"For this is the will of God, even your sanctification, that ye should abstain from fornication: That every one of you should know how to possess his vessel in sanctification and honour;"
1 Thessalonians 4:3-4
I like the expression -- "This is the will of God." It's so that simpletons like me can add 2 and 2 and not come up with anything but 4. I'm thrilled that God gives simpletons such as I am things easy to be understood.
Your sanctification is the will of God. Sanctification is defined in Webster's dictionary thusly:
The act of making holy. In an evangelical sense, the act of God's grace by which the affections of men are purified or alienated from sin and the world, and exalted to a supreme love to God.
God's will is for you to be crucified to this world (Gal 6:14) Wholy set apart to his holiness.
The will of God is for us to abstain from fornication in 1Thes 4:3. That should be an easy concept for a man that is born again by the Spirit of God to grasp. Fornication both in the flesh and in the spirit. Back in Jeremiah 3, Israel and Judah were accuseed by the Lord of adultery
against HIM. WOW!
Grant it that a man should not cheat on his wife, nor engage in premarital sex, nor in homosexual practice. That's easy. But when a man commits fornication against the Lord, he steps aside from devotion and love for God and gets involved in wrong "religious" activities -- that God NEVER SANCTIONED!
It is God's will for you to know how to possess your vessel in sanctification and honour. (verse 4 of 1Thes 4.) THIS is the will of God. Look in 2 Timothy 2:21
If a man therefore purge himself from these, he shall be a vessel unto honour, sanctified, and meet for the master's use, and prepared unto every good work.
THIS is the will of God! A purging of the old man, and a sanctification or a setting apart for God's use.
You ever get off in the flesh? I do. I am sickened by it, but every once in a while, my sanctification slips. THAT is NOT the will of God.
Mmmmm Mmmmmm Mmmmm!
