In his classic book Holiness, J.C. Ryle (1816-1900) calls us to meditate on the distinction between justification and Sanctification. For those unfamiliar with these terms, here is a working definition taken from our Statement of Faith:
Justification is God’s gracious and full acquittal (by the righteousness of Christ alone) of all sinners who repent and believe in Christ. Justification brings the believer into a relationship of peace and favor with God.
Sanctification is the experience, beginning in regeneration, by which the believer is set apart to God’s purposes, and is enabled to progress toward moral and spiritual maturity through the presence and power of the Holy Spirit dwelling in him.
For you sports fans out there, this analogy might help: Justification is the moment the coach declares you a player in good standing on his team and gives you a brand new uniform. Sanctification is the process by which you then are taught and trained by the coach to become an ever-improving and effective player.
We must understand the difference between the two. Otherwise, we may think that we must attain a certain level of maturity or performance before God will ever accept us and thus fall into pride and/or despair. Or we may think that our maturity is something that we don’t need to strive for since Christ has done it all for us and thus fall into laziness. To help drive this home, Ryle gives a nice list of distinctions:
a) Justification is the reckoning and counting a man to be righteous for the sake of another, even Jesus Christ the Lord. Sanctification is the actual making a man inwardly righteous, though it may be in a very feeble degree.
b) The righteousness we have by our justification is not our own, but the everlasting perfect righteousness of our great Mediator Christ, impute to us, and made our own by faith. The righteousness we have by sanctification is our own righteousness, imparted, inherent, and wrought in us by the Holy Spirit, but mingled with much infirmity and imperfection.
c) In justification our own works have no place at all and simple faith in Christ is the one thing needful. In sanctification our own works are of vast importance and God bids us fight, and watch, and pray, and strive and take pains, and labor.
d) Justification is a finished and complete work, and a man is perfectly justified the moment he believes. Sanctification is an imperfect work, comparatively, and will never be perfected until we reach heaven.
e) Justification admits no growth or increase: a man is as much justified the hour he first comes to Christ by faith as he will be to all eternity. Sanctification is eminently a progressive work, and admits of continual growth and enlargement so long as a man lives.
f) Justification has special reference to our persons, our standing in God’s sight, and our deliverance from guilt. Sanctification has special reference to our natures, and the moral renewal of our hearts.
g) Justification gives us our title to heaven, and boldness to enter in. Sanctification gives us our fitness for heaven, and prepares us to enjoy it when we dwell there.
h) Justification is the act of God about us, and is not easily discerned by others. Sanctification is the work of God within us, and cannot be hid in its outward manifestation from the eyes of men.
I commend these distinctions to the attention of all my readers, and I ask them to ponder them well. I am persuaded that one great cause of the darkness and uncomfortable feelings of many well-meaning people in the matter of religion is their habit of confounding, and not distinguishing, justification and sanctification. It can never be too strongly impressed on our minds that they are two separate things. No doubt they cannot be divided, and everyone that is a partaker of either is a partaker of both. But never, never ought they to be confounded, and never ought the distinction between them to be forgotten.