nctification is progressive, waiting to be
{121} consummated in the future; so is glorification in some sense
progressive, since by the presence of the Spirit we already have the
earnest of the glory that is to be. As Edward Irving beautifully
states it, condensing his language: "As sickness is sin apparent in the
body, the presentiment of death, the forerunner of corruption, and as
disease of every kind is mortality begun, so the quickening of our
mortal bodies by the inward inspiration of the Spirit is the
resurrection forestalled, redemption anticipated, glory begun in our
humiliation."

When is sanctification completed? At death, is the answer which we
find given in some creeds and manuals of theology. This may be true;
but we say it not, because the Scripture saith it not. So far as we
can infer from the word of God the date of our sanctification or
perfection in holiness is definitely fixed at the appearing of the Lord
"a second time without sin unto salvation." Our sanctification, now
going on, is glory begun in us; our glorification then ushered in will
be glory completed in us. The Spirit of glory now working in us brings
forward and already works within us the beginning of the perfect life.
Because we have been made "partakers of the Holy Ghost" we have thereby
"tasted the powers of the age to come" (Heb. 6: 4, 5, R. V.), that age
of complete deliverance from sin and sickness and death. But at most
we have only tasted as yet; we have not {122} drunk fully into the
fountain of immortal life. It is at Christ's advent that this blessed
consummation is fixed: "To the end he may establish your hearts
unblamable in holiness before our God and Father _at the coming of our
Lord Jesus with all his saints_" (1 Thess. 3: 13, R. V.). Not simply
blameless but faultless, seems to be the condition here foretold, since
it is unblamable in the sphere and element of holiness.

And with this agrees another text in the same epistle: "And the God of
peace himself sanctify you wholly; and may your spirit and soul and
body be preserved entire without blame _at the coming of our Lord Jesus
Christ_" (1 Thess. 5: 23, R. V.). The time appointed for the
consummation of this blameless wholeness is at the Saviour's advent in
glory. And how suggestive the order maintained in naming the threefold
man: "Your spirit, soul, and body." Our sanctification moves from
within outward. It begins with the spirit, which is the holy of
ho