I have it on my heart to say a few words on John 17 in reference to the character of sanctification.
At this moment, as we all know, the Lord was rejected. All through the Gospel, from chapter 1, He is unknown to the world and rejected by the Jews. But from chapter 13 He speaks as going out of the world and ascending on high.
In this chapter, however, what is brought out is that He came forth from the Father, not from God only, and this involves “eternal life.” That is where eternal life comes in. Its character is that it is the knowledge of the Father, for the Father sent His only-begotten Son that we might live through Him. It is in the knowledge of the Father, and Jesus sent by Him, that there is eternal life. And then the character in which we know Him is that of “holy Father,” and this is sanctification. When it is a question of the world, it is “righteous Father.” It is not that grace does not go out to poor sinners in the world to deliver them out of it, but that saints are not of it and have done with it.
Some think that Christ came into the world to connect Himself with humanity — that He united Himself to man in the incarnation — which is utter falsehood. He was a true man, but the thought of the union of God with man — with humanity as it was — is wholly unscriptural; there is no union before redemption. The doctrine of Scripture is that we are united to Christ after redemption is accomplished—united to a glorified Christ.
The Father and the World
As to the world, we have here a most important point practically, because “the friendship of the world is enmity with God” (James 4:44Ye adulterers and adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God. (James 4:4)). Wherever I let the spirit and associations of the world in, I am associating myself with that which has rejected Christ. The world is a judged system. “Now is the judgment of this world; now shall the prince of this world be cast out” (John 12:3131Now is the judgment of this world: now shall the prince of this world be cast out. (John 12:31)). “If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:1515And when he had made a scourge of small cords, he drove them all out of the temple, and the sheep, and the oxen; and poured out the changers' money, and overthrew the tables; (John 2:15)). The Father has a world of His own, which He has given to us, to which He has taken Christ to be the center — the new creation. The world, as it is, rejected Christ when He came into it, and now all that is over. The whole thing we belong to is a new creation. That is what a Christian is, and we have to keep hold of it in our walk and in our testimony. It is true we have the treasure in earthen vessels, but we belong entirely to the new creation. The treasure is not in its natural associations as to its surroundings here.
We read also, “By the which will we are sanctified, through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once” (Heb. 10:1010By the which will we are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. (Hebrews 10:10)). In Hebrews it is always sanctification by the blood — on the cross. There was a complete breach between God and the world, and the believer set apart to God. Here there is a double ground of sanctification, God’s will and Christ’s offering. And third, which is the practical part of it, we get the Holy Spirit as Him who actually works it, the immediate agent of the work in us: “Elect . . . through sanctification of the Spirit, unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 1:2). There is the communication of a new life in Christ. But it is a totally new thing —Christ our life, so as even Adam, innocent, did not have it. And this is really the principle of holiness. That which is born of God is a holy thing; we are “born again . . . by the Word of God, which liveth and abideth forever” (1 Peter 1:23), for the Word of God does abide forever.
Christ is that eternal life which was with the Father and becomes spiritually our life; it is nothing that is in man or of man. That gives it its true character. “That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the Word of life; for the life was manifested, and we have seen it, and bear witness, and show unto you that eternal life, which was with the Father, and was manifested unto us” (1 John 1:1212But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name: (John 1:12)). All that which was simple failure at the beginning came out as enmity against God’s own Son when Christ was in the world. He displayed divine goodness and power, all that divine grace could be, but this manifested God, and this man would not have at any cost. The world has been tested in this way, and the result is that, fallen man having been turned out of paradise, God has been turned out of the world into which He had come in grace. And so the world will not now bear a man that is like Christ. “The carnal mind is enmity against God” (Rom. 8:77Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. (Romans 8:7)), but “He gave himself . . . deliver us from this present evil world” (Gal. 1:44Who gave himself for our sins, that he might deliver us from this present evil world, according to the will of God and our Father: (Galatians 1:4)). I get the One, the Man that the world rejected and that God delighted in, and God says, I must carry out My purposes of grace, and to Christ He says, Come and sit at My right hand till I carry them out. So that is where He is gone, and the world sees Him no more.
Christ in Glory
In Israel, God was among them as a delivered people, but the veil was there unrent. It is not so now. When Christ died, the veil was rent, and now we have “boldness to enter into the holiest.” The veil is rent from top to bottom, and the only place I have to walk in is in the light as God is in the light. If I cannot walk in the light, I cannot walk with God at all.
We then come to what this sanctification is positively. God has personally accepted man in Christ; the Son of God is in the glory. Our actual condition is never spoken of except as being in connection with the second Man in glory; our only connection with God is in Christ; we are predestinated “to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren.” This is not a question of our responsibility; it all depends upon the finished work of the second Man; it rests upon what is done. Christ has obeyed even unto death and is glorified. As the result of His work, we have been begotten again with the word of truth, we have been made the children of God through faith in Christ Jesus, and thus we have a new nature. We are heirs of God and joint-heirs with Christ.
