Devotional 71: The Means of Sanctification: The Word, Sacraments, and Prayer

The Confession Read

In which war, although the remaining corruption for a time may much prevail, yet, through the continual supply of strength from the sanctifying Spirit of Christ, the regenerate part doth overcome; and so the saints grow in grace, perfecting holiness in the fear of God.

— Westminster Confession of Faith, Chapter 13, Section 3

Introduction

The room was quiet now. An hour earlier it had been filled with the voices of the congregation, the sound of the closing hymn still lingering in the air like the fragrance of incense after the censer has passed. But the pastor had not yet gone home. He sat in the vestry with his head in his hands, the worn leather of his Bible cool beneath his fingers, and he wept. Not for a parishioner in crisis, nor for a bereavement he had just attended, but for himself. The sermon he had preached that morning had been true, every word of it. The text had been expounded faithfully, the gospel had been offered freely, and Christ had been lifted up. Yet within the hour of the benediction, a bitterness had kindled in his heart over a slight from an elder who had criticized a point of administration. The old serpent, that pride which masquerades as wounded righteousness, had uncoiled itself in the warmth of his indignation. He had caught himself rehearsing the retort he would deliver when the moment came, the measured words that would put the elder in his place while preserving the appearance of pastoral gentleness. And then he had caught himself, and the horror of the discovery had driven him to his knees. How could the same tongue that had proclaimed Christ's excellencies be ready, so soon afterward, to defend its own? How could the man who had stood in the pulpit and spoken of the Spirit's renewing work feel, within the hour, the surge of that very corruption the Spirit is sent to mortify? He was sanctified — he knew it. The direction of his life, the love of his heart, the hunger of his soul all testified that God had done a work in him that no man could undo. And yet here was the war, as fierce as ever, raging in his own breast. The pastor who has not known that hour is a pastor who has not known his own heart. And the Christian of any station who imagines that the war of Section 2 is a war that ends in a negotiated peace has not yet grasped the hope that Section 3 holds forth. The Divines have told us in Section 1 what sanctification is and whence it flows. They have told us in Section 2 that it is comprehensive but imperfect, and that its imperfection is the occasion of an irreconcilable war. Now, in this closing section, they tell us how that war will end. And the news is better than we dared to hope: the war will not end in stalemate. The war will not end in defeat. The war will end in victory — not because the believer is strong, but because the sanctifying Spirit of Christ supplies a strength that does not fail, and the regenerate part, the new man created in Christ Jesus, will overcome. And on the far side of that overcoming, the saints grow in grace. They perfect holiness in the fear of God. The struggle that exhausts them is the very means by which they are made fit for glory.

