Wholly Sanctified: Living a Life Empowered by the Holy Spirit

by A.B. Simpson

Book Overview

A.B. Smith was the founder of The Christian and Missionary Alliance (C&MA), an evangelical Protestant denomination with an emphasis on global evangelism . A.B. Simpson's definition of sanctification... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0875094554
• ISBN13: 9780875094557
• Release Date: January 1991
• Publisher: Christian Publications
• Length: 132 Pages
• Weight: 0.25 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.3" x 5.6" x 8.5"

Customer Reviews

A Classic and Important Work

AB Simpson was the founder of the The Christian and Missionary Alliance. He intended these to function as loosely allied organizations focusing on Foreign Missions on the one hand and a loosely held organization of independent Churches on the other. Simpson himself was trained a Presbyterian Minister who later in life came in contact with the Holiness Movement (primarily the Keswick Movement although with Wesleyan influence as well) and he began an interesting conglomeration of his Calvinistic roots with the experience of the revival movement of that day. In promoting the 4-Fold Gospel as he understood it, Christ as Savior, Sanctifier, Healer and Coming King, Simpson put a strong emphasis upon the subsequent experience of Sanctification. He, as did many of his day, saw Salvation as a distinct starting place but saw as well a subsequent crisis experience in which the believer came to terms with their need for complete surrender to the Holy Spirit. Other traditions have termed this, "The Baptism of the Holy Spirit." That term today has come to be identified with the Charismatic movement and often to include the experience of tongues and so many movements which used the term and concept with ease and conviction prior to this have moved away from the terminology. Unfortunately, they have moved away from the teaching and promotion of the experience as well. Unfortunately, in today's C & MA, Sanctification as it was understood, experienced, preached and promoted by AB Simpson and the early Alliance is no longer given the emphasis it once was. Part of this may be a recoil to the exodus that took place in the early 20th century from the Alliance into what is now the Assemblies of God. With that exodus, the Alliance, while never overtly becoming anti-charismatic, has eschewed the terminology and experiences of its earlier heritage and has lost this theological distinctive or at least seen it diminish greatly. Simpson himself was something of an enigma. He doesn't always neatly reconcile his Calvinist theology with his revivalist experience. He is content in many ways to move with passion and trust to the fact that what he is living is working and tying into the power of the Holy Spirit without always exegeting why that is the case. It is part of his appeal in some ways, and that passion attracts many to his preaching and leadership in the days of his ministry and from it cam a great Missionary movement. This book is fundamental to understanding Simpson and the source of that power and success. This reviewer loves the denomination that came forth from the Four-Fold Gospel and recognizes the need for there to be a renewal and return as such to the power that drove it. Unfortunately is not being pushed strongly from C & MA pulpits today. This book is a wonderful place to start. It's message is timeless and needed today.