Gospel Foundations Part 1 - Ashamed of the Gospel

This is the first in a four part series of essays based on lectures delivered at Daniels Bible Church during the month of December, 2014.  They represent my attempt to faithfully and accurate exegete Romans 1:16-17.  Links to the other essays in this series once they are completed will be provided at the beginning or end of each essay, as appropriate.  My earnest prayer is that this work will assist Christians in more deeply and richly gazing upon the face of God and will provide an outlet for non Christians to perhaps encounter the truth of God's word in a life changing way for the first time.  All scripture quotations are bolded for ease of reference and are taken from the New American Standard Bible 1995 revision unless otherwise specified.

Ashamed of the Gospel

The book of Romans, found in the New Testament of the Holy Bible, is a seminal work of literature.  It has been called by some the greatest letter ever written.  It is a towering epic of theological discourse from the mind of the Holy Spirit inspired Apostle of Jesus Christ, Paul (formerly Saul) of Tarsus.  Even aside from the obvious affiliation with the Christian faith, this book is a grand and dizzying spectacle of complex literary structure which easily ranks among the great classics of history.  But when the truth of its position as the inspired and authoritative written revelation of God almighty who spoke the entire created order into existence by the word of His "mouth", gave life to the first man by the breath of His "nostrils", and rules over His creation with an absolute and unquestioned sovereignty, the book of Romans takes on an incalculable value as a source of absolute truth and wisdom for humanity.

And no passage of this great work expresses its theme better than verses 16 and 17 of the first chapter:

"16 For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.  17 For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith; as it is written, "But the righteous man shall live by faith."

Although only two verses long, this passage of scripture is absolutely loaded with meaning.  Every phrase is worthy of deep investigation and consideration.  I am going to take the phrases one at a time, in order.  First we will consider "For I am not ashamed of the gospel".  But before we dive in and begin to unpack that phrase we need to provide some context to be sure our thinking is in line with Paul's intention here.  

This book of the bible is actually a letter.  It was written by the Apostle Paul in the late fifties to 60 A.D. to a church which existed at that time in the city of Rome, the capital of the Roman Empire.  Paul makes it clear in his writing that he had never visited this church, but in verse 8 of chapter 1 he explains that "your faith is being proclaimed throughout the whole world."  This gives us insight into the fact that this was a strong and faithful church, apparently not saddled with the kind of gross impropriety which afflicted the church in Corinth (see the book of 1st Corinthians).  Paul goes on to write in verses 11 through 13 that he longed to visit this church for two reasons: first so that he might be able to "impart some spiritual gift" to them, and second so that he might "obtain some fruit" among them "even as among the rest of the Gentiles."  We might say that Paul had ulterior motives in his ministry.  He was concerned with imparting truth yes, but the focus of his efforts in this life were upon obtaining a reward from God in the next.  This is what he is implying with the phrase "obtain some fruit."  After revealing his motives in this manner, Paul further explains that he feels a sense of obligation, or debt, to "Greeks and barbarians, both to the wise and to the foolish." By including both the socially civilized as well as uncivilized and the intellectually sensible as well as the imbecilic Paul is intentionally incorporating all of humanity in his view.  In other words, he felt that he owed something to every person on the planet, wherever they might be and whenever he might encounter them.  And because of this feeling of obligation, he reveals in verse 15 that he is "eager to preach" the gospel to this Roman church, with the obvious implication being a concurrent ministry to the general population of the city of Rome itself.

And so we come to verse 16, which is the focus of my examination here.  Paul writes that he is excited to preach the gospel for, or because, he is not ashamed of this gospel.  Upon reading this, two questions come to my mind as needing to be clarified.  First, why does he state it this way?  Why does he feel the need to clarify that he is not ashamed?  Is he just defining his own position clearly or is there something else on his mind here?  And second, just exactly what is this gospel he is referring to?  I will attempt to answer these questions in reverse order.

"The Gospel" is really the core of the Christian faith.  It encompasses and summarizes everything those who have placed their faith in Jesus are to be about and to focus on.  Every believer should be able to explain and defend the gospel from scripture.  But can we all do that?  I'm not so sure.  I fear that in this modern culture of "easy believism" where the popular approach is to dilute all people regardless of their religious worldviews into "people of faith" many professing Christians would not even be able to find scripture to explain the gospel much less be able to defend it to someone.  So rather than simply assume that everyone reading this has a solid grasp of the gospel I will take the time to try to (briefly) explain this central element of Christianity from the pages of scripture.

First, let us examine the word itself.  Gospel is an ancient word that, outside of Christendom, has very little usage today.  In spite of its ancient origins it actually has a quite simple meaning.  It comes from a Greek word meaning glad tidings.  In modern vernacular we might say the gospel is good news.  More specifically, in the context of New Testament historical teachings, the gospel is the good news about the man named Jesus who in the bible bears the title of Christ or "the Christ".  Christ is itself a shortened version of the Greek christos, which in turn is a translation of the Hebrew word mashiyach (or messiah), which means literally "anointed one."  In ancient societies it was traditional to consecrate persons to regal offices by anointing them with oil.  Thus what we have bound up in this word gospel is the idea of good news about Jesus who was consecrated to a royal position.

But why do we need good news?  Is there some bad news that this good news is supposed to counteract?  Indeed there is.  The bad news is that humans as a whole are cut off and alienated from God.  This is because Adam, the progenitor of the rest of humanity, fell victim to temptation in the Garden of Eden.  Genesis 3:6 records the events as follows:  When the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was desirable to make one wise, she took from its fruit and ate; and she gave also to her husband with her, and he ate.  As we know, this was a deliberate act of disobedience against the express command of God, recorded one chapter earlier in verses 16-17: "From any tree of the garden you may eat freely; but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat from it you will surely die."  On the surface this was a violation of a command of God.  But on a deeper level it was a defamation of His very nature.  Titus 1:2 tells us that "God cannot lie" and Hosea 14:9 reveals that "the ways of the Lord are right."  Therefore God's instructions are right because they are an extension of His character and to violate those instructions is intrinsically wrong and opposed to His nature.  This is the very definition of sin.  And pertinent to our discussion of bad news, Paul himself explains in Romans 6:23 that "The wages of sin is death."  The news for all of humanity can't get much worse than that.

