Bibles, if you would please, to 1 Corinthians chapter number 1. We want to finish up 1 Corinthians chapter 1 tonight. And I want you to find, if you would please, verse number 30. We began here last Wednesday. And we saved these two verses for a separate message. We entitled it, What Jesus Is to Me. Now you remember Paul is dealing with worldly wisdom versus godly wisdom. The wisdom that's opposed to the gospel. The wisdom that sees the cross as silly, as foolishness. But to us which are saved, it's the power of God. He's reminding them because He's dealing with a sick church. There's division, there's faction, where they're broken up into followers of men, they're following a worldly wisdom, and I'm of Paul, I'm of Apollos, I'm of Cephas, I'm of Christ. And we found that division is not to be in the church, the division, the dividing line is in the world. And the dividing line is the cross, the wisdom of God into salvation. And the division is between those who hear the message, the Word of the cross, and they count it as foolishness. And those who hear the Word of the cross and they believe it, they receive it, and it's the power of God in their lives. And Paul's going to continue this theme all the way into chapter number 4. And you're going to come to the very end, and he's reminding them of their own calling, and then reminding them that there's no glorying in human flesh. It's not human reason, it's not human logic, it's not human achievement. He's reminding them that they're saved, they're part of the family of God, and it has nothing to do with them, but it has everything to do with the God who saved them. It's through the cross. And then He reminds them of who they are in Christ. Look at verse 30. But of Him, talking about God the Father, but of Him are ye in Christ Jesus. The ye there is plurally speaking to the entire body of believers. Are ye in Christ. He's speaking of us tonight who are saved. We're in Christ, who of God. is made into us wisdom and righteousness and sanctification and redemption. You see, the wisdom of God in Christ through His cross, all that we are in Jesus, His righteousness, His sanctification, His redemption, flow out of the wisdom of Christ and His cross and what He is to us. And we've been talking about how these three words encompass all of the Christian life. First of all, we learned in your notes in Roman numeral number one, or number one in your notes, the past work of righteousness. Christ in the wisdom of God, alright? He's God's wisdom at work in our lives, and He's made into us righteousness that takes care of our past. We learned that we're unrighteous in ourselves, but we are made righteous in Him. He who knew no sin became sin for us, 2 Corinthians 5.21, that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him. God imputed our sin to Christ's account. He paid for it in full. The moment we believe on Christ, He imputes the righteousness of Christ to our account and we are made righteous in Him. We are clothed in the righteousness of Jesus Christ. Aren't you glad? When God sees us, He doesn't see us as we are, but He sees us as who we are in Christ. And we're righteous in Him. It's justification. We're declared righteous before God. Great transaction that took place. But then we saw not only righteousness, but now sanctification. The present, what God's doing in the present. We know that righteousness takes care of the past, sanctification the present. Righteousness saves us from the penalty of sin, sanctification. God is saving us. from the power, the pollution, the domination of sin in our daily lives as believers. We've learned that that word sanctification from our last message means to be set apart. It means to be made holy. We're holy unto the Lord. There are three tenses of sanctification. We saw that. There is positional sanctification. That takes place the moment we're saved. I Corinthians 1-2, we're called to be saints. that we have been set apart unto God as His own possession. We're holy unto the Lord. We belong to Him. And so we're sanctified. But then we're going to look at progressive sanctification. I probably should have put that at the end because that's actually where we're going to spend our time tonight. Progressive sanctification. where we are being set apart. This is the will of God. Even your sanctification, this is God at work in your life and my life right now as believers making us holy. It's the process by which He makes us holy. But we also can take joy in the fact that there is a third aspect of sanctification. It is perfect sanctification. That's when we're forever set apart unto God. It's at that moment that we are saved to sin no more. that we will be perfectly set apart unto God. We're going to talk more about this, about the image of Christ, but it's at that moment that we are fully and finally and forever conformed into the very image of His Son. We are made morally like Him. For we shall see Him, John says, as He is. But what Paul is dealing with here in verse 30 is the progressive aspect of it. The process of spiritual growth in our life where he's conforming us to the image of Christ and we've learned it's God's will for every Christian. It sort of reminds me of one Sunday morning a family was driving home from church and a little girl