What is entire sanctification?

You may have so heard; but you have not so read. Turn to 1 Thessalonians 5:23, and now let us read carefully. "And the very God of peace sanctify you wholly: and, I pray God, your whole spirit, and soul, and body be preserved blameless to the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ." Now you observe here is entire sanctification to God; and yet we need entire preservation. If spirit, and soul, and body were sanctified in the sense of being made pure as Christ is pure, then there would be no need of being preserved blameless. Does Christ thus need to be preserved? If He were on earth would He thus need it?

No doubt, the believer grows in the knowledge of this sanctification, in his sense of its power and value, its practical influence and results, the experience and enjoyment of it. As "the truth" pours its divine light upon his soul, he enters into a more profound apprehension of what is involved in being "set apart" for Christ, in the midst of this evil world. All this is blessedly true; but the more its truth is seen, the more clearly we shall understand that sanctification is not merely a progressive work, wrought in us by the Holy Spirit, but that it is one result of our being linked to Christ, by faith, whereby we become partakers of all that He is. This is an immediate, a complete, and an eternal work. "Whatsoever God does, it shall be for ever: nothing can be put to it, nor anything taken from it." (Ecc. 3:14) Whether He justifies or sanctifies, "it shall be for ever." The stamp of eternity is fixed upon every work of God's hand: "nothing can be put to it," and, blessed be His name, "nothing can be taken from it.

There are passages which present the subject in another aspect, and which may require a fuller consideration hereafter. In 1 Thessalonians 5:23 the apostle prays for the saints whom he addresses, "And the very God of peace sanctify you wholly; and I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless to the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ." Here, the word is applied to a sanctification admitting of degrees. The Thessalonians had, along with all believers, a perfect sanctification in Christ; but as to the practical enjoyment and display of this, it was only accomplished in part, and the apostle prays that they may be wholly sanctified.

The conclusion of the Epistle begins with a prayer. "Now the God of peace Himself sanctify you wholly; and I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. He is faithful that calls you, who will also do it." God is for all who have believed in Christ the God of peace. Peace was made in the blood of the cross; believers are both reconciled and sanctified through the peace that God has made for us in the work of His Son. We stand therefore in a blessed relationship with the God of peace, have communion with Him, and from this flows practical devotedness of life and walk to God. Believers are sanctified by the three persons of the Godhead; by God the Father, by the blood of Jesus Christ, the offering of His body, and by the Holy Spirit.

We are in Christ completely set apart for God, bought with a price and no longer our own. We possess a new nature and are indwelt by the Holy Spirit. This demands of us that we be wholly set apart to God in every faculty, whether of mind or body. This is our practical sanctification, which springs from our increasing knowledge of God. This practical sanctification is wrought in the believer by the power of the Holy Spirit, who attaches the heart to God, revealing God more and more, as well as unfolding the glory of Christ. This devotedness to God in spirit, soul and body, depends upon the believer's apprehension of his relationship to the God of peace and his communion with Him. And this is progressive. Entire sanctification will be the blessed and eternal portion of all who are Christ's, when He comes, and we shall be like Him, "conformed to the image of His Son." The perfection comes with the coming of the Lord; in the power of this blessed hope shall we be preserved blameless even down here in this evil age. He is faithful who calls you, who will also perform it. Blessed assurance! He has called us to this life of blessed separation with Himself. He is faithful and will accomplish it. May we trust Him daily and stay close to Him.

There is: 1 Thessalonians 5:23, to which we have already referred. But the context shows that the word, "wholly" refers to the whole man in his tripartite nature — "spirit and soul and body." There is nothing partial about God's gracious work. Its sanctifying influence reaches every part of us, and is carried on "to the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ." When He comes the sanctification of the whole man will be carried to its completeness and perfection; but not before.

Not he that commendeth himself is approved, but whom the Lord commendeth. Do we find Paul turning back to rest upon his own feelings? His conscience bears him good witness - "I know nothing by myself; yet am I not hereby justified," he says: "but he that judgeth me is the Lord." (1 Cor. 4:4.) In vain we search the whole Bible for a witness given by the Holy Ghost to our souls of our complete 'sanctification.' We clearly see in Scripture that we are "children of God," "heirs of God," objects of His perfect love; that, in communion with Him, we have the enjoyment of His love, that we glory in Him. But as to entire 'sanctification,' we find it not at all; it is a notion which can in no way be made to accord with the true 'perfection' - that 'perfection' which is ours, already enjoyed by us in hope, but which will be completed only in the resurrection. It is an error connected with a host of other errors, and destructive of some of the most precious truths and consolations of the gospel.

