Acting the Miracle E-Book

• Herausgeber: Crossway
• Kategorie: Religion und Spiritualität
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 260

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2013

Beschreibung

Sanctification  |  noun  |  sa(k)-t-f-k-shn : a big word for the little-by-little progress of the everyday Christian life Fighting sin is not easy. No one ever coasted into greater godliness. Christian growth takes effort. But we are not left alone. God loves to work the miracle of sanctification within us as we struggle for daily progress in holiness. With contributions from Kevin DeYoung, John Piper, Ed Welch, Russell Moore, David Mathis, and Jarvis Williams, this invigorating book will help you say no to the deception of sin and yes to true joy in Jesus.

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“I love this book. One meets real holiness here, and it has real drawing power. C. S. Lewis said it well when he quipped, ‘How little people know who think holiness is dull. When one meets the real thing, it is irresistible.’ The content in these chapters awakened within me a deeper hungering and thirsting for righteousness. I pray it will cause those same hunger pangs to spread so that many more will taste and see that the Holy One himself is an irresistible treasure.”

Jason C. Meyer, Pastor for Preaching and Vision, Bethlehem Baptist Church, Minneapolis

“The Reformed view of sanctification has resonated with me for a long time. More importantly, it is biblically rooted, realistic, and hopeful, and it doesn’t fall into the error of perfectionism. Now we have a wonderfully accessible presentation of the Reformed view of sanctification. The scriptural support for a progressive view of sanctification is persuasively made. The realistic struggle that characterizes our lives is set forth, and the hope we have in Christ Jesus is proclaimed. I was encouraged and convicted in reading this work.”

Thomas R. Schreiner, James Buchanan Harrison Professor of New Testament Interpretation, Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, Louisville

“A great combination of theological insight and practical advice on one of the most important of all Christian doctrines.”

Douglas J. Moo, Wessner Chair of Biblical Studies, Wheaton College

“The Reformed and evangelical mind has recently concentrated much attention on the doctrines of justification and adoption, with many salutary effects. In some instances, however, concentration has degenerated into myopia, resulting in the distortion of the doctrine of sanctification. The present collection of essays is a helpful remedy to this situation. With chapters that are richly biblical, Christ-centered, and humane, Acting the Miracle refocuses our attention on the place and purpose of sanctification among the manifold works of the triune God. Readers will find this book both theologically and pastorally satisfying.” 

Scott R. Swain, Associate Professor of Systematic Theology and Academic Dean, Reformed Theological Seminary, Orlando

“This book is theologically informed and pastorally wise. It helpfully distinguishes and defines definitive and progressive sanctification, and it shrewdly shows how to approach Christian living without being reductionistic.”

Andy Naselli, Assistant Professor of New Testament and Biblical Theology, Bethlehem College and Seminary, Minneapolis

Acting the Miracle

Other Desiring God Conference books:

Finish the Mission: Bringing the Gospel to the Unreached and Unengaged, 2012

Thinking. Loving. Doing.: A Call to Glorify God with Heart and Mind, 2011

With Calvin in the Theater of God: The Glory of Christ and Everyday Life, 2010

The Power of Words and the Wonder of God, 2009

Stand: A Call for the Endurance of the Saints, 2008

The Supremacy of Christ in a Postmodern World, 2007

Suffering and the Sovereignty of God, 2006

Sex and the Supremacy of Christ, 2005

A God-Entranced Vision of All Things: The Legacy of Jonathan Edwards, 2004

Acting the Miracle: God’s Work and Ours in the Mystery of Sanctification

Copyright © 2013 by Desiring God

Published by Crossway

1300 Crescent StreetWheaton, Illinois 60187

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher, except as provided for by USA copyright law.

Cover design: Matt Naylor

First printing 2013

Printed in the United States of America

Unless otherwise indicated, Scripture quotations are from the ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway. 2011 Text Edition. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Scripture quotations marked NASB are from The New American Standard Bible®. Copyright © The Lockman Foundation 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995. Used by permission.

Scripture references marked NKJV are from The New King James Version. Copyright © 1982, Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission.

Scripture references marked NRSV are from The New Revised Standard Version. Copyright © 1989 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the U.S.A. Published by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the U.S.A.

All emphases in Scripture quotations have been added by the authors.

