Part 6 — Chapter II. The Reconciliation Of Man To God, Or The Application Of Redemption Through The Work Of The Holy Spirit. (continued 3)

Henry Clay said that he did not know for himself personally what the change of heart spoken of by Christians meant; but he had seen Kentucky family feuds of long standing healed by religious revivals, and that whatever could heal a Kentucky family feud was more than human.—Mr. Peter Harvey was a lifelong friend of Daniel Webster. He wrote a most interesting volume of reminiscenses of the great man. He tells how one John Colby married the oldest sister of Mr. Webster. Said Mr. Webster of John Colby: “Finally he went up to Andover, New Hampshire, and bought a farm, and the only recollection I have about him is that he was called the wickedest man in the neighborhood, so far as swearing and impiety went. I used to wonder how my sister could marry so profane a man as John Colby.” Years afterwards news comes to Mr. Webster that a wonderful change has passed upon John Colby. Mr. Harvey and Mr. Webster take a journey together to visit John Colby. As Mr. Webster enters John Colby's house, he sees open before him a large-print Bible, which he has just been reading. When greetings have been interchanged, the first question John Colby asks of Mr. Webster is, “Are you a Christian?” And then, at John Colby's suggestion, the two men kneel and pray together. When the visit is done, this is what Mr. Webster says to Mr. Harvey as they ride away: “I should like to know what the enemies of religion would say to John Colby's conversion. There was a man as unlikely, humanly speaking, to become a Christian as any man I ever saw. He was reckless, heedless, impious, never attended church, never experienced the good influence of associating with religious people. And here he has been living on in that reckless way until he [pg 816]has got to be an old man, until a period of life when you naturally would not expect his habits to change. And yet he has been brought into the condition in which we have seen him to-day,—a penitent, trusting, humble believer.” “Whatever people may say,” added Mr. Webster, “nothing can convince me that anything short of the grace of Almighty God could make such a change as I, with my own eyes, have witnessed in the life of John Colby.” When they got back to Franklin, New Hampshire, in the evening, they met another lifelong friend of Mr. Webster's, John Taylor, standing at his door. Mr. Webster called out: “Well, John Taylor, miracles happen in these latter days as well as in the days of old.” “What now, Squire?” asked John Taylor. “Why,” replied Mr. Webster, “John Colby has become a Christian. If that is not a miracle, what is?”

(b) To the Arminian view, that regeneration is the act of man, coöperating with divine influences applied through the truth (synergistic theory), we object that no beginning of holiness is in this way conceivable. For, so long as man's selfish and perverse affections are unchanged, no choosing God is possible but such as proceeds from supreme desire for one's own interest and happiness. But the man thus supremely bent on self-gratification cannot see in God, or his service, anything productive of happiness; or, if he could see in them anything of advantage, his choice of God and his service from such a motive would not be a holy choice, and therefore could not be a beginning of holiness.

Although Melanchthon (1497-1560) preceded Arminius (1560-1609), his view was substantially the same with that of the Dutch theologian. Melanchthon never experienced the throes and travails of a new spiritual life, as Luther did. His external and internal development was peculiarly placid and serene. This Præceptor Germaniæ had the modesty of the genuine scholar. He was not a dogmatist, and he never entered the ranks of the ministry. He never could be persuaded to accept the degree of Doctor of Theology, though he lectured on theological subjects to audiences of thousands. Dorner says of Melanchthon: “He held at first that the Spirit of God is the primary, and the word of God the secondary, or instrumental, agency in conversion, while the human will allows their action and freely yields to it.” Later, he held that “conversion is the result of the combined action (copulatio) of three causes, the truth of God, the Holy Spirit, and the will of man.” This synergistic view in his last years involved the theologian of the German Reformation in serious trouble. Luthardt: “He made a facultasout of a mere capacitas.” Dorner says again: “Man's causality is not to be coördinated with that of God, however small the influence ascribed to it. It is a purely receptive, not a productive, agency. The opposite is the fundamental Romanist error.”Self-love will never induce a man to give up self-love. Selfishness will not throttle and cast out selfishness. “Such a choice from a selfish motive would be unholy, when judged by God's standard. It is absurd to make salvation depend upon the exercises of a wholly unspiritual power”; see Dorner, Glaubenslehre, 2:716-720 (Syst. Doct., 4:179-183). Shedd, Dogm. Theol., 2:505—“Sin does not first stop, and then holiness come in place of sin; but holiness positively expels sin. Darkness does not first cease, and then light enter; but light drives out darkness.” On the Arminian view, see Bib. Sac., 19:265, 266.

John Wesley's theology was a modified Arminianism, yet it was John Wesley who did most to establish the doctrine of regeneration. He asserted that the Holy Spirit acts through the truth, in distinction from the doctrine that the Holy Spirit works solely through the ministers and sacraments of the church. But in asserting the work of the Holy Spirit in the individual soul, he went too far to the opposite extreme of emphasizing the ability of man to choose God's service, when without love to God there was nothing in God's service to attract. A. H. Bradford, Age of Faith: “It is as if Jesus had said: If a sailor will properly set his rudder the wind will fill his sails. The will is the rudder of the character; if it is turned in the right direction, all the winds of heaven will favor; if it is turned in the wrong direction, they will oppose.”The question returns: What shall move the man to set his rudder aright, if he has no desire to reach the proper haven? Here is the need of divine power, not merely to coöperate with man, after man's will is set in the right direction, but to set it in the right direction in the first place. Phil. 2:13—“it is God who worketh in you both to will and to work, for his good pleasure.”

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Still another modification of Arminian doctrine is found in the Revealed Theology of N. W. Taylor of New Haven, who maintained that, antecedently to regeneration, the selfish principle is suspended in the sinner's heart, and that then, prompted by self-love, he uses the means of regeneration from motives that are neither sinful nor holy. He held that all men, saints and sinners, have their own happiness for their ultimate end. Regeneration involves no change in this principle or motive, but only a change in the governing purpose to seek this happiness in God rather than in the world. Dr. Taylor said that man could turn to God, whatever the Spirit did or did not do. He could turn to God if he would; but he could also turn to God if he wouldn't. In other words, he maintained the power of contrary choice, while yet affirming the certainty that, without the Holy Spirit's influences, man would always choose wrongly. These doctrines caused a division in the Congregational body. Those who opposed Taylor withdrew their support from New Haven, and founded the East Windsor Seminary in 1834. For Taylor's view, see N. W. Taylor, Revealed Theology, 369-406, and in The Christian Spectator for 1829.

The chief opponent of Dr. Taylor was Dr. Bennet Tyler. He replied to Dr. Taylor that moral character has its seat, not in the purpose, but in the affections back of the purpose. Otherwise every Christian must be in a state of sinless perfection, for his governing purpose is to serve God. But we know that there are affections and desires not under control of this purpose—dispositions not in conformity with the predominant disposition. How, Dr. Tyler asked, can a sinner, completely selfish, from a selfish motive, resolve not to be selfish, and so suspend his selfishness? “Antecedently to regeneration, there can be no suspension of the selfish principle. It is said that, in suspending it, the sinner is actuated by self-love. But is it possible that the sinner, while destitute of love to God and every particle of genuine benevolence, should love himself at all and not love himself supremely? He loves nothing more than self. He does not regard God or the universe, except as they tend to promote his ultimate end, his own happiness. No sinner ever suspended this selfishness until subdued by divine grace. We can not become regenerate by preferring God to the world merely from regard to our own interest. There is no necessity of the Holy Spirit to renew the heart, if self-love prompts men to turn from the world to God. On the view thus combated, depravity consists simply in ignorance. All men need is enlightenment as to the best means of securing their own happiness. Regeneration by the Holy Spirit is, therefore, not necessary.” See Bennet Tyler, Memoir and Lectures, 316-381, esp. 334, 370, 371; Letters on the New Haven Theology, 21-72, 143-163; review of Taylor and Fitch, by E. D. Griffin, Divine Efficiency, 13-54; Martineau, Study, 2:9—“By making it a man's interest to be disinterested, do you cause him to forget himself and put any love into his heart? or do you only break him in and cause him to turn this way and that by the bit and lash of a driving necessity?” The sinner, apart from the grace of God, cannot see the truth. Wilberforce took Pitt to hear Cecil preach, but Pitt declared that he did not understand a word that Cecil said. Apart from the grace of God, the sinner, even when made to see the truth, resists it the more, the more clearly he sees it. Then the Holy Spirit overcomes his opposition and makes him willing in the day of God's power (Psalm 110:3).

B. The truth, as the efficient cause of regeneration.

According to this view, the truth as a system of motives is the direct and immediate cause of the change from unholiness to holiness. This view is objectionable for two reasons:

(a) It erroneously regards motives as wholly external to the mind that is influenced by them. This is to conceive of them as mechanically constraining the will, and is indistinguishable from necessitarianism. On the contrary, motives are compounded of external presentations and internal dispositions. It is the soul's affections which render certain suggestions attractive and others repugnant to us. In brief, the heart makes the motive.

(b) Only as truth is loved, therefore, can it be a motive to holiness. But we have seen that the aversion of the sinner to God is such that the truth is hated instead of loved, and a thing that is hated, is hated more [pg 818] intensely, the more distinctly it is seen. Hence no mere power of the truth can be regarded as the efficient cause of regeneration. The contrary view implies that it is not the truth which the sinner hates, but rather some element of error which is mingled with it.

Lyman Beecher and Charles G. Finney held this view. The influence of the Holy Spirit differs from that of the preacher only in degree,—both use only moral suasion; both do nothing more than to present the truth; both work upon the soul from without. “Were I as eloquent as the Holy Ghost, I could convert sinners as well as he,” said a popular preacher of this school (see Bennet Tyler, Letters on New Haven Theology, 164-171). On this view, it would be absurd to pray to God to regenerate, for that is more than he can do,—regeneration is simply the effect of truth.

