Regeneration - Volume 19, Issue 3

This series of thoughts was originally part of an internet discussion a few years ago with Jim Jordan over his essay Regeneration: Some Tentative Explorations. Readers familiar with Jordan's essay will understand more of the interaction, but the thoughts contained here can still stand on their own. Since writing this, while reading Peter Leithart's fine book The Baptized Body, some additional thoughts on this important subject occurred to me, which can be found on the previous page.

The Reformed world is currently cooking up a perfect Irish stew controversy. Thrown into the pot have been the meaning of regeneration, imputation, and justification, the relationship of faith and works, the New Perspective on Paul, the firing of Norman Shepherd twenty years ago from Westminister Seminary, and a Presbyterian (!) newspaper charging me with having become a paedobaptist ten years ago.

Part of this strange mix has been a concern to protect the historic evangelical faith with regard to the new birth. The point of this series of meditations is to offer a defense of the historic evangelical understanding of regeneration, but also to place it in a more scriptural context. That context is the Restoration of the heavens and earth that came with Jesus Christ. Hence the title—Life in the Regeneration. The new life in Jesus Christ is a reality in the heart of each individual genuinely converted to God. But this new life has come to pass in a new world, a world or age that Jesus called the Regeneration (Matt. 19:2).

There is an important sense in which regeneration has to be understood as applied to individuals. But this is not the primary thrust of the scriptural emphasis. If we emphasize individual regeneration alone, we will lose the glory of the biblical message of Regeneration. But if we keep the scriptural emphasis, we lose nothing with regard to individuals.

As we talk about what it means to be "born again," we have to preserve the scriptural pattern and order. First, as the cornerstone of all doctrines of regeneration, Jesus was born again from the dead (Col. 1:18). Because of Christ's birth from among the dead, the whole created order was made new in Him. We have a new heaven and a new earth because of Him. He is the firstborn of all creation (Col. 1:15). Jesus was raised from the dead for us, so that He might be the first born among many brethren (Rom. 8:29).

In doing this for us, Christ accomplished the resurrection of Israel (Ez. 37:1-14), which is why Nicodemus, a teacher in this Israel, should have known what Christ was talking about (John 3:7). You all must be born again. But this national regeneration carries individuals with it. A man must be born again to see the kingdom of God (John 3:3,5)

Christ was born again from the dead. Because of this, the whole created order was born again from the dead. Because of this, Israel was born again from the dead and is now the Church. Because of this, a man can be born again and enter the Church. If he was already in the Church, he can be born again and become a true son of the Church.

Jesus Christ, the firstborn, is therefore head of the Church of the Firstborn (Heb. 12:23). All of this is indicated in Paul's interpretation of the second psalm—

And we declare unto you glad tidings, how that the promise which was made unto the fathers, God hath fulfilled the same unto us their children, in that he hath raised up Jesus again; as it is also written in the second psalm, Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee (Acts 13:32-33).

When Christ was begotten from the dead in the resurrection, this was the fulfillment of a promise God made to our fathers. And because Christ entered resurrection life, we may enter His resurrection life. We may be born again.

It should not surprise us to find pockets of "unregeneration" in this world made new. The yeast works through the loaf gradually. But the yeast is alive, and brings life to the whole. Thus we find creatures who hate the new creation around them. Thus we find baptized covenant members who inexplicably hate the church of the Firstborn that claims them by baptism. No matter. Let God be true, and every man a liar—for the time being.

But these pockets of "unregeneration" have caused more than a few theological headaches. How can a part of the whole not have what the living whole has? Moreover, how can a part of the whole not really have what that part, as part of the whole, has?

This is the beginning of all spiritual wisdom. Among the sons of Sarah, we find sons of both Sarah and Hagar. Among the Jews, we find Jews and Gentiles. Among the regenerate, we find the regenerate and the unregenerate. Among the elect, we find the elect and the reprobate. Until the resurrection, why do these two categories always arise?

