The thing that confused me and wounded me for a long time, the thing that even soured me on the church for a while, was this: I felt like I was being taught that in my justification, total sanctification also occurred. I thought that in my salvation, my struggles would go away, and further, that if they weren’t removed, it somehow revealed I wasn’t actually new in Christ. But this is simply not true. Consider what Paul says in Philippians 3:12: “Not that I have already obtained this or am already perfect, but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own.”
