Every additional effort sunk him apparently but the lower in “the horrible pit and miry clay,” until “the Lord heard his cry,” until “the Lord brought him up, and set his feet upon a rock, and established his goings, and put a new song in his mouth.”
That the Scriptures speak of a conditional action of the mind, preparatory to the work of regeneration, appears from express passages, as well as from the general tenor of that numerous class of scriptures which enjoin duty upon the sinner, and predicate justification and salvation upon those duties. John i, 12, has already been quoted and commented upon, in which the new birth is suspended upon receiving Christ, or believing on his name. The many cases of healing the body, by Christ, are evident illustrations of the healing of the soul. In fact, we have good reasons for supposing that, in most of these cases at least, the soul and body were healed at the same time; and this was always on the condition of asking and believing. John iii, 14, 13, “As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up; that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” Here our Saviour shows the analogy between the cure of the Israelites by looking at the brazen serpent, and of sinners by looking to Christ. But how were the Israelites healed? By the conditional act of looking at the brazen serpent. So looking at Christ is the condition of healing the soul. Take away this condition and the whole analogy is destroyed. Let this condition be understood, and the text will accord with others, equally expressive of conditions. “Look unto me and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth.” “Seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness.” “Seek the Lord while he may be found.” God hath determined that all nations “should seek the Lord, if haply they might feel after him, and find him, though he be not far from every one of us.” Will any one pretend to say that this looking and seeking implies regeneration? This is mere assumption; where is the proof? who would ever infer this idea from the Scriptures themselves? What! is the sinner regenerated before the malady of his soul, the poisonous bite of sin, is healed? Has he found the Lord before he has sought him? And must he seek after he has found him? The kingdom of God is religion in the soul—it is “righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost;” and when we are regenerated, we have it in possession, and have therefore no need to seek it. But we are commanded to seek the kingdom of God; this, therefore, must be a work preparatory to, and conditional of regeneration. “Come unto me all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” “Take my yoke upon you,” &c. To be restless, and not to have on the yoke of Christ, is to be unregenerate; but such are to come and take the yoke, and then, and on that condition, they will find rest to their souls. “The Spirit and the bride say, Come, &c, and whosoever will, let him come and take of the water of life freely.” To take of the water of life is to be regenerate; but to this end we must come, and must first will in order to come. “Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if any man hear my voice and open the door, I will come in and sup with him, and he with me.” Before Christ is in the soul, there is no regeneration; but before he will come in, he knocks, and the sinner must first hear, and then open the door, and on this condition Christ comes in and imparts his grace.
But it is useless to proceed farther in quoting particular texts. They might be extended indefinitely, with a force and pertinency that cannot be evaded: all going to establish the fact that the work of grace on the heart is conditional.
Will any one pretend to deny, that the unregenerate sinner is called upon to seek, ask, repent, believe, &c? And what do such scriptures mean? The acts of the mind here enjoined must constitute regeneration, or they must follow regeneration as an effect of that work, or they must precede it as a necessary and required condition. To say that these acts are the very definition of regeneration itself—are only synonymous terms to express this renewal of the heart, is to make regeneration consist in exercises merely—is in fact to make it the sinner’s appropriate and exclusive work; unless it can be shown that this commanding the sinner to ask, &c, is nothing more nor less than a promise that God will ask, seek, repent, and believe for him! But this will hardly be pretended; and the idea that these acts do themselves constitute the new birth, has already been seen to be defective and indefensible.
To suppose that these acts follow regeneration, as an effect or fruit of the change itself, is to deny them that position and relation in which they are actually placed by the word of God. It makes one seek, after he has found; ask, after he has received; repent and believe, after he is possessed of that salvation, to obtain which these duties are enjoined. The phraseology to suit this theory, should evidently be of an entirely different character. When the sinner asks what he shall do to be saved, the answer should be —“Nothing until God renews the heart; and then as a fruit of this you will of course seek, ask, believe,” &c. If, indeed, the sinner is to do nothing until God renews him, why is it necessary that he should first be awakened? Why is the command addressed to him at all? Why does not the Holy Spirit immediately renew the heart, while the transgressor is stupid in his wickedness, instead of calling after him to awake, flee, and escape for his life? Do you say you can give no other reason than that it pleases God to take this course with the sinner, and to call up his attention to the subject before he renews him? I answer, then it pleases God that there should be certain preparatory acts of the mind in order to regeneration: and this is in fact admitting the principle for which we contend, and this more especially if it be acknowledged, as it evidently must be, that these preparatory mental states or acts are, to any extent, voluntary. Thus, not only is the absurdity of making these acts the result of regeneration most apparent; but in tracing out the consistent meaning and practical bearing of those scriptures that are addressed to the unconverted, we find them establishing the third alternative, that these acts of the mind are preparatory to regeneration, and are the prescribed conditions on which God will accomplish the work. Thus the Scripture argument is found to confirm the philosophical view of the subject, and both are strengthened by Christian experience. The doctrine of conditional regeneration, therefore, is confirmed by a threefold argument, no part of which, it is believed, can be easily overthrown. Against it, however, there are several strong objections urged, which have already been mentioned, and which we are now prepared to hear and examine.
1. It has been objected, that to admit human agency and co-operation in this change, is to deny salvation by grace. But how does this appear? Suppose the very conditions are by a gracious appointment —suppose the operations of a gracious system are in this way better adapted to a moral government—suppose this conditional action of the mind to be itself the result of a gracious influence, enlightening the understanding, and quickening and arousing the moral sense—finally, suppose these conditions not to be efficient, much less meritorious causes, by which the mind either changes itself, or renders itself more morally deserving of the Divine favour—I say suppose all this, and then show if you can, how such conditions can detract at all from the grace of this salvation.
