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THE FALL AND THE RESTORATION OF MAN

"And the LORD God took the man, and put him into the garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it. And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, 'Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat: but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.'"Genesis 2:15-17

The educated man of modern society has been taught from his childhood that the human species is in the process of evolving from a lower to a higher form of life. This is both taught and accepted almost without question. The teacher presents the ideas of evolution as already proved and fully established scientific facts, and the pupil receives the information without question. And neither the teacher nor the student has the slightest thought that perhaps the fantastic scheme being presented to him has absolutely no basis in the facts of the real world in which he actually lives.

It has been said that a man will believe almost anything as long as it is a lie. The more fantastic the tale is, the more readily will it be believed, even by the most educated of men. On the other hand, no matter how simple, plain, and direct that the truth is, it will almost always be rejected. As an ex-scientist, being well acquainted with the theory of evolution, I can say that I have seen first hand that this saying is true. For although that theory is utterly fantastic and not in the least verified in the laboratory or in real life experience, almost the totality of the scientific community accepts it without question and considers anyone to be a fool that believes the simple declarations of the Bible about creation.

The theory of evolution says that man began as a little glob of protoplasm or some such thing in some primeval sea of slime and that over millions and millions of years he has progressively evolved through some unknown but fantastic process into higher and higher forms of life, culminating in the wonderful, awesome, and miraculous creature that he is presently found to be. However, the Scriptures tell us simply that God created the world and that He then created Adam and Eve, who were perfect in holiness and righteousness. It further tells us that they sinned against the known will of God and that they fell from their exalted state of perfection and that their progeny have inherited from them this fallen and perverted state.

Modern science teaches us that there is no need of a Saviour; we are evolving from a lower more imperfect form and we will all, by and by, evolve into perfection. It says that we are not fallen creatures needing redemption and that we have absolutely nothing to feel guilty about because we are merely evolving creatures doing the best that we can do at this stage of our upward journey. On the other hand, the Bible says that all have sinned and come short of the glory of God and that wrath is determined against all sinners. But the Scriptures also offer us hope of deliverance, not just from the wrath but also from the sin that brings the wrath. For the Scriptures tell us of a means of restoration out of our fall, not just back up into that state of perfection from which Adam fell originally but into a far more exalted state, even into the very stature of Christ.

The theory of evolution gives no explanation for the evil that permeates man and all that he touches. By this theory there is no accounting for the evil and cruelty that almost completely fill the pages of the history of mankind because evil is a spiritual entity and not physical. As far back in time as one can search, all that can be found in relation to man and his doings is war, robbery, slaughter, invasion, murder, torture, rape, etc. Science, with all of its touted wisdom and knowledge, can furnish us with no explanation nor any solution. The Bible alone reveals to us why man is the way that he is and what can be done about it. With this in mind let us search the Scriptures to see what they have to tell us about the past, the present, and the future of the human race.

In the very first verse of the Bible and in all of the pages that follow we can see that, as opposed to the polytheism of the heathen, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob is presented to us as one God. Yet, throughout the Old Testament one of the Hebrew words which is very often used for God is Elohim, which is a plural word. Thus, from the very first to the very last our God remains a mystery to the mind of man. In some mysterious way, that one God evidences a three-fold nature, all three of which may be manifested at the same time. This, of course, boggles the mind and if one is not careful, it can lead into dangerous speculations about the structure of God, leading ultimately to idolatry in one form or another.

In the first chapter of the Bible we are told about the creation of man:

"And God said, 'Let us make man in our image, after our likeness'...So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him..."Genesis 1:26

Thus, we see that Adam was created in the image of God. Naturally, this does not mean that he was like God but only that he was created with qualities and characteristics like God. For instance, Adam was created in the likeness of God's infinite triune nature in that he is a trichotomy, i.e., he has three inseparable facets of his nature—body, soul, and spirit. In this sense, Adam was a unique creation. All other creatures are dichotomies, e.g., an angel has a soul and a spirit but no body and an animal has a soul and a body but no spirit. As far as we can see from the Bible, Adam alone in all of the universe was created in the image of God, a being with a three-fold nature, all three being manifest at one and the same time.

In addition to the above, Adam was created morally perfect. He was without spot or wrinkle or any such thing. He was created perfect in holiness and righteousness and was worthy to stand in the presence of the Almighty, being in His own image and likeness. There was not the slightest stain of sin or wickedness to be found in him in thought, word, or deed. Also, like God, he was a free will agent, for holiness and righteousness have no meaning without the exercise of free will.

Many will argue with me about this, but to me it is obvious that man was created in the image of the eternal appearance or likeness of the second Person of the Triune Godhead, the only begotten Son of God. God has an image or Adam could not have been created in His image. It seems to me that in order for Jesus to be incarnated as a man he must have had an image like a man and that man must have the likeness of Him in His pre-incarnate form. This, of course, I cannot prove except to point to two scriptures that seems to allude to it:

"God, who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son, whom he hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the worlds; who being the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person..."Heb 1:1-3

"Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son: in whom we have redemption through his blood, even the forgiveness of sins: who is the image of the invisible God..." Col 1:13-15

So God does have an image and that image is and forever was and forever shall be the likeness of the Son of God. And Adam was created in that image and likeness.

Finally, like God, Adam had the power to create in his own image and likeness. Again, Adam was unique in this regard because, although animals have the ability to procreate, as far as we can see from the Bible no other spirit in the universe could do so. Angels can never procreate in order to bring forth more angels; every angel is an individual act of creation by God Himself. Adam alone of all of God's creation is able to procreate eternal spiritual beings and in this manner he is in the likeness of God. Thus, we can see that Adam was not only unique but Adam was God's supreme creation since he is the only creature of God created in His own image.

This was Adam in his original state of perfection and purity. This is the man from whom every member of the human race is generated. God had restored the earth and had created Adam to be its new governor. He was placed in the garden to learn and to be proved and tested. Initially, he was given only one commandment to obey. Doubtless, there would have been more to follow. But God plainly warned him that in the day that he sinned he would surely die, or as the marginal reading in the Bible says, "in dying thou shalt die," that is, death will begin to take hold of him. If and when he were to prove himself worthy, he would replace Satan and would then take dominion over the whole earth. But Satan entered into the garden and tempted Adam so successfully that he wilfully sinned against his Creator.

In the fifth chapter of his letter to the Romans, Paul tells us that by the sin of one man death entered into the world. When Adam sinned, the death sentence passed upon him. And since all men were in Adam, that is, in his seed, death came upon all men. We see a similar thing in the case of King James II of England. When he was overthrown and fled into exile, he lost his crown. But not he alone, for all of the future first-born sons that issued forth from him and his lineage also lost the crown in him. His son and his son's son and his son's son's son, etc., also lost the crown of England when their father James II was deposed.

We can see this application to the human race in the following verse of Scripture:

"And Adam lived an hundred and thirty years, and begat a son in his own likeness, after his image; and he called his name Seth."Genesis 5:3

It is a law of nature that one can only beget in his own nature and likeness. Because Adam had become a sinner, he could only beget sinners. He had fallen from the image of God and could no longer pass that image on to his children. Death permeated his being, and he could do no other than pass that death on to the children that were in his loins.

What does death mean? Does it mean annihilation, i.e., the total destruction and non-existence of the person, as the Seventh Day Adventists and Jehovah's Witnesses believe? No, it most assuredly

does not. Then does it mean that the body dies and the soul and spirit are separated from it? Yes, it means that, but it also means more than that. We must remember that death was passed on the total man. And we must also remember that Adam was a trichotomy. Thus, death must lay hold on every facet of his nature, his body and his soul and his spirit.

