Thank you for your charitable spirit in receiving correction.
Blessings!
Isaiah on the "Free Will" of the Unregenerate Man
Discussion in 'Baptist Theology & Bible Study' started by OldRegular, Jul 2, 2012.
Page 4 of 6
-
-
We receive his POWER repeatedly AFTER we are saved.
We do not receive EITHER BEFORE we are saved.
But he works ON us and IN us before we are saved. Part of that work is regeneration whereby we are enabled to turn to and trust Christ.
NOBODY ON EARTH IN THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD HAS EVER BELIEVED THAT YOU RECEIVE THE SPIRIT BEFORE YOU ARE SAVED.
You constantly prove that the reason you are wrong on so many things is because you do not even know the issues- much less how they work themselves out.
-
NOBODY IN THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD BELIEVES THAT YOU RECEIVE THE SPIRIT BEFORE YOU ARE SAVED.
At the same time, no one in the history of the world has ever denied that the Holy Spirit works on and in a man BEFORE he is saved so that he CAN be saved.
You guys need to learn the issues before you waste time making long, irrelevant arguments. -
I am utilizing hyperbole in the all caps.
There have been, doubtlessly, some people who have taught that you receive the Spirit before you are saved because there have been people who have taught all kinds of nonsense.
Also, there are instances where people received the Spirit before "profession of faith" in the Bible. John the Baptist, for example, was filled with the Holy Ghost in his mother's womb. What we are talking about, though, is God's normative means.
The point is that receiving the Spirit BEFORE salvation is not necessary to have the Spirit do the work of regeneration on the totally depraved sinner so that he CAN turn to Christ in faith and be saved. -
What we are doing is pointing out to you that one precedes the other.
It is called in theological terms the ordo salutis.
That verse absolutely does prove that regeneration precedes faith. -
Well said. -
You personally said a few weeks ago that you believed a person can be regenerated "a long time" before they are "saved". Would you please explain in detail exactly what you meant when you said this?
Regenerated literally means to be "generated" or made alive "again". No one can be alive again until their sins have been washed away. And no one can have their sins washed away until they believe on Jesus.
Jhn 8:24 I said therefore unto you, that ye shall die in your sins: for if ye believe not that I am he, ye shall die in your sins.
Jesus himself said unless a person believes they shall die in their sins, so how is it possible to be spiritually alive before you believe? -
That quote from Spurgeon that you and Jerome keep posting is taken out of context as we have shown you numerous times.
In some cases "regeneration" is used as a synonym for salvation. But technically speaking it is not a synonym- it is a part of it.
The "die" there is talking about physical death. -
-
You Calvinists can't seem to understand that it is sin that causes spiritual death. Adam and Eve were spiritually alive until they sinned. Once they sinned they spiritually died.
Until a man believes, he remains spiritually dead in all his trespasses and sins. He cannot possibly be spiritually alive until he believes on Jesus and his sins are taken away.
You teach a man can be spiritually alive for "a long time" before he believes and his sins forgiven. This is utterly illogical and impossible. But worse, your doctrine denies Jesus Christ, because it teaches a man has spiritual life before he believes on Jesus. This is life without Christ. Serious error. -
Here is Spurgeon as he preached his famous sermon "Faith and Regeneration".
You take, for example, the word "regeneration" which has it's own definition and strip it of it's definition and replace it with the definition for salvation.
You do this kind of thing constantly.
You will die in your sins unless you believe. You cannot believe unless you are made alive.
It's not that complicated.
He is dead until he is made alive so that he can believe. This is what the Bible teaches as I have shown you several posts ago.
-
But he is not saying regeneration precedes faith, in fact, if you notice, he mentions faith first.
The scriptures say faith precedes regeneration;
Jhn 20:31 But these are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing ye might have life through his name.
This verse clearly says a person must first believe to have life. You even admitted a few weeks ago that this verse "appears" to say that. It doesn't just appear to say this Luke, that is EXACTLY what it says. And Quantum listed nearly 20 verses that ALL said a person must first believe to have life. How can ignore so much scripture, when there is not one verse that says you must have life to believe? You can't show it, because it doesn't exist.
