Page:Heaven Revealed.djvu/107

 wherewith we are to combat our pride, conceit, avarice, selfishness and all other hereditary evils—the same apostle elsewhere calls the "armour of God," and "the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God." (Eph, vi. 13, 17.)

The Lord also teaches that we are spiritually cleansed—are sanctified and saved, that is, brought out of a hellish and into a heavenly state, by means of the truth. "And for their sakes," He says, "I sanctify myself, that they also might be sanctified through the truth." "Sanctify them through thy truth; thy Word is truth." (John xvii. 17, 19.) It is the truth of God's Word which makes manifest our evils, and teaches us how to overcome them. It is the truth, therefore, by means of which we are spiritually washed and purified, and thus saved from sin and its consequences.

But the Bible, we shall be told, teaches that it is the blood of Christ which cleanseth from all sin. And so, indeed, it is. But what spiritual thing does the blood of Christ stand for or signify? It is the symbol of the precious and ever-living truth of the Word. This truth is the Lord's own life-blood which is forever being poured out for the purification and salvation of human souls. This, or the Lord operating through its instrumentality, can cleanse from sin, and clothe our souls in robes of righteousness. Hence that angelic throng which the Revelator beheld arrayed in white, are said to "have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb."

But we are not spiritually cleansed, or brought into the heavenly state, by simply understanding and believing