11  God at Work in You—  Part 2: God’s Role  in Sanctification  (Philippians 2:13)

for it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure. (2:13)

As the previous chapter stated, there are two equal and opposite errors into which Christians may fall concerning the doctrine of sanctification. On the one hand, quietists stress God’s role in sanctification, to the virtual exclusion of any human effort. Pietists, in contrast, emphasize self-effort at the expense of reliance on God’s power. In Philippians 2:12–13, the apostle Paul avoids both of those unbiblical extremes, and presents the true balanced view of sanctification.

Having presented the believer’s responsibility in sanctification in 2:12, Paul in verse 13 focused on God’s role in the believer’s sanctification. While the believer is working “out,” God is working “in.” In fact, apart from the reality of verse 13, the fulfillment of verse 12 would be impossible.

Jesus stressed that truth in the Upper Room Discourse, given to His disciples on the night before His death: “Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in Me. I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing” (John 15:4–5).

In this verse, Paul indicates the divine work in sanctification by emphasizing five key features about God: His person, His power, His presence, His purpose, and His pleasure.

HIS PERSON

for it is God (2:13a)

The first truth about God’s part in believers’ sanctification is His personhood, which is made clear by the personal pronouns who and His and by the verbs to will and to work.

Most pagan deities are described as impersonal, remote, and indifferent. That is not surprising, because false gods are fabricated by men out of fear and superstition. Even those that have personal characteristics are not portrayed as desiring fellowship with their worshipers. Understandably, their worshipers have no desire to fellowship with them. Since these false gods are fronts for demons, what the demons do impersonating the deities is only evil and harmful. That guarantees that they are worshiped solely for the purpose of appeasement—negatively to assuage the deities’ anger and thus to avoid problems, and positively to gain health, prosperity, power, and other benefits.

But the true and living God of Scripture is real and personal. The Bible does not try to prove that God is a person because it assumes that reality. In both testaments He is spoken of in anthropomorphic (humanlike) terms, such as having eyes and seeing, of having ears and hearing, of having feet and walking, of loving and hating, weeping and laughing, condemning and forgiving. He thinks, feels, acts, and speaks—all elements of personhood. As a person, He has a personal concern for mankind, and especially for His children. That personal concern is seen in His work in believers.

The God of Scripture has unimaginable love for fallen, sinful mankind, which has rebelled against Him, blasphemed Him, and vilified Him. He has such great love for them “that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life. For God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through Him” (John 3:16–17). It is not the Lord’s will “for any to perish but for all to come to repentance” (2 Peter 3:9).

For those who belong to Him, the God of Scripture has even greater love and the closest of personal relationships. In the Old Testament (Isa. 63:16; 64:8), and especially in the New (cf. Matt. 5:16, 45, 48; 6:1, 9; 23:9), He is referred to as His people’s Father. Adam and Eve, Moses, and many other Old Testament saints spoke with God directly. “The Lord used to speak to Moses face to face, just as a man speaks to his friend” (Ex. 33:11). The prophet Malachi wrote that

those who feared the Lord spoke to one another, and the Lord gave attention and heard it, and a book of remembrance was written before Him for those who fear the Lord and who esteem His name. “They will be Mine,” says the Lord of hosts, “on the day that I prepare My own possession, and I will spare them as a man spares his own son who serves him.” (Mal. 3:16–17)

The omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent Creator and Sustainer of the universe loves His children with everlasting love and kindness. God protects them according to His everlasting covenant and promises, forgives and cleanses with everlasting grace through His Son, and calls, gifts, and empowers them by His Spirit for spiritual service with everlasting impact. He sanctifies and will glorify those whom He has justified, bringing them into His heavenly kingdom to live with Him for all eternity.

No wonder Paul exulted:

Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and unfathomable His ways! For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who became His counselor? Or who has first given to Him that it might be paid back to Him again? For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him be the glory forever. Amen.” (Rom. 11:33–36)

HIS POWER

who is at work (2:13b)

The second essential truth emphasized here about God’s part in believers’ sanctification is His divine power. Above all else, it is God who is at work in the lives of His children. He calls them to obey, and then, through His sovereign power, empowers their obedience. He calls them to His service, and then empowers their service. He calls them to holiness, and then empowers them to pursue holiness.