Almost everyone is acquainted with physical death. We have seen our mothers and fathers, our brothers and sisters, and our aunts and uncles die and we know with certainty that we ourselves must one day go the way of all flesh. We understand that one day the life processes stop and the body begins to decay. We understand it, but we don't like it. Men often go to great efforts and expense to avoid it, but without success. When a baby is born into the world, we can be certain of only one thing about its future, one day it will die. In one sense, the child is born dead, for death is in its very being.

Just as every child is born with a physical corruption called death working in his members, he is also born with a moral corruption working death in his soul. When Adam sinned, an evil corruption or death entered into his soul. He was no longer in the image of God but fell into the corrupt and rebellious image of Satan. And all of the children of Adam have inherited this evil propensity of the mind and heart. It is for this reason that God looked down on the earth and said,

"And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually."Genesis 6:5

It is because of this universal soul death and corruption that the history of man is the history of evil and wickedness. This is why men, women, and children kill, lie, steal, and commit every sin imaginable; this is why unions, corporations, and nations cheat, lie, steal, and kill to gain their selfish ends; and this is why the world will destroy itself unless the Lord returns and sets up His Kingdom on the earth.

This soul death, this fallen state of the mind and will is also called the carnal mind in the Scriptures:

"For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be."Romans 8:6-7

The mind and will of the natural, unconverted man, whether he be religious or irreligious, is not subject to the mind and will of God, and by its very nature it can never be so. Man in his first birth may be religious, and he often is, but he can never desire the will of God because God's ways are not man's ways and God's thoughts are not man's thoughts.

Finally, we must consider the death of the third facet of Adam's nature, his spirit. When Adam sinned, his spirit suffered death, that is, he could no longer have natural communion with God who is a Spirit. God could commune with the fallen Adam, but He would always commune with Adam's animal nature. Paul speaks expressly about this:

"And you hath he quickened who were dead in trespasses and sins; wherein in times past ye walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience; among whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind; and were by nature the children of wrath, even as others. But God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us, even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ..."Eph 2:1-5

Let us examine this quotation carefully. First, we must notice that this letter is written to Christian believers, not to the people of the world, as is evidenced from the first verse of the epistle. Second, Paul tells them that they had been dead in trespasses and sins, but that they were now quickened or made alive. Third, he reminds them that they used to walk the way of the world, that is, according to the leadings of Satan who motivates all of the unconverted people of the whole world. Fourth, he reiterates that every man without conversion lives to fulfill the lusts of the flesh and mind and that they are one and all hell-bound creatures. And last, he says that when they were dead in their sins they were made alive in Christ.

Clearly, my friends, this death could not have been physical death. They were not dead in their bodies and raised up to life. They were dead in their spirits and separated from God and the wrath of God was determined against them. Paul tells us that all men in their natural state are following Satan and living according to their own lusts. It must be remembered that all men don't lust after the same things. Some men love power, some men love the brothel, and some men love the sanctuary. In some men the lusts of the flesh work very strongly and the lusts of the mind hardly at all. In other men the reverse is true; they feel a revulsion toward the gross sins of the flesh. But they will pursue the lusts of the mind in art, music, the sciences, or in religion with the same rebellious spirit and enthusiasm as the most renowned whore master.

This is the origin and the fall of Adam. And through him this is the origin and the fall of the whole human race. There is not one good thing in man. As the Scriptures say, every thought and imagination of his heart is evil and that continually. He can no more please God in his religiosity than he can please Him in his wickedness, for we are told that even the plowing and the praying of the wicked is sin. Man is born with his back toward God and with his mouth full of lies. He is by nature a rebellious creature of wrath. There is no sin of which he is not capable and there is no wickedness, the seed of which is not in his heart. Man is hopelessly, absolutely, and eternally lost. He must have a Redeemer.

That God has provided a redeemer in Jesus Christ has already been discussed at length in the booklet Jesus Christ, The Word of God. It has already been shown how Jesus Christ took upon Himself the seed of Abraham and offered up Himself a sacrifice to atone for the sins of the world, the just for the unjust. We saw how He worked out the legal aspects of salvation and redemption, and now we want to look at the way in which this redemption is worked in man in order to restore him from his awful fall.

Clearly, since death entered into all three aspects of his being, it follows that man must experience a three-fold restoration out of his fall. The Bible plainly teaches that this restoration is not accomplished in one fell swoop. Rather, we are told of three distinct works of God in man—justification, sanctification, and glorification. Each of these works is wrought in the individual by the power of the Holy Spirit and without Him there is nothing possible that man can do. Salvation is a work of God from beginning to end, and man can do nothing except believe in the appearance of Jesus Christ in his heart when He comes and obey Him in all things.

The work of justification is the first step in the restoration. There is both a legal and a practical side to this work. To be legally justified we must be forgiven of our sins so that we can stand before God without being condemned. But obviously this would do us no good if we were not made truly just so that we would not fall back into sin again. It should be clear that unless we are made really and truly just we would naturally continue in sin as before. Thus, the wrath of God would remain upon us because our continual sinning would continually bring His just condemnation upon us.

Very fortunately for us the work of justification is more than a mere reckoning of us to be just. God is not a pretender and He is not a liar. He hates sin and must forever hate sin. He does not impute Christ's righteousness to us, as is believed by a good portion of the sin-loving church world. The imputation of Christ's righteousness is not to be found in all of the Bible. What God does is just what we should expect that He would do if He really detests sin. God imparts Christ's righteousness to us. He forgives us of our sins, He breathes the Spirit of Christ into us, and He makes us alive in Him. He removes that spiritual death from us so that we become spiritually alive to God. We become a new creature in Christ through being born again by the Spirit of God.

This new birth is not just a legal concept. Old things pass away and all things become new because through Christ we are made conquerors over the world, the flesh, and the Devil. Communion with God is restored because the spirit of man is brought out of death. The result of the work of justification is that we pass from death unto life, from a state of condemnation to a state of acceptance with God.

This is indeed the first divine work of the Holy Spirit in a man in order to restore him out of the fall. Divine life is breathed into his dead spirit and he is born from above, a second birth, a spiritual birth, His spirit which was dead in trespasses and sins is resurrected. He has passed from death unto life and can now hear the voice of the Holy Spirit in his inward parts. For the first time in his life he is a spiritual man with spiritual longings and spiritual desires. For the first time in his life he can commune with the Almighty God. His spiritual eyes are opened so that he can now see, his spiritual ears are opened so that he can now hear, and his spiritual senses are now alive so that he can touch Him and taste Him and know that He is good. For the first time in his life he can actually do the will of God because the Holy Spirit works in him both to will and to do of God's good pleasure. This is the first work of God toward total redemption. And it is real.

The newly converted soul will almost always go through a time of rejoicing and great blessing. His heart is aflame with love for his Redeemer, and it seems as though there are no more enemies to be conquered. But this is not the case. After a time he finds that there is an enemy within his own soul, his old self-nature. He soon comes into conflict with the carnal mind which is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. He is a double minded man and unstable in all of his ways.

As the redeemed soul walks in the narrow way that leads to heaven, he finds that "the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other: so that ye can not do the things that ye would." Galatians 5:17. He finds that there is a law working in his members, the law of sin and death, that he must continually guard against lest it slay him unawares. He is painfully aware that his soul is still twisted by the fall so that he can't always do the full will of God, even when he wants to do so with all of his heart. Man fear, self-seeking, and pride are not far below the surface and given an opportunity they will burst forth. But he also knows that "they that are Christ's have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts." Galatians 5:24

The problem is not that Justification failed in its work, but it is that Justification was not designed to deal with the death of the soul but only the death of the spirit. This death of the soul is that old man, the Adamic nature, the carnal mind, that so befouls the world. This is that death that entered into the soul of man, that twisted the mind and perverted the will. The only reason why the justified man may live above sin is because his spirit by God's grace is stronger than the carnal mind. But he finds that there is a continual war going on between them.