asked her mommy, she said, It got me all confused and messed up. And the mama said, Oh, what did he say? Why did he confuse you? She said, Well, mommy, he said that God is bigger than we are. Is that true? And she said, Well, yes, honey, God's bigger than we are. And then he went on to say that God lives in us. Is that true? And she said, Yes, honey, that's true too. And the little girl said, That's why I'm confused. If God's bigger than us and He lives in us, wouldn't He show through us? And sanctification is the process whereby God that lives in us shows through us. It's where we reflect Him to the world. Notice if you would, letter A, real quickly, you're going to see here what I want you to understand is the person of sanctification. The person of sanctification. We see that in verse 30. Look what he says. But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God... Now Christ, who of God, is made into us wisdom, He's our wisdom, He's our righteousness, and righteousness and sanctification. And sanctification. A.J. Gordon, a great preacher of the past, is walking through the World's Fair in Chicago, Illinois. It was probably in the 19th century. In the distance he sees a man vigorously pumping water. I mean there's water spewing out everywhere. But then as he got closer, he discovered that what he thought was a man was actually the wooden figure of a man. And the water that was spewing was actually an artesian well. And it wasn't the man pumping the water. It was the water pumping the man. And what I want you to get from that is when it comes to this matter of sanctification, church, it's not so much us as it's Christ's life in us. that makes the difference. It is Christ in us that enables us to become what we should be in Him. I put Galatians 2 verse 20 in your notes. Let's look at it, could we? Notice he says, I am crucified with Christ. Now what does he mean by that? What he means is he's dead. That means the old man is dead. That means he's gone. The old flesh is gone. What it means is it's rendered inoperative. That means it's not to control me anymore. I'm crucified with Christ. Then he goes forward and says, nevertheless I live. He's talking about living in the flesh, yet not I. But he said it's Christ living in me. He's saying the life that I'm living now in the flesh as a Christian is not so much me living as it is Christ living in me and through me. Notice he said the life which I now will live in the flesh. I live by the faith of the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me. And so Christian, listen to me. Sanctification, Oswald Sanders says, is not something our Lord does in us as much as it is He Himself in us. It is Christ living His life through us as we yield ourselves to Him. He's the person of sanctification. We're allowing Jesus to show through in our lives. As you and I yield our lives to the very life of Christ in us, He sanctifies us. He works in us to mold us and shape us and direct us into what He'd have us to be. Can I remind us tonight, He's the potter, we're the clay. We get that mixed up sometimes. We want to be the potter. We want to determine what we're going to be, what our lives are going to look like, how we're going to live them, the tenor, all of those things. And the reality of it is the moment that I became a Christian, I gave up those rights to Christ. He is now Lord, to be Lord of my life. He is now to be the one who's in control. He's living His life through me as I yield myself to Him. He's the potter. He's the clay. He's the one who does the fashioning. And I'm to be the one who's doing the yielding. That's the person of sanctification. But then when it comes to this matter of sanctification, there is a goal. There's a goal. Preacher, what is the outcome of sanctification? Would you look with me? Is Romans 8.29 in your notes? It is. Alright, well I need to turn there. See, Christian keeps cheating for you. when she makes the outline. She gives you all these verses and all that makes it easy. But let's look at Romans 8.29. And I don't want you to be afraid of some of these words. Notice what he says here. For whom He did foreknow. Now what does that mean, preacher? That means that God knew before the foundation of the world those who would trust His Son and those who would reject His Son. And if you are a person who's received Christ, God knew beforehand. He foreknew the fact that you would trust His Son and that you would belong to Him and you would be in the family of God because God knows all things all the time. He also did predestinate. Now what does that mean? Does that mean that God foreknew me and therefore He predestinated me to be saved? No, that's not what He's saying. And you're going to see that in this text. Predestination has nothing to do... He's not even talking to unsaved people. Paul's writing to saved people. Predestination, you don't need to be afraid of that word. It has nothing to do with who goes to heaven and who goes to hell. It has nothing to do with who's saved and who's lost. It has everything to do with a person who belongs to Christ, who's believed on Him. And God says, all those that I foreknew would believe on My Son have been destined beforehand to something. What is it? to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren. So