Trade paperback 978-1-4335-3787-5PDF ISBN: 978-1-4335-3788-2Mobipocket ISBN: 978-1-4335-3789-9ePub ISBN: 978-1-4335-3790-5

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Acting the miracle : God’s work and ours in the mystery of sanctification / John Piper and David Mathis, editors.

pages cm

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-1-4335-3787-5 (tp)

1. Sanctification. 2. Spiritual formation. 3. Christian life.

I. Piper, John, 1946– II. Mathis, David, 1980–

BT765.A18                           2013

234'.8—dc23                                                          2013011772

Crossway is a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers.

VP           23    22    21    20    19    18    17    16    15    14    13

15    14   13    12    11    10    9     8    7    6     5    4    3     2    1

To Scott Anderson, who pioneered our National Conference a decade ago, serves as our host and emcee at Desiring God events, leads the team daily as our executive director, and weathers the waves of affliction, “sorrowful, yet always rejoicing” (2 Corinthians 6:10).

Contents

Contributors

Introduction: The Search for Sanctification’s Holy Grail

David Mathis

1Prelude to Acting the Miracle: Putting Sanctification in Its PlaceJohn Piper2Incentives for Acting the Miracle: Fear, Rewards, and the Multiplicity of Biblical MotivationsKevin DeYoung3

Sinners Learning to Act the Miracle: Restoring Broken People and the Limits of Life in the Body

Ed Welch

4

Acting the Miracle in the Everyday: Word of God, Means of Grace, and the Practical Pursuit of Gospel Maturity

Jarvis Williams

5

Acting the Miracle Together: Corporate Dynamics in Christian Sanctification

Russell Moore

Conclusion: Act the Miracle: Future Grace, the Word of the Cross, and the Power of God’s Promises

John Piper

Appendix: Conversation with the ContributorsAcknowledgmentsA Note on desiringGod.org

Contributors

Kevin DeYoung is pastor of University Reformed Church in Lansing, Michigan, where he has served since 2004. He is a council member of The Gospel Coalition and author of Just Do Something: A Liberating Approach to Finding God’s Will, as well as (on the topic of sanctification) The Hole in Our Holiness: Filling the Gap between Gospel Passion and the Pursuit of Godliness. Kevin and his wife, Trisha, have five children (Ian, Jacob, Elizabeth, Paul, and Mary).

David Mathis is executive editor at Desiring God and an elder at Bethlehem Baptist Church, Minneapolis. He is a graduate of Furman University, Greenville, South Carolina, and is completing a distance degree with Reformed Theological Seminary. He is editor of Thinking. Loving. Doing.: A Call to Glorify God with Heart and Mind and Finish the Mission: Bringing the Gospel to the Unreached and Unengaged. He and his wife, Megan, have twin sons (Carson and Coleman).

Russell Moore is president of the Southern Baptist Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission. He is author of Adopted for Life: The Priority of Adoption for Christian Families and Churches, as well as Tempted and Tried: Temptation and the Triumph of Christ. He is married to Maria, and they have five sons.

John Piper is founder of and teacher for Desiring God and chancellor of Bethlehem College and Seminary in Minneapolis. For over thirty years, he was senior pastor at Bethlehem Baptist Church. He is author of over fifty books, including Desiring God, The Pleasures of God, Don’t Waste Your Life, Seeing and Savoring Jesus Christ, and (on the topic of sanctification) Future Grace: The Purifying Power of the Promises of God. John and his wife, Noël, have five children and twelve grandchildren.

Ed Welch is a faculty member at the Christian Counseling and Education Foundation (CCEF) and has been counseling for almost thirty years. He has written extensively on depression, fear, and addiction, and his books include When People Are Big and God Is Small and (most recently) Shame Interrupted. Ed and his wife, Sheri, have two married daughters and four grandchildren.

Jarvis Williams is associate professor of New Testament interpretation at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky. He is the author of One New Man: The Cross and Racial Reconciliation in Pauline Theology and For Whom Did Christ Die: The Extent of the Atonement in Paul’s Theology. He is married to Ana, and they have a son (Jaden).

Introduction

The Search for Sanctification’s Holy Grail

David Mathis

Sanctification talk is notorious. If you’ve made the rounds in Christian circles for long enough, you know. You know.

