In Scott Brown's sermon titled 'Distinguished from the World by Truth,' the focus is on Jesus's prayer for his disciples as seen in John 17:13-19. Jesus prays for his disciples to be sanctified by God's truth, emphasizing that His word is truth. The sermon explores the concept of sanctification, meaning to be set apart and purified, and how believers are called to be distinct from the world. Brown contrasts the biblical understanding of truth with the modern notion of 'my truth,' encouraging Christians to rely on God's truth rather than personal interpretations. The sermon highlights the role of the Word of God as a transformative and guiding force, likening it to gold, silver, and other valuable elements. Brown emphasizes that Jesus's mission was to send his disciples into the world with truth, just as He was sent by the Father, and that this truth is both a source of sanctification and a means of living in accordance with God's will. The narrative illustrates how believers are called to reflect Jesus's life and mission, maintaining holiness and distinctiveness through adherence to divine truth.

As we continue on in this prayer of the Lord Jesus Christ, I'd like for us to begin reading in verse 13 because it helps us to understand the context the particular things that Jesus is praying for for his disciples and the theme of it before we get to the three verses that we plan to focus on this morning which are verses 17 to 19 so please open your Bibles to John 17 find verse 13 and we'll pick up the prayer in that verse. But now I come to you and these things I speak in the world that they may have my joy fulfilled in themselves. I have given them your word and The world has hated them because they are not of the world Just as I am not of the world. I Do not pray that you should take them out of the world but that you should keep them from the evil one. They are not of the world just as I am not of the world.

And then the verses of our focus this morning, verse 17 through 19, sanctify them by your truth. Your word is truth. As you sent me into the world, I also have sent them into the world and for their sakes I sanctify myself that they also may be sanctified by the truth oh lord we pray that you would take these words and work them deep within our souls I pray that you would make us a holy people set apart by your word and by your word only that you would come and you would make us the kind of people who are filled with the words of truth guided by the truth so that we might be kept from going back to Egypt the place they came we came from that you would continue to keep us walking away from Egypt our whole life long by your truth thank you for giving us such a beautiful and sweet help in this world. Oh Lord we're so grateful for your word and we pray that this would be the chief mark of our lives that we would walk in the truth and be sanctified by it. I pray that for us as a little church that we would walk in truth, your truth and none other.

Amen. Please be seated. So having prayed that his disciples would be kept from the evil one, he now prays that the Father would sanctify them by the tool of His truth, the Word of God. And it's such a thrill and a help in this world to have the Word of God. I don't know where we would be without God and His Word.

It is called gold, your gold. It is called silver, it is honey, it is rock, it's a hammer, it's fire, and it's water. And Moses says, it is your life. So that's what we're observing the Lord Jesus Christ praying about. He's praying about their life in the world and how to navigate the world after he leaves, because he's leaving.

And the theme of this whole prayer is, I'm leaving, you're staying, here's what I'm praying for you during your stay in the world. He'll depart to his Father's right hand. And these disciples are bystanders in the prayer. They're listening into the prayer. They're hearing astonishing things.

They're overhearing a conversation. In one way, it's a private conversation with God. It's a private deliberation between God the Father and God the Son, and the disciples are overhearing this prayer. And they're hearing astounding things, massively encouraging things, and maybe even some terrifying things. And they're hearing Jesus Christ pray about His motives and His Father's motives and their methods in their lives and the outcomes of their lives.

Their whole life is really being laid before them in this prayer as they hear this divine deliberation. They're learning things that weren't clear to them before, maybe mentioned from time to time throughout the life of Jesus, but they're coming much clearer and they're they're actually brought into the feelings of the Lord Jesus Christ toward them and Being opened up in this prayer to the realities of his life and his death and their glorification and they're overhearing really the overall purpose of their lives as the Lord Jesus is going to leave they have already been shocked by him I'm leaving imagine being left by the Lord Jesus he heals the sick he raises the dead he casts out demons he parts, He makes the waters stop from raging, He makes the wind stop from blowing, He can make an army be fed At the snap of a finger by bringing bread There's no one more powerful. No one more wise No one more astounding and he has just told them I'm leaving how would that be the most significant the most helpful person in your life says I'm gone I'm leaving and that's exactly what's happening.