But God in mercy has provided a remedy for even this. The sacrifice of Jesus Christ has purchased a full salvation, salvation from wrath and salvation from sin, not just committed sin but also the nature or

propensity to sin that is in the heart. The converted man may in this life have his heart purified from all sin so that his will is perfectly in harmony with the will of his Creator. This is the purpose of the Baptism with the Holy Ghost and fire, or what is also termed entire sanctification. This is part and parcel of the redemption that Jesus purchased by His shed Blood on the cross. He came to destroy the works of the devil, and I thank God that He can and will do it.

The water baptism of John may have purified the body ritually to symbolize the outward purification of ones life by sincere repentance, but John knew that his baptism was merely a symbol of that baptism which was to come. He himself said that he baptized with water, but that there would come another, even Christ, and He would baptize with the Holy Ghost and fire. This baptism with the Holy Ghost is the true Christian baptism and is the only way to be free from the carnal man of sin within. The actual meaning of the word baptism is a purification. And only the cleansing fire of the Holy Spirit can purify the soul of a man and free him from every taint of sin so that in thought, word, and deed he will be in harmony with the will of God.

God is love and man must be perfected in love if he is to be in perfect harmony with his Creator. Man in the unsanctified state can never love as God loves. His soul and mind are twisted and out of alignment with the mind of Christ. As long as the Adamic nature is clinging to his soul, he can never fulfill the command of Christ in the fifth chapter of Matthew where He says, "Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect." But when the Holy Spirit falls on the believer and purifies his heart, the inward man will be perfectly restored and then the Spirit will take up His abode in His fulness in the cleansed temple of his heart. This is the second work of God in man. This is the work of entire sanctification. And it is real.

And last of all the body must be clothed with immortality. Our redemption can never be complete without the restoration of the body from death. Only ignorant people desire to be free from the body. Since we are created a trichotomy, we can never be happy unless we have a body. But this present body is tainted with death and, therefore, we can never be happy with it either. Sickness and suffering, birth defects and deformities, old age and wrinkles, they are all the result of the fall of Adam. And God has provided a remedy for that through the merits of the Blood of Jesus Christ. The apostle Paul tells us about this final phase of the restoration:

"But some man will say, 'How are the dead raised up? And with what body do they come?' Thou fool, that which thou sowest is not quickened, except it die: and that which thou sowest, thou sowest not that body that shall be, but bare grain, it may chance of wheat, or of some other grain: but God giveth it a body as it pleaseth him, and to every seed his own body...So also is the resurrection of the dead. It is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption: it is sown in dishonour; it is raised in glory: it is sown in weakness; it is raised in power: it is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body...For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality. So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, 'Death is swallowed up in victory, 0 death, where is thy sting? 0 grave, where is thy victory?'"I Corinthians 15:35-55

"Behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God: therefore the world knoweth us not, because it knew him not. Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is."I John 3:1-2

"For our conversation is in heaven; from whence also we look for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ: who shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body, according to the working whereby he is able even to subdue all things unto himself." Philippians 3:20-21

So then the final phase of redemption is wrought at the resurrection of the dead. Death is swallowed up in victory and Jesus Christ is triumphant over all of his enemies. Sin brought death to the body, death to the soul, and death to the spirit. But through Christ we can be more than conquerors. For Christ has purchased the New Birth which brings life to the dead spirit, the Baptism with the Holy Spirit which frees the soul from the sin nature, and Glorification at the resurrection which brings immortality to the body. And they are all very real. Hallelujah!

THE TWO STEPS TO CONVERSION

"Ye know, from the first day that I came into Asia, after what manner I have been with you at all seasons, serving the Lord with all humility of mind, and with many tears, and temptations, which befell me by the lying in wait of the Jews: and how I kept back nothing that was profitable unto you, but have showed you, and have taught you publicly, and from house to house, testifying both to the Jew, and also to the Greek, repentance toward God and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ."Acts 20:18-21

In all ages Satan has attacked and undermined the first steps toward reconciliation between God and man. Satan knows that if he can stop the first steps toward God he will have made the sacrifice of Christ to be of no avail. Thus, he has always labored very diligently to deviate man from the strait gate that gives entrance into the narrow way, and he does this primarily by deceiving man about the conditions that must be met in order to enter into life. It is much easier to deceive man about the entrance when he is in darkness than it is to deceive him about the narrowness of the way when he is walking in the light.

The work of God in man is like any other work, in that, unless the proper foundation is laid, the work can never be accomplished. The body can never be glorified if the soul is not sanctified, the soul can never be sanctified unless the spirit is regenerated, the spirit can never be regenerated unless it be born again, the spirit can never be born again unless the past sins are forgiven, but the past sins can never be forgiven unless the proper conditions are met. Hence, forgiveness of sins is the foundation upon which all of the work of restoration rests and this foundation cannot be laid unless the ground is properly prepared and the necessary conditions met.

Salvation is a work of God alone. Man can never earn his salvation, and he cannot be saved when and where he wants. Man cannot even know that he must be saved unless this be revealed to him by the power of the Holy Spirit. Although most men are aware of the innate sinfulness of the human race and although most men live with an inward sense of guilt and foreboding, no man can or ever will find out what the problem with the world is nor will he ever find the solution to his troubles of mind and soul by his own efforts and intellect. All of the religions and philosophies of man have never solved his problems. As a matter of fact, they have served more as greased planks to help men slide off into the pit of hell. And why is this so? Because, being armed with his religions and philosophies, man will shield himself from the conviction and condemnation brought by the Holy Spirit at his visitation.

Only when the Holy Spirit visits a sinful man can he be saved. There is a day of visitation and it has nothing to do with religion or doctrines or churches. It is for this reason that thousands of ministers and theologians study the Scriptures and expound about the things of God in great detail without themselves having ever experienced the real thing. Literally millions of people profess salvation and the new birth without evidencing in the least the outward marks and manifestations of this glorious work of God in the heart. In short, salvation is forever beyond the reach of man, both in the mental comprehension and in the actual experience of the thing.

As I said above, salvation is completely a work of God. Not that man has nothing to do with his salvation. It is only that man of himself can do nothing in order to obtain it. Man must be awakened by the Holy Spirit to his undone condition, and then he must be lead step by step out of his lost state into the kingdom of God. It is only by God's grace that man is saved and this is a grand piece of work that can only be accomplished by the mighty power of God, because Jesus Christ and the way of God are not at all appealing to the rebellious, self-willed sinner. As Isaiah said, "And when we shall see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him."

By the very nature of the fall man is rebellious, self-willed, proud, arrogant, self-complacent, and not at all given to confession of guilt. This is not to say that he will not readily admit to sin, because he can hardly deny it. But his nature is such that he will never confess to guilt. He will have a multitude of justifications and excuses. He will never from his heart confess that he is evil and that he does what he does merely because that is what he wants to do. Because he always thinks that he deserves special consideration and that God understands his peculiar situation, he will never acknowledge that he deserves to go to hell. Down inside he is sure that God will overlook his many transgressions. And as saith the Psalmist,

"The transgression of the wicked saith within my heart that there is no fear of God before his eyes."Psalm 36:1

It is utterly impossible for the natural man to see just how depraved and sinful he really is except that the light of the Lord expose it to his own eyes. Man is willing to do almost anything except give up his will to God. He will adopt all manner of ascetic practices and do almost any service in order to obtain his salvation. He will give his body to be burned and he will give all of his goods to the poor. He will pray and fast until his body is emaciated. He will worship all manner of false gods and he will devote his whole life to their service in monasteries and convents. But when the Spirit of the Lord visits him, he will draw back from the cross that is presented to him. Jesus Christ is now and always has been a burdensome stone to the lost. It is for this reason that men crucified Him when He lived upon the earth, and for this same reason they will crucify Him now when He appears to them by His Spirit.

