Source: De Reformatie. 7 pages. Translated by Wim Kanis.

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The Beginning of Our Sanctification

The work of the Holy Spirit in the sanctification of our life has received more attention recently. Much has been said and written about the progress of the Spirit’s renewing work in God’s children. Whoever allows himself to be led by the Spirit may expect much from him. The life of a Christian has no standstill. The life that the Spirit works in us deepens and broadens. It has been emphasized that a Christian may, and therefore must, grow. Does not Paul speak of being changed into the image of Christ “from one degree of glory to another” (2 Cor. 3:18)? And does not Peter call for being and becoming “holy in all your conduct” (1 Peter 1:15) and for an increasing “growing in grace and knowledge” (2 Peter 3:18)?

In all this speaking about growth in faith, however necessary it is, I have sometimes missed the attention for the beginning of the work of the Holy Spirit in us. In a few articles I want to talk about this start. If we wish to honour the Holy Spirit as the great Giver of life and the Renewer of it, then the beginning of his work in us will also need to receive attention again and again. For it is precisely this beginning that teaches us how “immeasurably great” his power is for us who believe (see Eph. 1:19).

As the Spirit of Christ⤒🔗

Our confession attributes the sanctification of our hearts and lives to the Holy Spirit. Lord’s Day 8 of the Heidelberg Catechism speaks of “God the Holy Spirit and our sanctification. In Article 9 of the Belgic Confession of Faith, the Holy Spirit is called “our Sanctifier”. And when the Canons of Dort speak about the conversion of man, they expressly confess in chapters III/IV the work of the Spirit. Indeed, in Scripture, the sanctification or renewal of people is presented to us as the work of God’s Spirit. David connects the creation of a pure heart to the work of the Holy Spirit in Psalm 51. The Lord promises Israel, “I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules” (Ezek. 36:27). In Romans 8:1-17 Paul describes the Christian life as a life “in” and “according to” the Spirit. The same apostle testifies of “sanctification by the Spirit” (2 Thess. 2:13). However, as much as sanctification is to be honoured as a work of the Holy Spirit, we must not lose sight of Christ. He is the Saviour, who acquired everything for us. Sanctification, too, concerns a gift that we may receive from his hand. Not only did he justify us (i.e., brought about righteousness), he also became sanctification to us (see 1 Cor. 1:30).

Anyone who wishes to speak about the renewal of our lives will always have to start with Christ. He has acquired salvation for us. He is also the One who makes us share in it. Behind the coming of the great Giver of life on Pentecost stands the Christ (see Acts 2:33). The Spirit who is at work in our hearts and lives is the Spirit “of Christ” (see Rom. 8:9). It is the Spirit who allows himself to be sent by Christ in order to make people partakers of all that they have received in Christ.

It is always striking how the Heidelberg Catechism speaks of this work of the Spirit through Christ. It is Christ who, through his Holy Spirit, assures us of eternal life and makes us ready to live unto him (QA 1). It is Christ who rules us with his Word and Spirit (QA 31, who sends us his Spirit (QA 49), who gathers his church by his Spirit and Word (QA 54), who renews us into his image by his Spirit (QA 86).

The Spirit Takes Control of Our Heart←⤒🔗

When Scripture talks about changing people, the heart is almost always mentioned. People need to be given a different, a new “heart”. In Scripture, the heart of man comes to the fore as the centre of his feeling, willing, thinking and acting. The poet of the proverb says: “Keep your heart with all vigilance, for from it flow the springs of life” (Prov. 4:23). All life springs from our hearts. What we do is planned in our heart. Through sin our heart has become corrupt. Evil has affected the core of our life. Therefore, what our heart produces in us is “evil” from our youth (Gen. 8:21). Our heart is “deceitful above all things, even desperately sick” (Jer. 17:9). Men have a “crooked heart” (Prov. 17:20), and are “uncircumcised in heart” (Acts 7:20). Sin did not only affect the external personality, but it is “engraved on the tablet of the heart” (Jer. 17:1).

