Regeneration
By John Fast
“But realize this, that in the last days difficult times will come.” – 2 Timothy 3:1
In the previous study I plainly demonstrated the necessity of a true work of God in the heart and of a true conversion and new birth to prepare a person for the sufferings inherent with living in a dangerous season. Exactly what this new birth or regeneration entails, the nature of regeneration, and how it prepares a person for even the hardest and most trying services is what I intend to cover in this study. The new birth, or regeneration, is a subject on which much has already been written. I do not pretend to offer anything new that has not been said many times before and much better by more knowledgeable and godly men. In fact, it would be impossible to add anything new. Yet so many erroneous views continue to be held and taught. It is not a subject to be ignored and neglected because it is “too controversial”. Controversial truths are never popular truths but they are the most necessary truths. It is a subject about which it is positively dangerous to be wrong. To be wrong here is to be wrong for eternity. This truth cannot be stated too plainly or emphasized too much. It is errors in the understanding and/or a corruption and distortion of both the nature and necessity of a new birth that have always led to false gospels and false views of what it is to be a Christian. Perhaps no season in the history of the church has witnessed as many different Christs, different spirits, different forms of godliness, and different gospels than the one in which we currently live. The one thing they all have in common is they all place mankind at the center of all his religious thought and practice. A “Christianity” that has self and mankind as its ultimate end rather than “the praise and glory of His grace, which He freely bestowed on us in the Beloved” (Eph 1:6), cannot be one that is able and willing to suffer for Christ.
By Grace Alone
Every professing Christian would affirm that salvation is by grace alone. This truth is plainly declared in Paul’s familiar word, “For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God” (Eph 2:8). When Paul affirms “and that not of yourselves”, he is describing the true nature of grace, that its entire motivation and explanation reside in the will of God. It is very easy to affirm this truth formally and intellectually, but how ready we are to avoid its implications. It is one thing to profess to believe a truth and another thing entirely to understand and embrace its practical implications (Lk 6:46). A truth can be denied practically as well as actually. A person can be a professing Christian but a practical atheist. They can “profess to know God, but by their deeds deny Him,” (Tit 1:16). We deny this truth in practice when at any point in the process of salvation we introduce any cooperative or decisive role on the part of man. If salvation is contingent upon some contribution, some decision, or some choice which man himself must make, then at that point salvation is of ourselves, and not of grace. Paul’s definition “and that not of yourselves” is thereby negated, the true nature of grace is denied, Christianity is redefined, and another distorted gospel is substituted for the gospel of sovereign grace (Gal 1:6-9).
A different conception of grace is rooted in a conception of God that differs from God’s revelation of Himself found only in the Bible. The God of the Bible is a God who, consistent with His sovereignty and perfections, has sovereignly elected some sinners from before the foundation of the world to salvation through faith in Jesus Christ, and who, consistent with his holiness and justice, will consign the non-elect to eternal torment in a real lake of fire (Rv 20:15). The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ is just such a God. Jesus Himself said so. That this God is incompatible with the dominate conception of God taught and held today is apparent. After all, the God in whom we believe and whom we worship is not the one who goes by certain titles by which He is described, but the God who comports with certain conceptions and presuppositions we entertain of Him. We can use all the names and attributes by which God is revealed in the Bible, but unless we embrace the proper conception of God which these names and attributes designate, then we are not believing in or worshiping the God of the Bible, but one of our own making. We may honor Him with our lips and our hearts remain far from Him. There must be truth in the inward parts. And since the bulk of professing Christendom disavows conceptions of God that are essential to the God of sovereign grace, they do not worship the same God. A God that awaits our permission, or invitation, or that we must allow to do anything before He is able to do it is not the God of the Bible. It is not our prerogative to judge the heart of another. But in this we are not dealing with what is hidden in the heart but with open, objective, and concrete profession and habitual practice which we are in a position to examine and evaluate, and must examine and evaluate, by the light of Scripture. Otherwise all discernment is at an end, all distinction between what is and is not Christian is erased, and the gospel of sovereign grace is wide-open to distortion.
The sovereignty of grace is implicit in its nature. Grace is undeserved and unmerited favor extended to not simply undeserving sinners, but to ill-deserving and hell-deserving sinners. If any obligation is placed on God, arising from some act of ours, whether in thought or word or action, or by imposing on God some fallen human sense of fairness to which He is compelled to abide, then it is no longer grace, and a gospel based on such a view of grace is not the gospel of sovereign grace but a different and distorted gospel that places the freewill of man as the ultimate determiner of who is and is not saved. In such a gospel the grace of God is offered on the assumption that God has done His utmost to make salvation available to all men, but now it is up to man to exercise their own freewill and accept Jesus Christ. The ultimate decisive factor in whether someone is saved or not, now that Christ has made salvation available and freely offered it to all people, is declared to be the free and autonomous decision on the part of the person themselves. They must make the choice before God can make the change. This is the man-centered gospel that has dominated the evangelism and message of Christianity for decades, if not for the last two and a half centuries. True sovereign grace, on the other hand, neither knows nor allows any human contribution or divine obligation whatsoever.
Aggravating Factors
Many things have combined to make the present intrusion and increase of false, man-centered doctrines and practices especially dangerous. There is a widespread biblical ignorance, gullibility, and indifference among professing Christians, and a willingness to accept virtually every claim of extra-biblical revelation. This is an error that will support the error of others. No one who claims to have received a message direct from God can criticize the similar claims of others, regardless of how strange and unbiblical, without calling into question their own claim. No error has been more effective in eroding all confidence in the sufficiency, inerrancy, finality, and authority of Scripture than this notion that God is still giving new revelation today.
The malignant leavens of secular psychology, feminist ideology, liberal theology, worldliness, entertainment, relativism, mysticism, rationalism, pragmatism, and commercialism introduced into the church decades ago have now completely infiltrated and leavened the greatest proportion of professing Christianity. Long forgotten in our present age of commercial Christianity is the description of early Christianity by the second century scholar Tertullian, “There is no buying and selling of any sort in the things of God”.[1] A twisted version of love has replaced truth as the principle Christian virtue. It must be remembered that the same apostle who wrote First Corinthians 13 also wrote, “If anyone does not love the Lord, let Him be accursed” (1 Cor 16:22), and that those who perish in hell do so “because they did not receive the love of the truth so as to be saved” (2 Th 2:10). Those who truly love the Lord also hate evil, “Hate evil, you who love the Lord,” (Ps 97:10). Love for God as He truly is and has revealed Himself in His word is paramount. True love is to be without hypocrisy, abhorring what is evil and clinging to what is good (Rm 12:9). Indiscriminant and undiscerning love is no love at all, and respect for all religious opinions is nothing less than infidelity.
