The New Birth, Or, the Work of the Holy Spirit (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1867 edition. Excerpt: ...love, and joy in God's being--these are pre-eminent among the responses which a regenerate heart makes to truth as the instrument of the divine change within. They are intelligible responses. They are reasonable, natural, honorable responses. They constitute a new life in the soul, which honest men cannot help trusting, and wise men cannot help revering. " And God saw that it was good." VI. CREED ESSENTIAL TO CHARACTER. A third principle inferable from the doctrine before us, is that of the importance of truthfulness in theological opinion. The new birth as represented in the Scriptures gives no support to the theory, so natural to superficial thought, that belief, as such, is of little moment in religion; that God will judge characters, and not creeds; that we shall not be held responsible for obeying another man's faith in preference to our own. On the contrary, in regeneration character and creed are indissolubly united. God's instrument in effecting the change is truth. Falsehood finds no place there. Truth in caricature finds none. The less a man believes of truth, the more distant is he from the probable range of regenerating grace. The more distorted a man's opinions are, the more fearful are his perils. The more negative his convictions become, the more faint becomes all reasonable hope that he will be saved. In terrific consistency with this principle is the scriptural representation of the most hopeless depth of sin, as that of those to whom God sends delusion, that they may believe a lie. God acts in regeneration where truth can act; not elsewhere. The mind that withholds itself from truth is withholding-itself from God. There is reason to believe respecting many constant listeners to the preaching of the gospel, that here is the exact...