From the underlined portion of the Scripture at the beginning of this article we can see that there are two important questions that must be resolved before one can experience salvation. Salvation comes from conversion, and conversion comes from settling these two questions in the day of visitation, i.e., the Christ question and the sin question. One can never be said to be converted unless he changes from what he is to what he must be. That change is contained in these two issues—who I serve and how I live. Although I was not conscious of it, I was serving Satan and I was a slave to my own lusts. Now I must serve Jesus Christ alone and I must quit sinning. That is conversion.

Man in his unconverted state is a servant of Satan and he lives to fulfill the lusts of the mind and of the flesh. He may not believe that he is a servant of Satan, and he may not even believe in Satan. But because there are only two masters in this world, God and Satan, he is serving Satan if he is not consciously serving God in newness of life.

Is a sinner really free to choose between good and evil? Is he not a slave to his lusts and to Satan? Can a sinner cease from sin whenever he desires? I know from experience that no sinner has free will because he can never perform the good that he might desire to do and he cannot cease from the sins that so rule his life. Thus, a sinner only has an illusion of free will.

Free will means not only the power to choose between good and evil but it also means the power to do good or evil. No sinner has this power and, therefore, he does not have free will. He is a slave to sin and to Satan. He is driven by his lusts, whatever they may be. Good sinners are driven to commit good sins, and bad sinners are driven to commit bad sins. High minded men are driven to fulfill the lusts of the mind, and low minded men are driven to fulfill the lusts of the flesh. But in both cases they are each slaves to Satan and to their own peculiar lusts.

Men in the fall do not serve Satan because they love him, but because they have no choice. According to the apostle Paul, Satan is the god of this present world and they are his subjects. He doesn't care if a man believes in him or not. He is totally indifferent to man's opinion because the power is in his hands to rule this world. He is the prince of this world and shall be until Jesus Christ comes back, destroys him and his kingdom, and sets up His own glorious kingdom upon the earth. In addition, he is equally indifferent to man's goodness and man's religions because in both they remain servants of sin and under his power and dominion. As long as a man sins, he is a servant of Satan. This is what the apostle means when he says,

"Whosoever abideth in Him sinneth not: whosoever sinneth hath not seen Him, neither known Him...He that committeth sin is of the devil; for the devil sinneth from the beginning. For this purpose the Son of God was manifest, that He might destroy the works of the devil. Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin; for His seed remaineth in him: and he cannot sin, because he is born of God. In this the children of God are manifest, and the children of the devil..." I John 3:6-10

From these verses of Scripture we can readily see, if we want to see it, that there is one and only one way to know whom we serve. If I sin, I am a child of Satan. If I do not sin, I am a child of God. All men in the natural, unconverted state sin. Thus, all men, whatever their pretenses, are servants of Satan until they are changed by the mighty power of God and pass from death unto life.

In view of this, is there any activity of the natural man that is free from the rule and dominion of Satan? Can man in his natural state ever be free from Satan's power? The apostle John tells us that "the whole world lieth in wickedness," or as most versions of the Bible translate it, "the whole world is in the power of the evil one." Is this an exaggeration on the part of the apostle? If it is not, then this means that all that man does is tainted by the power and influence of Satan. It means that Satan rules in all of man's affairs, including his religions. In short, it means that man worships Satan and gives obedience to him in all that he does—in his religion, in his politics, in his work, in his play, in his family life, in his evil deeds, and in his good deeds. Seen in this light, life becomes frightening.

The Scriptures reveal and experience teaches that man is a slave to Satan from his birth. He has no free will because he is not free. He is free to theorize, but he is not free to act because he lacks the power necessary to put into effect his choices. But there comes a time in every man's life when he is visited by the Holy Spirit with light and power. The light reveals to him his lost and undone condition and the power enables him to act so as to determine his destiny. This is what John means when he says,

"But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, [even] to them that believe on his name."John 1:12

It is at this point that a man becomes a free will agent. Now he is capable of choosing to do good or to do evil. Now he is capable of choosing whom he will serve because the power of the Holy Spirit is available to him to break the power of Satan if he desires to be free.

Prior to this visitation a man may become religious, a man may accept Christ as his Savior, or a man may seek to live a holy life in a monastery, but it is impossible for him to accomplish anything other than a reformation, i.e., an outward conformity to man's piety. He can never truly repent and conform himself to the image of Christ. He must be visited by the Holy Spirit in heavenly power and he must be changed by this power in his inward being. Just as a leopard cannot lose his spots and an Ethiopian cannot change the color of his skin, neither can a man change who he is in his inward being.

In the day of a man's visitation by the Holy Spirit the divine light of Christ shines into the darkness of his heart and reveals to him the true state of his soul. For the first time in his life his eyes are opened so that he can see the truth about himself and about the world around him. For the first time in his life he can see that he has been a willing slave to Satan and that he has never in his whole life served God in truth. He can see his hypocrisy and his self-deception, and he can see that he is lost and undone, without God and without hope.

This revelation from the Spirit of God brings the individual for the first time in his life to the state of free will. The light of Christ enlightens him to his true condition and gives him power to choose his destiny. Because he is made aware of his lost state, he is also made aware of his bondage to Satan. He can see plainly that God is calling him out from his servitude to the great enemy of mankind in order that he might serve Him in newness of life.

The apostle Paul explains this idea very plainly in his letter to the Philippians as follows:

"...work out your own salvation with fear and trembling. For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure."Philippians 2:12,13

As can be seen, God works in the individual the desire to do His will and He also gives him the ability to do what He desires him to do. The visitation of the Holy Spirit brings this willingness and ability, and this must be worked out by the individual in fear and trembling lest the visitation pass away. This is free will, a thing that he has never had before, the ability to desire and the ability to do the will of God. And if in fear and trembling one converts to this visitation, he will witness a continuance of this free will, this ability to choose and to do the will of God working in his inward parts, until he passes out of this life into heavenly glory. But from the beginning to the end it must be worked out in fear and trembling, else joining with the evil, the Spirit will depart and the free will will also depart and the man returns into the pit of darkness and slavery to Satan.

In the Sermon of the Mount Jesus says,

"Enter ye in at the strait gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat: because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it."Matthew 7:13,14

By examining these words of Jesus we can see that there are three roads in which one may walk in this life. First, there is the common road into which everyone is born and in which everyone walks during the first part of his life. Although it may appear that life is unequal and that, therefore, there is not really a common road, this is only an illusion. Spiritually, all men are born on an equal basis—with their backs toward God and with their mouths full of lies. No matter what their outward stations may be in this life, whether they are white, black, yellow, or red; whether they are stupid, average, or intelligent; whether they are poor, middle class, or rich, before the all-seeing eyes of the Almighty God they are walking in the same road, the road leading to their day of visitation.

Second, we see that this road leads to two gates, one wide and one narrow. We see that the wide gate, which can be easily passed through, gives access to a broad road which is obviously very easy to the travelers. Because of the wideness of the gate one can pass through it without being required to lose anything that he is carrying in the first road. And since the road to which the gate leads is such that it is no more difficult than what one wants it to be, it is the choice of most wayfarers in this life.

Third, we see that the strait or narrow gate, which is passed through only with much difficulty, gives access to a narrow road which is obviously very difficult to traverse. This gate is so narrow that one must let loose of everything that he is carrying in the first road in order to pass through it. Because of the wideness of the one gate and the straitness of the other and the broadness of the one road and the narrowness of the other, almost everyone chooses the broad road which leads to destruction, and almost no one elects the narrow way that leads to life.

From these words of Jesus we can conclude that at some time in his life everyone is brought to the choice implied by the two gates and their corresponding ways. Also, we can see that one does not accidently or unconsciously pass through the strait gate; this gate is so narrow that one can pass through it only by great exertion. Thus, it is only by a conscious, adult choice that one can enter into the narrow way that leads to eternal life. This gate is called repentance. and this road is called the Way of Life.

