Sanctification by Faith

1 Thess. V. 23: "And the God of peace himself sanctify you wholly."

I. Experience.

George Fox was born in 1624. He was one of the first of the modern apostles of holiness, and founder of the Society of Friends. Here is his luminous testimony concerning his own inner life. "I knew Jesus, and He was very precious to my soul; but I found something within me that would not keep sweet and patient and kind. I did
what I could to keep it down, but it was there. I besought Jesus to do something for me, and when I gave Him my will, He came to my heart and took out all that would not be patient, all that would not be kind, and -- then He shut the door."

Could a second work of grace be stated more beautifully or definitely?

Dr. A. J. Gordon, of Boston, wrote: "It seems clear that it is still the duty and privilege of believers to receive the Holy Spirit by a conscious, definite act of appropriating faith, just as they received Jesus Christ ... It is as
sinners that we accept Christ for our justification; but it is as sons that we accept the Spirit for our sanctification. The Scriptures show that we are required to appropriate the Spirit as sons, in the same way that we appropriated Christ as sinners.

How Paul wrote to the Thessalonians

.1) In the second chapter and tenth verse he claimed for himself an experience beyond justification: "Ye are witnesses and God also how holily and righteously and unblamably we behaved ourselves toward you that believe."

(2) From the sixth verse to the ninth verse of the third chapter he rejoiceth that the members of that Thessalonian church had not backslidden but were still his joy and comfort. Yet in the tenth verse he declares that he is "praying night and day exceedingly that he may see their face and perfect that which was lacking in their faith." It is not difficult to see to what he was referring. They had exercised faith for justification, but not for sanctification: for, he says in the thirteenth verse. "To the end he may establish your hearts unblamable in Holiness." In other words, he longed to see them that he might lead them into the experience of sanctification, or holiness.

(3) This is still more apparent from what follows. Only three verses later (chap. iv., vs.
3) he writes: "For this is the will of God, even your sanctification. That each one of you may know how to possess himself of his own vessel in sanctification." (vs. 4.) "For God called us not for uncleanness, but in sanctification." (vs.7.) Notice how this is all connected together as a logical and rhetorical whole. "I desire to see you and perfect your faith, to the end ye may be unblamable in holiness: FOR this is the will of God even your sanctification: FOR God hath called us unto sanctification." This is so interlocked and dove-tailed and glued together that it cannot be pulled apart, or wrenched from its meaning.

(4) In the fifth chapter and nineteenth verse we read, "Quench not the Spirit. What has that to do with this subject? Everything. It is the Spirit who sanctifies, as the Word four times declares. Our hearts are cleansed through the baptism with the Holy Ghost.

Therefore he that quenches the Spirit defeats the will of God and prevents his work of grace in the soul.

(5) He says (chap. 5, vs. 22), "Abstain from every form of evil." And what bearing has this upon the subject? Very, very much. Only those get sanctified who abstain from evil and are walking in the light. Start a holiness meeting in any community: it will be the very best Christians who will be the first at the altar to seek holiness. Why? Because they are prayerfully walking with God, and welcome all the light He sends to their hearts. The command is, "Quench not the Spirit and abstain from all evil," and then the prayer. (verse 23.)

(6) "And the God of peace himself sanctify you wholly, and may your spirit and soul and body be preserved entire without blame." How much there is in that wonderful prayer for believers!
(a) You can not get sanctification by your own growth or development or by any human doings or deservings. The "God of peace himself" does the sanctifying, and brings the "peace of God that passeth understanding" to the heart.

(b) The verb "sanctify" is in the aorist tense and signifies an instantaneous, completed action. God sanctifies by one of His own almighty acts in a moment of time.

(c) He does it "completely;" holoteleis, as the Greek word is, meaning the whole, to the end of all necessity of our being. The German Bible translates it, "through and through."

(d) The apostle enlarges upon the completeness of it by saying, "May your spirit and soul and body be preserved in this sanctification." The Greek word for "body" means our physical being. The word translated "soul," means the principle of life, and such faculties as we share with lower animals. The word translated "Spirit" means that higher spiritual faculty by which we perceive duty and obligation; by which we know God and our accountability to Him; the faculty which makes us companions and fellows with angels in the spirit-realm. These three compose the whole of our being. From the crown of our head to the sole of our feet there is nothing more of us but our clothes. So completely may God's grace sanctify and keep us all!

