The following is a modified version of a prayer by John Stott,
an Anglican theologian from the 20th century. Let’s look at what he is praying to each of the Trinity, and discover what this prayer can lead us to understand better about each of them.
Heavenly Father, I pray that I would worship you as creator and sustainer. I pray that I would stay in your presence and be pleasing to you more and more each day.
Lord Jesus, I pray that I would worship you as lord, savior, and redeemer. I pray that I would take up my cross and follow you each day.
Holy Spirit, I pray that I would worship you as sanctifier, and that you would fill me with your spirit and cause your fruit to ripen in my life–your fruit of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness and self–control.
Sanctification is about setting ourselves apart for God; devoting our thoughts, our actions, our words, our love all to God.
Sanctification begins at the new birth and ends at death. It occurs as the believer is influenced and changed by the Holy Spirit through the preaching and teaching of God’s Word. As principles for living and for service are revealed, the believer’s mind is renewed and willingly they modify their conduct. Thus, they are made holy, set apart for God or sanctified, contrary to others without the influence of God’s Word in their lives.
Holy Spirit as Sanctifier: What does it mean for me to consider the Holy Spirit as a sanctifier? What does sanctification even mean? Am I willing to commit each day to the direction of the Holy Spirit? Do I listen for God’s direction in my pastor’s sermons, in the scriptures I read, in the prayers I say and the time I spend listening to God?
- Hebrews 10:7-10 The plain fact is that bull and goat blood can’t get rid of sin. That is what is meant by this prophecy, put in the mouth of Christ: You don’t want sacrifices and offerings year after year; you’ve prepared a body for me for a sacrifice. It’s not fragrance and smoke from the altar that whet your appetite. So I said, “I’m here to do it your way, O God, the way it’s described in your Book.” When he said, “You don’t want sacrifices and offerings,” he was referring to practices according to the old plan. When he added, “I’m here to do it your way,” he set aside the first in order to enact the new plan—God’s way—by which we are made fit for God by the once-for-all sacrifice of Jesus.
- John 8:32: If the Son Sets You Free 31-32 Then Jesus turned to the Jews who had claimed to believe in him. “If you stick with this, living out what I tell you, you are my disciples for sure. Then you will experience for yourselves the truth, and the truth will free you.”
- 2 Corinthians 6: 14-18 Don’t become partners with those who reject God. How can you make a partnership out of right and wrong? That’s not partnership; that’s war. Is light best friends with dark? Does Christ go strolling with the Devil? Do trust and mistrust hold hands? Who would think of setting up pagan idols in God’s holy Temple? But that is exactly what we are, each of us a temple in whom God lives. God himself put it this way: “I’ll live in them, move into them; I’ll be their God and they’ll be my people. So leave the corruption and compromise; leave it for good,” says God. “Don’t link up with those who will pollute you. I want you all for myself. I’ll be a Father to you; you’ll be sons and daughters to me.” The Word of the Master, God.
- 1 Thessalonians 4 1-3 One final word, friends. We ask you—urge is more like it—that you keep on doing what we told you to do to please God, not in a dogged religious plod, but in a living, spirited dance. You know the guidelines we laid out for you from the Master Jesus. God wants you to live a pure life. Keep yourselves from sexual promiscuity. 4-5 Learn to appreciate and give dignity to your body, not abusing it, as is so common among those who know nothing of God. 6-7 Don’t run roughshod over the concerns of your brothers and sisters. Their concerns are God’s concerns, and he will take care of them. We’ve warned you about this before. God hasn’t invited us into a disorderly, grungy life but into something holy and beautiful—as beautiful on the inside as the outside. 8 If you disregard this advice, you’re not offending your neighbors; you’re rejecting God, who is making you a gift of his Holy Spirit. 9-10 Regarding life together and getting along with each other, you don’t need me to tell you what to do. You’re God-taught in these matters. Just love one another! You’re already good at it; your friends all over the province of Macedonia are the evidence. Keep it up; get better and better at it. 11-12 Stay calm; mind your own business; do your own job. You’ve heard all this from us before, but a reminder never hurts. We want you living in a way that will command the respect of outsiders, not lying around sponging off your friends.
- John 17: Now I’m returning to you. I’m saying these things in the world’s hearing So my people can experience My joy completed in them. I gave them your word; The godless world hated them because of it, Because they didn’t join the world’s ways, Just as I didn’t join the world’s ways. I’m not asking that you take them out of the world But that you guard them from the Evil One. They are no more defined by the world Than I am defined by the world. Make them holy—consecrated—with the truth; Your word is consecrating truth. In the same way that you gave me a mission in the world, I give them a mission in the world. I’m consecrating myself for their sakes So they’ll be truth-consecrated in their mission.
- 1 Peter 1 22-25 Now that you’ve cleaned up your lives by following the truth, love one another as if your lives depended on it. Your new life is not like your old life. Your old birth came from mortal sperm; your new birth comes from God’s living Word. Just think: a life conceived by God himself! That’s why the prophet said, The old life is a grass life, its beauty as short-lived as wildflowers; Grass dries up, flowers wilt, God’s Word goes on and on forever. This is the Word that conceived the new life in you.
- Romans 12: Place Your Life Before God 1-2 So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him. Don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You’ll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you
