December 29th

Christ our Sanctification

Christ is not the Sanctifier in the sense that he does something to the soul that enables it to stand and persevere in holiness in its own strength. He does not change the structure of the soul but he watches over and works in it to will and to do continually and this becomes its sanctification. His influence is not exerted once and for all but constantly. When he is apprehended and embraced as the soul's sanctification he rules in and reigns over the soul in so high a sense that he, as it were, swallows us up, so enfolds, if I may say, our wills and our souls in his, that we are willingly led captive by him. We will and do what he wills in us. He charms the will into a universal bending to his will. He so established his throne in us and his authority over us that he subdues us to himself. He becomes our sanctification only in so far forth as we are revealed to ourselves and he revealed to us and as we receive him and put him on.

What! has it come to this, that the Church doubts and rejects the doctrine of entire sanctification in this life? Then, it must be that it has lost sight of Christ as its sanctification. Is not Christ perfect in all his relations? Is there not a completeness and fulness in him? When embraced by us are we not complete in him? The secret of all this doubting about and oppostion to the doctrine of entire sanctification is to be found in the fact that Christ is not apprehended and embrace as our sanctification." (Finney)