Category: Articles

It is now more than 30 years since I completed (September 1972) what on the assumption that its reasoning and contentions were correct was perhaps the most important theological work written in the twentieth century. Yet in the event, not entirely unexpected, it failed to find a publisher. Before going further, let me set part of the scene and go back to February 1957.

I was in the library, housed in the Trent Building of Nottingham University, wrestling with Romans 9. I eventually concluded that, contrary to the Wesleyan teaching with which I had been brought up, the Bible really did teach election and predestination. Helped perhaps by a certain predilection for Whitefield and a dislike of the somewhat autocratic character of Wesley, I resolved on the spot to commit myself to searching for Christian truth and prayed to God to give me light even if it hurt.

It was on 23 February 1957, my twenty-third birthday, that I attended by invitation my first Christian Union meeting. I was very impressed. Leslie Land of Melbourne Hall, Leicester, spoke on John 15, verse 5 of which I had learned for recitation as a four- or five-year-old at a Sunday School anniversary. The president of the Methodist Society to which I belonged was there too. He told me that he would not be joining because he did not accept the CU’s view of Scripture. I replied that it was precisely on that account that I intended committing myself. And I did so without regret.

Later that year, after spending the summer at Strasbourg University, I hung on the lips of speakers, one of whom was J.I.Packer, expounding Romans 3-8. I was powerfully affected.

It was not until 1958, when Packer’s “’Fundamentalism’ and the Word of God” was published, that I began to feel greater confidence regarding the inspiration and authority of Scripture. I simply devoured that brilliantly written work supplementing it later with John Wenham’s “Our Lord’s View of the Old Testament”. It was these two publications that influenced me more than any others during my university career. Somewhat later, in order to gain knowledge and understanding of the OT, I consulted Colin Brown, who further down the track was to become Professor of Systematic Theology at Fuller in California, about a more modern translation of the Bible than the KJV. (In my experience, the latter has proved something of a disincentive to serious study and a hindrance to understanding.) He recommended the RSV which, despite its deficiencies in some respects, proved a real blessing over the years.

During the late 50s the Banner of Truth Trust was making its impact on the evangelical students. I already had a deep interest in the Reformation and its controversy with medieval Catholicism, but the Banner helped me to acquire a greater knowledge and appreciation of our Protestant theological heritage and history. I also soon became aware that Packer was a committed Calvinist. His introductory essay to Owen’s ‘The Death of Death’ made a powerful impression on me and this resulted in my committing myself to serious study of Reformed theology in particular. In fact, to the neglect of my degree subjects, I began to give myself unstintingly to reading. Not really knowing what I wanted to do, after graduation I decided to stay on an extra year at Nottingham to gain a Certificate of Education. I found the course less than satisfactory and spent nearly all my time then as later reading Luther, Calvin, the Hodges, Warfield, Machen, Berkhof, Murray and many others as their books came to hand. I was somewhat less enamoured with Lloyd-Jones than some of my contemporaries, but I read him extensively especially when his sermons on Romans and Ephesians became available.

Once I was qualified I went off to fulfil a three-year teaching contract in New Zealand. There having left Methodism for Presbyterianism, I felt called to the ministry and prepared myself for it in keen anticipation. While I had one or two reservations arising out of personal circumstances and aspects of belief, I did not veer from my intention until I received a letter out of the blue from a minister of whom I knew but had never met advising me not to go to Dunedin but rather to Scotland. To cut a rather involved story short, I left New Zealand with some regret but failed to arrive at New College, Edinburgh. Thwarted and unhappy I had no option but to return to teaching for a while.

