Notice that the above passage is addressed to the Christian people of Corinth, not to the unsaved. It is we Christians who are commanded to "come out from them and be separate"; to "touch no unclean thing." God receives us on the basis of our cleansing ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit. Then He regards us as His sons and daughters.

So the great day of cleansing, of judgment, of deliverance has finally come. Whenever a person makes such a statement we should go to the Lord and determine if this is true. In the case of the present writer, the Lord, I believe, spoke to me over fifty years ago that the Day of Atonement, that which follows the Jewish feast of Pentecost, signifies the next move of God after the Pentecostal experience and would be judgment on the churches.

All I have experienced over the ensuing half-century has confirmed that it really was the Lord who spoke to me.

In between Pentecost and the Day of Atonement is the Jewish Blowing of Trumpets. This tells us there will be a time during which God sounds the trumpet of war against the enemy. I believe this is taking place now.

The battle will be joined and the enemy driven from God's saints. This is the exercise of eternal judgment on Satan, and the result will be the reconciliation of God's people to Himself: not just legally, as in the case of justification by faith, but actually, in accord with the concept of the Kingdom, the rule of God.

God is a Person and we are to relate to Him person to Person, not through a religious formula, a legal maneuver that serves to screen from God what we are.

As we have stated, we think the Day of Vengeance against the enemy has either begun or else is at hand. We believe it will continue throughout the thousand-year Kingdom Age and is the purpose for this long period of time that will take place before the new Jerusalem descends from Heaven to be established forever on a high mountain of the new earth.

If this is true, then the emphasis, for the Christians at least, is no longer on imputed righteousness but actual righteousness of behavior.

After we have been released from the chains of Satan it will be easier to behave righteously. Who would not want to be always kind, always truthful, always compassionate, always merciful, always honest, always helpful, always considerate of others, always modest, always loving, always joyous, always self-controlled? This is the moral image of Jesus Christ.

There are many people who demonstrate one or more of these virtues in their adamic personality. However, if enough pressure is put on them the adamic virtue eventually will fail. In order to get at the sin that is in people, God assigns their adamic nature, the good and the bad of it, to the cross with Jesus Christ.

To be continued.