18. Conversion and Regeneration

The change completed by immersion is sometimes called in sacred language, "being quickened," or "made alive," "passing from death to life," "being born again," "having risen with Christ," "turning to the Lord," "being enlightened," "conversion," "reconciliation," "repentance unto life." These, like the words propitiation, atonement, reconciliation, expiation, redemption, which express the various aspects of Christ’s death, describe the different perspectives from which this great change, sometimes called a "new creation," may be viewed. The complete change effected in a person by the Christian system consists of four things: — a change of views; a change of affections; a change of state; and a change of life. Now, with respect to each of these separately or combined, it is called by different names. As a change of views, it is called "being enlightened;" "Once you were darkness, now you are light in the Lord; walk as children of the light;" "After that you were enlightened," etc. As a change of the affections, it is called "being reconciled;" thus, "for if when we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more being reconciled we shall be saved through his life." As a change of state, it is called "being quickened;" "passing from death to life," "being born again," "having risen with Christ," "And you he made alive who were dead in trespasses and sins," "By this we know we have passed from death to life, because we love the brothers," "Being born again, not of corruptible, but of incorruptible seed, the word of God, which lives and abides forever." "If you are," or "since you have risen with Christ, set your minds on things above, not on things on the earth." As a change of life it is called "repentance unto life," "turning to the Lord," "conversion;" "Then God has granted to the Gentiles repentance to life." "And all who lived in Lydda and Sharon saw Eneas and turned to the Lord." "Unless you are converted and become like children, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven." "When you are converted, strengthen your brothers." "He who converts a sinner from the error of his way will save a soul from death and cover a multitude of sins."

Great confusion has been introduced into the Christian community by mixing up these terms, making only one of them mean all the others. Consider the controversy about regeneration; as if that word were used in sacred Scripture to refer to the entire change effected by the Christian system; whereas, strictly speaking, it is never used by itself in the Bible to represent any part of this change, much less the whole of it. We have the phrase "washing of regeneration" once, in contrast with the "renewal of the Holy Spirit," (Titus 3:5) but never, by itself, as indicating this fourfold change. But suppose it were conceded that the term regeneration might be just equivalent to "being born again," it could then only represent so much of this change as concerns mere state: for the figure of a new birth applies only to admission into a family or nation; and not to the process of quickening or making alive the person so admitted. It can, then, strictly speaking, only apply to the fourth part of that change which the gospel of salvation proposes and effects. Being born again is, or may be the effect of a change of views, of a change of affections; or it may be the cause of a change of life; but certainly it is not identical with any of them, and never can represent them all.

But could it include them all? It is impossible: for however we might extend the figure and suppose it to include its causes, it cannot also include its effects. If it should include a change of views, a change of affections, and a change of state, it cannot include a change of life, or of character. We should then use this word in its strict and scriptural sense if we want to avoid the great confusion now surrounding this subject. The deception or misunderstanding of this confusion is that by making regeneration equivalent to the entire change instead of one-fourth of it, the community will always be misled by trying to find the attributes of conversion in the new birth, or of the new birth in conversion; and so on with all the others. Being born again is not conversion, nor a change of views, nor a change of affections, but a change of state. True, indeed, that of the person who is born again we may suppose a change of views, a change of heart, and we may infer a change of character, and may therefore say he is enlightened, renewed in heart, converted as well as born again; but this allowance regarding the person, the subject of the change, is not permitted when speaking of the change itself. A Christian is, indeed, one whose views are enlightened, whose heart is renewed, whose relationship to God and the moral universe is changed, and whose way of life is according to righteousness and true holiness.