THEOLOGICAL AUTHORITIES Part 2
The wisdom of the fathers
THEOLOGICAL AUTHORITIES Part 2
Bishop Hedding says: "The degree of original sin which remains in some believers, though not a transgression of a known law, is nevertheless sin, and must be removed before one goes to heaven, and the removal of this evil is what we mean by full sanctification." "Regeneration is the beginning of purification. Entire sanctification is finishing that work."
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Sermon. Bishop Hamline: "It (regeneration) is a mixed moral state. Sanctification is like weeding the soul, or gathering the tares and burning them, so that nothing remains to grow there but the good seed." "Entire sanctification removes them -- roots them out of the heart, and leaves it a pure moral soil."
Bishop E. Thomson: "The first complete step in salvation, after forgiveness, which pardons past sins, must necessarily be deliverance from sin; and the soul that is not saved from sin, is not saved. The ROOT of sin must be extirpated from the heart."
Bishop Clarke says of sanctification -- "This meets the essential requirements in order to salvation; the defilement that unfits for heaven is washed away." -- Bishop Foster says, of the person entirely sanctified, that he is in -- "a state in which he will be entirely free from sin, properly so called, both inward and outward." "The process of this work is in this order: beginning with pardon, by which one aspect of sin, that is actual guilt, is wholly removed, and proceeding in regeneration, by which another kind of sin, that is depravity, is in part removed, terminating with entire sanctification, by which the remainder of the second kind, or depravity, is ENTIRELY REMOVED."
This statement of Bishop Foster is most admirably expressed, and presents the truth with much clearness. Regeneration removes some sin or pollution, and entire sanctification removes the corruption which remains after regeneration. This will be seen, from the authorities given, to be the Wesleyan idea of entire sanctification. (from "Purity and Maturity" by J.A. Wood)