There is a great deal of half-truth and almost truth taught by modern false teachers who continually use Christian terminology but give it new meanings, and who use biblical words and phrases in an unbiblical way, which only makes them more dangerous and destructive to true Christianity. There is a tendency for people to follow men, especially if they rise to a celebrity status, and to be swept up in the latest theological fad. There is a fanatical craving among professing Christians for a more exciting, fun, showy, sensuous, sensational, and novel worship. There is a pervasive tendency to judge the truth of something based on feelings and emotions rather than the Bible. There is a morbid desire to appear charitable and open-minded, and to avoid hurting someone’s feelings to where people are ashamed to say that anyone can be wrong, and whereby sin is given more respectable and less offensive names. There is a dismal vagueness and uncertainty concerning what is and is not Christian. There is a great emphasis placed on theological degrees and the appearance of success, to where many think that such popular, cleaver, successful, and intellectual people must certainly be safe guides. These teachers may occasionally espouse some strange, unbiblical, unsound, and even heretical views, but “they are such a gifted teacher and speaker, and they teach a great deal of truth”. Such a teacher is precisely the person guaranteed to do the most harm. Poison is always the most dangerous when administered in small doses and mixed with healthy food. Those who consume it never suspect, nor will they ever believe that they are being poisoned.
Let us beware of the humanistic and secular framework upon which most modern education and thinking is built unless its patterns and presuppositions become our own. Then, before we know it, our minds are led and carried astray by the undertow of modern thought and attitude that considers the sufficiency, inerrancy, authority, and finality of Scripture to be not only unimportant and foreign, but even hostile to our way of thinking and living. A Christianity that has anything less than a total dependence upon all of Scripture is not the Christianity of the Bible. The extent to which it fails to make the Bible and only the Bible the only rule of faith and life, it must also substitute the wisdom of man for the wisdom of God, and human invention for divine establishment, which is nothing less than apostasy from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ. It is the secularized mind and the mind conditioned by technology from which this challenge to the Bible comes, and that has compelled many of Christianity’s leading proponents to reconstitute the gospel so as to be relevant to the modern rather than the regenerate mind. This is the crowning sin of our times. Taking as their starting point the modern mentality, they have revised the gospel in an attempt to make it acceptable in the face of wholesale indifference and hostility to the truths of the Bible and the demands of the gospel.
As we read and listen to the theological output and observe much of the religious practices of the present day, output and practices that receive most of the attention, we cannot help but notice that one of their most striking features is the almost total absence of any attempt to be regulated and governed exclusively by Scripture itself, at least not Scripture in its historical and grammatical context. This is because the regulative principle of the Reformation has, for all intents and purposes, been abandoned, and with it the authority, inerrancy, and sufficiency of Scripture. The seeds for all of this were sown long before anyone reading this was born, when liberal theology began to question, then doubt, and then deny the authenticity and reliability of Scripture. Budding doubts and denials may take decades to come to full flower and bear their bitterest fruit. We are now experiencing some of the bitterest fruit ever, and we see it not only in the realm of doctrine and faith, but in the mindboggling acceleration of moral and spiritual disintegration, and the staggering multiplication of false gospels. It is not my intention, nor would it be possible or profitable to list and describe all these counterfeits. However, I believe it is my responsibility to take a moment and briefly comment on and warn against one of the most virulent and pernicious false gospels afoot today, and which is being adopted, promoted, propagated, and defended by many prominent people, organizations, churches, and institutions, thereby leading the minds of many astray, and that is the so-called “social” or “social justice” gospel.
A Different Gospel
Much has been and is being written and spoken about the need for relevance, and the assertion is the gospel message must be adjusted and presented in a way that corresponds to the supposedly scientific and technological world-view of modern man. The modern mind, we are told, is impervious, by reason of its superior scientific, technological, and socially conscious conditioning, to the whole notion of the totally depraved condition of mankind, the absolute sovereignty of God, and the inerrancy, sufficiency, authority, and finality of Scripture. Any adjustment of the gospel that ignores or discards these fundamental tenets of Scripture is, however, an abdication of Christianity, and the proponents of it ought to have the honesty to admit that the relevance for which they contend is not a socially conscious version of the Christian faith, but its contradiction and abandonment for a different gospel.
An increased priority and emphasis in a “social gospel”, no matter how many emotional, pseudo-theological, and plausible arguments cloak and spiritualized it, is unmistakable evidence of a decayed and declining devotion to the true gospel and true Christianity. Of this there can be no doubt. Such a gospel is the product of a mind that has been led astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ and that has exchanged the gospel of Jesus Christ for another gospel of the mind of man. No human being ever reaches a point where they are immune from the schemes and deceits of the devil. No mind is insusceptible to being led astray. Such a gospel receives very little if any hostility and opposition from the world and the flesh, and more often than not will evoke their sympathy, praise, and support. It is a gospel to which the world will listen because it speaks as from the world (1 Jn 4:5). The true gospel, however, has always been hated by and a cause of offence to the natural heart and mind. A “social gospel” seeks to change society and better an individual’s or certain group’s temporal conditions. The true gospel aims to change a person’s nature, which cannot help but alter their priorities and environment. The first focuses on affecting an external transformation, but leaves the person unchanged and still enslaved to their sin. The other produces such a radical transformation of a person’s nature that they now seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness which cannot help but bring about a radical change and improvement in the way they live.
When the Holy Spirit through the true gospel transforms a person’s nature, they will change their own environment. Apart from men and women being made new creatures in Christ any external moral and social change for the better will be superficial, arbitrary, forced, and temporary. A changed nature on the other hand includes a new and changed character with new habits, thinking, priorities, goals, and values which are permanent, abiding, and growing. The ultimate end of a “social gospel” is the old things and ways soon return and bring seven other spirits worse than the first, while nothing is made new. The ultimate end of the true gospel and true Christianity is old things are passed away and all things are made new.
The gospel was never given to be the means of changing societies into humanistic utopias, but to change and transform individual sinners into children of God and citizens of heaven. The gospel was not given to produce heaven on earth, but to prepare those chosen of God for heaven. Christ did not establish His church to be a force for social and societal change, but to be a people for His own possession, called out and separate from the world, and to be “like the Holy One who called you, be holy yourselves also in all your behavior” (1 Pt 1:15), and to “proclaim the excellencies of Him who has called you out of darkness into His marvelous light;” (1 Pt 2:9). One is a man-centered, and therefore a false gospel and Christianity, whereas the other is a Christ-centered, and therefore a true gospel and Christianity. One seeks principally the improvement and betterment of mankind in this world, while the other seeks the glory of Christ in this life and the next. One presents sinners as broken, poor, pitiable, and hurting in God’s sight, while the other teaches the total and universal corruption of man’s will, intellect, affections and conscience, living in a willful, deliberate, and perpetual state of rebellion to God and His word, and who are under His just wrath and judgment. One offers Christ and the gospel as a remedy for their social ills, while the other offers Christ and His gospel as the only safe shelter from the wrath to come. One sets the mind and heart on the things of this earth, while the other sets the mind and heart on the things above where Christ is. One is a faith that rests on the wisdom of men, while the other is a faith that is of the sovereign power of God (1 Cor 2:5).