Before talking about regeneration, we have to remember the importance of generation. Out of the five points of Calvinism, three of them have to do with the decrees of God. "Total depravity" has to do with this morning's newspaper (the record of man in the past), and is not one of the secret things hidden from us. The sin of man is revealed to us, and if we believe the Scriptures, can actually be seen by us. So the place to start in understanding regeneration would not be those passages which talk about regeneration (or even apostasy), but those passages which speak about the generation of unbelieving covenant members. Regeneration cannot be understood apart from generation.

Regeneration means becoming the seed of another—ultimately, having one family tree and then acquiring a different one. My father used to be Adam and now he is the last Adam. My father used to be the devil and now he is Abraham. A creature being summoned into being ex nihilo is being created. We might say he is being born. We would never say that he was being reborn. Rebirth entails having been in existence already, with another father.

Regeneration means being transformed from the seed of the serpent to the seed of the woman. This cannot simply be equated with baptism (or circumcision in the Old Testament) because most of the "broods of vipers" identified for us in the Bible were covenant members.

On all questions regarding regeneration, the basic question is: Who's your daddy? Outside the covenant, the devil is father. For the elect, God is our Father. But for the reprobate covenant member, God is his Father in a real covenantal sense, but in another tangible way, the devil is still his father. This is fully consistent with how Jesus addresses unbelieving covenant members. The emphasis is mine.

I know that ye are Abraham's seed; but ye seek to kill me, because my word hath no place in you. I speak that which I have seen with my Father: and ye do that which ye have seen with your father. They answered and said unto him, Abraham is our father. Jesus saith unto them, If ye were Abraham's children, ye would do the works of Abraham. But now ye seek to kill me, a man that hath told you the truth, which I have heard of God: this did not Abraham. (John 8:37-40)

Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do. (John 8:44)

Ye serpents, ye generation of vipers, how can ye escape the damnation of hell? (Matt. 23:33)

In this the children of God are manifest, and the children of the devil: whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God, neither he that loveth not his brother. (1 John 3:10)

Our interest in such passages should not have to do with the wickedness as such, but rather with the divine "paternity suit" that follows on the basis of it. If some covenant members are children of the devil and others are not (as the quotation from 1 John indicates), then there must be a divide of nature—different fathers require different natures, and vice versa. Now I am aware that some may want to reject the very idea of "nature." But such a rejection is problematic in discussions of regeneration because it is impossible in discussions of generation. We generate according to our kinds, we generate our nature. A fig tree bears figs, according to its nature, and does not bear oranges, which would be contrary to its nature.

In fact, biblically speaking, "nature" is not captured by a static Hellenistic definition, but rather something that is revealed through the process of generation. The nature of the father is found in the nature of the son. In order to acquire a different nature, I must acquire a different father.

In order to take all baptized covenant members as participants in Christ in the "strong sense," we would have to distinguish what is objectively given in Christ, and not what is subjectively done with those objective benefits. Perseverance would, on this reading, be what was subjectively done with what God has objectively given. In this view, the person who did not persevere was not given less of Christ. But this necessarily means that persevering grace is not an objective gift or grace. God's willingness to continue "the wrestling" would depend upon what kind of fight we put up, or cooperation we provide, and because no one's fundamental nature has been changed, those natures remain at "enmity with God." In this view, whatever total depravity means, it is not ontologically changed, just knocked down and sat upon. The Spirit pins one snarling dog, but not another. But this in turn leads to another thought—eventually at some time in the process we stop snarling and start cooperating (if we are bound to heaven), and what do we call this change or transformation? The historic name for this change has been regeneration, and I see no reason to change it.

Affirming the absolute need for personal regeneration is the sine qua non of historic evangelicalism. Affirming that the gates of hell will not prevail against the Church is the sine qua non of historic catholicity. Deny the former only, and the end result is the deadly nominalism found in many quarters of the institutional Church. Such saintlings need to be told that God can make sons of Abraham out of rocks. Deny the latter only, and you have the endless splintering sectarianism that has come to characterize American pop evangelicalism. This comes about when Christians cease affirming the need for an invisible work of the Spirit of God, and presume to be able to see exactly how and when that regeneration happens.

