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ultimate and primary in this process of spiritual formation.
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Understanding Demarests and Willards views of spiritual formation to fall
within this broadly Reformed understanding of sanctification (which is a good thing from my
perspective, since I also identify with this Reformed model) can help us to see some genuine
advances they have made in their thinking on spiritual growth. Especially as we compare their
views with the way a Reformed model of sanctification all too often works itself out in practice,
we can see some significant contributions of Willard and Demarest that can shore up some
potential weaknesses in Reformed circles. For example, in their consistent emphasis on
synergistic human efforts in the process of sanctification, Reformed Christians can often become
very imperative-oriented, with a corresponding under-emphasis on the indicatives of the gospel
sin, renews our entire nature according to the image of God, and enables us to live lives pleasing
to God." ("The Reformed View," in Five Views on Sanctification, 61 emphasis mine.)
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Hoekema writes, "It is important for us to realize that sanctification is not something we
do by ourselves, with our own efforts and in our own strength. Sanctification is not a human
activity, but a divine gift." (Ibid., 70.) Yet while sanctification is primarily Gods work, "it is not
a process in which we remain passive but one in which we must be continually active." (Ibid.,
71.) He quotes John Murrays hesitation to use the word "cooperation" to describe the human
effort involved in sanctification, lest we view it as though God does his part and we do ours.
Rather "God works in us and we also work. But the relation is that because God works we
work." (Ibid., 72; quoting John Murray, Redemption: Accomplished and Applied [Grand Rapids:
Eerdmans, 1955], 184-185.)