Now, it is true that a baby has life before it cries, but that does not negate the many scriptures that ALL say a person must believe to have life.
Before a baby has life, the two parents have to come together. Likewise, to be born again a person's spirit must come into union with the Holy Spirit, and they become one spirit.
1 Cor 6:17 But he that is joined unto the Lord is one spirit.
It takes TWO to "join". When we believe, our spirit is washed of it's sins and married to the Holy Spirit. They become one spirit, a new creation. It is like physical birth, when two parents come together, a new creation is born. A child is part of it's father, and part of it's mother, but it is a individual, a new creation. We are not our mother and father.
Likewise, when our spirit is joined to the Holy Spirit we become a new creation. We are not God, but we are partakers of the divine nature.
2 Pet 1:4 Whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises: that by these ye might be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.
I showed you Romans 8:9 before that shows a person is regenerated after they believe. Until a person has the indwelling Spirit, he is natural, he is "in the flesh", he is not spiritual.
Rom 8:9 But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his.
Until a person has the indwelling Holy Spirit, he is still "in the flesh", he is still a natural man. No man is spiritual until he has the indwelling Holy Spirit.
Then I showed you numerous verses (Gal 3:2, Eph 1:13, Acts 2:28-29, Acts 19:3) that ALL show a person receives the Spirit after believing.
This proves the natural man, or the man in the flesh can understand the simple gospel and believe, and when he does he receives the Holy Spirit and becomes a "spiritual" man.
No man is spiritual, quickened, born again, regenerated until he receives the indwelling Holy Spirit, and no man receives the Spirit until he first believes. -
"There is no life in God the Father for a sinner; there is no life in God the Spirit for a sinner apart from Jesus. The life of a sinner is in Christ. If you take the Father apart from the Son, though he loves his elect, and decrees that they shall live, yet life is only in his Son. If you take God the Spirit apart from Jesus Christ, though it is the Spirit that gives us spiritual life, yet it is life in Christ, life in the Son. We dare not, and cannot apply in the first place, either to God the Father, or to God the Holy Ghost for spiritual life. The first thing we are led to do when God brings us out of Egypt is to eat the Passover—the very first thing. The first means whereby we get life is by feeding upon the flesh and blood of the Son of God; living in him, trusting on him, believing in his grace and power. Our second thought was—there is life in Christ."
C. H. Spurgeon
John 6 :
45 It is written in the Prophets: ‘They will all be taught by God.’[Isaiah 54:13] Everyone who has heard the Father and learned from him comes to me...53 Jesus said to them, “Very truly I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. 54 Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day...63 The Spirit gives life; the flesh counts for nothing. The words I have spoken to you—they are full of the Spirit[Or are Spirit; or are spirit] and life...66 From this time many of his disciples turned back and no longer followed him.
67 “You do not want to leave too, do you?” Jesus asked the Twelve.
68 Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. 69 We have come to believe and to know that you are the Holy One of God.”
Peter got it right praise Jesus. Following a crowd does not mean you are drawn by the Father only listen and learning from the word of God ,the word of life, the word we are born again by, the word that regenerates us, the word that enable's us. Do not walk away from the only life you have Jesus Christ. Regeneration before faith is ridiculous.
Luke 10:21
At that time Jesus, full of joy through the Holy Spirit, said, “I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children. Yes, Father, for this is what you were pleased to do. -
And you ignored this quote by Spurgeon:
"Faith in the living God and his Son Jesus Christ is always the result of the new birth, and can never exist except in the regenerate."
Legs precedes walking.
Vocal chords precede singing.
Lungs precede breathing.
Brains precede thinking.
And regeneration precedes faith.
The scriptures say faith precedes regeneration;
Jhn 20:31 But these are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing ye might have life through his name.
You must be made alive so that you can live. Why can you not get this?
You have not even attempted to respond to those posts in any meaningful manner because you can't.