Miley, in Meth. Quar., July, 1881:434-462, holds that “the will cannot rationally act without motive, but that it has always power to suspend action, or defer it, for the purpose of rational examination of the motive or end, and to consider the opposite motive or end. Putting the old end or motive out of view will temporarily break its power, and the new truth considered will furnish motive for right action. Thus, by using our faculty of suspending choice, and of fixing attention, we can realize the permanent eligibility of the good and choose it against the evil. This is, however, not the realization of a new spiritual life in regeneration, but the election of its attainment. Power to do this suspending is of grace [grace, however, given equally to all]. Without this power, life would be a spontaneous and irresponsible development of evil.”

The view of Miley, thus substantially given, resembles that of Dr. Taylor, upon which we have already commented; but, unlike that, it makes truth itself, apart from the affections, a determining agency in the change from sin to holiness. Our one reply is that, without a change in the affections, the truth can neither be known nor obeyed. Seeing cannot be the means of being born again, for one must first be born again in order to see the kingdom of God (John 3:3). The mind will not choose God, until God appears to be the greatest good.

Edwards, quoted by Griffin, Divine Efficiency, 64—“Let the sinner apply his rational powers to the contemplation of divine things, and let his belief be speculatively correct; still he is in such a state that those objects of contemplation will excite in him no holy affections.” The Scriptures declare (Rom. 8:7) that “the mind of the flesh is enmity”—not against some error or mistaken notion of God—but “is enmity against God.” It is God's holiness, mandatory and punitive, that is hated. A clearer view of that holiness will only increase the hatred. A woman's hatred of spiders will never be changed to love by bringing them close to her. Magnifying them with a compound oxy-hydrogen microscope will not help the matter. Tyler: “All the light of the last day will not subdue the sinner's heart.” The mere presence of God, and seeing God face to face, will be hell to him, if his hatred be not first changed to love. See E. D. Griffin, Divine Efficiency, 105-116, 203-221; and review of Griffin, by S. R. Mason, Truth Unfolded, 383-407.

Bradford, Heredity and Christian Problems, 239—“Christianity puts three motives before men: love, self-love, and fear.” True, but the last two are only preliminary motives, not essentially Christian. The soul that is moved only by self-love or by fear has not yet entered into the Christian life at all. And any attention to the truth of God which originates in these motives has no absolute moral value, and cannot be regarded as even a beginning of salvation. Nothing but holiness and love are entitled to be called Christianity, and these the truth of itself cannot summon up. The Spirit of God must go with the truth to impart right desires and to make the truth effective. E. G. Robinson: “The glory of our salvation can no more be attributed to the word of God only, than the glory of a Praxiteles or a Canova can be ascribed to the chisel or the mallet with which he wrought into beauty his immortal creations.”

C. The immediate agency of the Holy Spirit, as the efficient cause of regeneration.

In ascribing to the Holy Spirit the authorship of regeneration, we do not affirm that the divine Spirit accomplishes his work without any accompanying instrumentality. We simply assert that the power which regenerates is the power of God, and that although conjoined with the use of means, there is a direct operation of this power upon the sinner's heart [pg 819] which changes its moral character. We add two remarks by way of further explanation:

(a) The Scriptural assertions of the indwelling of the Holy Spirit and of his mighty power in the soul forbid us to regard the divine Spirit in regeneration as coming in contact, not with the soul, but only with the truth. The phrases, “to energize the truth,” “to intensify the truth,” “to illuminate the truth,” have no proper meaning; since even God cannot make the truth more true. If any change is wrought, it must be wrought, not in the truth, but in the soul.

The maxim, “Truth is mighty and will prevail,” is very untrue, if God be left out of the account. Truth without God is an abstraction, and not a power. It is a mere instrument, useless without an agent. “The sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God” (Eph. 6:17), must be wielded by the Holy Spirit himself. And the Holy Spirit comes in contact, not simply with the instrument, but with the soul. To all moral, and especially to all religious truth, there is an inward unsusceptibility, arising from the perversity of the affections and the will. This blindness and hardness of heart must be removed, before the soul can perceive or be moved by the truth. Hence the Spirit must deal directly with the soul. Denovan: “Our natural hearts are hearts of stone. The word of God is good seed sown on the hard, trodden, macadamized highway, which the horses of passion, the asses of self-will, the wagons of imaginary treasure, have made impenetrable. Only the Holy Spirit can soften and pulverize this soil.”

The Psalmist prays: “Incline my heart unto thy testimonies” (Ps. 119:36), while of Lydia it is said: “whose heart the Lord opened to give heed unto the things which were spoken by Paul” (Acts 16:14). We may say of the Holy Spirit: “He freezes and then melts the soil, He breaks the hard, cold stone, Kills out the rooted weeds so vile,—All this he does alone; And every virtue we possess, And every victory won, And every thought of holiness, Are his, and his alone.” Hence, in Ps. 90:16, 17, the Psalmist says, first: “Let thy work appear unto thy servants”; then “establish thou the work of our hands upon us”—God's work is first to appear,—then man's work, which is God's work carried out by human instruments. At Jericho, the force was not applied to the rams' horns, but to the walls. When Jesus healed the blind man, his power was applied, not to the spittle, but to the eyes. The impression is prepared, not by heating the seal, but by softening the wax. So God's power acts, not upon the truth, but upon the sinner.

Ps. 59:10—“My God with his lovingkindness will meet me”; A. V.—“The God of my mercy shall prevent me,” i. e., go before me. Augustine urges this text as proof that the grace of God precedes all merit of man: “What didst thou find in me but only sins? Before I do anything good, his mercy will go before me. What will unhappy Pelagius answer here?” Calvin however says this may be a pious, but it is not a fair, use of the passage. The passage does teach dependence upon God; but God's anticipation of our action, or in other words, the doctrine of prevenient grace, must be derived from other portions of Scripture, such as John 1:13, and Eph. 2:10. “The enthusiasm of humanity” to which J. R. Seeley, the author of Ecce Homo, exhorts us, is doubtless the secret of happiness and usefulness,—unfortunately he does not tell us whence it may come. John Stuart Mill felt the need of it, but he did not get it. Arthur Hugh Clough, Clergyman's First Tale: “Would I could wish my wishes all to rest, And know to wish the wish that were the best.” Bradford, Heredity, 228—“God is the environment of the soul, yet man has free will. Light fills the spaces, yet a man from ignorance may remain in a cave, or from choice may dwell in darkness.” Man needs therefore a divine influence which will beget in him a disposition to use his opportunities aright.

We may illustrate the philosophy of revivals by the canal boat which lies before the gate of a lock. No power on earth can open the lock. But soon the lock begins to fill, and when the water has reached the proper level, the gate can be opened almost at a touch. Or, a steamer runs into a sandbar. Tugs fail to pull the vessel off. Her own engines cannot accomplish it. But when the tide comes in, she swings free without effort. So what we need in religion is an influx of spiritual influence which will make easy what before is difficult if not impossible. The Superintendent of a New York State Prison tells us that the common schools furnish 83 per cent., and the colleges and academies over 4 per cent., of the inmates of Auburn and Sing Sing. Truth without the Holy Spirit to apply it is like sunshine without the actinic ray which alone can give it vitalizing energy.

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(b) Even if truth could be energized, intensified, illuminated, there would still be needed a change in the moral disposition, before the soul could recognize its beauty or be affected by it. No mere increase of light can enable a blind man to see; the disease of the eye must first be cured before external objects are visible. So God's work in regeneration must be performed within the soul itself. Over and above all influence of the truth, there must be a direct influence of the Holy Spirit upon the heart. Although wrought in conjunction with the presentation of truth to the intellect, regeneration differs from moral suasion in being an immediate act of God.

Before regeneration, man's knowledge of God is the blind man's knowledge of color. The Scriptures call such knowledge “ignorance” (Eph. 4:18). The heart does not appreciate God's mercy. Regeneration gives an experimental or heart knowledge; see Shedd, Dogm. Theol., 2:495. Is. 50:4—God “wakeneth mine ear to hear.” It is false to say that soul can come in contact with soul only through the influence of truth. In the intercourse of dear friends, or in the discourse of the orator, there is a personal influence, distinct from the word spoken, which persuades the heart and conquers the will. We sometimes call it “magnetism,”—but we mean simply that soul reaches soul, in ways apart from the use of physical intermediaries. Compare the facts, imperfectly known as yet, of second sight, mind-reading, clairvoyance. But whether these be accepted or not, it still is true that God has not made the human soul so that it is inaccessible to himself. The omnipresent Spirit penetrates and pervades all spirits that have been made by him. See Lotze, Outlines of Psychology (Ladd), 142, 143.

In the primary change of disposition, which is the most essential feature of regeneration, the Spirit of God acts directly upon the spirit of man. In the securing of the initial exercise of this new disposition—which constitutes the secondary feature of God's work of regeneration—the truth is used as a means. Hence, perhaps, in James 1:18, we read: “Of his own will he brought us forth by the word of truth” instead of “he begat us by the word of truth,”—the reference being to the secondary, not to the primary, feature of regeneration. The advocates of the opposite view—the view that God works onlythrough the truth as a means, and that his only influence upon the soul is a moral influence—very naturally deny the mystical union of the soul with Christ. Squier, for example, in his Autobiog., 343-378, esp. 360, on the Spirit's influences, quotes John 16:8—he “will convict the world in respect of sin”—to show that God regenerates by applying truth to men's minds, so far as to convince them, by fair and sufficient arguments, that they are sinners.