It must be remembered that according to Jesus' words the gate itself does not give access to eternal life, but rather to the life-style that leads to it. Entering into the way does not guarantee an entrance into heaven. To inherit eternal life, one must persevere until the end. But the way in which one must walk after he chooses his gate is just as wide or narrow as the gate through which he passes. Thus, passing through the gate that gives entrance into the way that leads to life everlasting is just the first step in a new way of life, a life that is hid with Christ in God.

The folly of modern fundamentalist churches is that they offer a salvation without a true repentance toward God. They think that they can have their world and their heaven too. The emphasis today is in faith toward Jesus Christ. One is told that all that he must do is accept Christ as his Savior and he shall be saved. But it should be obvious that a faith toward Jesus Christ that works a true repentance toward God is not the same thing as accepting Jesus as Savior. As a matter of fact, the church world is so far removed from the Truth that they don't even know that the very popular doctrine of accepting Jesus as Savior is not to be found in the Bible.

What then does it mean to have faith toward Jesus Christ? What does it mean to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ so that we may be saved? In order to understand this we must have a clear idea of salvation. What does it mean to be saved? This is the key question because it is the key to understanding the Gospel. The word gospel means good news. So what is the good news that the coming of Christ into the world was to bring to us? It is the good news that Jesus Christ has come to save His people from their sins. When the angel announced to Joseph that Mary was to give birth to Jesus, he said,

"And she shall bring forth a son, and thou shalt call his name JESUS: for he shall save his people from their sins."Matthew 1:21

Salvation is salvation from sins. Man in the first birth is a slave to sin, and Jesus Christ has come to set him free from this bondage. This is salvation, and anything that comes short of this is not salvation. If a man claims to be saved while he is in bondage to sin, he is deceived. Or as the apostle says,

"He that saith, I know him, and keepeth not his command-ments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him."I John 2:4

Jesus Christ cannot save us from our sins unless we turn from them by a sincere repentance. But man cannot repent by his own will and efforts. Repentance is the gift of God whereby a man is enabled to turn his back on the world, the flesh, and the devil and to turn his face toward God to walk in conformity to His will. And this gift comes only through faith toward Jesus Christ. When the Holy Spirit visits the individual and reveals the truth about himself to him, he may begin to feel a sorrow for his past. But there are two kinds of sorrows that he may feel, as explained by Paul,

"Godly sorrow worketh repentance to salvation not to be repented of: but the sorrow of the world worketh death." II Corinthians 7:10

If we examine the behavior after Jesus death of the two men who betrayed Him, we can see an example of each of these sorrows and the result of each. Peter betrayed Jesus by denying Him, but Peter repented of his great sin and followed Jesus faithfully ever after. On the other hand, lets consider Judas who betrayed Jesus for money. Although he wept bitterly afterwards and even returned the money to those that paid him, which shows plainly that he was sorry, what did he do? He killed himself. Clearly his sorrow was not a godly sorrow as was the sorrow of Peter, seeing that it did not work the same good end.

If the individual gives place to a godly sorrow when he is visited by the Holy Spirit, he will begin to desire to change his life in order to live in conformity to God's will. He will realize that he has sinned greatly against the Lord and will seek forgiveness for his many trangressions. He will know that the wrath of God rests upon him and that one day he will receive his just recompense of reward. A great fear will begin to fill his soul because he will be conscious that he is unable to atone for his own sins and, in addition, he will be painfully conscious that he himself can never change his heart. For the first time in his life, whether heathen or Bible scholar, he will understand who Jesus Christ really is and why He came into the world to die on the cross.

This knowledge is not something that the natural man can ever acquire on his own because it is a knowledge that one must receive from the Holy Spirit and the Holy Spirit alone. It can not be dug out of the Bible nor can it be received from a preacher. It can be infused into the soul only by the Spirit of God. Men may think that they see it and they may claim to be saved by it, but without a revelation from God to the soul all that they can have is a mental conception about Jesus Christ and the gospel and all that they can receive is a mental salvation without the life and power.

What is this great knowledge that not even an intellectual genius can learn by long and arduous study? What is this great knowledge that not even great Bible scholars and theologians can dig out of the sacred writings? What is this absolutely indispensable knowledge that can be known only by its being infused into the heart by the Holy Ghost? It is the unmistakable and certain knowledge that no sinner can enter into the presence of God. Once one fully understands this startling fact that can never really be understood except by revelation from God, one will be fully persuaded that he must miserably perish forever unless he has a Savior who will give him power to live above sin. This is a Savior that staggers the mind, a Savior that sets a man free from the power of sin so that he may be perfect as the Father in heaven is perfect. To believe in this kind of a Savior is more than most men are willing to do because they love darkness rather than light.

Most men are not willing to believe in a Savior of any kind because they do not want to change their manner of life. They love their sins and they have no desire to be free from them. However, there are many who are willing to believe in a Savior that can save from the wrath of God as long as they do not have to give up their pet sins. They love some of their sins and have no desire to be rid of all of them. So they refuse to believe that no sinner can enter into God's presence. In other words, they want to believe that a sinner can enter into the presence of God as long as he accepts Jesus as his personal Savior and is somehow mysteriously clothed with Christ's righteousness so that God can't see the filth of his sinful soul or as long as he is a faithful member of some particular church that claims to have some special powers on the earth to save its adherents.

There are few indeed who want to believe in a Savior that saves from all sin. It is not that men cannot believe that Jesus Christ can set them free from the power of sin so that they need not sin. Rather it is that they wickedly do not want to believe it. The truth is that they do not want to be free from all sin. Yet no man who has experienced the visitation of the Holy Spirit can possibly believe any other thing without first hardening his heart against the Lord. He must then refuse to believe that God is a holy God who's eyes are too pure to behold iniquity and that He dwells in a holy heaven surrounded by holy angels who sing day and night, "Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty." It is utter folly to think that that most holy God would allow a sinner to taint His holy domain with the foulness of his sinful presence.

So then what does it really mean to have faith toward Jesus Christ? It is to have no doubts at all that He is able to save to the uttermost and to make us more than conquerors, as the apostle Paul expressly declares; it is to have no doubts at all that all men everywhere have the same opportunity to experience the love of God through Him—the Chinese man, the Hindu, the Amazonian, the African Pygmy, the Englishman, the German, the American; it is to have no doubts at all that God is just in all of His dealings with man and that at the Judgment no man will rightly be able to accuse Him of unfairness; it is to have no doubts at all that Jesus Christ is the eternal Word of God, that Word which was in the beginning with God, that Word which is God, and that He must be obeyed in all things in order to escape the just damnation of hell forever; and it is to have no doubts at all that Jesus Christ can and will save from the power of sin anyone who comes to Him in full obedience to His will.

This is a living faith toward Jesus Christ. This is what it means to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ with all of your heart so that you can be saved. This, then, is what it means to settle the Christ question. Any faith in Jesus Christ which is less than this is no saving faith because it can't prepare and enable the soul to repent toward God. And without settling the sin question no man can be saved.

THE NEW BIRTH

"Jesus answered, 'Verily, verily, I say unto thee, except a man be born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Marvel not that I said unto thee, ye must be born again.'" John 3:5-7

The above quotation may very well contain the three most important verses in the whole Bible. At any rate, it is certain that no other doctrine of Christ was stated with such definiteness and no other statement of Christ so directly effects our eternal future. For this reason I believe that this doctrine that is so much spoken about in these days warrants special study and consideration.

Before we talk about what it means to be born again, let us examine some of the details of the above quotation. First, it appears that whenever Jesus is going to state one of His universal laws of the kingdom of heaven He begins by saying verily, verily. Thus, whenever He begins with this expression, we need to take special notice because these words seem to be a signal to us that He is about to reveal some very important idea or doctrine.

