What is Regeneration?

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Regeneration:

1. What is regeneration?
Regeneration is an immediate re-creation of the sinful nature by God the Holy Spirit and an implanting into the body of Christ.

2. Is it a judicial or a re-creating act?
The latter. In regeneration the condition and not the state of man is changed.

3. Does regeneration occur in the consciousness or below the consciousness?
Below the consciousness. It is totally independent from what occurs in the consciousness. It can therefore be effected where the consciousness slumbers.

4. Is regeneration a slow process or an instantaneous action?
It is an instantaneous action that is the basis for a long development in grace.

5. Is regeneration concerned with the removal of the old or the enlivening of the new?
Regeneration includes both. However, one can rightly maintain that the latter has prominence.

6. Is regeneration a mediate or an immediate act of God?
It is immediate in the strict sense. No instrument is employed for it.

– Geerhardus Vos, Reformed Dogmatics)

“Regeneration is an act by God to awaken spiritual life within us – bringing us from spiritual death to spiritual life. On this definition, it is natural to understand that regeneration comes before saving faith. It is in fact this work of God that gives us the spiritual ability to respond to God in faith. However, when we say that it comes “before” saving faith, it is important to remember that they usually come so close together that it will ordinarily seem to us that they are happening at the same time. As God addresses the effective call of the gospel to us, he regenerates us and we respond in faith and repentance to this call. So from our perspective it is hard to tell any difference in time, especially because regeneration is a spiritual work that we cannot perceive with our eyes or even understand with our minds.

Yet there are several passages that tell us that this secret, hidden work of God in our spirits does in fact come before we respond to God in saving faith (though often it may be only seconds before we respond). When talking about regeneration with Nicodemus, Jesus said, “Unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God” (John 3:5). Now we enter the kingdom of God when we become Christians at conversion. But Jesus says that we have to be born “of the Spirit” before we can do that. Our inability to come to Christ on our own, without an initial work of God within us, is also emphasized when Jesus says, “No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him” p 703 (John 6:44), and “No one can come to me unless it is granted him by the Father” (John 6:65). This inward act of regeneration is described beautifully when Luke says of Lydia, “The Lord opened her heart to give heed to what was said by Paul” (Acts 16:14). First the Lord opened her heart, then she was able to give heed to Paul’s preaching and to respond in faith.

By contrast, Paul tells us, “The man without the Spirit (literally, the “natural man”) does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned” (1 Cor. 2:14 NIV). He also says of people apart from Christ, “no one understands, No one seeks for God” (Rom. 3:11).

The solution to this spiritual deadness and inability to respond only comes when God gives us new life within. “But God, who is rich in mercy, out of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead through our trespasses made us alive together with Christ” (Eph. 2:4–5). Paul also says, “When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your sinful nature, God made you alive with Christ” (Col. 2:13 NIV).”

– Grudem, W.A., 2004. Systematic theology: an introduction to biblical doctrine, Leicester, England; Grand Rapids, MI: Inter-Varsity Press; Zondervan Pub. House.

What about Movie Clips?

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Two articles that seek to apply the regulative principle of worship to the issue of movie clips (and other things):

Article #1: What about Movie Clips? Applying the Regulative Principle by Aaron Menikoff (original source here), senior pastor of Mt. Vernon Baptist Church in Sandy Springs, Georgia.

I had been a pastor for just a few months when a faithful church member sought me out to discuss the use of media in the services. He had led previous pastors to incorporate video and sound clips, and he wanted to be of help to me. He started off with a question kind of like this:

“So, what do you think about movie clips in the services?”

“Well, I really hadn’t planned on using media in the services.”

“Really? I’ve been involved in worship for quite some time, and it’s a pretty effective way to communicate.”

“Yeah, I don’t doubt that. But I’m afraid it might distract people from the heart of the service: the singing, preaching, and praying of the Word.”

“I wouldn’t think of it as a distraction, more of an addition, it makes the whole service better.”

“You might be right, but I really want our focus to be on the power of God’s Word to engage and excite us, so I’m going to stay away from movie clips.”

That’s about how the conversation ended. We were two grown men who both love the Lord but with different viewpoints on what would most honor God and be helpful to this local church. If you were in my shoes, how would you have answered his question?

Over the years, I’ve been asked to weigh in on many such issues related to our Sunday morning service.

Should we have Independence Day bunting? I said no, after figuring out what bunting is.

Christmas decorations? I said yes.

Dramatic Scripture readings? No.

A children’s choir? Yes, a couple times a year.

A collection box in the foyer? No.

Handbells? Yes.

Movie clips? See above.

As you can probably tell from these examples, I came to an established church with its own customs and traditions. If you’re planting a church, I suppose you’re more likely to be asked your opinion on incense, an art gallery in the foyer, and cutting edge or even secular music.

I’m less concerned that you reach the same conclusion I have on any of these examples. What I do want you to realize is that Scripture is not silent about corporate worship.

FIVE GUIDELINES FOR MAKING GODLY DECISIONS

The regulative principle helps me answer these kinds of questions. The regulative principle says that Scripture regulates what is permissible to do in public worship. And those who hold the regulative principle will approach each question carefully, asking not merely “What will God allow?” but also “What does God prefer?”

The following five guidelines, rooted in the regulative principle, have helped me to address which practices appropriately honor God and help his people in our weekly gatherings.