Gather a dozen thoughtful, biblically and theologically informed Jesus followers. Steer the conversation in the direction of sanctification—what it is and how you pursue it practically. Then take a step back, watch, listen, and give it some time.

If you let the discussion go long enough, and it gets into just about any detail, you’ll soon be able to discern a dozen distinct perspectives on the nitty-gritty of sanctification.

Opinions on sanctification are like elbows, some might say. Everybody’s got ’em.

Sanctification Gets Personal

As much as any Christian doctrine, sanctification gets personal—indirectly when we talk about the what, and then in particular when we address the how. As soon as we’re saying what sanctification is, it’s inevitable that the lines soon must be drawn to how we live. And the more defensive we are about our way of life, the less open we tend to be about having Scripture revise our notions about sanctification.

At the level of definition, as John Piper will explain in more detail in chapter 1, the fancy English word sanctification is simpler than it sounds. It’s built on the Latin word sanctus, meaning “holy.” Sanctification is the modest theological term we Christians typically use to refer to the process of being made holy.1 For the Christian, whose standard of perfect human holiness is Jesus, the God-man, sanctification is essentially becoming more like Jesus—“conformed to the image of his Son,” as Romans 8:29 puts it.

Another way to talk about sanctification is Christian growth or maturation. It’s a big word for the little-by-little progress of the everyday Christian life. It encompasses how every professing Christian should be living, where holiness is heading, how fast the progress should be, and how it happens in real life.

Look up. Can you see the controversies swirling overhead?

It’s Just Complicated

Not only is it personal, but sanctification talk also gets prickly quickly because it immediately involves so many massive realities in the Christian worldview and their coming together in daily life: grace and works; law and gospel; faith and the Holy Spirit; Christian obedience and pleasing God; love and good deeds. The stakes are high. Weak spots in our theology will turn up, before long, in our understanding of sanctification. It doesn’t take long before a wacky doctrine elsewhere begins to mess with our doctrine of holiness. True, Christian theology is a seamless garment, and every doctrine eventually relates to every other, but sanctification calls the question faster than the others and has the tendency to accentuate our problem areas.

But the fact that sanctification gets personal so quickly, and theologically complicated so fast, doesn’t mean sanctification talk is to be avoided. On the contrary, it means that it’s all the more important. We neglect careful, biblically informed reflection on this doctrine to our detriment, to the minimizing of our love toward others, and to the diminishing of the glory of God. Difficult as it can be, we must venture to speak about these things. We must talk sanctification.

Two Types of Sanctification

To make things a touch more complicated, the New Testament has two ways of talking about sanctification. For starters, we should clarify that this is a book mainly about the sanctification that theologians call progressive. Even though the biblical texts bear out two types, Christians throughout the centuries have found it most helpful in theological discussion to refer to the progressive type as simply “sanctification.” But the Scriptures also teach us about a kind of sanctification we can call “definitive.”

Definitive sanctification is the status of holiness we receive simultaneous with conversion and justification.2 It is the setting apart of believers, reliant on the holiness of Jesus, such that even the most unholy of those who truly have faith can be considered “saints” (holy ones, Rom. 1:7 and 1 Cor. 1:2) because they are “in” Jesus, the Holy One. “Sanctify” is used in this definitive sense in Hebrews (9:13–14; 10:10; 13:12), as well as in Paul, who says to the Corinthians, “you were sanctified” (1 Cor. 6:11). It is this definitive sanctification that marks the clean break with sin we hear about in Romans 6:11 (“Consider yourselves dead to sin”), Galatians 2:20 (“I have been crucified with Christ”), and Colossians 3:3 (“you have died”), among other texts.

But sanctification is also progressive. We are increasingly “set apart” as we progress in actual holiness, which flows from the spiritual life we have in Jesus by faith. This is the way the term sanctification is typically used theologically, and this is the focus of this book.

Piper will add more in the first chapter, but for now, suffice it to say that we are aware of, and greatly appreciative of, the often overlooked doctrine of definitive sanctification. We lament with David Peterson that “definitive sanctification is a more important theme in the New Testament than has generally been acknowledged,”3 but for our purposes in this book, take sanctification in the normal theological parlance of progressive sanctification, unless otherwise noted.

