Part 6 — Chapter II. The Reconciliation Of Man To God, Or The Application Of Redemption Through The Work Of The Holy Spirit. (continued 5)

A. Remission of punishment.

(a) God acquits the ungodly who believe in Christ, and declares them just. This is not to declare them innocent,—that would be a judgment contrary to truth. It declares that the demands of the law have been satisfied with regard to them, and that they are now free from its condemnation.

Rom. 4:5—“But to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is reckoned for righteousness”; cf. John 3:16—“gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on him should not perish”; see page 856, (a), and Shedd, Dogm. Theol., 2:549. Rom. 5:1—“Being therefore justified by faith, we have peace with God”—not subjective peace or quietness of mind, but objective peace or reconciliation, the opposite of the state of war, in which we are subject to the divine wrath. Dale, Ephesians, 67—“Forgiveness may be defined: 1. in personal terms, as [pg 855]a cessation of the anger or moral resentment of God against sin; 2. in ethical terms, as a release from the guilt of sin which oppresses the conscience; 3. in legal terms, as a remission of the punishment of sin, which is eternal death.”

(b) This acquittal, in so far as it is the act of God as judge or executive, administering law, may be denominated pardon. In so far as it is the act of God as a father personally injured and grieved by sin, yet showing grace to the sinner, it is denominated forgiveness.

Micah 7:18—“Who is a God like into thee, that pardoneth iniquity, and passeth over the transgression of the remnant of his heritage?” Ps. 130:4—“But there is forgiveness with thee, That thou mayst be feared.” It is hard for us to understand God's feeling toward sin. Forgiveness seems easy to us, largely because we are indifferent toward sin. But to the holy One, to whom sin is the abominable thing which he hates, forgiveness involves a fundamental change of relation, and nothing but Christ's taking the penalty of sin upon him can make it possible. B. Fay Mills: “A tender spirited follower of Jesus Christ said to me, not long ago, that it had taken him twelve years to forgive an injury that had been committed against him.”How much harder for God to forgive, since he can never become indifferent to the nature of the transgression!

(c) In an earthly tribunal, there is no acquittal for those who are proved to be transgressors,—for such there is only conviction and punishment. But in God's government there is remission of punishment for believers, even though they are confessedly offenders; and, in justification, God declares this remission.

There is no forgiveness in nature. F. W. Robertson preached this. But he ignored the vis medicatrix of the gospel, in which forgiveness is offered to all. The natural conscience says: “I must pay my debt.” But the believer finds that “Jesus paid it all.”Illustrate by the poor man, who on coming to pay his mortgage finds that the owner at death had ordered it to be burned, so that now there is nothing to pay. Ps. 34:22—“Jehovah redeemeth the soul of his servants, And none of them that take refuge in him shall be condemned.”

A child disobeys his father and breaks his arm. His sin involves two penalties, the alienation from his father and the broken arm. The father, on repentance, may forgive his child. The personal relation is re-established, but the broken bone is not therefore at once reknit. The father's forgiveness, however, will assure the father's help toward complete healing. So justification does not ensure the immediate removal of all the natural consequences of our sins. It does ensure present reconciliation and future perfection. Clarke, Christian Theology, 364—“Justification is not equivalent to acquittal, for acquittal declares that the man has not done wrong. Justification is rather the acceptance of a man, on sufficient grounds, although he has done wrong.” As the Plymouth Brethren say: “It is not the sin-question, but the Son-question.” “Their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more” (Heb. 10:17). The father did not allow the prodigal to complete the confession he had prepared to make, but interrupted him, and dwelt only upon his return home (Luke 15:22).

(d) The declaration that the sinner is no longer exposed to the penalty of law, has its ground, not in any satisfaction of the law's demand on the part of the sinner himself, but solely in the bearing of the penalty by Christ, to whom the sinner is united by faith. Justification, in its first element, is therefore that act by which God, for the sake of Christ, acquits the transgressor and suffers him to go free.

Acts 13:38, 39—“Be it known unto you therefore, brethren, that through this man is proclaimed unto you remission of sins: and by him [lit.: ‘in him’] every one that believeth is justified from all things, from which ye could not be justified by the law of Moses”; Rom. 3:24, 26—“being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus ... that he might himself be just, and the justifier of him that hath faith in Jesus”; 1 Cor. 6:11—“but ye were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus”; Eph. 1:7—“in whom we have our redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace.”

This acquittal is not to be conceived of as the sovereign act of a Governor, but rather as a judicial procedure. Christ secures a new trial for those already condemned—a trial [pg 856]in which he appears for the guilty, and sets over against their sin his own righteousness, or rather shows them to be righteous in him. C. H. M.: “When Balak seeks to curse the seed of Abraham, it is said of Jehovah: ‘He hath not beheld iniquity in Jacob, Neither hath he seen perverseness in Israel’ (Num. 23:21). When Satan stands forth to rebuke Joshua, the word is: ‘Jehovah rebuke thee, O Satan ... is not this a brand plucked out of the fire?’ (Zech. 3:2). Thus he ever puts himself between his people and every tongue that would accuse them. ‘Touch not mine anointed ones,’ he says, ‘and do my prophets no harm’ (Ps. 105:15). ‘It is God that justifieth; who is he that condemneth?’ (Rom. 8:33, 34).” It is not sin, then, that condemns,—it is the failure to ask pardon for sin, through Christ. Illustrate by the ring presented by Queen Elizabeth to the Earl of Essex. Queen Elizabeth did not forgive the penitent Countess of Nottingham for withholding the ring of Essex which would have purchased his pardon. She shook the dying woman and cursed her, even while she was imploring forgiveness. There is no such failure of mercy in God's administration.

Kaftan, in Am. Jour. Theology, 4:698—“The peculiar characteristic of Christian experience is the forgiveness of sins, or reconciliation—a forgiveness which is conceived as an unmerited gift of God, which is bestowed on man independently of his own moral worthiness. Other religions have some measure of revelation, but Christianity alone has the clear revelation of this forgiveness, and this is accepted by faith. And forgiveness leads to a better ethics than any religion of works can show.”

B. Restoration to favor.

(a) Justification is more than remission or acquittal. These would leave the sinner simply in the position of a discharged criminal,—law requires a positive righteousness also. Besides deliverance from punishment, justification implies God's treatment of the sinner as if he were, and had been, personally righteous. The justified person receives not only remission of penalty, but the rewards promised to obedience.

Luke 15:22-24—“Bring forth quickly the best robe, and put it on him; and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet: and bring the fatted calf, and kill it, and let us eat, and make merry: for this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found”; John 3:16—“gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on him should ... have eternal life”; Rom. 5:1, 2—“Being therefore justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ; through whom also we have had our access by faith into this grace wherein we stand; and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God”—“this grace” being a permanent state of divine favor; 1 Cor. 1:30—“But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who was made unto us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification, and redemption: that, according as it is written, He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord”; 2 Cor. 5:21—“that we might become the righteousness of God in him.”

Gal. 3:6—“Even as Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned unto him for righteousness”; Eph. 2:7—“the exceeding riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus”; 3:12—“in whom we have boldness and access in confidence through our faith in him”; Phil. 3:8, 9—“I count all things to be loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord ... the righteousness which is from God by faith”; Col. 1:22—“reconciled in the body of his flesh through death, to present you holy and without blemish and unreprovable before him”; Tit. 3:4, 7—“the kindness of God our Savior ... that, being justified by his grace, we might be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life”; Rev. 19:8—“And it was given unto her that she should array herself in fine linen, bright and pure: for the fine linen is the righteous acts of the saints.”

Justification is setting one right before law. But law requires not merely freedom from offence negatively, but all manner of obedience and likeness to God positively. Since justification is in Christ and by virtue of the believer's union with Christ, it puts the believer on the same footing before the law that Christ is on, namely, not only acquittal but favor. 1 Tim. 3:16—Christ was himself “justified in the spirit,” and the believer partakes of his justification and of the whole of it, i. e., not only acquittal but favor. Acts 13:39—“in him every one that believeth is justified” i. e., in Christ; 1 Cor. 6:11—“justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ”; Gal. 4:5—“that we might receive the adoption of sons”—a part of justification; Rom. 5:11—“through whom we have now received the reconciliation”—in justification; 2 Cor. 5:21—“that we might become the righteousness of God in him”; Phil. 3:9—“the righteousness which is from God by faith”; John 1:12—“to them gave he the right to become children of God”—emphasis on “gave”—intimation that the “becoming children” is not subsequent to the justification, but is a part of it.

Ellicott on Tit. 3:7—“δικαιοθέντες, ‘justified,’ in the usual and more strict theological sense; not however as implying only a mere outward non-imputation of sin, but as involving a ‘mutationem status,’ an acceptance into new privileges, and an enjoyment of the benefits thereof (Waterland, Justif, vol. vi, p. 5); in the words of the same writer: [pg 857] ‘Justification cannot be conceived without some work of the Spirit in conferring a title to salvation.’ ” The prisoner who has simply served out his term escapes without further punishment and that is all. But the pardoned man receives back in his pardon the full rights of citizenship, can again vote, serve on juries, testify in court, and exercise all his individual liberties, as the discharged convict cannot. The Society of Friends is so called, not because they are friends to one another, but because they regard themselves as friends of God. So, in the Middle Ages, Master Eckart, John Tauler, Henry Suso, called themselves the friends of God, after the pattern of Abraham; 2 Chron. 20:7—“Abraham thy friend”; James 2:23—“Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned unto him for righteousness; and he was called the friend of God”, i. e., one not merely acquitted from the charge of sin, but also admitted into favor and intimacy with God.

