Hebrews 10:5-7 says:
5 Therefore, when He came into the world, He said:
“Sacrifice and offering You did not desire,
But a body You have prepared for Me.
6 In burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin
You had no pleasure.
7 Then I said, ‘Behold, I have come—
In the volume of the book it is written of Me—
To do Your will, O God.'”
Here we read that the Lord Jesus Christ said that the Father prepared a body for Him.
So the body that the Lord Jesus Christ had when He was incarnate in this world—that perfect body—was prepared, not even by Himself, but by the Father Himself. The Father prepared Jesus’ body. Question number one: was that body imperfect for the accomplishing of the will of God in any way? No, if we say that that body was not perfect, then we are saying somehow the Father failed to prepare the perfect body that was necessary for the perfect sanctification of every believer.
Number two: if that’s the case, then the Lord Jesus Christ was lying because the Father hadn’t prepared His body. Now we have doubly accuse God, of wrong. No, that’s not the case. Our Father did it. He did indeed prepare the body of the Lord Jesus Christ—the perfect body necessary to be able to carry out the will of the Father.
Then it goes on in Hebrews chapter 10 to say that the Lord Jesus says this says, “Behold, I have come to do Your will, O God.” In fact it says that twice (verses 8 and 9), and then in Hebrews 10:10, that golden verse, it says:
10 By that will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.
Now the Greek perfect tense is used there for “sanctified,” and the Greek perfect tense means an action that is done once, never to be repeated again. It’s the exact opposite of the Greek continuous tense. So God, in the inspired Word of God, the Bible, selected—hand picked—the Greek perfect tense of “sanctify” to describe the extent and the completeness of our sanctification.
But even if you didn’t know about the Greek perfect tense, we still have the situation of the proofs: number one, of the body that the Father prepared for the Lord Jesus Christ to perfectly accomplish all for our justification, our redemption, our remission of sins and our complete and perfect sanctification. So He completed it. He finished it. He said, “I have come to do Your will, O God.”
And the connection to us is this: “by that will”—not your will, but by Jesus saying, “I have come Father to do Your will.” And He did do it as completely as the doing of everything that Jesus did to accomplish the Father’s will. And we can clearly see this all throughout the Gospels, particularly in the Gospel of John, where it says that Jesus came to do what His Father was doing and say what His Father was saying:
John 5:19 (NKJV)
19 Then Jesus answered and said to them, “Most assuredly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of Himself, but what He sees the Father do; for whatever He does, the Son also does in like manner.
John 12:49-50 (NKJV)
49 For I have not spoken on My own authority; but the Father who sent Me gave Me a command, what I should say and what I should speak. 50 And I know that His command is everlasting life. Therefore, whatever I speak, just as the Father has told Me, so I speak.”
So we see three forceful arguments for the completeness of our sanctification already accomplished (not by us, but by The Lord Jesus Christ):
Number one: the body that was prepared by the Father, testifying to the completeness of what the Father did through The Lord Jesus. He truthfully testified that body was prepared by the Father.
Number two: Second, Jesus comes and says, “Father, I have come to do Your will, O God”—stated twice so we would get it.
Number three: in verse 10, we’re told by that will—by Jesus’ will, which He did perfectly and completely when He accomplished what the Father wanted Him to do—by that will we have been sanctified (Greek perfect tense) by the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.
There you have it— three undeniable proofs that testify to the perfect sanctification that the believer lives in in:
Number one: the perfect body, the body that the Father prepared for the accomplishing of all.
Number two: Jesus coming to do the will of the Father.
Number three: the Greek perfect tense used for “sanctified”, telling of the completed, perfect accomplishment of everything that the Father wants through the Lord Jesus Christ, and by that will we have been—Greek perfect tense—sanctified by the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once and for all.
Hallelujah! To God be the glory!
By “perfect sanctification” we are not saying (as some do) that believers are sinless. We are stating the Bible truth that God is the One who already and perfectly sanctified (set apart, made holy) the believer. When you understand that those in Christ are already perfectly sanctified, then you have the perfect basis for a holy walk with God. Paul makes that case clear in 1 Corinthians 6:11-20. the Bible nowhere teaches that sanctification is “process”, as is so often claimed. The biblical “process” is learning to walk as the holy people that we already are, because of what The Lord Jesus Christ accomplished for us and God’s Grace.
You can learn much more about the biblical reality of Perfect Sanctification by listening to my series Living in The Reality of Perfect Sanctification.