Christ, opening blind eyes and unstopping deaf ears, illustrates the nature of God's operation in regeneration,—in the case of the blind, there is plenty of light,—what is wanted is sight. The negro convert said that his conversion was due to himself and God: he fought against God with all his might, and God did the rest. So our moral successes are due to ourselves and God,—we have done only the fighting against God, and God has done the rest. The sand of Sahara would not bring forth flowers and fruit, even if you turned into it a hundred rivers like the Nile. Man may hear sermons for a lifetime, and still be barren of all spiritual growths. The soil of the heart needs to be changed, and the good seed of the kingdom needs to be planted there.

For the view that truth is “energized” or “intensified” by the Holy Spirit, see Phelps, New Birth, 61, 121; Walker, Philosophy of Plan of Salvation, chap. 18. Per contra, see Wardlaw, Syst. Theol., 3:24, 25; E. D. Griffin, Divine Efficiency, 73-116; Anderson, Regeneration, 123-168; Edwards, Works, 2:547-597; Chalmers, Lectures on Romans, chap. 1; Payne, Divine Sovereignty, lect. 23:363-367; Hodge, Syst. Theol., 3:3-37, 466-485. On the whole subject of the Efficient Cause of Regeneration, see Hopkins, Works, 1:454; Dwight, Theology, 2:418-429; John Owen, Works, 3:282-297, 366-538; Robert Hall, Sermon on the Cause, Agent, and Purpose of Regeneration.

4. The Instrumentality used in Regeneration.

A. The Roman, English and Lutheran churches hold that regeneration is accomplished through the instrumentality of baptism. The Disciples, or followers of Alexander Campbell, make regeneration include baptism, [pg 821] as well as repentance and faith. To the view that baptism is a means of regeneration we urge the following objections:

(a) The Scriptures represent baptism to be not the means but only the sign of regeneration, and therefore to presuppose and follow regeneration. For this reason only believers—that is, persons giving credible evidence of being regenerated—were baptized (Acts 8:12). Not external baptism, but the conscientious turning of the soul to God which baptism symbolizes, saves us (1 Pet. 3:21—συνειδήσεως ἀγαθῆς ἐπερώτημα). Texts like John 3:5, Acts 2:38, Col. 2:12, Tit. 3:5, are to be explained upon the principle that regeneration, the inward change, and baptism, the outward sign of that change, were regarded as only different sides or aspects of the same fact, and either side or aspect might therefore be described in terms derived from the other.

(b) Upon this view, there is a striking incongruity between the nature of the change to be wrought and the means employed to produce it. The change is a spiritual one, but the means are physical. It is far more rational to suppose that, in changing the character of intelligent beings, God uses means which have relation to their intelligence. The view we are considering is part and parcel of a general scheme of mechanical rather than moral salvation, and is more consistent with a materialistic than with a spiritual philosophy.

Acts 8:12—“when they believed Philip preaching good tidings concerning the kingdom of God and the name of Jesus Christ, they were baptized”; 1 Pet. 3:21—“which also after a true likeness doth now save you, even baptism, not the putting away of the filth of the flesh, but the interrogation [marg.—‘inquiry’, ‘appeal’] of a good conscience toward God” = the inquiry of the soul after God, the conscientious turning of the soul to God.

Plumptre, however, makes ἐπερώτημα a forensic term equivalent to “examination,”and including both question and answer. It means, then, the open answer of allegiance to Christ, given by the new convert to the constituted officers of the church. “That which is of the essence of the saving power of baptism is the confession and the profession which precede it. If this comes from a conscience that really renounces sin and believes on Christ, then baptism, as the channel through which the grace of the new birth is conveyed and the convert admitted into the church of Christ, ‘saves us,’but not otherwise.” We may adopt this statement from Plumptre's Commentary, with the alteration of the word “conveyed” into “symbolized” or “manifested.”Plumptre's interpretation is, as he seems to admit, in its obvious meaning inconsistent with infant baptism; to us it seems equally inconsistent with any doctrine of baptismal regeneration.

Scriptural regeneration is God's (1) changing man's disposition, and (2) securing its first exercise. Regeneration, according to the Disciples, is man's (1) repentance and faith, and (2) submission to baptism. Alexander Campbell, Christianity Restored: “We plead that all the converting power of the Holy Spirit is exhibited in the divine Record.” Address of Disciples to Ohio Baptist State Convention, 1871: “With us regeneration includes all that is comprehended in faith, repentance, and baptism, and so far as it is expressive of birth, it belongs more properly to the last of these than to either of the former.” But if baptism be the instrument of regeneration, it is difficult to see how the patriarchs, or the penitent thief, could have been regenerated. Luke 23:43—“This day shalt thou be with me in Paradise.” Bossuet: “This day”—what promptitude! “With me”—what companionship! “In Paradise”—what rest! Bersier: “ ‘This day’—what then? no flames of Purgatory? no long period of mournful expiation? ‘This day’—pardon and heaven!”

Baptism is a condition of being outwardly in the kingdom; it is not a condition of being inwardly in the kingdom. The confounding of these two led many in the early church to dread dying unbaptized, rather than dying unsaved. Even Pascal, in later times, held that participation in outward ceremonies might lead to real conversion. He probably meant that an initial act of holy will would tend to draw others in its train. Similarly we urge unconverted people to take some step that will manifest religious [pg 822]interest. We hope that in taking this step a new decision of the will, inwrought by the Spirit of God, may reveal itself. But a religion which consists only in such outward performances is justly denominated a cutaneous religion, for it is only skin-deep. On John 3:5—“Except one be born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God”; Acts 2:38—“Repent ye, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ unto the remission of your sins”; Col. 2:12—“buried with him in baptism, wherein ye were also raised with him through faith”; Tit. 3:5—“saved us, through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit”—see further discussion and exposition in our chapter on the Ordinances. Adkins, Disciples and Baptists, a booklet published by the Am. Bap. Pub. Society, is the best statement of the Baptist position, as distinguished from that of the Disciples. It claims that Disciples overrate the externals of Christianity and underrate the work of the Holy Spirit. Per contra, see Gates, Disciples and Baptists.

B. The Scriptural view is that regeneration, so far as it secures an activity of man, is accomplished through the instrumentality of the truth. Although the Holy Spirit does not in any way illuminate the truth, he does illuminate the mind, so that it can perceive the truth. In conjunction with the change of man's inner disposition, there is an appeal to man's rational nature through the truth. Two inferences may be drawn:

(a) Man is not wholly passive at the time of his regeneration. He is passive only with respect to the change of his ruling disposition. With respect to the exercise of this disposition, he is active. Although the efficient power which secures this exercise of the new disposition is the power of God, yet man is not therefore unconscious, nor is he a mere machine worked by God's fingers. On the other hand, his whole moral nature under God's working is alive and active. We reject the “exercise-system,” which regards God as the direct author of all man's thoughts, feelings, and volitions, not only in its general tenor, but in its special application to regeneration.

Shedd, Dogm. Theol., 2:503—“A dead man cannot assist in his own resurrection.”This is true so far as the giving of life is concerned. But once made alive, man can, like Lazarus, obey Christ's command and “come forth” (John 11:43). In fact, if he does not obey, there is no evidence that there is spiritual life. “In us is God; we burn but as he moves”—“Est deus in nobis; agitante calescimus illo.” Wireless telegraphy requires an attuned receiver; regeneration attunes the soul so that it vibrates responsively to God and receives the communications of his truth. When a convert came to Rowland Hill and claimed that she had been converted in a dream, he replied: “We will see how you walk, now that you are awake.”

Lord Bacon said he would open every one of Argus's hundred eyes, before he opened one of Briareus's hundred hands. If God did not renew men's hearts in connection with our preaching of the truth, we might well give up our ministry. E. G. Robinson: “The conversion of a soul is just as much according to law as the raising of a crop of turnips.” Simon, Reconciliation, 377—“Though the mere preaching of the gospel is not the cause of the conversion and revivification of men, it is a necessary condition—as necessary as the action of light and heat, or other physical agencies, are on a germ, if it is to develop, grow, and bear its proper fruit.”

(b) The activity of man's mind in regeneration is activity in view of the truth. God secures the initial exercise of the new disposition which he has wrought in man's heart in connection with the use of truth as a means. Here we perceive the link between the efficiency of God and the activity of man. Only as the sinner's mind is brought into contact with the truth, does God complete his regenerating work. And as the change of inward disposition and the initial exercise of it are never, so far as we know, separated by any interval of time, we can say, in general, that Christian work is successful only as it commends the truth to every man's conscience in the sight of God (2 Cor. 4:2).

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In Eph. 1:17, 18, there is recognized the divine illumination of the mind to behold the truth—“may give unto you a spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of him; having the eyes of your heart enlightened, that ye may know what is the hope of his calling” On truth as a means of regeneration, see Hovey, Outlines, 192, who quotes Cunningham, Historical Theology, 1:617—“Regeneration may be taken in a limited sense as including only the first impartation of spiritual life ... or it may be taken in a wider sense as comprehending the whole of that process by which he is renewed or made over again in the whole man after the image of God,—i. e., as including the production of saving faith and union to Christ. Only in the first sense did the Reformers maintain that man in the process was wholly passive and not active; for they did not dispute that, before the process in the second and more enlarged sense was completed, man was spiritually alive and active, and continued so ever after during the whole process of his sanctification.”

