From what has already passed before as, we learn that the grand result of the work of Christ in the past is to give us a divinely perfect standing before God. "He has perfected forever them that are sanctified." He has introduced us into the Divine Presence, in all His own perfect acceptability, in the full credit and virtue of His name, of His Person, and of His work; so that, as the apostle John declares, "as He is, so are we in this world." (1 John iv. 17.)
Such is the settled standing of the very feeblest lamb in all the blood-bought flock of Christ. Nor could it possibly be otherwise. It must be either this or eternal perdition. There is not the breadth of a hair between this standing of absolute perfectness before God and a condition of guilt and ruin. We are either in our sins or in a risen Christ. There is no middle ground. We are either covered with guilt or complete in Christ. But the believer is declared, by the authoritative voice of the Holy Ghost in Scripture, to be "complete in Christ"--"perfect, as pertaining to his conscience"--"perfected in perpetuity"--"clean every whit"--"accepted in the Beloved"--"made [or become] the righteousness of God in Christ."
And all this through the sacrifice of the cross. That precious atoning death of Christ forms the solid and irrefragable foundation of the Christian's standing. "This Man, after He had offered one sacrifice for sins, forever sat down on the right hand of God." A seated Christ is the glorious proof and the perfect definition of the believer's place in the presence of God. Our Lord Christ, having glorified God about our sins, and borne His judgment on our entire condition as sinners, has conducted us, in living association with Himself, into a place, not only of forgiveness, acceptance, and peace, but of complete deliverance from the dominion of sin--a place of assured victory over every thing that could possibly be against us, whether indwelling sin, the fear of Satan, the law, or this present evil world.
Such, we repeat, is the absolutely settled standing of the believer, if we are to be taught by holy Scripture. And we earnestly entreat the Christian reader not to be satisfied with any thing less than this. Let him not any longer accept the muddled teachings of christendom's creeds, and its liturgical services, which only drive the soul back into the darkness, distance, and bondage of Judaism--that system which God found fault with, and which He has forever abolished, because it did not meet His holy mind, or satisfy His loving heart, in giving the worshiper perfect peace, perfect liberty, perfect nearness to Himself, and that forever.
We solemnly call upon all the Lord's people, throughout the various sections of the professing church, to consider where they are, and to see how far they understand and enjoy the true Christian position, as set forth in the various passages of Scripture which we have quoted, and which might easily be multiplied a hundredfold. Let them diligently and faithfully compare the teachings of christendom with the Word of God, and see how far they agree. In this way they will find how completely the professing Christianity of the present day stands in contrast with the living teachings of the New Testament; and as a consequence, souls are robbed of the precious privileges which belong to them as Christians, and they are kept in the moral distance which characterized the Mosaic economy.