Now this new nature must have an object, and God has given it one that is not in this world at all. There is not a single thing in this world that will not unsanctify us if we go after it. Sanctification is all connected with Christ in glory. The whole thing is new: The nature, the character and the object by which we are sanctified through the Holy Spirit is outside the world entirely. The object before us is a glorified Christ; He is our life: We are “created in Christ Jesus.” The believer has duties here and is not taken out of the world, but his life is wholly connected with Christ at the right hand of God, and everything that diminishes our perception of Him there diminishes our practical sanctification here.
Our testimony is that the Man whom the world rejected is at God’s right hand. The gospel begins, not with Christ come into the world, but with Christ turned out of it. The world rejected Him, and God took Him up into heaven. “I ascend unto My Father, and your Father; and to My God and your God” (John 20:1717Jesus saith unto her, Touch me not; for I am not yet ascended to my Father: but go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father, and your Father; and to my God, and your God. (John 20:17)). This was never said before redemption.
And just mark how the Apostle identifies us with Christ: “The world knoweth us not, because it knew Him not.” He completely associates us with a rejected Christ down here. “Now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be” —we have the treasure in poor earthly vessels now, “but we know” — we are so identified with Christ —“that, when He shall appear, we shall be like Him: for we shall see Him as He is” — up there in glory. We shall never see Him as He was down here in humiliation, but in glory we shall see Him as He is.
Christian Sanctification
And now what is the effect of this? “Every man that hath this hope in Him purifieth himself, even as He is pure” (1 John 3:33Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. (John 3:3)). I can never be as He was, for He never had any sin in His nature, but I am going to be perfectly like Him. And why purify myself? Because I am not pure, and therefore I must purify myself. He does not say pure as He is pure. But He is the standard by which I purify myself —Christ, as He is there above. I am to be like Him, and the life I have of Him can never be satisfied till then. I have ever to purify myself.
You may find other passages on the subject, but there is no other way of looking at sanctification in Scripture. There is no setting apart to God except in the second Man. Where am I to look at God’s holiness in a man? I answer, In Christ in glory. He was the Holy One and walked according to the Spirit of holiness down here, and I am to walk as He walked, but that by which the Holy Spirit works this in us is by looking at the glorified Christ up there, by having an object and a motive up there which takes my heart out of all that is here, as His was who walked through the world, as I have to do. I am going to be with Him and like Him. A man who, in heart, is not only with God and for God, but even now an imitator of God as a dear child —that is Christian sanctification.
What a blessed calling is ours! All is connected with a glorified Christ — a Christ that the world has rejected. He has given us a holy nature, born of God, and for an object, He has given you the glorified Christ, the Son of God.
How then am I to be set apart in the world? If I have nothing wholly outside it, my leaving particular evils comes to giving up one thing and taking to another, but getting something that is outside of it delivers me wholly from its power. The Lord Jesus says, “Sanctify them through Thy truth: Thy word is truth” (John 17:1717Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth. (John 17:17)). This is just what Christ the blessed Son of God was; He was the truth itself, and the truth perfectly suited to man’s heart and conscience. This is what the Word of God does, looked at as a means. The Father’s word brings the truth into my heart and searches it and detects everything that is there; it comes as a light and shows everything there that is not of the new creation. And it does so by revealing what is up there. The disciples were believers, and now He is looking for them to be sanctified, and that is done by showing them what is heavenly, associating them with what is in Him above by the Father’s word.
“For their sakes I sanctify Myself, that they also might be sanctified by the truth” (John 17:1919And for their sakes I sanctify myself, that they also might be sanctified through the truth. (John 17:19)). He is set apart as the Man of God’s counsels and heart, as Man in glory. Nay, He says, “I set myself apart,” and the Holy Spirit brings the knowledge of it down, and, by the communication of Christ in glory, makes me more like Him every day. He says, You must not have a motive that is not drawn from Me in heaven. All sanctification is referred to being like Him there, kept by the Holy Father to walk as He walked down here before His Father.
While it is, “Holy Father, keep through Thine own name those whom Thou hast given Me,” it is, “Righteous Father, the world hath not known Thee.” It is very solemn. He appeals to the Father as against the world. It is lying in wickedness. Meanwhile, Christ is “made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption.” “Imputed” cannot be applied to all these words. If to any, it is not the subject of this text. People talk of “imputed sanctification.” How about imputed redemption? What does that mean? I hope we shall get more than imputed redemption on going into glory! It is the kind and measure and standard of these things, and that is Christ, and He made them of God to us. It is a question of partaking in God’s holiness. Being born again, I am associated with Christ. I am going to be in the same glory that He is in, and I am going on until I get there, purifying myself as He is pure. Then I shall see Him as He is and be like Him. The world that we are naturally of has rejected the Son of God, and the associations of the believer are with a glorified Christ, waiting till He comes to take him home.
J. N. Darby, adapted