And so this this prayer is Is it's all at once it's illuminating. It's encouraging. It's astounding and in some places it's actually heartbreaking as he continues to make it clear that he's going away, and they will be alone in the world without his physical presence, and he's actually praying about how they will get on as a result of his departure. Now, it's interesting that the disciples are overhearing a prayer. And by the way, it just occurs to me, this happens to us when we pray together as a congregation.

In our prayer meetings, we hear other people pray, and they often pray the Word of God, which is a message for us. We overhear a message actually, prayed to God the Father, but the message is actually for us because it's the Word of God. And you're in a prayer meeting and you hear things that are going on that maybe you didn't know about in people's lives. That happens every Wednesday night when we gather. People pray about things that everybody doesn't know about, but now we're all brought in to this common knowledge of what's happening.

And you know, when we're together in prayer, particularly on Wednesday nights and even on Sunday morning when we have corporate prayer, we're often touched by the intimacy that that person had in their prayer and We're aware of the blessing to our souls regarding the things that they prayed for, and they're praying often for things that are happening in faraway places, maybe thousands and thousands of miles away, and we're learning. And we're actually entering in to what's happening thousands of miles away and The disciples are in this kind of a moment where they're brought into the feelings of the Lord Jesus Christ and the plans of the Lord Jesus Christ his protections his admonitions given actually in a prayer to his father. They're overhearing it. They're bystanders. They're like little children, you know, with their ear to the door trying to hear the conversation with their parents.

And so here the Lord Jesus Christ is praying for something that may have been quite terrifying to them, and that is their separateness from the world. They're learning from this prayer that they're being called out as holy men and being sent into the world as holy men, not to fit into the world at all, but to stick out as holy men. And that they're not meant to retreat from the world, but they're meant to be men of the truth in a world of lies. And they'll have to face all the consequences of that, of being so contrary to the world, because the world is against the Word of God. So as we've seen in this prayer, there are different things that you encounter in the prayer, there's information about their lives because Jesus is revealing information about their lives and then there are direct intercessions for them.

So That's what you find in the contour of this prayer. The Lord Jesus goes back and forth. It's like He's revealing something to them in some form of information about them. And then He makes a direct prayer for them, and that's what we find in this section as well. It's very consistent with the rest of the prayer Now in these three verses, I want to suggest that the disciples are learning at least three things I want to identify them you have an outline in front of you They're learning things about themselves and about God's intentions for them as they're overhearing this prayer and Here they are you've got the outline in front of you I'll give the three things to you and then we'll take them one by one.

They are learning that they are set apart and purified by truth. That's verse 17. And then secondly, that they are sent into the world with truth. That's verse 18. And then thirdly, that Jesus sanctified Himself.

He set Himself apart to come into the world to send His disciples with the truth. So that's what the disciples are overhearing here. So let's take these one by one. He has been speaking of his intention to keep them from the evil one by the power of his name. You know, whenever we're at this moment in the preaching of the Word of God in our church, I always wonder why in the world are we all here under these words?

What is it that God is doing with us? Why are we here? Why are these words in front of us right now? Because they're in front of us right now for a particular purpose. God is sovereign, God is kind, and God wants to bless His people by His Word.

And this passage of Scripture is no different. But this passage of Scripture might be the most disruptive passage of Scripture you've read all week long. And so we learn these three things about ourselves, and the disciples are learning them about themselves. What the disciples are learning is what we ought to learn as well. And the first is in verse 17, sanctify them by your truth.

Your word is truth. Here we have what the Son of God says about the Word of God, And what the Son of God says about the Word of God is that the Word is a sanctifying tool in their lives. You children here ought to just pay attention to this word, sanctify. What does it mean to be sanctified? There's another word too that you might want to learn and that's the word epistemology.

Truth, your theory of truth. Epistemology is your theory of truth. How you determine what truth is in the world. And the meaning of sanctify, well it's a big word, and you should teach your children this word, but there are two primary meanings of this word sanctify. First, it means to be set apart and made different, to be made holy.

Like for example, the Lord's Day is a holy day. It's a day like no other day. It's different. You don't want to treat this day like any other day. You don't want to act like the way you act in every other day of the week.

It's a day set apart and God actually created a day for this to take place. So it's to be different, to be set apart in a different category, to actually to stick out. And then the other meaning is to purify from sin, to actually be made holy, to be progressively made holy over your lifetime. When you come to the Lord, you come with all of your own holiness and he begins this process of Making you holy he's he captures ground he He throws down propositions that are raised up against Christ and he makes you think differently and act differently and talk differently and dress differently and operate differently in the world because you're a stranger on the earth now. But that's a result of being made holy by His Word.

