Sanctification is not our own work - Watchman Nee

Sanctification is not our own work, it is done by God for us: "Jesus also, that he might sanctify the people through his own blood, suffered without the gate” (Heb. 13.12); again, "for by one offering he hath perfected for ever them that are sanctified” (Heb. 10.14). Sanctification is a completed fact. We are sanctified because Jesus has died. However, in 1 Peter 1.15 we are commanded: "be ye . . . holy.” Why does the apostle say this? Because in spite of the fact that believers are already sanctified, this sanctification is only God's fact, it is not yet the believer's life experience. To be sanctified, it is necessary to draw upon the sanctification which the death of Jesus has prepared for us. We must take that sanctification as our sanctification before we can live a holy life.

The matter of overcoming the world follows the same principle. First is the work which Christ has accomplished””the fact of God. Jesus said: "I have overcome the world” (John 16.33). Second is our faith, for God's word also declares: "this is the victory that hath overcome the world, even our faith” (1 John 5.4). And lastly, we draw on the victory of Christ as our own victory, and so we overcome the world. This third step is our life experience after we have believed. Fact is God's work; faith is our trust in God's work; and experience is our having God's work practically in life.

Yet not only sanctification and victory follow this principle, even all the other major teachings of God's dealing with men follow it as well.

All God's facts are the works of God, not the efforts of men. These are not accomplished through the believer's prayer, work, sacrifice, self-denial or plotting. God's facts are done by God himself. All of His enterprises are accomplished in Christ. Faith is the only way by which to get to these facts; there is no other way.

Now let us illustrate how far apart from each other are God's fact and man's experience. According to God's fact, the assembly in Corinth was comprised of "them that are sanctified in Christ Jesus” (1 Cor. 1.2). They were the temple of the Holy Spirit (1 Cor. 6.19), even "washed . . . sanctified . . . justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God” (1 Cor. 6.11). But so far as their experience, what do we find? "Nay, already it is altogether a defect in you . . . Nay, but ye yourselves do wrong, and defraud” (1 Cor. 6.7,8); "ye sin against Christ” (1 Cor. 8.12). Why was there this state of affairs among them? It was because they had failed to draw upon the grace (fact) that God had provided for them. And hence such failure was theirs. The lofty position we have in fact is not to be experienced in life through our own attempts, diligence, affliction, pretension or effort. To experience the reality of God's fact for us, we only need to exercise faith to draw on that which the Lord has accomplished for us, taking it as our own. Daily confess what the Lord has done (fact), acknowledge it as truth, and draw it out with true faith. In ordinary times, drawing out means to confess that the work accomplished by Christ is factual and effectual in our life. In times of temptation, however, we must act upon this faith as though we have already possessed what He has given us. And thus shall experience happen in our lives.

A believer is more spiritual simply and only because he possesses more spiritual experiences. And these experiences are not self- created but are based on spiritual facts. They are not self-centered, for a believer's spiritual life is wholly dependent on the facts which God has accomplished for him. Fact is the foundation, faith is the process, and experience is the consequence. In other words, fact is the cause, faith is the way, and experience is the effect. A believer's spiritual life experience is but the final result, the final success. In advance of his deep spiritual life is the complete work of the Lord Jesus, which serves as the source. It is absolutely impossible for the believer to attain holiness or victory by his own effort. In order to be holy, victorious and dead to self, he cannot use his own strength but must rather: (1) confess that he is holy, victorious and dead to self in the Lord Jesus; and (2) act as if he is holy, victorious and dead to self because he believes that he is united with the Lord Jesus in life. All the experiences one has or wishes to have are already experienced by the Lord Jesus. To draw out by faith is to reckon what the Lord Jesus has as one's own. With the attitude and action of faith, one uses what he has reckoned as his own.

Yet in all this, let us not forget the Holy Spirit. How is it that God's fact becomes man's experience through faith? This is because of the work of the Holy Spirit. For when we believe in the fact which God has shown us in the Scriptures and exercise faith to draw upon it, the Holy Spirit will put upon us all the graces which God has accomplished in Christ and cause them to become reality in our lives so that we might experience them personally. Our confessing and our drawing out with faith open the door for the Holy Spirit to work by His adding into our lives that which the Lord has accomplished, thus enabling us to possess practical experiences. All the works of the Holy Spirit are based on God's fact. The Spirit does not accomplish any fact for us, He simply makes the accomplished fact of God real and living in our lives. God has already accomplished fact in the Lord Jesus, and hence we should exercise faith to confess and to draw upon this fact, as well as trust the Holy Spirit to add into our lives what God has done so that we might have spiritual experience.

Fact””when Christ died on the cross, He not only died for sinners but also caused sinners to die in Him. He died not only for sin but died also for sinners. That sinners died with Jesus on the cross is God’s fact. We have the following Scriptures as proof.

That one died for all, therefore all died. (2 Cor. 5.14b)
Knowing this, that our old man was crucified with him. (Rom.
6.6a)

We who died to sin. (Rom. 6.2)

From these verses (and others could be cited), we gather that in God’s eye, believers were crucified with Christ. We may not know this fact, and so we try to crucify ourselves. Daily we try, but daily we fail to be crucified, not knowing we are already dead in Christ. What we need to do is not to crucify ourselves but rather to use faith to draw upon His death, reckoning His death as our death. Baptism is the expression of faith as well as a confession. It expresses the fact and confesses it as fact. "Baptized into his death” (Rom. 6.3). This is confessing and appropriating His death by faith.

Although we died, and death and co-death are a fact, we are still commanded by God as follows: "even so reckon ye also yourselves to be dead unto sin.” This reckoning is the work of faith and not a looking at ourselves as dead, for this we could not do. We may look from dawn to dusk, but are we able to see ourselves as really dead? The more we look, the more alive we are: how we are prone to sin, we even love to sin. Only by "reckoning” in faith that we are dead in Christ””that His death is our death””do we come to the experience of co-death with Christ. From among those mentioned in the Scriptures who had this experience of co-death, Paul is a good representative. He wrote: "far be it from me to glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world hath been crucified unto me, and I unto the world” (Gal. 6.14); again, "the fellowship of his sufferings, becoming conformed unto his death” (Phil. 3.10); and also, "I have been crucified with Christ” (Gal. 2.20). If believers wish to have the experience of co-death with Christ””to experience it in life””they must not use their own way but use the way of God. This is fact, faith and experience.

The believer has died with Christ on the cross. Do you believe in this fact? Have you accepted this fact and reckoned yourself as dead? Believe, and you will have the experience of co-death, just as Paul believed and experienced. All the teachings in the Scriptures concerning God’s dealing with man always follow this procedure: fact, faith and experience.

Whatever God has done is perfect and complete. His way with mankind is to accomplish all the works for men and ask them to draw upon all of His work with faith, without resorting to any human method. For He now treats men with grace, and therefore it does not require men’s work (Rom. 4.4). This principle holds true with respect to such important teachings as sanctification, victory, and so forth.