(b) This restoration to favor, viewed in its aspect as the renewal of a broken friendship, is denominated reconciliation; viewed in its aspect as a renewal of the soul's true relation to God as a father, it is denominated adoption.

John 1:12—“But as many as received him, to them gave he the right to become children of God, even to them that believe on his name”; Rom. 5:11—“and not only so, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received the reconciliation”; Gal. 4:4, 5—“born under the law, that he might redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons”; Eph. 1:5—“having foreordained us unto adoption as sons through Jesus Christ unto himself”; cf. Rom. 8:23—“even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for our adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body”—that is, this adoption is completed, so far as the body is concerned, at the resurrection.

Luther called Psalms 32, 51, 130, 143, “the Pauline Psalms,” because these declare forgiveness to be granted to the believer without law and without works. Ps. 130:3, 4—“If thou, Jehovah, shouldst mark iniquities, O Lord, who could stand? But there is forgiveness with thee, That thou mayest be feared” is followed by verses 7, 8—“O Israel, hope in Jehovah; For with Jehovah there is lovingkindness, And with him is plenteous redemption. And he will redeem Israel From all his iniquities.” Whitefield was rebuked for declaring in a discourse that Christ would receive even the devil's castaways; but that very day, while at dinner at Lady Huntington's, he was called out to meet two women who were sinners, and to whose broken hearts and blasted lives that remark gave hope and healing.

(c) In an earthly pardon there are no special helps bestowed upon the pardoned. There are no penalties, but there are also no rewards; law cannot claim anything of the discharged, but then they also can claim nothing of the law. But what, though greatly needed, is left unprovided by human government, God does provide. In justification, there is not only acquittal, but approval; not only pardon, but promotion. Remission is never separated from restoration.

After serving a term in the penitentiary, the convict goes out with a stigma upon him and with no friends. His past conviction and disgrace follow him. He cannot obtain employment. He cannot vote. Want often leads him to commit crime again; and then the old conviction is brought up as proof of bad character, and increases his punishment. Need of Friendly Inns and Refuges for discharged criminals. But the justified sinner is differently treated. He is not only delivered from God's wrath and eternal death, but he is admitted to God's favor and eternal life. The discovery of this is partly the cause of the convert's joy. Expecting pardon, at most, he is met with unmeasured favor. The prodigal finds the father's house and heart open to him, and more done for him than if he had never wandered. This overwhelms and subdues him. The two elements, acquittal and restoration to favor, are never separated. Like the expulsion of darkness and restoration of light, they always go together. No one can have, even if he would have, an incomplete justification. Christ's justification is ours; and, as Jesus' own seamless tunic could not be divided, so the robe of righteousness which he provides cannot be cut in two.

Failure to apprehend this positive aspect of justification as restoration to favor is the reason why so many Christians have little joy and little enthusiasm in their religious lives. The preaching of the magnanimity and generosity of God makes the gospel “the power of God unto salvation” (Rom. 1:16). Edwin M. Stanton had ridden roughshod over Abraham Lincoln in the conduct of a case at law in which they had been joint counsel. [pg 858]Stanton had become vindictive and even violent when Lincoln was made President. But Lincoln invited Stanton to be Secretary of War, and he sent the invitation by Harding, who knew of all this former trouble. When Stanton heard it, he said with streaming eyes: “Do you tell me, Harding, that Mr. Lincoln sent this message to me? Tell him that such magnanimity will make me work with him as man was never served before!”

(d) The declaration that the sinner is restored to God's favor, has its ground, not in the sinner's personal character or conduct, but solely in the obedience and righteousness of Christ, to whom the sinner is united by faith. Thus Christ's work is the procuring cause of our justification, in both its elements. As we are acquitted on account of Christ's suffering of the penalty of the law, so on account of Christ's obedience we receive the rewards of law.

All this comes to us in Christ. We participate in the rewards promised to his obedience: John 20:31—“that believing ye may have life in his name”; 1 Cor. 3:21-23—“For all things are yours; ... all are yours; and ye are Christ's; and Christ is God's.” Denovan, Toronto Baptist, Dec. 1883, maintains that “grace operates in two ways: (1) for the rebel it provides a scheme of justification,—this is judicial, matter of debt; (2) for the child it provides pardon,—fatherly forgiveness on repentance.” Heb. 7:19—“the law made nothing perfect ... a bringing in thereupon of a better hope, through which we draw nigh unto God.” This “better hope” is offered to us in Christ's death and resurrection. The veil of the temple was the symbol of separation from God. The rending of that veil was the symbol on the one hand that sin had been atoned for, and on the other hand that unrestricted access to God was now permitted us in Christ the great forerunner. Bonar's hymn, “Jesus, whom angel hosts adore,”has for its concluding stanza: “'T is finished all: the veil is rent. The welcome sure, the access free:—Now then, we leave our banishment, O Father, to return to thee!” See pages 749 (b), 770 (h).

James Russell Lowell: “At the devil's booth all things are sold. Each ounce of dross costs its ounce of gold; For a cap and bells our lives we pay: Bubbles we buy with a whole soul's tasking; 'T is heaven alone that is given away, 'T is only God may be had for the asking.” John G. Whittier: “The hour draws near, howe'er delayed and late, When at the Eternal Gate, We leave the words and works we call our own, And lift void hands alone For love to fill. Our nakedness of soul Brings to that gate no toll; Giftless we come to him who all things gives, And live because he lives.”

H. B. Smith, System of Christian Doctrine, 523, 524—“Justification and pardon are not the same in Scripture. We object to the view of Emmons (Works, vol. 5), that ‘justification is no more nor less than pardon,’ and that ‘God rewards men for their own, and not Christ's, obedience,’ for the reason that the words, as used in common life, relate to wholly different things. If a man is declared just by a human tribunal, he is not pardoned, he is acquitted; his own inherent righteousness, as respects the charge against him, is recognized and declared. The gospel proclaims both pardon and justification. There is no significance in the use of the word ‘justify,’ if pardon be all that is intended....

“Justification involves what pardon does not, a righteousness which is the ground of the acquittal and favor; not the mere favor of the sovereign, but the merit of Christ, is at the basis—the righteousness which is of God. The ends of the law are so far satisfied by what Christ has done, that the sinner can be pardoned. The law is not merely set aside, but its great ends are answered by what Christ has done in our behalf. God might pardon as a sovereign, from mere benevolence (as regard to happiness); but in the gospel he does more,—he pardons in consistency with his holiness,—upholding that as the main end of all his dealings and works. Justification involves acquittal from all the penalty of the law, and the inheritance of all the blessings of the redeemed state. The penalty of the law—spiritual, temporal, eternal death—is all taken away; and the opposite blessings are conferred, in and through Christ—the resurrection to blessedness, the gift of the Spirit, and eternal life....

“If justification is forgiveness simply, it applies only to the past. If it is also a title to life, it includes the future condition of the soul. The latter alone is consistent with the plan and decrees of God respecting redemption—his seeing the end from the beginning. The reason why justification has been taken as pardon is two-fold: first, it does involve [pg 859]pardon,—this is its negative side, while it has a positive side also—the title to eternal life; secondly, the tendency to resolve the gospel into an ethical system. Only our acts of choice as meritorious could procure a title to favor, a positive reward. Christ might remove the obstacle, but the title to heaven is derived only from what we ourselves do.

“Justification is, therefore, not a merely governmental provision, as it must be on any scheme that denies that Christ's work has direct respect to the ends of the law. Views of the atonement determine the views on justification, if logical sequence is observed. We have to do here, not with views of natural justice, but with divine methods. If we regard the atonement simply as answering the ends of a governmental scheme, our view must be that justification merely removes an obstacle, and the end of it is only pardon, and not eternal life.”

But upon the true view, that the atonement is a complete satisfaction to the holiness of God, justification embraces not merely pardon, or acquittal from the punishments of law, but also restoration to favor, or the rewards promised to actual obedience. See also Quenstedt, 3:524; Philippi, Active Obedience of Christ; Shedd, Dogm. Theol., 2:432, 433.

4. Relation of Justification to God's Law and Holiness.

A. Justification has been shown to be a forensic term. A man may, indeed, be conceived of as just, in either of two senses: (a) as just in moral character,—that is, absolutely holy in nature, disposition, and conduct; (b) as just in relation to law,—or as free from all obligation to suffer penalty, and as entitled to the rewards of obedience.

So, too, a man may be conceived of as justified, in either of two senses: (a) made just in moral character; or, (b) made just in his relation to law. But the Scriptures declare that there does not exist on earth a just man, in the first of these senses (Eccl. 7:20). Even in those who are renewed in moral character and united to Christ, there is a remnant of moral depravity.

If, therefore, there be any such thing as a just man, he must be just, not in the sense of possessing an unspotted holiness, but in the sense of being delivered from the penalty of law, and made partaker of its rewards. If there be any such thing as justification, it must be, not an act of God which renders the sinner absolutely holy, but an act of God which declares the sinner to be free from legal penalties and entitled to legal rewards.

