SANCTIFICATION.

John xvii. 17, 19.

We may say the elect of God, under different dispensations, have had their different form and order of sanctification. Under the call of God, Abraham had his in his early days, for he was separated from earthly associations and natural relationships. Israel had theirs in their day afterwards-they were severed from the other nations of the earth, and walls of partition surrounded them. Israel's priesthood had their peculiar sanctification also; and Israel's land delivered from the Amonite, with all its productions in cattle, corn, fruits, and the like, went through their own several purifying.

All this has been so, in various perfections, according to divine wisdom and order. But I may add, the Church in this day, has her peculiar sanctification of a certain order high above all. She is called from the world to heavenly citizenship, in fellowship with a rejected Lord, and in knowledge of the Father. This is expressed by the Saviour Himself, in John xvii. 17, 19. "Sanctify them through Thy truth," He says, addressing the Father, "Thy word is truth; as Thou hast sent Me into the world, even so have I also sent them into the world; and for their sakes I sanctify

Myself, that they also may be sanctified through the truth."

Here we find a very peculiar character of sanctification. The instruments for carrying it on are very blessed-that is the truth concerning the Father, and the truth concerning a heavenly Jesus.

As I have said, the Lord was addressing the Father, when He says, "Sanctify them through Thy truth"— that is, He desires that His saints may be made a separate people through the power of that word which tells them of the Father. In other language, He desires that the sanctification of the elect may be in the virtue of full child-like liberty and assurance, or in the sense of dear personal relationship to God, as of children with a Father.

And when uttering these further words, "for their sakes I sanctify Myself, that they also may be sanctified through the truth," He was as the One that was just about to leave the world, and in heaven to take a place apart from all human, Jewish, earthly connections; and accordingly His desire for His people is this, that they may be sanctified, or made separate by communion with a heavenly Jesus, by that truth which tells them that they are no longer of the world, even as He is not of the world.

These are the peculiar instruments of the Church's sanctification. This sanctification is characteristically hers. It is, I may say, entirely her own.

Conscience demands much in the way of righteousThe rules of society exact good order and recti

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tude. The law of God requires holiness in thoughts and desires, saying, "thou shalt not lust." Surely it does, it could do no less. But Christ not only does all this, and more of the same kind, but looks for a sanctification of a high and peculiar order, as I have been observing, looks for a sanctification through the knowledge of a Father's love, and through fellowship with a heavenly Head.

This may well commend itself to the thoughts of those who are given to see nothing but various perfection in the wisdom and words of Christ. At the time of His uttering these desires before the Father, He was leaving earth for heaven. In that sense, it was that He was sanctifying Himself. We know that He had always been holy, infinitely, essentially holy; as holy when in the Virgin's womb, as now at the right hand of God. But when, in the course of this utterance, He said, "for their sakes I sanctify Myself," He lets us learn this, that He was about to enter on a new order or character of separation or holiness; that is, that He was about to sit in heaven, and draw His elect to Himself there.

This is very simple and sure to my thoughts. The sanctification of the Church depends, after this manner, on her having communion, not only in liberty and love, and in the sense of relationship, as of children with a Father, but also with Jesus as rejected on earth, or by this world; and accepted, and seated, and glorified in heaven.

How can he then, I ask, help forward the world in its purposes and expectations, or cultivate the earth as a scene of desirable citizenship? How can the elect, one of this dispensation, join in schemes which have such ends and prospects as these? If consistency with his calling be maintained, or the high and peculiar sanctification with which he is sanctified be understood, he cannot. He has lost his place the moment he makes the advancement, or the cultivation, or the display of this world his object. He is to labour in the earth, and by sweat of face to earn his bread. He is to learn some honest trade for necessary uses. He is to do good to all as he has opportunity. He is to be glad to communicate, and to be ready to every good work; but he is not to propose to cherish and adorn the earth, which Jesus has, for the present, left beneath him, or to join in displaying the capabilities, and the resources of the world and its citizens.

What higher order of holiness or sanctification, I ask, can there be, than that which we are here tracing? What more worthy of a calling from God? Yea, what so high? Our spirits, as the elect of this age, should know the liberty and the joy of the dearest relationships to God, and the power of separation from the world, because it refused Jesus, and Jesus has now refused it.

The Church is in "God the Father," and also in the "Lord Jesus Christ;" breathes in communion with a Father, and with a heavenly Lord, that is, with Jesus in His high and exalted lordship in the heavens.

THE FATHER'S HOUSE AND THE HEAvenlies.

THE vision of Micaiah (1 Kings xxii.)-the opening scene in Job-the Lord's word in Luke x. 18,-as well as the teaching of the Apostle in Eph. vi. 12,-and the action of the Angel in Rev. xii., all tell us that our adversary, our accuser, is in the heavenly places.

But does it not strike the soul with relief and comfort, that those heavens, where all this action proceeds, are a lower heaven than the Father's house? Be sure that this is so. There is a region to which the prince of the power of the air has access now, just as of old he had access to the garden of Eden, to carry on his accusings there, as once he conducted his temptations in the garden. This region is distinctly called heaven, or heavenly places, where principalities conduct their action, and spiritual wickednesses are recognised.

But this is a lower heaven. This is not the Father's house. This is not the residence of the excellent glory. It may be the seat of government, but it is not the place of the excellent glory.

I understand, moreover, that it is the place to which the holy Jerusalem descends, to take her government of, or her connection with, the millennial earth, in "the world to come," as we see in Rev. xxi. But she had descended ere she reached that spot-a witness that she belonged to a higher place. And so she does. She