Sanctification as Resurrection

In the earlier two posts, I have attempted to debunk a typical Western view of the Holy Spirit (as articulated by Augustine) and argued for a more Eastern view of the Holy Spirit, focusing on the work of the Holy Spirit specifically in Christian missiology. Now I want to explore a different aspect of the work of the Holy Spirit, namely sanctification - the theological term for the process by which believers become conformed more and more to the image of Christ. I use Luther's theologia crucis as a template because I think Luther makes excellent sense of the biblical picture of sanctification, especially as articulated by the apostle Paul. Once again, these are simply excerpts from a larger work of research. A full transcript of the paper can be obtained by contacting the author.


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The Christian church of the Western hemisphere, both Protestant and Catholic, owes an overwhelming theological debt to Martin Luther.[1] Albeit not single-handedly (but almost!), Luther violently shook the chains of papal oppression and found in Scripture the key that unlocked the shackles of medieval Catholic piety. “One thing, and only one thing,” Luther wrote in 1520, “is necessary for Christian life, righteousness, and freedom. That one thing is the most Holy Word of God, the gospel of Christ....”[2] Statements such as this – spoken into an ecclesiastical milieu of forced confessions, harsh penance, and expensive indulgences – scandalized the church and, in turn, the world. Yet not even excommunication and threats of death (issued the following year) could compel Luther to abandon his faith in Christ.

Luther developed his theology during his early years as a professor of Bible and parish priest at the Castle Church in Wittenburg. He called it the theologia crucis, “theology of the cross.” Simply put, Luther’s theologia crucis states that the law puts to death and the gospel brings to life. But how do these two dynamics work themselves out in the life of the believer? What is the role of the Holy Spirit? Using Luther’s theologia crucis as a guide, let us see how Scripture teaches us to properly understand the Holy Spirit’s relationship to the believer.

A Ruler for a Yardstick!

Just as both law and gospel were being spoken in the Law of Moses and the rest of the Hebrew Scriptures, so also both are spoken to us in the New Testament. Luther tacitly admits this:

But even though we are already in the New Testament and should have only the preaching of the Spirit, since we are still living in flesh and blood, it is necessary to preach the letter as well, so that people are first killed by the law and all their arrogance is destroyed. Thus they may know themselves and become hungry for the Spirit and thirsty for grace. ... These then are the two works of God, praised many times in Scripture: he kills and gives life, he wounds and heals, he destroys and helps, he condemns and saves, he humbles and elevates, he disgraces and honors, as it is written in Deuteronomy 32 [:39], I Kings 2 [I Sam. 2:6-8], Psalm 112 [:7-8], and in many other places. He does these works through these two offices, the first through the letter, the second through the Spirit.[3]

The central problem of sanctification occurs in how to accurately express the believer’s continued relationship to the law.[4] Christ has given a new command, to love one another. Yet Paul’s definition of love in 1 Corinthians 13 damns the human conscience just as much as the most stringent portions of Torah. The believer has simply exchanged Moses’ ruler for Jesus’ yardstick, for the law never commanded anyone to love one’s enemy!

The Holy Spirit Satisfies the Law

Before we lapse into despair, let us listen to Luther once again:

If God’s commandment, preached and explained as well as possible, is harmful and damning, as St. Paul says here, why then do the sophists and [Emser] pretend to make people godly with human teachings, with their own laws and an increase in good works? Indeed, since the law kills and condemns everything which is not grace and Spirit, they do no more with their many laws and works than to give the law much to kill and to condemn. Thus all their labor and effort is vain, and the more they do the worse they become; for it is impossible to satisfy the law with works and teachings. Only the Spirit can satisfy it. [emphasis added][5]

Now the light shines on us, and the dawning of the Son breaks in, for we have heard God’s voice! The law still puts the believer to death (an axiom that must still be believed!), but because she has been redeemed by Christ, the hammer of the law falls not on the believer but on the Holy Spirit of God.[6] And like Christ, the Spirit fulfills the law; for He is God Himself and not mere man. Therefore, the sanctification of the believer consists of a real, living, vibrant relationship with God the Creator because the Holy Spirit indwells her. And there is no longer a need to toil under the tyranny of law, but rather to humbly trust in the Holy Spirit to satisfy it on the believer’s behalf. Sanctification, like justification, is agreeing with God: agreeing that the law condemns on account of sin and the gospel vindicates on account of Christ. The letter kills, but the Spirit resurrects. Spirit, not self. Belief, not merit. Trust, not toil. Faith, not works.