So it has to do with the disciples are going to be distinguished from the rest of the world because of the Word of God, setting them apart from a perishing world, from those who walk in darkness. And those those who walk in darkness are of two categories, typically. Some of them you find in the church, and they really don't mind walking in darkness and still say, I believe Jesus is the Son of God. But they're not really separate from the world. And the other category are those who say they are and know they are and want to be separated from God in the world.

And what Jesus is saying is that his disciples are going to stick out. And so there are in this one verse, I want to identify three things just in this one verse The first of all is the intercessory prayer they the request Sanctify them he's requesting Jesus is requesting to before his father that he would make them different. He would make them different from the rest of the world, that they would not walk in the ways of the Gentiles, they would not be running back to Egypt, they'd be running away from Egypt. And then the second thing is the method by which this setting apart or sanctification takes place, because there's a particular method. We're told how it happens by your truth.

They are made different by truth. And then the reason, the reason that this tool is The operative function of making them different. The reason is your word is truth. Your word is truth. That's why.

Now the Lord Jesus Christ uses this word truth in a way that we should recognize. He doesn't use an adjective. In other words, he doesn't say your word is true. Well, it is true But he uses a noun your word is Truth it it's one thing to say that something is truthful But it's an it's an entirely heightened thing to say it is truth. It is the truth.

All of it embodies the truth. And So it is truth. It is the standard. It is the rock. It is the solid, unchangeable, unbreakable, irrefutable, everlasting truth.

It is truth. So here, Jesus is setting before His disciples as they're overhearing Him this matter that there is this thing called truth. And it...that thing is going to make them stick out in the world. It will make them different. It will sanctify them literally.

It will literally separate them from the rest of the world, and they'll never look the same again. And so his request is to make them different by the truth, by this thing that absolutely is true. Thankfully that truth is like gold, it's like silver, it's like honey, it's like water, it's refreshment for your soul, it heals. It's like a sword, it goes into, it wounds you, but it heals you at the same time. It's such a beautiful word that is truth.

We're so privileged to have it. Now today people are concerned about truth, But today you'll hear people talking about truth at the Oscars and the Golden Globes and the entertainers of this world and in Hollywood, but they talk about my truth, my truth. And what Jesus is praying about here is that his disciples would be liberated from their own truth That their own opinions their own inclinations would actually die in the face of truth. Christians are delivered from their truth, and they actually embrace what Francis Schaeffer called true truth. Why did he even have to say that?

Because so much of what is purported to be truth isn't. And the culture of the world around us, all the voices around us, particularly in the entertainment industry and the music industry, they want all truth to be personal and not objective. And people speak of the authority of my truth, which by the way is the message of all the Disney princesses, follow your heart. It's your truth. Be yourself, find yourself, strike out on your own journey and don't let anybody get in the way.

Be true to yourself. This is actually the new message of Joshua Harrison, his ex-wife. If you read what he's been writing, you're beautiful. Find your beauty. It's yours.

Don't let anybody get in the way of it. It's the modern zeitgeist. Zeitgeist is the general thinking at a moment of history. It's a popular mood, you know, that shapes everything. And the modern fad, the modern falsehood that almost everybody in the world has swallowed is this zeitgeist.

It really, well I remember it really well, you know, when I was growing up, the zeitgeist of the sixties. Oh, if you were there, you know what it was. Do your own thing Which really translated into sex drugs and rock and roll that's what that meant That was the zeitgeist the zeitgeist hasn't changed that much but You know the modern books the self-help books and all that they'll tell you that you should never let anybody steer you away from who you are and your truth. I bumped into an article on Huffington Post by an author by the name of Rebecca McCown, four steps to live your truth. Let me quote the four steps to live your truth.

Are you ready to live a life of truth and self-acceptance? Live your truth right here and now. What does this mean exactly? It means to live your most truthful self. Inside you is a person waiting to jump out and live in truth and openness.

Most of us spend our days living up to expectations and definitions. In this way, you, me, and all of us are living to be someone different than who we truly are." She says, this is a lie. It's time to live your truth and own it and she gives you four steps here they are if you want your own truth first accept who you are at this moment which by the way preaching contradicts all of that second acknowledge who you are and what you stand for. Third, define your truth. Fourth, live loudly and proudly.

