Wednesday, June 1

Holiness is always begun in this world

There is no idea more foolish or pernicious than this — that a person who is not sanctified, not made holy in this life, should afterwards be taken into the blessedness that consists in the enjoyment of God. Such a person cannot enjoy God, nor would God be a reward to them. Holiness is perfected in heaven, but it is always begun in this world.

— John Owen, quoted by Colin S. Smith in
The Plan
(Wheaton, Ill.: Crossway Books, 2011), 28