1. Corporate worship is Word-centered.

First, corporate worship is Word-centered. After Paul told Timothy of Scripture’s power to change lives (2 Tim. 3:16–17) he offered this simple exhortation: “Preach the word” (4:2). My most important pastoral duty is to lay Scripture before my church, confidently knowing that the Spirit can apply it to people’s lives and produce spiritual maturity.

A Christian gathering should not be merely “biblical” in some general, abstract sense. It should be so saturated with Scripture that it is obvious to everyone that we believe God works powerfully through his Word, as we preach the Word, sing the Word, and pray the Word. I don’t want to endorse anything that will distract us from Scripture. Continue reading →

Dependent Discipline

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Article by Jerry Bridges: Does Holiness Come By Striving After it or By Resting in God?

As I sat in the doctor’s waiting room, my attention was drawn to a portrait of a man sculpted out of a block of marble. The sculpture was complete down to about mid-thigh, but below that the partially chipped away marble gradually phased into the outline of the original block. The man in the sculpture was handsome and robust, the kind of body any man would like to have. But the arresting thing about the picture was that the sculptor’s hammer and chisel were in the hands of the man being sculpted. The man was sculpting himself. As I pondered the painting, I was struck by its graphic portrayal of how many Christians seek to grow in personal holiness. We try, as it were, to sculpt or mold ourselves. We seek to grow in holiness through our own personal efforts and willpower. And we’re just as ludicrous as a block of marble trying to sculpt itself.

Holiness is not, as is so often thought, adherence to a set of rules. It is conformity to the character of God—nothing more, nothing less. It is God’s plan for us. He has “predestined [us] to be conformed to the likeness of his Son” (Rom. 8:29). To this end, Paul says, “We are being transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit” (2 Cor. 3:18). The words conform and transform in these verses have the same root. A form is a pattern or model.

Transformed speaks of the process; conformed speaks of the end result. We are being transformed into the likeness of Christ so that we might finally be conformed to the likeness of Him who is our pattern or model.

Who, then, transforms us? Paul tells us in 2 Cor 3:18 that it is the Spirit. We are not sculpting ourselves into the likeness of Christ. Only the Holy Spirit can do that. The writer of Hebrews recognized this when he prayed, “May the God of peace … work in us what is pleasing to him” (He 13:20, 21). Paul prayed similarly for the Thessalonian believers, “May God himself, the God of peace, sanctify you [make you holy] through and through” (1 Thess. 5:23). We as believers can no more make ourselves holy than a block of marble can transform itself into a beautiful statue. We are totally dependent on the Holy Spirit to do this work in us. Yet over and over we place the entire burden for growing in holiness on ourselves. We make resolutions, we try harder, and we may even succeed in changing some of our outward conduct. But we cannot change our hearts. Only God can do that.

It was said of the Lord Jesus, for example, that He “loved righteousness and hated wickedness” (He 1:9). To be transformed into His likeness, then, is to be brought to where we, too, love righteousness and hate wickedness. This is more than merely changing our conduct or conforming to a set of rules. It is a complete renovation of our hearts, something only the Holy Spirit can do. Is the road to holiness, then, one of dependence on God, or of personal discipline? Surely it is one of dependence on God.

THE MYSTERY OF SANCTIFICATION

We must not, however, carry the analogy of the marble statue too far. After all, a piece of marble is absolutely lifeless. It has no mind, no heart, no will. The sculptor receives no cooperation from the lifeless block of marble, and expects none. The same is not true of believers. God has given us mind, heart, and will with which to respond to His work in us, with which to cooperate with His Spirit in the process of transforming us into the likeness of Christ. He intends that we understand His will with our minds, that we yearn to do it with our hearts, and that we actually make choices of obedience with our wills. We are to “make every effort … to be holy” (Heb 12:14). We are to train, or discipline, ourselves to be godly (1 Tim 4:7). We are to put to death the traits of our sinful nature and clothe ourselves with the traits of godly character (Col 3:5; Col 3:12).

The New Testament is filled with injunctions about holy character that address our responsibility. In the pursuit of holiness, we must not be passive blocks of marble in the hands of a sculptor.
Is the road to holiness, then, one of dependence on God, or of personal discipline?

Surely it is one of personal discipline. But how can this be?

If the work of transforming us into Christ’s likeness is the Holy Spirit’s ministry, where does our responsibility fit in? How can we be simultaneously responsible for pursuing holiness and totally dependent on the Spirit?

I am an engineer, both by training and by temperament. One characteristic of engineers is that we always want to know how things work.

I carried this analytical attitude into the Christian life. For years I tried to analyze the precise relationship between the Holy Spirit and the human personality. I visualized two gears, one representing the Spirit and one representing my own personality, and I wanted to know just how they meshed. I kept trying to answer the question of exactly how my personal responsibility for growing in holiness fit together with the work of the Holy Spirit.

I finally gave up. I concluded that God has not answered that question anywhere in the Bible. The mutual relationship of the Holy Spirit and the human personality in the work of sanctification is a mystery known only to God. But our inability to explain just how God works in and through our personalities should not keep us from believing that He does. He not only instructs us to “work out [our] own salvation with fear and trembling,” but also assures us that He Himself “works in [us] to will and to act according to his good purpose” (Phil 2:12;13). Although God has not explained to us the mystery of how He works in us, He has made our responsibility clear. He has also made it clear that, in carrying out that responsibility, we are dependent upon Him. I call this dependent discipline. Continue reading →