In a false gospel man is ultimate, in the true gospel Jesus Christ and His glory is ultimate. A false gospel sets the mind on the interests of man, whereas the true gospel sets the mind on the interests of God (Mt 16:23). Where enough people are thus transformed, this cannot help but influence and transform the society in which they live for the better. In other words, this improvement is the natural and spontaneous effect of a new nature. But where the true gospel and true Christianity have been rejected, replaced, revised, corrupted, prostituted, and abandoned for a different Jesus, a different gospel, and a different Christianity, this cannot help but result in social, moral, and societal decay and degeneration that nothing but a recovery of the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ will ever arrest and reverse. A “social gospel”, like any other false gospel, only makes a society worse in the long run, not better. It is still impossible to serve two masters. No one can serve a “social gospel” and the true gospel. One or the other will be loved and served and the other will be despised and hated. There is no way to harmonize them without distorting the true gospel. Given the hostility of the natural heart and mind to the true gospel it does not take much foresight to know which one will be corrupted and which will be the most popular, profitable, and appealing to the proud, carnal mind set on the flesh and the things of this earth. Only a true work of God in the heart, a true new birth and regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit, can transform the heart and mind of fallen mankind that is by nature hostile to God, His true Son, and His pure gospel.
You Must Be Born Again
Every word of Jesus Christ recorded in the Bible is to be received and taken with the utmost seriousness and reverence. Every word He uttered is infallible truth. All that contradicts, corrupts, adds, or subtracts from it is deadly error. All that Jesus said is to be received, believed, trusted, and acted upon by faith. It is the foolish builder who hears and reads the words of Jesus yet does not act on them (Mt 7:26). They are the words of Him who declared, “For I did not speak on My own initiative, but the Father Himself who sent Me has given Me commandment, what to say and what to speak” (Jn 12:49). Of all the words spoken by Jesus none are more solemn and emphatic than those He spoke to Nicodemus, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God” (Jn 3:3). No other statement uttered by Jesus has more bearing on where we will spend eternity; either in the presence of God, or paying “the penalty of eternal destruction, away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of His power” (2 Th 1:9). Jesus’ words to Nicodemus are familiar words, but more often than not their clear and obvious meaning is ignored or distorted. I wish to point out to anyone who reads this that Jesus did not speak these words to some idol-worshiping pagan who was living a life of gross immorality and in rebellion to the Law of God, but to one of the most upstanding, moral, and devote members of the Jewish religious elite. He did not speak them to some biblically illiterate person who was totally ignorant of the fundamental doctrines of the Bible, but to “the teacher of Israel” (Jn 3:10) whose native tongue was the language in which the Bible was written. He did not speak them to an average, working class, cultural, nominal, synagogue-going Jew, but to a highly educated scholar who had devoted His entire life to the study of the Scriptures, and who would put any modern-day Old Testament scholar to shame. Yet for all his advantages, sincerity, and knowledge this man Nicodemus was completely in the dark when it came to what was required to enter into and see the kingdom of God.
The world and the church have gone through many changes since Jesus first spoke those words two-thousand years ago. Nations, kingdoms, and empires have risen and fallen. Once strong churches have ceased to exist. Nations in which the Bible was once reverenced and God’s commands were unquestioned are now mired in immorality and lawlessness. Great theologians and preachers have lived, labored, written, and died. Countless missionaries have gone out into the world to proclaim this truth spoken by Jesus. Many new denominations and religious movements have sprung up and fizzled. Some have remained and splintered into various offshoots with their own particular views, practices, traditions, and beliefs. Innumerable cults, all of which claim the Bible as their authority, have come and gone. A myriad of false Christs, false gospels, and false doctrines have been advanced, refuted, yet they remain only to resurface from time to time in a different form and under different names. Incalculable attempts have been made to redefine Jesus’ words, redefine Christianity, and what it is to be a Christian. But here stands the rule established by Jesus Christ. Despite all the attempts to deny it, redefine it, soften it, expand it, distort it, and ignore it, yet it remains unchanged. It is as true now as when Jesus first spoke it, “unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God” (Jn 3:3). And the sad truth of the matter is, that despite two-thousand years of church history, and thousands and thousands of sermons and books on the topic, most today are just as much in the dark about the new birth as was Nicodemus. Like the church in Sardis, untold millions have been deceived into thinking they possess spiritual life when in reality they are spiritually dead (Rv 3:1). Like the church in Laodicea, their true spiritual condition is the polar opposite of what they believe it to be (Rv 3:17). They possess none of the fruit of a new birth, nor do they know or care to know what that fruit is. Spirituality, formality, emotionalism, morality, tradition, religious and political activity, a mere profession, intellectualism, and humanitarianism have been confused with spiritual life.
Jesus did not say you must be baptized to enter the kingdom of God. He did not say you must believe this or that teaching, you must go to this or that church, belong to this or that denomination, go through some religious exercise, subscribe to this or that philosophy, recite some sort of prayer, respond to an invitation, profess to affirm certain beliefs, live a certain kind of lifestyle, or any other such thing that the mind of man can invent. The indispensable requirement which Jesus emphatically insisted upon for seeing and entering into the kingdom of God was, “you must be born again”. The words Jesus chose to use make this requirement all the more emphatic. He prefaces His statement with “Truly, truly”; literally “Amen, amen”, thus emphasizing that there is no exception to this rule. He further states that without this new birth you “cannot”, ou dunatai, that is, you possess no power, and you have no ability in and of yourself to enter the kingdom of God by any other way or means whatsoever. Then to top it all off Jesus declared, “You must be born again” (Jn 3:7); the word “must” (dei) signifying a divine requirement and necessity to have this new birth before anyone can see or enter into the kingdom of God. Everyone who is not born again remains under the power of the evil one (1 Jn 5:19). Their mind remains darkened in its understanding of spiritual truths, the things of the Spirit are foolishness to them, and they continue to be blinded by the god of this world (Eph 4:18; 1 Cor 2:14; 2 Cor 4:4).
Here is a fundamental and immutable truth of the Bible. The dislike and animosity for the truths, commands, principles, requirements, stipulations, and accounts of Scripture have as their source a hatred for God Himself. When this hostility to God’s commands and requirements is clothed in religious terminology and wed to professing Christendom then it is man and no longer God who reigns supreme. It is man who determines the means, methods, and criteria by which a person may enter the kingdom of God, and man becomes the center and ultimate end for all of his religious thought and practice.
