 6 is they think chapter 6 is talking about them.

And it isn't. It's describing the Lord Jesus, not Christians. Look in verse 9. Knowing that Christ, having been raised from the dead, is never to die again. Death is no longer master over Him. The death He died.

He died to sin once for all. The life He lives. He lives to God. Glance at 9 and 10. Who died to sin? Who did? Who's alive to God? Not you. Not me. Jesus is dead to sin. Jesus is alive to God. And in all this marvelous outline, dead to the old man and dead to the old master and dead to the old husband, it's not you.

The finished part of the unfinished work is His sanctification, not yours. He's arrived. He's dead to sin. Who is more literally dead to sin in the whole universe than our Lord Jesus? Who is more alive to God than the Lord Jesus?

See, God isn't calling us to believe some deceitful imagination. He's calling us to a glorious fact that our Lord Jesus Christ is our sanctification. He's dead to sin. He's alive unto God. We're going to look at our sanctification as we go through this weekend together, but we can't start there.

Chapter 6 is His, not ours. The Lord Jesus has victory. Not you. Not me. The Lord Jesus is sanctified. He's dead to the old man and to the old master and to the old husband. Now watch. What is true of Jesus is true of Jesus as your substitute.

And if it's true of Jesus and true of Jesus as your substitute, it's true of you. If He did it as your substitute, if He did these things and He did these things for you, then you did them. If it's true of Him, if it's true of Him for you, it's true of you.

He died for me, so I don't have to. He paid my penalty, so I don't have to. That's substitution. That's what it means. Brothers, this is not heresy. This is gospel. He died to sin in your place, so you don't have to.

Now, we'll look at that this weekend, and may God give us grace to see that. He's alive to God as your substitute. And I don't clear my throat anymore when I say it, so you don't have to be. Now what am I saying?

Think of that. Jesus is sanctified. That's the finished part of the unfinished work. He's dead to sin. He's alive to God. He's victorious. He has conquered. He's entered in. There's music in the understanding that Christ is my sanctification as my substitute.

You know, we don't read verse 11 right. It says, You are to reckon yourself, to consider yourself, and we always read, consider yourself dead to sin. Drop that out of there. That's not what it's saying.

Consider yourself in Christ dead to sin, alive to God. He's not saying consider yourself dead. He's saying consider yourself to be in Christ. Yes, dead to sin, alive to God. But you're to reckon yourself to be in Christ.

This whole chapter is a chapter on identification with the Lord Jesus Christ. Victory is not something that God gives you. It's something that Jesus has. He'll share it with you. And you can enter into it.

But it's something that's His. John 16, 33, he says, Be of good cheer. You shall overcome the world. He didn't say you shall overcome the world. He said, I've overcome the world. That's why you ought to cheer up.

Because He's overcome the world. 2 Corinthians 2, 14, Thanks be to God who always leads me in my triumph. His triumph, not yours. It's His victory. The finished part, may God give us eyes. The finished part of the unfinished work, Jesus is sanctified.

The unfinished part is I'm not. That's coming. But we don't start with I'm not. We start with He is. And we've got to see Christ as our sanctification. He's dead to the old man. He's dead to the old master.

He's dead to the old husband. And He's dead to the old man, old husband, old master as my substitute. Just as really as He stood for me in justification. He stands for me in sanctification. And He's dead to sin and alive to God.

Don't get lost in spiritually sounding flowery language. It boils down to Jesus is your substitute. And He died for you and now if you miss Christ as your sanctification, you're not going to get the first place on personal holiness.

Knowing, Reckoning, Yielding, and Obeying in Christ

Seeing the Lord Jesus as our sanctification is the starting point. You don't need a program on how to get rid of your sin. Make sure you have a quiet time and make sure you confess every time. Keep short accounts.

Repent of your sin and suppress and resist and have kingdom authority over Satan and all that kind of stuff. That is not how you're going to know your sanctification. You don't need a program on how to be alive unto God.

Make sure you study and make sure you pray and make sure you fast and make sure you surrender. Make sure you're involved in ministry and your fellowship together and you exercise your spiritual gifts.

That won't do beans as far as your sanctification is concerned. Your sanctification is going to come out of this. Just as your satisfaction grows out of His satisfaction, your sanctification is a fruit of His sanctification.

...Christ. Now let's look at the word. I won't spend a long time on this. Now you can do your word studies. Knowing. Knowing. Knowing this. Knowing what? Knowing that He's sanctified. That's what the whole context is.

That's what you're to know. That He's arrived, not you. Reckon yourselves. Reckon? Reckon yourselves in Christ. I don't fly. The airplane flies. I'm in the airplane. I fly. I'm not victorious. He's victorious.

I'm in Him. I'm victorious. In Christ. So you know that He's victorious. You reckon that you're in Him. Then you yield. Not as many would say. I yielded so many times before God began to dawn this on my heart.

Surrender was my favorite indoor sport. Constantly yielding. Surrendering. Coming forward. Signing cards. Dedicating. Rededicating. Became one with the altar. I gave myself and gave myself and gave myself.

But every time it was, Lord, here I am again. I messed up. I promised I wouldn't. And I said, you never have to deliver me again. But here I am. Please, one more time. Give me another chance. And over and over and over again.