When I was in seminary, I had a teacher that loved to quote this verse. But I have come to realize that his interpretation of it was wrong.
He said, Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth. Of course, that was 1974 and he used the old King James Version, as did we all. Well, some used the American Standard Version from 1901, but I never liked it. I liked the New American Standard Version, but is was so new, the school was suspicious of it. It was a very conservative Church of Christ seminary and they didn’t like anything new.
But back to the verse. His interpretation was that the word which sanctifies us was the Bible, the word of God. He could quote great huge blocks of it. In his mind there had to be the most extensive chain reference system, it was unimaginable the amount of Bible he knew.
As far as he was concerned, it was the Bible that sanctifies us. The Bible is the word of God.
And it is, but that is not what John was talking about. John was talking about Jesus.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.In his whole book, John talks about the Word of God and how he come to live with us. And that Word of God, Jesus, makes us holy by his sacrifice and by his continued presence in our lives.
The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. (John 1:1,14)
The Bible by itself can do nothing. It cannot sanctify or help us unless we have the Word – Jesus – in us to guide us, and unless we have his Holy Spirit within us to enable us to understand that written word.
I watched 3:10 to Yuma yesterday, the newer one with Russell Crowe. The main character was a bad guy, a murdering thief without any real conscience. Yet he could quote a lot of Bible. He even had crosses on his pistols. But he was the furthest from a Christian there could be.
His knowledge of the written word of God was worthless because it did nothing within him. he might as well have memorized great blocks of Shakespeare for all the good it did him. in fact, his quotations were almost shocking coming out of the mouth of such a bad man.
He knew the written word and it did nothing for him. That is because he did not know the Word. He did not know Jesus.
I am not sure that Jesus recognized all this himself. He was, after all, human. He knew he had a mission and that he had come to bring God to earth. But he did know God. That is one thing for sure. As the apostle Paul said in Colossians 2:9 For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form. He had the power, and he gives it to us.
Our holiness, our sanctification does not come through anything we can do. when it comes down to it, we are failed creatures, unworthy of anything but punishment. It is the Word of God – Jesus himself – who sanctifies us. It isn’t the Bible that he is talking about. Without Jesus behind it, it is worthless. It is Jesus.
He alone is our holiness.
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