Beware of Slogans

Because of the inherent complexity of sanctification, involving not only these two types but also all these moving pieces (Jesus’s person and work, the Spirit’s work, faith, our works, grace, law, gospel, obedience, and more), there is a great temptation to oversimplify things. Because sanctification with all its tentacles feels like an octopus larger than we can comfortably tame, we may prefer our own little theological house pets that we can train and remain captain of. It’s nice to have a slogan that can keep it simple for stupid humans and make us feel like we’re in control.

Enticing as it sounds—and convicting as it may be to hear about if you’ve tried it—the well of sanctification reductionisms soon runs dry. “Let go and let God”—it won’t be long before that creates some problems. “Simply obey”—that won’t do it either. Nor will attaining some “second work of grace.” “Just get used to your justification”—attractive, yes, but there’s another reductionism at work here.

It’s as if we find the biblical data to be just too numerous and complicated, and what we really need is to search for sanctification’s holy grail. It must be out there somewhere—surely, there’s some quick fix, some theological secret to discover, some doctrinal key that unlocks what holiness really is and how to have it.

But if there’s any key to sanctification, it’s this: abandon your search for the key. At least abandon the search for a shortcut. Let your quest for the holy grail of sanctification end right here and right now and commit to a sanctification not of only, but of all—all the Scriptures, all of Christian theology, all the Bible’s salvific pictures, and, most ultimately, all of Jesus.

Simply Getting Used to Justification?

For one, let’s take a reductionism prevalent in the broadly Reformed community with which many readers of this book associate: the holy grail of justification by faith alone. One Lutheran spokesman, whom some Reformed would happily echo, says that sanctification is “simply the art of getting used to justification.”4

Just off several years’ fighting back a fresh assault on justification from various new perspectives on Paul, this precious doctrine, which became the occasion for Martin Luther to pioneer a sorely needed reformation, has become especially dear to many of us. So justification as a silver bullet for sanctification is enticing to those of us who love double imputation, Jesus’s “alien” righteousness, and making much of God’s free grace toward the ungodly.

The best possible meaning of such a slogan would have in view not just justification but the full panoply of initial and ongoing graces applied to the believer at the outset of the Christian life—new birth, faith and repentance, justification, definitive sanctification, adoption, and more. It would be better to say that progressive sanctification is based on definitive sanctification. Christian growth means learning to live like who we already are in Jesus, living out in and through us the holiness that is already ours in him.

But even on this best possible reading, there is so much more to be said, and this epithet for sanctification ends up betraying a sloppy understanding of justification or sanctification or both. Justification by faith alone is a beautiful, wonderful, essential doctrine, worth defending to the death. If we had the space, I’d love to give some extended effort here to celebrating this vital doctrine. True Christian theology can’t do without it and must not minimize it in any way. It is an essential aspect of our relationship to Jesus. But it’s not the whole. The Scriptures have much more to say to us than simply get to know your justification. That way of saying it is careless at best, if not tragically misguided. What we need for practical sanctification is not one Christian doctrine, but all of them. Not one or a handful of Christian Scriptures, but every one. Not part of Jesus, but the whole Christ.

Union to the Rescue?

In response to such a reductionistic fixation on the doctrine of justification, a fresh wave of voices claim to have found the grail in another place, perhaps even more pious than justification, believe it or not. They rightly emphasize the reality and importance of our union with Christ. The best of these voices will not play union over and against justification, but note that union with Christ is “the big category” for the Holy Spirit’s application of Jesus’s redemptive work to us and that justification, sanctification, regeneration, adoption, and glorification are “aspects” of our union with Jesus by faith. Yes.

Since union with Christ “may be the most important doctrine you’ve never heard of,”5 and since sanctification is one aspect of our union with Christ, it may be helpful here not to assume your familiarity but to provide a brief introduction to this important doctrine.6

Simply put, union with Christ is the theological term for the believer’s being joined to Jesus by the Holy Spirit through faith. In fulfillment of God’s ancient promise, I will be your God, and you will be my people, it is “the most general way of characterizing Jesus’s work of salvation.”7 The way in which all that Jesus accomplished for us gets applied to us is through our being connected to Jesus, our being “in” him. The occasion of this connection is faith, and the agent of this connection is the Holy Spirit. Our union with Jesus is part and parcel of the covenantal relationship between Jesus and his bride in which the two become one—and what God truly has joined together, no man may separate.