Dr. Hovey suggests an apt illustration of these two parts of the Holy Spirit's work and their union in regeneration: At the same time that God makes the photographic plate sensitive, he pours in the light of truth whereby the image of Christ is formed in the soul. Without the “sensitizing” of the plate, it would never fix the rays of light so as to retain the image. In the process of “sensitizing,” the plate is passive; under the influence of light, it is active. In both the “sensitizing” and the taking of the picture, the real agent is not the plate nor the light, but the photographer. The photographer cannot perform both operations at the same moment. God can. He gives the new affection, and at the same instant he secures its exercise in view of the truth.

For denial of the instrumentality of truth in regeneration, see Pierce, in Bap. Quar., Jan. 1872:52. Per contra, see Anderson, Regeneration, 89-122. H. B. Smith holds middle ground. He says: “In adults it [regeneration] is wrought most frequently by the word of God as the instrument. Believing that infants may be regenerated, we cannot assert that it is tied to the word of God absolutely.” We prefer to say that, if infants are regenerated, they also are regenerated in conjunction with some influence of truth upon the mind, dim as the recognition of it may be. Otherwise we break the Scriptural connection between regeneration and conversion, and open the way for faith in a physical, magical, sacramental salvation. Squier, Autobiog., 368, says well, of the theory of regeneration which makes man purely passive, that it has a benumbing effect upon preaching: “The lack of expectation unnerves the efforts of the preacher; an impression of the fortuitous presence neutralizes his engagedness. This antinomian dependence on the Spirit extracts all vitality from the pulpit and sense of responsibility from the hearer, and makes preaching an opus operatum, like the baptismal regeneration of the formalist.” Only of the first element in regeneration are Shedd's words true: “A dead man cannot assist in his own resurrection” (Dogm. Theol., 2:503).

Squier goes to the opposite extreme of regarding the truth alone as the cause of regeneration. His words are none the less a valuable protest against the view that regeneration is so entirely due to God that in no part of it is man active. It was with a better view that Luther cried: “O that we might multiply living books, that is, preachers!” And the preacher is successful only as he possesses and unfolds the truth. John took the little book from the Covenant-angel's hand and ate it (Rev. 10:8-11). So he who is to preach God's truth must feed upon it, until it has become his own. For the Exercise-system, see Emmons, Works, 4:339-411; Hagenbach, Hist. Doct., 2:439.

5. The Nature of the Change wrought in Regeneration.

A. It is a change in which the governing disposition is made holy. This implies that:

(a) It is not a change in the substance of either body or soul. Regeneration is not a physical change. There is no physical seed or germ implanted in man's nature. Regeneration does not add to, or subtract from, the number of man's intellectual, emotional or voluntary faculties. But regeneration is the giving of a new direction or tendency to powers of affection which man possessed before. Man had the faculty of love before, but his love was supremely set on self. In regeneration the direction of that faculty is changed, and his love is now set supremely upon God.

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Eph. 2:10—“created in Christ Jesus for good works”—does not imply that the old soul is annihilated, and a new soul created. The “old man” which is “crucified”—(Rom. 6:6) and “put away” (Eph. 4:22) is simply the sinful bent of the affections and will. When this direction of the dispositions is changed, and becomes holy, we can call the change a new birth of the old nature, because the same faculties that acted before are acting now, the only difference being that now these faculties are set toward God and purity. Or, regarding the change from another point of view, we may speak of man as having a “new nature,” as “recreated,” as being a “new creature,” because this direction of the affection and will, which ensures a different life from what was led before, is something totally new, and due wholly to the regenerating act of God. In 1 Pet. 1:23—“begotten again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible”—all materialistic inferences from the word “seed,” as if it implied the implantation of a physical germ, are prevented by the following explanatory words: “through the word of God, which liveth and abideth.”

So, too, when we describe regeneration as the communication of a new life to the soul, we should not conceive of this new life as a substance imparted or infused into us. The new life is rather a new direction and activity of our own affections and will. There is, indeed a union of the soul with Christ; Christ dwells in the renewed heart; Christ's entrance into the soul is the cause and accompaniment of its regeneration. But this entrance of Christ into the soul is not itself regeneration. We must distinguish the effect from the cause; otherwise we shall be in danger of a pantheistic confounding of our own personality and life with the personality and life of Christ. Christ is indeed our life, in the sense of being the cause and supporter of our life, but he is not our life in the sense that, after our union with him, our individuality ceases. The effect of union with Christ is rather that our individuality is enlarged and exalted (John 10:10—“I came that they may have life, and may have it abundantly.” See page 799, (c)).

We must therefore take with a grain of allowance the generally excellent words of A. J. Gordon, Twofold Life, 22—“Regeneration is the communication of the divine nature to man by the operation of the Holy Spirit through the word (2 Pet. 1:4).... As Christ was made partaker of human nature by incarnation, that so he might enter into truest fellowship with us, we are made partakers of the divine nature, by regeneration, that we may enter into truest fellowship with God. Regeneration is not a change of nature, i. e., a natural heart bettered. Eternal life is not natural life prolonged into endless duration. It is the divine life imparted to us, the very life of God communicated to the human soul, and bringing forth there its proper fruit.” Dr. Gordon's view that regeneration adds a new substance or faculty to the soul is the result of literalizing the Scripture metaphors of creation and life. This turning of symbol into fact accounts for his tendency toward annihilation doctrine in the case of the unregenerate, toward faith cure and the belief that all physical evils can be removed by prayer. E. H. Johnson, The Holy Spirit: “Regeneration is a change, not in the quantity, but in the quality, of the soul.” E. G. Robinson, Christian Theology, 320—“Regeneration consists in a divinely wrought change in the moral affections.”

So, too, we would criticize the doctrine of Drummond, Nat. Law in the Spir. World: “People forget the persistence of force. Instead of transforming energy, they try to create it. We must either depend on environment, or be self-sufficient. The ‘cannot bear fruit of itself’ (John 15:4) is the ‘cannot’ of natural law. Natural fruit flourishes with air and sunshine. The difference between the Christian and the non-Christian is the difference between the organic and the inorganic. The Christian has all the characteristics of life: assimilation, waste, reproduction, spontaneous action.” See criticism of Drummond, by Murphy, in Brit. Quar., 1884:118-125—“As in resurrection there is a physical connection with the old body, so in regeneration there is a natural connection with the old soul.” Also, Brit. Quar., July, 1880, art.: Evolution Viewed in Relation to Theology—“The regenerating agency of the Spirit of God is symbolized, not by the vitalization of dead matter, but by the agency of the organizing intelligence which guides the evolution of living beings.” Murphy's answer to Drummond is republished. Murphy's Natural Selection and Spiritual Freedom, 1-33—“The will can no more create force, either muscular or mental, than it can create matter. And it is equally true that for our spiritual nourishment and spiritual force we are altogether dependent on our spiritual environment, which is God.” In “dead matter” there is no sin.

Drummond would imply that, as matter has no promise or potency of life and is not responsible for being without life (or “dead,” to use his misleading word), and if it ever is to live must wait for the life-giving influence to come unsought, so the human soul is not responsible for being spiritually dead, cannot seek for life, must passively wait for the Spirit. Plymouth Brethren generally hold the same view with [pg 825]Drummond, that regeneration adds something—as vitality—to the substance of the soul. Christ is transsubstantiated into the soul's substance; or, the πνεῦμα is added. But we have given over talking of vitality, as if it were a substance or faculty. We regard it as merely a mode of action. Evolution, moreover, uses what already exists, so far as it will go, instead of creating new; as in the miracle of the loaves, and as in the original creation of man, so in his recreation or regeneration. Dr. Charles Hodge also makes the same mistake in calling regeneration an “origination of the principle of the spirit of life, just as literal and real a creation as the origination of the principle of natural life.” This, too, literalizes Scripture metaphor, and ignores the fact that the change accomplished in regeneration is an exclusively moral one. There is indeed a new entrance of Christ into the soul, or a new exercise of his spiritual power within the soul. But the effect of Christ's working is not to add any new faculty or substance, but only to give new direction to already existing powers.

(b) Regeneration involves an enlightenment of the understanding and a rectification of the volitions. But it seems most consonant with Scripture and with a correct psychology to regard these changes as immediate and necessary consequences of the change of disposition already mentioned, rather than as the primary and central facts in regeneration. The taste for truth logically precedes perception of the truth, and love for God logically precedes obedience to God; indeed, without love no obedience is possible. Reverse the lever of affection, and this moral locomotive, without further change, will move away from sin, and toward truth and God.

Texts which seem to imply that a right taste, disposition, affection, logically precedes both knowledge of God and obedience to God, are the following: Ps. 34:8—“Oh taste and see that Jehovah is good”; 119:36—“Incline my heart unto thy testimonies”; Jer. 24:7—“I will give them a heart to know me”; Mat. 5:8—“Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God”; John 7:17—“If any man willeth to do his will, he shall know of the teaching, whether it is of God”; Acts 16:14—of Lydia it is said: “whose heart the Lord opened to give heed unto the things which were spoken by Paul”; Eph. 1:18—“having the eyes of your heart enlightened.” “Change the centre of a circle and you change the place and direction of all its radii.”

