Puritans and Revival IX: God’s Work in Regeneration
As we continue our series on the influence of the Puritans on the Great Awakening (US) and the Evangelical Revival (UK), we’re looking more closely at the doctrine of regeneration.
George Whitefield wrote of 5 stages of the observable pattern of regeneration:
A man must be made to feel and bewail his sin.
He must be convinced of foundation of all sin.
Our sin is beyond simply what we’ve done, but it goes as deep as who we are by nature.He must be convinced of sins that are entangled even with his best religious duties.
Our best efforts must be washed in the blood of Christ. Selfishness and pride are mixed in with all of it.He must have a particular sense of the guilt of the sin of unbelief.
Unbelief is a willful choice. You are willfully choosing to call God a liar while holding the gospel at arm's length.
He must lay hold of the all-sufficient righteousness of Christ.
What is the pattern? The first four deal with the emptying of a person of supposed righteousness before they are, fifth, filled with the hope of Christ. This is generally the pattern of God in regeneration. It is not what we do to climb up to God. It is what God does in us. Ian Murray writes, “There is nothing a man must do before He comes to Christ. But there is a great deal God must do in a man before He is willing to come.”
Since we cannot make ourselves alive, some may use God’s sovereignty as an excuse to do nothing but “wait on God.”
But if you were to tell a starving man that can’t feed himself, he would do everything he could to find a man who CAN and is willing to feed him. When God works in someone’s heart to truly see his sin and his own desperation, he won’t sit around philosophizing with you about the finer points. He will seek God, search the Scriptures, hang on every word from the sermon, etc., with all of his might.
Come, ye sinners, poor and wretched,
Weak and wounded, sick and sore;
Jesus ready waits to save you,
Full of pity, joined with pow’r:
He is able, He is able,
He is willing, doubt no more.
Let not conscience make you linger,
Nor of fitness fondly dream;
All the fitness He requireth
Is to feel your need of Him:
This He gives you, this He gives you,
’Tis the Spirit’s rising beam.
(Joseph Hart)
All you need to be is needy! And even the sense of need, God has put there.
In Daniel Rowland’s sermon 'The Voice of the Turtle Dove,' he asks,
“‘If I am unable to convert myself why should I be asked to open my heart to God when I cannot?' His answer was that acceptance of one's spiritual inability was a necessary step toward God, for only if men felt themselves weak would they cry out to a God of strength. However, if they felt they had some moral strength to 'open the door' to God whenever they wished, they would become careless and would not seek God. Rowland wrote, 'When I perceive my own indigence and weakness, I will turn all God's demands into petitions. When he saith, "Turn! Turn", I will earnestly and eagerly cry out, "Turn me, and I shall be turned."'
God commands us to repent and believe. When we feel that we are unable, we must run to the throne of God and beg him, ‘Help me believe! Help me repent!’ With the command from Christ, comes a power.
In Whitefield's sermon 'A Penitent Heart, the Best New Year's Gift,' he says:
“Some of you... may say, You have no power, you have no strength: but have not you been [lacking] ... in such things that were within your power? Have you not as much power to go to hear a sermon, as to go into a playhouse, or to a ball, or masquerade? You have as much power to read the Bible, as to read plays, novels, and romances; and you can associate as well with the godly, as with the wicked and profane: this is but an idle excuse, my brethren, to go on in your sins: and if you will be found in the means of grace, Christ hath promised he will give you strength.”
In an example of these evangelistic appeals, Whitefield asked his listeners whether or not they had received the Holy Spirit. He then pointed out the right use of the means of grace as the only safe path along which to seek regeneration:
“Do we constantly and conscientiously use all the means of grace required thereto? Do we fast, watch, and pray? Do we, not lazily seek, but laboriously strive to enter in at the strait gate? ... If so, we are in that narrow way which leads to life; the good seed is sown in our hearts, and will, if duly watered and nourished by a regular persevering use of all the means of grace, grow up to eternal life.”
Subscribe to our YouTube channel for weekly updates, or listen / subscribe on: iTunes, Google Play, and Spotify