Sanctification as Resurrection

Let us then formulate our pneumatology to reflect the principles of Luther’s theologia crucis, since the doctrine is biblical through and through. If Christ accomplishes the work of our salvation, not us: then it must also be the Spirit and not we ourselves who lives the salvific life. Let us look to Paul’s formulation of life in the Spirit:

For I through the law died to the law that I might live to God. I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.[7]

And we have such trust through Christ toward God. Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think of anything as being from ourselves, but our sufficiency is from God, who also made us sufficient as ministers of the new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.[8]

But you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. Now if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not His. And if Christ is in you, the body is dead because of sin, but the Spirit is life because of righteousness. But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you.[9]

To recapitulate the words of Paul: all humanity has sinned, merited death, and in point of fact, already died. To use Luther’s language, we might say that even though the outer man (i.e. the body) lives, the inner man is dead because of sin as revealed by the law; and one day the outer man will die as well. So the inner man is a lifeless corpse, a collection of dry bones, a pile of dust. The great surprise comes at the moment of conversion: when saving faith is placed in the person of Christ and in His work on the cross and in the empty tomb; when the very breath of God (i.e. – the Holy Spirit) enters the believer, just as He entered Adam at the very beginning.[10] This is what Paul calls the new creation (2 Cor. 5:17). Thus, the Spirit lives in and through the believer.[11]

Now, Paul articulates his point very carefully. We must be clear that the believer has no life of himself. He does not live; no, the Holy Spirit lives in him! So it would be inaccurate to say strictly that the believer is still dead, because the Spirit lives in him. But he is as good as dead, because the new life belongs not to the believer but to the Holy Spirit.[12] The man is simply a shell, a vessel, a clay jar in which has been placed the treasure of Christ.[13] The Holy Spirit is the active agent in doing good works.[14] Thus, sanctification, for the believer, is not so much contained in living more and more a new life but in realizing more and more that oneself has died and that the Spirit lives instead![15] Consider the words of Paul, “So then death is working is us, but life in you.”[16] Sanctification is the resurrection of the inner man,[17] a reality that will one day be realized in the outer man as well when the body is resurrected and the complete man, both inner and outer, is fully glorified.

Therefore He who supplies the Spirit to you and works miracles among you, does He do it by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith? – just as Abraham “believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness.” ... So then those who are of faith are blessed with believing Abraham.[18]

Just as faith is the vehicle by which the God’s saving grace is granted to the sinner, so faith is the vehicle by which God’s new life is granted to the believer. When the sinner trusts in Christ for salvation, then grace is given for justification; as the believer trusts the Holy Spirit for new life, grace is given for sanctification.[19] Put another way: justification occurs as the sinner places faith in the Son rather than self; sanctification occurs as the believer places faith in the Spirit rather than self.[20]

I believe that by my own reason or strength I cannot believe in Jesus Christ, my Lord, or come to him. But the Holy Spirit has called me through the Gospel, enlightened me with his gifts, and sanctified and preserved me in true faith, just as he calls, gathers, enlightens, and sanctifies the whole Christian church on earth and preserves it in union with Jesus Christ in the one true faith. In this Christian church he daily and abundantly forgives all my sins, and the sins of all believers, and on the last day he will raise me and all the dead and will grant eternal life to me and to all who believe in Christ. This is most certainly true.[21]

Finally, in all these things we must realize that faith is not an active choice of the human will but rather the gift of God, the working of the Spirit in the human heart.[22] In this way, the methodology of grace remains consistent from beginning to end.

Conclusion

So, like Luther, let us cast off all Aristotelian notions of sanctification as some sort of cosmic ladder by which we are climbing in righteousness from the terra firma of vice to the heavenly realms of virtue. Such a mindset relies on the knowledge of good and evil rather than the Spirit of the Living God. We have already eaten that fruit, and it poisoned us, even to death. Being dead, then, like Lazarus, let us rather hear the voice of Jesus calling us to come forth from the grave and trust in the Living God: realizing that, on the basis of the redeeming work of God the Son who died on our behalf and was raised to life again, God the Father has breathed His Holy Spirit into us; and trusting the Holy Spirit to live through our mortal flesh. Thus, our sanctification has nothing to do with piling up good deeds to impress our heavenly Father, but with submitting to the Holy Spirit as He lives the life of God Himself in and through us. I myself have died with Christ, spiritually, and will one day literally die; but the Spirit lives, and lives in me! Therefore, let us take up our cross and follow Jesus to the grave, trusting the Holy Spirit to glorify the Father in us and, at the last day, to raise us up in the very Presence of God for all eternity.

