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This is day two together of our look at Hebrews chapter 10. In these scriptures
we're going to look at together today, we're going to find God has a lot to say
about our holiness, your holiness, my holiness. By God's will and through Jesus'
sacrifice, you have been made holy.

Now the question is, do you look holy? Do you even feel holy? These verses help
us to understand what it means when we say that God has made us holy.

He set us apart for His purposes. And I want us to look in these verses at two
focuses of holiness or sanctification, the idea of sanctification of our growth
in Christ, our growth to become more and more like Christ, more and more holy.
It's from the same root word as holy.

To be sanctified is to be holy. To be holy is to be sanctified. And we find in
these verses we're going to look at today that holiness, sanctification refers
to two things.

It refers number one to the finished action of being made holy, what Jesus did
for us on the cross. And it refers number two in the Bible to the daily process
of becoming holy. And when you get a hold of the fact that both of those are
true in your life, not either or one or the other, but both, you've gotten a
hold of one of the most important truths about your growth that you can
understand.

Sanctification, holiness, growth is both a finished action and a daily process.
In some ways, it's like a marriage. When you get married, you say, "I do.

" And then you spend the rest of your life living out those words, living out
what it means. You are married, but are you acting married yet? And if you're
acting married, do you really know how to, in a marriage, make things work in
every situation, every circumstance?

No, not yet. You've got a lot of growing to do. You're going to grow the rest of
your life.

The finished action of the wedding ceremony has to be lived out in the daily
process of married life. Same thing is true of your spiritual life. So let's
look at this more closely.

Look beginning in verse 10 and down through verse 18, what the scripture has to
say to us. "And by that will, we have been made holy through the sacrifice of
the body of Jesus Christ once for all. Day after day, every priest stands and
performs his religious duties.

Then and again he offers the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins.
But when this priest had offered for all time one sacrifice for sins, he sat
down at the right hand of God. Since that time, he waits for his enemies to be
made his footstool, because by one sacrifice he has made perfect forever those
who are being made holy.

" The Holy Spirit also testifies to us about this. First he says, "This is the
covenant I will make with them after that time," says the Lord, "I will put my
laws in their hearts. I will write them on their minds.

" And then he adds, "Their sins and lawless acts I will remember no more. And
where these have been forgiven, there is no longer any sacrifice for sin. " Now
that last phrase, "no longer any sacrifice for sin," you don't need to make
another sacrifice because Jesus has done all that's needed to be done.

In these verses, we see those two focuses of sanctification of holiness that we
talked about just a moment ago. First of all, your holiness, your sanctification
is once and complete. Here in verse 10, "By that will we have been, you have
been made holy by the sacrifice of the body of Jesus once for all.

" It's not the only place in the New Testament that we're told this. First
Corinthians 1. 30 says, "Because of God you are in Christ Jesus who has become
to us wisdom from God.

In Christ we are put right with God and have been made holy, have been set free
from sin. " In both of those verses, Hebrews 10. 10 and 1 Corinthians 1.

30, you see the same exact phrase, "have been made holy. " It's past tense. God
has made you holy because of your trust in Christ.

You've been set free from sin, you've been put right with God, you've been made
holy. Even as I say that, you might be thinking, "That doesn't quite seem to
fit. " I mean, when we look at our own lives, we know that none of us is
perfect.

You look at your life, you say, "I'm certainly not perfect. We all struggle with
sin. So how can God say He's made us holy?

How can He say we've already been made holy? " Well, it's because of what His
Son did for us. When you trust in Christ, God sees you from that moment on as
having the same holiness as His Son.

Remember, we talked about last week, Jesus substituted for you. He substituted
for you on the cross. He took your sin on His life.

But also in that, He put His holiness on your life. That's the second half of
that transaction. It's awesome.

It's awesome to think about. This is not something we earn. It's a gift that God
gives to us.

In fact, God has already made you holy if you've trusted Christ. That is an
unseen gift. That is a foundation for our growth as believers, to see what God
has already done in your life.

But it's not the whole truth. The whole truth is there's a both/and here. Once
God has made us holy, we start on the path of growing into being the new people
that He wants us to be.

And that leads to a second focus of holiness or sanctification. Sanctification
is once for all, but sanctification is also continual and progressive. Your
holiness, you're growing to be more and more like God.

It's continual and progressive. It's obviously a process in our lives to grow.
It's a process in our lives to grow physically.

It's a process in our lives to grow in a job, in a new task. And it's a process
in our lives to grow spiritually. There are no shortcuts to spiritual growth.

The New Testament again and again and again talks about the things that God has
for us to do in that process. First Peter 2 says, "Like newborn babes, crave
pure spiritual milk so that by it you may grow up in your salvation. " So we're
to crave the milk of God's Word.

Hebrews 12-14, when we get there, we're going to see that it says, "Seek to live
a clean and holy life, for one who is holy will not see the Lord. " So we're not
just to expect to live, we're to seek to live this kind of life. 2 Peter 3-18
says, "Grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

" There's something we're to grow in. We have been made holy, but we're also
being made holy. Now one verse that we've just looked at together, Hebrews
10-14, actually sums up both in one verse.

That verse says, "By one sacrifice he has made perfect forever those who are
being made holy. " Made perfect forever and being made holy. Made perfect
forever, that's a finished act.

Being made holy, that is a continuing process. Here's what this says about your
growth, how you and I grow as followers of Jesus. You express faith concerning
these two truths when you say, "I am a holy person who is being made holy.

I am a sanctified person who is being sanctified. " You don't say, "I'm an
unholy person who God's trying to make holy. " No, he made you holy in Jesus and
he's making you holy in Jesus.

Both are true. Because this was done, it was finished, it was completed, it was
settled at the moment of your salvation. Now why is this important?

Let me sum up what this means. This means that growth, sanctification, holiness,
is not the process of you trying really hard to become something you're not. I
am not holy at all.

Maybe God somehow can create this miracle. Sanctification, holiness, growth is
instead the process of beginning to live out what God has already made you to
be. You may not see it yet, you probably don't feel it yet, but the minute you
ask Jesus Christ into your life, he did make you a new creation.

He did do something new in your life. Some people act as if that's all that
needed to happen and now you would just automatically grow into holiness. Well,
it doesn't happen that way either.

There is a process that goes along with what God has already done. It's
both/and. At the moment of salvation, God changed your spiritual DNA.

But you have to grow into what that DNA means. Just like a child has to grow
into physical health and a child has to grow into understanding if they've been
given good genes to learn things, you have to grow into who God has made you to
be. But the freedom that comes in that is realizing you're not trying hard to be
something you're not.

God has done something new in your life and he wants you to grow into that the
rest of your life. And when you get into heaven, the picture is going to be
completed. So in your mind right now, take just a moment to say these two
statements in your mind.

Just two simple thank yous. First, Lord, thank you that you made me holy. Lord,
thank you that you made me holy.

And then say in your mind this prayer, Lord, thank you that you are making me
holy. Hold on to both of those truths. One more time.

Say that prayer. Lord, thank you that you made me holy and thank you that you
are making me holy. In Jesus' name, amen.

Tomorrow we're going to look together at a new way that God has provided through
Jesus.