Eph. i. 1.

That is Paul's way of describing a church. There were plenty of very
imperfect Christians in the community at Ephesus and in the other
Asiatic churches to which this letter went. As we know, there were
heretics amongst them, and many others to whom the designation of 'holy'
seemed inapplicable. But Paul classes them all under one category, and
describes the whole body of believing people by these two words, which
must always go together if either of them is truly applied, 'saints' and
'faithful.'

Now I think that from this simple designation we may gather two or three
very obvious indeed, and very familiar and old-fashioned, but also very
important, thoughts.

I. A Christian is a saint.

We are accustomed to confine the word to persons who tower above their
brethren in holiness and manifest godliness and devoutness. The New
Testament never does anything like that. Some people fancy that nobody
can be a saint unless he wears a special uniform of certain conventional
sanctities. The New Testament does not take that point of view at all,
but regards all true believers in Jesus Christ as being, therein and
thereby, saints.

Now, what does it mean by that? The word at bottom simply signifies
separation. Whatever is told off from a mass for a specific purpose
would be called, if it were a thing, 'holy.' But there is one special
kind of separation which makes a person a saint, and that is separation
to God, for His uses, in obedience to His commandment, that He may
employ the man as He will. So in the Old Testament the designation
'holy' was applied quite as much to the high priest's mitre or to the
sacrificial vessels of the Temple as it was to the people who used them.
It did not imply originally, and in the first place, moral qualities at
all, but simply that this person or that thing belonged to God. But then
you cannot belong to God unless you are like Him. There can be no
consecration to God except the heart is being purified. So the ordinary
meaning of holiness, as moral purity and cleanness from sin, necessarily
comes from the original meaning, separation and devotion to the service
of God.

Thus we get the whole significance of Christian holiness. We are to
belong to God, and to know that we do belong to Him. We are to be
separated from the mass of people and things that have no consciousness
of ownership and do not yield themselves up to Him for His use. But we
cannot belong to Him, and be devo