Work is from the verb energe, the source of the English word energy. God energizes His children to obey and serve Him; His power enables their sanctification. As noted in the previous chapter, believers can do nothing holy or righteous in their own power or resources. Just as no one can be justified by the work of the flesh (Rom. 3:20), so no one can be “perfected [sanctified] by the flesh” (Gal. 3:3). Paul confessed that “nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh; for the willing is present in me, but the doing of the good is not” (Rom. 7:18). He confessed that “by the grace of God I am what I am, and His grace toward me did not prove vain; but I labored even more than all of them, yet not I, but the grace of God with me” (1 Cor. 15:10). He encouraged the Corinthians to “be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord,” because he could assure them “that [their] toil [was] not in vain in the Lord” (v. 58). Paul did not underestimate the importance of faithful obedience. But he knew that underlying all acceptable service is the gracious power of God. It is “not that we are adequate in ourselves to consider anything as coming from ourselves,” he wrote, “but our adequacy is from God” (2 Cor. 3:5). He reminded the Ephesians that he “was made a minister, according to the gift of God’s grace which was given to [him] according to the working of His power,” and rejoiced, “Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly beyond all that we ask or think, according to the power that works within us, to Him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever. Amen” (Eph. 3:7, 20–21).

Before Jesus gave the Great Commission, “Make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age,” He reminded the disciples that “all authority [or power] has been given to Me in heaven and on earth” (Matt. 28:18–20). And before He gave the final call to “be My witnesses both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and even to the remotest part of the earth,” He promised the disciples, “You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you” (Acts 1:8).

It is important that believers minister to each other, because that is God’s will (Gal. 5:13). It is also God’s will that preachers and teachers minister to the church (Eph. 4:11–13). It is important that the holy angels minister to believers, because God sends out those “ministering spirits . . . to render service for the sake of those who will inherit salvation” (Heb. 1:14). But above all else, God Himself is believers’ supreme and indispensable resource and power. The wonder of all wonders is that it is God who is at work in them. Paul summed it up in Colossians 1:29 when he said, “I labor, striving according to His power, which mightily works within me.”

It is for that reason that sanctification will continue throughout the believer’s life (1:6). Those whom God justifies He invariably sanctifies. He will accomplish His will by saving and preserving those who come to Him (John 6:40, 44). David understood that great truth when he wrote, “The Lord is my shepherd” (Ps. 23:1). He knew that he would not lack anything he needed (v. 1), that God would protect him (v. 4) and guide him (v. 3). Above all, David had the divine assurance that he would live forever in God’s presence (v. 6).

In perhaps the most magnificent passage declaring God’s preservation of believers Paul wrote,

What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who is against us? He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him over for us all, how will He not also with Him freely give us all things? Who will bring a charge against God’s elect? God is the one who justifies; who is the one who condemns? Christ Jesus is He who died, yes, rather who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who also intercedes for us. Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? Just as it is written, “For Your sake we are being put to death all day long; we were considered as sheep to be slaughtered.” But in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Rom. 8:31–39)

The revival under King Hezekiah illustrates God at work in the lives of His people. That mighty spiritual work began with the restoration of the temple. Hezekiah charged the Levites, “Consecrate yourselves now, and consecrate the house of the Lord, the God of your fathers, and carry the uncleanness out from the holy place. . . . My sons, do not be negligent now, for the Lord has chosen you to stand before Him, to minister to Him, and to be His ministers and burn incense” (2 Chron. 29:5, 11). The next day, “King Hezekiah arose early and assembled the princes of the city and went up to the house of the Lord” (v. 20). Later, he called all the city together, and everyone “rejoiced over what God had prepared for the people” (v. 36). Continuing his pursuit of spiritual revival, “Hezekiah sent to all Israel and Judah and wrote letters also to Ephraim and Manasseh, that they should come to the house of the Lord at Jerusalem to celebrate the Passover to the Lord God of Israel” (30:1). A decree was circulated throughout the country, calling the people to the long-neglected Passover feast. The edict included both a warning and a promise:

Do not stiffen your neck like your fathers, but yield to the Lord and enter His sanctuary which He has consecrated forever, and serve the Lord your God, that His burning anger may turn away from you. For if you return to the Lord, your brothers and your sons will find compassion before those who led them captive and will return to this land. For the Lord your God is gracious and compassionate, and will not turn His face away from you if you return to Him” (vv. 8–9).