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[1] Robert Kolb, Martin Luther: Confessor of the Faith [Kolb], Christian Theology in Context, ser. ed. by Timothy Gorringe, Serene Jones, and Graham Ward (Oxford: Oxford University, 2009), p.41.

[2] Martin Luther, The Freedom of a Christian, Martin Luther’s Basic Theological Writings, edited by Timothy F. Lull [Luther] (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1989), p.597.

[3] Luther, Concerning the Letter and the Spirit, p.88.

[4] For a general discussion of this problem, see Bruce Demarest, The Cross and Salvation [Demarest], Foundations of Evangelical Theology, John S. Feinberg, gen. ed. (Wheaton, Crossway Books, 1997), p.420-424.

[5] Luther, Concerning the Letter and the Spirit, p.87.

[6] See Kolb, p.104, 130.

[7] Galatians 2:19-20, [NKJV].

[8] 2 Corinthians 3:4-6, [NKJV].

[9] Romans 8:9-11, [NKJV].

[10] Kolb sees in Luther the continuing dynamic of Creator-creature all the way through to the Spirit-believer relationship. See Kolb, p.28-29.

[11] John Chrysostom captures the idea perfectly: “This response reminds you that the one who is there does nothing by himself and that the gifts that are expected are in now way the works of man, but it is the grace of the Spirit that has descended on all of you that brings about this mystical sacrifice. There is no doubt that a man is present there, but it is God who acts through him” [emphasis added] Yves M. J. Congar, I Believe in the Holy Spirit, Vol.II: Lord and Giver of Life, trans. by David Smith (New York, Seabury, 1983), p.2. See also Basil the Great, On the Holy Spirit, trans. with notes by Rev. Blomfield Jackson, M.A., Nicene and Post-Nicene Father, Second Series, Vol. 8, ed. by Philip Schaff, D.D., LL.D. and Henry Wace, D.D. (Peabody: Hendrickson, 1999), p.31; David F. Wells, God the Evangelist: How the Holy Spirit Works to Bring Men and Women to Faith (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1987), p.33, 36; Luther, On the Councils and the Church, p.542-543.

[12] We diverge from Luther at this point, as he uses some language that seems to indicate that the believer shares in the ontology of holiness given by the Spirit. “Thus it is St. Paul’s opinion, I Timothy 1 [:9], that ‘the law is not laid down for the just,’ for the Spirit gives him everything that the law demands. Thus when he says, ‘God has made us preachers of the Spirit and not the letter,’ he means that in the New Testament only grace and not law should be preached, so that men truly become godly through the Spirit” (Luther, Concerning the Letter and the Spirit, p.89). This writer prefers to interpret Paul in such a way that the Spirit retains all ontology of righteousness in the life of the believer and to express the imputation of righteousness strictly in terms of the indwelling Spirit. Such a view requires acceptance of the paradox of self-death and Spirit-life; however, Paul’s claim concerning the exclusion of boasting in regard to personal holiness (Rom. 3:27) and the methodology of grace remains ontologically correct all the way through. This view has the added advantage in that the perils of Platonic/Gnostic philosophy are completely avoided in the discussion of flesh and spirit. Admittedly, it remains to articulate precisely the meaning of the Holy Spirit writing the law of God on the heart of man rather than tablets of stone, a discussion too detailed to be included here.

[13] See 2 Corinthians 4.

[14] See Kolb, p.156.

[15] Kolb claims that Jacques LeFèvre influenced Luther toward a classic Christian understanding of sanctification in the dual dynamic of mortification of flesh and vivification of spirit. Luther himself saw baptism in the death and resurrection motif worked out in the believer over a lifetime. See Kolb, p.69, 85. See also Demarest, p.409-410.

[16] 2 Corinthians 4:12 [NKJV].

[17] “Through the Spirit the believer dies to sin and is raised to new life in Christ” Wells, p.36.

[18] Galatians 3:5-9, [NKJV].

[19] Although Luther would probably agree, he articulated the liberation in justification and sanctification differently. He argues along the lines of recovered humanity and divine living rather than using such overt Trinitarian language. The two expressions are not incompatible. See Kolb, p.78; Luther, The Freedom of a Christian, p.612.

[20] This view of sanctification seeks to work out Luther’s general method of the turn from “self to God” (Kolb, 41). While this writer interprets differently some nuances of Pauline soteriology, we follow Luther’s heart and passion for Christ to receive all glory for the miracle of salvation.

[21] Luther, The Small Catechism, p.481. This is his explanation of the third article of the creed.

[22] Kolb, p.178.