sin or
weakness. Much of the old leaven still remains, but it will be
forgiven, not be imputed to us, if only we continue in faith and are
occupied with purging out that remaining impurity.

This is Christ's thought when he says to his disciples (Jn 15, 3),
"Already ye are clean because of the word which I have spoken unto
you," and in the same connection he declares that the branches in him
must be purged that they may bring forth more fruit. And to Peter--and
to others--he says (Jn 13, 10), "He that is bathed needeth not save to
wash his feet, but is clean every whit: and ye are clean, but not
all." These passages, as is also stated elsewhere, teach that a
Christian by faith lays hold upon the purity of Christ, for which
reason he is also regarded pure and begins to make progress in purity;
for faith brings the Holy Spirit, who works in man, enabling him to
withstand and to subdue sin.

16. They are to be censured according to whose representations and
views a Christian Church is to be advocated which should be in all
respects without infirmity and defect, and who teach that, when
perfection is not in evidence, there is no such thing as the Church of
Christ nor as true Christians. Many erring spirits, especially strong
pretenders to wisdom, and precocious, self-made saints, immediately
become impatient at sight of any weakness in Christians who profess
the Gospel faith; for their own dreams are of a Church without any
imperfections, a thing impossible in this earthly life, even they
themselves not being perfect.

17. Such, we must know, is the nature of Christ's office and dominion
in his Church that though he really does instantaneously, through
faith, confer upon us his purity, and by the Spirit transforms our
hearts, yet the work of transformation and purification is not at once
completed. Daily Christ works in us and purges us, to the end that we
grow in purity daily. This work he carries on in us through the agency
of the Word, admonishing, reproving, correcting and strengthening; as
in the case of the Corinthians through the instrumentality of Paul.
Christ also uses crosses and afflictions in effecting this end.

He did not come to toil, to suffer and to die because he expected to
find pure and holy people. Purity and holiness for us he has acquired
in his own person to perfection, inasmuch as he was without sin and
perfectly pure from the moment he became man, and this purity and
holiness he communicates t