The text John 1:12, 13—“But as many as received him, to them gave him the right to become children of God, even to them that believe on his name: who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God”—seems at first sight to imply that faith is the condition of regeneration, and therefore prior to it. “But if ἐξουσίαν here signifies the ‘right’ or ‘privilege’ of sonship, it is a right which may presuppose faith as the work of the Spirit in regeneration—a work apart from which no genuine faith exists in the soul. But it is possible that John means to say that, in the case of all who received Christ, their power to believe was given to them by him. In the original the emphasis is on ‘gave,’ and this is shown by the order of the words”; see Hovey, Manual of Theology, 345, and Com. on John 1:12, 13—“The meaning would then be this: ‘Many did not receive him; but some did; and as to all who received him, he gave them grace by which they were enabled to do this, and so to become God's children.’ ”

Ruskin: “The first and last and closest trial question to any living creature is, ‘What do you like?’ Go out into the street and ask the first man you meet what his taste is, and, if he answers candidly, you know him, body and soul. What we like determines what we are, and is the sign of what we are; and to teach taste is inevitably to form character.” If the taste here spoken of is moral and spiritual taste, the words of Ruskin are sober truth. Regeneration is essentially a changing of the fundamental taste of the soul. But by taste we mean the direction of man's love, the bent of his affections, the trend of his will. And to alter that taste is not to impart a new faculty, or to create a new substance, but simply to set toward God the affections which hitherto have been set upon self and sin. We may illustrate by the engineer who climbs over the cab into a runaway locomotive and who changes its course, not by adding any new rod or cog to the machine, but simply by reversing the lever. The engine slows up and soon moves in an opposite direction to that in which it has been going. Man needs no new faculty of love; he needs only to have his love set in a new and holy direction; this is virtually to give him a new birth, to make him a new creature, to impart to him a new life. But being born again, created anew, made alive from the dead, are physical metaphors, to be interpreted not literally but spiritually.

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(c) It is objected, indeed, that we know only of mental substance and of mental acts, and that the new disposition or state just mentioned, since it is not an act, must be regarded as a new substance, and so lack all moral quality. But we reply that, besides substance and acts, there are habits, tendencies, proclivities, some of them native and some of them acquired. They are voluntary, and have moral character. If we can by repeated acts originate sinful tendencies, God can surely originate in us holy tendencies. Such holy tendencies formed a part of the nature of Adam, as he came from the hand of God. As the result of the Fall, we are born with tendencies toward evil for which we are responsible. Regeneration is a restoration of the original tendencies toward God which were lost by the Fall. Such holy tendencies (tastes, dispositions, affections) are not only not unmoral—they are the only possible springs of right moral action. Only in the restoration of them does man become truly free.

Mat. 12:33—“Make the tree good, and its fruit good”; Eph. 2:10—“created in Christ Jesus for good works.”The tree is first made good—the character renewed in its fundamental principle, love to God—in the certainty that when this is done the fruit will be good also. Good works are the necessary result of regeneration by union with Christ. Regeneration introduces a new force into humanity, the force of a new love. The work of the preacher is that of coöperation with God in the impartation of a new life—a work far more radical and more noble than that of moral reform, by as much as the origination of a new force is more radical and more noble than the guidance of that force after it has been originated. Does regeneration cure disease and remove physical ills? Not primarily. Mat. 1:21—“thou shalt call his name Jesus; for it is he that shall save his people from their sins.”Salvation from sin is Christ's first and main work. He performed physical healing only to illustrate and further the healing of the soul. Hence in the case of the paralytic, when he was expected to cure the body, he said first: “thy sins are forgiven” (Mat. 9:2); but, that they who stood by might not doubt his power to forgive, he added the raising up of the palsied man. And ultimately in every redeemed man the holy heart will bring in its train the perfected body: Rom. 8:23—“we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for our adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body.”

On holy affection as the spring of holy action, see especially Edwards, Religious Affections, in Works, 3:1-21. This treatise is Jonathan Edwards's Confessions, as much as if it were directly addressed to the Deity. Allen, his biographer, calls it “a work which will not suffer by comparison with the work of great teachers in theology, whether ancient or modern.” President Timothy Dwight regarded it as most worthy of preservation next to the Bible. See also Hodge, Essays and Reviews, 1:48; Owen on the Holy Spirit, in Works, 3:297-336; Charnock on Regeneration; Andrew Fuller, Works, 2:461-471, 512-560, and 3:796; Bellamy, Works, 2:502; Dwight, Works, 2:418; Woods, Works, 3:1-21; Anderson, Regeneration, 21-50.

B. It is an instantaneous change, in a region of the soul below consciousness, and is therefore known only in its results.

(a) It is an instantaneous change.—Regeneration is not a gradual work. Although there may be a gradual work of God's providence and Spirit, preparing the change, and a gradual recognition of it after it has taken place, there must be an instant of time when, under the influence of God's Spirit, the disposition of the soul, just before hostile to God, is changed to love. Any other view assumes an intermediate state of indecision which has no moral character at all, and confounds regeneration either with conviction or with sanctification.

Conviction of sin is an ordinary, if not an invariable, antecedent of regeneration. It results from the contemplation of truth. It is often accompanied by fear, remorse, and cries for mercy. But these desires and fears are not signs of regeneration. They are selfish. They are quite consistent with manifest and dreadful enmity to God. [pg 827]They have a hopeful aspect, simply because they are evidence that the Holy Spirit is striving with the soul. But this work of the Spirit is not yet regeneration; at most, it is preparation for regeneration. So far as the sinner is concerned, he is more of a sinner than ever before; because, under more light than has ever before been given him, he is still rejecting Christ and resisting the Spirit. The word of God and the Holy Spirit appeal to lower as well as to higher motives; most men's concern about religion is determined, at the outset, by hope or fear. See Shedd, Dogm. Theol., 2:512.

All these motives, though they are not the highest, are yet proper motives to influence the soul; it is right to seek God from motives of self-interest, and because we desire heaven. But the seeking which not only begins, but ends, upon this lower plane, is never successful. Until the soul gives itself to God from motives of love, it is never saved. And so long as these preliminary motives rule, regeneration has not yet taken place. Bible-reading, and prayers, and church-attendance, and partial reformations, are certainly better than apathy or outbreaking sin. They may be signs that God is working in the soul. But without complete surrender to God, they may be accompanied with the greatest guilt and the greatest danger; simply because, under such influences, the withholding of submission implies the most active hatred to God, and opposition to his will. Instance cases of outward reformation that preceded regeneration,—like that of John Bunyan, who left off swearing before his conversion. Park: “The soul is a monad, and must turn all at once. If we are standing on the line, we are yet unregenerate. We are regenerate only when we cross it.” There is a prevenient grace as well as a regenerating grace. Wendelius indeed distinguished five kinds of grace, namely, prevenient, preparatory, operant, coöperant, and perfecting.

While in some cases God's preparatory work occupies a long time, there are many cases in which he cuts short his work in righteousness (Rom. 9:28). Some persons are regenerated in infancy or childhood, cannot remember a time when they did not love Christ, and yet take long to learn that they are regenerate. Others are convicted and converted suddenly in mature years. The best proof of regeneration is not the memory of a past experience, however vivid and startling, but rather a present inward love for Christ, his holiness, his servants, his work, and his word. Much sympathy should be given to those who have been early converted, but who, from timidity, self-distrust, or the faults of inconsistent church members, have been deterred from joining themselves with Christian people, and so have lost all hope and joy in their religious lives. Instance the man who, though converted in a revival of religion, was injured by a professed Christian, and became a recluse, but cherished the memory of his dead wife and child, kept the playthings of the one and the clothing of the other, and left directions to have them buried with him.

As there is danger of confounding regeneration with preparatory influences of God's Spirit, so there is danger of confounding regeneration with sanctification. Sanctification, as the development of the new affection, is gradual and progressive. But no beginning is progressive or gradual; and regeneration is a beginning of the new affection. We may gradually come to the knowledge that a new affection exists, but the knowledge of a beginning is one thing; the beginning itself is another thing. Luther had experienced a change of heart, long before he knew its meaning or could express his new feelings in scientific form. It is not in the sense of a gradual regeneration, but in the sense of a gradual recognition of the fact of regeneration, and a progressive enjoyment of its results, that “the path of the righteous” is said to be “as the dawning light”—the morning-dawn that begins in faintness, but—“that shineth more and more unto the perfect day”(Prov. 4:18). Cf. 2 Cor. 4:4—“the god of this world hath blinded the minds of the unbelieving, that the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should not dawn upon them.” Here the recognition of God's work is described as gradual; that the work itself is instantaneous, appears from the following verse 6—“Seeing it is God, that said, Light shall shine out of darkness, who shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.”

Illustrate by the unconscious crossing of the line which separates one State of the Federal Union from another. From this doctrine of instantaneous regeneration, we may infer the duty of reaping as well as of sowing: John 4:38—“I sent you to reap.” “It is a mistaken notion that it takes God a long time to give increase to the seed planted in a sinner's heart. This grows out of the idea that regeneration is a matter of training; that a soul must be educated from a lost state into a state of salvation. Let us remember that three thousand, whom in the morning Peter called murderers of Christ, were before night regenerated and baptized members of his church.” Drummond, in his Nat. Law in the Spir. World, remarks upon the humaneness of sudden conversion. As [pg 828]self-limitation, self-mortification, suicide of the old nature, it is well to have it at once done and over with, and not to die by degrees.

(b) This change takes place in the region of the soul below consciousness.—It is by no means true that God's work in regeneration is always recognized by the subject of it. On the other hand, it is never directly perceived at all. The working of God in the human soul, since it contravenes no law of man's being, but rather puts him in the full and normal possession of his own powers, is secret and inscrutable. Although man is conscious, he is not conscious of God's regenerating agency.

We know our own natural existence only through the phenomena of thought and sense. So we know our own spiritual existence, as new creatures in Christ, only through the new feelings and experiences of the soul. “The will does not need to act solitarily, in order to act freely.” God acts on the will, and the resulting holiness is true freedom. John 8:36—“If therefore the Son shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed.” We have the consciousness of freedom; but the act of God in giving us this freedom is beyond or beneath our consciousness.

