REGENERATION by Milton C. Wilcox

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Jun 17, 1889

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 15, No. 23.

REGENERATION.

By Milton C. Wilcox

LAST week we gave a few thoughts on justification, showing what it is, and how willing God is to justify the sinner from all his past deeds of unrighteousness. That is, God forgives, passes over, covers by his own perfect righteousness, the past life of the sinner; he looks upon him as though he had never sinned. This is most precious favor on the part of God which brings into fellowship and peace with him a rebel against his government. "Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ." Rom. 5:1.

But while justification is a most precious boon, and has brought joy to many hearts, it is not all that is needed. In fact, it would only add to the individual’s misery and despair. For how many have sought for forgiveness, or justification, and through God’s grace obtained it, and have fallen right back into the old sins again and again. And so they have gone on sinning and repenting, sinning and repenting, and God has forgiven them; but the continual falling brings continual discouragement, till oftentimes the individual gives up in despair. He has prayed again and again, "Lord, forgive me this once, and I will never commit the sin again;" but he has found in the words of the apostle Paul, "For the good that I would, I do not, but the evil which I would not, that I do." Rom. 7:19. How many live in this condition for years!

What is the reason of this continual sinning? Why is it that the individual does not keep his promise to the Lord to sin no more in that direction?

For this reason: The sinner has looked only at the individual sins and not at the nature of which the sins are an outgrowth. He has sinned, and his sins have brought shame, humiliation, sore trials, and evil consequences. He has come to hate those sins because of this. He has gone in his search no deeper than the sins. He has not looked beyond to the carnal heart, which is enmity against God, of which the individual sins are only the natural fruit. Or, if he has, he may so love some things in that nature as to cling to it still. Just as long as it does not break out into open, humiliating sins, it is pleasing to him. He loves to think the thoughts of the carnal mind, and wishes the deeds that are sinful were not sinful, so that he might indulge in them. Many go on this way year after year. They do not realize their condition themselves. The deceitfulness of the sinful nature blinds them. They fall into sin and do not know why they fall.

But God has not left us in ignorance upon the reason of the sinning, nor withheld from us the secret of overcoming. Just as long as our nature remains unchanged, just as long as the carnal heart holds sway, just so long man will fall into sin. He cannot do otherwise. He may make all the good resolutions and promises and vows that he will, in time of temptation they will prove worthless, as powerless to hold him as a spider’s web. Hear a few testimonies of the word of God:—

Jer. 17:9: "The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked; who can know it?"

Matt. 15:19: "For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies."

Gal. 5:19-21: "Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these, Adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, envyings, murders, drunkenness, revelings, and such like; of the which I tell you before, as I have also told you in time past, that they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God."

Many other passages might be given which show the inherent evil of the natural heart. And this nature is common to all men. Jews and Gentiles "are all under sin; as it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one." "For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God." Rom. 3:9, 10, 23. For this reason, men cannot do God’s will. They may be outwardly moral as Paul (Phil. 3:4-6); but like him they will be forced to confess, "The evil which I would not, that I do." Rom. 7:19.

It is manifest, therefore, that if man is ever brought into a condition where he can do God’s will, his nature must be changed. The carnal heart must be taken away. This, in Scripture, is called regeneration, or being born again. Titus 3:5. This is what our Saviour tells the proud and outwardly righteous Pharisee, Nicodemus, in whose heart there was kindled a desire to know more of Jesus. "Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again [born from above, margin], he cannot see the kingdom of God." John 3:3. Nicodemus tried to throw discredit upon these words of our Saviour by taking them in a strictly literal, fleshly sense; and our Lord repeats his thought in the following words: "Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born from above." Verses 5-7, margin.

James speaks of being begotten "with the word of truth" (James 1:18), and Peter says: "Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth forever." 1 Peter 1:23. And John also speaks of the character of those who are born, or begotten of God. 1 John 3:9.

It would be useless to take space to describe the new birth in detail, or the exact offices of the agencies which are connected therewith. Our object is to know how it can be accomplished in us, how we can become new creatures in Christ Jesus.

1. The sinner must see himself as revealed in God’s word. Of course this implies the searching of that word. If he is honest in his desires to know and do God’s will, the Spirit of God will reveal to him the word of God as he studies it. The law of God will reveal to him that he is a sinner. 1 John 3:4; Rom. 7:7. God’s word will show that this evil is inherent in his very nature.

2. He must have that hatred of sin, not individual sins alone, but the carnal heart, the sinful nature, that he will be willing to renounce it forever, and yield himself wholly to do God’s will.

3. But he cannot put away this sinful nature in his own strength. As with Paul, it will be to him a loathsome body of death; and, like Paul, he can only be freed by the Lord Jesus Christ. Rom. 7:24, 25. Therefore he must come with true repentance for all past sins, with such a hatred of the carnal nature that he is not only willing but anxious to renounce it forever, and submit his will to God in all things, and by simple faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and the promises of his word, ask him to take away that carnal nature and replace it by a spiritual nature, which loves God’s law and delights in his holy will.

And, oh, how willing God is to grant such a request! He has shown how anxious he was to save men by giving his Son to die; that Son who also "gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works." Titus 2:14. Listen to the words of that Saviour: "Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you. . . . If a son shall ask bread of any of you that is a father, will he give him a stone? or if he ask a fish, will he for a fish give him a serpent? or if he shall ask an egg, will he offer him a scorpion? If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children; how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him." Luke 11:9-13.

It is by the Holy Spirit that the change is wrought, and the above text shows how willing God is to bestow it. And if we truly and earnestly seek God for this he will fulfill to us the promise of Ezekiel 36:26, 27: "A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you; and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and ye shall keep my judgments, and do them." We will then be in Christ new creatures. The old affections, the love of sin, the enmity against God’s law, will have passed away; the heart will be made new, a heart that finds its highest joy in doing God’s will. 2 Cor. 5:17.

In this way we can walk above condemnation, not in our own strength, but in the strength of Christ. Our deeds of love will be the outgrowth of our faith, the righteousness of faith, the faith which worketh by love.

When brought in this condition, or the condition where we renounce all sin and yield all to Christ, baptism is the outward symbol of our faith, the manifestation to the world of our union with Christ.

If justification is precious, regeneration is much more so. The one is forgiveness of past sins only, the other includes all of that, and also the change of that nature which caused us to sin. It gives us a living connection with the great Fount of spiritual life, from which we may ever draw strength and help to keep us from falling; and it opens to us God’s holy word, magnifies his pure precepts, and makes infinitely of more worth his precious promises. Dear sinner, whether in the church or out, pause not in your seeking till the new heart is given, till you are a new creature in Christ Jesus.

M. C. W.