Wanting To Do Good Will Not Stop You From Sinning

My Utmost For His Highest

This is the will of God, your sanctification… —1 Thessalonians 4:3

{CHAMBERS} “Sanctification is not a question of whether God is willing to sanctify me— is it my will? Am I willing to let God do in me everything that has been made possible through the atonement of the Cross of Christ? Am I willing to let Jesus become sanctification to me, and to let His life be exhibited in my human flesh? (see 1 Corinthians 1:30). Beware of saying, “Oh, I am longing to be sanctified.” No, you are not. Recognize your need, but stop longing and make it a matter of action. […] He [Jesus] completed everything for my salvation and sanctification. No wonder Paul said that nothing “shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:39). [….] Never confuse the effect with the cause. The effect in me is obedience, service, and prayer, and is the outcome of inexpressible thanks and adoration for the miraculous sanctification that has been brought about in me because of the atonement through the Cross of Christ.

{ELGIN}  Wanting verses doing.  Preference to do what we want pushing God to the back of our minds.  It’s like the times that you did, or still do, things that you knew were contrary to what your parents had said to do or not to do.  All the while you were doing your own thing you were aware that you were being disobedient.  It’s the same  with your heavenly Father.  Paul talked about this in Romans (7:18-25).  He wrote “I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. For I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing…..   Although I want to do good, evil is right there with me. For in my inner being I delight in God’s law;  but I see another law at work in me, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within me.  What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death? Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord!”

At the point of disobedience, your heart rate increases, your mind starts racing … you are acutely aware that you are about to step over the line.  The temptation is about to transition to sin.  It is the battle that will rage in you until you see Jesus face to face.  Your old nature must be nailed to the cross every day, every moment.  (1 Corinthians 10:13) “No temptation has overtaken you except what is common to mankind. And God is faithful; He will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, He will also provide a way out so that you can endure it.”  Do you look at the waves and your ability to walk on them or to Jesus and His ability to walk with you.  You cannot be successful in your new life by wanting to be good and wanting to not sin.  That is a formula for failure. Don’t be satisfied with “partial” sanctification, believing that the life you are living is as good as it will ever get.  That is not the life you have been called to.  It is the life you have been saved from.