What a wonderful salvation it is! Carnality slain! The old man crucified! His vile affections and lusts all gone! The body having only normal appetites and passions! The soul having clean thoughts and holy desires! The spirit seeing God and rejoicing in His Companionship and presence and love. This is salvation; this is life; the foretaste and beginning of life eternal

[url=https://www.sermonindex.net/search3.php?domains=www.sermonindex.net&q=The+Second+Blessing+in+Experience%2C+in+Theology+and+in+Scripture&sa=Google+Search&sitesearch=www.sermonindex.net&client=pub-2782595449860661&forid=1&channel=3390373323&ie=ISO-8859-1&oe=ISO-8859-1&safe=active&cof=GALT%3A%23666633%3BGL%3A1%3BDIV%3A%23CCCCCC%3BVLC%3A666633%3BAH%3Acenter%3BBGC%3AFFFFFF%3BLBGC%3AFFFFFF%3BALC%3A666633%3BLC%3A666633%3BT%3A666666%3BGFNT%3A666633%3BGIMP%3A666633%3BFORID%3A11&hl=en]The Second Blessing in Experience, in Theology and in Scripture In Sermon Index[/url]

Guys anything to do with second blessing, christian perfection, Holiness, Christ All in All, let me know any links, books anything.

It's something thats close to my heart and I want to find out more.

Andrew Murray wrote a book titled The Two Covenants, it is an excellent read, highly recommended. Towards the end of the book there is a short note on the second blessing that is insightful, here it is and also a link to read it online at CCEL...

The Second Blessing

IN the life of the believer there sometimes comes a crisis, as clearly marked as his conversion, in which he passes out of a life of continual feebleness and failure to one of strength, and victory, and abiding rest. The transition has been called the Second Blessing. Many have objected to the phrase, as being unscriptural, or as tending to make a rule for all, what was only a mode of experience in some. Others have used it as helping to express clearly in human words what ought to be taught to believers as a possible deliverance from the ordinary life of the Christian, to one of abiding fellowship with God, and entire devotion to His service. In introducing it into the title of this book, I have indicated my belief that, rightly understood, the words express a scriptural truth, and may be a help to believers in putting clearly before them what they may expect from God. Let me try and make clear how I think we ought to understand it.

I have connected the expression with the two Covenants. Why was it that God made two Covenants—not one, and not three? Because there were two parties concerned. In the First Covenant man was to prove what he could do, and 169
what he was. In the Second, God would show what He would do. The former 169was the time of needed preparation; the
latter, the time of Divine fulfilment. The same necessity as there was for this in the race, exists in the individual too. Conversion makes of a sinner a child of God, full of ignorance and weakness, without any conception of what the whole-hearted devotion is that God asks of him, or the full possession God is ready to take of him. In some cases the transition from the elementary stage is by a gradual growth and enlightenment. But experience teaches, that in the great majority of cases this healthy growth is not found. To those who have never found the secret of a healthy growth, of victory over sin and perfect rest in God, and have possibly despaired of ever finding it, because all their efforts have been failures, it has often been a wonderful help to learn that it is possible by a single decisive step, bringing them into a right relationship to Christ, His Spirit, and His strength, to enter upon an entirely new life.

What is needed to help a man to take that step is very simple. He must see and confess the wrongness, the sin, of the life he is living, not in harmony with God’s will. He must see and believe in the life which Scripture holds out, which Christ Jesus promises to work and maintain in him. As he sees that his failure has been owing to his striving in his own strength, and believes that our Lord Jesus will actually work all in him in Divine power, he takes courage, and dares surrender himself to Christ anew. Confessing and giving up all that is of self and sin, yielding himself wholly to Christ and His service, he believes and receives a new power to live his life by the faith of the Son of God. The change is in many cases as clear, as marked, as wonderful, as conversion. For lack of a better name, that of A Second Blessing came most naturally.

