XIX. Old and New Terminology
“That which is born of the flesh is flesh.”—Johniii. 6.
Beforewe examine the work of the Holy Spirit in this important matter, we must first
define the use of words.
The word “regeneration” isused in a limited sense, and in a more extended sense.
It is used in the limitedsense when it denotes exclusively God’s act of quickening, which
is the first divine act whereby God translates us from death into life, from the kingdom of
darkness into the kingdom of His dear Son. In this sense regeneration is the starting-point.
God comes to one born in iniquity and dead in trespasses and sins, and plants the principle
of a new spiritual life in his soul. Hence he is born again.
But this is not the interpretation of the Confession of Faith, for article 24 reads: “We
believe that this true faith, being wrought in man by the hearing of the Word of God and
the operation of the Holy Ghost, doth regenerate and make him a new man, causing him
to live a new life, and freeing him from the bondage of sin.” Here the word “regeneration,”
used in its wider sense, denotes the entire change by grace effected in our persons, ending
in our dying to sin in death and our being born for heaven. While formerly this was the
usual sense of the word, we are accustomed now to the limited sense, which we therefore
adopt in this discussion.
Respecting the difference between the two—formerly the work of grace was generally
represented as the soul consciously observed it; while now the work itself is described apart
from the consciousness.
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Of course, a child knows nothing of the genesis of his own existence, nor of the first
period of his life, from his own observation. If he were to tell his history from his own recol-
lections, he would begin with the time that he sat in his high chair, and proceed until as a
man he went out into the world. But, being informed by others of his antecedents, he goes
back of his recollections and speaks of his parents, family, time, and place of birth, how he
grew up, etc. Hence there is quite a difference between the two accounts.
The same difference we observe in the subject before us. Formerly it was customary,
after the manner of Romish scholastics, to describe one’s experience from one’s own recol-
lections. Being personally ignorant of the implanting of the new life, and remembering only
the great spiritual disturbance, which led one to faith and repentance, it was natural to date
the beginning of the work of grace not from regeneration, but from the conviction of sin
and faith, thence proceeding to sanctification, and so on.
But this subjective representation, more or less incomplete, can not satisfy us now. It
was to be expected that the supporters of “free will” would abuse it, by inferring that the
origin and first activities of the work of salvation spring from man himself. A sinner, hearing
XIX. Old and New Terminology
XIX. Old and New Terminology