Justus is derived from jus, and suggests the idea of courts and legal procedures. The fact that “justify” is derived from justus and facio, and might therefore seem to imply the making of a man subjectively righteous, should not blind us to its forensic use. The phrases “sanctify the Holy One of Jacob” (Is. 29:23; cf. 1 Pet. 3:15—“sanctify in your hearts Christ as Lord”) and “glorify God” (1 Cor. 6:20) do not mean, to make God subjectively holy or glorious, for this he is, whatever we may do; they mean rather, to declare, or show, him to be holy or glorious. So justification is not making a man righteous, or even pronouncing him righteous, for no man is subjectively righteous. It is rather to count him righteous so far as respects his relations to law, to treat him as righteous, or to declare that God will, for reasons assigned, so treat him (Payne). So long as any remnant of sin exists, no justification, in the sense of making holy, can be attributed to man: Eccl. 7:20—“Surely there is not a righteous man upon earth, that doeth good and sinneth not.” If no man is just, in this sense, then God cannot pronounce him just, for God cannot lie. Justification, therefore, must signify a deliverance from legal penalties, and an assignment of legal rewards. O. P. Gifford: There is no such thing as “salvation by character”; what men need is salvation from character. The only sense in which salvation by character is rational or Scriptural is that suggested by George Harris, Moral Evolution, 409—“Salvation by character is not self-righteousness, but Christ in us.” But even here it must be remembered that Christ in us presupposes Christ for us. The objective atonement for sin must come before the subjective purification of our natures. And justification is upon the ground of that objective atonement, and not upon the ground of the subjective cleansing.

[pg 860]

The Jews had a proverb that if only one man could perfectly keep the whole law even for one day, the kingdom of Messiah would at once come upon the earth. This is to state in another form the doctrine of Paul, in Rom. 7:9—“When the commandment came, sin revived, and I died.” To recognize the impossibility of being justified by Pharisaic works was a preparation for the gospel; see Bruce, Apologetics, 419. The Germans speak of Werk-, Lehre-, Buchstaben-, Negations-, Parteigerechtigkeit; but all these are forms of self-righteousness. Berridge: “A man may steal some gems from the crown of Jesus and be guilty only of petty larceny, ... but the man who would justify himself by his own works steals the crown itself, puts it on his own head, and proclaims himself by his own conquests a king in Zion.”

B. The difficult feature of justification is the declaration, on the part of God, that a sinner whose remaining sinfulness seems to necessitate the vindicative reaction of God's holiness against him, is yet free from such reaction of holiness as is expressed in the penalties of the law.

The fact is to be accepted on the testimony of Scripture. If this testimony be not accepted, there is no deliverance from the condemnation of law. But the difficulty of conceiving of God's declaring the sinner no longer exposed to legal penalty is relieved, if not removed, by the three-fold consideration:

(a) That Christ has endured the penalty of the law in the sinner's stead.

Gal. 3:13—“Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us.” Denovan: “We are justified by faith, instrumentally, in the same sense as a debt is paid by a good note or a check on a substantial account in a distant bank. It is only the intelligent and honest acceptance of justification already provided.” Rom. 8:3—“God, sending his own Son ... condemned sin in the flesh” = the believer's sins were judged and condemned on Calvary. The way of pardon through Christ honors God's justice as well as God's mercy; cf. Rom. 3:26—“that he might himself be just, and the justifier of him that hath faith in Jesus.”

(b) That the sinner is so united to Christ, that Christ's life already constitutes the dominating principle within him.

Gal. 2:20—“I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I that live, but Christ liveth in me.” God does not justify any man whom he does not foresee that he can and will sanctify. Some prophecies produce their own fulfilment. Tell a man he is brave, and you help him to become so. So declaratory justification, when published in the heart by the Holy Spirit, helps to make men just. Harris, God the Creator, 2:332—“The objection to the doctrine of justification by faith insists that justification must be conditioned, not on faith, but on right character. But justification by faith is itself the doctrine of a justification conditioned on right character, because faith in God is the only possible beginning of right character, either in men or angels.” Gould, Bib. Theol. N. T., 67-79, in a similar manner argues that Paul's emphasis is on the spiritual effect of the death of our Lord, rather than on its expiatory effect. The course of thought in the Epistle to the Romans seems to us to contradict this view. Sin and the objective atonement for sin are first treated; only after justification comes the sanctification of the believer. Still it is true that justification is never the sole work of God in the soul. The same Christ in union with whom we are justified does at that same moment a work of regeneration which is followed by sanctification.

(c) That this life of Christ is a power in the soul which will gradually, but infallibly, extirpate all remaining depravity, until the whole physical and moral nature is perfectly conformed to the divine holiness.

Phil. 3:21—“who shall fashion anew the body of our humiliation, that it may be conformed to the body of his glory, according to the working whereby he is able even to subject all things unto himself”; Col. 3:1-4—“If then ye were raised together with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated on the right hand of God. Set your mind on the things that are above, not on the things that are upon the earth. For ye died, and your life is hid with Christ in God. When Christ, who is our life, shall be manifested, then shall ye also with him be manifested in glory.”

Truth of fact, and ideal truth, are not opposed to each other. F. W. Robertson, Lectures and Addresses, 256—“When the agriculturist sees a small, white, almond-like thing rising from the ground, he calls that an oak; but this is not a truth of fact, it is [pg 861]an ideal truth. The oak is a large tree, with spreading branches and leaves and acorns; but that is only a thing an inch long, and imperceptible in all its development; yet the agriculturist sees in it the idea of what it shall be, and, if I may borrow a Scriptural phrase, he imputes to it the majesty, and excellence, and glory, that is to be hereafter.”This method of representation is effective and unobjectionable, so long as we remember that the force which is to bring about this future development and perfection is not the force of unassisted human nature, but rather the force of Christ and his indwelling Spirit. See Philippi, Glaubenslehre, v, 1:201-208.

Gore, Incarnation, 224—“'Looking at the mother,' wrote George Eliot of Mrs. Garth in The Mill on the Floss, ‘you might hope that the daughter would become like her—which is a prospective advantage equal to a dowry—the mother too often standing behind the daughter like a malignant prophecy: Such as I am, she will shortly be.’George Eliot imputes by anticipation to the daughter the merits of the mother, because her life is, so to speak, of the same piece. Now, by new birth and spiritual union, our life is of the same piece with the life of Jesus. Thus he, our elder brother, stands behind us, his people, as a prophecy of all good. Thus God accepts us, deals with us, ‘in the Beloved,’ rating us at something of his value, imputing to us his merits, because in fact, except we be reprobates, he himself is the most powerful and real force at work in us.”

5. Relation of Justification to Union with Christ and the Work of the Spirit.

A. Since the sinner, at the moment of justification, is not yet completely transformed in character, we have seen that God can declare him just, not on account of what he is in himself, but only on account of what Christ is. The ground of justification is therefore not, (a) as the Romanists hold, a new righteousness and love infused into us, and now constituting our moral character; nor, (b) as Osiander taught, the essential righteousness of Christ's divine nature, which has become ours by faith; but (c) the satisfaction and obedience of Christ, as the head of a new humanity, and as embracing in himself all believers as his members.

Ritschl regarded justification as primarily an endowment of the church, in which the individual participated only so far as he belonged to the church; see Pfleiderer, Die Ritschl'sche Theologie, 70. Here Ritschl committed an error like that of the Romanist,—the church is the door to Christ, instead of Christ being the door to the church. Justification belongs primarily to Christ, then to all who join themselves to Christ by faith, and the church is the natural and voluntary aggregation of those who in Christ are thus justified. Hence the necessity for the resurrection and ascension of the Lord Jesus. “For as the ministry of Enoch was sealed by his reception into heaven, and as the ministry of Elijah was also abundantly proved by his translation, so also the righteousness and innocence of Christ. But it was necessary that the ascension of Christ should be more fully attested, because upon his righteousness, so fully proved by his ascension, we must depend for all our righteousness. For if God had not approved him after his resurrection, and he had not taken his seat at his right hand, we could by no means be accepted of God” (Cartwright).

A. J. Gordon, Ministry of the Spirit, 46, 193, 195, 206—“Christ must be justified in the spirit and received up into glory, before he can be made righteousness to us and we can become the righteousness of God in him. Christ's coronation is the indispensable condition of our justification.... Christ the High Priest has entered the Holy of Holies in heaven for us. Until he comes forth again at the second advent, how can we be assured that his sacrifice for us is accepted? We reply: By the gift of the Holy Spirit. The presence of the Spirit in the church is the proof of the presence of Christ before the throne.... The Holy Spirit convinces of righteousness, ‘because I go unto the Father, and ye see me no more’ (John 16:10). We can only know that ‘we have a Paraclete with the Father, even Jesus Christ the Righteous’ (1 John 2:1), by that ‘other Paraclete’ sent forth from the Father, even the Holy Spirit (John 14:25, 26; 15:26). The church, having the Spirit, reflects Christ to the world. As Christ manifests the Father, so the church through the Spirit manifests Christ. So Christ gives to us his name, ‘Christians,’ as the husband gives his name to the wife.”

[pg 862]

As Adam's sin is imputed to us, not because Adam is in us, but because we were in Adam; so Christ's righteousness is imputed to us, not because Christ is in us, but because we are in Christ,—that is, joined by faith to one whose righteousness and life are infinitely greater than our power to appropriate or contain. In this sense, we may say that we are justified through a Christ outside of us, as we are sanctified through a Christ within us. Edwards: “The justification of the believer is no other than his being admitted to communion in, or participation of, this head and surety of all believers.”

