Regeneration
or New Birth
Introduction:
Does
believing that Christ finished the work of forgiveness of sins and
justifying
His people at the cross negate the need for regeneration?
This appears to
be a misrepresentation being leveled at those of us who do believe and
proclaim
what the Bible teaches concerning our Lord having come “to
finish the
transgression, and to make an end of sins, and to make
reconciliation
for iniquity, and to bring in everlasting righteousness,”
Daniel 9:24.
For
any who may be confused, I hope to set the record straight regarding
what I
know to be true and what is my hopeful experience with regard to the
Lord’s
dealing in my own heart. May the Lord be pleased to bring
comfort to His
people through this testimony of His free and sovereign grace!
1. WHAT IS REGENERATION?
Simply
stated, I believe that it is the sovereign work of the Spirit of God,
in
conjunction with the will of the Father and the Son, to give life to
all elect,
redeemed, and justified sinners, which in turn causes them to hear
Christ’s
Word, believe on Him as He is revealed in the Gospel, and submit to Him
as
their righteousness before God, John 5:21, 24-27.
Can
any say that Christ has died for them if they have not been regenerated
by the
Spirit and called out of darkness into light? NO!
No more than
someone can say that they are elect of God, if they are yet in
unbelief.
However, just as it is not regeneration that is their
election before
God, neither is the new birth their justification before God.
Their
election was from eternity, in Christ, according to God’s
sovereign will and
purpose and their justification before God was
accomplished in time by the blood of the Lord Jesus.
When
Christ told Nicodemus “ye must be born again,” He
was not giving him something
to do in order to have forgiveness of sins or to be justified before
God!
Rather, He was telling him what the Spirit must do in him in
order for
him to renounce his self-righteous, works grounded religion, and truly
‘see’
(perceive and know) the kingdom of God- John 3:3,8. As is true of any
sinner
(depraved, blind, and dead in sin), unless the Holy Spirit reveal to us
the
deep things of God, we cannot know the things of God in truth, 1
Corinthians
1:9-14.
What
is the answer to any who may ask, “How can I know
whether I am the Lord’s
and whether God has chosen me unto salvation and Christ died for
me?” YE
MUST BE BORN AGAIN! We do not enter into a relationship with
God in our
experience through mere intellectual reasoning, but rather the
revelation of
Christ, by His Word and Gospel, to the heart, and that only after the
Spirit of
God has made us alive unto God, and given faith to believe on Christ in
truth,
Ephesians 1:13.
Up
until the time of regeneration, even those who are elect
of God the Father and redeemed and justified by Christ’s
blood, are said to be
lost. That does not mean that they are under the wrath of God
or that
until they believe God’s looks on them as ungodly.
To believe that is to
deny what Christ accomplished at
2. THE NECESSITY OF THE NEW
BIRTH
The
clear teaching of Scripture regarding regeneration (new birth or being
born
from above) may be summed up in the following verses:
i.
God’s love and
affection for His elect is eternal and unchanging because of the work
of His
Son.
ii.
However, in the
flesh, none of His elect can please Him by their efforts at satisfying
Him,
because that is only possible by His Son. It is this truth
that He shows
them in revealing Christ in them and causing them to renounce their own
efforts
and submit to the righteousness of God imputed in Christ at the cross.
i.
The Apostle
Paul speaks of the Spirit of God being given to those for whom Christ
died as “the
earnest of our inheritance”
ii.
In real
estate, the earnest is something of value given by a buyer to insure
the full
realization of the purchase in time.
1.
The elect
were bought by the precious blood of the Lord Jesus Christ- 1
Corinthians 6:20
2.
The Spirit
of God is given in time to every blood bought sinner as the guarantee
of their
full glorification when Christ comes for them.
3.
It is the
Spirit indwelling the elect of God that gives them assurance that they
are the
Lord’s, and causes them to look to Christ alone for
righteousness, and not
anything in them, not even the grace of faith.
1.
WHAT
HAPPENS WHEN ONE IS BORN AGAIN?