It is therefore this corrupt heart that the Holy Spirit takes hold of when he renews us in Christ’s image. The beginning of our sanctification consists in the fact that the Holy Spirit changes, renews and radically transforms our hearts. The Scriptures use various distinctive terms for this radical renewal. It speaks of a “circumcision” of the heart (Deut. 30:6), of the removal of “the foreskin” from the heart (Jer. 4:4), of giving a “new heart” and of giving people a “heart of flesh” (Ezek. 11:19). David prays for a “clean heart” (Ps. 51:10). And the Lord promises to give a heart to fear him (Jer. 32:39) and to know him (Jer. 24:7). We find the echo of this speaking of Scripture when the Canons of Dort deal with the conversion of man. At this conversion the Holy Spirit not only enlightens our understanding and renews our will, but he works in our heart (CoD III/IV.12). “He opens the closed and softens the hard heart, circumcises that which was uncircumcised” (III/IV.11). Over against the remonstrant idea that at conversion God extends a friendly appeal to us and acts on our feelings, the Canons confess another, much more powerful and divine working of the Holy Spirit: he gives us a new heart and a new spirit is put within us (III/IV, Ref. Error 7).

Our hearts are touched and renewed by the Finger of God (see Luke 11:20). A.A. van Ruler calls this touch the great element in the doctrine of the Holy Spirit.1 Just as the atonement represents the mystery of salvation in the doctrine of Christ, so is the divine contact in the doctrine of the Holy Spirit. In the Spirit, it is God himself who touches us in our hearts, in the centre of our lives, and thus he transforms us. With this touch our sanctification begins. All of our faith and all of our love for the Lord is preceded by this touch. Here we are dealing with the deepest level of a person’s conversion. It cannot be put into words. There is something that cannot be searched out in the work of the Holy Spirit in the transformation of our hearts. We are faced with “a supernatural, most powerful and at the same time most delightful, marvellous, mysterious, and inexpressible work” as we confess in the words of the Canons of Dort (III/IV.12).

When the Holy Spirit begins his renewing work in the lives of God’s children, he comes to dwell in their hearts. This indwelling of the Spirit is the background of all that he is doing to God’s children. The Spirit was poured out at Pentecost, to dwell in us. It is not merely a divine power that is working with us, but God himself has taken occupancy of our hearts as the basis for his work of renewal. We receive indwelling in the centre of our personality! No one less than God himself, namely God the Holy Spirit, lives and dwells in us. We might say with Jodocus vanLodensteijn that the entire Trinity dwells with us in the manner and in the power of the Holy Spirit.2 Paul speaks repeatedly of this indwelling of the Holy Spirit (see 1 Cor. 3:16; 6:19; 2 Tim. 1:14). Through this indwelling, both the single believer (see 1 Cor. 6:19) and the entire church (cf. 2 Cor. 6:16; Eph. 2:21) become temples of the Holy Spirit. The term “indwelling” points to the inner and permanent character. According to the Word of Christ, the Spirit dwells with us and will be in us (see John 14:17).

Thus this expression characterizes the progress of salvation.3 We do not read in the Old Testament that the Spirit “dwells” in the hearts of believers and that they are his temple. That is the riches of the new covenant in Christ’s blood. The God who dwelt in tabernacle and temple now comes to dwell in the hearts of his children (see 2 Cor. 6:16). It could not be any more intimate and internal! The Holy and Exalted One is in us and remains with us.

Regeneration←⤒🔗

The Scriptures use different terms for the work of the Holy Spirit in and on God’s children. We find words such as calling, enlightening, converting, renewing, cleansing, sanctifying. In the dogmatic reflection, the reformed people began to call this beginning of the renewing work of the Spirit as “regeneration”. Does not the Lord Jesus speak of being “born of the Spirit “(see John 3:5) and the apostle John of being “born of God” (see 1 John 2:29)? And does not Peter call the believers “born again” of an imperishable seed (see 1 Peter 1:23)? There is much to be said for designating the beginning of the Spirit’s work in us in this way. More than other expressions in Scripture, “regeneration” or “being born again” determines the radical nature of the work of the Spirit. We need rebirth in order to enter into God’s kingdom. We must become different people. No less than a “new” birth is needed for faith and obedience to be found in us!

The Canons of Dort unmistakably use the term “regeneration” for the beginning of the renewing work of the Holy Spirit (see III/IV.11,12). But it should not escape our notice that our confession also uses the word in a broader sense. It then points to the ongoing work of the Spirit in the renewal of our lives. Thus Article 24 of the Belgic Confession of Faith states that true faith regenerates a person and makes him a new man.4 The question now arises: what does this beginning of God’s work in us, which we call regeneration, entail? What kind of change is involved here? Especially a person such as Dr. A. Kuyper occupied himself with this question. Anyone who reads Kuyper’s reflections should not forget that Kuyper’s concern was to get rid of all human pride and to highlight the priority of God’s work in us.

