Chapter 8
Sham Doctors
“For they have healed the hurt of the daughter of my people slightly, saying, peace, peace; when there is no peace.” (Jer. 8:11.) There is nothing Satan fears more than that believers shall be made fully whole. Hence, he seeks in many ways to blind them to God’s provision for the Double Cure. He has many doctors whose work it is to substitute some sham for this great work of grace. For years I was deluded by some of these doctors, and I am glad to be used of God to help expose them. They have deceived many good people — ministers among the number — and their sophistry is to be dreaded like poison.
Dr. Delusion. He deafens the ears of believers and blinds their eyes to the commands, prayers, promises, and examples of the Bible, which require and provide for full salvation, and thus persuades them that it is a delusion.
Dr. Fire. This error substitutes fire for the blood, purgatory for the present, has no proof from the Word, and is so absurd that it has been accepted by none of the evangelical churches.
Dr. Water. He would substitute water baptism for the baptism of the Holy Ghost. Inbred sin, from which the soul is to be purified, is deeper than the muscle, bones, marrow, or nerves, so that his notion of cleansing from it simply by the application of water to the skin is so ridiculous that but few have been deceived by it. It is utterly without witness and without Scripture proof. I knew a man who had been baptized three different ways, but was still a sinner.
Dr. Culture. “Culture” is frequently substituted for the Holy Spirit. People are educated in our Sunday-schools and colleges, grow up in the church, become official members, and perhaps ministers, yet are as ignorant as was Nicodemus. They may write books, and have “peculiar views of their own” on holiness, but their “culture car” never reaches the depot of full salvation. It runs on flimsy, wooden rails, painted and polished though they may be, instead of on the track of tried gospel truth.
Dr. Deception. He tells his patients that the Double Cure advocates claim absolute perfection, including freedom from errors of judgment, infirmities, unpleasant dreams, wandering thoughts, dependence on the atonement, temptations, and need of watchfulness and prayer. He thus places the standard higher than the Bible does, and deluding into the belief that the Double Cure is something more than “perfect love from a pure heart,” he prevails upon many to substitute some remedy of his own instead, and then rejoices over the perplexity and pain which follows.
Dr. Imputation. He teaches that none can be pure; that the purity of Jesus is imputed to the believer, and covers him like a white robe might be thrown over a man that was covered with putrefying sores, or as the pure snow may cover a foul yard.
Dr. Repression. This error seeks to keep inbred sin in the believer’s heart through the notion that sanctification can not cleanse it out, but only suppress it. It’s defenders quote the Scriptures, which teaches we are to be “overcomers,” but omit that it is to be not by our own will power, but through the blood of the Lamb and the word of our testimony. This has been called “the Jack-in-the-box theory.” So long as one’s hand is on the box, the Jack is kept down, but when the hand is raised, up jumps the Jack. It proposes to bind the tiger of depravity, and let him live in the soul-temple instead of casting him out. Fatal course! Multitudes of victims! It quotes Romans 7th, which does not refer to a sanctified experience at all, and says that the “body can not be sanctified.” It confounds the physical body, which is to be ‘kept under,” with the “body of sin,” which is to be cleansed away, and locates sin in the flesh instead of in the soul.
Dr. Works. “Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling” (Phil. 2:12) is often wrenched from its proper meaning to support his notion. This passage does not refer to getting saved, but to the works which flow from the person who is saved. The prostitution of it which substitutes works for the blood is condemned by a perfect avalanche of Scripture, as “NOT BY WORKS of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us.” (Tit. 3:5.) “BY THE WORKS of the law shall no flesh be justified.” (Gal, 2:16.) “NOT OF WORKS, lest any man should boast. For we are his WORKMANSHIP, created in Christ Jesus unto good works.” (Eph. 2:9, 10, and references.)
