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Abundant Life in the Son: A Study of Salvation

affections are made holy: “Be devoted to one another in brotherly love”
(Romans 12:10). And finally, the will is surrendered to the will of God
and this gives the believer the power to achieve God’s purpose, “For it is
God who works in you to will and to act according to his good purpose”
(Philippians 2:13).

Paul exhorted the believers in Rome: “Do not offer the parts of your
body to sin, as instruments of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves
to God…and offer the parts of your body to him as instruments of
righteousness” (Romans 6:13). Sanctification is for all those who make
up the church. “Christ loved the Church and gave himself up for her to
make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the
word” (Ephesians 5:25–26). He did this so that He might present the
church to himself in all its beauty—“radiant…without stain or wrinkle
or any other blemish, but holy and blameless” (v. 27).

The Experience of Sanctification

The Bible teaches that the baptism in the Holy Spirit is an experience
which normally follows regeneration (Acts 2:38). We see a variation
to this pattern in Acts 10:44–46, when the household of Cornelius
experienced both regeneration and Spirit baptism on the same occasion.
The purpose of the baptism in the Spirit is to give power for service
(Acts 1:8). In contrast to this, the purpose for sanctification is to produce
the kind of right living that reflects a person’s relationship to God and
causes him or her to grow spiritually.

Some people view sanctification as a separate crisis experience which
occurs in a person’s spiritual nature. They believe that some time after
the new birth a person is made instantly perfect from all sin. They claim
that this experience, which involves a decision to be sanctified, brings
the soul into a state of perfected holiness and includes freedom from
sin and corruption and perfect dedication to God. They insist that this
instant perfection is the result of the baptism in the Holy Spirit (which
they say is the same as sanctification).

Those who believe that baptism in the Holy Spirit results in instant
perfection (entire sanctification) refer to 1 John 3:8–9 in support of their
position. However, in that passage John was speaking about a person

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