I have been pondering something. It has to do with the processes of consecrating, sacrificing, dedicating and sanctifying. These seem to be all rolled up into the same thing.

I have been thinking about these things, because one day I was sitting in a quiet moment, and God told me: "Sanctify yourself".

I don't hear from God in an audible voice (now's the time for all you budding psychologists to say, "Oh, really? How long, Dr. Brownell, have you been 'hearing' these voices?").

I sense a complete thought impressed upon my mind in such a way that I know it is Him. After over 40 years of a learning curve with Him, I finally understand a few things.

Anyway, ever since God told me to sanctify myself, I've been wondering about that. What does that word mean?

How does one actually go about sanctifying oneself?

I opened the concordance to see what I could find. Lots of entries. I got as far as Exodus chapter 13. Now, here is a place that really grabbed my attention, because I am the first-born, the oldest child among five in my family. This section of the Bible shows God instructing the Israelites under the leadership of Moses to set aside, to dedicate or to hand over to God the first-born of every womb, for both people and animals. I immediately made the connection: "That's me!"

What is being talked about, however, in that chapter is sacrificing these first-born to God. It does not mean devoting them to serving God in some special kind of way; it simply means to kill the animals and to "redeem" the lives of first-born human children with the sacrifice of lambs. That felt ominous and heavy.

By way of application, there was something about being born first that set me aside as belonging to God, but also dead to the world. I think these two descriptions are essential to the concept of sanctification. Although I have not reached beyond Exodus in the current study of the concept of "sanctify", I know that in Hebrew the term is often translated to mean "set aside for God's purposes" or "holy".

To sanctify oneself, then, means to set oneself aside as belonging to God and dead to the world. If a person were to simply organise the day with these two principles in mind, what might be the result?

The alarm goes off, and you jump out of bed. Instead of asking yourself what you want to do that day, you say to God: "Here I am; I belong to you. Now what?"

Instead of looking around to see what's playing at the theatre or what sporting event is taking place, or instead of meeting friends at the club, you say: "I am dead to such things." The New Testament puts it this way: "We have died and our lives are hid in Christ Jesus."

Now, I don't believe that means those who sanctify themselves are supposed to sit around looking, acting, and smelling like dead people. Rather, I think, putting it together with the first premise – that we belong to God-those who have sanctified themselves let God determine what they are to participate in and how they are to do that, and to what degree they are to invest themselves.

What are the psychological benefits of sanctifying oneself (in this understanding of the term?

The greatest one I can think of is peace, the rest and wholeness that comes from being set free from the need to organise one's life so that everything turns out okay. If you belong to someone else, and that person gets to set your agenda, and if you are dead to world, then you are not responsible for the outcome of anything in particular. That is freeing. That enables a person to let go of the responsibility that often drives people into stress and anxiety.

I think there is another effect, psychologically, that comes to a person who sanctifies him or herself. It is humbling to do so. In fact, one must, I think, be humbled to even get to the place in which one can hear the call of sanctification.

It is not a simplistic death-to-self, which is the call of the ascetic. Oh no. It is the call to live fully but at another's discretion without becoming attached to anything in the world in which one lives.

It requires that one become a holy transient. But being wholly transient doesn't necessarily mean taking a vow of poverty. It means being strong enough in one's self to present oneself as a living sacrifice to God. That is what the Bible also calls worship.

I have a hunch the more I proceed in my study of the word "sanctify," the more I will be challenged in how to live my life. And here's a challenge to you, reader: find out what "sanctify yourself" might mean to you.