The next thing that I would like for us to notice is that what He was about to say was to be said to one of the leaders of the Jewish Church, which was the church of God at that time. This was not being spoken to some drunkard or whore-master, nor was it being spoken to a pagan or an infidel. It was being spoken to a very religious man, a pillar of the church of God. And I think that we can safely say that what Jesus was telling him was something that he did not already know, although it most certainly was something that was necessary for him to know if he were to go to heaven. We can draw this conclusion because Jesus said, "I say unto thee."

Next, we can see that Jesus laid down a condition that must be met in order to enter into the kingdom of God. When Jesus said "except," He established the absolute necessity for the fulfillment of the condition that He was about to declare. Clearly, then, if this condition is absolutely necessary, it is of paramount importance that we understand it so that we can fulfill it without fail, since to fail here is to exclude ourselves from the kingdom of God.

What was this condition that must be met if any man is to enter into the kingdom of God? It is that one must be born twice. Jesus said that a man must be born of water and of the Spirit. And lest one should mistake Him to mean water baptism when He says water, He rephrases this by saying, "That which is born of the flesh," that is, the water surrounding him in his mother's womb, "is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit." Men who wish to believe that Jesus is here teaching the necessity of water baptism say that this interpretation makes Jesus guilty of a tautology, that is, a needless repetition. But in this case it is not a needless repetition. Jesus is talking to a man that believes that to be born a Jew is a sufficient qualification for entrance into the kingdom of God. Thus, in order to effectively clarify this point to Nicodemus, Jesus is emphasizing that in no case is the fleshly birth, even a Jewish birth, able to give a man entrance into God's kingdom. He must have a second birth, a spiritual birth.

However, even if we are to reject this argument as too weak, we must still recognize that there is not a drop of outward, physical water in the new birth. Let us call to mind that John the Baptist said that Christ would come after him and that He would baptize His followers "with the Holy Ghost and fire." Now if this fire spoken of here is not real, physical fire, and I know of no one that would claim that it is, then the water spoken of in connection with the new birth cannot be real, physical water. Since water is used to outwardly wash and cleanse physical objects, the water spoken of in relation to the new birth would be symbolic of the cleansing of our outward lives by that work of God in the repentant sinner. Similarly, since fire is that substance used to purify an object throughout, the fire spoken of in relation to Christ's baptism is symbolic of the inwardly purifying effect of that work of God in the heart and mind of the saint. There is absolutely no way that one can logically show that Jesus is here teaching the necessity of water baptism.

Why is this second birth so necessary? It is because, as the apostle Paul says, "flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God." I Corinthians 15:50. The kingdom of God is a spiritual kingdom, and only spiritual beings can enter into it. Since man in his fleshly birth is spiritually dead because of the fall of Adam and is alive only to the physical world, he can never enter into the spiritual kingdom of God unless he is made spiritually alive. Thus, Jesus can declare the absolute necessity of the second or spiritual birth. A man must be made a living spirit, and this is accomplished by the new birth which is wrought by the Spirit of God.

The fact that Jesus said, "Marvel not that I said unto thee, ye must be born again," shows that He was aware that most people would have trouble believing this doctrine. We can see that Nicodemus stumbled at it because in obvious surprise he said, "How can these things be?" Indeed, this is a doctrine that has caused almost everyone that calls himself a Christian to stumble in unbelief. It is for this reason that the denominations that control nearly 80% of all professors of Christianity in the world either do not believe in the new birth or they think that it is water baptism. It is more than they can or want to believe that this new birth entails a real and dramatic change in the individual whereby he passes from death unto life, from a natural man to a spiritual man, by means of a powerful, traumatic experience with God.

It is commonly thought that this new birth was not experienced by men and women in the old dispensations before the Holy Spirit was poured forth on the day of Pentecost. Was this true? Was it impossible and unnecessary for Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, David, and all of the other wonderful saints in the Old Testament to experience this being born again by the Spirit of God? Was this experience reserved for the New Testament saints only? I think that it is obvious from the words of Jesus in reply to Nicodemus that all saints have always had to experience this birth in order to enter into the kingdom of God. He said in verse 10, "Jesus answered and said unto him, Art thou a master of Israel, and knowest not these things?"

In this verse the word "master" was translated from the Greek word didaskaloV which means a teacher. In other words, Jesus was asking Nicodemus how it was possible that he could be a teacher in the Jewish Church and not know that a man must be born again in order to enter into the kingdom of God. Clearly, Jesus felt that this was not a new doctrine to the Jewish people, but a doctrine that should have been known and understood always by them. That this is the case is verified by Paul in the 4th chapter of Romans where he makes it abundantly clear that Abraham was saved in the same way that we are to be saved, i.e., by faith, and that no one ever was saved in any other way. Thus, Nicodemus, a teacher of the Jews, should have known this doctrine.

What is the new birth and why is it so necessary? I think that these questions can best be answered by looking to the Jews in their relationship to God because everything about their religion was symbolic of that religion which was to come by Jesus Christ. One of the most striking things about the religion and covenant delivered to the Jews by Moses was that it says not one thing about heaven or an after-life. It is an earthly religion which is composed of outward rites and ceremonies and which regulates the outward lives of the Israelites by promises and threats to be rewarded in this life. If we will recognize that everything about the Jews in their religion and in their relationship to God has a spiritual counterpart in the religion of Jesus Christ, we will be able to understand what the new birth is and why one must experience it.

To be a Jew one must be born of a Jew. To be more specific, to be a Jew one must be of the blood line of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. It is totally impossible to become a Jew by adopting Jewish beliefs and obeying the precepts of the Jewish religion. One may become a member of the Jewish religion by coming to believe it to be the true religion, by being catechized, and by being baptized and circumcised, and thereby become Jewish, but he can never be a Jew unless his paternal genealogy goes back to Jacob. God made a covenant with Abraham and He renewed that covenant with Isaac and Jacob. The children of Israel (let us remember that Israel is another name for Jacob) are born into the covenant that God made with Abraham and they are confirmed in that covenant by the rite of circumcision.

In like manner, it is impossible for the natural man to believe in Christianity and thereby to become a Christian. In so doing he would be merely trying to act like Christ. But if we remember that the word Christian means to be like Christ, not to act like Christ, we can easily see that the natural man may convert to the ethics and religious structure of Christianity and become Christianish, that is, he may adopt many of the modes of behavior and thought of a Christian, but he can never be a Christian. He may, by much study of the Scriptures, even become expert in all of the doctrines of Christ and live in close agreement with their outward demands. But just as the Gentile that converts to Judaism can never change his blood line by observing the precepts of Moses, this man will still be an unregenerated, natural man without the inward life of God no matter how much he reads the Bible and observes its commands and attends church.

The old covenant was a physical covenant made by God with Abraham and only children of the physical seed of Israel can be partakers of that covenant. Since the new covenant is a spiritual covenant made by God with Abraham, only spiritual children of the spiritual Seed of Abraham, Jesus Christ, can be partakers of that covenant. One must be spiritually born in order to become a partaker of the spiritual blessings and promises which are alone found in Jesus Christ, the Seed of Abraham. Church membership, rites and ceremonies, and doctrinal beliefs mean nothing. They cannot regenerate the dead soul; they cannot create life.

Let me repeat what was said above. One becomes a Jew because he is generated or procreated by a Jewish man, a man who is of the physical seed of Abraham. In a completely analogous manner, one becomes a Christian by being regenerated or created anew in Christ, the spiritual Seed of Abraham, by the power of the Holy Spirit. It is totally impossible to pass from death unto life without this glorious work of the Holy Spirit of Christ in the soul.