Jumping back to Jesus, we have identified that He was consecrated and anointed to a royal position.  But what was this position that He was to hold and the purpose that He was to fulfill? Stated plainly, Jesus is the visible representation of God on Earth who is to rule the entire world after first restoring a remnant of fallen and sinful mankind to a right relationship with God after that relationship was shattered by Adam as explained above.  Scripture says much on this topic, but very nicely summarizes it in at least two places, both of which we will look at.  The first is 1st Corinthians 15:1-4:

"1 Now I make known to you, brethren, the gospel which I preached to you, which also you received, in which also you stand, 2 by which also you are saved, if you hold fast the word which I preached to you, unless you believed in vain.  3 For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, 4 and that He was buried, and that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures."

In this writing of the Apostle Paul we find the three central components of Jesus's mission on earth.  First that He was to die as a surrogate to bear the punishment for the sins of humanity.  Second that He was to be buried as a visible and tangible evidence of His death.  Third that He was to be raised to new life as a symbol of the hope of resurrection which is given to all who place their faith and trust in Him.  In this Paul is really just echoing the words of His master, Jesus Himself, who explained these things to His disciples just after His crucifixion at the hands of the Jewish authorities and the Roman government, as found in Luke 24:44-47:

44 Now He said to them, "These are My words which I spoke to you while I was still with you, that all things which are written about Me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled."  45 Then He opened their minds to understand the Scriptures, 46 and He said to them, "Thus it is written, that the Christ would suffer and rise again from the dead the third day, 47 and that repentance for forgiveness of sins would be proclaimed in His name to all the nations, beginning from Jerusalem."

In both of these sequences we see references to "the scriptures", the "Law of Moses", "the Prophets", and "the Psalms".  This is referring to the Old Testament of the Bible, the special revelation given by God to the nation of Israel.  Through this body of written communication God foreshadowed the coming of the anointed one who would take away sins.  This is an important point because it lends powerful authenticity and credibility to who Jesus was and is.  His life and ministry was the fulfillment of thousands of years of prophecies, as follows in brief:

• The Law of Moses
• Genesis 3:15 - The seed of Eve will bruise Satan on the head, and Satan will bruise Him on the heel.  Jesus's triumph over sin and death signified Satan's defeat while Satan symbolically bruised Jesus on the heel during His torture and death.
• Genesis 12:3 - In Abraham's seed all the Earth would be blessed.  Jesus was of the genealogical line of Abraham and is of course the great blessing of God given to the world.
• Numbers 21:9 - God instructs Moses to raise up a bronze snake to cure the Israelites of poisonous snake bites.  This foreshadows Jesus being raised up on a cross at His crucifixion.
• Deuteronomy 18:15 - Moses told Israel that God would raise up for them a prophet like Moses himself.  This describes Jesus very well, since Moses talked with God "face to face" and was God's mediator between Himself and the nation of Israel, just as Jesus was to be.
• The Prophets
• Isaiah 7:14 - A virgin will give birth to a son who will be Emmanuel (God with us). The synoptic (or historical) gospel accounts are clear that Jesus's mother, Mary, was a virgin when she gave birth to Him.
• Isaiah 9:1-7 - A child will be born, a son will be given, the government will rest on His shoulders.  This prophecy will see final fulfillment when Jesus returns to Earth.
• Isaiah 42:1 - God will uphold His servant, who will be the chosen one in whom God's soul delights.  God says emphatically in the gospels that He is well pleased with Jesus.
• Isaiah 53 - This chapter describes God's servant as one who would bear our griefs, carry our sorrows, and be pierced through for our transgressions just as Jesus ultimately was.
• Daniel 7:13-14 - One like a son of man is to come and be presented before the Ancient of Days (God the father), and to this one will be given dominion.  This is another future fulfillment prophecy.
• Micah 5:2 - One from long ago, from the days of eternity, will go forth from Bethlehem Ephrathah.  This prophecies Jesus's birth in Bethlehem.
• Zechariah 9:9 - A king is coming, endowed with salvation, humble, and mounted on a colt.  This foreshadows Jesus's bringing of salvation to mankind and His entering of Jerusalem on a foal, which He did.
• The Psalms
• Psalm 2:7 - You are My Son, today I have begotten You.  A foreshadowing of Jesus as "the only begotten of the Father" (John 3:16).
• Psalm 16:10 - You will not allow Your Holy One to undergo decay.  A promise that Jesus would not decay in the ground, but instead rise to new life.
• Psalm 22:1-8 - My God, my God, why have You forsaken me?  The temporary disruption of the unity of God the Father and God the Son while Jesus was on the cross is in view here.
• Psalm 69:1-21 - For my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink.  This is exactly what happened when Jesus was being crucified.  He was offered wine vinegar on a sponge to quench His thirst.
• Psalm 72 - Let all kings bow down before Him, all nations serve Him.  Another prophecy that will only be fulfilled when Christ returns to set up His kingdom on Earth.
• Psalm 110:1 - Sit at My right hand until I make Your enemies a footstool for Your feet.  God the Father promising to subdue all opposition to God the Son.  Yet another future fulfillment prophecy.
• Psalm 118:22 - The stone which the builders rejected has become the chief corner stone.  The Jews, here depicted as builders, rejected Jesus, here depicted as a stone which ended up as the corner stone of the foundation of this metaphorical structure which symbolizes the kingdom of God.

Although this list is not exhaustive it demonstrates quite well that Jesus was unmistakably identified long before His appearance on Earth.  To summarize that appearance and the gospel message He brought; the good news of Jesus is that He came to enable a way back into a right relationship with God by offering Himself up as a sacrificial scapegoat to pay the penalty for the sins of mankind through His death, burial, and resurrection into new life.

Now then, having defined the gospel we need to go back to the first of our original questions.  Why would Paul state his position in the way he does; "For I am not ashamed of the gospel".  The word ashamed carries with it some very strong connotations.  Noah Webster defined it this way in 1828: Affected by shame; abashed or confused by guilt or a conviction of some criminal action or indecorous conduct, or by the exposure of some gross errors or misconduct, which the person is conscious must be wrong, and which tends to impair his honor or reputation.  That is very strong language indeed!  Phrases such as gross errors, indecorous conduct, and criminal action make it very clear that to be ashamed of something is to view it with a great deal of disdain in one's own personal view.

With this in mind it must be said that we know unequivocally from scripture that Paul was quite clearly not ashamed of the message of his master.  In 2nd Corinthians chapter 11 he explicitly records for our consideration a list of the sufferings he had endured for the sake of this gospel.