Nicodemus conveyed his utter astonishment to Jesus’ emphatic statement by asking, “How…?” (Jn 3:4). Jesus intentionally expressed this requirement in language meant to emphasize its impossibility from a human level. To be born again is a physical and natural impossibility. It is something that no human being has the ability to do. Just as no one can do anything to affect their own natural physical birth, so they can do nothing to affect their new spiritual birth. They have no more input into the conception of their new spiritual life than they had into the conception of their physical life. No amount of education, religious training, natural talents, morality, or good works can affect this new birth otherwise Nicodemus would not have had to ask “how”. In reply to his question, Jesus did not tell Nicodemus to believe, (as do the bulk of church doctrinal statements today), so that by virtue of his believing he might be born again. Faith is a fruit of the new birth, not its cause. The tree must come before the fruit. Jesus did not tell Nicodemus to be baptized or perform some other religious ritual to affect his own new birth. Jesus made it very clear that the new birth or regeneration is a sovereign work of God in which sinful man is completely passive and totally dependent on the will and power of the Holy Spirit (Jn 3:8). We may not like this truth. The great majority of professing Christians certainly do not like it. We may shrink from it and resist it with all our might. It may not fit in with the traditional phrases that have become the staple of our formulaic, invitational, and decision-driven evangelism. It may conflict with our superficial understanding of John 3:16. But if we resist and reject this truth, then I need to remind you that this resistance and rejection is against Jesus Christ and the sovereignty of God. And what answer will we give when we stand before Him whose truth we have rejected and whose gospel we have corrupted?
An Unpopular Truth
If there is one truth which Scripture reveals about God against which the fallen, darkened, and unregenerate mind of man is especially hostile toward it is God’s absolute sovereignty, “But our God is in the heavens; He does whatever He pleases” (Ps 115:3); “So then He has mercy on whom He desires, and He hardens whom He desires” (Rm 9:18). If God truly causes all things to exist, if He actively controls, rules over, and governs everything without exception, down to the smallest detail and atom in the universe, then the natural mind perceives this as a tremendous threat to their own freedom and is by nature hostile to it and rises up in opposition against it. This hostility to God’s absolute sovereignty is reflected in the various objections raised against it and in the way it is typically misrepresented and caricatured. It is very easy to arouse prejudice against a doctrine by attaching to it contemptuous and misrepresentative epithets, especially a doctrine that the natural man already instinctively abhors.
If the doctrine of God’s sovereignty can also be associated with a person’s name, especially a person who lived hundreds of years ago, and of whom most today are totally ignorant, as if the doctrine was invented by him, then their rejection is made that much easier. The clarity and precision of the Reformers, the Puritans, and their writings concerning this doctrine is a primary reason they have been the target of so much scorn, ridicule, misrepresentation, and neglect. All the texts of Scripture that reveal this truth are more easily ignored or explained away if the doctrine can be attributed to some aberrant, archaic, and mistaken theological system invented by a few misguided men. It then becomes easy to vilify, disparage, and dismiss those who teach and preach this doctrine as was George Whitefield by the Wesley’s, and Charles Spurgeon by many of his contemporaries, one of whom wrote, “If any such terrible being as Mr. Spurgeon’s God existed, I would not worship him.” [2] Sadly, he and those who hold the same opinion do not worship Him. Rather they worship a god of their own invention
The Bible, however, clearly teaches that God is absolutely sovereign, and that regeneration, or the new birth, is a sovereign work of God in which man plays no role whatsoever. It is God “who according to His great mercy has caused us to be born again” (1 Pt 1:3). It is “by His doing you are in Christ Jesus” (1 Cor 1:30). Whom God chooses to regenerate in time was determined in eternity past, “He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world” (Eph 1:4). The regeneration of individuals is not on account of something they did in time, but “according to the kind intention of His will” (Eph 1:5). It is not based on any foreseen decision that individuals would make, thereby making regeneration a reward for believing and the result of something done by the freewill of man, making a person their own savior; rather it is, “because God chose you from the beginning for salvation” (2 Thes 2:13), and “not according to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace which was granted us in Christ Jesus from all eternity” (2 Tm 1:9). People who are regenerate, who have experienced a new birth, are regenerate because God graciously chose to regenerate them. All who believe in Christ were graciously elected unto salvation, “and as many as had been appointed to eternal life believed” (Ac 13:48); “and the Lord opened her heart to respond to the things spoken by Paul” (Ac 16:14). This is the clear teaching of Jesus, the apostles, and the entire Bible. It is a teaching which the heart, mind, reasoning, and philosophies of man have continually attempted to explain away, resist, corrupt, and deny more than any other doctrine found in Scripture.
Very few ever stop to consider if there is another explanation for this changed view of God and the Bible. For the great majority the simple explanation that the Bible must change with the times or that advances in human knowledge and shifts in cultural norms have made older beliefs and practices untenable is enough. The assertion that remaining relevant in a modern world and convincing the modern mind requires such a change is never questioned. The argument that the doctrine of God’s sovereignty is unfair, irrational, and incompatible with human responsibility appears plausible enough. But there is another explanation given by Jesus Christ and the Bible, and that is mankind by nature is hostile to the things of God, “the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God; for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so” (Rm 8:7; cf. 1 Cor 2:14; Col 1:21). Mankind’s fall into sin resulted in a fundamental change in his nature. He lost the ability but not his responsibility to love and obey God, thereby making him by nature a child of wrath. He now lives in a world and in a realm that loves darkness rather than light, prefers error and falsehood to the truth, calls evil good and good evil, and hates anything that would challenge his autonomy and prevent him from living any way that he chooses. Fallen man is a slave to sin (Rm 6:17; Tit 3:3). He is not able to choose good and reject evil (Mt 12:34). He is what older theologians used to call non posse non peccare, – he is not able not to sin. The only freedom he has is the freedom to sin, and it is only in the realm of sin that he can act as a free agent. He is by nature depraved, and it is in his depravity that he acts as a free agent. His depravity expresses itself in his thinking, reasoning, decisions, and actions for which he is fully responsible because he does them willingly and freely.
Rather than yield to God’s absolute sovereignty, however, the freewill of man is made the great sovereign ruler which not even God dare infringe upon. It is asserted that mankind, though dead in trespasses and sin (Eph 2:1), not only has the will and ability to come to God whenever he deigns himself good and ready, but can also successfully resist God’s sovereign and almighty grace. Ignored, however, is the obvious fact that this resistance is itself an action; an action against an almighty regenerating and renewing power, which is quite a feat of strength for a dead man. It ignores Jesus’ clear declaration that, “All that the Father gives Me shall come to Me,” (Jn 6:37). It means that Jesus’ will and desire is to be thwarted and go unrealized, “Father, I desire that they also, whom You have given Me, be with Me where I am, in order that they may behold My glory, which You have given Me;” (Jn 17:24). The notion that Christ’s will could be thwarted is not only repugnant, but thoroughly unchristian.
