“Sanctify them through Thy truth: Thy word is truth. As Thou hast sent Me into the world, even so have I also sent them into the world. And for their sakes I sanctify Myself, that they also might be sanctified through the truth” — John 17:17-19.
SANCTIFICATION is two-fold, positional and practical. All believers are sanctified (that is, set apart to God) by the one Offering of our Lord Jesus Christ, and in this sense, “perfected forever” (Heb. 10:10,14). But we are called to walk in conformity with our place in Christ. This is practical sanctification and by the Word of truth ministered to the heart in the power of the Holy Spirit. In our Lord’s high-priestly prayer in John 17 He stresses the importance of this. He set Himself apart to go to the cross and to the throne that our hearts might be occupied with Him where He now is, in order that we might be separated from all that is of the world.
“There amidst the joy eternal
Is the Man who went above,
Bearing marks of all the hatred
Of the world He sought in love.
He has sent us here to tell
That His love is changeless still.
He has sent us, that in sorrow
And in suffering, toil and loss,
We may learn the wondrous sweetness,
The deep mystery of His cross—
Learn the depth of love that traced
That blest path across the waste.