As God’s chosen ones, all the believers in Christ are made the sons of God in full by His sanctifying Spirit. First, the Spirit sanctifies us positionally by working in our environment to bring us to salvation, and then He operates in us in a dispositional way to sanctify us dispositionally so that we may become sons of God in full.
Regeneration is only the beginning; God wants us to be His holy sons, the same as Christ in life and nature, and for this He dispenses Himself into us day after day to work His holy nature into us and make us the sonship.
God is dispensing Himself into us in a sanctifying way: He works Himself into us and sanctifies us by both separating us unto Himself and saturating us with His holy nature. However, we may not live in our sonship day-by-day because we may not care for the sanctifying Spirit’s speaking and working in our spirit.
We need to turn to our spirit, exercise our spirit, and learn to live according to the Spirit, and have our being altogether by the Spirit, so that we may live according to the Spirit all day long and be sanctified dispositionally to be the sons of God in full.
Then, we need to grow in life – we need to allow the life of Christ to grow in us and nurture this life by being properly nourished in the Spirit. We need to read the Bible, pray-read the word of God, and be in the word of God in a living way so that we may be nourished with God’s life and be sanctified in God’s word.
We need to listen to spiritual speaking, listening to messages that minister life and truth to us, so that we may be sanctified by the hearing of the faith. Also, we need to come to the meetings and overflow with the word of God we have enjoyed so that we may be sanctified corporately and help others be sanctified also.
May we go on in our Christian life to be sanctified for sonship more and more as we grow in life unto maturity, for the Lord to have a holy sonship that expresses Him corporately in humanity!
Being Sanctified by the Spirit unto Sonship by Living by the Spirit
Before we were born again, the Holy Spirit was sanctifying us by arranging all situations and things so that we may turn to the Lord and receive the gospel. After we received the Lord Jesus with His holy life and nature into us, sanctification for sonship is going on day by day.
Daily, the Spirit operates in us and around us to sanctify us and make us the holy sons of our Holy Father. In whatever situation we’re in, even when we can’t sleep at night or we’re bored during the day, the sanctifying Spirit within us is working in us and speaking to us all the time (see Rom. 15:16; 8:4; Eph. 5:26).
However, we may not live in our sonship because we may not care for the sanctifying Spirit’s speaking and working in our spirit. How much do we heed this constant continual work of the sanctifying Spirit in us? How sensitive are we to the Lord’s speaking? How obedient are we to His working within day by day?
It is not only in great things or big decisions, happenings, and crisis of our life that we need to listen to the Lord but it is in the daily ordinary times, when it seems that not much is happening….yet the Spirit is working and speaking.
Today we must learn to live by the Spirit and serve by the Spirit; we need to act according to the Spirit and have our whole being altogether by the Spirit, with the Spirit, and according to the Spirit all the day long (see Rom. 1:1, 9; 8:4; Phil. 3:3; Zech. 4:6).
How much do we really live, move, act, conduct ourselves, and speak by the Spirit during the day? Still not as much as we ought to. A lot of problems in the churches are due to the fact that we don’t live in the Spirit and we don’t serve by the Spirit, but we conduct ourselves in our natural man, by our self, and even degrading in the flesh with our opinions, preferences, and ideas.
We need to be refreshed and renewed. We need to be reminded day by day to turn to our spirit so that God would dispense His holy nature in our being and make us holy as God is holy. For us to be holy we need the holy element of God to be dispensed into us.
We need God’s holy element and holy nature to increase in us, and for this we need to cooperate with the Lord by turning to our spirit, being in our spirit, and doing everything in our spirit.
Lord Jesus, keep us in the process of sanctification unto sonship. Dispense Your holy element and holy nature into our being. Lord, we want to cooperate with Your sanctification. Save us from slowing down the process of sanctification in us. We want to learn to exercise our spirit, turn to our spirit, and serve in the Spirit. Lord, may our whole being be altogether by the Spirit, with the Spirit, and according to the Spirit all the day long!
Growing in the Life of Christ with the Proper Nourishment in the Spirit
As the Lord is sanctifying us both positionally and dispositionally, we need to cooperate with Him on the one hand to exercise our spirit and live according to the Spirit, and on the other hand, by being properly nourished so that we may grow in life.
After the divine birth, after we’re born again, we need to grow in the divine life of Christ with the proper nourishment in the Spirit. We can be nourished in three ways: by reading the holy word, by listening to the spiritual speaking, and by coming to the meetings (see John 8:31-32; Eph. 5:26; Rev. 2:7; Psa. 73:16-17, 22-26; 77:13).
As the church we are being washed and cleansed by the Lord’s sanctifying word (Eph. 5:26); this washing begins from the washing of regeneration and continues day by day as we read the Bible and exercise our spirit to take God’s sanctifying word in.
In God’s word is the Spirit; the essence of the word is the Spirit, the Holy Spirit. The essence of the word of God is holy. How can we be sanctified without coming to the holy word of God? How can we be washed without coming to the word?
This brings us to the question, How much time do we spend in the word of God every day? How much time do we spend in the word that washes us, sanctifies us, and makes us holy? We need to come to the word of God every day, no matter how many years we’ve been a Christian, and be washed, cleansed, and sanctified.
Also, we need to listen to spiritual speaking: listen to the speaking of the word of God, the proper interpretation of the Bible, the ministry of the word, the preaching of the gospel, and the cutting straight of the word of the truth.
We need to place ourselves again and again under the hearing of faith; seek to listen not just to studies of the Bible but life-studies, the messages that give you life. Then, when you will meet with the saints, you will be filled with the sanctifying word of God and you can speak this word to others.
In this way we will grow in life and participate in the divine sonship more and more so that the Father would have a pleasant household filled with growing-in-life-sons and sanctified children.
This should be a daily matter: daily we need to read the Bible, enjoy the Lord in His word, be nourished and washed in God’s word, listen to some spiritual speaking, and come to the meetings to overflow with the sanctifying and nourishing word of God.
Lord Jesus, we want to grow in the life of Christ with the proper nourishment in the Spirit. Your word is our food. We feed on Your nourishing, cleansing, and sanctifying word. Lord, wash us and cleanse us in Your word. Draw us to spend more time with You in Your love letter in the Bible. We choose to be under the hearing of the faith, being infused with the words of this life. Then, we want to overflow with the enjoyment in God’s word, the sanctifying word which has been wrought into us!
References and Hymns on this Topic
- Inspiration: the Word of God, my Christian experience, bro. Minoru Chen’s sharing in the message for this week, and portions from, The Issue of the Dispensing of the Processed Trinity and the Transmitting of the Transcending Christ (ch. 1), as quoted in, the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, The Vision, Practice, and Building up of the Church as the Body of Christ, week 1 / msg 1, God’s Purpose for the Church (1) To Have the Divine Sonship in Full through Sanctification for the Corporate Expression of God.
- Picture credit for Ephesians 1:3 and more spiritual quotes via, Christian Pictures Blog.
- Hymns on this topic:
# Oh, sanctify us, Lord; now add Thyself to us, / In our experience, Thy Person spread in us, / That in reality the church be glorious, / O Lord, do add Thyself, we pray. (Hymns #1135)
# Reading the Bible— / I love the Word of God! / Reading the Bible— / I love the Word of God! / Every verse reveals Yourself to me, / Every line conveys reality. / When I pray the words that You breathed out / You become so real to me. (Song on Reading the Bible)
# How we thank Thee that Thy holy Word / With Thy nature, saturates us; / From the world it separates us. / Thank Thee, Father, for Thy holy Word. (Hymns #1081)
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