2. It has been objected, that “since man never is what he ought to be until he is renewed and made holy, therefore any act short of that which either constitutes or implies regeneration cannot be acceptable to God—God cannot consistently approve of any step that falls short of man’s duty. It is his duty to be holy, and therefore any thing short of this is sin, and consequently cannot be accepted as a condition.” We should be careful to discriminate between things closely related, and yet actually distinct from each other. It is one thing to be pleased with the character of the mind as a whole, in view of its relations to the Divine law and its necessary qualifications for heaven, and another thing to be pleased with a particular mental state, or conditional volition, in reference to its adaptation to a proposed end, or a specific object. For instance: the Calvinists think that an awakened and an anxiously inquiring sinner is in a more suitable state of mind to receive the blessing of regeneration, than one perfectly stupid and thoughtless. If they do not, why do they try to bring sinners to thoughtfulness? Why do they try to awaken them to a sense of their danger, and make them tremble under the view of the Divine displeasure? Or why do they call their attention to Gospel provisions and a crucified Saviour? Is not this a preparatory process? And have they the Divine warrant for such a course? Is this the method which the Divine Being takes to save his rebellious subjects? Then, doubtless, this method is well pleasing to him: and in reference to this specific end he has in view, he is pleased with each successive step in the process. He is pleased when the shiner pays attention to the word; he is pleased when he is awakened, and when he begins to tremble and inquire, “What shall I do to be saved?” This is just as he would have it, and just as he designed; although the entire character of the sinner is not acceptable to him until he is made holy. The very principle, then, objected to by the Calvinists is recognized by their own theory and practice. Now if we say God is pleased to accept of the sinner’s prayer, and faith, and sorrow for sin, as a condition of what he will do for him, what propriety is there in replying, God cannot accept of any thing short of a holy heart? We know he cannot approve of a heart until it is holy; but he can approve of certain feelings and volitions as suited, according to the Divine appointment, to be the condition on which he will make the heart holy. Do you ask on what ground he accepts of this? I answer, on the ground of the merits of Christ; the ground on which the whole process rests. God does not accept of the prayer, repentance, and faith of the regenerate, because they are regenerate, and by reason of their holiness; but their acceptance is wholly and continually through Christ. Through the same medium and merits the prayer of the inquiring sinner is heard and answered.
If your servant had left you unjustly, and deserted the service he was obligated to perform, and you should finally tell him, if he would return and resume his duties you would forgive the past, and accept of him for the future, would it be inconsistent to say, you were pleased when he began to listen to the proposal, and pleased when he took the first and every succeeding step, as being suitable and necessary to the end proposed, although, in view of his duty and your claim, you would not be pleased with him, as your acceptable servant, until he was actually and faithfully employed in your service?
Let it not be inferred from the above that I advocate a gradual conversion. I do not. I believe when God renews the heart he does it at once; but the preparatory steps are nevertheless indispensable to the accomplishment of this work. And God is well pleased with the first step of attention on the part of the sinner, and with every succeeding step of prayer, anxious inquiry, feeling of moral obligation, purpose to forsake sin, looking after and attempting to believe in Christ, not because these are all that he requires, but because they are the necessary preparatives for what is to follow.
3. The foregoing remarks will prepare the way to meet a similar objection to the last, and one to some extent the same in substance. It is this: “Are these conditional acts of the mind holy or unholy exercises? If holy, then the work of regeneration is accomplished already, and therefore these cannot be the conditions of that change. If unholy, then they can be no other than offensive to a holy God, and therefore cannot be conditions well pleasing to him.” In addition to what has been already said, having a bearing upon this question, it may be stated that the terms holy and unholy may be equivocal, as used in this connection; and thus the supposed dilemma would be more in words than in fact, more in appearance than in reality. This dilemma is urged in the argument under the idea that there can be but the two kinds of exercises, holy and unholy. And this may be true enough, only let us understand what is meant. If by holy exercises are meant those in which the entire feeling is on the side of God, I readily answer, No, the mind before regeneration has no such exercises. If by holiness is meant, that the judgment and conscience are on the side of truth, I answer, Yes, this is the state of the mind when it is truly awakened by the Holy Spirit and by Divine truth. It is entirely immaterial to me, therefore, whether the objector call the exercise holy or unholy, provided he draw no special inferences from the use of a general term that the positions here assumed do not authorize. Sure I am that the objector cannot say there is nothing in the exercises of the unregenerate, awakened sinner, such as God would have for the end proposed, until he is prepared to say that a fear of the consequences of sin, an enlightened judgment, the remorse of conscience for the past, the feelings of obligation for the future, and the hope of victory over sin through Christ, all combining to induce the sinner to flee for refuge, and lay hold upon the hope set before him, are all wrong, and not as God would have them? But when a man is prepared to say this, it is difficult to see how he could be reasoned with farther, for he would seem to have given up reason and Scripture. And yet who does not know that these are the exercises of the soul awakened to a sense of sin and its consequences, even while as yet his unholy affections hang upon him like a body of death:—Yea, who does not know that it is this body of death, from which he cannot escape, and this abhorrence of sin and its consequences, that rein him up, and incline him to a surrender of his soul into the hands of Christ, from whom, as a consequence, he receives power to become a son of God. “But what is the motive?” it is asked, “is not this unholy?” And pray what does this inquiry mean? If by motive is meant the moving cause out of the mind; that cannot be unholy, for it is the Holy Spirit, and the holy word of God, that are thus urging the sinner to Christ. If by motive is meant the judgments and feelings of the mind, that prompt to these voluntary efforts to avoid sin and its consequences, these are the enlightened understanding and the feelings of obligation, already alluded to, which, I repeat, the objector is welcome to call holy or unholy as he pleases; all I claim is, they are what God approves of, and are the necessary conditions of his subsequent work of renewing the heart.