When once it is seen how greatly this change is needed in the life of most Christians, and how entirely it rests on faith in Christ and His power, as revealed in the Word, all doubt as to its scripturalness will be removed. And when once 170
its truth is seen, we shall be surprised to find how, throughout Scripture, 170in history and teaching, we find what
illustrates and confirms it.

Take the twofold passage of Israel through water, first out of Egypt, then into Canaan. The wilderness journey was the result of unbelief and disobedience, allowed by God to humble them, and prove them, and show what was in their heart. When this purpose had been accomplished, a second blessing led them through Jordan as mightily into Canaan, as the first had brought them through the Red Sea out of Egypt.

Or take the Holy Place and the Holiest of All, as types of the life in the two covenants, and equally in the two stages of Christian experience. In the former, very real access to God and fellowship with Him, but always with a veil between. In the latter, the full access, through a rent veil, into the immediate presence of God, and the full experience of the power of the heavenly life. As the eyes are opened to see how terribly the average Christian life comes short of God’s purpose, and how truly the mingled life can be expelled by the power of a new revelation of what God waits to do, the types of Scripture will shine with a new meaning.

Or look to the teachings of the New Testament. In Romans, Paul contrasts the life of the Christian under the law with that under grace, the spirit of bondage with the Spirit of adoption. What does this mean but that Christians may still be living under the law and its bondage, that they need to come out of this into the full life of grace and liberty through the Holy Spirit, and that, when first they see the difference, nothing is needed but the surrender of faith, to accept and experience what grace will do by the Holy Spirit.

To the Corinthians, Paul writes of some being carnal, and still babes, walking as men after the flesh; others being spiritual, with spiritual discernment and character. To the Galatians, he speaks of the liberty with which Christ, by the Spirit, makes free from the law, in contrast to those who sought to perfect in the flesh, what was begun in the Spirit, 171
and who gloried in the flesh;—all 171to call them to recognise the danger of the carnal, divided life, and to come at once to
the life of faith, the life in the Spirit, which alone is according to God’s will.

Everywhere we see in Scripture, what the state of the Church at the present day confirms, that conversion is only the gate that leads into the path of life, and that within that gate there is still great danger of mistaking the path, of turning aside, or turning back, and that where this has taken place we are called at once, and with our whole heart, to turn and give ourselves to nothing less than all that Christ is willing to work in us. Just as there are many who have always thought that conversion must be slow, and gradual, and uncertain, and cannot understand how it can be sudden and final, because they only take man’s powers into account, so many cannot see how the revelation of the true life of holiness, and the entrance on it by faith out of a life of self-effort and failure, may be immediate and permanent. They look too much to man’s efforts, and know not how the second blessing is nothing more nor less than a new vision of what Christ is willing to work in us, and the surrender of faith that yields all to Him.

I would fain hope that what I have written in this book may help some to see that the second blessing is just what they need, is what God by His Spirit will work in them, is nothing but the acceptance of Christ in all His saving power as our strength and life, and is what will bring them into, and fit them for, that full life in the New Covenant, in which God works all in all.

Let me close this note with a quotation from the introduction to a little book just published, Dying to Self: A Golden Dialogue, by William Law, with notes by A.M.: “A great deal has been said against the use of the terms, the Higher Life, the Second Blessing. In Law one finds nothing of such language, but of the deep truth of which they are the, perhaps defective, expression, his book is full. The points on which so much stress is laid in what is called Keswick 172
teaching, stand prominently out in his whole argument. The low state of the average life of believers, 172the cause of all
failure as coming from self-confidence, the need of an entire surrender of the whole being to the operation of God, the call to turn to Christ as the One and Sure Deliverer from the power of self, the Divine certainty of a better life for all who will in self-despair trust Christ for it, and the heavenly joy of a life in which the Spirit of Love fills the heart—these truths are common to both. What makes Law’s putting of the truth of special value is the way in which he shows how humility and utter self-despair, with the resignation to God’s mighty working in simple faith, is the infallible way to be delivered from self, and have the Spirit of Love born in the heart.”

[url=http://www.ccel.org/ccel/murray/covenants.iii.xix.html]Two Covenants - The Second Blessing[/url]

In Christ,

Ron

Thanks for your help and thanks to them that sent PM's. I will certainly read and study all items that have been sent to me.