All the continued misrepresentations, caricatures, and opposition to this truth simply proves what the Bible has always declared, and history has repeatedly borne out; that fallen man is by nature hostile toward God and a child of wrath. The corruption of human nature by sin as a result of the fall is no partial or superficial thing. It is not a disease of the skin, but of the entire person and nature. Wrong views of the radical nature of the disease and its extent will always produce diminished and faulty views of the radical nature of the remedy. It is only when the sense of the severity of sin as guilt, evil, rebellion, offense, defilement, bondage, and despair takes hold of our minds that we grasp the significance of Jesus’ words, “you must be born again”. In a dangerous season when truth is assailed and sound doctrine is not endured, then those who love the truth should grasp it more firmly and proclaim it more loudly than ever. Despite all attempts to avoid, deny, soften, distort, and redefine it, nothing will ever alter the rule laid down by Jesus, “unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God” (Jn 3:3).
What It Means to Be Born Again
Regeneration is that radical, real, and total change and transformation of the whole person, their heart, mind, will, and, affections, by the Holy Spirit, working through the word of God read and/or preached (1 Cor 1:21), which every person who is a true Christian experiences, and by which they are prepared for every good work. “For you have been born again not of seed which is perishable but imperishable, that is through the living and abiding word of God….And this is the word that was preached to you” (1 Pt 1:23, 25). This change always begins with a sovereign, effectual, and irresistible call of God through which God the Father brings the sinner into fellowship with His Son. A call requires a response. It is God who calls, but it is the sinner who must respond. This response must involve the heart, mind, and will of the one called. But herein lies the problem. The proclamation of the gospel has sometimes been compared to a prison, in which everyone is imprisoned in sin, but Jesus has unlocked everyone’s cell door and all they need to do is get up, open the door, and walk out. Or the gospel has been equated with a gift which we must take from the hand of God. But can a dead man open a cell door? Can a dead man take or accept a gift? How can a person who is dead in trespasses and sins, who is hostile in mind toward God, and who has no ability or desire to do the things that are pleasing to Him answer a call to fellowship with Jesus Christ? It is a physical, spiritual, and moral impossibility. Jesus Himself affirmed this impossibility when He said, “No one can come to Me, unless the Father who sent Me draws him;”; “no one can come to Me unless it has been granted him from the Father” (Jn 6:44, 65). The great Princeton theologian Benjamin B. Warfield understood the real problem when he wrote,
“It is useless to talk of salvation being for “whosoever will” in a world of universal “won’t.” Here is the real point of difficulty: how, where, can we obtain the will? Let others rejoice in a “whosoever will gospel”: for the sinner who knows himself to be a sinner, and knows what it is to be a sinner, only a “God will” gospel will suffice. If the gospel is to be committed to the dead wills of sinful men, and there is nothing above and beyond, who then can be saved?….I am told to repent if I would be forgiven; but how can I repent? I only do what is wrong because I like it, and I can’t stop liking it or like something else better because I am told to do so, nor even because it is proved that it would be better for me. If I am to be changed, something must lay hold of me and change me.”[3]
This is the glory of the gospel of God’s sovereign grace (Tit 3:5). God’s call is irresistible and effectual because it includes the grace which enables the person called to answer the call and embrace Jesus Christ as offered in the gospel. If the gospel of Jesus Christ were not one of sovereign, irresistible, and effectual regeneration, and if we were not completely passive in regeneration, being the mere objects of a supernatural work which God alone performs, then there would be no gospel to offer. Good news without a radical transformation would only confirm the world’s sin and misery. Unless God, by His sovereign power and grace, turns our hatred into love, and our unbelief into faith, we could never answer the call of the gospel in sincere faith and love. Faith in Jesus Christ is the effect of regeneration, not its cause. Regeneration is the beginning of all other graces which God works in us. They are all the fruit of regeneration. We are not born again by repenting and believing, or by conversion, but we repent and believe because we have been born again.
This change and transformation is so radical, thorough, and pervasive that no better word could be more fitting to describe it as ‘regeneration’ or a ‘new birth’. There is a radical and complete alteration and transformation of the inner man so that they become a different person than they were before. Their physical body is not changed; no new faculties are added to their mind and body, but they definitely have a whole new focus and outlook to their old ones. Their thinking about sin, the world, the Bible, and Jesus Christ are new. Their tastes, priorities, values, opinions, desires, and will are so new that they are by all accounts a new person. Friends, family, and even other professing Christians who knew them before their regeneration will wonder and ask, “What happened to him/her? They are not the same person we once knew. They no longer hold the same views, values, and opinions as us. They have even gone so far as to say that what we believe is wrong. Who do they think they are? They are taking this Bible-stuff way to seriously”. For some the new birth is as drastic and dramatic a change as going from pitch darkness to full sunlight, while for others it is like the gradual dawn of a new day where there is no precise and observable moment that separates night from day, yet the difference between night and day is obvious (1 Jn 3:10). The experience may differ from person to person, but the effects and fruit are always the same because it is the same Holy Spirit who regenerates, and it is the same God in whose likeness the new self “has been created in righteousness and holiness of the truth” (Eph 4:24; cf. Col 3:10).
Sadly, the popular conception of conversion far too commonly entertained and propagated by the great proportion of professing Christendom is so shallow, superficial, cheap, worldly, and beggarly that it utterly fails to take into consideration the momentous change of which conversion is the fruit. The entire notion of what is involved in regeneration becomes so weakened and watered down that it bears virtually no resemblance to that which is taught by the gospel, and so the Christianity which it represents bears no relation to that taught by the Bible. A cheap, tawdry, numbers-driven, man-centered, and decisionistic evangelism has robbed the gospel which it proclaims of its radical transforming power which is the glory of the gospel of sovereign grace. It is a radical, astonishing, and permanent change because it is a sovereign re-creative act of God Almighty. “If any man is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come” (2 Cor 5:17). There are two Greek words that are translated “new”. One means “new” in the sense of repaired, renovated, or “new and improved”. The other means “new” in the sense of brand new; a new existence that did not exist before. It is this second meaning that is used to describe the person who is in Christ. They are not the old man cleaned up, repaired, and reformed. They are not the broken man fixed, but the dead man raised to newness of life. They are a totally new and different person than they were before regeneration. They have a new principle of spiritual life, with new values, new thinking, new views of sin, of the world, of Jesus Christ, new motivations, priorities, desires, and a new love for the word of God.
