Bread of Life
Spiritual Formation Conference
©2013 Joanne Joe Jung
A. Types of Sanctification
 1. Positional
– Christ’s righteousness imputed or
credited to us
 2. Progressive
 3. Perfective–
– The believer grows in victory
over sin and Christlikeness
Believers are changed into His
likeness at His return
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B. Progressive Sanctification is
Spiritual Formation
C. The Why of Sanctification
It is God’s will - 1 Thess 4:3
God commanded it – Heb 12:14
Follows the example of Christ
Benefits the community, attracts the lost
D. Purpose - Heb 5:12-13 – to become mature
Christians with spiritual discernment
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E. A really good definition
Spiritual [trans]formation is the continuing
response to the reality of God’s grace shaping
us into the likeness of Jesus Christ, through the
work of the Holy Spirit, in the community of
faith for the sake of the world.
Jeffrey Greenman, 2005
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II. Why is Spiritual Formation
important?
Our spirits are formed as we take in information about
who we really are and as we begin living our lives on
the basis of that identity.
Christian spiritual formation is coming to the right
answer to “Who am I?” and then living our lives on the
basis of that proper identity.
Smith in Gangel, 248
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 A. The
Trinity
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Father
Son
Holy Spirit
Planned
Sanctification
Provided
Sanctification
Performs
Sanctification
Architect
Administrator
Applier
Ultimate Source Intermediate
Agent
Direct Agent
1Cor 8:6; Heb
10:10
1Cor 6:11; 2Thes
2:13
1Cor 1:30, 8:6;
Eph 5:26;
Heb 2:11, 10:10,
14
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 B. The
Christ-follower
Christian spiritual formation is coming to the right
answer to ‘Who am I?’ and then living our lives
on the basis of that proper identity.
Smith, in Gangel, Handbook on Spiritual Formation
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 Pseudo-transformation
One may be capable of performances that benefit
others spiritually and yet be a stranger oneself to
the Spirit wrought inner transformation that true
knowledge of God brings. The manifestation of
the Spirit in charismatic performance is not the
same thing as the fruit of the Spirit in Christ-like
character, and there may be much of the former
with little or none of the latter.
J.I. Packer
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Something to consider

It seems a well-tended soul is more rare than we would
like to believe. Ignored souls bring typical results. There
are the typical warning signs: loneliness and regrets,
depression and self-centeredness, envy and anger. The
untended soul is a corruption of who God intended us to
be. It is uglier than anything a mirror could ever reflect
back to us.
Valerie Bell, Spiritual Renewal
The real Son of God is at your side. He is beginning to turn
you into the same kind of thing as Himself. He is beginning,
so to speak, to “inject” His kind of life and thought, His life
into you; beginning to turn the tin soldier into a live man. The
part of you that does not like it is the part that is still tin.
C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity
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Character is a word that describes the default
“me.” The person I am over the long haul in life.
The person who emerges in the most difficult,
challenging moments. Character defines the
attitudes, convictions, and behaviors that
distinguish my life.
Gordon MacDonald,
“Cultivating Character”
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III. Who’s involved?
 C. Progress
1. Two questions
2. Your answers
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 A. Obstacles
• External
• Internal
 Jeremiah 17:9
The heart is deceitful above all things, and
desperately sick; who can understand it?
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I want to cultivate my relationship with God. I want all
of life to be Intimate – sometimes consciously,
sometimes unconsciously – with the God who made,
directs, and loves me…I don’t want to live as a
parasite on the first-hand spiritual life of others, but to
be personally involved with all my senses, tasting and
seeing that the Lord is good…Usually for that to happen
there must be a deliberate withdrawal from the noise of
the day, a disciplined detachment from the insatiable
self.
Eugene Peterson, The Contemplative Pastor
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

B. The Bible plays a central role
Character is developed when we let the Scripture
inform us. We are what we permit to enter the deepest
part of our soul. A steady diet of television, cheap
publications, and shallow literature will make us
dreadfully inadequate people. A daily exposure to the
Scripture and to literature that focuses on Scripture is a
necessary part of the diet.
Gordon MacDonald, “Cultivating Character”
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Getting into the Word, The Word getting into us
Biblical Text
Historical Context
Literary Context
Cultural Context
Social Context
response
Religious Context
Authorial Intent,
Application/intended
Genre
Big Idea
Paragraph
Sentence
Word
Meaning
Contemporary Context
Lectio Divina
Cultural Context
Social Context
Religious Context
Lectio
Meditatio
Oratio
Contemplatio
Significance
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 C. Means
of Grace
• A definition
A God-given, Christ-modeled, Spirit-driven
practice we embrace, both individually and
corporately, for the purpose of experiencing
and expressing growth in godliness.
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• Some classic means
 Silence/Solitude
 Fasting
 Prayer
 Confession
 Biblical Hospitality
 Biblical Thanksgiving
 Service
 Celebration
 ____________ breaks the seduction of ____________
and allows us to hear God’s invitation to __________.
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

Purpose of Spiritual Disciplines [Means of Grace]
We undertake these activities (spiritual disciplines) in
order to peel away layers of our own callousness and
insensitivity, so that we become aware of the God who is
always with us.
Douglas Rumford, SoulShaping
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