God foreknew that I would believe on Christ on a Sunday night in 1984. He knew that. He knew that before He ever created the world. He knew that before Christ ever died on the cross. He knew that before I was born. He knew that before I actually believed on His Son and was saved. He knew that. God knew everybody that was going to be saved. He didn't determine it. He knew it. And God made a divine decree or choice. And God made the choice that every person who chose to believe in His Son, that the outcome of their faith would be that they would be conformed to the image of His Son. That is predestination. That is the goal of sanctification. That is what God is doing in our lives right now. Look at II Corinthians 3, verse 18. Remember the church at Corinth is the most carnal church in the Bible. These are a bunch of unspiritual babies in Christ. And he said, not some of us, not part of us, not most of us, but we all. Did you see that? With open face. That means with an honest heart. Beholding as in a glass. Looking in a mirror. Gazing in a mirror. The glory of the Lord. When you look into the Bible, the Bible is a mirror. And it shows us the reflection of Christ. Who He is. I see Jesus in the pages of Scripture. That's what the Bible is all about. It's a hymn book. Now watch this. And I'm looking into it as a mirror. I see Him, but now watch this. I also see myself. And I'm not measuring up. I see what I am, but what I ought to be as a Christian. And when you and I bring our lives into alignment with the will of God, that means we're yielding to the Lord. We're yielding to the Holy Spirit. We're being obedient to the Word. Then 2 Corinthians 3.18 says that we're beholding in the glass the glory of the Lord. What we should be are changed. into the same image from glory to glory. That means one level of glory to another level of glory. That means we ought to be a little more like Jesus tomorrow than we are today, a little more like Jesus next month than we are this month, a little more like Jesus next year than we are this year. That's what that means. I'm being changed into the image of Christ. You say, what about these carnal Christians that are going their own way? They're out of church. They're living for the world. They will be like Christ. It'll either be the easy way or the hard way. But everybody's going to be made like Jesus. I sure want to cooperate. It's much easier to cooperate. Now the Holy Spirit, did you notice something? 2 Corinthians 3.18 says it's even as by the Spirit of the Lord. So it's the Spirit of Christ in us. The Holy Spirit is the sanctifying or the change agent that is transforming us into the very image of Christ. So Christ's life in us is the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Christ who indwells every believer that is changing us into the image of Christ from one level of glory to the next. where I'm growing in Him. And that's the goal. By the way, this is what God is doing in your life right now. That's what's happening right now. Every trial, every situation of life, every circumstance, every decision that I make for God, all of those things, God's working in them to bring me to conformity to the image of His Son. You know what? There's times that I'm not cooperating. You say, what happens then? God gets my attention. Sin has to be dealt with. Self-will has to be dealt with. There's confession. There's bringing ourselves back into alignment with God. There's the determination of obedience to Christ. See, that's why the Bible is so important in the life of a Christian. It's not just getting knowledge in our head. It's allowing it to change our lives to make us different on a daily basis. That's why the Bible is so important in our lives. Then notice there's a process. Now here's where I think Philippians 2 shouldn't be in your notes, but it may be. But if it's not, will you turn there with me to Philippians 2? I want you to see the process. Now all of this is bound up in that word there in 1 Corinthians 1 verse 30, sanctification. Now you say, Preacher, why didn't Paul just go ahead and explain it right there? Because we know that the Bible is progressively revealed. We have all of the Bible. It is there. As we work our way through it, you will see it. It's just not laid out like I'm sharing it with you right now. Because see, we have all of the Bible. They're living when the Bible was being written. We have all the Scripture. We're living in a blessed day where we have all of the Word of God. They saw in part. We have all of it. And therefore we use all of it, right? And so look at Philippians 2. Here's how he described it to the Philippian believers. Look what he says in verse number 12. Wherefore, my beloved, as ye have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, they were continuing to grow in the Lord, being obedient to the Lord. Notice these next words. Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling. Look at verse 13. For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure. Now what does all that mean? There are two parts to sanctification. And guys, don't get ahead of me. I'm going to give both of them, but I only want you to put the first one up there. There is first of all our part and then there's God's part, but we're going to talk about our part first. Now here's where I want you to help me, church. Do we have any part in salvation? No, it's not of works, right? Believing is not a part. That's just receiving and responding to the gospel. So we do nothing to be saved. But in sanctification, we have a responsibility. We're to do something. There's our part. It involves human effort. It involves human responsibility. We're to work out our own salvation with fear and trembling. Those two words work out means to thoroughly develop. It means to work something to completion. It's not a matter of working for something, but working out something that we already have. So salvation is apart from human effort. It's not of works, Ephesians 2.8. But now wait a minute. Sanctification involves human effort. It's obedience to Christ. It is experiencing and realizing the full potential of all that we have and all that we are in Him. So when God saved you, you got the total package. God didn't give you salvation piecemeal. You don't get a second blessing, third blessing, all of that stuff. God gives it all to you at one time. We're complete in Him, Colossians 2.10. He's given us all things that pertain to life and God in 2 Peter 1.3. II Peter 1.4, He's given to us exceeding great and precious promise. So here's what He's saying. God's given us everything necessary for living life successfully for Him, not only in this life but the life to come. And I'm to work out in my daily life all that God worked in the moment that I was saved the moment that you were saved. And so that's what's happening. This matter of yielding to Christ, this matter of being obedient to the will of God, of obeying the Scripture, of living out the imparted righteousness of Christ, of living out God's truth in my daily life, of responding to Him. All of that is my part. I'm responsible to do that. Okay? Somebody said, well, isn't it just automatic? Shouldn't it just be that way? Well, if it was, why would God command us as believers to do something? It must not be automatic. There's a choice. Just as I had to make a choice to be saved, I have to make a choice that I'm going to live for Christ and be obedient to Him and work out what He worked in in our lives. That's the human element. There's obedience to the Lord, yieldingness to the Holy Spirit, living out Christ's righteousness. in our daily lives. Then there's God's part. Notice what He says. He says in verse 12, "...work out your own salvation, fear, and trembling." Verse 13, "...for it is God which worketh in you." So it's not that it's all me and it's not that it's all God. God didn't say, As some people say, you just need to let it all go and surrender. No, there is a surrender in the Christian life, but you've got to get beyond the altar. There's some obedience involved. There's obedience involved. Some Christians never get beyond an altar. They confess, they surrender, they keep... But they never get beyond that and start living out the Christian life in their day. And they never have victory. And the reason is they're stopping short of full victory in their lives because they're not living in obedience to Christ. And it's God who works in us. God worked for us in salvation. He works in us in sanctification and He works through us in service. So He worked for us in salvation. That's past. Now He's working in me sanctification that He might work through me, that I might be His servant, that I might honor Him, that I might be used of Him. And so God worketh in you. So God is at work in our lives. God's putting forth His power to accomplish His good pleasure. So God gives us both the desire and the ability to do, to accomplish that that He has for us that's revealed in His work. I'm not talking about something mystical out here. I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about obedience to the Scripture. Preacher, what does this look like? You talk about this desiring, this doing, this my part, this God's part. Here's the reality of it. Jesus said, without me you can do nothing. So it's Christ's power in us. Anything good in our lives, even the choices that we make and the obedience of our life, it's the power of Christ in us that enables us and makes it a reality. But yet our will must be engaged that we are obedient to Him. Are you following me tonight? Now let me show you what it looks like. Can you give me another week in I Corinthians chapter 1 possibly? Look back if you would to Ephesians chapter 4. I want you to see what it looks like. Here you're going to get a Bible illustration of it. Somebody said, I want the meat of the Word. You're getting it. This is it. This is spiritual growth in grace. This is how it happens. Look at Ephesians chapter 4 verse 21. jot these verses down in your notes. Notice what he said, "...if so be..." That's a phrase in our Bible that means since. "...if so be since that you have heard him and have been taught by him, as the truth is in Jesus, that you put off..." Will you underline those two words, put off? "...concerning the former conversation..." That's your former lifestyle. "...the old man..." That's who you were before God saved you. The old man. It's old by reason of the new birth. I've been crucified with Christ. It's old. That's who I was. Now the old man's still there. God said, I'm to put it