1 Tim. 1:14—“faith and love which is in Christ Jesus”; 3:16—“He who was manifested in the flesh, Justified in the spirit”; Acts 13:39—“and by him [lit.: ‘in him’] every one that believeth is justified from all things, from which ye could not be justified by the law of Moses”; Rom. 4:25—“who was delivered up for our trespasses, and was raised for our justification”; Eph. 1:6—“accepted in the Beloved”—Rev. Vers.: “freely bestowed on us in the Beloved”; 1 Cor. 6:11—“justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ.” “We in Christ” is the formula of our justification; “Christ in us” is the formula of our sanctification. As the water which the shell contains is little compared with the great ocean which contains the shell, so the actual change wrought within us by God's sanctifying grace is slight compared with the boundless freedom from condemnation and the state of favor with God into which we are introduced by justification; Rom. 5:1, 2—“Being therefore justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ; through whom also we have had our access by faith into this grace wherein we stand; and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God.”

Here we have the third instance of imputation. The first was the imputation of Adam's sin to us; and the second was the imputation of our sins to Christ. The third is now the imputation of Christ's righteousness to us. In each of the former cases, we have sought to show that the legal relation presupposes a natural relation. Adam's sin is imputed to us, because we are one with Adam; our sins are imputed to Christ, because Christ is one with humanity. So here, we must hold that Christ's righteousness is imputed to us, because we are one with Christ. Justification is not an arbitrary transfer to us of the merits of another with whom we have no real connection. This would make it merely a legal fiction; and there are no legal fictions in the divine government.

Instead of this external and mechanical method of conception, we should first set before us the fact of Christ's justification, after he had borne our sins and risen from the dead. In him, humanity, for the first time, is acquitted from punishment and restored to the divine favor. But Christ's new humanity is the germinal source of spiritual life for the race. He was justified, not simply as a private person, but as our representative and head. By becoming partakers of the new life in him, we share in all he is and all he has done; and, first of all, we share in his justification. So Luther gives us, for substance, the formula: “We in Christ = justification; Christ in us = sanctification.” And in harmony with this formula is the statement quoted in the text above from Edwards, Works, 4:66.

See also H. B. Smith, Presb. Rev., July, 1881—“Union with Adam and with Christ is the ground of imputation. But the parallelism is incomplete. While the sin of Adam is imputed to us because it is ours, the righteousness of Christ is imputed to us simply because of our union with him, not at all because of our personal righteousness. In the one case, character is taken into the account; in the other, it is not. In sin, our demerits are included; in justification, our merits are excluded.” For further statements of Dr. Smith, see his System of Christian Theology, 524-552.

C. H. M. on Genesis, page 78—“The question for every believer is not ‘What am I?’but ‘What is Christ?’ Of Abel it is said: ‘God testified of his gifts’ (Heb. 11:4, A. V.). So God testifies, not of the believer, but of his gift,—and his gift is Christ. Yet Cain was angry because he was not received in his sins, while Abel was accepted in his gift. This was right, if Abel was justified in himself; it was wrong, because Abel was justified only in Christ.” See also Hodge, Outlines of Theology, 384-388, 392; Baird, Elohim Revealed, 448.

B. The relation of justification to regeneration and sanctification, moreover, delivers it from the charges of externality and immorality. God does not justify ungodly men in their ungodliness. He pronounces them just only as they are united to Christ, who is absolutely just, and who, by his [pg 863] Spirit, can make them just, not only in the eye of the law, but in moral character. The very faith by which the sinner receives Christ is an act in which he ratifies all that Christ has done, and accepts God's judgment against sin as his own (John 16:11).

John 16:11—“of judgment, because the prince of this world hath been judged”—the Holy Spirit leads the believer to ratify God's judgment against sin and Satan. Accepting Christ, the believer accepts Christ's death for sin, and resurrection to life for his own. If it were otherwise, the first act of the believer, after his discharge, might be a repetition of his offences. Such a justification would offend against the fundamental principles of justice and the safety of government. It would also fail to satisfy the conscience. This clamors not only for pardon, but for renewal. Union with Christ has one legal fruit—justification; but it has also one moral fruit—sanctification.

A really guilty man, when acquitted by judge and jury, does not cease to be the victim of remorse and fear. Forgiveness of sin is not in itself a deliverance from sin. The outward acquittal needs to be accompanied by an inward change to be really effective. Pardon for sin without power to overcome sin would be a mockery of the criminal. Justification for Christ's sake therefore goes into effect through regeneration by the Holy Spirit; see E. H. Johnson, in Bib. Sac., July, 1892:362.

A Buddhist priest who had studied some years in England printed in Shanghai not long ago a pamphlet entitled “Justification by Faith the only true Basis of Morality.” It argues that any other foundation is nothing but pure selfishness, but that morality, to have any merit, must be unselfish. Justification by faith supplies an unselfish motive, because we accept the work done for us by another, and we ourselves work from gratitude, which is not a selfish motive. After laying down this Christian foundation, the writer erects the structure of faith in the Amida incarnation of Buddha. Buddhism opposes to the Christian doctrine of a creative Person, only a creative process; sin has relation only to the man sinning, and has no relation to Amida Buddha or to the eternal law of causation; salvation by faith in Amida Buddha is faith in one who is the product of a process, and a product may perish. Tennyson: “They are but broken lights of Thee, And thou, O Christ, art more than they.”

Justification is possible, therefore, because it is always accompanied by regeneration and union with Christ, and is followed by sanctification. But this is a very different thing from the Romanist confounding of justification and sanctification, as different stages of the same process of making the sinner actually holy. It holds fast to the Scripture distinction between justification as a declarative act of God, and regeneration and sanctification as those efficient acts of God by which justification is accompanied and followed.

Both history and our personal observation show that nothing can change the life and make men moral, like the gospel of free pardon in Jesus Christ. Mere preaching of morality will effect nothing of consequence. There never has been more insistence upon morality than in the most immoral times, like those of Seneca, and of the English deists. As to their moral fruits, we can safely compare Protestant with Roman Catholic systems and leaders and countries. We do not become right by doing right, for only those can do right who have become right. The prodigal son is forgiven before he actually confesses and amends (Luke 15:20, 21). Justification is always accompanied by regeneration, and is followed by sanctification; and all three are results of the death of Christ. But the sin-offering must precede the thank-offering. We must first be accepted ourselves before we can offer gifts; Heb. 11:4—“By faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain, through which he had witness borne to him that he was righteous, God bearing witness in respect of his gifts.”

Hence we read in Eph. 5:25, 26—“Christ also loved the church, and gave himself up for it; that he might sanctify it, having cleansed = [after he had cleansed] it by the washing of water with the word” [= regeneration]; 1 Pet. 1:1, 2—“elect ... according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, in sanctification of the Spirit [regeneration], unto obedience [conversion] and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ [justification]”; 1 John 1:7—“if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanseth us from all sin”—here the “cleansing” refers primarily and mainly to [pg 864]justification, not to sanctification; for the apostle himself declares in verse 8—“If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.”

Quenstedt says well, that “justification, since it is an act, outside of man, in God, cannot produce an intrinsic change in us.” And yet, he says, “although faith alone justifies, yet faith is not alone.” Melanchthon: “Sola fides justificat; sed fides non est sola.” With faith go all manner of gifts of the Spirit and internal graces of character. But we should let go all the doctrinal gains of the Reformation if we did not insist that these gifts and graces are accompaniments and consequences of justification, instead of being a part or a ground of justification. See Girdlestone, O. T. Synonyms, 104, note—“Justification is God's declaration that the individual sinner, on account of the faith which unites him to Christ, is taken up into the relation which Christ holds to the Father, and has applied to him personally the objective work accomplished for humanity by Christ.”

6. Relation of Justification to Faith.

A. We are justified by faith, rather than by love or by any other grace: (a) not because faith is itself a work of obedience by which we merit justification,—for this would be a doctrine of justification by works; (b) nor because faith is accepted as an equivalent of obedience,—for there is no equivalent except the perfect obedience of Christ; (c) nor because faith is the germ from which obedience may spring hereafter,—for it is not the faith which accepts, but the Christ who is accepted, that renders such obedience possible; but (d) because faith, and not repentance, or love, or hope, is the medium or instrument by which we receive Christ and are united to him. Hence we are never said to be justified διὰ πίστιν, = on account of faith, but only διὰ πίστεως, = through faith, or ἐκ πίστεως, = by faith. Or, to express the same truth in other words, while the grace of God is the efficient cause of justification, and the obedience and sufferings of Christ are the meritorious or procuring cause, faith is the mediate or instrumental cause.

Edwards, Works, 4:69-73—“Faith justifies, because faith includes the whole act of unition to Christ as a Savior. It is not the nature of any other graces or virtues directly to close with Christ as a mediator, any further than they enter into the constitution of justifying faith, and do belong to its nature”; Observations on Trinity, 64-67—“Salvation is not offered to us upon any condition, but freely and for nothing. We are to do nothing for it,—we are only to take it. This taking and receiving is faith.” H. B. Smith, System, 524—“An internal change is a sine qua non of justification, but not its meritorious ground.” Give a man a gold mine. It is his. He has not to work for it; he has only to work it. Working for life is one thing; working fromlife is quite another. The marriage of a poor girl to a wealthy proprietor makes her possessor of his riches despite her former poverty. Yet her acceptance has not purchasedwealth. It is hers, not because of what she is or has done, but because of what her husband is and has done. So faith is the condition of justification, only because through it Christ becomes ours, and with him his atonement and righteousness. Salvation comes not because our faith saves us, but because it links us to the Christ who saves; and believing is only the link. There is no more merit in it than in the beggar's stretching forth his hand to receive the offered purse, or the drowning man's grasping the rope that is thrown to him.