I continued my commitment to reading and lay preaching. However, in less than a couple of years I managed to get a job organising adult education with the Cambridgeshire Education Authority near Peterborough. This proved much more to my liking. In addition, it gave me both more freedom and less pressure to pursue my own studies. In 1969 I had three articles published in “Christianity Today” and began to think I could make a useful contribution as a writer. But there was an unforeseen problem on the horizon. I had gradually become rather disillusioned with certain evangelical trends. For a start I had an increasingly uneasy feeling that despite frequent mention of a new reformation, there was a hardening of commitment to the old one. This was epitomised in Dr. Packer who seemed to me to be over-committed to traditional Reformed theology and too little concerned with gaining new light from Scripture. I also discovered that old creeds and confessions had ousted the Bible as the primary court of appeal. To question or disagree with the former was tantamount to disagreeing with Scripture! Furthermore, I had an essay on the unpardonable sin returned to me pronto with the curt comment that it was unacceptable since I had used the RSV! Clearly I had sinned against the light myself. For all that, my disquiet with my failure to understand traditional covenant theology, which was supposed to undergird infant baptism, increased.

Finally, in late 1969 a friend well versed in Reformed theology somewhat inadvertently confirmed my view that the covenant of grace or unity of the covenant theology propounded by John Murray converted law into grace, a Pelagian idea if ever there was one. Clearly something was wrong, so I set about trying to discover what constituted biblical covenant theology. In the event it did not take me long. At the beginning of 1970 I began to write in earnest, primarily with the intention of clarifying my own thinking.

By September 1972 I had completed a rather long and rambling book which I eventually entitled “A Challenge to the Church”. The problem was to know what to do with it. The only theologian whose address I knew was Dr. A.S.Wood, the Principal of Cliff College, Near Sheffield, a Methodist but one trained at New College, Edinburgh. I wrote to him and amazingly he agreed to read my work. He was not all that long in recording his reactions. While apparently very impressed with my thinking he was less so with aspects of my presentation. He warned of difficulties with publishers, suggested shortening the work by at least a third and writing a smaller non-technical book as a kind of trailer. I undertook and completed the latter in August 1973. But publishers and editors were still not interested some hinting darkly that I had veered from the faith or, at least, from ‘evangelical orthodoxy’. Later I wrote a number of essays but still editors would not come to the party. After all, they had already got the truth, hadn’t they? Of course, Reformed theology was very much in the ascendant by this stage as was an air of optimism and triumphalism. For many Dr. D.M. Lloyd-Jones was an infallible oracle and his sermons were pouring from the press. Though I read him regularly, I tended to see him in less glamorous terms. I could understand the 18-year-old J.I.Packer being swept away by his oratory as avowed in the blurb for the volume on Romans 5, but for me, approaching 40, he was rather a traditionalist, a man among boys who tragically to this day have failed to grow up even here in Australia. His preaching in his own words was meant to be ‘logic on fire’ (or was it ‘theology on fire’?), yet it seemed to me often to defy logic not least in the volume just mentioned. But the Westminster Confession of Faith and the Thirty-Nine Articles of the Church of England were now the touchstone of truth. With the twentieth century ruled by the seventeenth it was little wonder that an Oxbridge man had written somewhere (The Church of England Newspaper?) in 1972 that Oxford (epitomised by Packer) and Cambridge (by John Stott) had failed us: the plain truth was that despite much edifying work on their part they were locked in the past and apparently incapable of cutting new stone from the quarry of Scripture. A favourite text was “Ask for the ancient paths, where the good way is ….” (Jer. 6:16); it should have been “Remember not the former things, nor consider the things of old. Behold, I am doing a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it? I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert” (Isa. 43:18f. ESV). One thing was clear, at least to me, we were ill-equipped indeed to meet the challenges of the future. And so it has turned out thirty years on.

Despite the pervasive influence of Reformed theology, modern evangelicalism is as doctrinally divided as ever. Since the beginning of the new millennium some appalling articles have appeared in various magazines. Restorationism, characteristic of the OT, aided and abetted by New Age thinking, seems to have become the order of the day despite the massive and explicit evidence against it. Traditional dogma masquerades as biblical doctrine. Apart from the fact that light from the Bible is filtered through the prism of Puritanism, there is no open forum with the result that baneful dogmas like original sin, as full of holes as Haggai’s bag (1:6), are allowed to go unchallenged. If justification by faith is, thankfully, widely held, it is not taken to its logical conclusion. Despite some sterling work on the part of some commentators, a crude fundamentalism exercises a powerful influence. What is the problem? Surely evangelical failure to recognise that the Augustinian worldview is not only false but absurd. It posits original perfection at the beginning instead of at the end and thus puts the cart before the horse, the donkey before the carrot. While we should all to be grateful for the triumph of grace in his thinking, we ought also to recognise Augustine’s pathetic failure in other areas. His belief in original righteousness and Fall there from, original sin and universal curse, to go no further, has led to an appalling perversion of Scripture, and its ramifications distort the entire biblical picture. The arguments against all four ideas are overwhelming as I sought to show in part thirty years ago but have done so in more detail since then. But so long as they remain ignored, we shall be forced to persist in a futile attempt to fit clear biblical teaching into a false framework. The inevitable result of this is distortion and disharmony.

