Requirements and Conditions for Sanctification

There are two parts to sanctification: We have a part in setting ourselves apart for sacred use, and God has a part in thoroughly cleansing the heart from the sin nature and filling us with the Holy Ghost to enable us to do His work as He wants us to. “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.”* (Romans 12:1-2) We see here that this offering is to be a “living sacrifice.”

God is looking for those who will live for Him and not themselves, and will glorify God in their body and spirit which are His (1 Corinthians 6:20). We present ourselves in repentance once—unclean, unholy, and in sin. Then God forgave us of our sins and took away our guilt and we began to live for Him. Now we present ourselves in an altogether different condition—holy. The first time we came to the Lord we were full of the world and the love of the world, but as He saved us He transferred our affections from the world to Himself; and now we come presenting ourselves, not being conformed to the world, but transformed and separate from it. All this is done to “prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect will of God,” and “This is the will of God, even your sanctification.”* (1 Thessalonians 4:3) We are not responsible for the carnal nature, hence cannot repent of it, but we must acknowledge its existence within us and reach the place where we loath it and refuse it the right to abide in our hearts, and consecrate ourselves before the Lord to permit Him to remove it, that we henceforth should not live unto ourselves but unto Him who died for us (2 Corinthians 5:15). Our bodies and all are turned over unreservedly unto God for His Holy Spirit to take charge of and use as He sees fit.

In justification we forsake sin, the world, and all evil things. In sanctification we forsake ourselves. One who is justified is dead to sin. One who is sanctified is also dead to self. The seeds of sin find a very fertile seed bed in self. That is the carnal nature—to please one’s self instead of God. In the process of sanctification that nature is removed and the Holy Spirit fills our souls with the divine nature, which is to please God and not ourselves. The Apostle Paul said, “I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me.”* (Galatians 2:20) This signifies the death of the carnal nature, which is steeped in selfishness and egotism. Christ suffered without the gate that He might sanctify the people with His own blood (Hebrews 13:12), and Paul had gone forth to Him without the camp (Hebrews 13:13), and actually permitted the same thing to happen to him in spirit that happened there to Jesus in the flesh. He had committed himself to the death of the self-life and all that was within him that was contrary to God and godliness. Everything that had been gain to him in a worldly way and in his self-life, he permitted to be removed from him that Christ might be enthroned within. “I am crucified”—the “I” with all its selfish purposes and personal ambitions was forever put away from him and he testified from henceforth: “For me to live is Christ.”

When one is sanctified, the “I” is gone. It is no longer then “I” but Christ; and not mine, but Christ’s. We are all His and all we have is His. A clear example of this is found in the case of the early disciples at Jerusalem. When they were filled with the Holy Ghost (sanctified) they were all of one heart and one soul and none of them said that the things they possessed were their own, but they sold their possessions and made distribution to those who had need (Acts 2:44-45; 4:32-37). I do not say that all who receive the Holy Ghost today will sell all their possessions as these did, but I do say that they will begin right away to use them for the glory of God and the promotion of His cause instead of consuming them all upon themselves, and their affections and desires will be quickly loosened from the things of this world and set on things above just as theirs were.

Now read Romans 5:1-5. We see here that two graces or experiences are spoken of. He first says, “Therefore being justified by faith””; then he speaks of another grace: “By whom also we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand.”

This second grace, “standing grace” (sanctification) then, is entered into by faith. To obtain it, one must have that living, definite faith in God that counts God faithful and “that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.”* (Hebrews 11:6) When we have made a complete consecration of ourselves and all to God, then we must believe that God accepts our sacrifice and sends the Holy Spirit into our hearts accomplishing the complete eradication of the sin principle and filling the heart with divine love.

“If we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ, his Son, cleanseth us from all sin”* (1 John 1:7)—in nature as well as practice. In order to be eligible for this glorious experience of complete sanctification, one must be walking in all the light he has and be altogether clear with God in as far as he knows. When one is committing sin by failing to walk in the light, he needs to repent and be forgiven of those sins before he can receive the Holy Spirit.

One who is justified is holy; one who is sanctified is perfected in holiness (2 Corinthians 7:1). In others words, the justified person is holy in practice or life, not committing sin; but the sanctified person is holy in nature, having had the sin nature destroyed out of his heart.

At first thought, some are tempted to feel that the complete surrender of ourselves to God is too great a sacrifice. Yet Jesus gave His all for us, and, in all fairness, we should count it only a “reasonable service” to give ourselves to Him. It could not be unfair for Him to have possession of that which He has purchased with His own life’s blood. There has never been a selfish person who was happy. Such people do not even make good neighbors or citizens, let alone good Christians. The reason is obvious. Man was so constructed that he could only be happy in the will of God. Something in him yearns after God. A godly and heavenly atmosphere is his natural realm. Out of such surroundings he is just as unhappy and dissatisfied as the fish out of water, and for the same reason. As one has said, “My soul was made for Thee, O God! and will not rest until it rests in Thee.”1 But when we fully turn ourselves over to God to do His will and serve others that He might be glorified, we will fully realize the truth of the words of Jesus: “Whosoever will save his life [the self-life that seeks to please one’s self and gratify the flesh] shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life [that is, deny himself and forsake fleshly desires and personal ambition] for my sake shall find it.”* () In other words, the surrendered life is the real, true life, and when we have found the secret of complete submission and surrender to God, we have just then found the way of the “more abundant” life and the source of true happiness and pleasure in this world.