So, do you feel "guilty" because you love your wife too? You want to please her out of guilt? You equate love with guilt?
No, I don't think you are following at all. I'll try it another way. I love God and want to please Him. So, when I sin I feel guilty because I have failed in doing that.
You could just as well sit back and enjoy the ride, do whatever you wish, and that would change nothing.
Absolutely not true, as our side has endlessly said. The difference is in who gets the credit for it. For you, the credit must go to man. We give all the credit to God. In any case perseverance must physically take place, so that prohibits sitting back and relaxing.
But what does sanctification accomplish?
It brings us ever closer to Christ during our time on earth.
He gave everyone a free ticket to paradise. If we don't end up there that's our fault. In other words "work out your salvation" (cf Phil 2:12) through Christ; He bought everyone a ticket.
I don't know how you can possibly say that. To get something of value all one has to do is turn in the ticket. This is the last analogy I would think of for your side. For you all, to get something of value you must also work and do good deeds and your sacraments, etc. There is nothing free about the ticket that you hold. It is worthless until you prove yourselves worthy of getting into the stadium. When I have a free ticket to a Cardinals game I don't have to prove anything.
Find me one instance where we give credit to man in our theology or liturgy. That is just plain bogus, FK.
We don't give credit to man; we put expectations on man.
In any case perseverance must physically take place, so that prohibits sitting back and relaxing
That is inconsistent with your theology of double predestination. Either you persevere because God makes you persevere, or you fail because God makes you fail by design—and there is nothing you can do to change it. So, those who choose not to do anything because they are already "saved" can always say God leads me, I am who I am and what I am and where I am just as God made me. No guilt whatsoever. In fact, it promotes sinning, just as Luther taught.
It brings us ever closer to Christ during our time on earth
If you are "saved" then it's not an accomplishment but a foregone conclusion. One cold just as easily say that he will be sanctified on God's time whenever that happens and not really worry about being sanctified on earth.
I don't know how you can possibly say that. To get something of value all one has to do is turn in the ticket
The salvation came as a free gift in the sense that those who willingly come to Christ, walk with Christ, imitate Christ, and become Christ-like in their hearts will be saved. The ticket was freedom to do so. Before Christ, no matter how much one wanted, one couldn't. It was a foregone conclusion that all mankind would go to hell.
Christ restored the freedom given to Adam and Eve to choose between good and evil. That freedom was lost when they sinned. They became captives of death and all their generations with them. It was Christ who brought down the shackles of death, and made mankind free to choose once again.
Maybe one day you will realize this. I pray.