thoughts and ruminations while in exile (1 Pet. 2:11)

I purchased John Owen’s book, Communion with the Triune God, back in early 2009, and I am almost done reading it. As you can tell by the title, it is about how we as believers have communion with God. There are three sections to the book. In each section Owen develops how we have communion with each Person of the Trinity—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. At the present, I am finishing up the section on our communion with the Son.

Since Owen’s section on the Son is two-hundred pages long, I cannot comment on everything he says. Therefore, I will limit my comments to a particular chapter that I have found both enlightening and edifying. The chapter I’m referring to is entitled, “Communion with Christ in the Grace of Sanctification.”

For starters, the title of the chapter is interesting since most Christians, when speaking about sanctification, talk about the Holy Spirit. Of course, this is not incorrect, since the Holy Spirit works through the means of grace (the Word, sacraments, and prayer, etc.) to conform us more into the image of Christ. Owen, however, shows how the work of Christ is inextricably connected to the work of the Holy Spirit in our sanctification. This is because one cannot separate the work of Christ from the work of the Holy Spirit. We can distinguish the work of Christ from the work of the Spirit, but we cannot separate, or draw a wedge between the two. This is because without the Person and work of Christ there would be no work of sanctification.

How so? Because, as Owen says, “the Spirit, as unto us a Spirit of grace, holiness, and consolation, is of the purchase of Christ.” By this I take Owen to mean that all of the blessings we receive from the Holy Spirit have been purchased for us by the work of Christ on the cross. Thus, as Owen writes later on, “The Spirit takes of that fullness that is in Christ, and in the name of the Lord Jesus bestows it actually on them for whose sanctification he is sent.”

In this chapter Owen has two goals: 1) To show how the work of Christ is indispensable to our sanctification, and 2) to explain how believers must lay hold of these benefits, and how by doing this, they will make progress in their sanctification. I will limit my discussion to Owen’s second point.

How can we appropriate the benefits Christ has purchased for us so that we might advance in our sanctification? Paul seems to speak to this issue in 2 Corinthians 3:18. He says, “And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another.” I think I can safely say that Paul is teaching us that we grow in our walk with God by gazing at the Person of Christ as he is revealed to us in the Bible. Because believers have experienced such a radical change of heart through the new birth, it is our joy and delight to meditate upon Christ, whom Paul calls, “the image of God” (2 Cor. 4:4; cf. Heb. 1:3).

Similarly, Owen says if we want to grow in our sanctification we must continually look to Christ. That is, we must “eye the Lord Jesus as the . . . one in whom it has pleased the Father to gather all things unto a head (Eph. 1:10), that from him [Christ] all things might be dispensed unto them [that is, believers]. All treasures, all fullness, the Spirit not by measure, are in him [Christ].” Therefore, Owen encourages us to look to Christ; and as we do so, to contemplate three things in particular.

1. The Purifying Efficacy of Christ’s Blood.

We must continually do this because of our sin. It’s not that we simply struggle with sin, it’s that we still continue to sin. Because of this, lest we be daily crushed by God’s law, we must remember what God has done for us in Christ. Owen says, “The saints see that in themselves they are still exceedingly defiled; and, indeed, to have a sight of the defilements of sin is a [greater] spiritual discovery than to have only a sense of the guilt of sin.” Where do we take this guilt? We take it to the cross and remember 1 John 1:9. Owen calls this verse “the spring from which flows all the purifying virtue . . .” Not only this, but Christ promises to make us holy (Eph. 5:26-27).

Owen encourages us to meditate upon these truths, for when we do “faith obtains new life, new vigor . . .” Therefore, we should “draw nigh, and see its beauty, purity, and efficacy. . . . One moment’s communion with Christ by faith herein is more effectual to the purging of the soul, to the increasing of grace, than the utmost self-endeavors of a thousand ages.”

Stay tuned for part 2.