Common Mistakes
The fact that regeneration produces a drastic change in a person is beyond question, notwithstanding the counterclaims of a “carnal” Christian theology, or those who want to limit regeneration to the forgiveness of sin. Regeneration not only cleanses from sin, but it also creates a new creature that “has been created in righteousness and holiness of the truth” (Eph 4:24). This new creature is of a divine and holy character of which the Holy Spirit is the author. This change is profoundly evident both from Scripture and experience. It is so great a change that it is called “having been freed from sin, you became slaves of righteousness” (Rm 6:18). It is called turning from darkness to light (Ac 26:18), and being “delivered from the domain of darkness, and transferred…to the kingdom of His beloved Son” (Col 1:13).
This change, however, must not be confused with other changes that often come upon people who come under the teaching of the gospel; changes that are at best superficial and temporary. It must not be mistaken for a mere change in the judgment from error to truth, or from atheism to deism, or from false religion to “Christianity”. This was the change which the magician Simon had (Ac 8:13), but he was still “in the gall of bitterness and in the bondage of iniquity” (Ac 8:23). This change must not be confused with a person’s outward behavior going from irreligious to religious, or with a “re-dedication”. This is common enough among people who grow up in a highly religious atmosphere where you cannot throw a rock without hitting a church, and where the fear of man thwarts and suppresses their lusts. This is no more than the Gentiles had (Rm 2:14). It must not be confused with a change from immorality to mere spirituality. This is the case with false conversions. They are changed and influenced for a time by the common workings of the Holy Spirit convicting their consciences, illuminating their minds, and stirring their emotions, but then eventually they fall away (Heb 6:4-6; 2 Pt 2:20-22). This change must not be confused with an ecstatic and emotional experience. There are plenty who receive the word with joy who later fall away, compromise, and assimilate with the culture and distort the truth when “because of the word”, and for the sake of righteousness they are called to suffer for the truth (Mt 13:21; Mk 4:17). It must not be confused with following and taking pleasure in listening to some popular preacher. The Jews in Ezekiel’s day had this (Ezk 33:30-32). It must not be confused with being zealous for some particular viewpoint or thing in religion. Jehu had this (2 Kgs 10:28, 31). It must not be confused with outward morality and religious activity and zeal. The Pharisees and rich young ruler had this (Mt 23:28). It must not be confused with associating and keeping company with sincere and godly people. Demas, Hymenaeus, Alexander, Philetus, and Diotrephes had this, yet none of them were regenerate (1 Tm 1:20; cf. 1 Jn 2:19). This change we speak of does not alter a person’s basic personality. If they were outgoing and gregarious, or shy and timid before regeneration they will remain so, but these old traits will be infused with new habits, values, tastes, and priorities that depose sin from its dominion over them and bring them under the rule and government of the law of God and Jesus Christ so that they no longer live for themselves, but for Christ and His glory. This is the change which is always the fruit of regeneration.
A Real Change
This change is a real, permanent, and growing change, not a groundless, temporary, and static delusion. It really exists. It really and noticeably manifests itself in a person’s life. The blind, unbelieving world and shallow, superficial, and carnal forms of “Christianity” would have us to think, and try to persuade us, that no such radical change takes place, or that such a change is a rare exception to the rule or a higher phase of the Christian life achieved only by a few privileged super-saints. It would have us believe that someone can be a Christian without such a radical change. Because they have never experienced the effects of a genuine new birth they deny that such a radical change exists, and that a true work of God’s grace does not make that great a difference between those who are regenerate and those who are not. Therefore, whoever professes and exhibits such a change is branded a fanatic, a legalist, narrow-minded, judgmental, and intolerant of the beliefs of others, and even a threat and danger to themselves and others.
Permit me to offer four evidences for your consideration that this change wrought by regeneration is a real, radical, and stupendous change. First, the Holy Spirit has selected words, similes, and ideas to represent this work of sovereign grace so as to leave no excuse for missing the significance of their meaning. This change is called “a new creation” (Gal 6:15); “a new creature” (2 Cor 5:17); “the new self” (Eph 4:24); being “born again” (1 Pt 1:23). Their unregenerate life was their “former manner of life” (Eph 4:22), and their old lusts were their “former lusts” (1 Pt 1:14); all of which speak of this change as a reality and not just a theoretical, imaginary, or distorted thing.
Second, it is manifested to be real by the extraordinary effects it has upon a person in changing them not only in their outward behavior, but in their thinking, reasoning, values, priorities, judgment, affections, and desires quite contrary to what they were before. This is evidenced in the drastic and dramatic change in the Apostle Paul (Gal 1:23; 1 Tm 1:13, 14). It appears by the radical change in the Thessalonians who “turned to God from idols to serve a living and true God” (1 Th 1:9), and it is abundantly attested to by the experience of countless saints who can testify to the reality of this momentous change. It is nothing short of blasphemy to assert that God’s work of regenerating grace is so impotent that it cannot and does not produce a real and radical change of the whole person in whom it has been wrought, or to ascribe such a marvelous change to a person’s own freewill, however much assisted by grace. What glory does God receive, and what proof is there that someone is a disciple of Jesus Christ in a life that bears no marks and no fruit of regeneration? “By this is My Father glorified, that you bear much fruit, and so prove to be My disciples” (Jn 15:8).
Third, faith itself is said to be a gift of God’s grace (Eph 2:8). Faith is not something that is innate. No one is born with faith. There is nothing meritorious in faith itself. Regeneration is not a reward for faith. We are not saved by faith, but through faith in Jesus Christ as He is offered in the gospel; the very gospel which is foolishness to the natural man and toward which he is hostile in mind. Faith is the product of an almighty power that produces faith in the person who has been regenerated. The same divine power that raised Christ from the dead is what makes every believer alive spiritually (Rm 8:9-11). The exercising of the faith that is a gift of God and by which we are justified is itself a spiritual act which first requires spiritual life. Spiritual life must first exist before the act of faith. Without life there can be no act, but where spiritual life is created it will always produce the fruit that is in keeping with its nature. Justifying faith is the first movement of new spiritual life.
Fourth, the reality of this drastic change is displayed in the consistency of its effects in all those in whom it has been created. They are “those who have received a faith of the same kind as ours” (2 Pt 1:1). They are all “being transformed into the same image from glory to glory” (2 Cor 3:18). Three thousand people with different backgrounds and languages were all affected in the same way by the same Spirit working through the same sermon (Ac 2:37). If this change were a mere emotional whim could the same whim possess all three thousand alike? They were all devoting themselves to the apostles teaching (Ac 2:42); that is, they all had a new love and devotion for the word of God. Like newborn babes they all longed for the pure milk of the word, that by it they all may grow in respect to salvation (1 Pt 2:2). This was the effect on all who had truly tasted the kindness of the Lord (1 Pt 2:3). All this demonstrates that the new birth is a real and radical change and not just a passing phase or emotional high that leaves a person substantially unchanged from what they were before regeneration and virtually indistinguishable from the people and culture in which they live.