For Kuyper, the quickening (making alive) of our hearts is about the implantation of the new life,5 of the start of a new life,6 about the planting of a seed of life7or of the ability to believe8 , about introducing “something” new9 , about connecting our souls with the life source of the Holy Spirit.10 Although Kuyper certainly does not want to think of a change of substance11 , the terminology he uses can easily suggest this notion. In particular, his reference to the introduction of a “seed” or “germ” of life12 raises the question as to whether we are still doing justice to the miracle of our rebirth as a spiritual transformation of our hearts.

Rather than with Kuyper, I prefer to align myself with the Canons of Dort when they attempt to further describe the miracle of regeneration. They confess that this conversion is about the opening of the closed heart, about softening what is hard, about circumcising what is uncircumcised (III/IV.11), about the new creation, the raising from the dead, and the making alive (III/IV.12). When the Holy Spirit regenerates us, he takes hold of us at the centre of our lives; he opens, renews and renews our hearts and thus raises us from the dead and makes us alive.

In considering what the Spirit is doing at the beginning of our sanctification, we must keep in mind that he is the Spirit who also proceeds from the Father. Here too the confession of God’s Trinity carries significant importance! The Spirit honours the Father’s work of creation. Sanctification does not negate this work of the Father, but redeems it from sin and death and restores it to God’s purpose. The Canons honour this in the way they speak about what is happening to our will at regeneration. The Holy Spirit “makes the will, which was dead, alive; which was bad, good; which was unwilling, willing; and which was stubborn, obedient” (III/IV.11).13 The Holy Spirit takes hold of what has been corrupted by sin, but does not bring about an entirely new, second creation. This applies not only to our will, but to everything that makes me my own personality, this actual human being. As H. Bavinck says, the continuity of our own self, of our nature with all its faculties and powers, is maintained at the time of regeneration.14 In a marvellous way, the Spirit leaves all this intact, while renewing and sanctifying it. I remain myself, and yet become radically different!

This radical renewal of our hearts does not mean that there is no more sin in our innermost being. We have indeed been redeemed from the tyranny and slavery of sin (CoD V.1), but there are still remnants (reliquiae, CoD V.3) of sin in us. Even as born-again people we still have a sinful nature, against which we have to struggle throughout our lives (HC QA 56). There remains evil in us (QA 126). Paul knows of the constant struggle between “spirit” and “flesh” (Rom. 7:14-26; Gal. 5:16, 17) and he calls the believers “to put off the old self” (Eph. 4:22).

Calvin and the early reformers have spoken in this context of a born-again “part” and an unregenerate “part” in the believer. A. Kuyper spoke of a born-again “core” and a yet-to-be-renewed “accommodation”.15 But in Scripture we find no occasion for all of this. Our “heart” is being renewed and “we” are born again. It is about a conversion of the whole person at the core of his personality. W.H. Velema rightly says: “The problem of old and new in a heart cannot be made transparent in an anthropological and terminological way”.16 We have a “new” heart while at the same time our “corrupt nature” still moves us. However, “old” and “new” do not coexist in the same way and with equal rights (see Rom. 6:6; 7:17). We have our minds “on the things of the Spirit” (Rom. 8:5), “the mind of Christ” (1 Cor. 2:16), even though we also know the desires of “the flesh”. It is telling that the Canons speak of the “remnants” of sin in us!

In all of this we must remember that the renewal of our hearts is also an ongoing work of the Holy Spirit. We are being transformed into Christ’s image (see 2 Cor. 3:18) and the new self is being renewed (see Col 3:10). The born-again David prays for a “clean heart” (Ps. 51:10). Believers, too, because of “the evil which still clings to us” (HC QA 126), cannot do without prayer: “Create in me a pure, clean heart, I pray; renew a steadfast spirit deep within me. Give me new life...!” (Ps. 51:4; rhymed version).17