The Wesleyan scheme is inclined to make faith a work. See Dabney, Theology, 637. This is to make faith the cause and ground, or at least to add it to Christ's work as a joint cause and ground, of justification; as if justification were διὰ πίστιν, instead of διὰ πίστεως or ἐκ πίστεως. Since faith is never perfect, this is to go back to the Roman Catholic uncertainty of salvation. See Dorner, Glaubenslehre, 2:744, 745 (Syst. Doct., 4:206, 207). C. H. M. on Gen. 3:7—“They made themselves aprons of fig-leaves, before God made them coats of skin. Man ever tries to clothe himself in garments of his own righteousness, before he will take the robe of Christ's. But Adam felt himself naked when God visited him, even though he had his fig-leaves on him.”

[pg 865]

We are justified efficiently by the grace of God, meritoriously by Christ, instrumentally by faith, evidentially by works. Faith justifies, as roots bring plant and soil together. Faith connects man with the source of life in Christ. “When the boatman with his hook grapples the rock, he does not pull the shore to the boat, but the boat to the shore; so, when we by faith lay hold on Christ, we do not pull Christ to us, but ourselves to him.” Faith is a coupling; the train is drawn, not by the coupling, but by the locomotive; yet without the coupling it would not be drawn. Faith is the trolley that reaches up to the electric wire; when the connection is sundered, not only does the car cease to move, but the heat dies and the lights go out. Dr. John Duncan: “I have married the Merchant and all his wealth is mine!”

H. C. Trumbull: “If a man wants to cross the ocean, he can either try swimming, or he can trust the captain of a ship to carry him over in his vessel. By or through his faith in that captain, the man is carried safely to the other shore; yet it is the ship's captain, not the passenger's faith, which is to be praised for the carrying.” So the sick man trusts his case in the hands of his physician, and his life is saved by the physician,—yet by or through the patient's faith. This faith is indeed an inward act of allegiance, and no mere outward performance. Whiton, Divine Satisfaction, 92—“The Protestant Reformers saw that it was by an inward act, not by penances or sacraments that men were justified. But they halted in the crude notion of a legal court room process, a governmental procedure external to us, whereas it is an educational, inward process, the awakening through Christ of the filial spirit in us, which in the midst of imperfections strives for likeness more and more to the Son of God. Justification by principle apart from performance makes Christianity the religion of the spirit.” We would add that such justification excludes education, and is an act rather than a process, an act external to the sinner rather than internal, an act of God rather than an act of man. The justified person can say to Christ, as Ruth said to Boaz: “Why have I found favor in thy sight, that thou shouldest take knowledge of me, seeing I am a foreigner?”(Ruth 2:10).

B. Since the ground of justification is only Christ, to whom we are united by faith, the justified person has peace. If it were anything in ourselves, our peace must needs be proportioned to our holiness. The practical effect of the Romanist mingling of works with faith, as a joint ground of justification, is to render all assurance of salvation impossible. (Council of Trent, 9th chap.: “Every man, by reason of his own weakness and defects, must be in fear and anxiety about his state of grace. Nor can any one know, with infallible certainty of faith, that he has received forgiveness of God.”). But since justification is an instantaneous act of God, complete at the moment of the sinner's first believing, it has no degrees. Weak faith justifies as perfectly as strong faith; although, since justification is a secret act of God, weak faith does not give so strong assurance of salvation.

Foundations of our Faith, 216—“The Catholic doctrine declares that justification is not dependent upon faith and the righteousness of Christ imputed and granted thereto, but on the actual condition of the man himself. But there remain in the man an undeniable amount of fleshly lusts or inclinations to sin, even though the man be regenerate. The Catholic doctrine is therefore constrained to assert that these lusts are not in themselves sinful, or objects of the divine displeasure. They are allowed to remain in the man, that he may struggle against them; and, as they say, Paul designates them as sinful, only because they are derived from sin, and incite to sin; but they only become sin by the positive concurrence of the human will. But is not internal lust displeasing to God? Can we draw the line between lust and will? The Catholic favors self here, and makes many things lust, which are really will. A Protestant is necessarily more earnest in the work of salvation, when he recognizes even the evil desire as sin, according to Christ's precept.”

All systems of religion of merely human origin tend to make salvation, in larger or smaller degree, the effect of human works, but only with the result of leaving man in despair. See, in Ecclesiasticus 3:30, an Apocryphal declaration that alms make atonement for sin. So Romanism bids me doubt God's grace and the forgiveness of sins. [pg 866]See Dorner, Gesch. prot. Theol., 228, 229, and his quotations from Luther. “But if the Romanist doctrine is true, that a man is justified only in such measure as he is sanctified, then: 1. Justification must be a matter of degrees, and so the Council of Trent declares it to be. The sacraments which sanctify are therefore essential, that one may be increasingly justified. 2. Since justification is a continuous process, the redeeming death of Christ, on which it depends, must be a continuous process also; hence its prolonged reiteration in the sacrifice by the Mass. 3. Since sanctification is obviously never completed in this life, no man ever dies completely justified; hence the doctrine of Purgatory.” For the substance of Romanist doctrine, see Moehler, Symbolism, 79-190; Newman, Lectures on Justification, 253-345; Ritschl, Christian Doctrine of Justification, 121-226.

A better doctrine is that of the Puritan divine: “It is not the quantity of thy faith that shall save thee. A drop of water is as true water as the whole ocean. So a little faith is as true faith as the greatest. It is not the measure of thy faith that saves thee,—it is the blood that it grips to that saves thee. The weak hand of the child, that leads the spoon to the mouth, will feed as well as the strong arm of a man; for it is not the hand that feeds, but the meat. So, if thou canst grip Christ ever so weakly, he will not let thee perish.” I am troubled about the money I owe in New York, until I find that a friend has paid my debt there. When I find that the objective account against me is cancelled, then and only then do I have subjective peace.

A child may be heir to a vast estate, even while he does not know it; and a child of God may be an heir of glory, even while, through the weakness of his faith, he is oppressed with painful doubts and fears. No man is lost simply because of the greatness of his sins; however ill-deserving he may be, faith in Christ will save him. Luther's climbing the steps of St. John Lateran, and the voice of thunder: “The just shall live by faith,” are not certain as historical facts; but they express the substance of Luther's experience. Not obeying, but receiving, is the substance of the gospel. A man cannot merit salvation; he cannot buy it; but one thing he must do,—he must take it. And the least faith makes salvation ours, because it makes Christ ours.

Augustine conceived of justification as a continuous process, proceeding until love and all Christian virtues fill the heart. There is his chief difference from Paul. Augustine believes in sin and grace. But he has not the freedom of the children of God, as Paul has. The influence of Augustine upon Roman Catholic theology has not been wholly salutary. The Roman Catholic, mixing man's subjective condition with God's grace as a ground of justification, continually wavers between self-righteousness and uncertainty of acceptance with God, each of these being fatal to a healthful and stable religious life. High-church Episcopalians, and Sacramentalists generally, are afflicted with this distemper of the Romanists. Dr. R. W. Dale remarks with regard to Dr. Pusey: “The absence of joy in his religious life was only the inevitable effect of his conception of God's method of saving men; in parting with the Lutheran truth concerning justification, he parted with the springs of gladness.” Spurgeon said that a man might get from London to New York provided he took a steamer; but it made much difference in his comfort whether he had a first class or a second class ticket. A new realization of the meaning of justification in our churches would change much of our singing from the minor to the major key; would lead us to pray, not for the presence of Christ, but from the presence of Christ; would abolish the mournful upward inflections at the end of sentences which give such unreality to our preaching; and would replace the pessimistic element in our modern work and worship with the notes of praise and triumph. In the Pilgrim's Progress, the justification of the believer is symbolized by Christian's lodging in the Palace Beautiful whose window opened toward the sunrising.

Even Luther did not fully apprehend and apply his favorite doctrine of justification by faith. Harnack, Wesen des Christenthums, 168 sq., states the fundamental principles of Protestantism as: “1. The Christian religion is wholly given in the word of God and in the inner experience which answers to that word. 2. The assured belief that the Christian has a gracious God. ‘Nun weisz und glaub' ich's feste, Ich rühm's auch ohne Scheu, Dasz Gott, der höchst' und beste, Mein Freund und Vater sei; Und dasz in allen Fällen Er mir zur Rechten steh', Und dampfe Sturm und Wellen, Und was mir bringet Weh'.’ 3. Restoration of simple and believing worship, both public and private. But Luther took too much dogma into Christianity; insisted too much on the authority of the written word; cared too much for the means of grace, such as the Lord's Supper; identified the church too much with the organized body.” [pg 867]Yet Luther talked of beating the heads of the Wittenbergers with the Bible, so as to get the great doctrine of justification by faith into their brains. “Why do you teach your child the same thing twenty times?” he said. “Because I find that nineteen times is not sufficient.”

C. Justification is instantaneous, complete, and final: instantaneous, since otherwise there would be an interval during which the soul was neither approved nor condemned by God (Mat. 6:24); complete, since the soul, united to Christ by faith, becomes partaker of his complete satisfaction to the demands of law (Col. 2:9, 10); and final, since the union with Christ is indissoluble (John 10:28, 29). As there are many acts of sin in the life of the Christian, so there are many acts of pardon following them. But all these acts of pardon are virtually implied in that first act by which he was finally and forever justified; as also successive acts of repentance and faith, after such sins, are virtually implied in that first repentance and faith which logically preceded justification.