Scripture Foundation

The Apostle Paul knew something about prevailing corruption. In the seventh chapter of Romans he has laid bare his soul with a candour that has startled every honest reader since. Romans 7:23 reads: "But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members." The Greek verb for "warring" is antistrateuomenon, a military term for an opposing army taking the field. And the result is captivity: aichmalōtizonta, a prisoner of war led away in chains. Here is the "remaining corruption" of the Confession prevailing — and prevailing "much," not merely by a border skirmish but by an incursion that reaches the citadel of the will. The man who delights in God's law finds himself, in the very moment of his delight, dragged toward a compliance he hates. And yet this is not the last word. The seventh chapter of Romans is not the final chapter of Paul's anthropology. He breaks through in the eighth chapter with a declaration that answers every fear the seventh chapter has raised. Romans 8:1-2 declares: "There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death." The condemnation is gone — not because the sin is gone, but because the sinner is in Christ. And the "law of the Spirit of life" — a new operative principle, a new dynamic of grace — has "made me free" from the law of sin and death. The Greek verb ēleutherōsen is aorist: a definitive act accomplished in the past. The freedom is already secured, even while the battle still rages. This is the theological foundation of the Confession's confidence. The war is real, and corruption may for a season prevail. But the outcome is not in doubt, because the decisive victory has already been won in Christ, and the Spirit who raised Christ from the dead now dwells in the believer, supplying the strength by which the regenerate part will overcome. But how does this overcoming actually work? The Apostle gives us the anatomy of victory in his letter to the Galatians. Galatians 5:16 commands: "This I say then, Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh." The verb peripateite is a present imperative — walk, continually, habitually, in conscious dependence upon the indwelling Spirit. And the promise is absolute: "ye shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh." The Greek construction is ou mē, the strongest form of negation available. Walking in the Spirit and fulfilling the desires of the flesh are mutually exclusive. Where the Spirit's supply of strength is received by faith, the flesh's power to command obedience is broken. The Confession's "continual supply" is no theological abstraction; it is the moment-by-moment ministry of the Holy Ghost to the believing heart, the grace that meets each temptation with a sufficiency that comes from outside ourselves. Paul returns to this theme in his letter to the Philippians with a passage that illuminates both the supply of the Spirit and the human responsibility that receives it. Philippians 2:12-13 reads: "Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling. For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure." The verb "work out" is katergazesthe — not "work for" but "bring to completion, carry through to its appointed end." And the ground of this strenuous activity is not human resolve but divine energy: "God which worketh in you." The present participle energōn describes a continuous, active, energetic working. God is not passively observing the believer's struggle; He is the prime mover within it. Every holy desire — the "to will" — and every holy act — the "to do" — are His gifts. And yet the believer is not passive. He works because God works. The supply of the Spirit does not make effort unnecessary; it makes effort effectual. This is the mystery of sanctification: the believer exerts himself with all the intensity of one whose life depends on it, and yet he ascribes every advance to the grace that enabled it. The Apostle Peter adds the final note: the direction and destination of this overcoming. 2 Peter 3:18 exhorts: "But grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ." The Greek verb auxanete is a present imperative: keep growing, continually and progressively. Growth is not optional; it is the normal condition of the regenerate life. And the growth is specifically "in grace": not in moral achievement but in the apprehension of what God has freely given. And "in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ": not abstract doctrinal knowledge but personal, experiential intimacy with Christ, which is both the instrument and the evidence of sanctification. The Confession gathers all these threads: the saints grow in grace, and that growth is the perfecting of holiness: the Spirit-empowered movement toward complete conformity to Christ that awaits them in glory. And all transpires "in the fear of God": the reverent awe that remembers who God is, what sin deserves, and what grace has accomplished.

