The Work of Sanctification, Part 3

In "The Work of Sanctification, Part 3," Pastor Robert McNutt preaches Romans 8:13 (from the reading of Romans 8:12-17) to answer one question: how do I become more like Jesus? Sanctification, he teaches, is a Spirit-wrought process in which the regenerate Christian must actively cooperate, the commanded work being to "by the Spirit put to death the deeds of the body." Distinguishing the physical body (the remaining seat of sin) from the flesh, he shows that residual sin twists natural, God-given instincts into inordinate affections, calling the believer to lifelong discipline (1 Corinthians 9:27). McNutt rejects two false paths to holiness - monasticism, which flees the world through asceticism (as Luther and Whitefield learned in vain), and legalism, which trades a changed heart for external rules - and points instead to the Spirit's power already resident in every believer, so no Christian may claim he lacks the ability to obey. Practically, mortification means grasping our heritage in Christ, refusing to grieve the indwelling Spirit, abstaining from sin, and dealing with temptation's first motions at once - "nip it in the bud" (James 1:13-15) - while walking in the Spirit (Galatians 5:16) and supplementing faith with virtue and self-control (2 Peter 1:5-11). He warns the change takes a lifetime, but as believers cooperate they grow more like Christ and adorn the gospel. https://www.sermonaudio.com/sermons/7...