Paul says 23 "in far more labors, in far more imprisonments, beaten times without numbers, often in danger of death.  24 Fives times I received from the Jews thirty-nine lashes.  25 Three times I was beaten with rods, once I was stoned, three times I was shipwrecked, a night and a day I have spent in the deep.  26 I have been on frequent journeys, in dangers from rivers, dangers from robbers, dangers from my countrymen, dangers from the Gentiles, dangers in the city, dangers in the wilderness, dangers on the sea, dangers among false brethren; 27 I have been in labor and hardship, through many sleepless nights, in hunger and thirst, often without food, in cold and exposure.  28 Apart from such external things, there is the daily pressure on me of concern for all the churches."

With a laundry list of trials and persecutions such as this it seems rather painfully (no pun intended) obvious that Paul was not ashamed of the gospel he was proclaiming.  He had certainly been shamed on multiple occasions by his life's work.  But if he had been ashamed of it he would have quit trying long before this.  Why would anyone subject themselves to such intense trouble for the sake of something they were not proud of?  They would have to be either insane or else deeply devoted to that which they were being persecuted for.  In Paul's case it is clearly the latter.

So was this all Paul was getting at when he told the church at Rome that he was not ashamed of the gospel?  Was he making a statement as to his credentials to be able to preach to them?  Or is there something else at work here?  Is there something deeper and perhaps less obvious that he had in mind when he put these words to paper?  To answer that question, let us consider human nature for a moment.  We have already looked at the facts of Adam and Eve's disobedience by violating God's specific instructions.  Although technically only Eve's motivation for disobeying is recorded for us it can safely be assumed that Adam was of similar mind as his wife.  And as it pertains to our discussion the key component of their impetus was mainly their own self interest; namely that they wanted to obtain a greater level of personal advancement than that which had been granted them by God.  Stated simply, their sin was born on the wings of pride just as Satan's had been before them.  Pride and the desire to exalt oneself is the key element which led to their downfall.  That sinful condition of pridefulness still infects all of us today just as it did in Paul's day.  Pride causes us to want to be looked upon with favor by those around us.  It prompts us to be selfish with that which we currently possess and greedy to obtain more possessions.  And it drives us to avoid that which might impugn our own assessment of our reputation, namely embarrassment and shame.  

With that point established, consider the words of Christ in John chapter 15 as He instructed His disciples on what kind of treatment they would receive at the hands of the world by following Him: 18 "If the world hates you, you know that it has hated Me before it hated you.  19 If you were of the world, the world would love its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, because of this the world hates you.  20 Remember the word that I said to you, 'A slave is not greater than his master.'  If they persecuted Me, they will also persecute you; if they kept My word, they will keep yours also.  21 But all these things they will do to you for My name's sake, because they do not know the One who sent Me."  With this teaching Jesus is making it clear that to follow Him, to be His disciple, to be chosen out of the world is to be guaranteed persecution caused by hatred.  In the context of this discussion we can easily connect the dots to see that this vilification by the world will result in being shamed, just as Paul was.

These two elements, our sinful condition of pride and the desire to avoid anything which would lead to a defamation of our ego, and the guarantee of Jesus that that is exactly what Christians will face, presents a clear and immediate conflict for anyone who follows Christ.  And it tends to lead unmistakably, if not checked, to being ashamed of Jesus and His gospel which we are called to profess.  Now, most of us would never utter such a thing aloud, that we might sometimes be ashamed of our Lord.  But if we are honest with ourselves, in the quietness of our hearts, we must admit the truth of this situation.  And lest we assuage our guilty consciences with any sort of reassurance that we are OK and God understands, I call to remembrance Mark 8:38: "For whoever is ashamed of Me and My words in this adulterous and sinful generation, the Son of Man will also be ashamed of him when He comes in the glory of His Father with the holy angels."  Woe to us if we are ashamed of this gospel, this good news, of Jesus Christ.

I believe Paul, and more importantly the Holy Spirit who is communicating through him, understood this point very well.  Therefore I am convinced that this was the real purpose in his statement "For I am not ashamed of the gospel."  I believe he was saying, in effect, "I know your human tendency is to feel embarrassment and shame because of the way the world treats you.  I know you struggle with standing up and representing Jesus to the hostile enemy that surrounds you.  And I am telling you to not be that way.  I am telling you to follow my lead.  I am not ashamed of the gospel of Jesus.  Take your cues from me and my life and let's run this race with endurance and finish strong!"

This is all well and good.  But to people like us, steeped in a culture of self aggrandizement, this may be easier said than done.  How do we reverse a perhaps life long stance of lurking quietly in the shadows of our communities, rarely daring to utter a word in defense of the One we claim to have allegiance to?  How do we become unashamed of the gospel like Paul was?  I believe the bible provides a very clear solution to this problem.  Consider Psalm 119:5-6: Oh that my ways may be established to keep Your statutes!  Then I shall not be ashamed when I look upon all Your commandments.  It really can't get any plainer than that.  The Psalmist is saying, in effect, that if one wants to know how to be unashamed of God and His commandments, and by extension His gospel, then by all means keep reading.  We could actually examine the entire chapter because it is loaded with helpful strategies.  But for the sake of space I will drill down and focus in on and unpack verses 14-16:

14 I have rejoiced in the way of Your testimonies as much as in all riches.  15 I will meditate on Your precepts and regard Your ways.  16 I shall delight in Your statutes; I shall not forget Your word.

• I have rejoiced in the way of Your testimonies as much as in all riches - The idea here is to be exhilarated with lively and pleasurable sensations over the pattern of life or methodology of existence that is defined and prescribed by God, to the point that this is valued equal to every single material possession, experience, or position that it is humanly possible to obtain in this life.
• I will meditate on Your precepts - This means to leisurely dwell in contemplation, turning and examining carefully from multiple angles, the subject of God's authoritative commandments.
• and regard Your ways - The ESV translates this as "fix my eyes upon Your ways".  I prefer that translation because it better conveys the idea of locking a penetrating and intent gaze upon the character, mannerisms, and conduct of the Lord.
• I shall delight in Your statutes - Just as a swimmer luxuriates in the cool water of a swimming pool on a blisteringly hot summer day, the author of this Psalm intends to fully plunge into and immerse completely and totally in the ordinances of God, in such an all consuming way that vision is clouded and obscured toward anything else.
• I shall not forget Your word - What is conveyed here is to adamantly refuse to ignore or cease to care about the speech that pours forth from the Lord.  This is a deliberate decision and act of the will.