What the Divines Meant

When the Westminster Divines came to the third and final section of their chapter on sanctification, they were writing not as theorists but as pastors who had seen the damage done by errors on both sides of the question. The Antinomians had taught that the war within the believer was of no consequence: sin in the justified man was not properly sin, and the believer need not trouble himself over its presence or its occasional victory. The perfectionists had taught that the war could be ended in this life by a second work of grace that would eradicate the old nature entirely. Both errors, the Divines knew, shipwrecked souls. The Antinomian produced counterfeit Christians who mistook a dead conscience for a peaceful one. The perfectionist produced despairing Christians who, failing to achieve the promised eradication, concluded that they had never truly been converted. Against both, Section 3 stakes its claim on two truths that must be held together: the war is real and sometimes painful, yet the war has a guaranteed outcome. The phrase "may much prevail" is pastoral realism of the first order. The Divines are not describing a hypothetical possibility. They are describing the actual experience of the Apostle Paul, of David after Bathsheba, of Peter in the high priest's courtyard, of every believer who has ever known a season when sin seemed to have the upper hand. The Greek of Romans 7:23 speaks of being "brought into captivity," and the Divines do not soften that language. Corruption can prevail to the point where the believer feels himself a prisoner, where the habits he thought were broken reassert their mastery, where the progress he thought he was making evaporates and the old bondage returns with a force that mocks his former confidence. This is not a sign that sanctification has failed; it is a sign that the war described in Section 2 is genuine war, and in genuine war, battles are sometimes lost. But the conjunction is the turning point of the whole section: the temporary prevalence of corruption is not the final state. "Yet, through the continual supply of strength from the sanctifying Spirit of Christ, the regenerate part doth overcome." The word "continual" is crucial. The Spirit does not supply strength once and then depart, leaving the believer to manage on his own. The supply is ongoing, uninterrupted, always available for the asking: not a reservoir to be drawn down but a fountain that never ceases to flow. And the strength is supplied "from the sanctifying Spirit of Christ" — the Spirit whose particular office it is to make the believer holy. The Spirit who regenerated is the Spirit who sanctifies, and He does not begin a work He does not intend to finish. The phrase "the regenerate part doth overcome" deserves careful attention. The Divines do not say "the believer doth overcome" as though victory were a matter of native resolution. They do not say "the will doth overcome" as though the decisive factor were human determination. They identify the overcoming agent as "the regenerate part": the new nature created in Christ Jesus, the new man that was born of the Spirit in regeneration. This new nature is not a mere improvement of the old; it is a new creation, possessing new desires, new capacities, new affections, and, most importantly for this section, new strength. The regenerate part is not stronger than the flesh in its own right. But it is united to Christ. It is indwelt by the Spirit. It is nourished by the Word. And therefore, though it may be buffeted, though it may be driven back, though it may for a season seem to be overwhelmed, it will finally overcome. The victory is certain not because the new nature is intrinsically invincible but because the One who created it is faithful, and He supplies the strength by which it prevails. The outcome of this overcoming is twofold. First, "the saints grow in grace." The word "saints" is significant: it is the New Testament term for all believers, those set apart by God. Growth in grace is not the preserve of a spiritual elite; it is the common inheritance of every child of God. And the growth is in grace: not in self-righteousness, not in the moral improvement the natural man can achieve by discipline, but in a growing reliance upon the unmerited favour of God. The believer who is growing in grace is becoming more dependent, not less, more aware of his own insufficiency, not more confident in his own attainments. The progress of sanctification is, paradoxically, an advance in humility. Second, they are "perfecting holiness in the fear of God." The verb "perfecting" does not imply that they attain sinless perfection in this life; that error has already been excluded by Section 2's insistence that sanctification is "imperfect in this life." Rather, it means that they are being brought toward completeness, toward the full measure of holiness that is their destiny in Christ. The Greek of 2 Corinthians 7:1 uses epitelountes, a present participle suggesting ongoing, active pursuit: "perfecting holiness." The believer is engaged in a work of completion, and the work will not be done until glory. But it is real work, and it is measured work, and it is progressive work. And all of it is done "in the fear of God": not a servile terror that drives the soul from God's presence, but a reverent awe that remembers the holiness of the One before whom we live, the justice that sin deserves, and the mercy that has spared us from what we deserve. The fear of God is the atmosphere in which holiness flourishes. Remove the fear of God, and sanctification withers into moralism. Restore the fear of God, and sanctification becomes worship: the offering of the whole self to the One whose holiness is the standard and whose grace is the power.

