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The Acts of the Apostles
John did not teach that salvation was to be earned by obedience;
but that obedience was the fruit of faith and love. “Ye know that He
was manifested to take away our sins,” he said, “and in Him is no sin.
Whosoever abideth in Him sinneth not: whosoever sinneth hath not
seen Him, neither known Him.”
1 John 3:5, 6
. If we abide in Christ,
if the love of God dwells in the heart, our feelings, our thoughts, our
actions, will be in harmony with the will of God. The sanctified heart
is in harmony with the precepts of God’s law.
There are many who, though striving to obey God’s command-
ments, have little peace or joy. This lack in their experience is the
result of a failure to exercise faith. They walk as it were in a salt land,
a parched wilderness. They claim little, when they might claim much;
for there is no limit to the promises of God. Such ones do not correctly
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represent the sanctification that comes through obedience to the truth.
The Lord would have all His sons and daughters happy, peaceful, and
obedient. Through the exercise of faith the believer comes into posses-
sion of these blessings. Through faith, every deficiency of character
may be supplied, every defilement cleansed, every fault corrected,
every excellence developed.
Prayer is heaven’s ordained means of success in the conflict with
sin and the development of Christian character. The divine influences
that come in answer to the prayer of faith will accomplish in the soul
of the suppliant all for which he pleads. For the pardon of sin, for the
Holy Spirit, for a Christlike temper, for wisdom and strength to do His
work, for any gift He has promised, we may ask; and the promise is,
“Ye shall receive.”
It was in the mount with God that Moses beheld the pattern of that
wonderful building that was to be the abiding place of His glory. It
is in the mount with God—in the secret place of communion—that
we are to contemplate His glorious ideal for humanity. In all ages,
through the medium of communion with heaven, God has worked out
His purpose for His children, by unfolding gradually to their minds the
doctrines of grace. His manner of imparting truth is illustrated in the
words, “His going forth is prepared as the morning.”
Hosea 6:3
. He
who places himself where God can enlighten him, advances, as it were,
from the partial obscurity of dawn to the full radiance of noonday.
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True sanctification means perfect love, perfect obedience, perfect
conformity to the will of God. We are to be sanctified to God through