First, then, let us consider what Sanctification is.
1. In the first place let me make it clear that, _Sanctification is not the "Baptism with the Holy Spirit."_ The two are constantly confused. There is an intimate relation between the two, but they are not at all one and the same thing; and only confusion and misconception can arise from confounding two experiences which God keeps separate. That Sanctification is not the baptism with the Holy Spirit and that the baptism with the Holy Spirit is not Sanctification, will become clear as we proceed and find out from a study of the Bible just what Sanctification is.
2. In the second place, let me say that _Sanctification is not the eradication of the carnal nature_. We will see this when we come to examine God's definition of Sanctification; for God has very clearly defined what Sanctification is and when it takes place. Those who teach "the eradication of the carnal nature" are grasping after a great and precious truth, but they have expressed that truth in a very inaccurate, unfortunate, and unscriptural way, and this way of stating it leads to grave misapprehensions and errors and abuses. The whole controversy about "the eradication of the carnal nature" arises from a misapprehension and from using terms for which there is no warrant in the Bible. The Bible nowhere speaks about "the carnal nature," and so certainly not about "the eradication of the carnal nature." There is such a thing as a carnal nature, but it is not a material thing, not a substance, not a something that can be eradicated as you pull a tooth or remove the vermiform appendix. "A carnal nature" is a nature controlled by the flesh. Certainly it is a believer's privilege not to have his nature governed by the flesh. Our nature should be and may be under the control of the Holy Spirit, and then it is not a carnal nature; but one nature has not been eradicated and another nature put in its place, but our nature is taken out from under the control of the flesh and put under the control of the Holy Spirit. Furthermore, while it is our privilege to have our nature under the control of the Holy Spirit and delivered from the control of the flesh, _we still have "the flesh,"_ and shall have the flesh as long as we are in this body. But if we "walk by the Spirit" we do not "fulfil the lusts of the flesh" (Gal. 5:16). The 8th chapter of Romans describes the life of victory, just as the 7th chapter, 9-24 verse describes the life of defeat, when men are "_carnal_, sold under sin," but it is in the 8th chapter where life "in the Spirit" is described (Rom. 8:9) that we are told that we _still have_ the flesh, _but that it is our privilege not_ to "live _after the flesh_," but "by the Spirit," to "put to death the deeds of the body." So we see that the body is there, but in the power of the Spirit we do, day by day and (if we live up to our privilege) every day and every hour and every minute, continuously "put to death the deeds of the body."
3. So much as to what Sanctification is not. We will see exactly what it is if we look at God's definition of Sanctification. We shall find that the word Sanctification is used in the Bible in a two-fold sense.