Let me take this analogy a step farther. We can even say that, just as with the physical birth, a man has no say in the matter as to when he may experience this spiritual birth. We are told by John that,

"He came unto his own, and his own received him not. But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name: which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God."John 1:11-13

Thus, it is obvious that because a man wills to experience this birth that makes us sons of God it can in no wise produce it. God visits a man when and how He will. As a matter of fact, it is just this willing in the flesh that causes men and women to become involved in false religions. They think that by merely accepting Christ as their Savior they will by definition be born again. However, all that results is that they become religious, but they remain strangers to the true life and power of the Holy Spirit.

It is no accident that Jesus chose the birth process to symbolize the experience wherein a man is converted from a sinner to a saint. The natural birth process possesses all of the elements found in conversion. There is the time of conception when the seed is planted in the womb. If the womb is receptive, there is the gestation period during which the seed is forming and many inward changes are occurring, although the living creature has not yet been brought forth. Finally, there comes the trauma of birth. And trauma it is! No one who has ever given birth and no one who has ever witnessed a birth could ever give a casual description of this awesome event. When the birth pains begin, they are not very intense, they are of brief duration, and they are infrequent. As time passes, they become more frequent, of longer duration, and of greater intensity. Finally, as the new creature comes forth, the pains are almost continuous and almost unbearable.

This is the trauma of birth. This is the physical experience that Jesus chose to use to describe the process of spiritual conversion. And as I said above, it is no accident that Jesus chose the birth process to symbolize conversion. The process of conversion is very similar. The Holy Spirit comes to the individual and plants the seed of the kingdom in his heart. If the ground of his heart is receptive, the seed will begin to grow and cause great discontent with the world and life in general. Although God is working in his heart to produce great upheavals, the individual is unaware that it is God. This discontentment will grow until God sees that the person is able to repent and turn from his former life. Then God will appear to the soul and bring him forth to the birth. If he is willing, he will be transformed by the power of God into a child of the kingdom of God. If he is not willing, he will be a still birth and decay into nothing.

As in the natural birth, there is danger of an abortion during the gestation period. Many people cannot bear the great and powerful upheavals going on in their breasts and they will seek relief by turning to religion. In so doing they find some relief by healing the wound slightly, but all that they become is religious. It is at this time that many people accept Christ as their Savior and join some evangelical and fundamentalist church and believe themselves to be saved. Many become preachers and theologians. Some throw themselves into their religion with great ardor and lead very sacrificial lives for the cause of souls. But, alas, they are deceived and unconverted, strangers to God and the living leadership of the Holy Spirit. They are like Nicodemus.

The new birth does not make one religious (the carnal mind will do that), but it does make one spiritual. It makes one alive to the voice of the Spirit of God. It gives one communion with God by opening the spiritual eye so that it can see the light of Christ and by opening the spiritual ear so that it can hear the voice of the Holy Spirit. The light of God begins to enlighten his mind and the Spirit of Christ begins to lead him through the wilderness of the new life which is hid with Christ in God.

The scriptures of the Old Testament are not only an accurate report of historical events but they also generally teach us valuable spiritual lessons either directly or by allegory. The true and accurate historical account of the deliverance of the Israelites out of the land of Egypt by the hand of Moses is one of the most powerful examples of God's use of His dealings with man in the Old Testament to teach us by spiritual allegory how He deals with man in the New Testament times. Let us examine this familiar story to see what God has for us. In order to recognize the allegory we must understand that the Israelites represent the individual that God is going to save, Pharaoh is Satan, Egypt is the world, Moses is Christ, the Passover lamb is also Christ as the Lamb of God, the blood of the lamb is the Blood of Christ, etc.

Initially, the Israelites were quite happy and content in the land of Egypt and under the dominion of Pharaoh. Everything seemed to go well for them and Pharaoh gave them almost everything that they wanted. They had the best of the land and they grew rich and powerful. They enjoyed all of the pleasures of Egypt and felt great liberty. Egypt was not barbaric, but rather it boasted of an advanced culture, especially in the arts, religion, and sciences. The Israelites were able to enjoy the Egyptian religion which was one of the most sophisticated and humane religions in the world at that time with a highly developed sense of an after-life. As a matter of fact, like most people in the world, Egypt was a very religious nation.

In like manner, a man goes through a certain number of years of his life being quite content with the world and enjoying all of the pleasures that it has to offer him. He thinks little of his spiritual state and has no fear of Satan because he has never felt himself oppressed by him. Generally, the individual will be religious to some degree or other. He may even be a minister or a theologian in one or other of the worlds many churches. But whatever his station may be, he will be enjoying the fruits and the advantages of the world system.

It is clear from the Scriptures that God moved on Pharaoh so that he brought the Israelites into great bondage and slavery to himself. Their state of liberty and freedom and riches was changed into a state of servitude under harsh taskmasters. Slowly their servitude was increased and the harshness of the taskmasters increased correspondingly. The land that had been so sweet was now become very burdensome. The Israelites began to feel their bondage more and more and they began to groan for deliverance. They did not groan to God; they just groaned. Life lost its savor and with each passing day the burden of their slavery grew more and more cruel.

In like manner, God moves on Satan to bring the man into slavery and bondage to sin. What used to be great fun is now a harsh taskmaster. Life begins to lose its luster and the pleasures that the world has to offer become more and more burdensome. With each passing day the man becomes increasingly aware that he is a slave to his lusts and to the world. The soul begins to be filled with great discontent, but the individual finds himself unable to deliver himself from his bondage. He sees the world as a hopeless mess and can see no point in living. A groan is born in his soul, not a groan to God, just a groan.

When God talked to Moses out of the burning bush, He told Moses that He had heard the cries of the people Israel and that He was sending Moses to Egypt to deliver them out of the hands and power of Pharaoh. He was not doing this for their sakes but for the sake of His promise to Abraham. It was not because they were worthy of deliverance but because Abraham was worthy that God should fulfill His promise to him.

When God hears the groan of the soul that has begun to feel its bondage to Satan and sin, He sends the great Deliverer, Jesus Christ, to his rescue to save him from the power and dominion of the oppressor. God does not do this because that soul is worthy, because in reality the soul deserves nothing better than to suffer for its many sins. He does it for Christ's sake and for Christ's sake only.

When Moses arrived in Egypt, he visited the people and they agreed to leave if Pharaoh would allow them to do so. Then Moses went to Pharaoh and the king refused to let the people go and increased their burdens. It was then apparent that neither the people nor Pharaoh believed that Moses had the power and authority to deliver them. The Israelites even wanted Moses to leave because their bondage increased after his arrival. When the Lord first visits the groaning soul, the man will not believe that the heavenly Moses has the power to deliver him and he will not be at all happy that He has come to him. The Israelites did not greet Moses with brass bands and parades and no man ever rejoices when the Lord comes to save him.

Moses began to display his power and authority both to Pharaoh and to the people Israel. Pharaoh hardened his heart and commanded his taskmasters to increase the Israelites' burdens and bondage. The people harangued Moses and wanted him to leave them alone. They were not ready to be delivered. But Moses continued to display his power in even more convincing ways. When the Lord visits the lost soul in order to save him, Satan will increase the power of sin over him so that he will not want to be delivered. Thus, the soul will draw back from the delivering power and will desire to remain in bondage. But then the Holy Spirit will increase that person's sense of guilt.

Finally, the Israelites were fully convinced by the display of his power that he could deliver them. Moses told them that God was going to destroy the firstborn of Egypt and that they could avoid the same destruction if they would demonstrate their faith by eliminating all leaven from their homes, killing a lamb, sprinkling the blood on the door posts of their home, eating the flesh of the lamb, and preparing themselves to depart from Egypt. The Israelites did as commanded, the power of Pharaoh was broken, and at the command of Moses they began to march.

