Welcome to another week on Things Unseen.

I suppose most of us have met Christians who don't much like it when we mention the word doctrine,

or get irritated when we use words like justification. Actually, it's more than a little strange because often enough the same people get upset with us

if we don't know what a bunt is in baseball

or don't understand the difference between a birdie and an eagle on the golf course,

or if soccer is their thing that we don't understand the offside rule upsets

them, or if it's cricket, they're upset if we don't know the difference between fielding

at silly mid-off and fielding in the gully. Every branch of life, every aspect of human knowledge,

has its own vocabulary, terms it uses that contain essential

information, sometimes in a kind of shorthand. So important words, big words in that sense,

really are important in the Christian life. I say all this just to prepare you for this week's theme.

It's one big theological word, sanctification. Certainly a big word in the Bible.

Strictly speaking, the noun sanctification isn't used all that often, but the verb to sanctify is used, I think

about 150 times in one form or another, and the result of being sanctified, being holy,

is used another hundred times, meaning something or someone that's been sanctified. The Hebrew and Greek verbs that are used in the Bible for sanctify

both mean to set something apart.

Yes, in a negative sense, it means being set apart from an ordinary,

from a common, from a day-to-day use.

But it also has a positive sense.

Being set apart for a special use.

Being set apart for something or someone in particular.

It's like this.

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