The Sanctification Paradox
The apostle from Tarsus was a man single-minded in his pursuits. To know Jesus Christ and to be like Him (Phil. 3:10–11) were Paul’s two central preoccupations. (See “To Know Him and Be Like Him” in the September/October 2025 issue of Israel My Glory.) They directed and consumed his life.
The second of these two concerns—becoming more like Jesus Christ through the process of spiritual growth—is called sanctification. In Philippians 3:13–14, Paul emphasized sanctification’s central place in his life and, by implication, the central place it should occupy in ours too: “Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended; but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.”
In other words, Paul readily acknowledged that he had not yet “arrived” spiritually. He still had a long way to go in becoming like Jesus. And yet, refusing to be distracted by the less important things of life or sidetracked by the missteps of the past, he resolved to keep his eyes firmly fixed on the goal: growth in Christlikeness through sanctification.
Philippians 3:13–14 reveals that progressive sanctification is God’s will for us on this earth. It is the reason we are here: to be constantly increasing in Christlikeness throughout all the days of our lives.
The Problem
I find this teaching of Scripture inspiring and challenging. But I also find it convicting and sometimes even dispiriting because there are days when I don’t feel all that Christlike. If you were to ask me, “How’s your sanctification coming along?” I would probably feel uncomfortable. Most days, I would have to answer that my spiritual growth is progressing slower than it could be.
Maybe you’ve felt that way. Maybe you feel that way today, like you’re doing all the things you’re supposed to do to pursue Christlikeness—regularly spending time in the Word, serving in church, trying to lead a life that is pleasing to God—and yet you feel like you’re just spinning your wheels spiritually, getting nowhere in particular.
If so, I’d like to encourage you with a truth that appears in the development of Paul’s writings. We tend to view Paul as somewhat of a spiritual superhero, but he didn’t view himself that way. In fact, his assessment of his own spirituality and holiness started out modest and grew even more modest over time. Three passages in particular, written at different points in Paul’s life, shed light on this trend. When we place them in chronological order and trace the trajectory of his self-image, we receive the impression that Paul grew less impressed with himself the longer he lived.
The Example
Paul wrote 1 Corinthians during his third missionary journey, probably in the year AD 55 or 56. At that point, he had been a believer in Jesus for about 20 years. As he wrote to the Corinthians, notice how he regarded and characterized himself: “For I am the least of the apostles, who am not worthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God” (1 Cor. 15:9).
Because Paul is one of my favorite apostles, my immediate reaction to this verse is to push back against it—to say, “Come on, Paul, give yourself a little more credit than that!” But this is how he saw himself: as someone whose inclusion in the apostolic circle was utterly undeserved. And so, he thought of himself as “the least of the apostles.”
But maybe Paul’s self-esteem will improve over time, we figure. In a few years, if he really works hard at this progressive sanctification thing, perhaps he’ll start to feel a little more deserving of his apostleship. So, let’s check in with him a little later to see how he’s progressed.
Paul wrote his epistle to the Ephesians during his first Roman imprisonment, about five or six years after he wrote 1 Corinthians. In this letter, we find a second spiritual self-assessment: “To me, who am less than the least of all the saints, this grace was given” (Eph. 3:8).
Uh-oh! What happened? Paul was supposed to go up in the spiritual rankings, not further down. In only a few years, he went from regarding himself as the least of all the apostles to the least of all the saints. Instead of gaining spiritual ground, he felt like he’d lost it.
When we fast forward another two or three years, the situation worsens further still. Paul wrote his first epistle to Timothy in the early to mid-60s, after the apostle had been released from his first Roman imprisonment. Writing to Timothy, he assessed himself a third time: “This is a faithful saying and worthy of all acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am chief” (1 Tim. 1:15).
So, over the course of less than a decade, Paul went from estimating himself as the least of all the apostles, to the least of all the saints, to the chief of all the sinners. And this evaluation comes from a man who avowed that life’s purpose was to seek to know Jesus Christ and be like Him.
The Paradox
What should we make of all this? Why did Paul become increasingly self-deprecatory over time? Was he just being modest—putting on a false air of humility? I don’t think so. These passages give us a genuine and unfeigned window into Paul’s true thoughts and feelings about himself. I don’t think Paul actually failed in his pursuit of sanctification because at the end of his life, he looked back and spoke more positively about how his spiritual growth had progressed and turned out (2 Tim. 4:7–8).
Something else is going on here. As we read about how Paul viewed himself, we get a glimpse into one of the truly paradoxical things about Christian sanctification: Oftentimes, the more sanctified you become, the less sanctified you feel. To put it another way, Christlikeness is a goal that seems to be constantly receding: The closer you get to it, the farther away it seems to be.
Why is this the case? Because walking with Jesus and learning to think more biblically naturally causes us to become more keenly aware of the things within us that miss the mark and fall short of the perfect standard of God’s holiness and glory. This awareness can cause us to feel like we’re plateauing spiritually or even losing ground—not necessarily because we actually are, but sometimes, paradoxically, because we’re making progress. We may not always feel this progress, but it is nevertheless there.
I point this out not to offer an excuse for spiritual lethargy or laziness, but rather to encourage you. Are there days when you don’t exactly feel like a spiritual superhero? Neither did Paul most of the time. (And even on our best days, we can hardly expect to do better than he did.)
So, in those seasons of spiritual dryness, or whenever you feel like you just aren’t seeing the fruit in your life that you know should be there, don’t agonize over it. Don’t allow yourself to become morbidly introspective or beat yourself up as a spiritual failure. Instead, keep fixing your eyes on Jesus and pursuing Christlikeness whether you feel like you’re making headway or not. You might be doing better than you think. Remain in the Word, stay engaged at church, continue yielding to the Holy Spirit, and keep putting one foot in front of the other. Like Paul, make it your aim to do this one thing: “Forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, I press toward the goal” (Phil. 3:13–14).
