CHAPTER XVII. HELPS TO PERCEIVE THE PROPRIETY OF EXPECTING FULL SALVATION IN THIS LIFE. YOUR attention, for a few minutes! Let that person whom I addressed last night hearken! You say, "Last night you urged me to consider the propriety of the doctrine that we may be cleansed from all sin, in life and health. Now, here is just my difficulty. I have not materials of thought sufficiently strong to enable me to cope with the prejudices of education, and other temptations which assail my mind against the doctrine. It is true I have the Scriptures, and I did admire the body of divinity' of them which you presented so convincingly. But I am unable to classify and draw proper inferences, so as to silence objections within and without. Can you help me any further?" Perhaps I can. But let me say I am a poor controversialist, especially with the children of God of other denominations. It is not my forte. I have no heart to it. It does not quite become a stranger. It is the proper work of the regular pastors, I think, if it must be done. Nor should it be in any other spirit than that of love,— seeing that one is our Master, even Christ, and all we are brethren.-Matt. 23: 8. However, I have no objections to offer you all the assistance in my power. As there are others in like circumstances with yourself, they may be benefited, also, by this public reply. But I must apprise you time will not allow me to expatiate largely ;as is consistent with perspicuity. as brief Let me ask you a few questions. You need not trouble about noting them down, as that will distract your attention and weary you; besides, I am not fond of seeing such note-takers in our assemblies. If you wish a copy of the questions afterwards, you can have them. Give me your undivided attention now, and if the Holy Spirit condescend to write the questions and answers on your heart, you will have no difficulty in calling the substance of them to remembrance. 1. WHERE was the sin of our race contracted? There can be but one answer: In this world. And, besides, by our first parents, when in perfect health, and long before death. To our original sin we have added our own personal impurities, which bear the mark of years. Now, where is the impropriety of supposing we may be cleansed from them in this world? If our first parents sinned when in perfect health, why may not their posterity be cleansed from it in perfect health? If they lost their holiness long before death, why may not we regain it long before death? If Satan has tempted and polluted every one of us, less or more, in health, why may not Jesus cleanse us from it in healtb? Or, has Satan more power to pollute than the Son of God to purify? This would be curious theology, and Christ-dishonoring. If Adam and Eve, and each of us, have been rendered guilty and polluted by believing Satanic promises, why, in the name of all that is good, may we not be pardoned and purified by believing Divine promises? That one, for in stance: "If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness."-1 John 1: 9. Or, is Satan's veracity more to be depended upon than that of the Lord our God? Who of us has never credited Satan in his temptationpromises? Why, then, should we distrust the veracity of our Lord Christ, where he says, "If ye shall ask anything in my name, I will do it. And whatsoever ye shall ask in my name, that will I do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son." Does he not here solicit us to place unlimited confidence in his veracity, as well as in the virtue of his name? Ponder these things. I have another question. 2. In what world was the REMEDY for sin provided? In this world, and both for pardon and for purity. Why not, then, have the remedy applied in this world? Where is the impropriety of expecting this, and urging others to expect it? That "we may be pardoned any time we repent and believe," you seem not to question; but, why exclude purification with the same readiness on our part? Why thus limit the application of that precious blood? Another question. 3. Is there any likelihood of our being cleansed from sin AFTER DEATH? In a Protestant mind there can be but one answer: "None whatever." The Roman Catholics, indeed, fondly cling to the notion of a purgatory; vainly supposing that the fires of hell may do in another life what Christ's blood has failed to do in this. But is there any promise in Scripture to this effect? Not one. The Protestant, with the Bible in his hand, rejects the conceit. He recognizes for that office the blood of Christ alone, and in this life only. He believes, with the Bible and with the ancient church, that none suffer after death but those who suffer eternally. You see the propriety, therefore, of insisting upon purity of heart in the life that now is; otherwise we are undone forever. 4. May we be cleansed from all sin one MINUTE before death? Yes, surely; for a moment after would be too late,—it is eternity then! As to "the article of death, when the soul is neither in the body nor out of it; or an intermediate state, which is neither time nor eternity," it is simple nonsense. Death affords nothing of the sort. The soul stays in the body till the stroke of death severs her from it finally. It is time with the soul till the close of the last moment of its connection with the body; after that, it is broad eternity. The soul, then, must be cleansed before death, or not at all forever. A moment? a minute before death? This is all we claim as a basis for our argument for purity long before death. Consider. What is a minute? It is the sixtieth part of an hour,—a small portion of duration, indeed; but it is time, nevertheless, as truly as the hour. Now, if the soul may be cleansed from all sin one minute before death, why not one hour? · a year ? or years? Where, then, is the impropriety of insisting that we may be cleansed from all sin long before death? On rational and Gospel principles, none whatever. Let us abide by the Gospel and common sense. If "metaphysics" dip deeper than they, those may dive after them who please. But I know nothing in that respectable science which would go to teach or prove that the soul may effect its purification from indwelling sin merely by going out of the body. And, if it did, what becomes of the blood of Christ, the only revealed instrument of the soul's purification? 5. Have we any PROMISE we shall be cleansed from sin when dying? No; not one direct promise, from Genesis to Revelation; at least, I have discovered none, and I am going through The Lord may Inference is one the Bible the second time upon my knees. "But do you deny the possibility of it?" No, indeed. I believe the largest portion of Christians are cleansed from sin at that. time. Not that they are necessitated to wait till then; but, from causes to which they voluntarily yield, they do wait till then. But that is not to the point. save without a special "death promise." thing; a direct promise is another. Where is there such a promise? But I could count you off promises by fives, and tens, and scores, that we may be purified in health and life. Take that beautiful one, which shines in the New Testament like the sun in the firmament of heaven, pronounced by Zechariah, Luke 1: 73, 75,-"The oath which he sware to our father Abraham, that he would grant unto us, being delivered out of the hand of our enemies [our sins are enemies indeed], to serve him without fear in HOLINESS and RIGHTEOUSNESS, before him, ALL THE DAYS OF OUR LIFE." Mark that,-"all the days of our life;" not when we are just leaving the body a moment or two before death, no, but all the days of our life. Ponder upon another question. 6. How many New Testament ARGUMENTS could you bring against this doctrine? The seventh of Romans? But the opinion has long prevailed among the learned that this was the experience of Saul of Tarsus, not of Paul the Apostle. Some suppose he only personified a Jewish penitent, that is, assumed his character, one deeply convinced of sin, and of the insufficiency of all legal observances to procure him deliver |