At this juncture, I would make three points: first, nothing I have read since 1972 has given me reason to think that my ‘challenge’ was misguided or mistaken except in certain details. Second, no editor or reader who has been acquainted with my work has been prepared to take me on. (One or two American editors have expressed support but have been hamstrung by “publishers’ rules”). Third, in the mid-nineties I was greatly encouraged by my reading of W.L.Lane’s commentary on Hebrews (Word, 1991). Much of what he said seemed to endorse the essence of my own thinking which had stemmed in the main from Romans, the most misunderstood letter in the NT. Towards the end of 2000, however, David De Silva’s commentary on Hebrews, “Perseverance in Gratitude”, proved remarkably supportive especially with regard to its worldview. Though it may simply reflect the limitations of my reading, the strange thing is that I have failed to come across a review of it, and I am prompted to wonder why.

In these days of Islamic and Hindu resurgence and Western disillusionment and disbelief in the reIevance of so-called “Christianity”, I am convinced that it is vital for us to present the full-orbed truth as it is in Jesus. Failure to do this can only earn us the wrath and judgement of God himself (cf. Gal. 1:6-9). It did so in ancient times when the Babylonians destroyed the temple and took over the Promised Land, it could well do so again in our own day. We reject prophets on pain of death. “… the Church cannot do without thinkers – or prophets …. She destroys herself in doing so”, wrote Harry Blamires (The Christian Mind, p.50, London, 1963). “What is needed desperately today is prophetic insight. Scholars can interpret the past; it takes prophets to interpret the present. Learning will enable a man to pass judgment on our yesterdays, but it requires a gift of clear seeing to pass sentence on our own day. One hundred years from now historians will know what was taking place religiously in this year of our Lord; but that will be too late for us. We should know right now” (A.W.Tozer, Of God and Men, pp.22f. Harrisburg, Penn. 1960). As George Orwell observed in the original preface to “Animal Farm”, “Anyone who challenges prevailing orthodoxy finds himself silenced with surprising effectiveness.” And so during the last 30 years I, who to my knowledge am alone in offering the Church a new and more biblical theology, have met with constant rejection by editors and publishers. Furthermore, I have not received a single request to present my views for analysis and critical appraisal. (Not surprising really, since the Bereans of Acts 17 appear to have been banished from the planet.) So far as evangelicals are concerned the problem is that they have gone back to Egypt. They have returned to Augustine, to the Reformers and to the Puritans not to learn from their mistakes but to uncritically embrace them. The plain truth is, however, that apart from the fact that the latter’s understanding of Scripture was clearly imperfect (i.e. inadequate, incomplete and even distorted in places), they are incapable of meeting the needs of the twenty-first century.

What is required today is a new openness to truth. How else are we as Christians to challenge the world? It is tragic that words addressed by Dr. Packer in 1958 to liberals to consider the possibility that they were mistaken should now have to be addressed to those who supported him in his evangelicalism (see “’Fundamentalism’ and the Word of God”, pp. 144f.). We do well to remind ourselves that in the NT, along with the liberal Sadducees, there were the conservative Pharisees who were most vehemently denounced by Jesus. At a later date, if there was a Luther and a Calvin there were also reactionaries like Erasmus and Sir Thomas More. History may not repeat itself, but it is certainly recapitulated! We have been warned. And while many modern evangelicals bemoan the sad state of both church and state, they fail to recognise that they themselves are a fundamental part of the problem. They have a log in their own eye which must be removed before they can see clearly to extricate the speck in the eye of others. The perennial message of Scripture is, repent or pay the penalty.

