Symbol of Blood, Part 2

Justification means to be forgiven or according to direct translation to be made righteous. Clearly, only the righteous will dwell with God. Alma 5:58, "For the names of the righteous shall be written in the book of life, and unto them will I grant an inheritance at my right hand." Interesting as well is that the 'just' is a synonym with the 'righteous', further linking the words.

When we are forgiven by God, we are 'justified' and made righteous again. Moroni 6:8 "But as oft as they repented and sought forgiveness, with real intent, they were forgiven."

But sanctification is greater than justification. Sanctification is to be made holy - and that is greater than righteous. There are plenty of scriptures to begin to show the difference. First in D&C 60:7, "For I am able to make you holy, and your sins are forgiven you." Sanctification and justification are TWO seperate steps.

Is being 'righteous' enough to enter God's presence? Look at 1 Nephi 10:21, "Wherefore, if ye have sought to do wickedly in the days of your probation, then ye are found unclean before the judgment-seat of God; and no unclean thing can dwell with God; wherefore, ye must be cast off forever." No unclean thing can dwell with God. Forgiveness is NOT cleanliness since forgiveness absolves us before God, but not of the price of sin. Remember, mercy cannot rob justice. Just because God forgives and forgets from His perspective does not mean we ourselves are clean.

Moroni 10:33 sums it up perfectly, "And again, if ye by the grace of God are perfect in Christ, and deny not his power, then are ye sanctified in Christ by the grace of God, through the shedding of the blood of Christ, which is in the covenant of the Father unto the remission of your sins, that ye become holy, without spot."

Without spot matches perfectly with becoming clean before God. Again in Alma 13, speaking of those that are righteous High Priests, the Lord says, "Therefore they were called after this holy order, and were sanctified, and their garments were washed white through the blood of the Lamb."

I could go on about the difference of Justification and Sanctification, and probably will later on, but I think that is enough for now. But, here is the thing - in every scripture I have noted about Sanctification, the same scripture also mentions the blood of Christ. Sanctification and the symbol of the blood of Christ are intimately connected and that is why I have spent so much time quantifying sanctification. Now onto the link between it and the blood.

One last thought that I will save for another time. My belief is that sin puts a spiritual stain on our spirit. I believe many of these scriptures about being washed are literal. When we feel the spirit, one of the things we are feeling from the warm glow is the actual cleaning of our spirits. Spiritual cleaning is a warming process. Again the symbolism of baptism by fire by receiving the Gift of the Holy Ghost - another proof of the difference between justification and sanctification - two baptisms. Spiritual stain can be seen by the trained eye. Some people seem to be full of light in their countenance. That is the absence of dark spiritual stain. Spiritual stain covers the inate emittance of light from our spirit. I'll come back to it since this will probably all come full circle when I finish the symbol of blood discussion.