The pattern of life that is described for our benefit in this wonderful passage of scripture is one of complete and total subjection of every area of life into the character and under the dominance of God.  Let me illustrate it this way.  Suppose a woman has been dating a man for a few months.  Their relationship is beginning to turn serious.  One day she gets a letter from her boyfriend in the mail.  Upon opening the letter, she reads the following:

My dearest love, lately I have discovered increasing joy over each part of my life that you have recommended I change.  It fills me with joy inexpressible to hear of each new item you select for me to implement into my behavior.  I have also found myself daydreaming for hours on end about each and every one of the commands you gave me last week.  This meditation even made me late for work one day.  I have been so enthralled with you that I've caught myself carefully studying the way you move, the actions you take, and the choices you make.  I've started a notebook and I'm up to page 20 so far with my detailed observations of you.  I'm having difficulty even thinking about anything except what you have most recently instructed me to do each time we are together.  The one thing I'm desperately afraid of is that I might eventually forget even the tiniest anecdote or the most innocuous of words that escape like filaments of gold from your perfect lips.  I love you.

Now, if you were to read a letter such as that what would be a word that comes to mind to describe the man who wrote it?  Liar perhaps, if we take the approach that he is insincere.  But let's suppose that the man's intent is genuine and that he really feels the way he wrote about the woman in question.  Then I think the only word sufficient to come close to the level of commitment on display here is "obsessed".  This man is absolutely infatuated, addicted, and consumed with his girlfriend.  I like the word obsessed here for two reasons.  One is that I believe it sums up all of that in a small amount of space.  Second, because the word obsession and obsessed have definite negative connotations in our culture.  Typically when we consider those words and then apply them to someone it is not in a positive light.  So I think to use them here in view of our commitment level to God causes us to pause, sit up and take notice, and reflect deeply.

That type of deep meditative contemplation is what is needed here.  Because remember, the Psalmist says that by following this pattern of life we can avoid being ashamed of God.  By striving for this level of obsession with our Lord, according to the bible, we can come to the place where, like the Apostle Paul, we boldly go forth in beaming proclamation and fearless defense of the gospel of Jesus Christ.  If we make this the pursuit of our lives we will eliminate the systemic tendency that we have to devalue and marginalize the presence of God in our lives.

I trust you will think deeply on these things and seek to draw a full measure of the cup of God's wisdom in these matters, as I have striven to do.

Part 2 coming soon...

Looking For Peace

The Journey

           The man stumbled over a loose rock and nearly fell.  Only his grip on the donkey’s reins kept him from succumbing to gravity.  The terrain was treacherous, and he was exhausted from struggling for hours to keep his footing sure.  His feet felt slick in his sandals, and he knew it was more than just sweat which moistened his skin.  He could feel every blister, both those that had already ruptured and the newcomers recently formed.  His back and shoulders ached from the effort of coercing the stubborn animal to follow him.  His legs felt like jelly.  His hands were scraped raw by the rope, but blissfully numb to dull the pain.

The man quickly glanced back at the donkey’s passenger to see if he had upset her balance.  His betrothed gave him a tired yet confident smile.  It was a confidence the man did not share nor did he believe he was worthy of.  If only she knew how terrified he was on the inside.  If only she knew how much uncertainty and anger waged a calamitous battle with trust and love in his mind.  Schooling his face to tranquility and his mind to stillness, he smiled back at her encouragingly.  Turning his attention once again to the path before them, he began to reflect on the impossible, unbelievable events which had brought him to this place.

The man remembered well the morning he had awoken, cold sweat drenching his body, from the dream.  The dream of dreams.  The vision of visions.  The encounter in which The Lord had spoken to him.  He wasn’t sure he could ever forget the shining glory of the angel who had delivered the unlikely instructions: that he was to go ahead with his original plan to marry the young woman who was now riding behind him.  He hadn’t dared to argue with the angel of the Lord.  But his mind, both during the dream and after he had awoken, boiled with questions.  How could he possibly take her as his wife when she had been so blatantly, so obviously, so publicly unfaithful to him.  He cast a quick glance back over his shoulder at the bulge in her abdomen and quickly averted his eyes.  He remembered well the feelings of hurt and betrayal that had threatened to overwhelm his senses on the day, some weeks prior to his dream, when he along with everyone else in their village, had realized the truth: that she was with child prior to marriage.

In spite of his intensely conflicting emotions, the man was above all else honorable and righteous.  Prior to his dream he had determined to divorce her quietly rather than go forward with the prescribed penalty for adultery: stoning.  And after the dream, although he was woefully unprepared to reconcile his own thoughts, one thing was clear.  The Lord had given him a command and that command he would obey, though it might cost him his financial livlihood, his friends, his family, his reputation, and if he lost his footing in these treacherous mountains one more time, his life.

The man crested the last rise as the final sparkling rays of sunlight slowly faded behind the hills in the distance.  Below him, the lights of Bethlehem twinkled like a sea of stars.  At last he had reached his destination and could register as Caesar had commanded.  He almost fell to his knees from the sheer weight of relief that surged over him like a tidal wave.  He silently thanked God for reaching his destination.  With one more furtive glance at his fiance’s very pregnant belly, he silently wondered if this Child was truly the one spoken of in the prophets as the Prince of Peace.  Could He possibly straighten out the mess that this life had become?  Would the man finally find the peace on earth he was looking for?

The Birth

                The man stood like a stone sentinel upon the outcropping of rock.  Above him the night sky was clear and still.  The stars stood out in stark contrast against the sable backdrop of infinity which covered the earth like a blanket.  Below him in the valley the peaceful sounds of his charges soothed his ears.  Even in the darkness he could easily pick out the sea of what looked like cotton spread out below him.  If cotton, then living cotton.  His weathered face creased in a smile as the distant sound of a newborn lamb’s bleating floated to his ears, riding the gust of wind which suddenly blew against him and threatened to rip his cloak from his shoulders.

                The man’s momentary smile faded as he once again resumed his motionless vigil and considered the options before him.  There was just no way around it that he could see.  The raiders last month had left him with half of the herd, half of his family’s food, and all of a mountainous and virtually unpayable debt to his employers who were now bereft of fifty percent of their investment.  He thought of his young son, born just three short years ago.  What would his life be like if he as well as the rest of his brothers and sisters had to grow up as indentured servants due to the failure of their father to do his job?  He glanced across to the outcrop his younger brother had chosen as a perch for the night.  Just beyond him was the man’s eldest son, sharing for the first time tonight in the male responsibilities of keeping watch over the flock.  What would happen to all of them because he had been derelict in his duty?  The man’s tortured thoughts taunted him endlessly.