Again, our faith union with Jesus is how the objective accomplishments of his life, death, and resurrection two millennia ago come to be subjectively applied to other humans, whether Peter, Paul, Mary, Augustine, Luther, Spurgeon, or believers in the twenty-first century. John Murray memorably captures this important distinction of the objective and subjective in the title of his book Redemption: Accomplished and Applied.8 Our redemption was accomplished by Jesus in the past, and it is applied to us by the Spirit in our present.

Keep these two categories clear: Jesus’s objective achievement and our subjective reception by faith through the Spirit. To put it simply and generally, our union with Jesus by faith is the way in which all that he has purchased for us is given to us. Specific aspects, then, of this general union include regeneration, justification, sanctification, adoption, and glorification. In a book on sanctification, it is important to see that sanctification is one aspect of our union with Jesus, alongside other vitally essential aspects.

Joined to Jesus

The apostle Paul alone references our being “in Christ” in some form over 160 times. Draw in the apostle John and his own way of saying it, and you have well over two hundred references, in just these two writers, of believers’ being “united” to Jesus.

The two prevailing ways in which the New Testament speaks of our union with Jesus are (1) our being in him, and (2) his being in us. Paul says in Ephesians 1:3 that it is “in Christ” that Christians have “every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places”—including sanctification—and that the Father “chose us in him before the foundation of the world” (v. 4). In 2 Corinthians 5:17 Paul says, “If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation.” He says in Philippians 3:8 that he has “suffered the loss of all things and count[s] them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him.” It is “in him” that we “become the righteousness of God” (2 Cor. 5:21), and only “in Christ Jesus” do we have “wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption” (1 Cor. 1:30).

But union with Christ means not only that we are “in him,” but also that he is “in us.” Paul writes in Romans 8:10, “If Christ is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness,” and he declares in Galatians 2:20, “I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me.” When Paul challenges the Corinthians, “Examine yourselves, to see whether you are in the faith,” he tells them, “Test yourselves. Or do you not realize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you?” (2 Cor. 13:5). In Colossians 1:27 he celebrates “the riches of the glory of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.”

Since union with Christ means not only that the believer is “in” Jesus but also that Jesus is “in” him, it should be no surprise to find several passages from John that combine both ideas.

By this we know that we abide in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit. (1 John 4:13)

Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me, and I in him. (John 6:56)

The classic passage may be from John 15. In the words of Jesus,

Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me.I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.If anyone does not abide in me he is thrown away like a branch and withers; and the branches are gathered, thrown into the fire, and burned.If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. (John 15:4–7)

The Help and the Hitch of Union with Christ

So there’s just a taste of the bigness and biblical prevalence of union with Christ. But the specific topic before us is sanctification. So let’s make some connections. Sinclair Ferguson claims, “Of all the doctrines surrounding the Christian life this, one of the profoundest, is also one of the most practical in its effects.”9 How is it that the doctrine of union with Christ is so practically helpful in our progressively becoming like Jesus?

Again here’s Ferguson:

When we are joined to him there is also a sense in which his life and power become available to us to transform our lives. We may even go as far as to say that when we are united to Christ, the whole of his past life is made available to us, not simply to compensate for our past (by way of pardon) but actually to sanctify our present lives, so that our own past may not inescapably dominate our present Christian life. We, who in the past have marred the image of God by sin, may gaze into the face of Christ and discover that the power of our own past sin may not destroy us in the present.10

There is a fullness in our union with Jesus that provides a richness of resources for our blessing and worship and growth. There is a multidimensionality to this union, as it is fleshed out in its various aspects, that meets us where we are in our process of becoming more like Jesus and helps move us forward.

And there’s more. This is Anthony Hoekema:

One of the ways in which the doctrine of union with Christ is helpful is in enabling us to preserve a proper balance between two major aspects of the work of Christ: what we might call the legal and the vital aspects. The Western branch of the Christian church, represented by such theologians as Tertullian and Anselm, tended to emphasize the “legal” side of Christ’s work. . . . The Eastern wing of the church, however, represented by such theologians as Irenaeus and Athanasius, was more inclined to stress the “vital” or “life-sharing” side of Christ’s work.11

Union with Christ helps us to see and be reminded that Jesus isn’t just our righteousness but also our holiness—he is “the Holy and Righteous One” (Acts 3:14). And he is not just our holiness but also our life. And he isn’t just our life but also our righteousness. Union reminds us to embrace the whole Christ for all his benefits rather than just picking a favorite and crafting a slogan. You can’t have him for justification without having him for sanctification.