But the moment of regeneration is never visible to us. Lack of regeneration, however, is visible over time because the works of the flesh, Paul tells us, are manifest. The fruit of the Spirit manifest themselves publicly as well, and Jesus tells us to make our judgments on the basis of fruit. But it must be noted that biblical judgments of this sort are mature, and are based on the mature outcome of a person's way of life. All this to say that genuine discernment is based on the video, not on the snapshot.

Eventually, the view that natures are unchanged (or non-existent) has to go one of two directions—either we must minimize how bad unbelievers are, or we must emphasize how bad believers still are. Either way gets us into trouble, and the only alternative is to stick with some notion of the traditional evangelical and Reformed concept of genuine heart regeneration, which means heart transformation.

So then, for those who persevere, how they subjectively receive grace is part of what has been objectively given. We are to work out our salvation because God is at work in us to will and to do for His good pleasure. My continued subjective positive responses tomorrow must be considered as part of His objective gift to me. We work out what He works in.

What are we to say to the view that the Bible does not teach that some people are individually "regenerated"? A view that locates perseverance in an ongoing and mysterious wrestling of the Spirit, rather than in a change of nature of those elected to heaven? If the Spirit wrestles with all baptized believers, but with some more than others, then pastorally, heaven or hell depends upon the extent of that wrestling. There has to be a watershed in there somewhere. One obvious question that would arise, were this kind of thing to be taught from the pulpit, is when, how, and why does God give up on a person? He is wrestling with all of us, meaning that all of us resist Him to some extent. Do any cooperate with Him fully? How much is necessary? This has the effect of locating that watershed in our choices, which we must avoid.

Morbid introspection can work with virtually any doctrinal material. In a traditional Reformed pietistic setting, it tries to pry into the decrees of election to find out the names of the chosen. In the view that a person in conversion does not undergo a change of nature, the guessing would have to involve the inscrutable whims of the Spirit. What kind of wrestling will God do with me? How long will He be willing to keep it up? But the basic question should always be, "Who is my Father?" The only faithful covenantal answer is "God."

It cannot be the case that all who are covenantally "in Christ" by virtue of baptism are in exactly the same position as regards the grace and favor of God—with no distinction save that some persevere. To think that having "all grace" except for persevering grace is somehow reassuring is to have a wildly skewed sense of priorities. "Other than that, how was the play, Mrs. Lincoln?" How is God's withholding of perseverance not a refusal of grace? If we say that the grace was forfeited by those who subjectively resisted His work in their lives "too much," then why did God withhold from them the gift of "not resisting too much?"

Jim Jordan has helpfully shown the connection between the ten commandments and Ezekiel's heart of stone, and this appears to be a connection St. Paul makes also. But this does not really weaken the need for individual regeneration. How could it? The apostolic treatment concludes with an indictment of individual covenant members. "But their minds were blinded: for until this day remaineth the same vail untaken away in the reading of the old testament; which vail is done away in Christ. But even unto this day, when Moses is read, the vail is upon their heart" (2 Cor. 3:14-15).

Blindness is a condition which covenant members then and now can certainly have. If the change in a person is simply relational, then how can these covenant members be described as blinded and having a veil on their hearts? Relationally, they would be identical to the elect.

In reponse to the question, "What more can there be than union with Christ?" the answer would appear to be permanent union with Him. And this idea of permanence is one which the Lord certainly talks about. Servants come and go, but sons are forever.

Then said Jesus to those Jews which believed on him, If ye continue in my word, then are ye my disciples indeed; And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free. They answered him, We be Abraham's seed, and were never in bondage to any man: how sayest thou, Ye shall be made free? Jesus answered them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Whosoever committeth sin is the servant of sin. And the servant abideth not in the house for ever: but the Son abideth ever. If the Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed. (John 8:31-36)

The problem with our Auburn opponents is that they wanted to talk about passages like this one, or the wheat and tares, and ignore the passages like John 15. But we don't want to be guilty of the reverse problem, camping out in John 15 and failing to treat the fact that many of the illustrations indicate an ontological difference between the elect and reprobate within the covenant as one existing the entire time. Tares are weeds the entire time, the sow that is washed is a clean pig but still has a natural affinity for the mire, the dog that vomited is still a dog. On the other side, all the branches are true branches, including those to be cut out, etc. I simply want to affirm all the passages at face value, and let God sort it out.