The Urban Dictionary pictures these two friends who are talking. I'm leaving my husband. I Just don't love him anymore. It was a tough decision, but I have to stand in my truth The friend replies You are so brave. I am so proud of you for being so true to yourself.

Stay strong sister That's the zeitgeist follow your heart be true to yourself Do what you want to do and don't let anybody get in the way Well, Jesus is actually praying for something different. He is praying that they will be separated from the world by truth, by His truth, by the truth. Jesus has already proclaimed Himself in this prayer as the way the truth in the upper room discourse as the way I am the way the truth and the life and here Jesus is praying that his disciples would be distinguished by truth this would be the distinguishing mark of their lives My view of the context flow of this prayer is that Jesus is primarily talking about the first meaning of the word sanctified and that is separate. I do believe it implies the second meaning to be purified. As one is purified, one is separated.

So I think it's both, but the context clearly in this prayer, Jesus is talking about their life in the world and what it's going to be like for them in the world and how to get on in the world. And they get on in the world by being sanctified by truth, not by themselves. Jesus wants to deliver us from ourselves, frankly. And He's praying that his disciples will be set apart truth sets People at odds People say doctrine divides it certainly does truth separates the world Jesus said you shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free. You are continually being set free by truth, not bound in a prison.

Truth sets free, which is contrary to what the whole world says about truth. Now there are many illustrations of this. I believe I originally have identified at least 50 illustrations of this from the Bible, and I'm just going to start walking through some of them to help us understand what he is talking about. The first illustration is found in Revelation chapter 6 verse 9. It's this scene in heaven, and there are martyrs under the throne of God literally martyrs they're they're crying out they've been killed and The why are they there?

They were so set apart from the world For proclaiming the truth of the Word of God that they were killed for the Word of God. That's how separate they were. And this I'll read the verse, the souls of those who had been slain for the Word of God and the testimony which they held, they cried out with a loud voice saying, How long, O Lord, holy and true, until you judge and avenge our blood on those who dwell on the earth? It's dangerous to your life to be sanctified by truth because it sets you apart. It sets you in opposition.

It sets you in creating a different culture than the world. It sets you on a pattern of life where you do not love the world. You turn away from the world. Second illustration is Jeremiah, the prophet. In Jeremiah chapter 1, we learn that Jeremiah actually was sanctified in the sense of being set apart, and God actually set him apart from his mother's womb.

And the Lord says, before I formed you in the womb, I knew you. Before you were born, I sanctified you. I ordained you as a prophet to the nations, but then Jeremiah says oh, but Lord, I'm just a youth he might have been 16 or 20 years old at this time Maybe you're around that age and the question might be is This true of me Have I been sanctified? From my mother's womb am I set apart for God Did God set me apart in this world by the truth? You're 16, you're 17, you're 18 years old.

Is this true of you? And then Jeremiah hears the word the Lord say, whatever I command you, you shall speak. Do not be afraid of their faces For I am with you to deliver you says the Lord then the Lord put forth his hand and touched my mouth and The Lord said to me behold. I have put my words in your mouth." Remember, this was Jeremiah the prophet, the weeping prophet, the one who saw everything fall apart almost every day of his life. Except this one thing he knew.

God's mercies were new every morning great was his faithfulness in the midst of all the trials and the trouble But it was God who separated him from the world, from his mother's womb. God ordained this person to be set apart by truth. And that's how God does it with all of us. The Lamb was slain before the foundation of the world. He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world.

If you're a Christian, He set you apart from your mother's womb, just like Jeremiah, But he set you apart to be contrary to the world because of the truth of God. Third illustration in 2 Timothy 2, he speaks of vessels, you know, things that hold water. He gives this illustration of a container, and the Bible makes it clear that you're like a container. You're a vessel, and there are vessels of honor and vessels of dishonor. Therefore, if anyone cleanses himself, he will be a vessel for honor, sanctified, set apart and useful for the master, prepared for every good work." And then the apostle commands Timothy, therefore, flee from youthful lusts and pursue righteousness faith love peace with those who call on the Lord out of a pure heart.