The doctrine of the new birth is central to evangelical theology. While it played a less dominant role at the time of the Reformation when it tended to be integrated with other doctrines such as repentance and renewal in general, it came into its own during the evangelical revival of the eighteenth century. Wesley (see e.g. Sermon XXXIX), Whitefield and Edwards, among others, laid great stress on it. For all that it is questionable whether it has been properly understood.

The Traditional View

Traditionally regeneration has been strongly, almost exclusively, linked with sin, original sin in particular. We have been told that the new birth is an absolute imperative arising from our lost condition since the ‘Fall’. All Adam’s posterity born of woman are said to be sinners by nature, choice and habit and in urgent need of regeneration apart from which they cannot be saved and face eternal damnation. However, the fallacy of this sort of reasoning is blatant: it must be unbiblical, for, if nature takes precedence, choice is eliminated. Its ultimate source is in fact Augustine. When referring to God’s sending Christ into the world to be our mediator, the Bishop of Hippo wrote, “God did this (i.e. send Christ as Mediator) so that those who believe in Christ might be absolved by the washing of regeneration from the guilt of all their sins – both the original sin they have inherited by birth to counter which, in particular, rebirth was instituted, and all other sins incurred by evil conduct – and might be delivered from perpetual condemnation” (Needham, p.251, cf. pp.59,121,142,206,252,286). In view of statements like this, it is legitimate to put the issue in simple terms and say that for Augustine regeneration, like baptism (cf. p.252), was the antidote of original sin. (Cf. John Wesley in the sermon referred to above, which follows that on original sin: “Hence it is, that, being born in sin, we must be ‘born again’“, p.517). However, when it is expressed thus starkly, it is bound to raise queries in the minds of all who try to read their Bibles objectively uninfluenced by tradition. Before turning to famous passages like John 3, it is useful to fill in some of the background to the received dogma.

Since Augustine‘s influence on the Western church has been so great, needless to say his views on regeneration and associated doctrines like baptism have prevailed even to our own times, not simply in Catholicism but in Protestantism too. One has only to read systematic theologies like those of Hodge, Berkhof, Grudem (pp. 494-501, who is not alone in being at pains to posit rebirth before natural birth!), and Reymond to see that regeneration is regarded as necessary to counter original or birth sin. (It should be noted that in more recent times theologians and evangelists have recognised the difference between an imperative and a necessity. Regrettably, this has not led to the theological re-assessment it requires. See further below.) Indeed, in the minds of many who, in view of the obvious hyperbole of 58:3 (cf. Job 31:18), read more into Psalm 51:5 than they should, sin goes back to conception, to the time when they were conceived by ‘carnal lust’ as Augustine termed it (see e.g. Needham, p.142; Blanchard, p.475, etc.). Since the latter is their basic premise, it is scarcely surprising that their projected order of salvation (ordo salutis) necessarily begins with regeneration (see WCF 10, cf. e.g. Reymond, pp.703-711). But, apart from noticing that it would appear to involve semantic and logical absurdity, this line of thinking has a very dubious grounding in Scripture. For a start, regeneration in the OT, at a time when the Holy Spirit had not yet been (fully) given (John 7:39), is never more than a promise (Dt. 29:4; 30:6; Jer. 24:7; 31:33; 32:39f.; Ezek. 11:19; 36:26f., etc.). Since this is so, Hebrews 11 is made up of a list of unregenerate OT believers (note 11:39f. Paul specifically refers to Abraham as “ungodly”, Rom. 4:5!). Thus, when we come to the NT, we are told in no uncertain terms that regeneration, or salvation, is founded on faith in Jesus (John 1:12; 3:16,36; 6:27,40,47,54; Acts 2:38; Rom. 1:16; 1 Pet. 1:9; 1 John 5:11f., etc., cf. Luke 1:46-55,68-79). Since Jesus as Messiah and the giver of (new) life (1 Cor. 15:45) was himself only a promise during the time of the law and the prophets, how do we account for OT faith if regeneration is its necessary precondition?