Mat. 6:24—“No man can serve two masters”; Col. 2:9, 10—“in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily, and in him ye are made full, who is the head of all principality and power”; John 10:28, 29—“they shall never perish, and no one shall snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who hath given them unto me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father's hand.”

Plymouth Brethren say truly that the Christian has sin in him, but not on him, because Christ had sin on him, but not in him. The Christian has sin but not guilt, because Christ had guilt but not sin. All our sins are buried in the grave with Christ, and Christ's resurrection is our resurrection. Toplady: “From whence this fear and unbelief? Hast thou, O Father, put to grief Thy spotless Son for me? And will the righteous Judge of men Condemn me for that debt of sin, Which, Lord, was laid on thee? If thou hast my discharge procured, And freely in my room endured The whole of wrath divine, Payment God cannot twice demand, First at my bleeding Surety's hand, And then again at mine. Complete atonement thou hast made, And to the utmost farthing paid Whate'er thy people owed; How then can wrath on me take place, If sheltered in thy righteousness And sprinkled with thy blood? Turn, then, my soul, unto thy rest; The merits of thy great High-priest Speak peace and liberty; Trust in his efficacious blood, Nor fear thy banishment from God, Since Jesus died for thee!”

Justification, however, is not eternal in the past. We are to repent unto the remission of our sins (Act 2:38). Remission comes after repentance. Sin is not pardoned before it is committed. In justification God grants us actual pardon for past sin, but virtual pardon for future sin. Edwards, Works, 4:104—“Future sins are respected, in that first justification, no otherwise than as future faith and repentance are respected in it; and future faith and repentance are looked upon by him that justifies as virtually implied in that first repentance and faith, in the same manner that justification from future sins is implied in that first justification.”

A man is not justified from his sins before he has committed them, nor is he saved before he is born. A remarkable illustration of the extreme to which hyper-Calvinism may go is found in Tobias Crisp, Sermons, 1:358—“The Lord hath no more to lay to the charge of an elect person, yet in the height of iniquity, and in the excess of riot, and committing all the abomination that can be committed ... than he has to the charge of the saint triumphant in glory.” A far better statement is found in Moberly, Atonement and Personality, 61—“As there is upon earth no consummated penitence, so neither is there any forgiveness consummated.... Forgiveness is the recognition, by anticipation, of something which is to be, something toward which it is itself a mighty quickening of possibilities, but something which is not, or at least is not perfectly, yet.... Present forgiveness is inchoate, is educational.... It reaches its final and perfect consummation only when the forgiven penitent has become at last personally and completely righteous. If the consummation is not reached but reversed, then forgiveness is forfeited (Mat. 18:32-35).” This last exception, however, as we shall see in our discussion of Perseverance, is only a hypothetical one. The truly forgiven do not finally fall away.

[pg 868]

7. Advice to Inquirers demanded by a Scriptural View of Justification.

(a) Where conviction of sin is yet lacking, our aim should be to show the sinner that he is under God's condemnation for his past sins, and that no future obedience can ever secure his justification, since this obedience, even though perfect, could not atone for the past, and even if it could, he is unable, without God's help, to render it.

With the help of the Holy Spirit, conviction of sin may be roused by presentation of the claims of God's perfect law, and by drawing attention, first to particular overt transgressions, and then to the manifold omissions of duty, the general lack of supreme and all-pervading love to God, and the guilty rejection of Christ's offers and commands. “Even if the next page of the copy book had no blots or erasures, its cleanness would not alter the smudges and misshapen letters on the earlier pages.” God takes no notice of the promise “Have patience with me, and I will pay thee” (Mat. 18:29), for he knows it can never be fulfilled.

(b) Where conviction of sin already exists, our aim should be, not, in the first instance, to secure the performance of external religious duties, such as prayer, or Scripture-reading, or uniting with the church, but to induce the sinner, as his first and all-inclusive duty, to accept Christ as his only and sufficient sacrifice and Savior, and, committing himself and the matter of his salvation entirely to the hands of Christ, to manifest this trust and submission by entering at once upon a life of obedience to Christ's commands.

A convicted sinner should be exhorted, not first to prayer and then to faith, but first to faith, and then to the immediate expression of that faith in prayer and Christian activity. He should pray, not for faith, but in faith. It should not be forgotten that the sinner never sins against so much light, and never is in so great danger, as when he is convicted but not converted, when he is moved to turn but yet refuses to turn. No such sinner should be allowed to think that he has the right to do any other thing whatever before accepting Christ. This accepting Christ is not an outward act, but an inward act of mind and heart and will, although believing is naturally evidenced by immediate outward action. To teach the sinner, however apparently well disposed, how to believe on Christ, is beyond the power of man. God is the only giver of faith. But Scripture instances of faith, and illustrations drawn from the child's taking the father at his word and acting upon it, have often been used by the Holy Spirit as means of leading men themselves to put faith in Christ.

Bengel: “Those who are secure Jesus refers to the law; those who are contrite he consoles with the gospel.” A man left work and came home. His wife asked why. “Because I am a sinner.” “Let me send for the preacher.” “I am too far gone for preachers. If the Lord Jesus Christ does not save me I am lost.” That man needed only to be pointed to the Cross. There he found reason for believing that there was salvation for him. In surrendering himself to Christ he was justified. On the general subject of Justification, see Edwards, Works, 4:64-132; Buchanan on Justification, 250-411; Owen on Justification, in Works, vol. 5; Bp. of Ossory, Nature and Effects of Faith, 48-152; Hodge, Syst. Theol., 3:114-212; Thomasius, Christi Person und Werk, 3:133-200; Herzog, Encyclopädie, art.: Rechtfertigung; Bushnell, Vicarious Sacrifice, 416-420, 435.

Section III.—The Application Of Christ's Redemption In Its Continuation.

Under this head we treat of Sanctification and of Perseverance. These two are but the divine and the human sides of the same fact, and they bear to each other a relation similar to that which exists between Regeneration and Conversion.

[pg 869]

I. Sanctification.

1. Definition of Sanctification.

Sanctification is that continuous operation of the Holy Spirit, by which the holy disposition imparted in regeneration is maintained and strengthened.

Godet: “The work of Jesus in the world is twofold. It is a work accomplished for us, destined to effect reconciliation between God and man; it is a work accomplished in us, with the object of effecting our sanctification. By the one, a right relation is established between God and us; by the other, the fruit of the reëstablished order is secured. By the former, the condemned sinner is received into the state of grace; by the latter, the pardoned sinner is associated with the life of God.... How many express themselves as if, when forgiveness with the peace which it procures has been once obtained, all is finished and the work of salvation is complete! They seem to have no suspicion that salvation consists in the health of the soul, and that the health of the soul consists in holiness. Forgiveness is not the reëstablishment of health; it is the crisis of convalescence. If God thinks fit to declare the sinner righteous, it is in order that he may by that means restore him to holiness.” O. P. Gifford: “The steamship whose machinery is broken may be brought into port and made fast to the dock. She is safe, but not sound. Repairs may last a long time. Christ designs to make us both safe and sound. Justification gives the first—safety; sanctification gives the second—soundness.”

Bradford, Heredity and Christian Problems, 220—“To be conscious that one is forgiven, and yet that at the same time he is so polluted that he cannot beget a child without handing on to that child a nature which will be as bad as if his father had never been forgiven, is not salvation in any real sense.” We would say: Is not salvation in any complete sense. Justification needs sanctification to follow it. Man needs God to continue and preserve his spiritual life, just as much as he needed God to begin it at the first. Creation in the spiritual, as well as in the natural world, needs to be supplemented by preservation; see quotation from Jonathan Edwards, in Allen's biography of him, 371.

Regeneration is instantaneous, but sanctification takes time. The “developing” of the photographer's picture may illustrate God's process of sanctifying the regenerate soul. But it is development by new access of truth or light, while the photographer's picture is usually developed in the dark. This development cannot be accomplished in a moment. “We try in our religious lives to practise instantaneous photography. One minute for prayer will give us a vision of God, and we think that is enough. Our pictures are poor because our negatives are weak. We do not give God a long enough sitting to get a good likeness.”

Salvation is something past, something present, and something future; a past fact, justification; a present process, sanctification; a future consummation, redemption and glory. David, in Ps. 51:1, 2, prays not only that God will blot out his transgressions (justification), but that God will wash him thoroughly from his iniquity (sanctification). E. G. Robinson: “Sanctification consists negatively, in the removal of the penal consequences of sin from the moral nature; positively, in the progressive implanting and growth of a new principle of life.... The Christian church is a succession of copies of the character of Christ. Paul never says: ‘be ye imitators of me’ (1 Cor. 4:16), except when writing to those who had no copies of the New Testament or of the Gospels.”

Clarke, Christian Theology, 366—“Sanctification does not mean perfection reached, but the progress of the divine life toward perfection. Sanctification is the Christianizing of the Christian.” It is not simply deliverance from the penalty of sin, but the development of a divine life that conquers sin. A. A. Hodge, Popular Lectures, 343—“Any man who thinks he is a Christian, and that he has accepted Christ for justification, when he did not at the same time accept him for sanctification, is miserably deluded in that very experience.”

This definition implies:

(a) That, although in regeneration the governing disposition of the soul is made holy, there still remain tendencies to evil which are unsubdued.

John 13:10—“He that is bathed needeth not save to wash his feet, but is clean every whit [i. e., as a whole]”; Rom. 6:12—“Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey the lusts thereof”—sin dwells [pg 870]in a believer, but it reigns in an unbeliever (C. H. M.). Subordinate volitions in the Christian are not always determined in character by the fundamental choice; eddies in the stream sometimes run counter to the general course of the current.

