Great Quotes: New Birth

Romans 11:1 I say then, God has not rejected His people, has He? May it never be! For I too am an Israelite, a descendant of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin. 2 God has not rejected His people whom He foreknew. Or do you not know what the Scripture says in the passage about Elijah, how he pleads with God against Israel? 3 “Lord, THEY HAVE KILLED YOUR PROPHETS, THEY HAVE TORN DOWN YOUR ALTARS, AND I ALONE AM LEFT, AND THEY ARE SEEKING MY LIFE.”
4 But what is the divine response to him? “I HAVE KEPT for Myself SEVEN THOUSAND MEN WHO HAVE NOT BOWED THE KNEE TO BAAL.” 5 In the same way then, there has also come to be at the present time a remnant according to God’s gracious choice. 6 But if it is by grace, it is no longer on the basis of works, otherwise grace is no longer grace.

“But it is an internal grace, a secret in-breathing (inspiration) of God, a bestowing of faith and love through the Holy Spirit, a communication of power that enlightens the understanding, bends the will, and creates within us all good. It is distributed not according to any merit, but purely according to God’s mercy, out of pure grace, and it works irrefutable, invincibly, and irresistibly. This grace precedes every good work, prepares and accomplishes every good work in us, and creates in us first of all the capacity, the willing, in order only then as cooperating grace to bring about in us the doing itself. It supplies us the capacity to believer and to love, but then also makes us actually believe and love. Through grace, the intellect loses its blindness and the will its weakness. In this way human capacities are not suppressed or destroyed thought grace, but rather restred to their original power and purity…

“As one who is infintely exalted above every creature, God is nonetheless with His being immediately present in every creature. He is entirely in heaven and entirely on earth and entirely in both and in everything that exists. He is neither confinved by nor excluded from anything. He Himself is everywhere entirely. There is an essential difference betwen the being of God and the being of His creatures. Nevertheless, He is immediately present in all things, with His entire being. In Him we lie and move and have our being. He Himself supports all things directly by the word of His power.” Herman Bavinck

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