Scriptural Sanctification - Media Sabda Org

witnesses, to testify, not merely from his word, but also from his work within us, as to his power and
readiness to save. That was why the apostles and others were to tarry at Jerusalem until they were
indued with this "power from on high" -- power to testify humbly, gratefully, and boldly from their
experience of full salvation -- from their reception of the Spirit of love and joy and peace and
courage, and not from a fuller objective revelation of Christ's divinity and ability to save. It was this
gift of "prophecy" this power, not to foretell, but to "forth-tell" out of the heart -- this power, as Paul
expresses it, of "speaking unto men to edification and exhortation and comfort," that they received.
It is the power to speak to profit out of a heart filled with the Spirit, as well as out of the Book,
illuminated by the anointing of the same Spirit.
Hence it was that Paul's ministry was one of testimony -- "to testify the gospel of the grace of
God." He often confirmed and enforced his statements of doctrine by giving his experience of its
truth. To the Galatians he intimates that he could not preach the gospel successfully without such
experience. He says: "It pleased God, who separated me from my mother's womb, and called me by
his grace, to reveal his Son in me, that I might preach him among the heathen." Here Paul evidently
refers to an internal revelation of Christ to his consciousness -- an experimental knowledge of the
Saviour -- as coming directly from God, and not through man, as an important, if not indispensable,
condition of his successfully preaching or testifying of him to others.
This must in some measure be true with all who are to witness for Christ, whether preachers or
laymen. Bishop C. D. Foss, of the Methodist Episcopal Church, has well said: "'Ye are my
witnesses,' saith the Lord. The Church, which is Christ's body, has a testimony to offer concerning
its Head, and also concerning the life which continually flows from the Head into all the members."
Hence, when, by persecution, the Spirit-filled disciples of Jerusalem were scattered abroad, they,
preachers and laymen, "went everywhere preaching the word" and testifying for Christ.
Methodism stands for experience and testimony. In speaking of Wesley, Bishop Foss says:
"When at the age of thirty-six he 'felt his heart strangely warmed,' Methodism was born. His
subsequent experience and teaching concerning 'perfect love' brought in a new era for yearning,
struggling, doubting disciples; and the twin evangels of salvation now, and of salvation from all sin,
sounded out more clearly than ever before, not only through all the branches of the Church he
founded, but throughout all evangelical Christendom."
What are the class meetings and love feasts of Methodism, and the experience, testimony, and
"praise" meetings of other Churches for but to testify to men what we have experienced of God's
saving power? And the glory of his name and the good of others are supposed to be promoted by
such testimony. Every assured believer may and ought with Charles Wesley to say:
"What we have felt and seen,
With confidence we tell;
And publish to the sons of men
The signs infallible."