He mixes those two things that the separation from the world and the continuous act of purification of the heart. And it prepares you for every good work, which actually may be quite disruptive in the world. The fourth illustration is centered around the word flesh and filthiness of the flesh. Second Corinthians 7-1, this separation involves our separating ourselves from filthiness. He says, therefore having these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit perfecting holiness in the fear of God when a person begins to run away from filthiness, it's separate, it implicitly separates him from the world.

He can no longer listen to the things that he used to listen to, he doesn't want to. He no longer wants to watch the things he used to watch. He no longer wants to talk about the things he used to talk about, except in light of the standard of truth, the rock, the honey, the water, the fire, the hammer of the truth. Fifth illustration. Children.

It's an illustration of children. But as obedient children, not conforming yourselves to the former lusts, as in your ignorance, but as he who called you is holy, you shall be holy in all your conduct because it is written be holy for I am holy and then skipping a verse in verse 18 he says in first Peter chapter 1 knowing that you were not redeemed with corruptible things like silver or gold from your aimless conduct received by tradition from your fathers, but with the precious blood of Christ as of a lamb without blemish and without spot So these are illustrations of being set apart by truth as a result of embracing the Word of God, making them ready for service in the world for God, because the Word of God sets you apart. Here's another illustration, a holy generation. First Peter 2, 9, but you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people, that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness and into His marvelous light who were once not a people, but now you are the people of God who had not obtained mercy but now have obtained mercy." In Deuteronomy 14 verse 2, Moses is telling the children of Israel they can't have haircuts like the pagans, They can't cut themselves like the pagans.

And he tells them why. You are the children of the Lord your God. You shall not cut yourselves or shave the front of your head for the dead. For you are a holy people to the Lord your God. And the Lord has chosen you to be a people for himself a special treasure above all the peoples who are on the face of the earth that's a picture of God's people they are separated from the world by the truth by truth itself and because of that they are a treasure to God.

The seventh illustration is an illustration of a city, Babylon, Revelation 18.4. It's a picture of people coming out of Babylon. You know, you have these two great pictures in the Bible. Coming out of Egypt, coming out of Babylon, it's really the same thing. Different time in history, same problem.

The great cultures of the world will absorb you and they will digest you and they will spit you out. But God says don't let that happen. Come out of her, my people, come out of Babylon lest you share in her sins, lest you receive her plagues." There are many, many, many illustrations in the Bible. Jesus speaks of trying to serve two masters. John speaks of loving the world.

Peter speaks about Christians being strangers in a strange land and people will think it's strange that you don't walk like them. They'll think you are so strange. If you're afraid of being thought of as strange, you can't be a Christian because it's the Word of God that separates you from the world. Moses spoke of this in Exodus chapter 32. He says, you shall not follow the crowd.

32 Verse 2, you shall not follow the crowd. Paul speaks of it to the Ephesian church like matters of having fellowship with darkness. So Jesus is praying to His Father that His disciples would be separate, that they would actually stick out in the world because of truth. Because of truth. Charles Simeon, the English Great Awakening preacher, said that the sanctification of his people was a very principle in which he aimed at, and that He did for them by suffering for them.

We'll get to that in verse 19. But the truth of this whole matter is that the only rule by which we might glorify God and enjoy Him forever is by the Word of God. To be guided, separated from the world, by the Word of God. How can a young man keep his way pure? By keeping it according to your word.

David says, your words are true, and therefore it is truth. Paul says let the word of Christ dwell richly in you. He said to the same church in Colossae that in Jesus Christ are hid all the treasures and the wisdom of the knowledge of God." And Paul was called to preach the unsearchable riches of Christ. So the truth is objective and we should always be distrustful of our truth and trusting in God's truth. But the reality that Jesus is revealing to his disciples in this prayer is that the great consequence of their following him is that they will be separated from the world by truth.

The most disruptive thing you can do in your life is to follow Jesus Christ and it will cause all kinds of disruption in that sense because light always separates darkness but what Jesus said is that the darkness will never be able to overcome it never maybe only for a short time but never eternally So they are set apart and purified by truth. That's what they're learning in this prayer. Secondly, that He is sending them into the world with truth. Verse 18, as you sent me into the world, I also have sent them into the world. So Jesus here is revealing to them information that He is sending them into the world, and he is telling them that there's a similarity in his mission and their mission.

