29
The Nature of Regeneration
them too; as in those hypocrites described in Isa. 58:2: “Yet they seek Me daily, and delight to know My ways: they take delight in approaching to God.” See how high they may some times stand, who yet fall away (Heb. 6:4-6). They may be “enlightened, taste of the heavenly gift,” be “partakers of the Holy Ghost, taste the good Word of God, and the powers of the world to come.” Common operations of the Divine Spirit, like a land flood, make a strange turning of things upside down : but when they are over, all runs again in the ordinary channel. All these things may be, where the sanctifying Spirit of Christ never rests upon the soul, but the stony heart still remains; and in that case these affections cannot but wither, because they have no root. But regeneration is a real thorough change, whereby the man is made a hew creature. (2 Cor. 5:17.) The Lord God makes the creature a new creature, as the goldsmith melts down the vessel of dishonor, and makes it a vessel of honor. Man is, in respect of his spiritual State, altogether disjointed by the fall; every faculty of the soul is, as it were, dislocated: in regeneration the Lord loosens every joint, and sets it right again. Now this change made in regeneration, is: 1. A change of qualities or dispositions : it is not a change of the substance, but of the qualities of the soul. Vicious qualities are removed,and the contrary dispositions are brought in, in their room. “The old man is put off” (Eph. 4 :2 2 ) ; “the new man put on” (ver. 24). Man lost none of the ra tional faculties of his soul by sin: he had an understanding still, but it was darkened; he had still a will, but it was con trary to the will of God. So in regeneration, there is not a new substance created, but new qualities are infused; light instead of darkness, righteousness instead of unrighteousness. 2. I t is a supernatural change; he that is born again, is bom of the Spirit: (John 3 :5 .) Great changes may be made by the power of nature, especially when assissted by external revelation. Nature may be so elevated by the common in-
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