                Suddenly, as if ten thousand bonfires had abruptly burst into flame in front of him, the night sky erupted in a blaze of light.  The man toppled backwards off of his rock, sight completely taken for several seconds as his eyes struggled with adjusting to the incredible brilliance on display before him.  With his vision gradually clearing and shapes starting to come into focus once again, he realized there was someone standing a few yards in front of him who had not been there before.  His addled mind screamed at him that there was something wrong with what he was seeing.  Abruptly it dawned on him what his senses had been trying to work out; the figure in front of him was standing in mid-air at least 20 feet off the ground.  It appeared to be a human male, clothed in purest white, with a gentle smile and a calm demeanor.  This could be nothing other than an angel of the Lord.  But it was the angel’s words, spoken in a serene and melodious voice, which held the man spellbound. 

“Do not be afraid; for behold, I bring you good news of great joy which will be for all the people; for today in the city of David there has been born for you a savior, who is Christ the Lord.  This will be a sign for you: you will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.”  All at once the air over the valley was filled with an uncountable host of angels, stretching as far as sight could travel; an impossibly vast army of unfathomable size.  With a thunderous roar the man had only heard equaled in his youth when he had visited the great sea, the angelic multitude burst into spontaneous song: “Glory to God in the highest, And on earth peace among men with whom He is pleased.”

As suddenly as they had come the angels vanished, leaving the valley covered in a silence that was unnaturally still after the supernatural display which had just occurred.  Tottering to his feet, the man stumbled toward his son and brother.  A flame of hope had suddenly leaped into existence in his mind.  Could this be the answer to his prayers?  Could this savior the angels had spoken of rescue him from his financial dilemma?  Spurring the others on before him, the man hurried back to the tents to awaken his family.  He had to go and see this baby the angels had spoken of.  Would the man finally find the peace on earth he was looking for?

The Visit

                The man gazed intently through the sighting holes of his astrolabe.  He nodded to himself satisfactorily.  He and his companions were right on course and schedule.  Tomorrow would mark the end of their long journey.  He ducked back into their spacious silk tent and eased his body down onto the pillows arranged on the floor.  He relaxed his tired muscles with a sigh and studied the astrological tables spread out before him.  They had been traveling for many months.  It had been a difficult journey, lacking most of the amenities he was used to at home in his palace.  He thought back to their recent meeting with King Herod.  “Go and search carefully for the Child; and when you have found Him, report to me, so that I too may come and worship Him.”, the king had decreed.  The man couldn’t quite put a finger on it, but something in the king’s demeanor had seemed off.  His colleagues had agreed with him.  And the dreams they had shared the night after seeing Herod had confirmed their suspicions that the king was not to be trusted.  The man schooled his thoughts to stillness and sank into the abyss of sleep in preparation for the culmination of their journey on the morrow.

                Early the next morning the man and his associates made their way slowly through the town to the house where they had been advised that the Child and his parents resided.  With trembling hands they knocked on the door.  A grizzled and rather careworn Jew greeted them.  After explaining who they were and their purpose for coming, he hesitantly allowed them into the house.  The man and his colleagues eagerly followed.  They had been waiting for this moment for so long and had prepared so many mental images of how this meeting would play itself out.  But nothing could have prepared them for the reality which greeted them.

                A small Child of perhaps one or two years of age sat calmly, almost expectantly, upon His mother’s lap.  The man had seen small children before, although not of his own issue.  But this Child was different than anything else he had ever experienced.  The toddler gazed at them with a penetrating stare completely out of place on His otherwise juvenile features.  The man felt like his body was pierced through with a stake and his soul was laid out, raw and tender, exposed for all to see its many faults and secret evils.  The Child uttered no sound, made no move, but just looked.  And in that look the man felt more completely undone than at any other time in his long life.  His thoughts flashed to the Hebrew scriptures he had studied in order to determine the location of this meeting.  He reflected upon the ancient prophet Isaiah and his response upon seeing a vision of God in His throne room.  The man suddenly, in a manner vastly more profound than if he had read it in a book, understood completely how the old prophet must have felt.  Almost without conscious thought he felt his body imitating that of Isaiah; his knees hit the floor first, and then the rest of his body and with more humility and submission than he had ever thought possible, he bowed down and worshipped the King of kings and Lord of lords with all of his might.

                After presenting the Child with their gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh, and departing for home, the man and his associates traveled in complete silence for awhile, none of them willing to break into the ruminations of the others.  As he rode, the man thought again of the ancient Hebrew prophecies and he wondered, with the Child so small now, how long would it take for Him to establish His kingdom, and would he and his friends still be alive when it happened?  Would the man finally find the peace on earth he was looking for?

                                                          

  

The Death

                The man idly toyed with his sword, passing it back and forth from one hand to the other.  He paid no mind to the fearful looks of the Jews nearby.  He ignored the occasional screams and moans of the dying men behind him.  He pretended not to notice the peculiar stench which always accompanied the specter of impending death.  Crucifixions were boring work, there was no doubt about it.  Sure, the build-up to it had its fair share of entertainment.  The scourgings were usually fun.  He and his fellow soldiers often gambled over who could inflict the most damage to the condemned person’s body, and of course competition was always engaging.  This one had been an exceptional contest.  The man spared a glance behind him at the three crosses erected on this cursed hilltop.  The central cross held what was left of something only passingly recognizable as a human body.  The scourging crew had worked this one over particularly hard, ripping huge chunks of flesh from both the front and back of his body.  They had perhaps gotten a little carried away this time, caught up in almost a frenzy of excitement.  But after all, he was just a filthy Jew, and a condemned one at that, so who really cared?

                But the real problem with crucifixions were that they took so long.  There was just nothing to do after getting the prisoner nailed to the cross and mounting it in the ground.  The rabble was almost always too frightened to do anything worth suppressing.  And the blasted convicts usually took forever to actually die.  Granted, that was kind of the point.  But knowing all that didn’t curb the monotony one bit.

                A few yards away the rest of the cohort was involved in a dicing game.  They appeared to be playing for the clothes of the middle prisoner.  But the man didn’t feel like dicing.  For one thing this unnatural darkness which had obscured the sun a few hours ago was really getting on his nerves and giving him a headache.  All he really wanted was to get this detail over with and get on with his weekend.  His favorite tavern in the city was calling his name and he was particularly thirsty today for some reason.  The man needed a few drinks to soothe his aching head.

