Sanctification precedes regeneration.

For my money, Justification and Sanctification* happen simultaneously, in Regeneration/ New Birth from Above.

IV. THE NATURE OF JUSTIFICATION

1. It is Instantaneous. It is an act, and not a process. It occurs and is complete the moment the individual believes. It admits of no degrees or stages.

The penitent Publican is said to have gone down to his house justified.

He was justified completely the moment he put his faith in the propitiatory work of Christ.

The justification of the believer is always put in the past tense. There is not in all the Bible the slightest hint of a continuous process in justification.

2. It is Everlasting.

When one is justified, he is justified for all eternity. justification can never be revoked or reversed. It is once for all time and eternity. For that reason God asks: "Who shall lay anything to the charge of Gods elect?" (Rom. 8:33).

Christ paid a full ransom, and made a complete satisfaction for all believers; otherwise Christ would have to die again, or else the believer would come into condemnation for his future sins.

But we read that Christ's offering was once for all (Heb. 10:10), and that the believer "shall not come into condemnation but is passed from death unto life." (John 5:24).

So far as the believer's standing is concerned, he has already passed the judgment. He has stood trial, and has been fully and everlastingly acquitted.

That Paul taught an everlasting, unchangeable justification is shown by the fact that he felt called on to defend his doctrine against the attacks of those who would contend that it gave license for sin. This is the indictment that is brought today against the doctrine we are setting forth.

Lastly, we read: "By one offering he hath perfected forever them that are sanctified" (Heb. 10: 14).

It is true that it is the sanctified* that are under consideration in this quotation, but it is applicable to the justified also; for the sanctified and the justified are one.

If the sanctified* are perfected forever, so are the justified. The perfection here is perfection of standing before God."

*Sanctified, or separated, unto New Life, not the continuing Sanctification, or setting apart, of a Godly Life.

 

First we need to define sanctification and specify which of its two meaning we are discussing.

Saints, are the people who have been set apart, sanctified, for God's purpose. The OT Saints (see Hebrews 11) gained approval by faith. However, God also "makes holy," sanctifies, individuals by the washing of regeneration.

When 2 Thessalonians 2:13 says individuals are chosen for salvation (the purpose) through sanctification by the Spirit, the meaning is the Spirit sets the individuals apart in Christ, where they are made alive (regenerated.)

 

That's exactly right and in that sense you could say it comes before regeneration.

 

Yes, being set apart in Christ comes before being made holy, and the washing of regeneration, being made alive together with Christ, results in being made holy, also called the circumcision of Christ. So the Biblical sequence is: Set apart, then regenerated (made alive) together with Christ, which results in being made holy.

1) You cannot be together with Christ until you are set apart in Christ.
2) You cannot be made holy until you undergo the washing of regeneration.

There is nothing debatable about any of this, those that put the order according to man-made doctrine simply ignore God's word.