This doctrine is the opposite of that expressed in the phrase: “the essential divinity of the human.” Not culture, but crucifixion, is what the Holy Spirit prescribes for the natural man. There are two natures in the Christian, as Paul shows in Romans 7. The one flourishes at the other's expense. The vine dresser has to cut the rank shoots from self, that all our force may be thrown into growing fruit. Deadwood must be cut out; living wood must be cut back (John 15:2). Sanctification is not a matter of course, which will go on whatever we do, or do not do. It requires a direct superintendence and surgery on the one hand, and, on the other hand a practical hatred of evil on our part that coöperates with the husbandry of God.

(b) That the existence in the believer of these two opposing principles gives rise to a conflict which lasts through life.

Gal. 5:17—“For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; for these are contrary the one to the other; that ye may not do the things that ye would”—not, as the A. V. had it, “so that ye cannot do the things that ye would”; the Spirit who dwells in believers is represented as enabling them successfully to resist those tendencies to evil which naturally exist within them; James 4:5(the marginal and better reading)—“That spirit which he made to dwell in us yearneth for us even unto jealous envy”—i. e., God's love, like all true love, longs to have its objects wholly for its own. The Christian is two men in one; but he is to “put away the old man” and “put on the new man” (Eph. 4:22, 23). Compare Ecclesiasticus 2:1—“My son, if thou dost set out to serve the Lord, prepare thy soul for temptation.”

1 Tim. 6:12—“fight the good fight of the faith”—ἀγωνίζου τὸν καλὸν ἀγῶνα τῆς πίστεως = the beautiful, honorable, glorious fight; since it has a noble helper, incentive, and reward. It is the commonest of all struggles, but the issue determines our destiny. An Indian received as a gift some tobacco in which he found a half dollar hidden. He brought it back next day, saying that good Indian had fought all night with bad Indian, one telling him to keep, the other telling him to return.

(c) That in this conflict the Holy Spirit enables the Christian, through increasing faith, more fully and consciously to appropriate Christ, and thus progressively to make conquest of the remaining sinfulness of his nature.

Rom. 8:13, 14—“for if ye live after the flesh, ye must die; but if by the Spirit ye put to death the deeds of the body, ye shall live. For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God”; 1 Cor. 6:11—“but ye were washed, but ye were sanctified, but ye were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, and in the Spirit of our God”; James 1:26—“If any man thinketh himself to be religious, while he bridleth not his tongue but deceiveth his heart, this man's religion is vain”—see Com. of Neander, in loco—“That religion is merely imaginary, seeming, unreal, which allows the continuance of the moral defects originally predominant in the character.” The Christian is “crucified with Christ” (Gal. 2:20); but the crucified man does not die at once. Yet he is as good as dead. Even after the old man is crucified we are still to mortify him, or put him to death (Rom. 8:13; Col. 3:5). We are to cut down the old rosebush and cultivate only the new shoot that is grafted into it. Here is our probation as Christians. So “die Scene wird zum Tribunal”—the play of life becomes God's judgment.

Dr. Hastings: “When Bourdaloue was probing the conscience of Louis XIV, applying to him the words of St. Paul and intending to paraphrase them: ‘For the good which I would, I do not, but the evil which I would not, that I do,’ ‘I find two men in me’—the King interrupted the great preacher with the memorable exclamation: ‘Ah, these two men, I know them well!’ Bourdaloue answered: ‘It is already something to know them, Sire; but it is not enough,—one of the two must perish.’ ” And, in the genuine believer, the old does little by little die, and the new takes its place, as “David waxed stronger and stronger, but the house of Saul waxed weaker and weaker” (2 Sam. 3:1). As the Welsh minister found himself after awhile thinking and dreaming in English, so the language of Canaan becomes to the Christian his native and only speech.

2. Explanations and Scripture Proof.

(a) Sanctification is the work of God.

1 Thess. 5:23—“And the God of peace himself sanctify you wholly.” Much of our modern literature ignores man's dependence upon God, and some of it seems distinctly intended to teach [pg 871]the opposite doctrine. Auerbach's “On the Heights,” for example, teaches that man can make his own atonement; and “The Villa on the Rhine,” by the same author, teaches that man can sanctify himself. The proper inscription for many modern French novels is: “Entertainment here for man and beast.” The Tendenznovelle of Germany has its imitators in the sceptical novels of England. And no doctrine in these novels is so common as the doctrine that man needs no Savior but himself.

(b) It is a continuous process.

Phil. 1:6—“being confident of this very thing, that he who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Jesus Christ”; 3:15—“Let us therefore, as many as are perfect, be thus minded: and if in anything ye are otherwise minded, this also shall God reveal unto you”; Col. 3:9, 10—“lie not one to another; seeing that ye have put off the old man with his doings, and have put on the new man, that is being renewed unto knowledge after the image of him that created him”; cf. Acts 2:47—“those that were being saved”; 1 Cor. 1:18—“unto us who are being saved”; 2 Cor. 2:15—“in them that are being saved”; 1 Thess. 2:12—“God, who calleth you into his own kingdom and glory.”

C. H. Parkhurst: “The yeast does not strike through the whole lump of dough at a flash. We keep finding unsuspected lumps of meal that the yeast has not yet seized upon. We surrender to God in instalments. We may not mean to do it, but we do it. Conversion has got to be brought down to date.” A student asked the President of Oberlin College whether he could not take a shorter course than the one prescribed. “Oh yes,” replied the President, “but then it depends on what you want to make of yourself. When God wants to make an oak, he takes a hundred years, but when he wants to make a squash, he takes six months.”

(c) It is distinguished from regeneration as growth from birth, or as the strengthening of a holy disposition from the original impartation of it.

Eph. 4:15—“speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into him, who is the head, even Christ”; 1 Thess. 3:12—“the Lord make you to increase and abound in love one toward another, and toward all men”; 2 Pet. 3:18—“But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ”; cf. 1 Pet. 1:23—“begotten again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, through the word of God, which liveth and abideth”; 1 John 3:9—“Whosoever is begotten of God doeth no sin, because his seed abideth in him: and he cannot sin, because he is begotten of God.” Not sin only, but holiness also, is a germ whose nature is to grow. The new love in the believer's heart follows the law of all life, in developing and extending itself under God's husbandry. George Eliot: “The reward of one duty done is the power to do another.” J. W. A. Stewart: “When the 21st of March has come, we say ‘The back of the winter is broken.’ There will still be alternations of frost, but the progress will be towards heat. The coming of summer is sure,—in germ the summer is already here.”Regeneration is the crisis of a disease; sanctification is the progress of convalescence.

Yet growth is not a uniform thing in the tree or in the Christian. In some single months there is more growth than in all the year besides. During the rest of the year, however, there is solidification, without which the green timber would be useless. The period of rapid growth, when woody fibre is actually deposited between the bark and the trunk, occupies but four to six weeks in May, June, and July. 2 Pet. 1:5—“adding on your part all diligence, in your faith supply virtue; and in your virtue knowledge”—adding to the central grace all those that are complementary and subordinate, till they attain the harmony of a chorus (ἐπιχορηγήσατε).

(d) The operation of God reveals itself in, and is accompanied by, intelligent and voluntary activity of the believer in the discovery and mortification of sinful desires, and in the bringing of the whole being into obedience to Christ and conformity to the standards of his word.

John 17:17—“Sanctify them in the truth: thy word is truth”; 2 Cor. 10:5—“casting down imaginations, and every high thing that is exalted against the knowledge of God, and bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ”; Phil. 2:12, 13—“work out your own salvation with fear and trembling; for it is God who worketh in you both to will and to work, for his good pleasure”; 1 Pet. 2:2—“as new-born babes, long for the spiritual milk which is without guile, that ye may grow thereby unto salvation.” John 15:3—“Already ye are clean because of the word which I have spoken unto you.” Regeneration through the word is followed by sanctification through the word. Eph. 5:1—“Be ye therefore imitators of God, as beloved children.” Imitation is at first a painful effort of will, as in learning the piano; afterwards it becomes pleasurable and even unconscious. Children unconsciously imitate the handwriting of their parents. Charles Lamb sees in the mirror, as he is shaving, the apparition of his dead [pg 872]father. So our likeness to God comes out as we advance in years. Col. 3:4—“When Christ who is our life, shall be manifested, then shall ye also with him be manifested in glory.”

Horace Bushnell said that, if the stars did not move, they would rot in the sky. The man who rides the bicycle must either go on, or go off. A large part of sanctification consists in the formation of proper habits, such as the habit of Scripture reading, of secret prayer, of church going, of efforts to convert and benefit others. Baxter: “Every man must grow, as trees grow, downward and upward at once. The visible outward growth must be accompanied by an invisible inward growth.” Drummond: “The spiritual man having passed from death to life, the natural man must pass from life to death.” There must be increasing sense of sin: “My sins gave sharpness to the nails, And pointed every thorn.” There must be a bringing of new and yet newer regions of thought, feeling, and action, under the sway of Christ and his truth. There is a grain of truth even in Macaulay's jest about “essentially Christian cookery.”