Both Luther and Calvin used the word regeneration in a loose way, confounding it with sanctification. After the Federalists made a distinct doctrine of it, Calvinists in general came to treat it separately. And John Wesley rescued it from identification with sacraments, by showing its connection with the truth. E. G. Robinson: “Regeneration is in one sense instantaneous, in another sense not. There is necessity of some sort of knowledge in regeneration. The doctrine of Christ crucified is the fit instrument. The object of religion is to produce a sound rather than an emotional experience. Revivals of religion are valuable in just the proportion in which they produce rational conviction and permanently righteous action.” But none are left unaffected by them. “An arm of the magnetic needle must be attracted to the magnetic pole of the earth, or it must be repelled,—there is no such thing as indifference. Modern materialism, refusing to say that the fear of God is the beginning of wisdom, is led to declare that the hate of God is the beginning of wisdom” (Diesselhoff, Die klassische Poesie, 8).

(c) This change, however, is recognized indirectly in its results.—At the moment of regeneration, the soul is conscious only of the truth and of its own exercises with reference to it. That God is the author of its new affection is an inference from the new character of the exercises which it prompts. The human side or aspect of regeneration is Conversion. This, and the Sanctification which follows it (including the special gifts of the Holy Spirit), are the sole evidences in any particular case that regeneration is an accomplished fact.

Regeneration, though it is the birth of a perfect child, is still the birth of a child. The child is to grow, and the growth is sanctification; in other words, sanctification, as we shall see, is simply the strengthening and development of the holy affection which begins its existence in regeneration. Hence the subject of the epistle to the Romans—salvation by faith—includes not only justification by faith (chapters 1-7), but sanctification by faith (chapters 8-16). On evidences of regeneration, see Anderson, Regeneration, 169-214, 227-295; Woods, Works, 44-55. The transition from justification by faith to sanctification by faith is in chapter 8 of the epistle to the Romans. That begins by declaring that there is no condemnation in Christ, and ends by declaring that there is no separationfrom Christ. The work of the Holy Spirit follows upon the work of Christ. See Godet on the epistle.

The doctrine of Alexander Campbell was a protest against laying an unscriptural emphasis on emotional states as evidences of regeneration—a protest which certain mystical and antinomian exaggerations of evangelical teaching very justly provoked. But Campbell went to the opposite extreme of practically excluding emotion from religion, and of confining the work of the Holy Spirit to the conscious influence of the truth. Disciples need to recognize a power of the Holy Spirit exerted below consciousness, in order to explain the conscious acceptance of Christ and of his salvation.

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William James, Varieties of Religious Experience, 271—“If we should conceive that the human mind, with its different possibilities of equilibrium, might be like a many sided solid with different surfaces on which it could lie flat, we might liken mental revolutions to the spatial revolutions of such a body. As it is pried up, say by a lever, from a position in which it lies on surface A, for instance, it will linger for a time unstably half way up, and if the lever cease to urge it, it will tumble back or relapse, under the continued pull of gravity. But if at last it rotate far enough for its centre of gravity to pass beyond the surface A altogether, the body will fall over, on surface B, say, and will abide there permanently. The pulls of gravity towards A have vanished, and may now be disregarded. The polyhedron has become immune against further attraction from this direction.”

III. Conversion.

Conversion is that voluntary change in the mind of the sinner, in which he turns, on the one hand, from sin, and on the other hand, to Christ. The former or negative element in conversion, namely, the turning from sin, we denominate repentance. The latter or positive element in conversion, namely, the turning to Christ, we denominate faith.

For account of repentance and faith as elements of conversion, see Andrew Fuller, Works, 1:666; Luthardt, Compendium der Dogmatik, 3d ed., 201-206. The two elements of conversion seem to be in the mind of Paul, when he writes in Rom. 6:11—“reckon ye also yourselves to be dead unto sin, but alive unto God in Christ Jesus”; Col. 3:3—“ye died, and your life is hid with Christ in God.” Cf. ἀποστρέφω, in Acts 3:26—“in turning away every one of you from your iniquities,” with ἐπιστρέφω in Acts 11:21—“believed” and “turned unto the Lord.” A candidate for ordination was once asked which came first: regeneration or conversion. He replied very correctly: “Regeneration and conversion are like the cannon-ball and the hole—they both go through together.” This is true however only as to their chronological relation. Logically the ball is first and causes the hole, not the hole first and causes the ball.

(a) Conversion is the human side or aspect of that fundamental spiritual change which, as viewed from the divine side, we call regeneration. It is simply man's turning. The Scriptures recognize the voluntary activity of the human soul in this change as distinctly as they recognize the causative agency of God. While God turns men to himself (Ps. 85:4; Song 1:4; Jer. 31:18; Lam. 5:21), men are exhorted to turn themselves to God (Prov. 1:23; Is. 31:6; 59:20; Ez. 14:6; 18:32; 33:9, 11; Joel 2:12-14). While God is represented as the author of the new heart and the new spirit (Ps. 51:10; Ez. 11:19; 36:26), men are commanded to make for themselves a new heart and a new spirit (Ez. 18:31; 2 Cor. 7:1; cf. Phil. 2:12, 13; Eph. 5:14).

Ps. 85:4—“Turn us, O God of our salvation”; Song 1:4—“Draw me, we will run after thee”; Jer. 31:18—“turn thou me, and I shall be turned”; Lam. 5:21—“Turn thou us unto thee, O Jehovah, and we shall be turned.”

Prov. 1:23—“Turn you at my reproof: Behold, I will pour out my spirit unto you”; Is. 31:6—“Turn ye unto him from whom ye have deeply revolted, O children of Israel”; 59:20—“And a Redeemer will come to Zion, and unto them that turn from transgression in Jacob”; Ez. 14:6—“Return ye, and turn yourselves from your idols”; 18:32—“turn yourselves and live”; 33:9—“if thou warn the wicked of his way to turn from it, and he turn not from his way, he shall die in his iniquity”; 11—“turn ye, turn ye from your evil ways; for why will ye die, O house of Israel?” Joel 2:12-14—“turn ye unto me with all your heart.”

Ps. 51:10—“Create in me a clean heart, O God; And renew a right spirit within me”; Ez. 11:19—“And I will give them one heart, and I will put a new spirit within you; and I will take the stony heart out of their flesh, and will give them a heart of flesh”; 36:26—“A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you.”

Ez. 18:31—“Cast away from you all your transgressions, wherein ye have transgressed; and make you a new heart and a new spirit: for why will ye die, O house of Israel?” 2 Cor. 7:1—“Having therefore these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all defilement of flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God”; cf. Phil. 2:12, 13—“work out your own salvation with fear and trembling; for it is God who worketh in you both to will and to work, for his good pleasure”; Eph. 5:14—“Awake, thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall shine upon thee.”

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When asked the way to heaven, Bishop Wilberforce replied: “Take the first turn to the right, and go straight forward.” Phillips Brooks's conversion is described by Professor Allen, Life, 1:266, as consisting in the resolve “to be true to himself, to renounce nothing which he knew to be good, and yet bring all things captive to the obedience of God, ... the absolute surrender of his will to God, in accordance with the example of Christ: ‘Lo, I am come ... to do thy will, O God’ (Heb. 10:7).”

(b) This twofold method of representation can be explained only when we remember that man's powers may be interpenetrated and quickened by the divine, not only without destroying man's freedom, but with the result of making man for the first time truly free. Since the relation between the divine and the human activity is not one of chronological succession, man is never to wait for God's working. If he is ever regenerated, it must be in and through a movement of his own will, in which he turns to God as unconstrainedly and with as little consciousness of God's operation upon him, as if no such operation of God were involved in the change. And in preaching, we are to press upon men the claims of God and their duty of immediate submission to Christ, with the certainty that they who do so submit will subsequently recognize this new and holy activity of their own wills as due to a working within them of divine power.

Ps. 110:3—“Thy people offer themselves willingly in the day of thy power.” The act of God is accompanied by an activity of man. Dorner: “God's act initiates action.” There is indeed an original changing of man's tastes and affections, and in this man is passive. But this is only the first aspect of regeneration. In the second aspect of it—the rousing of man's powers—God's action is accompanied by man's activity, and regeneration is but the obverse side of conversion. Luther's word: “Man, in conversion, is purely passive,”is true only of the first part of the change; and here, by “conversion,” Luther means “regeneration.” Melanchthon said better: “Non est enim coäctio, ut voluntas non possit repugnare: trahit Deus, sed volentem trahit.” See Meyer on Rom. 8:14—“led by the Spirit of God”: “The expression,” Meyer says, “is passive, though without prejudice to the human will, as verse 13 proves: ‘by the Spirit ye put to death the deeds of the body.’ ”

As, by a well known principle of hydrostatics, the water contained in a little tube can balance the water of a whole ocean, so God's grace can be balanced by man's will. As sunshine on the sand produces nothing unless man sow the seed, and as a fair breeze does not propel the vessel unless man spread the sails, so the influences of God's Spirit require human agencies, and work through them. The Holy Spirit is sovereign,—he bloweth where he listeth. Even though there be uniform human conditions, there will not be uniform spiritual results. Results are often independent of human conditions as such. This is the truth emphasized by Andrew Fuller. But this does not prevent us from saying that, whenever God's Spirit works in regeneration, there is always accompanying it a voluntary change in man, which we call conversion, and that this change is as free, and as really man's own work, as if there were no divine influence upon him.

Jesus told the man with the withered hand to stretch forth his hand; it was the man's duty to stretch it forth, not to wait for strength from God to do it. Jesus told the man sick of the palsy to take up his bed and walk. It was that man's duty to obey the command, not to pray for power to obey. Depend wholly upon God? Yes, as you depend wholly upon wind when you sail, yet need to keep your sails properly set. “Work out your own salvation” comes first in the apostle's exhortation; “for it is God who worketh in you” follows (Phil. 2:12, 13); which means that our first business is to use our wills in obedience; then we shall find that God has gone before us to prepare us to obey.