He's comparing it. He says, as you sent me, I also, you know, as I have been sent, so send I you. That's the idea. So there's a similarity in Jesus being sent from His Father and our being sent into the world. So He doesn't take us out of the world, He sends us into the world, He gives us truth and sends us into the world with the most disruptive tool that exists.

It's the most divisive tool, because doctrine does divide. So Christ sends His children into the world to do a very similar work that He came for. Jesus is the pattern for our work as pastors and As members of the body of Christ as kings and priests in the household of God we are priests after his pattern and Jesus was sent into the world to reveal the Father So are we Jesus was sent into the world to seek and save those who are lost So are we Jesus was sent into the world to seek and save those who are lost. So are we. Jesus was sent into the world as a light to the world and we dare not hide our light in under a bushel, under a basket, but set it on a lamp stand.

Jesus was anointed by the Spirit, guided by the Spirit, and so we're to be filled with the Spirit. Jesus was about His Father's business. We too are to be about our Father's business. So there's this similarity of the work. The way that you know how to live in this world is to look at Jesus.

And looking at Jesus, beholding His face, becoming like Him, it really helps you to do Everything in your life, everything. It's one thing to pursue business, but if you pursue Jesus, you'll know how to pursue business. It's one thing to pursue marriage, but if you pursue Jesus, it will just equip you to be married. If you want to be single, pursuing Jesus helps you to be single in whatever state you find yourself. It's the universal principle of life and Jesus is saying, learn of me.

I'm gentle and humble in heart, and you'll find rest for your souls. Jesus is telling His disciples that He's sending them in a very similar way that He was sent by His Father. The Apostle Paul in the book of Romans opening up the book, he says that he was separated to the gospel of God as an apostle. Up ahead in the next, in two chapters ahead in chapter 20 verse 21 Jesus said to them again Peace to you as the father sent me. I also send you But Jesus also told them something else earlier.

He said, Behold, I send you out as sheep in the midst of wolves. Therefore be wise as serpents and harmless as doves. But beware of men, For they will deliver you up to councils and scourge you in their synagogues In the religious places. It's the religious people Who will deliver you up Not the pagans You will be brought before governors and kings for my sake as a testimony to them and to the Gentiles Even as my father sent me so I send you And then Paul said how how shall they preach except they are sent? So the whole idea in this Information that Jesus is giving his disciples is that he is sending them out as laborers into his vineyard But they will be very separate from the rest of the labors.

In his commentary, George Newton writes this, they must do his work and deliver his message. The errand which he sends them on, they must not bring their own devices to the people, their own fancies and conceits, the issue of their own brains, The froth of their own spirits as many do in these times. No They must speak the words of Christ and speak them fully and completely, they must, quote, fulfill the word of God, as the apostle speaks in Colossians 1.25. They must, without respect or fear, deliver all their Master's message to any man to whom he may send them. How great, however, that man might be!

He says they must be ready upon occasion to drop down the balm of Gilead, the sweet and precious comforts of the gospel, into the sores of those whom God has wounded, to speak even to the hearts of God's people and to utter a word in season to the weary." So, you know, he is revealing to his disciples that he's sending them into the world. And the Apostles really understood this. You know, Paul said, how beautiful on the mountains are the feet of them who bring good news. The very last things that Jesus says in the gospel of Matthew before his ascension is, Go into all the world. You know, this is what happened with the people who went to the nursing home on Thursday night.

This is what happened at the abortion clinic yesterday. People went out into the world and they said that Jesus Christ is the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords and He's come to save you. He's come to heal you, dropping the balm of Gilead all over the place. And then Jesus sanctifies himself in order to send his disciples with truth. Verse 19.

Here Jesus reveals information to them about their lives and what He is all about and what He's doing. He says, and for their sakes I sanctify myself. And I believe He's primarily talking about setting Himself aside and Being sent by his father into the world to be a sacrifice of sin for sin. I sanctify myself That in order that there's the reason in order that they also May be sanctified by the truth and again. I think that that primary meaning of sanctification is setting apart, but it does include the progressive sanctification aspect of it.

So first, He sanctified himself. And this is the doctrine that Jesus Christ freely and willingly offered up his life, setting himself apart to suffer for our sin. He suffered so that we would not suffer. He received the punishment that we deserved. He received the mocking that we deserved.

He received the slander that we deserved. We deserve to be stripped naked and exposed. He did that for us. Later on we'll read that he was stripped and hung on a cross for everyone to slander, laugh at, and mock. That's what we deserved.