At this point the suggestion inevitably arises that original sin was not an insurmountable obstacle to faith. But we can go further. There are multitudinous reasons why we should question the Augustinian dogma of original sin. It lacks adequate exegetical support, it harbours enormous, in fact, insuperable, logical difficulties, it is clearly in conflict with other teaching of Scripture and, while denied by the Jews and the Orthodox, it has never, to my knowledge, been substantiated by any Christian theologian of any school. In light of this, it is highly appropriate to reconsider the biblical doctrine of regeneration.

John 3

John 3 is the classic passage on the subject. It is noticeable here that when Jesus tells him that one must be born again in order to see the kingdom of God (v.3, ESV), Nicodemus quite naturally infers that another physical birth is what is required. After all, re-generation suggests repetition! The idea that a man who is old might re-enter his mother’s womb is clearly cause for astonishment. So Jesus corrects Nicodemus’ misapprehension by referring to spiritual birth or birth from above. And in light of verses 12 and 13 we are surely right to conclude that Jesus is differentiating between earthly and heavenly births. He goes on to tell Nicodemus not to marvel, first, because a spiritual birth is a sovereign, if invisible, act of the Spirit of God and, secondly, as a (Gk. ‘the’) teacher of Israel he should have some understanding of these things. After all, passages like Jeremiah 31:31-34 and especially Ezekiel 11:19 and 36:26f. were clear OT promises pointing to the eventual reality of the new or second birth when Christ, the second Adam, came.

Augustine and Cleansing

Before taking a closer look at John 3 and 1:12f. we need to note that Augustine was doubtless influenced by passages like Titus 3:3-7 (cf. Eph. 5:25-27) where verse 5 refers to the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit (cf. Needham, p.121, cf. 293). Thus we find him referring to the washing away of guilt by regeneration. But is this a tenable proposition? Does regeneration really wash away guilt? In 1 Corinthians 6:11 Paul appears to link washing with atonement as Peter does in Acts 2:38, cf. 22:16, something that Augustine himself seems to be aware of on occasion. Arguably, the washing refers to baptism as it does in John 3:5, cf. Ezek. 36:25-27; Eph. 5:26, but this involves acceptance of the death and atonement of Christ on the sinner’s behalf followed by reformation of life under the influence of the Spirit (cf. Rom. 5:8,10) who is promised when we believe. In other words, sin’s detergent is blood, not Spirit (Rom. 3:25; Eph. 1:7; Heb. 9:14; 1 Pet. 1:2,19; 1 John 1:7; Rev. 1:5; 7:14; 22:14). Regeneration is linked directly with sanctification of which it is the first step. The new or regenerate life follows on forgiveness of sins and justification achieved through the blood of Christ (Rom. 3:21-26). Otherwise expressed, imputed righteousness is succeeded by imparted righteousness as regenerate believers are led by the Spirit of God (Rom. 8:13f.; Gal. 5:18).