Mat. 11:12—“the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and men of violence take it by force.” Conversion is like the invasion of a kingdom. Men are not to wait for God's time, but to act at once. Not bodily exercises are required, but impassioned earnestness of soul. Wendt, Teaching of Jesus, 2:49-56—“Not injustice and violence, but energetic laying hold of a good to which they can make no claim. It is of no avail to wait idly, or to seek laboriously to earn it; but it is of avail to lay hold of it and to retain it. It is ready as a gift of God for men, but men must direct their desire and will toward it.... The man who put on the wedding garment did not earn his share of the feast thereby, yet he did show the disposition without which he was not permitted to partake of it.”

[pg 831]

James, Varieties of Religious Experience, 12—“The two main phenomena of religion, they will say, are essentially phenomena of adolescence, and therefore synchronous with the development of sexual life. To which the retort is easy: Even were the asserted synchrony unrestrictedly true as a fact (which it is not), it is not only the sexual life, but the entire higher mental life, which awakens during adolescence. One might then as well set up the thesis that the interest in mechanics, physics, chemistry, logic, physiology and sociology, which springs up during adolescent years along with that in poetry and religion, is also a perversion of the sexual instinct, but this would be too absurd. Moreover, if the argument from synchrony is to decide, what is to be done with the fact that the religious age par excellence would seem to be old age, when the uproar of the sexual life is past?”

(c) From the fact that the word “conversion” means simply “a turning,” every turning of the Christian from sin, subsequent to the first, may, in a subordinate sense, be denominated a conversion (Luke 22:32). Since regeneration is not complete sanctification, and the change of governing disposition is not identical with complete purification of the nature, such subsequent turnings from sin are necessary consequences and evidences of the first (cf. John 13:10). But they do not, like the first, imply a change in the governing disposition,—they are rather new manifestations of a disposition already changed. For this reason, conversion proper, like the regeneration of which it is the obverse side, can occur but once. The phrase “second conversion,” even if it does not imply radical misconception of the nature of conversion, is misleading. We prefer, therefore, to describe these subsequent experiences, not by the term “conversion,” but by such phrases as “breaking off, forsaking, returning from, neglects or transgressions,” and “coming back to Christ, trusting anew in him.” It is with repentance and faith, as elements in that first and radical change by which the soul enters upon a state of salvation, that we have now to do.

Luke 22:31, 32—“Simon, Simon, behold, Satan asked to have you, that he might sift you as wheat: but I made supplication for thee, that thy faith fail not; and do thou, when once thou hast turned again [A. V.: ‘art converted’], establish thy brethren”; John 13:10—“He that is bathed [has taken a full bath] needeth not save to wash his feet, but is clean every whit [as a whole].” Notice that Jesus here announces that only one regeneration is needed,—what follows is not conversion but sanctification. Spurgeon said he believed in regeneration, but not in re-regeneration. Second blessing? Yes, and a forty-second. The stages in the Christian life are like ice, water, invisible vapor, steam, all successive and natural results of increasing temperature, seemingly different from one another, yet all forms of the same element.

On the relation between the divine and the human agencies, we quote a different view from another writer: “God decrees to employ means which in every case are sufficient, and which in certain cases it is foreseen will be effectual. Human action converts a sufficient means into an effectual means. The result is not always according to the varying use of means. The power is all of God. Man has power to resist only. There is a universal influence of the Spirit, but the influences of the Spirit vary in different cases, just as external opportunities do. The love of holiness is blunted, but it still lingers. The Holy Spirit quickens it. When this love is wholly lost, sin against the Holy Ghost results. Before regeneration there is a desire for holiness, an apprehension of its beauty, but this is overborne by a greater love for sin. If the man does not quickly grow worse, it is not because of positive action on his part, but only because negatively he does not resist as he might. ‘Behold, I stand at the door and knock.’ God leads at first by a resistible influence. When man yields, God leads by an irresistible influence. The second influence of the Holy Spirit confirms the Christian's choice. This second influence is called ‘sealing.’ There is no necessary interval of time between the two. Prevenient grace comes first; conversion comes after.”

To this view, we would reply that a partial love for holiness, and an ability to choose it before God works effectually upon the heart, seem to contradict those Scriptures which assert that “the mind of the flesh is enmity against God” (Rom. 8:7), and that all good works are the result of God's new creation (Eph. 2:10). Conversion does not precede regeneration,—it chronologically accompanies regeneration, though it logically follows it.

[pg 832]

1. Repentance.

Repentance is that voluntary change in the mind of the sinner in which he turns from sin. Being essentially a change of mind, it involves a change of view, a change of feeling, and a change of purpose. We may therefore analyze repentance into three constituents, each succeeding term of which includes and implies the one preceding:

A. An intellectual element,—change of view—recognition of sin as involving personal guilt, defilement, and helplessness (Ps. 51:3, 7, 11). If unaccompanied by the following elements, this recognition may manifest itself in fear of punishment, although as yet there is no hatred of sin. This element is indicated in the Scripture phrase ἐπίγνωσις ἁμαρτίας (Rom. 3:20; cf. 1:32).

Ps. 51:3, 11—“For I know my transgressions; And my sin is ever before me.... Cast me not away from thy presence, And take not thy Holy Spirit from me”; Rom. 3:20—“through the law cometh the knowledge of sin”; cf. 1:32—“who, knowing the ordinance of God, that they that practise such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but also consent with them that practise them.”

It is well to remember that God requires us to cherish no views or emotions that contradict the truth. He wants of us no false humility. Humility (humus) = groundness—a coming down to the hard-pan of facts—a facing of the truth. Repentance, therefore, is not a calling ourselves by hard names. It is not cringing, or exaggerated self-contempt. It is simple recognition of what we are. The “'umble” Uriah Heep is the arrant hypocrite. If we see ourselves as God sees us, we shall say with Job 42:5, 6—“I had heard of thee by the hearing of the ear; But now mine eye seeth thee: Wherefore I abhor myself, And repent in dust and ashes.”

Apart from God's working in the heart there is no proper recognition of sin, either in people of high or low degree. Lady Huntington invited the Duchess of Buckingham to come and hear Whitefield, when the Duchess answered: “It is monstrous to be told that you have a heart as sinful as the common wretches that crawl on the earth,—it is highly offensive and insulting.” Mr. Moody, after preaching to the prisoners in the jail at Chicago, visited them in their cells. In the first cell he found two, playing cards. They said false witnesses had testified against them. In the second cell, the convict said that the guilty man had escaped, but that he, a mere accomplice, had been caught. In the last cell only Mr. Moody found a man crying over his sins. Henry Drummond, after hearing the confessions of inquirers, said: “I am sick of the sins of these men,—how can God bear it?”

Experience of sin does not teach us to recognize sin. We do not learn to know chloroform by frequently inhaling it. The drunkard does not understand the degrading effects of drink so well as his miserable wife and children do. Even the natural conscience does not give the recognition of sin that is needed in true repentance. The confession “I have sinned” is made by hardened Pharaoh (Ex. 9:27), double minded Balaam (Num. 22:34), remorseful Achan (Josh. 7:20), insincere King Saul (1 Sam. 15:24), despairing Judas (Mat. 27:4); but in no one of these cases was there true repentance. True repentance takes God's part against ourselves, has sympathy with God, feels how unworthily the Ruler, Father, Friend of men has been treated. It does not ask, “What will my sin bring to me?” but, “What does my sin mean to God?” It involves, in addition to the mere recognition of sin:

B. An emotional element,—change of feeling—sorrow for sin as committed against goodness and justice, and therefore hateful to God, and hateful in itself (Ps. 51:1, 2, 10, 14). This element of repentance is indicated in the Scripture word μεταμέλομαι. If accompanied by the following element, it is a λύπη κατὰ Θεόν. If not so accompanied, it is a λύπη τοῦ κόσμου = remorse and despair (Mat. 27:3; Luke 18:23; 2 Cor. 7:9, 10).

Ps. 51:1, 2, 10, 14—“Have mercy upon me ... blot out my transgressions. Wash me thoroughly from mine iniquity, And cleanse me from my sin.... Create in me a clean heart, O God; ... Deliver me from bloodguiltiness, O God”; Mat. 27:3—“Then Judas, who betrayed him, when he saw that he was condemned, repented himself, and brought back the thirty pieces of silver to the chief priests and elders, saying, I have sinned in that I betrayed innocent [pg 833]blood”; Luke 18:23—“when he heard these things, he became exceeding sorrowful; for he was very rich”; 2 Cor. 7:9, 10—“I now rejoice, not that ye were made sorry, but that ye were made sorry unto repentance; for ye were made sorry after a godly sort.... For godly sorrow worketh repentance unto salvation, a repentance which bringeth no regret: but the sorrow of the world worketh death.” We must distinguish sorrow for sin from shame on account of it and fear of its consequences. These last are selfish, while godly sorrow is disinterested. “A man may be angry with himself and may despise himself without any humble prostration before God or confession of his guilt” (Shedd, Dogm. Theol., 2:535, note).