The only way I can do this is to affirm the objectivity of the covenant, affirm that ontological differences exist between the elect and the reprobate whether the covenant is involved or not, and affirm that we should not pry too closely into it. We should teach that these things are so, not that we know what and where and how they are so.

I want to affirm this kind of ontological anthropology because the Bible repeatedly does, but it does so in terms of the nature of the ancestry. It speaks of thornbushes, vipers, the devil's children, and so on, and it does this frequently when addressing those covenant members whose spiritual ancestry (and therefore nature) ought to have been different than it was.

In the Bible, personal identity is not primarily a question of some substance inside a man. But each man still has a nature, inherited from his father. So ontology is not a philosophical problem in the Bible, but rather a problem of generation. And when this generation is sinful, the only solution to the problem is regeneration, which is to say, generation by a new father.

So can we say that God gives exactly the same thing (Himself) to all baptized individuals? And then account for the differences in outcome by saying that God's Spirit works with all individuals differently? I don't think so.

When someone gets married, he gives himself. And he does so, promising that he will continue to do so forever. God does the same with His elect.

For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Rom. 8:38-39)

The elect believe this promise, and it is always fulfilled because the promises are always apprehended by faith. It is not fulfilled for the reprobate covenant member because he does not believe it, and never did. So if God gives Himself to me as my Father, then this means that I no longer have the nature of my first father, the devil. This is why God continues to be a Father to me. If He gave Himself fully to a reprobate covenant member, then He would give Himself the same way tomorrow, and the day after, and suddenly the reprobate covenant member cannot be considered reprobate.

So long as we acknowledge that there are covenant members who are not saved, then we must necessarily say that God does not give Himself to all in the same way. And this is just another way of saying that some covenant members need to be regenerated.

We are not engaged in a fight to recover biblical language simpliciter, but rather in a fight to recover the right to use biblical language when necessary. The vocabulary of historic liturgies, systematics, the creeds, and so on are also most necessary, and we should have no interest in ditching them unless absolutely necessary. Our endeavors in this whole area should include fifty years of attempted harmonization. At the same time, what we must reject is such uninspired creedal vocabulary making it impossible to use biblical language (as appropriate) without being called a heretic. I want to be able to use the word regeneration in the same way the Synod of Dort did, but I don't want to be told that the usage of that venerable synod outranks Christ's reference to life in the Regeneration.

Some are troubled by the idea of definitive justification at the beginning of our Christian lives and another eschatological "justification" at the end of history. They are right to be wary about any attempt to smuggle autonomous works into the
equation, but wrong in not realizing that eternity/time transactions cannot always be tidily represented on the blackboard.

I once asked Mike Horton if he agreed with the Reformed commonplace that not only our persons needed to be justified, but that also our works needed to be. He said that he did. I asked him when he thought our works were to be justified, and he answered that he thought that would be at the last day. I thought this was a good possibility, but asked whether this might not be construed by some as a "progressive" justification. Another possibility (it seems to me) is that our works need to be justified as we do them, which seems to be even more like a progressive justification. The strange thing is that because of shibboleth/sibboleth, tomato/tomahto issues, a man could find himself in deep presbyterial doo-doo for saying this, depending on his pronunciation. But I cannot imagine any Reformed man getting in trouble anywhere for saying that our works must be justified, and not just our persons. But suppose he talks out loud about when this might happen?

With all this noted, we still need a word to describe the heart transformation that occurs in everyone who goes to heaven. And we need a word to describe the imputation of Christ's righteousness to the sinner. We already have stipulated theological definitions for regeneration and justification. Why change them? Some might want a more strictly exegetical name or words for these realities. I am not necessarily against this, but the disadvantage that a biblical name has when it is being used in a precise, theological way is that the need for consistency and precision can then displace the broader (and more gloriously sloppy) connotations that are usually found in any biblical usage. How does the Bible use hypostasis? Does anyone really care anymore?