off, which is corrupt according to deceitful lusts. There's nothing good about the old me. Not one thing. Flesh is flesh. That's all it's ever going to be. Look at verse 23, "...and be renewed in the spirit of your mind." Would you write down Romans 12, verses 1 and 2 as a cross-reference to that? Would you write that down right there if it's not already there? Romans 12, 1 and 2. What that is is being renewed in the spirit of your mind. That's where we're not conformed to this world, but we're being transformed by the renewing of your mind. What renews my mind? The Bible. It's renewing my mind. What do you mean? It's teaching me what's wrong and what's right. How to stay right. What should be put out of my life and what should be put into my life as a Christian. And it's the power of Christ that enables me to put it off the old man and put on the new man. Because look at verse number 24. And that you put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true wholeness. This is my part. This is what I am to do. I am to make a conscious choice that I put out of my life that that displeases God and put into my life that which does please God. Put off the old man. Put on the new. But we're not left to guess work of what that looks like. Now he's going to get real practical. Look what he says in verse 25. Wherefore putting away lying, falsehood, that's the old man. Do you know every time a person lies that's a Christian, they're living in the power of the flesh, the old man? God said you're to put that off. You're to put that off. But there's not a vacuum. I'm to put something in its place. Look at what He said, Wherefore, putting away lying, speak every man truth with his neighbor. I replace truth with falsehood. A person who's lived a life of deception and falsehood, God said, I've saved you, I've delivered you from that. Now you put that off, and you put into your life honesty and truth. You see the difference? I put off the old. Let me just say something to us tonight. I want you to listen to me. There's no excuse for remaining who we are. God has given us the power of Christ and the truth of the Scripture to show us what I'm not to be. I don't have to be an angry person. I don't have to be an ugly person. I don't have to be a bitter person. I don't have to be a person with corrupt communication. All of this is in these verses. That does not have to define me. That is not who I have to be. That may have been who I was. That's not who I am now in Christ. And what he's saying is, stop living in who you were and start living in the power of who you are in Jesus. That's what he's saying. And you go all the way down through these verses and you're going to see a series of putting off and putting on and putting off and putting on. Look what he says. Look down if you would, verse 28. Let him that stole steal no more, but rather let him labor, working with his hands instead of... You know what's God's answer for somebody that steals? It's working. That's it. Works good for everybody. Look at verse 29. Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth. That's not just cursing, that's belittling, that's slandering, that's gossip, any kind of corruption. But that which is good to the use of, instead of letting my words be unwholesome, let my words be wholesome. You see what he's saying? Then he says verse 31, put away bitterness and wrath and anger. And then verse 32, what am I to put in? I'm put in tender heartedness, forgiveness. Do you see that? He's telling us how to live. He's telling us what His will is. This is sanctification. I don't have to be what I used to be. I can be new and different in Christ as I'm studying the Word. And you look into the Bible and with an honest, open heart of desirous for God to speak to you and show us who He wants us to be. And the Word of God shows us who we are. We see ourselves in the mirror. And then we say, wait a minute, that's not who I'm to be in Christ. I'm to put that off. I've been delivered from this. I can be this. You say, preacher, you don't understand. I've tried. Try again. You see, it's a series of putting off and putting on. That's why it's from glory to glory. Somebody says, well, I just fly off the handle. Well, confess that to the Lord and put on the right kind of spirit. Be angry and sin not, the Bible says. Don't let anger become sinful. Don't have bitterness and wrath and clamor in your life. And let's say that you're going to yield yourself to the Holy Spirit and you're going to be a long-suffering instead, fruit of the Spirit. But you say, well, preacher, I know I did good today, but I blew it tomorrow. The next day I blew it. Well, you know what a lot of Christians do? That's just the way I am. No, it's not. That's who you were. You see, now watch this. Can I get real theological with you? Somebody called... I'm going to use a real big word. Can you all forgive me for this big word? Somebody called it an anthropomorphic hangover. You say, preacher, what in the world is that? That means that the old nature... Listen, I was saved when I was 17, but there was some habit traits that had been grained in my life. And the longer you've been saved, the old man habit patterns have been so ingrained in your life that it seems natural that that's who you are. And some things in