     For something to do, on a whim, he turned to look at the soon to be corpses.  There was nothing special about the two men on the other two crosses.  They hadn’t suffered a scourging and were in various states of the dying process, as normal.  But the man in the middle, there was something different about Him.  True, He was barely recognizable as a man with His face completely disfigured, chunks of flesh missing all over His body, and covered seemingly in rivers of blood.  But in spite of that, the man noticed something about this prisoner.  He had lost count of the number of crucifixions he had taken part in and he was quite good at gauging the level of pain a person was currently suffering.  This one had suffered more physical abuse and mutilation than any he had ever seen.  But even with all of that, the man hanging there and slowly dying seemed to be in more agony than could be explained by His physical wounds.  Most prisoners became partially accustomed to the pain after a while, the mind working to block some of it out.  But this one’s pain seemed to be actually increasing rather than decreasing.  He was literally writhing on the cross, what was left of His face contorting and twisting in a level of agony that the man usually saw during the peak of the worst scourgings.  Suddenly, without warning, the prisoner cried out in a voice louder and more powerful than any man in His condition had a right to, “My God, my God, why have You forsaken me?”  Shocked to stillness, the man simply stood and stared.  He was still staring a few minutes later when, after taking some wine on a sponge that had been lifted up to Him, He cried out again.  This time, impossibly, He was even louder than the last.  “It is finished!”, He proclaimed.  And then, with an inhuman level of calm and a measured pace, He lowered His head down to His chest and became still.

The man was transfixed.  This was not the way crucified people died.  They did not suddenly muster up the lung capacity to cry out not once but twice and then seem to just decide to surrender to death.  A thought came to him.  It floated out of nowhere into his consciousness.  It began to take shape in his mind.  It captivated him.  It refused to be ignored.  Without realizing he was speaking the man gave voice to this thought that was now more sure and solid and real and firm than any thought he had ever had in his life.  “Truly this man was the Son of God!”, he uttered involuntarily.  With his mind too clouded to think straight he stumbled away from the crosses in the direction of the city.  Perhaps those drinks would clear his head from this unwelcome fog which had overtaken him.  Gaining strength of will from his determination to drown out what he had just witnessed he increased his pace away from that awful hill.  Would the man finally find the peace on earth he was looking for?

     

                          

The Ascension

                The man’s eyes watered from the brightness of the sky.  His neck muscles ached from holding his head in this unnatural position.  His mouth grew dry.  But he refused to move.  He was desperate to keep his eyes trained on the Lord rising into the air as long as possible.  He was only a speck now, and the man couldn’t even be sure he was really even seeing Him any longer.  But he held his gaze heavenward.  He had always been a stubborn man, headstrong and impetuous.  It had gotten him into trouble on a number of occasions.  But this time he didn’t care.  He was determined to keep looking until the Lord was completely out of sight.

                Abruptly, with his peripheral vision, he became aware of two men in white clothing standing beside he and his brothers.  They said “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into the sky?  This Jesus, who has been taken up from you into heaven, will come in just the same way as you have watched Him go into heaven.”  Sheepishly, the man lowered his gaze.  All thoughts of his recent betrayal as well as his many failures before that vanished in a clarity of purpose that consumed his senses.  “Alright then, let’s get back to Jerusalem like the Lord said.  We need to wait for the Helper He said would come to us.”  Without waiting for an answer from his companions he turned and began walking in the direction of the city.  He was anxious to get to work.  Undoubtedly, after a few months the Lord would return to establish His kingdom.  Then would the man finally find the peace on earth he was looking for?

The Hatred

                The man gazed out of his living room window as the cold December snow spiraled lazily to the ground in ever increasing volume.  The fire on the hearth to his left was blazing, fighting back the chill in the air outside.  His wispy white hair curled haphazardly around his rheumy blue eyes.  His gnarled and age spotted hands carefully held his mug of cocoa so as not to spill the hot liquid on either himself or the furniture.  An occasional car drove slowly past the house and out of sight down the street.  The man sat.  And he remembered.

                His had been a life mostly devoid of peace.  He had barely known his mother, who had died when he was only four.  A despairing father turned to alcohol instead of his child when he needed him the most.  The drinking grew steadily worse as the years went by and then the abuse came.  The small, fractured, and dysfunctional family attended church on Sundays and dwelled in the blackest pits of despair the rest of the week.  And so the man was introduced early to the concept of pain and the absence of love.  When his father died from liver failure just before his 19^th birthday no one mourned him, least of all the young man.  Seeking to flee his childhood demons he enlisted in the Army.  There he learned that the horrors of alcoholism were nothing compared to the horrors of war.  Seeing men, many of them his friends, torn to pieces or robbed of their physical abilities or stripped of any mental capacity soured him to the notion that life held any sanctity at all.  How could it, when it was fragile and so easily taken away?

                After the war, the man got married as most young soldiers did upon returning home.  He got a job working for the railroad and began to grow a family.  He thought that perhaps now he might finally wrest a semblance of peace out of this hellish existence on earth.  But then, his illusions were shattered just as his young daughter’s spine was shattered by the four thousand pound vehicular weapon wielded by yet another drunken idiot who fate had allowed to live.  The man had almost no memory of the fateful night almost half a century ago now, when he first saw his daughter in a coma, wrapped in bandages, with tubes running into her from every direction; the only sign of life the incessant bleating of the heart rate monitor beside the hospital bed.  He had stumbled out of that place in a blind rage, found the driver of the car who had just been released on bail, and bringing all of his military training to bear, had beaten the man to death with his bare hands.

                The man passed the next four decades observing the continued decline of human civilization behind the walls of a prison.  He watched as America went to war first in Korea, then Vietnam.  He watched as millions died at the hands of the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia.  He watched as millions more perished from starvation under Mao Zedong’s Communist government in China.  He watched as East Germans, attempting to escape to the west, were gunned down by their own people.  He watched as Presidents were assassinated, riots were started, black men were lynched, murders uncounted were perpetrated, rapes unconscionable were committed, and corruption ran rampant like a wildfire in a drought parched forest.

                When the man was finally released from prison he found that his former wife wanted nothing to do with him.  His paralyzed daughter, poisoned by the advice of her mother, refused to even see him.  And so he sat and continued to watch the world pass by, growing more bitter with each passing year.  His most hated time of year was the month of December.  He was annually infuriated by the extra crowds of mindless, lemming-like shoppers he had to contend with in stores and the hordes of inept drivers he had to dodge on the streets.  He was incensed at the aura of joy and happiness that seemed to pervade people’s senses like a group psychosis during this time of the year.  But the man was, without doubt, the most hatefully roused to fury by the grinning preachers he would occasionally and accidentally stumble across as he rapidly changed channels on his television.  Every so often, out of spite, he would stop and listen critically for a few moments as they blathered on about Jesus and peace on earth and all of that rot.  He remembered well the same lies that were foisted upon him as a child.  Life had taught him better than that.  Peace was a myth that weak-minded fools clung to so as to escape the miserable reality of their lives.  The man had become convinced decades ago that he would never find the peace on earth he was looking for.