Theological Depth

Owen devoted a lifetime to understanding what this section describes, not as a detached observer but as a man who knew the war from the inside. In his treatise on the mortification of sin, he insists that the believer must never interpret a temporary defeat as a final overthrow. The flesh may win a battle, but it cannot win the war, because the Captain of the Lord's host has already determined the outcome. Owen's counsel was intensely practical: the believer who has fallen must not lie where he has fallen. He must rise, confess the sin, apply afresh to the blood of Christ, and renew the engagement. The supply of the Spirit is not withdrawn because the believer has stumbled; it is precisely for such moments that the supply is given. And Owen was careful to distinguish between the presence of sin and the dominion of sin. The flesh may prevail for a time, may carry the believer into captivity as it carried Paul, and yet not reign. The difference is this: sin reigns when the will consents without resistance; sin prevails when the will consents under protest after a struggle. The very grief that follows a fall, the very shame that accompanies a defeat, is evidence that sin has not regained its throne. The king may win a skirmish, but he has not recovered his crown. Watson, in his Body of Divinity, takes up the phrase "grow in grace" and presses it with the warmth of a pastor who knows how readily believers mistake the absence of feeling for the absence of growth. Growth in grace, Watson observes, is not always perceptible to the one who is growing. A child does not see himself grow taller from day to day, but his father, returning after a journey, sees the change at once. So it is with the believer. He may feel that he is making no progress, that the same sins trouble him today that troubled him a decade ago, that the war is as fierce now as it was then. And yet there may be real growth that he does not perceive: a quicker sensitivity to sin, a deeper grief over it, a more instinctive turning to Christ in the moment of temptation, a gentler spirit in the face of provocation. These are the increments of grace, and though they are often invisible to the soul that possesses them, they are precious in the sight of God. Watson counsels the believer not to measure his growth by his feelings but by the fruits of the Spirit that others can observe in his life. A.A. Hodge, in his commentary on the Confession, draws attention to the logic of the three sections taken together. Section 1 establishes that sanctification is real and comprehensive: the whole man is renewed, and the dominion of sin is broken. Section 2 establishes that sanctification is imperfect: remnants of corruption remain in every part, and a continual war results. Section 3 establishes that sanctification is progressive and ultimately victorious: the regenerate part overcomes, growth in grace occurs, and holiness is perfected. Hodge insists that this threefold structure is not arbitrary but corresponds to the actual shape of the Christian life. The believer who knows only Section 1 — who has been taught that sin's power is broken but has not been taught that its presence remains — will be shattered by the first discovery of indwelling sin. The believer who knows only Section 2 — who is acutely aware of the war but has not grasped that victory is certain — will sink into despair, fighting without hope. And the believer who knows only Section 3 — who anticipates growth and victory but has not understood the reality of the struggle — will be unprepared when the battle intensifies. The pastoral wisdom of the Confession lies in holding all three together, and Hodge's exposition helps the reader see how each section corrects a particular imbalance. Robert Shaw, in his Exposition of the Confession of Faith, takes up the phrase "perfecting holiness" and traces its roots in the biblical language of completion. The Greek epitelountes in 2 Corinthians 7:1 carries the sense of bringing a task to its intended end. Shaw observes that the believer's holiness in this life is always a holiness in progress, not a holiness attained. It is like a building under construction: the foundation has been laid, the walls are rising, the shape of the finished edifice is already discernible, but the scaffolding is still up and the workmen are still on site. The perfection toward which the believer moves is the perfection of Christ Himself, and that perfection will not be fully realized until the day when the believer sees Christ as He is and is made like Him. But the movement toward that perfection is real, and it is the work of the Spirit in the present life. Shaw's emphasis on the progressive character of perfection guards against the despair that arises when believers measure themselves against an unattainable standard and conclude that because they have not arrived, they are not on the way. Taken together, these voices — Owen's pastoral realism, Watson's diagnostic warmth, Hodge's structural clarity, and Shaw's careful exegesis — converge on the same truth: the war of sanctification is real, sometimes painful, but ultimately triumphant. The believer fights not as one beating the air but as one whose Captain has already secured the field, and every advance in holiness is the Spirit's pledge that the work He began will be brought to completion.