my life as a Christian dropped out of my life the moment I got saved. I mean I had a filthy, terrible, cursing mouth. I got saved and Brother Craig, it was gone. I never cursed again. But I'll tell you, I've had a battle with my temper since the day I got saved. I have to continually work at that. I have to continually bring that under the control of the Holy Spirit so that I respond in a right way. Because see, that was something that had been so ingrained in my life. Here's what I found. There's things in my life that I no longer struggle with. But boy, there's a whole lot of things I still struggle with and I battle with every day of my life and I have to bring it under the control of the Holy Spirit, confess it to God, get it right, seek to be obedient to the Lord. You say, well, why don't God just deliver you from that? He is delivering me from that through the process of sanctification as I live in obedience to Christ and I put off the old man and I put on the new. You see what I'm saying? That's how you put fear out of your life. That's how you put worry out of your life. That's how you put anxiety out of your life. It's a process. Because that anthropomorphic hangover, that old man, seems to want to just hang on to our lives. Let me give you an illustration. I'm going to get ready to close. I'll give you redemption next Wednesday night. Is that okay? Hey, we're getting in the deep stuff. Y'all, we're in the deep end of the pool tonight. Some of you are saying, I'm drowning with that anthropomorphic. Drowning. Listen, you're just going to go wow somebody with a term, you know. I got an anthropomorphic hangover. What have you been drinking last night? Well, thank the Lord, it's just Pepsi. Amen? I don't even know what I was going to say next now. See what you all did to me? What was I talking about? I got so caught up in that anthropomorphic hangover stuff. What it is, is this stuff has such a hold in our lives. that sometimes it's hard, and we're asking ourselves, well, why doesn't God just, just, just, just, just, boom, it's gone, because that's the struggle of the transformation. You following me? And that's how God designed sanctification. And that's the struggle of it. Think of a butterfly in a cocoon, okay? What goes in is the ugly caterpillar, right? And we have no idea what goes on inside that cocoon. But we know there's a struggle coming out, right? That if you cut the cocoon and help the butterfly out, it dies. But there's something about the struggle that strengthens its wings. That what went into the cocoon is totally different than what comes out. And that's the transformation in Christ. The struggle of what comes out of the cocoon is far different than what went in. And one day, listen, can I tell you, this struggle... That's what redemption is. When we get there, that's future. That's what it's about. See, this life is a struggle. It is. It is. It's a struggle dealing with the old flesh and the old man and what I was and those old habits and the old attitudes and those things that defined me before I was saved and yielding that to God and confessing it and seeking to be obedient and letting the Spirit of Christ change me and transform me. And we go from one struggle to the next struggle to the next struggle in the process of sanctification to one day. We come out on the other side in glory and as a thing of beauty. And what went into the cocoon, my friend, is nothing like what comes out of the cocoon when we stand before Jesus. That's sanctification. And where you are in the process has to do with how obedient and yielded and sensitive you are to the Spirit of God and to the Word of God. And me as well. Are you following me? But God will accomplish it. Amen? And that leads us to the future work of redemption that we'll look at next week. Alright? And you said, preacher, I can't believe we're three weeks in one verse. We actually could have went four, but I was good. Okay? And we're going to get there. You're saying there's 16 chapters in the book of I Corinthians and we're going to be in it forever. Well, the first chapter is foundational. We'll pick up some speed when we work our way through it, okay? There's going to be some times we'll pick up some speed, sometimes we're going to slow down. But here's my question to you. Where are you spiritually? Are you cooperative with God or are you resisting God? Are you just comfortable with who you are? Are you letting Jesus change you into who He wants you to be through the Spirit of God? So we can make all the excuses we want to the why we are. Let me tell you what an excuse is. Billy Sunday said an excuse is the skin of a reason stuffed with a lie. And we're lying to ourselves. Because I don't have to be defined by who and what I was before God saved me. In my wicked flesh, I can be defined by who I am in Jesus Christ. And the choice is up to us. And maybe tonight there's something you need to confess. An area of your life need to be brought under into obedience to Christ, brought under the control of the Holy Spirit. Maybe there needs to be some cooperation in your life with God. Maybe you need to stop being Lord and vacate your throne of your heart and let Jesus be Lord. I don't know. But maybe tonight you need to respond to Him or bring a need to the Lord.