Back on the topic, in Luke 18, for example, two covenant members go down to the Temple to pray. The Pharisee was rigorously orthodox (and Reformed!) in his formulation. He gave glory to God for all that he had and was (soli Deo gloria!). He thanked God that he was not as other men (what do you have that you did not receive as a gift?), and so forth. We see right through this sin of his, of course, and close our Bibles in order to thank God that we are not like that Pharisee. Sorry, I got sidetracked.

Anyway, the other fellow confessed that he was a sinner, and asked God to be merciful to him. God was merciful to him, and so he went home justified rather than the other (Luke 18:14). So here is a biblical term to describe what happens to a repentant covenant member who is finally getting his act together. He is justified. Now it might be replied (and should be) that this does not do justice to the other usages of the word justification in Scripture. Exactly so, which is why I think we ought not to be trying to come up with biblical phrases or uses only. We should use terms which are consistent with Scripture, based on Scripture, and are subordinate to Scripture. We do not pick and choose, but rather harmonize them all. A man can be justified in one sense and not in another. This was the condition of the Pharisee, who went home that day unjustified. The other man had been circumcised, and was able to worship in the temple. He was justified, right? In one sense. But then he went home justified, and we may assume that he had not arrived that way.

Some might want to say that we have no need to use the word converted of such a man (which misleads people), because it suggests he never really was in Christ in the first place. But sometimes this is precisely what we do need to suggest. Being in Christ is not just one thing that is operated by just one on/off switch. The hypocrite is in Christ in one sense, and he is not in Christ in another. Part of our problem is that we want to nail too many things down. Tares are in the wheat field, but they do not partake of ontological wheatness. But when the pietists beat this drum too loudly, they need to be reminded that the fruitless branches in John 15 do partake of ontological branchness.

God is perfect, but He is no perfectionist. He likes to mess with our heads.

Many theological problems are created by turning certain issues into theological problems. As Yogi Berra might have said.

One of the central sticking issues in the Federal Vision stuff is the question of personal regeneration. But this is only a problem because we are dealing with it on the blackboard, as a theological problem involving categories. But personal regeneration is personal, and the most important thing about it is not its placement in the right category. You must be born again.

Here is how we stumble. Take a basic truism of Reformed theology— the doctrine of the antithesis. While doing this, never forget that truisms are true, but also guard against using the abstracted truth as a shield to guard against the actual truth. And in this case, here is how it is frequently done.

"I am guarding the antithesis," a man might solemnly say, as he haggles over one of his pet doctrines. But what makes this work? It is the assumption that "the antithesis" is between righteousness and unrighteousness, abstractly considered. And since his pet doctrine is on the side of righteousness, in the same column on the blackboard, in fact, it must be a faithful representation of the "antithesis."

But the antithesis is not a theological form of A and not A. It is not the contrast between right and wrong. It is not between righteousness and unrighteousness. The antithesis divides people—the seed of the woman and the seed of the serpent. We are talking about billions of personal names: mothers, fathers, wives, husbands, sons, and daughters.

The antithesis is not about abstracted categories at all. Upholding and defending the antithesis means doing whatever we can to keep a clear distinction between those people who walk in the light and those people who, hating their brother, continue to walk in darkness.

This is where the doctrine of personal regeneration comes in. I don't care what you call it—transformation, conversion to God, effectual call, being born again to God—but this reality is the only thing that will enable us to make faithful sense of the secular and ecclesiastical worlds around us.

Now there are two basic ways to mess this up. One is to deny the antithesis, which is the route of saccharine do-gooders, weepy universalists, chagrined hand-wringers, and other exegetical bed-wetters. The indivisibility of the human race (their godhead) is assumed, declared, preached, and exalted. This dogma is then ferociously applied to any who might call it into question. So this "we are the world" position is forced to acknowledge that the only divisible segment of the human race consists of those Christians who blasphemously posit the divisibility of the human race. Since this sets up a clear absurdity that their secular apologists cannot solve, these angular and uncooperative Christians have to be quickly shouted down, and then frogmarched off for their (tax-supported) Inclusivity Training. This accounts for why the tolerant and inclusive can become so savage so quickly.