A Total Change
This change that is wrought by God is not only a real change but it is also a total change of the entire person. They are changed in soul, mind, heart, and practice. They are in all respects a new creature; “the old things passed away; behold, new things have come. They “have put on the new self who is being renewed to a true knowledge according to the image of the One who created him” (Col 3:10). As a result of this change their thinking, reasoning, and understanding are inexplicably altered. They no longer conform themselves to this world, but are continually being transformed in their mind (Rm 12:2). They have an increasing sense of being a stranger and alien in this world. They no longer fit in as they once did. They find themselves living among a people to whom they no longer belong. Before regeneration their thoughts of Christ and things eternal were slight, uncertain, and superficial. The things that are seen and that concern their life in this world were uppermost in their minds and affections. They admired riches, titles, pleasures, and honors while Christ and spiritual riches were despised. After regeneration all these earthly things become regarded with less and less significance and their loss is counted as nothing compared to the surpassing value of knowing Jesus Christ (Phil 3:8). Jesus is now esteemed as “the power of God and the wisdom of God” (1 Cor 1:24). Strictness and duty in the commands and principles of the Bible was seen as an unnecessary and needless thing, and they put much stock in the wisdom, praise, and opinion of man, but now God’s “testimonies are my delight; they are my counselors” (Ps 119:24), and “I have inclined my heart to perform Your statutes forever, even to the end” (Ps 119:112).
This change does not stop here, but it goes further and subdues the will and delivers it up to Christ. Their will rebelled against God and His word, and there was no fear of God before their eyes (Rm 3:18). They did not subject their will to the law of God, nor were they even able to do so (Rm 8:7). The reason given by Jesus for why people reject His words and teaching is because they are unwilling to do the will of God (Jn 7:17).The reason given by Jesus for the Jewish leaders refusal to come to Him was because “you are unwilling to come to Me, that you might have life” (Jn 5:40). Before regeneration their will was enslaved to their various lusts and pleasures (Tit 3:3), but now they are “slaves of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart” (Eph 6:6). They now “live the rest of the time in the flesh no longer for the lusts of men, but for the will of God” (1 Pt 4:2). They are convinced that it is the one who does the will of God who abides forever (1 Jn 2:17). Henceforth, the will sides with God and His word and subscribes and submits to His will as the only rule and law for faith and life. Even when the doing of the good is lacking, the wishing for it is present in them (Rm 7:18), and they joyfully concur with the law of God in the inner man (Rm 7:22).
The will being subdued to the will of God and enslaved to Christ, the object of their love also changes. At the Fall mankind transferred their love from God to their idols, the principle idols being self and the world. The god they love is the god of their own imagination, which just so happens to bear a striking resemblance to themselves, “You thought I was just like you” (Ps 50:21), which is precisely why they love their god and their Jesus, because they invented him. But to compare their god and their Jesus to the God who has revealed Himself only in His written word, and to examine their conceptions of God and Jesus Christ by the light of divine revelation, this is something for which they exhibit the utmost reluctance and hostility. Nothing will incite the irrational wrath of unregenerate people more than a perceived threat to their idols, and nothing poses a greater threat than the truth as it is in Christ Jesus. This is why darkness will not come to the light, lest it be exposed for what it really is (Jn 3:20). They love darkness rather than the light (Jn 3:19). But when someone is born again by the power of God this changes the primary object of their love. They come to the light because they love the light (Jn 3:21). A new nature will have corresponding new affections. The natural man has natural affections for the things that are natural and of this world. The one who is born again now has a new nature with new affections that correspond to their new spiritual nature; affections which the natural man cannot have nor understand because “a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God; for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them,” (1 Cor 2:14). Because this new spiritual nature wrought by the supernatural power of the Holy Spirit is lasting, abiding, and growing, then so is the love for the things of the Spirit of God lasting, abiding, and growing while the love for the things of this world – its values, priorities, fads, trends, lusts, wisdom, pride, reasoning, thinking, and pleasures, grows cool and dead, “For whatever is born of God overcomes the world;” (1 Jn 5:4).
In overcoming the world, the thoughts, reasoning, and thinking are changed. Their way and pattern of thinking is no longer dictated by or conformed to this world, but is being transformed by the renewing of their mind, so that they continuously examine and prove whether or not something is the will of God, “that which is good, and acceptable, and perfect” (Rm 12:2). Since the only place God has revealed His will is in His revealed and written word, it is upon the authority of Scripture alone that any teaching, practice, church, philosophy, or teacher is to be examined. All that can abide the test of Scripture is to be accepted as “that which is good, acceptable, and perfect”, and all that cannot is to be rejected as incompatible with the revealed will of God.
Just as leaven diffuses itself and leavens the whole lump of dough, in the same way God’s grace diffuses itself throughout the entire person, affecting a total change of all their faculties. They are no longer the same person. The entire person thus being changed, this also changes their practices. Sin no longer reigns in their mortal bodies so that they obey its lusts (Rm 6:12). They no longer willingly present the members of their body to sin as instruments of unrighteousness; but to God as those alive from the dead, and their members as instruments of righteousness to God (Rm 6:13). They no longer practice sin, but they practice righteousness (1 Jn 3:7, 8). The truth they love and embrace is according to godliness, and the godliness they practice is according to truth (1 Tm 6:3). So you see reader, that this is a total change as well as a real change.
A Preparatory Change
By this change God prepares His elect for His service. He not only purifies for Himself a people for His own possession, but they are now zealous for good deeds (Tit 2:14). This is the main point that I wish to emphasize in this study, and the reason for all that has been said about the nature and necessity of the new birth up until now. If God had not intended to use His people for some new service then He did not need to create a new creature. The old creature was perfectly suited for the old use and service in which it was employed. But God would have His people bear much fruit in this world by which He is glorified (Jn 15:8). Since the old man is “alienated and hostile in mind, engaged in evil deeds” (Col 2:21), and is “disobedient, deceived, enslaved to various lusts and pleasures” (Tit 3:3), God by an act of His sovereign grace creates in them a new and heavenly nature, endowed with new principles, new loves, new thoughts, new desires, and new abilities to render any service to God which before their new birth they had no ability or inclination to do, whether that service is active or passive, doing or suffering.
