There can be no real or right sanctification till a man is clear about sin. Until I know my perfect acceptance, and am perfectly assured of salvation, through all sin being gone, I am mingling up my state with my standing. The holy nature is there, but there can be no proper sanctification till I see that Christ has not only borne my sins up to such a day, but that all my sins are gone and, besides that, I have a perfect acceptance in Christ.

There are three things: peace as to sins; present grace; and glory to come (Rom. 5:1–2). Not merely no condemnation as in Christ Jesus—all sin having been cleared away—but a position—a new place in Christ Himself—is ours. All, as to the first Adam, was settled on the cross, and I have a new place in Christ; I am called to walk now as Christ walked, but I am to be conformed to God’s Son in glory. I am to walk as Christ walked, not to be as Christ was. He was without sin in Him, but we have sin in us; nonetheless, sin in our walk is never to be allowed.

Not only are my sins cleared away, but I see a Man gone into glory; and now, not only I would not sin, but I want to be like that Christ in glory—I press on towards the mark (2 Cor. 3:18). I see Christ in glory by faith now; I know I am to be like Him by-and-by, and I want to be as like Him as ever I can be, even now. It is like a light at the end of a tunnel: the nearer I get, the brighter the light. I see the flesh in me never changes, only appears worse and worse; but if my eye is fixed, and my mind is occupied with and full of Christ, I shall get more like Him at every step, changed “into the same image from glory to glory.”