The Wesleyan understanding of baptism with the Holy Spirit and other aspects of entire sanctification.

Christians generally recognize the need to live a holy, or sanctified, life. But they differ on what sanctification is and how it is achieved. How does one achieve sanctification in this life? How much success in sanctification is possible? Is a crisis experience following one's conversion normal--or necessary? If so, what kind of experience, and how is it verified? Five Views on Sanctification--part of the Counterpoints series--brings together in one easy-to-understand volume five major Protestant views on sanctification: Wesleyan View – represented by Melvin E. Dieter Reformed View – represented by Anthony A. Hoekema Pentecostal View – represented by Stanley M. Horton Keswick View – represented by J. Robertson McQuilkin Augustinian-Dispensationalism View – represented by John F. Walvoord Writing from a solid evangelical stance, each author describes and defends his own understanding of the doctrine sanctification and then responds to the views of the other authors. The Counterpoints series presents a comparison and critique of scholarly views on topics important to Christians that are both fair-minded and respectful of the biblical text. Each volume is a one-stop reference that allows readers to evaluate the different positions on a specific issue and form their own, educated opinion.

Previously published: Sisters, Or.: Multnomah Publishers, c2000.

The Gospel Mystery of Sanctification presents the culmination of Puritan thought on living the Christian life. Combining doctrinal precision and pastoral sensitivity, Walter Marshall shows how sanctification is essential to spiritual life, dependent on spiritual union with Jesus Christ, and inseparable though distinct from justification. He shows how holiness involves both the mind and the soul of the believer and that it is the aim of the Christian life. It is no wonder that this book has been reprinted many times throughout the years and received such high praise from leading ministers of the gospel. "The most important book on sanctification ever written." John Murray (1898 1975), professor of systematic theology, Westminster Theological Seminary

The doctrine of theosis has enjoyed a recent resurgence among varied theological traditions across the realms of historical, dogmatic, and exegetical theology. In Christification: A Lutheran Approach to Theosis, Jordan Cooper evaluates this teaching from a Lutheran perspective. He examines the teachings of the church fathers, the New Testament, and the Lutheran Confessional tradition in conversation with recent scholarship on theosis. Cooper proposes that the participationist soteriology of the early fathers expressed in terms of theosis is compatible with Luther's doctrine of forensic justification. The historic Lutheran tradition, Scripture, and the patristic sources do not limit soteriological discussions to legal terminology, but instead offer a multifaceted doctrine of salvation that encapsulates both participatory and forensic motifs. This is compared and contrasted with the development of the doctrine of deification in the Eastern tradition arising from the thought of Pseudo-Dionysius. Cooper argues that the doctrine of the earliest fathers--such as Irenaeus, Athanasius, and Justin--is primarily a Christological and economic reality defined as "Christification." This model of theosis is placed in contradistinction to later Neoplatonic forms of deification.

A Plain Account of Christian Perfection by John Wesley is about the theory of perfection according to Christian theology. Excerpt: "1. WHAT I purpose in the following pages is, to give a plain and distinct account of the steps by which I was led, during the course of many years, to embrace the doctrine of Christian Perfection. This I owe to the serious part of mankind; those who desire to know all the truth as it is in Jesus. And these only are concerned with questions of this kind. To these I would nakedly declare the thing as it is, endeavoring all along to show, from one period to another, both what I thought, and why I thought so."

Entire Sanctification may be the most important, least understood doctrine of holiness tradition. Once it was the central concern of much of that tradition's preaching. Churches would hold "holiness revivals," and people would attend extra services to learn more about it. Now, there are churches where it is never mentioned, and many who attend historic holiness denominations would be hard-pressed to explain what it means. However, if the gospel of Jesus Christ is more than a free ticket to heaven -- if Christ expects his disciples to live as he lived and not merely because he lived -- then sanctification needs to become, once again, a central concern of the church.Beginning from the ground up, this book explores how the doctrine of holiness and entire sanctification is deeply woven into the fabric of Scripture. Once we understand the nature of God and the nature of humanity, the problem of sin and the work of salvation, we discover that sanctification is the culmination of the great story of salvation and the hope of everyone who wants to follow Jesus and be a part of the Kingdom of God that Christ proclaimed. This is a book for any disciple of Christ who wants to understand why holiness is not simply an "add-on" to the gospel but rather God's ultimate plan for humanity, allowing us to truly become human again, living the way God had always intended us to live.