Here
is the real issue that must be settled with regard to regeneration or
the new
birth. It is not whether or not the elect must be born again,
but rather,
what happens when they are born again.
This
is a centuries old debate, and one which each one of us must be fully
persuaded
in our own minds. Is the new birth a matter of the elect
being given a
new sinless nature as many believe? I do not believe so,
either according
to the Word of God or my own experience.
1.
Romans chapter
7 is not teaching that we have a sinless nature in us combating our sin
nature.
A careful study of it shows just the opposite. Paul is saying
that the
good he would do, he does not. If there were a sinless nature
in him, as
was in Christ, it would never yield to the flesh, would it?
In fact, his
conclusion is, ‘O wretched man that I am!’
That is all that any
regenerated sinner can say about himself. See the testimony
of the
Publican in Luke 18:13.
Romans chapter 7 is showing
what happens when we
begin to look away from Christ and His satisfaction of the Law and
Justice of
God, and think that we can by our obedience to it find acceptance with
God. Paul states this premise in the very first verse of the
chapter- “for
I speak to them that know the law…”
It can only condemn.
Only Christ has removed the condemnation by His obedience
unto death- v.
25.
2.
I John 3:9 is being quoted as a proof text
of a sinless nature in the
believer, but again, a careful study of the context will show that this
is not
what it is teaching. When the Scripture says, ‘Whosoever
is born of
God does not sin,’ I have yet to find any
professing believer to tell me
that they have lived even a moment without sinning, if they are honest.
Even
our best righteousness is but filthy rags and tainted with sin.
Therefore, the only valid interpretation is that one born of
God cannot
sin, because where the law has already been satisfied for them fully in
the
death of Christ, that one cannot be considered a transgressor (sinner)
from
God’s perspective. See 1 John 3:3, 4. God sees
those whom Christ redeemed
as justified (righteous) before Him- 1 John 4:17. In our
experience, we
know ourselves to be nothing but sin, but before God, there is no sin
committed
because there is no law against us in that Christ satisfied it fully.
When John writes of
“his seed remaineth
in him,” one must also look at the context to see what seed
he is referring to.
It is not the seed of sinlessness
as some would
think. Rather, it is the seed of the Word, or the Gospel, as
already
described in 1 John 2:27- ‘the truth that abides (remains) in
you.’ What
truth is that? It is the fact that our righteousness before
God is in the
imputed righteousness of Christ alone as the Just one, 1 John 2:1.
When I
sin, my conscience would accuse me as being unworthy of salvation, but
the
seed, the revealed Word, abides in me to remind me where my
righteousness is
and thereby gives me hope and assurance before God, all the while
drawing my
heart to Christ once again in repentance.
To do righteousness as
described in 1 John 2:29 and
3:7, is not to have a sinless nature, nor to live sinlessly,
but rather to live in full dependence and submission to the ONE true
righteousness of God in Christ. To live by any other supposed
righteousness is a delusion and can only condemn.
Some
may ask, “What then changes when a sinner is born again, if
we are not given a
sinless nature?” The answer is simple:
1.
We are given the very Spirit of God to
indwell our hearts- John 14:17
“Even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot
receive, because it seeth
him not, neither knoweth
him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth
with you, and
shall be in you.”
Don’t you get upset when
you hear people talking all the time about ‘Mother
Nature,’ rather than
attributing the works of creation to God Himself? Why would
it be any
different here when talking of the work of the Spirit in us, to keep
referring
to some “new nature,” rather than the Spirit of God
Himself indwelling our
hearts? He truly is sinless, but there is nothing in our
nature as
falling creatures but deadness and corruption. He does cannot
and does
not sin, but anything related to our hearts is tainted with sin. Galatians 5:17 “For
the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the
flesh: and these are contrary
the one to the other: so that ye cannot do the things that ye
would.”