The Truth

                People throughout history have sought for peace in their lives.  Some have done it through the acquisition of wealth and power.  Others have retreated from the world and gone into seclusion.  Still others have used suicide as a misguided means of escape.  At the time surrounding the birth of Jesus some had the misguided notion that the promised Messiah would bring them a material peace and freedom from whatever troubles beset them in their lives, be they relational, financial, political, or otherwise.

                But the truth is that a true material level of peace will not be possible on this earth until the Messiah, King Jesus, comes a second time.  The scriptures tell us in Revelation chapter 20 that when He comes again Christ will establish a literal physical kingdom which He will rule over unopposed.  But until that time there can be no material peace because of the presence of sin and the corruption that all of creation is groaning under, as Romans chapter 8 makes clear.  So what was the purpose of the first advent of the Son of God, if not to bring peace to this earth?  The answer is, quite simply, that He came to bring peace in our hearts.

                A relationship with Jesus Christ and the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit is the only way to experience peace that transcends this life and extends into eternity.  Sure, someone can attain a level of happiness here and now through a marriage relationship, philanthropic efforts, financial success, or other means.  But none of that persists past the point of physical death.  As Matthew 6 reveals:

1. 19"Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. 20"But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys, and where thieves do not break in or steal;…

And King Solomon in the book of Ecclesiastes, with all of his wisdom and his riches and his incessant pursuit of physical pleasures, when he finally came to the end of himself, realized the truth.  All material possessions are vanity.  All of man's ambition is meaningless.  All of life apart from God is a chasing after the wind.

                But in contrast to this bleak picture, we find the soothing words of almighty God.  He assures us that whoever believes in His son will not perish, but will have eternal life.  And what is this sort of life?  What is it that we have to look forward to?  Jesus said in John 17 that eternal life is:

1. 3"that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent."

And why would we want to spend the rest of eternity getting to know someone?  Because the Psalmist says that the loving-kindness of God never ceases and that His compassion never fails and that they are new every morning!  God is so infinitely vast in His being that we will spend forever experiencing Him and it will never grow old.  It will never grow stale.  It will never be burdensome.  It will never fade.  The experience of knowing God is a never ending cornucopia of delights and pleasures and ecstasies.  

               And we can begin that most delightful of journeys now!  We don't have to wait another day.  If we confess with our mouths that Jesus is Lord (which means placing Him at the center of our lives and surrendering our petty ambitions to be joyfully swallowed by His divine will) and believe in our hearts that God raised Him from the dead (thus placing our hope for the future not in ourselves and our own abilities but rather in the promise of resurrection and glorification to come) then we will be saved!  This is the only way to experience true peace in this life and on this earth.  And not this present existence only but for all of eternity.  Will you place your faith and trust in Jesus right now and find the peace that you are looking for?

"Old School" Regeneration

Recently a good friend posed two questions to me for discussion.  They are: “Were the OT saints regenerated in the Old Testament?” and “Is it Regeneration then Conversion or Conversion then Regeneration?”  Here is my attempt to answer those questions from scripture for (hopefully) your reading enjoyment.

The two questions are obviously linked by the parallel element of Regeneration.  But I believe the first question is the more difficult of the two to answer adequately.  So I will spend the bulk of my time dealing with it.  My answer to the second question will be much shorter because it will rely on the evidence already presented in my attempt to answer the first. 

There are two foundational elements which informed my thinking on this topic from the beginning.  They are what I believe to be the best definitions of Regeneration available.  The first is of divine origin while the second is man-made.

Titus 3:4-7 - 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.

Regeneration: In theology, new birth by the grace of God; that change by which the will and natural enmity of man to God and His law are subdued, and a principle of supreme love to God and His law, or holy affections, are implanted in the heart. (Noah Webster)

1. Did the Old Testament saints experience regeneration?  I believe that they did.  My argument is based on two key factors: the logic that flows from scripture and the example of King David.  I will deal with the logic first.  In the New Testament regeneration is concurrent with faith and repentance.  It signifies spiritual life being granted where previously there had been only death.  We can see this element of death and rebellion in Romans 3:10-18 - ¹⁰ as it is written,

“There is none righteous, not even one;
¹¹ There is none who understands,
There is none who seeks for God;
¹² All have turned aside, together they have become useless;
There is none who does good,
There is not even one.”
¹³ “Their throat is an open grave,
With their tongues they keep deceiving,”
“The poison of asps is under their lips”;
¹⁴ “Whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness”;
¹⁵ “Their feet are swift to shed blood,
¹⁶ Destruction and misery are in their paths,
¹⁷ And the path of peace they have not known.”
¹⁸ “There is no fear of God before their eyes.”

In addition to that passage, 1 Corinthians 2:14 reads thusly – “¹⁴ But a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually appraised.”  Romans 8:6-8 further clarifies the condition of man – “⁶ For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace, ⁷ because the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God; for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so, ⁸ and those who are in the flesh cannot please God.”

In contrast to the above passages which paint a picture of hopelessness we see the New Testament authors expounding the element of faith.  Ephesians 2:8-9 reveals saving faith as both a gift from God rather than from ourselves as well as the primary vehicle through which salvation is given: “⁸ For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; ⁹ not as a result of works, so that no one may boast.”   This passage along with many others on faith securely interlink both the regeneration spoken of in Titus 3:4-7 above and its metaphor of new birth spoken of in John 3:3 (“³ Jesus answered and said to him, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.”)  with the element of faith as not the only, but certainly two of the essential components of salvation.

With faith established as a critical element of restoration with God we must examine whether any Old Testament saints demonstrated this kind of faith.  They certainly did.  In the later chapters of the book of Hebrews we see a stirring account of the giants of faith from the Old Testament.  This list is prefaced by the following statement in 10:38-11:2 – “³⁸ But My righteous one shall live by faith; And if he shrinks back, My soul has no pleasure in him. ³⁹ But we are not of those who shrink back to destruction, but of those who have faith to the preserving of the soul.” 11 Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.² For by it the men of old gained approval.  This is clearly pointing to these people as having the faith which results in approval from God.  The author of Hebrews even goes so far as to say that Noah “became an heir of the righteousness which is according to faith.”  There is no disputing the fact that these men and women were people of faith.  But the question remains, were they regenerated?  I believe they were regenerated, although lacking a precise theological term for the experience and a full explanation of the grace God was extending to them.  It is the only logical conclusion to be drawn from the fact that faith and regeneration are inextricably linked.  If a person has faith then they have experienced regeneration.  If they experience regeneration then they will show it through faith.