The other error is to affirm but misplace the antithesis. Some make the antithesis personal, which is good, but they also make it tribal or racial. This was the error of the Judaizers in the first century, and is the error of various racialists today. But others, in defense of orthodoxy, misplace the antithesis by making it a division of abstract categories. But it is nothing of the kind. It is the division between those people who are the seed of the woman and those people who are the seed of the serpent. These two groups of people have antipathy settled between them (by the decree of God), and nothing whatever can be done to dissolve that antipathy in various humanistic or ecumenical solvents.

Now here is the problem, and this is why the doctrine of the absolute necessity of the new birth is so important. The fundamental antithesis is between those who are on their way to heaven and those who are on their way to hell. We are invited (in numerous places in the Scriptures) to consider our earthly lives in the light of our ultimate destinations. The rich fool is not encouraged to say or think, "Well, I know I am in hell for all eternity, but for a while there I sure had enough money to build some bigger barns!" This vantage of eternity (and only this) gives us genuine perspective on our lives. We may affirm other doctrinal truths alongside this one, but we may never mute or diminish the absolute necessity of the new birth for every son or daughter of Adam. If we lose that battle, we lose the war.

None of this is being said to take away from the importance of the Church, which is the body of Christ. The eschatological Church is identical to the company of the elect, and on that great day, there will be no confusion or blurring of our categories at all. But until then, in the mess of history, the historical Church contains wheat and tares, sheep and pigs, brothers and false brothers. This means that if we allow historical categories to trump eschatological ones, we will wind up offended by the historical antipathy that God settled between the seed of the woman (in history) and the seed of the serpent (in history). And if we are offended at what God has done in this, we will soon be stumbled and offended by what He has done elsewhere. If we don't repent of this, we will not succeed in removing the antithesis which so offends us—but we might manage to turn coat.

At the same time, those who want to affirm the central importance of regeneration, but who also want to assert that they have the power to peer into hearts and determine who around here is really born again and who not, are preserving an important truth (the need for personal regeneration), but they are paying far too high a price. That price is that they have also introduced the very dangerous sectarian (and—sorry everybody!—baptistic) impulse into the life of the Church. We, the Pure and Lovely, consist of "thee and me, and I have my doubts about thee."

But those who want to affirm the central importance of the Church in history, but who also want to act as though if you are "baptized, it's all good," are just begging for marginal Christianity to take root everywhere. And marginal Christianity is always tare-Christianity, not wheat-Christianity. These folks are also paying too high a price for the raggedy piece of the truth that they manage to preserve.

This is why we preach Christ. This is why we preach Christ crucified. This is why we call all men to be converted to God, so that they might live faithful and gracious lives—a gift from the hand of God. This is why we are rightly called
evangelicals. Christ died, was buried, and rose again on the third day so that we could walk in newness of life.

If we hear a word enough, we think we know what it means. We live in a Christian sub-culture that has strongly emphasized the need to be "born again." Without denying this need for regeneration at all, we still have to place the reality of this in a biblical context, lest we turn it into something entirely unbiblical—which we have been in great danger of doing.

Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature: For by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him: And he is before all things, and by him all things consist. And he is the head of the body, the church: who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead; that in all things he might have the preeminence . . . (Col. 1:12-22)

This is a particularly rich text, but in order to see it rightly we first have to put away an unbiblical set of assumptions. Whenever we hear the word regeneration, we think of individuals getting saved or not. This is entailed by the biblical concept of regeneration, and required by it, but if we begin and end here, we will have a gross distortion of the Bible's teaching. The gospel is not limited to the salvation of atomistic individuals.

The common assumption is that God drops a rope from heaven, and then the theological debates begin. Pelagians want to shimmy up the rope, Arminians want to hang on while God pulls, Calvinists say that God ties the rope to us with one of His knots, and some of our more severe brethren think He ties it around our necks. Within the constraints of this debate, the Calvinists are quite right. But note that something is still wrong with the entire picture. The illustration itself limits us in ways the Bible does not. Within those constraints, the Calvinists are correct, but there is more going on outside those constraints.