The people responded favorably because “the hand of God was also on Judah to give them one heart to do what the king and the princes commanded by the word of the Lord” (v. 12). God commanded His people to return to Him and then gave them the heart to do it, graciously energizing the fulfillment of His command.

HIS PRESENCE

in you, (2:13c)

The third essential truth about God’s part in believers’ sanctification is His divine presence. The preposition in is often featured in Paul’s writings as he records the beloved truth that Jesus Christ dwells in believers (cf. Rom. 8:9–10; Gal. 2:20; Col. 1:27). The Lord Himself spoke of His indwelling presence in John 17:22–23: “The glory which You have given Me I have given to them, that they may be one, just as We are one; I in them and You in Me, that they may be perfected in unity, so that the world may know that You sent Me, and loved them, even as You have loved Me.”

David understood and gloried in the reality of the Lord’s continual presence with him: “You scrutinize my path and my lying down, and are intimately acquainted with all my ways” (Ps. 139:3). As noted above, the Lord was his Shepherd, who never forsook or neglected him or failed to protect him and abundantly provide for his needs (Ps. 23). In ways that are far beyond human comprehension, God indwells His people, both as individuals and collectively in the church. Jesus promised the disciples and all future believers: “I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may be with you forever; that is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it does not see Him or know Him, but you know Him because He abides with you and will be in you” (John 14:16–17; cf. Acts 1:8). Perhaps because of their immaturity and worldliness, Paul reminded the Corinthians of that truth at least three times. “Do you not know that you are a temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you?” (1 Cor. 3:16), he asked rhetorically. Later he added, “Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own?” (6:19). In his second epistle he wrote, “We are the temple of the living God; just as God said, ‘I will dwell in them and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people’” (2 Cor. 6:16; cf. Ex. 29:45; Heb. 13:5).

God works unceasingly for the welfare of His people (Rom. 8:28). His holiness, wisdom, power, love, presence, and mercy are infinite. Having begun their new life in Christ through the power of His Spirit, believers are perfected by that same divine power. Because some believers in the Galatian churches were seeking to live by their own wisdom and resources, Paul asked in dismay, “Are you so foolish? Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh?” (Gal. 3:3).

HIS PURPOSE

both to will and to work (2:13d)

The fourth essential truth emphasized here, which is at the heart of God’s work in believers’ sanctification, is His divine purpose. That purpose is revealed by what He energizes believers to do—to will and to work.

The phrase both to will and to work is best interpreted as referring not to God’s will and work but to that of believers. The will to do what is right before God must precede any effective work that is done toward that end. A genuine desire to do God’s will, as well as the power to obey it, originates with Him.

To will is from thel, which refers to thoughtful, purposeful choice, not to mere whim or emotional desire. It is what the psalmist had in mind when he prayed, “Incline my heart to Your testimonies” (Ps. 119:36; cf. 110:3) and what Ezra spoke of when he reported that “the heads of fathers’households of Judah and Benjamin and the priests and the Levites arose, even everyone whose spirit God had stirred to go up and rebuild the house of the Lord which is in Jerusalem” (Ezra 1:5; cf. 7:27). Later Ezra gave thanks that God also inclined the heart of King Artaxerxes of Persia to permit the Jews “to adorn the house of the Lord which is in Jerusalem” (7:27). Proverbs declares that “the king’s heart is like channels of water in the hand of the Lord; He turns it wherever He wishes” (Prov. 21:1).

God uses two means to move believers’ wills. First is what might be called holy discontent, the humble recognition that one’s life always falls short of God’s standard of holiness. When Isaiah beheld “the Lord sitting on a throne, lofty and exalted, with the train of His robe filling the temple,” he could only exclaim in reverential fear, “Woe is me, for I am ruined! Because I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips” (Isa. 6:1, 5). Like all righteous people, he was dissatisfied with his spiritual state—a dissatisfaction immeasurably intensified by that awesome experience. Although Paul could say, “I am conscious of nothing against myself,” he was quick to add, “yet I am not by this acquitted” (1 Cor. 4:4). As carefully and honestly as he examined his life, he knew that his finite perception could not detect every sin or spiritual shortcoming. His holy discontent led him to lament in his letter to the church at Rome, “Wretched man that I am! Who will set me free from the body of this death?” (Rom. 7:24).

