In the teaching of salvation in the modern day the focus is on getting human beings to do something. It may be to make a decision or to walk an aisle. It may be to look to Jesus for something in general or perhaps for forgiveness of sins in particular. Even when people are told to look to Jesus they are usually told to look to Him in such a way that it is contingent upon them doing something. They are told that Jesus will forgive them if they will pray a prayer or that if they will simply believe in Him He will save them from hell. Perhaps we tell others that they must repent and believe in order to be saved. That is very true and the Bible uses those very words. But what do we mean when we use those words? Do we mean that a person has the strength from self to just repent of external and internal sin? Do we mean that a person simply must make a choice to believe and that belief is the deepest belief of his or her soul that controls all other beliefs?
As mentioned in the last newsletter, some people try to educate others about the Gospel of justification and then get them to believe that the Gospel is true. Satan believes that the Gospel is true, but he is not a converted being. The intellectual belief that the Gospel is true does not mean that a person is a true believer of the Gospel. If a belief in the Gospel is only intellectual, then a mere change in the intellect means that a person does not now believe in the Gospel. If we move on to assurance with only an intellectual belief, then we have the absurd conclusion that many have taught. A person may be a believer at one point (intellectual belief in the Gospel) and yet can fall away and be an unbeliever or even an atheist and still be converted. The problem with that position is that it uses the biblical terms of “believe” or “faith” without the biblical meaning of them. The Bible does not refer to saving faith as an intellectual belief alone, but to the soul as converted and therefore in a state of being a believing soul.
The agent of conversion is not that of the human soul, but is God. Jesus taught that the soul must be born from above in order to enter the kingdom (John 3:3). But He also taught who that agent of change was. He taught us that it was the Holy Spirit (John 3:8). Some hear these things often and put them into a different category or simply have lost the ability to hear. While a person must believe in Jesus Christ in order to be truly converted, that person must be born from above and it is the Holy Spirit that does that. It is not that a person changes him or herself, but a person that is going to be truly converted must be converted by the agency or working of the Holy Spirit.
Pelagian thinking doesn’t really allow much for the Holy Spirit because it focuses on the moral power of man to do what is right. Arminian thinking allows for the Holy Spirit but in the end it is the human being that must make the choice. In modern versions of Reformed thinking the Holy Spirit is a doctrine but not a reality. So if we can convince a person to be more moral, to make a choice, or to believe a doctrine they must be converted. But conversion is of God as triune and is not the work of human beings. The Scriptures refer to the actions and workings of the Holy Spirit as the One who works in time and as the One who regenerates and converts souls. Apart from the work of the Holy Spirit there is no conversion.
4 But when the kindness of God our Savior and His love for mankind appeared, 5 He saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit, 6 whom He poured out upon us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, 7 so that being justified by His grace we would be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life (Titus 3:4-7)
These verses can be rather shocking if we look at them from a God-centered point of view. We notice in verse 4 that it is the kindness of God our Savior and His love for mankind that appears. We can read that rather casually and know that He saves us, but how does He save us? The only Savior who is God saves not on any other basis but His own mercy and grace. There is nothing within the sinner and there is nothing the sinner can do in his or her own power to save self. This is the work of the living God. So how does this Savior save sinners? He saves them “by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit.” The only Savior, according to this text, saves by the work of the Holy Spirit in regenerating and renewing souls. Where is the cross? Where is the imputed righteousness of Christ in this text? They are not in this text, but that does not mean that they are not true. It is just that this text has a different focus. What did Christ purchase for sinners? We say that the Holy Spirit is a blessing and we are correct. Could it be that Christ purchased the Spirit and His work for His people at the cross?
Before the last question is answered, let us look again at Titus 3:4-7. God is the only Savior and He saves sinners by His mercy and grace. He does not save them because they repent or because they work up morality or faith. He saves sinners because of who He is and not because of anything found in them. He finds them hateful and hating one another living in all manners of vile sin (Titus 3:3). All of salvation can only be moved on the basis of God’s grace and mercy rather than anything that a vile sinner can do. God saves sinners by the work of the Holy Spirit. Sinners are not saved until they are regenerated and renewed by the Holy Spirit. But this work of the Spirit comes through Jesus Christ. It is Christ who is called Savior in verse 6 while God is called Savior in verse 4. But the text tells us that the Holy Spirit is poured upon us. The word for “upon,” when preceded by the accusative case, can also mean “in.” The Holy Spirit was not just poured on the outside, but He was given in order to change the inner person. This can be seen from Romans 5:5: “and hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out within our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us.”
Surely it is obvious at this point that being saved is not just a matter of uttering a prayer, making a decision, or of being intellectually convinced. It is only when God saves sinners through Christ by pouring out the Holy Spirit in sinners who regenerates and renews them. The end result, then, is that the sinner is justified by grace (Titus 3:7). It is not that grace saves sinners and leaves them as they are, but the grace that flows from the throne of God is a grace purchased by Christ and poured out to and in sinners by and in the Person and work of the Holy Spirit. We should also notice how this text connects regeneration and justification. It is only when a sinner is regenerated by the Spirit can the sinner be said to be justified before God by grace. By the grace of God the sinner is changed from a state of unbelief to a state of belief by the regenerating power of the Spirit. A person is not declared just because the person has come up with something called belief or faith, but because the Spirit has regenerated the person and now the person is in a state of a continual belief or faith.
Now we are in a better position to answer the previous question: Could it be that Christ purchased the Spirit and His work for His people at the cross? See what Galatians 3:12-14 has to say about this:
12 However, the Law is not of faith; on the contrary, “HE WHO PRACTICES THEM SHALL LIVE BY THEM.” 13 Christ redeemed us from the curse of the Law, having become a curse for us– for it is written, “CURSED IS EVERYONE WHO HANGS ON A TREE “– 14 in order that in Christ Jesus the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles, so that we would receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.
This text tells us without any equivocation at least one reason that Christ redeemed us from the curse of the Law by becoming a curse for us. He did this so that in Christ Jesus the blessing promised to Abraham would not only come to the Jews but to the Gentiles. That blessing is that the promise of the Spirit would be received through faith. The promise of the Spirit is spoken of many times in the Old Testament and then by Jesus. We are told in the Old Testament (Ezekiel 36) what God is going to do in the New Covenant:
26 “Moreover, I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. 27 “I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will be careful to observe My ordinances. 29 “I will not hide My face from them any longer, for I will have poured out My Spirit on the house of Israel,” declares the Lord GOD.
The promise seen in the Old Testament is that God will give people a new heart. His Spirit would be put within them and they would be caused to walk in His statutes. God would no longer hide His face from them. Now we see that in Christ the Spirit has been purchased and is sent to regenerate and renew the souls of sinners (Titus 3:3-7). Now we see that believers are the temple of the living God and of the Holy Spirit (I Cor 3:16-16; 6:19). The very life of the believer is Christ and the believer has been baptized into Christ by the Spirit (I Co 12:13). It is Christ who looses us from our sins by His blood (Rev 1:5), but it is the Spirit who cleanses us in the inner person. For Christ to save sinners in the biblical way, which is to regenerate them and cleanse them from sin, then He had to purchase all those things for them. For Him to purchase all of those blessings for them, He had to purchase the Spirit who works those things and applies them. Conversion, then, is truly all of grace since God alone can do this work of regenerating and renewing. The agent of a salvation that is all of grace has to be God and not a human being. The agent of conversion is the Holy Spirit who was purchased by Christ. Humility is the proper response.
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