Puritan Application

First, learn to interpret your defeats through the lens of this section, not through the lens of your feelings. There will be seasons, perhaps you are in one now, when the remaining corruption prevails. A sin you thought was conquered returns with unexpected force. A temptation you believed you had outgrown ambushes you in a moment of weakness. A habit you had put to death shows signs of life. In that hour, the natural conclusion is that you have never truly been sanctified, that your faith is a fraud, that the Spirit has abandoned you. The Confession meets that despair with a word of sober hope: temporary prevalence is not final dominion. The very war you are fighting is evidence that the Spirit is at work within you, for the dead do not fight and the unregenerate do not wage war against their sin. The Apostle Paul knew captivity, yet he was an apostle. David knew a fall that shook the kingdom, yet he was a man after God's own heart. Do not let a lost battle persuade you that the war is lost. Rise, confess the sin, plead the blood of Christ, and renew the conflict. The Spirit who supplied strength yesterday will supply strength today, and the supply is not diminished by your failure; it is magnified by your need. Second, distinguish carefully between the supply of the Spirit and the manufacture of your own resolutions. The Confession speaks of a "continual supply of strength" that comes from outside the believer: from the sanctifying Spirit of Christ. The danger in the Christian life is to receive this truth doctrinally while ignoring it practically. We hear that the Spirit supplies strength, and then we rise from our knees and set about the work of sanctification as though everything depended on our own discipline. We make resolutions, construct systems of accountability, impose regimens of self-denial, all good things in their place, but none of them the supply of the Spirit. The supply of the Spirit is received by faith, not manufactured by effort. It comes as we look to Christ in the Word and in prayer, as we depend consciously and continually upon the Spirit's enabling. The believer who tries to overcome the flesh by sheer force of will is like a man trying to row a great ship against the current with a single oar. The believer who relies upon the Spirit's supply is like the same ship with its sails spread to the wind: the effort is real, but the driving power comes from Another. Learn to pray not only for forgiveness after you fall but for strength before you fight. Learn to begin each day with a conscious acknowledgment of your dependence: "Lord, I cannot mortify this sin. I cannot cultivate this grace. I cannot resist this temptation. But Thou hast promised the continual supply of Thy Spirit, and I receive that supply now by faith, trusting Thee to do in me and through me what I cannot do myself." Third, let the certainty of victory shape your posture toward the present struggle. The Confession does not say "the regenerate part may overcome" or "the regenerate part shall overcome if the believer tries hard enough." It says "the regenerate part doth overcome": an indicative, a statement of fact that is as certain as the promise of God. Every true believer will persevere to the end. Every spark of grace kindled by the Spirit will be fanned into a flame that no power of hell can extinguish. The war is long, but the war has a determined outcome, and the outcome is not in doubt. This certainty is not meant to produce complacency; the war is real, and the believer who sleeps on the battlefield will wake up wounded. But it is meant to produce confidence. The soldier who knows his side will win can endure wounds that would break a man who fights without hope. You do not fight to earn the victory; the victory is already secured by Christ. You fight from the victory, not for it. And the same Lord who triumphed over principalities and powers at the cross, who led captivity captive and gave gifts unto men, will bring His campaign in your soul to its appointed conclusion. He who began a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ. Let that certainty steady your hands and strengthen your heart. The battle is fierce, but the Captain has never lost a soldier, and He will not begin with you. Fourth, pursue growth in grace as the positive counterpart of mortification. It is possible to become so absorbed in the negative work of putting sin to death that we neglect the positive work of cultivating righteousness. The Confession presents sanctification as a two-sided reality: the several lusts are weakened and mortified, and the believer is quickened and strengthened in all saving graces. The war is not only a defensive campaign of resisting temptation; it is an offensive campaign of growing in grace. Ask yourself: Am I more patient than I was a year ago? Do I love Christ more deeply? Is my faith more settled upon the promises? Do I pray with more freedom and fervency? Am I quicker to forgive, slower to take offense, more generous in my judgments of others? These are the graces in which we are called to grow, and growth in grace is as much the Spirit's work as mortification of sin. The believer who never examines the positive evidence of the Spirit's work may miss the very thing that would encourage him most: not the sins that have been subdued, but the graces that have been strengthened. The tree does not only need dead branches pruned; it needs live branches nourished. Feed your soul on the promises, dwell upon the excellencies of Christ, fill your mind with whatever is true and honourable and pure and lovely, and you will find that the positive cultivation of grace is the most effective strategy for the negative mortification of sin. As light displaces darkness, so grace displaces corruption. Fifth, and finally, let the fear of God be the atmosphere in which all your holiness is cultivated. The Confession closes with a phrase that can be easily overlooked: "in the fear of God." But the Divines did not add those words as an afterthought. The fear of God is the soul of sanctification. Without it, holiness becomes a project of self-improvement, a matter of pride in one's attainments or despair at one's failures. With it, holiness becomes worship: a response to the majesty and mercy of the God who has called us to Himself. Cultivate the fear of God by meditating on His holiness. Read Isaiah's vision in the temple and let the weight of that holiness press upon your soul until you know yourself to be a man of unclean lips. And then hear the gospel: the live coal from the altar has touched your mouth; your iniquity is taken away and your sin is purged. Read the account of the crucifixion and remember what your sin cost the Son of God. The fear of God is not the terror of a slave but the reverence of a son who knows the price of his redemption, who walks softly before the Father who spared not His own Son that He might spare him. Live in that fear, and your holiness will not be an anxious striving after an unreachable standard but a glad response to a grace that has already made you acceptable in the Beloved. For the soul that fears God, every act of obedience is an act of love, and every advance in sanctification is an advance toward the day when we shall see Him as He is, and be like Him.

