THE SECOND CRISIS IN CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE
27 -- AFTER SANCTIFICATION, WHAT?
No experience however glorious should be regarded as a
finality. One of the greatest dangers common to all Christians is that of
resting in a past experience. Every experience God has given should simply be
regarded as preparatory for something better farther on, and should be utilized
as a stepping stone to higher altitudes of grace. There is positively no such
thing as getting it all. "The path of the just is as the shining light
that shineth more and more unto the perfect day." After the heart has been
purified and sanctified by the baptism with the Holy Ghost and fire, there is
now the proper heart condition for endless.
Growth in Grace
As a soul cannot grow into the grace of justification, for
the simple reason that it is something God must do for us, so in like manner it
is impossible to grow into sanctification, seeing that sanctification is a
"divine act" -- a something God must do in us. While it is impossible
to grow into sanctification, there is a limitless, endless, boundless growth in
grace after sanctification. "Onward" must ever be the watchword of
all who would maintain a spiritual experience. Next station to stagnation is
damnation. Sanctification, negatively stated, is not so much getting something
we never had, as it is getting rid of some things we have always had.
Purification may be said to be subtraction, while growth in grace is addition.
We can never grow the impurities of carnality out of the heart, any more than
we can grow weeds out of the garden. Indeed, sanctification is the necessary
antecedent of growth in grace. Until the weeds have been removed from the
garden, the suckers removed from the corn, and the useless branches from the
vine, the growth of the vegetables, of the corn, and of the fruit is retarded
and stinted. The experience common to the multitudes who have been sanctified
has been that they grow more in grace in one month after the heart has been
cleansed than they did previously in a year, or even in a number of years.
There are three things always essential to a symmetrical
growth, namely, good health, proper food and sufficient exercise. Holiness is
soul-health, spiritual wholeness or soundness. Sin is a malady -- a soul
disease. Perfect soul-health will give a keen spiritual relish or appetite for
"the sincere milk," and the "strong meat" of the Word,
"that ye may grow thereby." Being healthy and well fed, the soul is
now in a condition to exercise itself "unto godliness," and so it
will "grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior, Jesus
Christ." As the person thus goes forward and onward to know the Lord, he
will have certain
Testings
Such is the divine program. "Many shall be purified and
made white, and tried." God will have a tried people. Earthly props and
human dependencies will be swept away. It is one thing for us to trust God, but
altogether another thing for us to come to the place where God can trust us.
"Whom shall He teach knowledge? And whom shall he make to understand
doctrine? Them that are weaned from the milk and drawn from the breasts."
The weaning time of a child is usually a rather stormy period, and the child is
apt to think itself greatly mistreated and abused. It invariably fails to
understand why it should be thus dealt with; but the parent understands the
wherefore. Not until in after years will the child understand. So to the
sanctified soul, these seasons of peculiar testing -- these providential
hardships -- will seem exceedingly mysterious and inexplicable, but in later
years they will be recognized as great blessings; trials are simply blessings
in disguise. Trials and
testings are God's challenge t o our faith to prove Him, and
the divine method of enlarging us. Trials are growing pains. The loss of
property, gross misrepresentations, fierce persecutions, mental perplexities,
affliction, the thwarting of cherished ambitions, the going down in a seeming
defeat in the effort to lead others into the experience, the blighting of
pleasing prospects, and innumerable kindred blessings are all calculated to
wean and detach the soul from the things of earth and teaching it the way of
submission and faith, will develop the iron graces and unconquerable sinews of
a holy character from which heroes and martyrs are made. Hence Peter says,
"Beloved, think it not strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try
you, as though some strange thing happened unto you; but rejoice, inasmuch as
ye are partakers of Christ's sufferings." "Though for a season, if
need be, ye are in heaviness through manifold temptations; that the trial of
our faith, being much more precious than gold that perisheth, though it be
tried wit h fire, might e found unto praise and honor and glory at the
appearing of Jesus Christ." The spirit of heaviness is perfectly
compatible with the spirit of holiness; for of these same persons who are thus
being tried he says, "Who are kept by the power of God through faith unto
salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. (I. Peter 1:5-7.) Trials and
testings are the way to promotion. A tunnel is simply as short-cut to a
destination. It is during these testing the soul learns to stand alone and walk
by faith. "If we suffer we shall also reign with Him." "joint
heirs with Christ, if so be that we suffer with Him, that we may be also
glorified together." After the soul has thus had proper discipline and
stood true, it is prepared for
Service
We are saved to serve, and it now becomes our exalted
privilege to become "laborers together with God." Sanctification is
not simply freedom from sin, but antagonism to sin. Having on the "whole
armor" the individual is now prepared to stand in the battle's front and
"endure hardness as a good soldier of Jesus Christ." No longer does
he go to battle as a conscript, who, being drafted, is compelled to go, but as
a true and tried soldier, enthused with the perfect love of God, and with the fullness
of the spirit in his heart; he is now prepared to "fight the good fight of
faith," being "a vessel unto honor, sanctified and meet for the
Master's use and prepared unto every good work." Having been fully tested
and found unswerving in his fidelity and undaunted in his courage, the Lord
will see to it that doors of usefulness and opportunity will be opened to him,
so that he will be "always abounding in the work of the Lord." Having
been comforted himself, he is now prepared to comfort others by the same
comfort wherewith he himself is comforted of God. The human method is, do in
order to be; but the divine method is be in order to do. Be right and you'll do
right. When we remember that our faithful service on earth determines our rank
in heaven -- for reward is according to labor -- we shall ever feel that no
time must be wasted; and that not how little may I do and yet get to heaven,
but how much may I do for my Master before I go to heaven, will be the attitude
of the soul. Work will now become a luxury, and service a delight. "They
that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament; and they that turn
many to
righteousness as the stars forever and ever." (Dan.
12:3.)