God formed and created a new creature for some new, glorious, and particular service, whether to do, or to suffer for doing what is right rather than for doing what is wrong (1 Pt 3:17). When the Apostle Peter wrote his first epistle it was to strengthen, encourage, and sustain his Christian readers who were living as strangers in the midst of an unbelieving and antagonistic world (1 Pt 1:1). They were already suffering, but their afflictions were about to get much worse. The current of the times made it clear to discerning Christian leaders that believers were entering a much more ominous and dangerous season. Growing hostility manifesting itself in malicious charges, misrepresentations, and pressure to assimilate would have warned believers of the approach of much greater hardships. They were being slandered by their adversaries as evildoers (2:12), they and their faith were targets of ridicule and insults (3:9), their good behavior in Christ was increasingly reviled (3:16), they were being maligned for refusing to participate in, affirm, support, or celebrate the unbridled immorality embraced by the culture in which they lived (4:4), and they were being reviled for the name of Christ (4:14). All this made them an easy target for marginalization, mob-inspired hatred, government instigated sanctions, economic reprisals, and the infamous persecutions of Nero. Peter realized (no doubt from his own painful personal experience) how intense the pressure and temptation would be to compromise, assimilate, and even deny in practice what they profess to believe in principle in order to avoid suffering for the cause of Christ. Therefore, Peter warned them, “do not be conformed to the former lusts which were yours in your ignorance, but like the Holy One who called you, be holy yourselves also in all your behavior; because it is written, “You shall be holy, for I am holy” (1 Pt 1:14-16). If there is anything that will cause Christians to appear as lights in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation (and let us not forget that darkness hates the light – Jn 3:20; 15:20; 1 Jn 3:13; 4:5, 6), it is to live so as to be holy in all your behavior and to hold fast to the word of life (Phil 2:15, 16).
Under these circumstances the first truth which Peter chose to encourage and bolster his readers with, and to prepare them for the severest of sufferings, was that they “are chosen according to the foreknowledge of God the Father,” (1 Pt 1:1, 2). Peter reminded his readers of their election and that it was based on nothing but the sovereign grace of God. In fact, their sufferings were a direct result of their election. Like the Philippians, not only was it granted as a gift of God’s sovereign grace that they believe in Christ, but also to suffer for His sake (Phil 1:29). Peter went so far as to inform his readers that they had “been called for this purpose, since Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example for you to follow in His steps” (1 Pt 2:21). They had not only been elected to salvation, but to suffering for the cause of Christ. Their suffering was “according to” (kata with the accusative) the will of God (4:19); that is, their suffering, just like their election, was in full accord with God’s divine, sovereign, and gracious will. God had willed that they should suffer for doing what was right rather than for doing what was wrong (3:17). God not only knew of their circumstances, but He had always known, and He always knows because He has ordained them from eternity past. Their fiery ordeal had a divine purpose. It had come upon them for their testing (4:12), “so that the proof of your faith, being more precious than gold which is perishable, even though tested by fire, may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ” (1 Pt 1:7).
The purpose of God in choosing according to His foreknowledge involves not only the end for which God elects, which is eternal life, but also the means. We are elected to the end as well as to the means for achieving that end. And the cause for God’s electing love is not to be found in anything in us, but only in the sovereignty of God. Electing love is a sovereign love, “But God, being rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved),” (Eph 2:4, 5). When did God love His elect with this great love? Before the foundation of the world (Eph 1:4), and from all eternity (2 Tm 1:9). Their names were written in the book of life from the foundation of the world (Rv 13:8; 17:8). And in the fullness of time, when according to His sovereign foreknowledge and will, God in time reveals His Son in His elect (Gal 1:15, 16). It was in love that God predestined His elect to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, “according to the kind intention of His will” (Eph 1:5). And if we have received “a spirit of adoption as sons by which we cry out, ‘Abba Father!’ (Rm 8:15), “and if children, heirs also, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him in order that we may also be glorified with Him” (Rm 8:17). The end, glorification, is achieved by the means, suffering with Christ. This is not suffering for the sake of suffering, but suffering as a test and trial of faith to prove whether it is the faith that is the fruit of regeneration and a gift of the Holy Spirit, or if it is a counterfeit, temporary, and fair-weather faith that is from the spirit of this world; whether it is the faith that perseveres to the end, or the faith that shrinks back to destruction. There must be a great corruption and blindness working in the heart that refuses to stoop to the sovereignty of an electing God; to a God who has determined not only the final and eternal ends, but also the means to those ends, of all the works of His hands.
Regeneration is essential if we are to be prepared to suffer as a Christian. Only a new creature will be enabled to stand firm in the true grace of God against all the pressure to compromise the true grace of God, all the oppositions, all the ridicule and discouragements, and all the attempts and plausible arguments for reconstituting the true message of the true grace of God. True grace is sovereign grace; anything else is a cheap counterfeit and will not stand the fiery trials that come upon it for its testing. What are persecutions, what are threats, what is marginalization, what are veiled and not so veiled messages to conform or suffer the consequences, what are the frowns, reproaches, and slanders of enemies? They are all so many stumbling blocks placed in the believer’s way to keep them from God and from trusting and obeying Him and His word, and where this principle of new spiritual life is lacking, they prove to be insurmountable obstacles. Unregenerate hearts and minds are quite overcome by them, so they compromise, accommodate, assimilate, and invent and cling to forms of godliness without its life changing and transforming power. But the regenerate heart and mind will stand firm in the true sovereign grace of God and declare with Paul, “What shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who is against us? He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how will He not also with Him freely give (charizomai – a gift of grace) us all things?…Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?…But in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor heights, nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Rm 8: 31-39). They are not only chosen according to the foreknowledge of God, they are also “protected by the power of God through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time” (1 Pt 1:5).
We live in a time when there is gross darkness concerning the doctrine of regeneration and what it is to be born again. Let us not be overcome by this darkness. Let us boldly and courageously declare the words of Jesus, that “unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God” (Jn 3:3). But let us go further and declare not only the words, but all the implications which this truth conveys concerning the nature and necessity of a new birth and the sovereign grace of God that creates it, no matter how incompatible these truths may be with the god of cultural, commercial, and man-centered Christianity and the prevailing conceptions of what most people believe to be the God of love. There is a great need for self-examination as to whether we have known and experienced this radical change which is always the fruit of regeneration or not. This change can always be known and discerned by its effects. Its beginnings may be hidden and go undetected, but its effects are always the same. The paths by which God brings His elect to this great change may be different, but the means is always the same, the word of God, and the fruits of this change are always the same. This is a purpose for which the Apostle John wrote his first epistle, “These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, in order that you may know that you have eternal life” (1 Jn 5:13). When John says, “that you may know that you have eternal life”, it is the same thing as saying, “that you may know that you are born again and will enter the kingdom of God”.
In our next study I will examine the necessity of having clear Scriptural evidence for a true work of regeneration in the heart and soul in order to prepare us for sufferings, the nature of that evidence, and some things that often obscure and cloud it.
[1] From The Apology of Tertullian, 197 A.D. The word “apology” is not used here in the sense of saying “sorry”, but as a defense of truth.
[2] Iain H. Murray, Archibald G. Brown: Spurgeon’s Successor (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth Trust, 2011), 283.
[3] Benjamin B. Warfield, The Plan of Salvation (Eugene, OR: Wipf and Stock Publishers, 2000), 43, 44.