Further, it must be clarified that salvation has only ever come via grace.  Even under the Mosaic Law, escape from the wrath of God was never granted on the basis of the keeping of the Law.  The prophet Samuel makes this clear in 1 Samuel 15:22 when he admonishes Saul: “Has the Lord as much delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as in obeying the voice of the Lord?  Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to heed than the fat of rams.  Rather than a means of obtaining salvation the Law served rather as an illustration of exactly what happens when man views God’s benchmarks as being obtainable by works.  2 Corinthians 3:5-6 illustrates this point: “⁵ Not that we are adequate in ourselves to consider anything as coming from ourselves, but our adequacy is from God,⁶ who also made us adequate as servants of a new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.”  A powerful example of this element of salvation apart from the Law is that of King David.  When confronted in 2 Samuel 12 by Nathan the prophet after his horrific sin with Bathsheba and Uriah David immediately responds with the following statement in verse 13: “I have sinned against the Lord.”  Nathan responds, with the full authority of the Lord, just as immediately: “The Lord also has taken away your sin; you shall not die.”  There was no sacrifice.  There was no observance of the “letter” of the Mosaic Law.  There was only David’s contrite and humble heart of faith in his God.  And when we consider that the wages earned by sin is death as explained in Romans 6:23 it seems clear that God was graciously absolving David of his guilt purely on the basis of his faith.  To add to the already overwhelming evidence we find David in Psalm 51 pouring his heart out to the Lord in a prayer of confession and repentance.  In verse 11 of this famous Psalm David penned the following words: “Do not cast me away from Your presence and do not take Your Holy Spirit from me.”  The Hebrew word used here is ruwach (roo’-akh) and is the same word using in Genesis 1 to describe the “Spirit of God” hovering above the waters that had just been created.  Admittedly, ruwach can be used to denote simply wind, breath, or mind; but in context we must assume that in both places it is referring specifically and uniquely to the Holy Spirit.  And calling once again upon the foundational passage in Titus 3 the conclusion is that the Holy Spirit had been poured out on King David in the act of regeneration, Old Testament style.

But how can this be?  Doesn’t salvation, and by extension regeneration, come only through the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ?  Yes, it certainly does now as evidenced by the teaching of Peter in Acts 4:10-12: “¹⁰ let it be known to all of you and to all the people of Israel, that by the name of Jesus Christ the Nazarene, whom you crucified, whom God raised from the dead—by this name this man stands here before you in good health. ¹¹ He is the stone which was rejected by you, the builders, but which became the chief corner stone. ¹² And there is salvation in no one else; for there is no other name under heaven that has been given among men by which we must be saved.”  But we must remember that God historically has revealed Himself through a sequential process of ever increasing understanding which builds upon that which came before and adds to it without contradicting any of it.  The theological term for this is Progressive Revelation.  The best and most obvious example of this is Christ Himself.  God first foreshadows the Messiah in Genesis 3:15 when He pronounces judgment on Satan: “And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed; He shall bruise you on the head, and you shall bruise him on the heel.”  He then continues to preface His coming through the Law and the Prophets, from the Bronze snake that Moses “lifted up” in the wilderness to the suffering servant seen in Isaiah 53.  But the full revelation of God’s plan of ultimate redemption was not seen until the first advent of Jesus when He was incarnated in human flesh.  This is Progressive Revelation.  So with this in mind, we must understand that each generation of humanity was only held to the standard that had been revealed to them at that time.  Salvation has always been accomplished by the work of the Holy Spirit through the medium of faith expressed as belief in the word of God.  Prior to the incarnation, the word of God was limited to that which was spoken verbally by the prophets and that which was written down.  This word was life giving even before the Messiah came, as in Psalm 19:8 – “The precepts of the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart;  The commandment of the Lord is pure, enlightening the eyes.”  Then, according to the principle of Progressive Revelation, the word or logos of God was expanded to include the Word of God in the person of Jesus.  John 1:1-4 puts it this way: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.² He was in the beginning with God. ³ All things came into being through Him, and apart from Him nothing came into being that has come into being. ⁴ In Him was life, and the life was the Light of men.”  Thus prior to the coming of Jesus faith and salvation, and by association regeneration, were all possible, based purely and solely upon faith in His word and extended to mankind by His grace.

2. Is it Regeneration then Conversion or Conversion then Regeneration?  The answer to this question lies in all of the passages used above to answer the first.  Conversion is understood as the expression of the twin gifts of faith and repentance whereby a person is made right in the sight of God.  But faith and repentance cannot be granted to a dead person because a dead person cannot respond to stimuli.  They must be made alive in order to react appropriately.  And Romans 3:10-18, 1 Corinthians 2:14, and Romans 8:6-8 make it abundantly clear that all men begin in a state of death.  This is where Regeneration comes into play.  Regeneration must occur prior to Conversion so that the soul which was formerly dead and hostile to God can respond out of the newness of life that is now being experienced for the first time.

To summarize, I believe the bible teaches that Saving Faith is a primary component of Conversion and is a gift given by God to enable a person to seek after, treasure, and ultimately exalt Him.  Such a gift of grace would be ineffective if given to a spiritually dead person because they lack any capacity to respond due to their lifeless spiritual condition.  Therefore, Saving Faith must always be preceded by Regeneration.  Because of this necessary sequence of events, I believe the Old Testament saints were indeed regenerated prior to receiving their saving faith in the word of God.  Although the bible does not explicitly state this, I believe it is logically implicit in the structure and nature of Salvation that is taught in the New Testament.

Lies

A lament for the lies

That have poisoned the minds

Twisted the souls

Corrupted the design

It began in the Garden

With a pernicious question

Did God really say?

Do you ask it still today?

A lament for the lies

To our girls and our boys

Perverted the unity

Intended to reflect trinity

Men are to dominate

Might will make right

Women are objects

For the bedroom at night

A lament for the lies

To our sons and our daughters

Reversed their roles

Split them asunder

Males are buffoons

Best keep them from rule

Females are better

Fit the man with fetters

A lament for the lies

That have polluted our churches

Filled up the pews

With spiritual corpses

Come and taste me

The world, it pleads

And with our mouths we bring praise

While our actions, malaise

author unimportant