Dr. Growth. The victims of this mistake usually quote, “but grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” (2 Pet. 3:18.) They forget that this text has no reference whatever to sanctification; that this relates to growth, which is an increase, while sanctification relates to a purging and filling, and is the condition of the greatest possible growth. It is just as wise to talk about growing the weeds out of a garden or a cancer out of a child, as to seek sanctification by growth. Many say they are seeking it by growth, but no one ever obtained it in that way. The sooner a transportation line which has tried to carry passengers to a certain port for 1800 years, and has never yet landed one, is abandoned, the better for all concerned. Brother, don’t embark for Beulah Land by the “growth line.” If you do, like many before you, you will be lost in the fog.
Dr. Got-it-all-at-conversion. Many who are deceived by him claim that “they got the Double Cure when converted.” This is contrary to sense, fact, and Scripture.
Sense. It is as ridiculous as to claim that the birth of a child includes perfect health, or that the rescuing of a sinking leper from a watery grave cures him of the leprosy.
Fact. Millions have been converted at one time and entirely sanctified as another and second work, while no one has ever been converted and entirely sanctified by the one act. If there is such a person let him report and pass examination.
Scripture. The Bible all through exhorts sinners to repent and be converted, and then urges believers to consecrate themselves and be entirely sanctified. It nowhere includes the latter with the former. The apostles were converted before Pentecost, sanctified then. Cornelius was converted before he sent for Peter, sanctified after. The Ephesian converts were “believers,” after- wards fully sanctified. (Acts 19:2-6.) No church creed in Christendom holds the monstrous fallacy that conversion fully sanctifies the soul. This doctor’s theory reminds us of the story of an old Scotchman. Some claimed that he was dead, others thought not. A counsel was held, who, in due time, made the final announcement, “He is dead.” Just then up he rose in his coffin and exclaimed, “I’m no dead, I’m no dead.” His Wife, astonished and bewildered, rebuked him, saying, “Lie doon, Jamie, lie doon. The doctors knows more about it than you do.” Many spiritual doctors have made a similar mistake, and it is feared that many have been deceived by them.
Dr. Opposition. The following are some of the fallacies by which he seeks to prejudice people against this blood-bought blessing. He says that “it leads to fanaticism,” but forgets that were such the case God would not have provided it and commanded His children to accept of it. He claims that “its profession promotes pride.” Does a profession of loyalty foster treason? or of health lead to sickness? He objects that “it imposes heavy burdens.” Instead, it relieves of weights and imparts power from on high to do duties already devolving. It is not a burden to be carried, but wine to refresh. “It brings new temptations.” Yes, but eliminates their ally of carnality from the heart, and gives needed grace to resist them. It transforms vacillating Peters into conquering princes. “Many professors do not believe in it.” Many do. One Columbus sailing around the world proves its rotundity. The thousands who are enjoying the Double Cure, and living, telling, and preaching it, prove its verity against any number of witnesses who never took the medicine. “It was only for the apostles and extraordinary persons.” Jesus expressly declared that it was for all who should believe on Him through their word. (John 17:17, 20.) Multitudes from all the walks of life have possessed it and now enjoy it. “Some ministers preach against it.” So did they against the prophets and against Jesus. So have they against every Bible doctrine. Jesus said there would be false prophets, and all who preach against this thus show the fruit whereby their falsity is known. Many do preach it, love it, and lead others into its light. Listen to the true watchman, not to the wolves.
This doctor is full of objections, and often before one is answered he flies for another. The source of such opposition in most cases lies in an unwillingness to comply with all the conditions of the Cure. For fuller answers, see “Wood’s Perfect Love,” “Out of Egypt into Canaan,” and Pickett’s “Book and Its Theme.”
Dr. Perverted Scripture. He seeks to keep from the Double Cure by misinterpreting Scripture. The following are among the Scriptures which this doctor misapplies:
“There is none righteous, no not one.” (Rom. 3:10.) It is a mistake to apply this text to the Double Cure, as the context expressly declares that it has reference not to Christians but to reprobates, “whose feet are swift to shed blood,” and who have “no fear of God before their eyes.” “I find then a law, that, when I would do good evil is present with me.” (Rom. 7:21, also 24.) Instead of disproving the Double Cure, this chapter graphically pictures the need of it. It is a description of the conflict between the truth and carnality. Step into the next chapter and you will find Paul delivered from that experience and rejoicing in the Double Cure.