A. J. Gordon, Ministry of the Spirit, 63, 109-111—“The church is Christian no more than as it is the organ of the continuous passion of Christ. We must suffer with sinning and lost humanity, and so ‘fill up ... that which is lacking of the afflictions of Christ’ (Col. 1:24). Christ's crucifixion must be prolonged side by side with his resurrection. There are three deaths: 1. death in sin, our natural condition; 2. death for sin, our judicial condition; 3. death to sin, our sanctified condition.... As the ascending sap in the tree crowds off the dead leaves which in spite of storm and frost cling to the branches all the winter long, so does the Holy Spirit within us, when allowed full sway, subdue and expel the remnants of our sinful nature.”

(e) The agency through which God effects the sanctification of the believer is the indwelling Spirit of Christ.

John 14:17, 18—“the Spirit of truth ... he abideth with you, and shall be in you. I will not leave you desolate; I come unto you”; 15:3-5—“Already ye are clean.... Abide in me ... apart from me ye can do nothing”; Rom. 8:9, 10—“the Spirit of God dwelleth in you. But if any man hath not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his. And if Christ is in you, the body is dead because of sin; but the spirit is life because of righteousness”; 1 Cor. 1:2, 30—“sanctified in Christ Jesus ... Christ Jesus, who was made unto us ... sanctification”; 6:19—“know ye not that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit which is in you, which ye have from God?” Gal. 5:16—“Walk by the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh”; Eph. 5:18—“And be not drunken with wine, wherein is riot, but be filled with the Spirit”; Col. 1:27-29—“the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory: whom we proclaim, admonishing every man and teaching every man in all wisdom, that we may present every man perfect in Christ; whereunto I labor also, striving according to his working, which worketh in me mightily”; 2 Tim. 1:14—“That good thing which was committed unto thee guard through the Holy Spirit which dwelleth in us.”

Christianity substitutes for the old sources of excitement the power of the Holy Spirit. Here is a source of comfort, energy, and joy, infinitely superior to any which the sinner knows. God does not leave the soul to fall back upon itself. The higher up we get in the scale of being, the more does the new life need nursing and tending,—compare the sapling and the babe. God gives to the Christian, therefore, an abiding presence and work of the Holy Spirit,—not only regeneration, but sanctification. C. E. Smith, Baptism of Fire: “The soul needs the latter as well as the former rain, the sealing as well as the renewing of the Spirit, the baptism of fire as well as the baptism of water. Sealing gives something additional to the document, an evidence plainer than the writing within, both to one's self and to others.”

“Few flowers yield more honey than serves the bee for its daily food.” So we must first live ourselves off from our spiritual diet; only what is over can be given to nourish others. Thomas à Kempis, Imitation of Christ: “Have peace in thine own heart; else thou wilt never be able to communicate peace to others.” Godet: “Man is a vessel destined to receive God, a vessel which must be enlarged in proportion as it is filled, and filled in proportion as it is enlarged.” Matthew Arnold, Morality: “We cannot kindle when we will The fire which in the heart resides; The Spirit bloweth and is still; In mystery our soul abides. But tasks in hours of insight willed Can be in hours of gloom fulfilled. With aching hands and bleeding feet, We dig and heap, lay stone on stone; We bear the burden and the heat Of the long day, and wish 't were done. Not till the hours of light return All we have built do we discern.”

(f) The mediate or instrumental cause of sanctification, as of justification, is faith.

[pg 873]

Acts 15:9—“cleansing their hearts by faith”; Rom. 1:17—“For therein is revealed a righteousness of God from faith unto faith: as it is written, But the righteous shall live from faith.” The righteousness includes sanctification as well as justification; and the subject of the epistle to the Romans is not simply justification by faith, but rather righteousness by faith, or salvation by faith. Justification by faith is the subject of chapters 1-7; sanctification by faith is the subject of chapters 8-16. We are not sanctified by efforts of our own, any more than we are justified by efforts of our own.

God does not share with us the glory of sanctification, any more than he shares with us the glory of justification. He must do all, or nothing. William Law: “A root set in the finest soil, in the best climate, and blessed with all that sun and air and rain can do for it, is not in so sure a way of its growth to perfection, as every man may be whose spirit aspires after all that which God is ready and infinitely desirous to give him. For the sun meets not the springing bud that stretches toward him with half that certainty as God, the source of all good, communicates himself to the soul that longs to partake of him.”

(g) The object of this faith is Christ himself, as the head of a new humanity and the source of truth and life to those united to him.

2 Cor. 3:18—“we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are transformed into the same image from glory to glory, even as from the Lord the Spirit”; Eph. 4:13—“till we all attain unto the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a fullgrown man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ.” Faith here is of course much more than intellectual faith,—it is the reception of Christ himself. As Christianity furnishes a new source of life and energy—in the Holy Spirit: so it gives a new object of attention and regard—the Lord Jesus Christ. As we get air out of a vessel by pouring in water, so we can drive sin out only by bringing Christ in. See Chalmers' Sermon on The Expulsive Power of a New Affection. Drummond, Nat. Law in the Spir. World, 123-140—“Man does not grow by making efforts to grow, but by putting himself into the conditions of growth by living in Christ.”

1 John 3:3—“every one that hath this hope set on him (ἐπ᾽ αὐτῷ) purifieth himself, even as he is pure.” Sanctification does not begin from within. The objective Savior must come first. The hope based on him must give the motive and the standard of self-purification. Likeness comes from liking. We grow to be like that which we like. Hence we use the phrase “I like,” as a synonym for “I love.” We cannot remove frost from our window by rubbing the pane; we need to kindle a fire. Growth is not the product of effort, but of life. “Taking thought,” or “being anxious” (Mat. 6:27), is not the way to grow. Only take the hindrances out of the way, and we grow without care, as the tree does. The moon makes no effort to shine, nor has it any power of its own to shine. It is only a burnt out cinder in the sky. It shines only as it reflects the light of the sun. So we can shine “as lights in the world” (Phil. 2:15), only as we reflect Christ, who is “the Sun of Righteousness” (Mal. 4:2) and “the Light of the world” (John 8:12).

(h) Though the weakest faith perfectly justifies, the degree of sanctification is measured by the strength of the Christian's faith, and the persistence with which he apprehends Christ in the various relations which the Scriptures declare him to sustain to us.

Mat. 9:29—“According to your faith be it done unto you”; Luke 17:5—“Lord, increase our faith”; Rom. 12:2—“be not fashioned according to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is the good and acceptable and perfect will of God”; 13:14—“But put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the flesh, to fulfil the lusts thereof”; Eph. 4:24—“put on the new man, that after God hath been created in righteousness and holiness of truth”; 1 Tim. 4:7—“exercise thyself unto godliness.” Leighton: “None of the children of God are born dumb.” Milton: “Good, the more communicated, the more abundant grows.” Faith can neither be stationary nor complete (Westcott, Bible Com. on John 15:8—“so shall ye become my disciples”). Luther: “He who is a Christian is noChristian”; “Christianus non in esse, sed in fieri.” In a Bible that belonged to Oliver Cromwell is this inscription: “O. C. 1644. Qui cessat esse melior cessat esse bonus”—“He who ceases to be better ceases to be good.” Story, the sculptor, when asked which of his works he valued most, replied: “My next.” The greatest work of the Holy Spirit is the perfecting of Christian character.

Col. 1:10—“Increasing by the knowledge of God”—here the instrumental dative represents the knowledge of God as the dew or rain which nurtures the growth of the plant (Lightfoot). [pg 874]Mr. Gladstone had the habit of reading the Bible every Sunday afternoon to old women on his estate. Tholuck: “I have but one passion, and that is Christ.” This is an echo of Paul's words: “to me to live is Christ” (Phil. 1:21). But Paul is far from thinking that he has already obtained, or is already made perfect. He prays “that I may gain Christ, ... that I may know him” (Phil. 3:8, 10).

(i) From the lack of persistence in using the means appointed for Christian growth—such as the word of God, prayer, association with other believers, and personal effort for the conversion of the ungodly—sanctification does not always proceed in regular and unbroken course, and it is never completed in this life.

Phil. 3:12—“Not that I have already obtained, or am already made perfect: but I press on, if so be that I may lay hold on that for which also I was laid hold on by Jesus Christ”; 1 John 1:8—“If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.” Carlyle, in his Life of John Sterling, chap. 8, says of Coleridge, that “whenever natural obligation or voluntary undertaking made it his duty to do anything, the fact seemed a sufficient reason for his not doing it.” A regular, advancing sanctification is marked, on the other hand, by a growing habit of instant and joyful obedience. The intermittent spring depends upon the reservoir in the mountain cave,—only when the rain fills the latter full, does the spring begin to flow. So to secure unbroken Christian activity, there must be constant reception of the word and Spirit of God.

Galen: “If diseases take hold of the body, there is nothing so certain to drive them out as diligent exercise.” Williams, Principles of Medicine: “Want of exercise and sedentary habits not only predispose to, but actually cause, disease.” The little girl who fell out of bed at night was asked how it happened. She replied that she went to sleep too near where she got in. Some Christians lose the joy of their religion by ceasing their Christian activities too soon after conversion. Yet others cultivate their spiritual lives from mere selfishness. Selfishness follows the line of least resistance. It is easier to pray in public and to attend meetings for prayer, than it is to go out into the unsympathetic world and engage in the work of winning souls. This is the fault of monasticism. Those grow most who forget themselves in their work for others. The discipline of life is ordained in God's providence to correct tendencies to indolence. Even this discipline is often received in a rebellious spirit. The result is delay in the process of sanctification. Bengel: “Deus habet horas et moras”—“God has his hours and his delays.” German proverb: “Gut Ding will Weile haben”—“A good thing requires time.”