Prayer

O Lord God Almighty, who art of purer eyes than to behold iniquity, and who alone canst make the unclean clean and the unholy holy, we bow before Thee as those who know the war within, who have felt the strength of remaining corruption and the bitterness of its temporary victories, and who confess that apart from the continual supply of Thy Spirit we can do nothing. We thank Thee that Thou hast not left us to fight in our own strength, that the Spirit of Christ dwells within us, and that His supply of grace is as constant as our need of it is continual. For every temptation Thou hast enabled us to resist, for every sin Thou hast helped us to mortify, for every grace Thou hast caused to grow in our barren hearts, we give Thee thanks, acknowledging that all our progress is Thy gift and all our victories are Thine. Yet, O Father, we mourn the slowness of our growth and the frequency of our defeats. The remaining corruption that abides in every part of our nature is a grief to our souls. We have allowed the flesh to prevail when the Spirit's strength was available for the asking. We have trusted our own resolutions when we should have trusted Thy supply. We have grown weary in the war and have sometimes laid down our arms as though the battle were lost. Forgive us, for Christ's sake, and restore unto us the joy of Thy salvation. Let not the memory of our defeats persuade us that the war is lost, for the victory is Thine and Thou hast pledged it to every soul in whom Thou hast begun a good work. The regenerate part shall overcome not because we are strong but because Thou art faithful, and the supply of the Spirit shall not fail until the work is done. Grant us, we beseech Thee, the grace of daily dependence. Teach us to begin each morning with an empty hand stretched out to receive what Thou alone canst give. When the enemy comes in like a flood, let the Spirit of the Lord lift up a standard against him. When the flesh promises pleasure, give us eyes to see the poison beneath the honey and the hook beneath the bait. When the world beckons with its vanities, remind us that the fashion of this world passeth away and that only he who doeth the will of God abideth for ever. And when we fall, as we have fallen and shall fall again until that day when sin shall be no more, lift us up, we pray, and set our feet once more upon the Rock that is higher than we. Let every fall teach us a deeper dependence and a truer humility, that we may learn to boast not in our own strength but in the Lord. Cause us to grow in grace, O Spirit of the living God. Deepen our faith until it rests with unshakeable confidence upon Christ alone. Enlarge our love until it embraces the unlovely and forgives the undeserving. Strengthen our hope until it pierces through the gloom of the present age and fixes upon the inheritance that is incorruptible and undefiled and fadeth not away. Perfect in us that holiness without which no man shall see the Lord, and let every advance in sanctification be to the praise of Thy glorious grace. Keep us, we pray, in the fear of God all the days of our pilgrimage. Let not our familiarity with holy things breed contempt, nor our experience of mercy breed presumption. Grant that we may walk before Thee with reverence and godly awe, remembering that Thou art a consuming fire to all who trifle with sin and a fountain of mercy to all who flee to Christ. Let the fear of God be the atmosphere in which our holiness is cultivated, the soil in which every grace is rooted, the motive that purifies our obedience from the leaven of self-righteousness. Bring us at last, O Lord, to that blessed state where the warfare shall be ended and the victory complete, where no remaining corruption shall trouble our peace and no temptation shall threaten our standing, where the Spirit's work shall be perfected and the image of Christ shall be fully formed in us, and where we shall see Thee face to face and be satisfied with Thy likeness. Until that day, keep us fighting the good fight, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despised the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God. In His name we pray, who ever liveth to make intercession for us. Amen.