Life precedes breath but a baby, once born must breath in order to have life (continuously).
You don't know the issues. Calvinists agree with all of this.
You become one with Christ AFTER salvation. So what????
Everybody believes that.
That has nothing to do with the fact that the Holy Spirit works on and in a person BEFORE he believes enabling him TO believe.
Part of that work is regeneration as I have clearly shown in posts you continue to run and hide from. -
It does not seem to matter how many times I tel you that we Calvinists already believe that.
Are you dumb or are you not reading these posts thoroughly? -
Spurgeon on Regeneration
It appears that those who believe in "freewill" as well as those who believe the Doctrines of Grace like to quote Spurgeon.
SO! From: http://www.spurgeon.org/sermons/0130.htm
Regeneration: A Sermon (No. 130) Delivered on Sabbath Morning, May 3,1857, by the REV. C. H. Spurgeon at the Music Hall, Royal Surrey Gardens.
Neither is a man regenerated, we say, in the next place, by his own exertions. A man may reform himself very much, and that is well and good; let all do that. A man may cast away many vices, forsake many lusts in which he indulged, and conquer evil habits; but no man in the world can make himself to be born in God; though he should struggle never so much, he could never accomplish what is beyond his power. And, mark you, if he could make himself to be born again still he would not enter heaven, because there is another point in the condition which he would have violated—"unless a man be born of the Spirit, he can not see the kingdom of God." So that the best exertions of the flesh do not reach this high point, the being born again of the Spirit of God.
And now we must say, that regeneration consists in this. God the Holy Spirit, in a supernatural manner—mark, by the word supernatural I mean just what it strictly means; supernatural, more than natural—works upon the hearts of men, and they by the operations of the divine Spirit become regenerate men; but without the Spirit they never can be regenerated. And unless God the Holy Spirit, who "worketh in us to will and to do," should operate upon the will and the conscience, regeneration is an absolute impossibility, and therefore so is salvation."What!" says one, "do you mean to say that God absolutely interposes in the salvation of every man to make him regenerate?" I do indeed; in the salvation of every person there is an actual putting forth of the divine power, whereby the dead sinner is quickened, the unwilling sinner is made willing, the desperately hard sinner has his conscience made tender; and he who rejected God and despised Christ, is brought to cast himself down at the feet of Jesus. This is called fanatical doctrine, mayhap; that we can not help; it is scriptural doctrine, that is enough for us. "Except a man be born of the Spirit he can not see the kingdom of God; that which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit." If you like it not, quarrel with my Master, not with me; I do but simply declare his own revelation, that there must be in your heart something more than you can ever work there. There must be a divine operation; call it a miraculous operation, if you please; it is in some sense so. There must be a divine interposition, a divine working, a divine influence, or else, do what you may, without that you perish, and are undone; "for except a man be born again, be can not see the kingdom of God." The change is radical; it gives us new natures, makes us love what we hated and hate what we loved, sets us in a new road; makes our habits different, our thoughts different, makes us different in private, and different in public. So that being in Christ it is fulfilled: "If any man be in Christ he is a new creature; old things are passed away, behold all things are become new." -
In regards to regeneration preceding faith, or vice versa, apparently CHS was just plain ole "wishy-washy". :D J/K
In all sincerity, could the sermon that both sides have bandied about have been a sermon from earlier in his life, and over time, changed his mind? He does seem to have two entirely different views that are being expressed. Could he have seen regeneration post-faith, and then over time, come to the pre-faith regenration? I ask these in all sincerity. Does anyone know? -
Brain dead? Naw!! :sleep: Asleep at the wheel? :sleep: Well.......... :D :laugh: -
First off, thanks for the "civilness" in your posts to me. :thumbs:
I also agree with this wholeheartedly.
We see a triune God at work in salvation. God the Father, sent God the Son, to die for sinful man. When God the Son was received back in heaven to God the Father, God the Spirit came down, and now dwells in the soul of the saved. In reality, we have a triune God dwelling in us, because we don't get one part of the Godhead w/o the other Two.
Page 4 of 6