BACK to the BASICS: WHY NOT SANCTIFIED WHEN CONVERTED?

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1. Because it is contrary to the Word of God. God could do many things He does not do, simply
because it is not His method or plan of doing. He could make twenty dollar gold pieces grow on
sycamore trees if it were simply a question of power; but such is not His way of doing. So He
unquestionably could sanctify a man wholly at the same instant He pardons his sins, but this is not
His method as revealed in His Word. He has never called or commanded a sinner to become
sanctified, nor has He given any promises of sanctification to a sinner. In every instance where the
command or promise of sanctification is given in the Word of God it is to those who are already His
people. In the study of God’s Word many cases can be pointed out where sanctification was not
accomplished in conversion. God has method and system in all His works. What He does for one
man in conversion He does for others; He dies not have a half dozen ways of converting folks. The
manifestations of that work may vary, but the same work is divinely inwrought.
2. The sinner does not realize his need of sanctification. The one thing that engages the attention
of the penitent sinner is his guilt and condemnation, and the consequent results of his sins, and how
he may find deliverance and obtain the favor of God. Had God sanctified me when He converted me
He would have done so without my having understood my need or privilege of the same and without
my asking. No sinner feels his need of sanctification, nor thinks of praying God to sanctify him when
under conviction for sin and seeking pardon. And although there are preachers who insist that
justification and sanctification are simultaneous, not one would invite a penitent sinner to come and
seek sanctification. If this is what a sinner should seek and expect to receive why should he not be
told of it? After peace has been obtained, and the soul has the consciousness of pardon, and comes
to see and feel its need of deliverance from “the sin which doth so easily beset,” and understands that
such is the will of God and the “inheritance among them which are sanctified by faith,” there can be
intelligent asking and compliance with conditions and proper appreciation of the gift bestowed.
3. The work of justification and the work of sanctification deal with two different phases of sin;
the former having to do with sins committed — sin as an act, while sanctification has to do with sin
inherited — sin as a principle or nature. In some particulars these works of the Spirit are antipodal
— direct opposites. In justification there is the quickening of our moral nature — the impartation of
a new life; in sanctification there is the destruction, and crucifixion — the deadening of our carnal
nature “our old man” as in Rom. 6:6. The first a making alive process; the second a deadening
process. Pardon and crucifixion are surely not identical. Our sins are never said to be crucified, nor
“our old man” pardoned. This could not be so in the nature of the case. On the contrary, sins
committed are pardoned, Isa. 55:7, and “our old man is crucified,” Rom. 6:6. The first gives us the
favor of God; the second restores to us the moral likeness and image of God; the first gives us a right
to heaven; the second gives us the fitness for heaven. In the first we are born of the Spirit; in the
second we are baptized with the Spirit. In the nature of things a birth must precede a baptism. Just
as certain as the birth of the Spirit marks a distinct crisis or epoch, just so certainly does the baptism
with the Spirit mark the entrance upon a new era and life experience.
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