D&D 5E - Sanctuary useless?

1.) Since he is usually the only one on the front line, Sanctuary can be used to reduce the melee damage he takes by 60 to 75% against trash mobs, or by maybe 40% against truly scary things. They can't redirect their attack and it gets wasted. He doesn't use it often, really, but it's nice to have (Dodge + Sanctuary) or (Blade Ward + Sanctuary) as an option if he finds himself low on hit points or something.

2.) He can use it to protect other characters in emergencies. When the party got attacked by ten Mage Armored Invisible Stalkers, both the paladin and the lore bard (primary healer) took large amounts of damage in the alpha strike--I think the bard was at 4 HP when the paladin got his chance to act. The bard had gotten off a Hypnotic Pattern, which immobilized 7 or 8 of the Invisible Stalkers, and the paladin rushed over to his side and threw down Twin Sanctuary + Lay on Hands for 35 points of damage, which allowed the bard to keep Hypnotic Pattern up, which combined with Wall of Force saved their collective bacon.

#2 is the most common use of Sanctuary at my table. It's especially awesome that Sanctuary is a bonus action no-concentration spell.

In theory you could use Sanctuary as kind of a Shield-like spell if you attacked and then re-cast it every round; you'd reduce your damage by maybe 75% without impairing your offense at all at the cost of one first-level spell slot per turn.

Another option would be to grapple an enemy creature and then cast Sanctuary with your free hand. On subsequent rounds you could Dodge while maintaining your grip, which isn't an attack and so does not break Sanctuary. That could be effective against a Medium/Large melee monster like an Efreeti, especially if the Bardlock has it Hexed on Strength checks so it can't escape the grapple. Disadvantage to all attacks plus inability to move plus Sanctuary when you try to kill the paladin while everyone else is pasting you with ranged attacks sounds really... annoying. In fact, I need to try that one.

It is unclear whether grappling/pushing breaks sanctuary, since no attack roll is involved even though you're taking the attack action. At my table I'd be tempted to rule that it does, because grabbing someone in a hostile fashion sure doesn't seem like a noncombatant kind of thing to do, but the RAW on PHB 194 is clear: grappling is not an attack.

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