Endnotes←⤒🔗

  1. ^ See A.A. van Ruler, Theologisch Werk, VI, Nijkerk 1973, p. 21.
  2. ^ See A.A. van Ruler, Ibid. [1], p. 15. Van Ruler notes: “That is the most amazing thing about the entire pneumatological reasoning”. We may recall here the word of Christ: “If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him” (John 14:23).
  3. ^ See Jonggil Byun, The Holy Spirit was not yet, Kampen 1992, p. 190: “This ‘indwelling’ of the Holy Spirit is something new which characterizes the NT church. For, though he exercised various kinds of works in them, we do not read anywhere in the Bible that the Holy Spirit dwelt in the believers of the OT.”
  4. ^ The Belgic Confession also uses “being born again” for the beginning of God’s work in us, see Art. 35: “Those who are born anew have a twofold life”. D.J. de Groot, De wedergeboorte, Kampen 1952, notes: “The doctrine of regeneration in the narrower sense has thus, as far as the essence of the matter is concerned, not been an invention of seventeenth-century dogmatists in search of scholastic distinctions. The reformers and the earliest symbolic writings of the Reformed Churches also identified an operation of the Holy Spirit in the heart of the sinner, by which he changes this fundamentally, so that man will be able to hear and believe the call of the gospel. And they also called this working and change regeneration, although they often failed to sharply confine it from the ongoing renewal of man” (p. 192).
  5. ^ A. Kuyper, Het werk van den Heiligen Geest, Kampen 1927, p. 375, p. 380.
    Available in English as “The work of the Holy Spirit”.
  6. ^ A. Kuyper, Ibid. [5], p. 379.
  7. ^ A. Kuyper, Ibid. [5], p. 561.
  8. ^ A. Kuyper, Ibid. [5], p. 393.
  9. ^ A. Kuyper, Ibid. [5], p. 393.
  10. ^ A. Kuyper, Ibid. [5], p. 391.
  11. ^ He writes: “The seed of regeneration is in no sense something demonstrable or intelligible or perceptible. It is of a purely spiritual nature” (Ibid. [5], p. 401).
  12. ^ Kuyper’s speaking of this infusion of a “seed of life” is related to his doctrine of creation: all creatures carry a germ of life within them by virtue of their creation by the Word,see W. H. Velema, De leer van de Heilige Geest bij Abraham Kuyper, `s-Gravenhage 1957, p. 43.
  13. ^ When the Canons of Dort say in III/IV.11, that “new qualities” (Latin text: novas qualitates) are instilled in the will, this does not mean that the Holy Spirit is adding new assets to man’s created will. The formulation is certainly open to question. But it should be clear that the fathers of Dort are here turning against the opinion of the Remonstrants that in spiritual death “the spiritual gifts” were not separated from the will (see III/IV. Rej. Error 3). In the preceding paragraph we hear what these spiritual gifts are. The authors of the Canons maintain that the will by itself cannot produce anything good. To do so, God must pour out “new qualities of faith, of obedience, and of the consciousness of his love in our hearts” (see III/IV. Rej.Error 6). In their contestable formulation, the fathers of Dort wanted to do justice to Philippians 2:13: “For it is God who works in you , both to will and to work for his good pleasure.” Compare what the theologians from Hessen stated at the synod: “Of the change of the will, and of the instilling in it of new and supernatural powers and faculties, and of the mighty and powerful inclination of these to choose and to will the spiritual and heavenly good, there is a beautiful place, Philippians 2:13 — It is God who works in you to will” (Acts of the National Synod of Dordrecht, 2004; ed. J. H. Donner/S. A. van den Hoorn, Leiden n/y., p. 488).
  14. ^ See H. Bavinck, Gereformeerde Dogmatiek, IV, Kampen 41930, p. 69.
    Available in English as “Reformed Dogmatics”  (4 volumes).
  15. ^ See A. Kuyper, De Gemeene Gratie, II, Amsterdam-Pretoria, 1903.
    Available in English as “Common Grace”  (Vol. #2). On p. 308 we read: “...and when we pay exclusive attention to the hidden self of our being at the deepest core of our personality, then what was dead has been made alive, what was weak has become completely healthy, what was under his wrath has been put in the splendour of his pleasure, and this self is absolutely holy”. According to Kuyper, this deepest self can therefore no longer sin.See also A. Kuyper, Ibid. [5]
  16. ^ J. van Genderen/W. H. Velema, Beknopte gereformeerde dogmatiek, Kampen (1992), p. 595.
    Available in English as “Concise Reformed Dogmatics”.
  17. ^ Book of Praise, Anglo-Genevan Psalter, 2014.

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