After feeling greater and greater displays of the convicting power of God for sin, the soul realizes that Christ is sufficient to save. He settles the Christ question by repenting, that is, by removing the spiritual leaven (sin) from his heart, applying by faith the blood of the Lamb to the door posts of his heart, partaking of the life of Christ into himself, and preparing to depart from the world. This is a great decision and is done in great turmoil of soul.

The Israelites began to march toward the border of Egypt under the leadership of Moses. It is at this time that there appeared a cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night to guide them out of the domain of Pharaoh. Likewise, the sinner begins to leave the world under the leadership of Christ. Then, because he doesn't know how to leave the world, there appears a light, the light of the Holy Spirit, to guide him out of Satan's domain. As with the cloud that led the Israelites toward the border, this light of the Holy Spirit leads the sinner in his flight from the world, which is Satan's domain.

The Israelites could not escape the wrath of God on Egypt unless they offered the paschal lamb and applied the blood, and they would not be out from under the dominion of Pharaoh until they were out of his territory. Correspondingly, the sinner cannot escape the wrath of God determined against the whole world until he offers up the Lamb of God and by faith applies the precious blood to his own heart, and he will not be free from Satan until he fully repents and separates from the world of which Satan is the prince.

After the death of Egypt's firstborn Pharaoh told the Israelites to get out of his land. However, when the Israelites formed up in marching order and headed for the border, Pharaoh changed his mind. He called together his army and sent his chariots and soldiers after them to force them to remain under his power. The cloud led the Israelites to the Red Sea so that they were bound in on two sides by mountains and the sea in front. At this point the army of Pharaoh came up behind them. It was impossible for the Israelites to escape and they were too weak to fight. They began to cry to Moses in their fear. It was all that they could do.

Oh, what a rich lesson God is teaching us here! The Holy Spirit begins to show the individual that he must give up everything if he is to serve the Lord. He must leave everything behind—father, mother, wife or husband, children, lands, jobs, religion, everything. He decides to do so and under the leadership of the Holy Spirit he begins to separate. But the sinner is soon penned in on all sides. Then, Satan sends his army to keep him in subjection. Parents get up in arms. Friends ridicule. Children whine. He is offered a promotion at work. It is more than the sinner can cope with. He cries to the Lord to deliver him but it looks impossible.

At this point, God intervenes on behalf of the Israelites. The cloud that has been leading them suddenly moves around behind them, between them and the army of Pharaoh, so that the people can no longer see the threatening hordes and so that that terrifying army couldn't reach them. The cloud continues to give light to the Israelites but leaves the pursuing army in utter darkness and confusion. Moses tells the people to stand back and watch the salvation of Jehovah. He raises his rod over the water of the sea and the sea miraculously parts and the ground dries up so that the people may cross dry shod.

God comes to the rescue of the helpless sinner. The great army of Satan that is trying to hinder goes into confusion and is hidden from the sinner. All that he can see is the light of the Lord that powerfully convicts him of his sinfulness. Then the Lord gloriously opens the way for him to pass from death unto life. God's power opens the way for him to convert, even where there was no way.

What were the Israelites to do? They did not want to go back into Egyptian slavery. But did they dare go forward? Could they trust that the sea would not close upon them and drown them? Did God really open the sea, or was it just a coincidence? If they begin to walk between the two great walls of water, will they suddenly cover them and kill them? And even if they get to the other side, what will keep the army from following them? And will Jehovah take care of them after they get on the other side? What will they eat? Where will they get water in that awful Wilderness? Oh, what faith was demanded of them if they were to escape their slavery!

The sinner stands at the edge of his spiritual Red Sea. By now he does not want to go back into his slavery to sin. But will the Lord really deliver him from the power of Satan? Will he really be free from all of those sins that so captivated him all his life? If he yields himself totally to the Lord, will He be able to deliver him out of their power. Is it true or is it only a dream? If he steps out of the world and casts himself on the Lord, will the walls of water cover him and drown him? Will he find that he was a fool? Will he find that after he has given up everything and risked everything it was only a foolish hope after all? Oh, what amazing faith is demanded of him and how few there are that will do it! How few will trust God with their lives!

Although God opened the sea and made a way for them to cross and to escape the pursuing army, the Israelites had to make the choice. Jehovah and Moses did not force them to cross. They could have submitted to the army of Pharaoh and returned to their slavery. The choice was theirs and theirs alone. And by a magnificent faith in Moses and the great Jehovah they began to march out of Egypt by the outstretched arm of the LORD. After the Israelites crossed over to the other side, the army of Pharaoh tried to follow them. But Jehovah caused the waters to return to their proper place and every horse and every rider was slain. They were never seen again by the people of God.

Although God opens the way and makes it plain to the sinner, he and he alone can make the choice. God never saves us against our will. We must choose to leave the world and all of our sins and to serve the Lord forever. We must place our whole future into God's hands and commit ourselves unreservedly into the path that He has shown us. At this point the sinner may, and he usually does, decide to return to his slavery to sin. But if he chooses to serve the Lord, it is by a magnificent faith and by that faith alone that he marches out of spiritual Egypt unhindered. When his old sins try to follow him, God destroys their power over him and gives him a marvelous deliverance from them all. He will never be bothered by them again.

The vast majority of so-called Christians today contend very strongly that one can never be free from sin in this life. They say that although we must reckon ourselves free from sin, it is the height of folly to believe that it is possible to be actually free from sin before we die. We are to trust in Christ's righteousness to cover us, but we can never expect to share in His righteousness and to be righteous. This is the belief of almost all so-called Christians.

But is it true? Well, not if we are to believe the allegory that God has given to us. Let us note that the Israelites were actually out of Egypt and out from under the dominion and power of Pharaoh. After they crossed the Red Sea, they were not just pretending to be out when in fact they were still in Egypt. They did not just claim to be free while in fact they were still under the dominion of Pharaoh. They were free. They were free, indeed. And the cloud was with them by day and it was a pillar of fire by night to give them light so that they would never have to walk in darkness. This cloud led them in the way that they were to go—to the promised land.

My friends, the salvation that comes by Jesus Christ is salvation out of the world and out of sin. All who profess to be born again while they are still involved in the vain spirit and conversation of the world and in sin are deceived and liars. They do not have the Holy Spirit to be as a cloud by day and as a fire by night so that they never walk in darkness. They have never experienced that salvation taught to us by this wonderful allegory. No matter how zealous they may be, they have a head religion and nothing more. They are not new creatures. They are merely the old creature become religious. They have never been born again. And as Jesus said, "Except a man be born again, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God."

From this wonderful allegory we can see that the new birth is not just some mental assent to the Christian religion. It is not even a very emotional mental assent to the Christian religion. This is a traumatic and earth-shaking experience with the power of God that totally changes ones life. It is very much like emigrating to another country. Just as God did not try to change Egypt so that his people could stay there and enjoy its benefits, but rather He took them out of it, God does not try to change this world so that the Christian can live in it and enjoy its benefits. God hates this world and is going to destroy it. He has no intention of reforming it. It belongs to Satan and the stench of hell is in it. It must be destroyed.

No true Christian will be involved in the politics and affairs of this world. A Christian is a new creature. He has become a citizen of heaven and is now just a pilgrim and stranger passing through this sin cursed land. He is an ambassador of Christ and a harbinger of the coming wrath of God against the world system. He will have nothing to do with the world's fads, fashions, pleasures, sports, entertainments, politics, wars, religions, good works, etc. He is no longer in the world because he is a heavenly and spiritual creation. He is not a man who has become a nice person and who is interested in bettering this world. He is not interested in bettering this world because this world belongs to God's bitter enemy. He is interested in taking people out of this world and not in making them better and happier in it.

This certainly doesn't sound like the usual idea of a Christian. But the reason is very simple. A true Christian is something totally different from the usual idea. He has been transformed by the mighty power of that God that said, "Be ye holy, for I am holy"

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