The Spirit lusting against the flesh, in that
He never allows the regenerated sinner to put any confidence in
anything in us
but only in the Christ by whom we are justified, saved, reconciled, and
kept
unto the day of our final redemption when we shall be completely rid of
the
presence of sin- 1 John 3:1-3
2.
We are given life-
What is created in us is not a ‘new’ nature;
separate from who
we are, but LIFE ITSELF! Just as when God created Adam and
breathed into
his nostrils and he became a living soul, so it is when God is pleased
to
regenerate one of His elect, that one is given spiritual life.
Where the
Spirit of God dwells, there is LIFE! The very word
‘spirit’ means
‘breath.’
Here then is the real
definition of the place of
regeneration with our justification before God. Romans 5:17
declares that
the ‘gift of righteousness shall reign IN LIFE by
one.’ The gift of
righteousness was accorded in the death of Christ, imputed there at the
cross,
and it is revealed by the Spirit of God in LIFE, when He is pleased to
bring
the sinner from spiritual deadness to spiritual life. Both
are the effect
of righteousness being imputed at the cross, not when we believe.
The
‘justification of life’ described in Romans 5:18 is
stating that God giving
life to dead sinners is justified by Christ having removed condemnation
in HIS
DEATH, v. 18.
Some mistakenly refer to 2
Corinthians 5:17 as proof
that there is a new sinless nature given whereby ‘all things
become new.’
However, again, CONTEXT is everything. ‘If anyone
is in Christ as a new
creature (creation) it is BECAUSE old things are (have passed away),
not our
old sinful nature, but rather the old things of the LAW and its
condemnation
against us. Christ by His death fulfilled it and put it away
once for
all. Is this not what the previous verses declare leading up
to the
‘Therefore,’ in verse 17? All things are
(have) become new in that on the
ground of Christ’s righteous obedience unto death, there is
NOW no condemnation
toward those who are in Christ Jesus, by electing and redeeming grace
(Romans
8:1).
Once again, LIFE is given at
regeneration, BECAUSE
it is not possible for those whom Christ redeemed to be held in
deadness, even
as it was not possible that Christ should be held in His death, having
satisfied law and justice by His death (Acts 2:24).
3.
We are given LIGHT- Those who are yet blind,
trusting in themselves
that they are righteous (Luke 18:9) and despising others, cannot see
the light
unless the Spirit of God gives them eyes to see. 2Co
4:4 “In whom the god of this world
hath blinded the minds of them
which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who
is the
image of God, should shine unto them. “
It is only as God commands the
light to shine out of
darkness, into the heart that sinners are made to believe, and submit
to the
righteousness of God in Christ. This is what is created in
the elect upon
regeneration- THE LIGHT OF THE KNOWLEDGE OF THE GLORY OF GOD IN THE
FACE OF
JESUS CHRIST. Those who say that knowledge is insignificant,
and relate
regeneration to something other than imparting of the KNOWLEDGE of
Christ, need
to read this verse carefully. The day the light of the
KNOWLEDGE of
Christ is minimized and mocked, how great is the darkness, as Christ
Himself
testified in Mt
6:23 “But if thine eye be evil, thy whole
body shall be full of
darkness. If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness, how great
is that
darkness! “
CONCLUSION:
I thank God for
the light of the
knowledge of Christ that He has caused to shine in my heart, by His
grace and
continue to pray for more light. Don’t be deterred
by any who endeavor to
dissuade you by referring to this as “new” light.
It is as old as the
Scriptures, and let us be like the Bereans,
not
looking to men, but to the Scriptures alone, and weighing every
doctrine in the
light of God’s Word- Acts 17:11. As we look to the
Word, relying only on
the Spirit of God as our teacher, and truly rest in Christ alone, and
His
finished work at
As my earthly
pilgrimage passes, and I
draw near to the time when I shall stand before a holy God, I have no
other
plea, than that when He died, He died for me! This is my
testimony of
grace, and one I believe to be confirmed by the very Word of God
HIMSELF!
May the Lord grant us all this persuasion!
KEN WIMER
Shreveport Grace
Church