Mr. Wesley distinguishes this state from a state of perfection, which, in his opinion, shews itself in three ways, by the experience of the heart, first, in the absence of sin; second, in perfect love; and third, by the witness which the Holy Spirit bears to the perfect man, of His complete sanctification, as of his justification. But when I search the Scriptures for proofs of this witness borne by the Holy Spirit, I nowhere find them. If I consult Mr. Wesley, the only answer he can give me is, that if these things are affirmed to me by a true man, and no sufficient reasons exist for disbelieving the statement, I ought not to reject his testimony. "But not he that commendeth himself is approved, but whom the Lord commendeth," 2 Cor. 10:18. When I turn to Paul, I meet with very different language. Does Paul go back to rest upon his own feelings? His conscience bears him good witness. "I know nothing by myself," says he, "yet am I not hereby justified: but he that judgeth me is the Lord," 1 Cor. 4:4. Again, I say, that it is in vain I search the whole Bible for this witness, given by the Holy Spirit to our souls, of our complete sanctification. I clearly see in the Scriptures that we are children, heirs of all things, objects of God's perfect love — that in communion with Him we have the enjoyment of this love, that we may glory in Him; but as to our entire sanctification, I nowhere find it. It is a notion which can in no way be made to accord with the true perfection — that perfection which is ours, and already enjoyed by us in hope, but which will be completed only in the resurrection. For we "ourselves also, which have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body," Rom. 8:23. "For we know that the whole creation (of which our bodies are a part) groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now" (v. 22). Observe, these words do not occur in Romans 7 but in chapter 8, which speaks of the soul set at liberty — the soul that has received the witness of the Spirit, and is at liberty, because it has received this witness. As to the other passages which you have quoted, you join two together, which, however, are not connected in the word, that you may derive from them an inference which may have some appearance of truth. You tell me that He in whom was no sin (1 John 3:5) has left us an example that we should follow His steps (1 Peter 2:21). This is not in the New Testament. We read (1 Peter 2:21-22), that "Christ suffered for us, leaving us an example, that we should follow his steps: who did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth." Now, He is the example, not of what we are (which it would be folly to pretend), but of what our conduct ought to be. Elsewhere it is said, "He was manifested to take away our sins; and in him is no sin," 1 John 3:5. But in this latter passage nothing is said of Jesus Christ as our example.

A. I will tell you. They say, "We ought not to seek sanctification by human effort; but that by receiving Christ as our sanctification the germ of sin is destroyed, and we are perfectly holy, and without sin or evil concupiscence." It is true that we shall never, by any strength or effort of man, attain to sanctification; and that if we look to Christ, we shall find an abundant spring of life and holiness. I grant also that a soul which is under the law, and groaning beneath the burden of its wretchedness, will get no blessing by useless struggles for deliverance. But all this does not hinder the doctrine, as a whole, being false. For it is false to say, that by receiving Christ as our sanctification we can ever, on earth, attain to perfection, and extirpate entirely sin from our nature. It is an error which connects itself with a host of other errors, destructive of the most precious truths and consolations of the gospel; and which injures, in a high degree, our sanctification itself.

Hence we see in 1 Thess. 2 that the joy and hope of the apostle's heart in his labours of love is no present honour, recompense, influence, or gratification; it is the saints he here cherished and led on as his crown of boasting before our Lord Jesus at His coming. In 1 Thess. 3 he prays the Lord to make them exceed and abound in love toward one another, and toward all, in order to confirm their hearts unblameable in holiness before our God and Father, at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ with all His saints. In 1 Thess. 4 it is the especial consolation, yea triumph, in presence of the death of brethren. As Jesus died and rose, resurrection will be the portion of those who die; for God will bring with Jesus those who have slept through Him. In 1 Thess. 5 the day of the Lord is supposed to be familiarly known, and about to come as a thief in the night with destruction for those who are of darkness, which is in no way the characteristic of the Christian, but of the condition out of which the knowledge of Christ takes him. Also, in verse 23, the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, and not death, is presented as the time and circumstances in which the desire for the entire sanctification of the saints, wholly and in every part, inwardly and outwardly, will be realized according to the faithfulness and power of Him who calls the saints.

Now, sanctification is chiefly spoken of as accomplished, and before justification; but it is also spoken of as progressive: "Ye are washed, ye are sanctified, ye are justified." "Sanctified unto obedience and the blood of sprinkling." "Sanctified in God the Father." Such are the expressions of scripture, treating the Christian as sanctified and set apart by grace, and thus brought under the efficacy of the blood of sprinkling and justified. But while thus personally, as born of God, wholly sanctified, scripture does say, "Follow after holiness," "And the very God of peace sanctify you wholly." It looks for a practical and increasing realization of this setting apart in thought and affection by a growing knowledge of Christ. The Evangelical school, fancying it knows how to take care of holiness better than divine wisdom does, takes only the latter, rejecting the former. This has led to pressing the former more particularly; it may be to the exclusion of the latter. But those who reject the former press a mere practical change, in contrast with a divine title over us and personal setting apart to God, and use the practical state as a test of justification, and they thus cast true souls into doubt, and lower the nature both of justification and sanctification itself. The gospel is lost. This is the mischievous extreme in which Mr. Trench is. I would recommend him a sentence of Dr. O'Brien's: "God's honour is to be maintained by the right use of the safeguards which He Himself has provided for it, not by our devising new muniments for its protection."

As some confusion exists with respect to progress in sanctification, I add that in the setting us apart for God by the blood and the new birth - in the entrance into the relationship (that is, sanctification of the person) there is no progress; but in the development of the life through the knowledge of Christ, and in conformity to the model revealed in Christ, the word speaks distinctly of progress. "Follow after holiness," it is written in Hebrews 12:14. We "are transformed into the same image from glory to glory, as by the Spirit of the Lord." (2 Cor. 3:18.) "Now the very God of peace sanctify you wholly." (1 Thess. 5:23.)