By Elizabeth Prata

The thread of Christianity depends on a unity from one generation to the next of mutual understanding of our important words. Hence the Word of the Week.

People sometimes get these mixed up: Justification-Sanctification-Glorification. The previous weeks’ links for Justification and Sanctification are below. Justification is the moment when God declares a sinner righteous through the atoning work of Jesus. It is the judicial act of God, by which he pardons all the sins of those who believe in Jesus. Picture a courtroom, the judge bangs the gavel in the verdict then says, ‘You’re free to go.’…

Sanctification is what happens over the rest of our lives on earth. We are being made holy by the work of the Spirit and our own efforts to partner with Him in the ongoing growth of resisting sin and pursuing Christ-likeness. In our fleshly lives, sanctification never ends. We’ll never be perfectly holy while we are in this flesh.

Glorification is what happens after death when we receive our new bodies at the resurrection. At CARM.org, glorification is defined–

Glorification is the future and final work of God upon Christians where He transforms our mortal physical bodies to the eternal physical bodies in which we will dwell forever.

Behold, I tell you a mystery; we shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet; for the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed. For this perishable must put on the imperishable, and this mortal must put on immortality. (1 Corinthians 15:51-53).

We don’t know exactly what our glorified bodies will be like, or exactly when we will receive them, but in the end we will be like Jesus. (1 John 3:2).

Glorification means we will finally be FREE from the power and presence of sin! Can you imagine a brain freed from the darkness of sin and able to behold His glory? Able to sing and praise and worship freed from sinful lips and tongue? Able to commune with Jesus perfectly and to love our fellow brothers and sisters without fault?

All crippling diseases will be gone. All pain and deterioration will be gone. No more tooth fillings, eyeglasses, dialysis, titanium hips, prosthetics… nothing.

Glorification is something we should all be looking forward to as the hope of our reward: sinless bodies that can dwell personally with Christ in perfect worship.

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Further reading:

Blog post: Our Future Glorification

Essay: How does the Bible describe the glorified bodies we will possess in Heaven?

5. Sanctification
4. Propitiation
3. Immanence
2. Transcendence
1. Justification