So this often neglected but practically powerful doctrine of the believer’s union with Jesus is vital for sanctification. Then have we found our silver bullet? Was the warning above about avoiding sanctification sloganeering and reductionisms issued prematurely? Might union with Christ be the holy grail?

Here’s the hitch. Union with Christ ends up being a very nondescript way of talking. Perhaps you’re already sensing this from what I’ve written (or not written) in this introduction. As theologian John Frame observes, union with Christ is “the most general way of characterizing Jesus’s work of salvation. . . . [It is] an exceeding broad topic.”12 It’s a glorious generality and is meant by God to be gloriously general, but it doesn’t carry inherently the specificity of its various aspects—regeneration, justification, sanctification, adoption, glorification. Indeed, as Frame says, union with Christ and being “in” Christ “are the most general things that can be said about us as [God’s] people.”13 The way in which we flesh out in more detail what it means to be united to Jesus is to address the blessings of justification, sanctification, regeneration, and glorification. The strengths and weaknesses of union lie in its being the broad category that includes the other benefits. And the strengths and weaknesses of sanctification lie in its specificity as an aspect of that union. We mustn’t play the two off each other. So where to from here?

Room for Reliance

As important and helpful as the doctrine of union with Christ is, this one doctrine is not sanctification’s holy grail. We’re back to a sanctification of all, not only. We return to the truth that what is needed for Christian sanctification is not some silver-bullet doctrine or fresh slogan or new overriding emphasis, but the whole of the Bible and the whole of Christian theology and the whole of Jesus. The same Jesus who is our righteousness for justification is the same Jesus who is our holiness for sanctification—both definitive and progressive—is the same Jesus we’re united to by faith to receive those priceless graces.

By virtue of our Spirit-powered faith union with Jesus, we have the new-creation spiritual life of regeneration, and the righteousness of justification, and the holiness of sanctification, and the familial affection and privilege of adoption, and the honor of glorification. This is big. It gets complicated. There are so many ducks that it’s hard to get them all in a row—and that’s just the way God would have it. After all, he is the sanctifier, not we. He would rather we always lean on him for holiness than supposing we have it figured out.

Where’s the Spirit in All This?

Before closing this introduction, it’s worth asking, What is the role of the Holy Spirit in all our talk about sanctification? Sometimes our sense of fairness is irked by how often Jesus and the Father get mentioned while the Holy Spirit seems to remain out of view. This may not be all bad.

It can be helpful to think of the Spirit as the self-effacing member of the Trinity. In John 16:14, Jesus describes the main “job” of the Spirit this way: “He will glorify me.” There is something intrinsically mystical about the Spirit, as John 3:8 intimates: “The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.” Graham Cole, even in writing a long book about the Spirit, acknowledges this elusiveness:

What God has made known concerning the divine name, will, and ways we know truly but not exhaustively. As for the Spirit, the mystery deepens. For . . . the Spirit points away from himself to another. Thus there is an elusiveness about the Spirit when thematized as the object of inquiry.14

As there is a sense of the mystical and elusiveness to our union in Christ, so also with the Spirit who effects and sustains that union. In particular, the Spirit is elusive and self-effacing by relentlessly drawing attention to Jesus’s person and work. So “the power of the Holy Spirit” (Rom. 15:13; see also 15:19; 1 Cor. 2:4; Eph. 1:16) often is known explicitly by other terms, such as “the power of the gospel” (see Rom. 1:16). It’s not as though the gospel as a mere message has an inherent power apart from the power of the personal Spirit. The reason there is power in the gospel is that the Holy Spirit works through that Jesus-glorifying message.

So also “the power of the cross” (see 1 Cor. 1:17, 18, 24). In and of itself, the cross, or any news about a cross, isn’t powerful. But God himself, in the particular person of the Holy Spirit, possesses power and has chosen to do his most direct and potent work in and through and alongside the preaching of a crucified Messiah, who was dead and is now alive. Which brings us at last to the great goal of sanctification.

The Beginning and End of Sanctification