True repentance, as illustrated in Ps. 51, does not think of 1. consequences, 2. other men, 3. heredity, as an excuse; but it sees sin as 1. transgression against God, 2. personal guilt, 3. defiling the inmost being. Perowne on Ps. 51:1—“In all godly sorrow there is hope. Sorrow without hope may be remorse or despair, but it is not repentance.”Much so-called repentance is illustrated by the little girl's prayer: “O God, make me good,—not real good, but just good enough so that I won't have to be whipped!” Shakespeare, Measure for Measure, 2:3—“'Tis meet so, daughter; but lest you do repent As that the sin hath brought you to this shame, Which sorrow is always towards ourselves, not heaven, Showing we would not spare heaven as we love it, But as we stand in fear.... I do repent me as it is an evil, And take the shame with joy.” Tempest, 3:3—“For which foul deed, the Powers delaying, not forgetting, Have incensed the seas, and shores, yea, all the creatures, Against your peace.... Whose wrath to guard you from ... is nothing but heart's sorrow And a clear life ensuing.”

Simon, Reconciliation, 195, 379—“At the very bottom it is God whose claims are advocated, whose part is taken, by that in us which, whilst most truly our own, yea, our very selves, is also most truly his, and of him. The divine energy and idea which constitutes us will not let its own root and source suffer wrong unatoned. God intends us to be givers as well as receivers, givers even to him. We share in his image that we may be creators and givers, not from compulsion, but in love.” Such repentance as this is wrought only by the Holy Spirit. Conscience indeed is present in every human heart, but only the Holy Spirit convinces of sin. Why is the Holy Spirit needed? A. J. Gordon, Ministry of the Spirit, 189-201—“Conscience is the witness to the law; the Spirit is the witness to grace. Conscience brings legal conviction; the Spirit brings evangelical conviction. The one begets a conviction unto despair; the other a conviction unto hope. Conscience convinces of sin committed, of righteousness impossible, of judgment impending; the Comforter convinces of sin committed, of righteousness imputed, of judgment accomplished—in Christ. God alone can reveal the divine view of sin, and enable man to understand it.” But, however agonizing the sorrow, it will not constitute true repentance, unless it leads to, or is accompanied by:

C. A voluntary element,—change of purpose—inward turning from sin and disposition to seek pardon and cleansing (Ps. 51:5, 7, 10; Jer. 25:5). This includes and implies the two preceding elements, and is therefore the most important aspect of repentance. It is indicated in the Scripture term μετάνοια (Acts 2:38; Rom. 2:4).

Ps. 51:5, 7, 10—“Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity; And in sin did my mother conceive me.... Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean: Wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.... Create in me a clean heart, O God; And renew a right spirit within me”; Jer. 25:5—“Return ye now every one from his evil way, and from the evil of your doings”; Acts 2:38—“And Peter said unto them, Repent ye, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ”; Rom. 2:4—“despisest thou the riches of his goodness and forbearance and longsuffering, not knowing that the goodness of God leadeth thee to repentance?”

Walden, The Great Meaning of Metanoia, brings out well the fact that “repentance”is not the true translation of the word, but rather “change of mind”; indeed, he would give up the word “repentance” altogether in the N. T., except as the translation of μεταμέλεια. The idea of μετάνοια is abandonment of sin rather than sorrow for sin,—an act of the will rather than a state of the sensibility. Repentance is participation in Christ's revulsion from sin and suffering on account of it. It is repentance from sin, not of sin, nor for sin—always ἀπό and ἔκ, never περί or ἐπί. The true illustrations of repentance are found in Job (42:6—“I abhor myself, And repent in dust and ashes”); in David (Ps. 51:10—“Create in me a clean heart; And renew a right spirit within me”); in Peter (John 21:17—“thou knowest that I love thee”); in the penitent thief (Luke 23:42—“Jesus, remember me when thou comest in thy kingdom”); in the prodigal son (Luke 15:18—“I will arise and go to my Father”).

[pg 834]

Repentance implies free will. Hence Spinoza, who knows nothing of free will, knows nothing of repentance. In book 4 of his Ethics, he says: “Repentance is not a virtue, that is, it does not spring from reason; on the contrary, the man who repents of what he has done is doubly wretched or impotent.” Still he urges that for the good of society it is not desirable that vulgar minds should be enlightened as to this matter; see Upton, Hibbert Lectures, 315. Determinism also renders it irrational to feel righteous indignation either at the misconduct of other people or of ourselves. Moral admiration is similarly irrational in the determinist; see Balfour, Foundations of Belief, 24.

In broad distinction from the Scriptural doctrine, we find the Romanist view, which regards the three elements of repentance as the following: (1) contrition; (2) confession; (3) satisfaction. Of these, contrition is the only element properly belonging to repentance; yet from this contrition the Romanist excludes all sorrow for sin of nature. Confession is confession to the priest; and satisfaction is the sinner's own doing of outward penance, as a temporal and symbolic submission and reparation to violated law. This view is false and pernicious, in that it confounds repentance with its outward fruits, conceives of it as exercised rather toward the church than toward God, and regards it as a meritorious ground, instead of a mere condition, of pardon.

On the Romanist doctrine of Penance, Thornwell (Collected Writings, 1:423) remarks: “The culpa may be remitted, they say, while the pœna is to some extent retained.” The priest absolves, not declaratively, but judicially. Denying the greatness of the sin, it makes man able to become his own Savior. Christ's satisfaction, for sins after baptism, is not sufficient; our satisfaction is sufficient. But performance of one duty, we object, cannot make satisfaction for the violation of another.

We are required to confess one to another, and specially to those whom we have wronged: James 5:16—“Confess therefore your sins one to another, and pray one for another, that ye may be healed.” This puts the hardest stress upon our natural pride. There are a hundred who will confess to a priest or to God, where there is one who will make frank and full confession to the aggrieved party. Confession to an official religious superior is not penitence nor a test of penitence. In the Confessional women expose their inmost desires to priests who are forbidden to marry. These priests are sometimes, though gradually, corrupted to the core, and at the same time they are taught in the Confessional precisely to what women to apply. In France many noble families will not permit their children to confess, and their women are not permitted to incur the danger.

Lord Salisbury in the House of Lords said of auricular confession: “It has been injurious to the moral independence and virility of the nation to an extent to which probably it has been given to no other institution to affect the character of mankind.”See Walsh, Secret History of the Oxford Movement; A. J. Gordon, Ministry of the Spirit, 111—“Asceticism is an absolute inversion of the divine order, since it seeks life through death, instead of finding death through life. No degree of mortification can ever bring us to sanctification.” Penance can never effect true repentance, nor be other than a hindrance to the soul's abandonment of sin. Penance is something external to be done, and it diverts attention from the real inward need of the soul. The monk does penance by sleeping on an iron bed and by wearing a hair shirt. When Anselm of Canterbury died, his under garments were found alive with vermin which the saint had cultivated in order to mortify the flesh. Dr. Pusey always sat on a hard chair, traveled as uncomfortably as possible, looked down when he walked, and whenever he saw a coal-fire thought of hell. Thieves do penance by giving a part of their ill-gotten wealth to charity. In all these things there is no transformation of the inner life.

In further explanation of the Scripture representations, we remark:

(a) That repentance, in each and all of its aspects, is wholly an inward act, not to be confounded with the change of life which proceeds from it.

True repentance is indeed manifested and evidenced by confession of sin before God (Luke 18:13), and by reparation for wrongs done to men [pg 835] (Luke 19:8). But these do not constitute repentance; they are rather fruits of repentance. Between “repentance” and “fruit worthy of repentance,” Scripture plainly distinguishes (Mat. 3:8).

Luke 18:13—“But the publican, standing afar off, would not lift up so much as his eyes unto heaven, but smote his breast, saying, God, be thou merciful to me a sinner [‘be propitiated to me the sinner’]”; 19:8—“And Zacchæus stood, and said unto the Lord, Behold, Lord, the half of my goods I give to the poor; and if I have wrongfully exacted aught of any man, I restore fourfold”; Mat. 3:8—“Bring forth therefore fruit worthy of repentance.” Fruit worthy of repentance, or fruits meet for repentance, are: 1. Confession of sin; 2. Surrender to Christ; 3. Turning from sin; 4. Reparation for wrong doing; 5. Right moral conduct; 6. Profession of Christian faith.

On Luke 17:3—“if thy brother sin, rebuke him; and if he repent, forgive him”—Dr. B. H. Carroll remarks that the law is uniform which makes repentance indispensable to forgiveness. It applies to man's forgiveness of man, as well as to God's forgiveness of man, or the church's forgiveness of man. But I must be sure that I cherish toward the offender the spirit of love, whether he repents or not. Freedom from all malice toward him, however, and even loving prayerful labor to lead him to repentance, is not forgiveness. This I can grant only when he actually repents. If I do forgive him without repentance, then I impose my rule on God when I pray: “Forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors” (Mat. 6:12).

On the question whether the requirement that we forgive without atonement implies that God does, see Brit. and For. Evang. Rev., Oct 1881:678-691—“Answer: 1. The present constitution of things is based upon atonement. Forgiveness on our part is required upon the ground of the Cross, without which the world would be hell. 2. God is Judge. We forgive, as brethren. When he forgives, it is as Judge of all the earth, of whom all earthly judges are representatives. If earthly judges may exact justice, much more God. The argument that would abolish atonement would abolish all civil government. 3. I should forgive my brother on the ground of God's love, and Christ's bearing of his sins. 4. God, who requires atonement, is the same being that provides it. This is ‘handsome and generous.’ But I can never provide atonement for my brother. I must, therefore, forgive freely, only upon the ground of what Christ has done for him.”

(b) That repentance is only a negative condition, and not a positive means of salvation.

This is evident from the fact that repentance is no more than the sinner's present duty, and can furnish no offset to the claims of the law on account of past transgression. The truly penitent man feels that his repentance has no merit. Apart from the positive element of conversion, namely, faith in Christ, it would be only sorrow for guilt unremoved. This very sorrow, moreover, is not the mere product of human will, but is the gift of God.