We need to recover an understanding of the glory of the regeneration, and we begin by looking at what the word means, and then at how the Bible applies it. Regeneration refers to rebirth after death. With this in mind, what do we learn from Scripture about regeneration?

First, Jesus was born again. In our text above, we learn that Jesus was the firstborn from the dead (Col. 1:18). Our father Adam plunged us into a condition of death. Jesus entered into that Adamic death, and was born again from that death. The apostle Paul quotes the 2nd Psalm ("Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee") and applies it to the resurrection (Acts 13:33). Because Jesus was born again from the dead, everything else can be born again from the dead. And this is what we see. Unless Jesus was born again from the dead, no one else could be born again from the dead. Unless Jesus was raised from the dead, we are all still in our sins, which is the same thing as still being in our death.

Second, the entire cosmos was born again. Our text again says that Jesus was the firstborn of every creature. This principle of new life was placed at the heart of the cosmic order, and began to work its way out. "And Jesus said unto them, Verily I say unto you, That ye which have followed me, in the regeneration when the Son of man shall sit in the throne of his glory, ye also shall sit upon twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel" (Matt. 19:28). The creation longs for the culmination of this glorious process (Rom. 8:22). The regeneration referred to here is the regeneration of heaven and earth, which would not have been possible apart from the resurrection—the engine of this cosmic regeneration.

And third, Israel was born again. In his famous conversation with Nicodemus, Jesus pressed this particular point. You (all) must be born again (John 3:7). You are a teacher of Israel, and you don't know this? This is what Ezekiel so wonderfully predicted for Israel (Ez. 36:25-28; 37:11). Israel was born again, and so we are now members of the new Israel, the Christian church. The valley of dry bones came to life, and all Israel stood to its feet.

And finally, John Smith was born again. But we must place this in its right context. Jesus said "a man" must be born again if he is to see the kingdom of heaven (John 3:3,5). Our passage in Colossians descends from the cosmic heights to tell the Colossian Christians how it was applied to them. After Christ accomplished the cosmic new birth (v. 20), He brings this new life to those who had been alienated through sin (v. 21). It is the same here. Without the resurrection, without the transformation of the heavens and earth, without the reconstitution of the new Israel, there is no such thing as individual regeneration. We do not say that corporate regeneration makes individual regeneration superfluous, but rather we say that corporate and cosmic regeneration makes individual regeneration both possible and mandatory. The world has been reconciled to God through Christ. Therefore, Paul presses the point. Be therefore reconciled.

Compare this to getting wet. What difference does it make how you get wet, just so long as you do? The problem here has to do with autonomous man's desire to control and manage this thing. But Christ has remade the world, and we
cannot control what He is doing. It makes a difference whether you got wet because someone spritzed a little moisture in your face or you got wet because the tsunami hit the beach. The issue of control is always the issue, really. One of the central features of Christ's teaching on regeneration is ignored or twisted by us, because we cannot handle the fact that God has never been successfully domesticated by man. The wind blows where it wants, Jesus taught us (John 3:8). Some people try to bottle the wind—and tell others how to be born again. Others ignore this by pretending that Jesus must be talking about gentle zephyrs, playing quietly among the flowers. But perhaps He wanted us to think about a typhoon.

If our thinking about regeneration begins and ends with the individual, we will drastically misunderstand the nature of God's work in the world. If it never gets down to the individual level, the confusion is just as bad. When a man is summoned by an evangelist to the new birth, he is not being summoned into a private chamber, where mysterious things happen to him as an individual. Rather, the evangelist declares that Jesus has been born again from the dead. Because Jesus has been born again from the dead, He is the Lord over all creation, and all creation, the heavens and the earth, rejoice in having been made new. God has also raised Israel from the dead so that a new Israel might be God's nation in this new creation. The unregenerate individual is told that everything around him has been transformed, and that he might as well come along quietly. Behold, the Lord Jesus, the Savior of the world.