Not as though I had already attained, either were already perfect.” (Phil. 3:12.) This does not refer to perfect love, but to another kind of perfection. For proof see verse 15, in which Paul boldly professes the Double Cure by saying, “Let us therefore, as many as be perfect be thus minded.”
“There is no man that sinneth not.” (Kings 8:46.) If it were true that at that time all were living in sin, it would not prove that Jesus would never be able to save from it. Commentators declare that this text should be translated, “There is no man that MAY not sin.”
“If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.” (1 John 1:8.) The true meaning of this text is shown in the verses preceding and following it. These declare cleansing from all sin, so that this text means, “If any one who never has been cleansed says he has no sin to be cleansed from, that man deceives himself, and the truth is not in him.” It has no reference to those who are enjoying the Double Cure, but to unsanctified people who say they have no sin to be cleansed from. This is further proved by verse 6, which declares that “If we say that we have fellowship with him, and walk in darkness [sin], we lie, and do not the truth.” Every text which this doctor quotes against the Double Cure, like those mentioned, is misapplied.
Dr. Death. Some substitute “death” for Jesus. If this were true then death, the child of sin and grandchild of the devil, would be mightier than God. On the other hand, the Bible nowhere teaches that death sanctifies, but always attributes it to an act of God, and obtainable in this life and now. A multitude of sturdy facts as pallbearers carry this notion away to the grave, where it awaits the resurrection of the doomed.
All of the above doctors are used of Satan for the express purpose of hindering Christ’s kingdom by defeating the Double Cure. They have no support for their views from the Word of God, and have never effected a cure. Many ministers and people have been deceived by them and crippled in their lifework, and many doubtless have, by listening to their sophistries, been eternally lost. Their nostrums produce spiritual deafness, blindness, and decrepitude, and keep in an unstable, unsatisfactory, crooked path, up and down, “oh-miserable-man-that-I-am” experience, instead of imparting perfect soul-health and its blessed experiences of purity, joy, strength, and victory.
THE TRUE PHYSICIAN
I am sure I was converted,
And my sins were washed away,
For I had my Savior’s presence,
And the witness day by day.
But my spirit still was tainted
With a stubborn, strange disease,
Which oft made me feel more willing
Self instead of Christ to please.
Advised with many doctors,
Seeking for a perfect cure,
But their notions all were different,
And they failed to make me pure.
Doctor Ignorance informed me
That conversion cured all,
Purifying all the nature
Which was ruined by the fall.
But I knew he was mistaken,
For my Bible taught me so,
And my “up and down” experience
Told me that he did not know.
Doctor Works and Doctor Water,
Doctor Growth and Doctor Fire,
All were free with their opinions,
But to help me failed entire.
Then I heard of Doctor Culture,
Who could polish the outside,
But he could not reach the evil,
And a cure for sin provide.
Nor could Doctor Imputation
Understand my case at all,
Nor could Doctor Sin Repression,
So I ceased on them to call.
Many said that I must suffer
With my painful soul disease,
Until Doctor Death would free me,
Only he could give release.
But I knew they were mistaken,
And I freely told them so,
Else redemption was a failure,
And the Savior’s promise, too.
All these doctors had their plasters,
Which they wanted me to try,
But they never wrought a cure,
So I bade them all good-bye.
Then I yielded all to Jesus,
Unto sin and self I died,
And reposing on His promise,
I by faith was sanctified.
Now I know the Great Physician
Can effect the Double Cure,
And the heart of each believer
Make and keep completely pure.
Christians, wont you seek this blessing,
Waiting for you from above?
It is Pentecostal power,
It is Jesus’ perfect love.