We deserved to be completely exposed. He was completely exposed for our benefit so that we could go free. He sanctified himself, setting himself apart to be a sacrifice for our sin. He says, why did he do it? For their sakes.

He did it for our sake. Isn't that amazing that he did not want you to be exposed and slandered and mocked and hated quite like he was? And so he stood in our place. It is true that we do enter into the sufferings of Christ, we do enter into the slanders of Christ, we do bear His marks upon us, that's for sure. But we learn what He did, that they also might be sanctified by the truth.

And his whole earthly life being set apart makes it very clear that he became the spotless lamb of God. He was the perfect high priest. He never broke any law. And Paul says to Titus that he gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from every lawless deed and purify for himself his own special people, zealous for good works. In Hebrews 13 verse 12, we read that Jesus came that he might sanctify the people with his own blood.

Paul speaking to the Philippian church, he said that Jesus offered himself up to death, even the death on the cross. Luke in the book of Acts reveals to us that he was the Lamb of God that was slain from before the foundation of the world. In Matthew 27 we learn the same thing. In Galatians 2.20, we learn that He loved us and gave Himself for us. And that really forms the whole motivation for how we operate in the church Paul says to the Ephesians walk in love as Christ also loved us and given himself for us and offering and a sacrifice to God For a sweet smelling aroma and Jesus gave up his life In John 10 verse 17 Jesus says, no one takes my life from me.

I have the power to lay it down. We saw him do that. We saw that happen many times in the gospel of John. People were set to kill him and he just slipped through the crowd. They couldn't put their hands on him because he came to lay his own life down for our sake.

I really like the way Thomas Manton expressed it in his commentary I was reading last week. He says, we could defile ourselves, but we cannot cleanse ourselves. And then he gave an illustration. He said, your little children will get themselves dirty, but somebody has to come and clean them up. Anybody can relate to that?

And we are those kind of children. We have nothing to offer up. Our best works, All tainted by sin. We don't even know the depths of our depravity in our minds and all of all of our actions You know, we are so corrupt. We don't we don't really hardly know how to do anything with purity I mean if you If you give something away or evangelize or offer a helping hand, or if you're even walking a little old lady across the street, you're always hoping somebody will see you, even though you know it's what you should do.

And He gave Himself up for the depths of our sin that we don't even know. And that's why there were sacrifices for unintentional sins in the Old Testament. We just don't know the depth of it, but Jesus Christ came and offered himself as a sacrifice for all of our sins, all of our sins in the past, all of our sins today, and all of our sins in the future. Praise God for that. So Jesus is, he's praying for his disciples that they would be distinguished by truth in the world.

Stand for truth and recognize how disruptive it is to be separated from a perishing world even a religious world and To depart from evil and to do good to wash yourselves and make yourselves clean and put away put away the evil from your eyes do not walk in the counsel of the ungodly or stand in the path of sinners or sit in the seat of the scornful but delight in the law of the Lord And if you meditate on it day and night, you'll be like a tree, planted by rivers of water, bringing forth fruit in season, whose leaf shall not wither, and whatever he does he shall prosper. So, reckon yourself to be dead to sin and alive to God. Set your mind on the things above where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Be a people of the Word. Be a holy people.

I pray that God would make us a holy people, guided by His Word guided by His Word and by His Word alone. And when our inner self rises up and says, follow your heart, that we refuse that inner self. And we quit walking according to my truth, even though the great entertainers of the world will tell you to find your truth. And you'll follow your truth all the way into everlasting torment. But the truth of Jesus Christ is like gold, It's like silver, it's like honey, it's like water, and it is your life, and it is your only hope of healing in this world.

The Word of God, able to go into the innermost being and heal all of your diseases. What a gift the Word of God is. And so we've just encountered what the Son of God says about the Word of God. Would you pray with me? Oh Lord, we thank you for this rich treasure, this gold, this marvelous balm for the healing of our souls and for the setting ourselves apart from a world which is perishing.

Oh God I pray that you would make us a holy church. We know that a holy church is a happy church. We know that a holy church is a church that is so delighted at the sacrifice of the Son of God and all of the marvelous blessings and freedoms to know the truth and to be set free, to have truth and be free from the destructions of this world. Lord, we're so thankful for it. Pray that you would bring us all into all of its blessings in this church.

Amen.