The Steps of Biblical Sanctification

You probably hear a lot about God’s sanctifying work in your life through His Word. But what does that process look like? How do you know if the living truth of Scripture is actually at work in your life? How do you know that God’s Word has actually taken root in your life?

To help you understand your own spiritual growth and how God’s Word works in your life, I want to highlight the key steps in the process of sanctification with three simple words.

The first is cognition. God’s pattern for spiritual growth starts with understanding what the Bible says and what it means. The meaning of the Scripture is the Scripture—if you don’t know what it means, you don’t have the truth. So the process of spiritual growth starts with understanding what the Bible says.

Many years ago as a child, the importance of knowing and understanding God’s Word was impressed upon me. I began to read my Bible repetitiously—day after day, over and over. The further I went, the more connections I was able to draw from book to book. After a few years, I was overwhelmed with the understanding that the Bible is its own interpreter. And you can see that conviction borne out in my teaching to this day.

True sanctification begins with renewing your mind. You must know the truth, plain and simple. There’s no premium on ignorance in sanctification. You’re not going to get there through some emotional or mystical experience. Spiritual growth won’t happen by osmosis—it requires the discipline of constantly putting God’s truth in your mind.

Don’t confuse childlike faith with childish thinking. There are no shortcuts in sanctification—a lack of biblical knowledge will always retard your spiritual growth. Apart from the truth of Scripture, there simply is no mechanism to restrain your sinful flesh. Legalism can’t do it. Pragmatism can’t either. The same goes for mysticism and sacramentalism. The only certain method for true spiritual growth starts with absorbing God’s eternal truth.  Continue at John MacArthur

Holy Cow: The Holiness of Hindu Herds by Clint Archer

The apogee of Hinduism extends far beyond the borders of India. And though Hindus do not proselytize (most believe you need to be born Indian to be Hindu), the religion is exported with the emigration of its adherents. Our church is nestled near the epicenter of the largest population of Indians outside of India—Durban, South Africa. Hinduism is not monolithic, it is a chaotically diverse kaleidoscope of beliefs, attitudes, and practices. It is mystical and enigmatic, but it does contain certain threads of commonality woven throughout its diversity. These threads reveal a religion that is fundamentally flawed as a deadly trap of false hope, with tragic results in this life and the life to come. I wanted to share one tenant which makes this religion harmful to its adherents, namely the famishing fetish they have with the sacred cow.

Most Westerners can hardly tell the difference between any old cow and the sacred cow of India. This ignorance is excusable when one considers how ordinary the holy cow seems. It grazes, chews the cud, and after allowing for the masticated mess to move through the seven sacred stomachs, it fertilizes the field just as any other cow would. If one were tramping through that field—or were a pedestrian in Delhi—and happened to plant your foot in that freshly fertilized spot, you might fail to appreciate the privilege of encountering a holy cow pie. And every report I’ve heard from visitors to India include a special mention for the ubiquitous postprandial packages strewn all over the city streets. So holiness is often in the eye of the beholder. To a Hindu Indian the cow represents something wholly different than it does to, say the average MacDonald’s customer.    Keep Reading...