The second means God uses to move believers’wills is holy aspiration, the positive side of holy discontent. After He instills a genuine hatred of sin, He cultivates a genuine desire for righteousness. After He makes believers discontent with what they are, He gives them the aspiration to greater holiness. Above all, it is the desire to be like Christ, “to become conformed to the image of [God’s] Son” (Rom. 8:29). In Philippians Paul brings together his own holy discontent and holy aspiration when he confesses:

Not that I have already obtained it or have already become perfect, but I press on so that I may lay hold of that for which also I was laid hold of by Christ Jesus. Brethren, I do not regard myself as having laid hold of it yet; but one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and reaching forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. (3:12–14)

Holy resolve leads to holy living. A godly will produces godly work.

It cannot be overemphasized that only God can produce in believers the will or the work that He commands of them. To work is from energe, which refers to being energized and active in a particular endeavor. James noted that “every good thing given and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights” (James 1:17). Understanding that truth, the writer of Hebrews wrote, “Now the God of peace, who brought up from the dead the great Shepherd of the sheep through the blood of the eternal covenant, even Jesus our Lord, equip you in every good thing to do His will, working in us that which is pleasing in His sight, through Jesus Christ” (Heb. 13:20–21).

Just as believers are not saved by good works but wholly by God’s grace working through their faith (Eph. 2:8–9), so also they are sanctified by His grace working through their obedience. They are God’s “workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that [they] would walk in them” (v. 10). Just as believers are sovereignly predestined to salvation, so also are they predestined to sanctification. Again, Romans 8 is helpful:

For those whom He foreknew, He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son, so that He would be the firstborn among many brethren; and these whom He predestined, He also called; and these whom He called, He also justified; and these whom He justified, He also glorified. (Rom. 8:29–30)

HIS PLEASURE

for His good pleasure. (2:13e)

The fifth and final essential reality about God’s part in believers’ sanctification is the overwhelming truth that God works in their sanctification for His own good pleasure. His will for believers is that they think and do what pleases Him. Although that is accomplished primarily by His own power, when His children seek His will and do His work, it brings Him great pleasure. Good pleasure translates eudokias, which expresses great enjoyment and satisfaction. Because God is infinitely self-sufficient, one cannot but wonder how anything or anyone, especially a sinful human being, could add to His satisfaction. Yet that clearly is what Paul is saying. Even when they were weak, vacillating, and fearful, Jesus assured the disciples, “Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has chosen gladly to give you the kingdom” (Luke 12:32). Giving a place in His kingdom to His children brings God great pleasure.

Because believers’ sanctification brings Him satisfaction, God grants them the resources to pursue it. Paul wrote to the Ephesians that “the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ . . . has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ . . . [and has] made known to us the mystery of His will, according to His kind intention which He purposed in Him” (Eph. 1:3, 9). To the Thessalonians he added that God will “fulfill every desire for goodness and the work of faith with power” (2 Thess. 1:11).

Even when they rebel against Him, God still desires to bless His people if they turn and obey. Isaiah addressed these encouraging words to wayward Israel: “Seek the Lord while He may be found; call upon Him while He is near. Let the wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man his thoughts; and let him return to the Lord, and He will have compassion on him, and to our God, for He will abundantly pardon” (Isa. 55:6–7). Through Hosea, the Lord said to His beloved people, “How can I give you up, O Ephraim? How can I surrender you, O Israel? . . . My heart is turned over within Me, all My compassions are kindled. I will not execute My fierce anger; I will not destroy Ephraim again. For I am God and not man, the Holy One in your midst, and I will not come in wrath” (Hos. 11:8–9).

Believers’ supreme purpose is to obey, worship, and glorify God, and their fulfilling that purpose brings pleasure to Him. That magnificent truth is one of the many unique realities of Christianity. The sovereign God of the universe takes personal pleasure in what He Himself inspires and empowers His redeemed children to be and to do.

Every Christian should understand that sanctification takes his most strenuous effort, but is nonetheless totally dependant on God’s power. Like many other truths of Scripture, those seemingly irreconcilable realities are hard to understand. Having done all they can, believers are to give God all the credit. Just as the Lord instructed, after they have done “all the things which are commanded,” they are to confess, “We are unworthy slaves; we have done only that which we ought to have done” (Luke 17:10).