All this suggests that in seeking to counter sins already committed with Spirit instead of blood or atonement Augustine confused flesh and spirit or Spirit (nature) with sin and grace (morality). Thus in the history of dogmatic theology the result was the virtual assimilation of justification with sanctification, which remains characteristic of the Roman Church, and apparently, though it is formally denied, of many Protestants, to this day. This brings us back to John 3 where the focus of attention is not sin, which is not mentioned, but nature, that is, flesh and Spirit (cf. John 1:12f.; 6:63, cf. 1 Cor. 15:45-50). The problem with Augustine’s understanding of this passage was that he regarded the flesh, following the Fall, as (naturally) sinful. Indeed, he went so far as to assert that even the Virgin Mary was “sinful flesh” and says, “For the flesh He (Christ) took from her, He either cleansed in order to take it, or cleansed by taking it” (Needham, p.123). This is clearly not the view of Jesus who, when a woman in the crowd suggested that the breasts he sucked and the womb that bore him were blessed, replied that those, including Mary his mother, who hear the word and keep it are blessed (Luke 11:27f., cf. Mark 3:31-35). So here again Augustine’s reasoning is flawed, for yet once more he wants to use Spirit instead of blood as the cleansing agent, since it is obvious that at his birth Jesus had still to atone for sin. (The reader should note that it is similar reasoning, not made explicit, that enables Augustinians to ride roughshod over the unavoidable deduction that Jesus as the son of Adam inherited his (original) sin.) Needless to say, Augustinians and indeed most evangelicals, not to mention Romans Catholics, view the flesh (and by implication sex, though this is somewhat inconsistently denied nowadays) as inherently sinful to this day. In the nineteenth century, stalwarts like Charles Hodge, seeking support for the dogma of original sin, could write that John 3:6 clearly (sic) meant that, “That which is born of corrupt parents is itself corrupt; and is corrupt in virtue of its descent or derivation” (ST, 2, p.242. Cf. Ryle, p.3; Litton, p.191, and, in the twentieth century, Berkhof, p.240: Murray, CW, 2, pp.184f., Romans 244f., and Blanchard, p. 475). In one sense he was right, for the flesh as deriving from the corruptible earth is naturally corruptible, but he was wrong to associate corruption with native sinfulness. For him as for Augustine all corruption stemmed from sin, but this is not what the Bible teaches.

However, it has to be acknowledged that many modern commentators betray a change in attitude. They seem to recognise what ought to be obvious to eyes not blinded by Augustinian dogma that when Jesus refers to the flesh he is talking about human nature as created by God, our physical and naturally mortal nature which stems from a naturally corruptible and, by definition, non-eternal earth (Ps. 102:25-27; Isa. 40:6-8, etc.). Thus H. Ridderbos, having referred to John 1:13, states that flesh “denotes a person in his or her natural existence as begotten by a father and given birth to by a mother” (p.128. See also Morris, Carson, Lindars, etc., ad loc.). In other words, the necessity of the new birth arises from human need to complete its God-ordained pilgrimage or odyssey to the (spiritual) kingdom of heaven for which the flesh is entirely unfitted. As Paul puts it so graphically and emphatically in 1 Corinthians 15:50, where again sin is not on the horizon, (physical) flesh and blood by its very nature cannot inherit the (spiritual) kingdom of God nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable (cf. 1 Cor. 9:25; 1 Pet. 1:23-25; Gal. 6:8).

The Role of Sin

It might well be countered at this point that I am ignoring the role of sin. Not at all! The original promise to man, Adam, who stemmed from a naturally temporal earth, was one of (eternal) life on the condition that he kept the commandment (Gen. 2:17; WCF 7.2). (The idea that Adam was created immortal is Greek and Augustinian, see Needham, p.47, not Jewish or Christian. In any case, since he died, it involves logical absurdity.) The divine intention was that man, who as created from the earth was naturally corruptible (Rom. 1:23), should seek spiritual incorruptibility (Rom. 2:7) by keeping the commandments which promised life. In the event Adam failed as we all do (Rom. 3:9,23) because we all break the law (1 K. 8:46; Rom. 5:12; John 8:34). There was one exception (John 8:46; Heb. 4:15; 1 Pet. 2:22, etc.), however: he was the stronger or last Adam specifically sent by God to win the battle against the world, the flesh and the devil (Heb. 2:14; 1 John 3:8) everyone else had lost (Rom. 3:19-31; 1 Cor. 1:29; Gal. 2:16) and to effect a marvellous rescue (cf. John 3:16).

It must not pass without notice that having become incarnate, that is, flesh, Jesus had of necessity to keep the law and to be born again in accordance with the implication of Leviticus 18:5 (Dt. 30:20; 32:46f.; Ezek. 20:11,13,21; Luke 10:25-28; Rom. 2:13; 10:5 , etc.) and his own dictum (John 3:6) like, though prior to, all the rest of his brethren (cf. Heb. 2:10f.). As Berkhof maintains without appreciating the significance of his comment, “This statement (i.e. John 3:3, cf.5-7) of the Saviour is absolute and leaves no room for exceptions” (p.472). And that is precisely what is implied in Matthew 3:13-17 (cf. Mk. 1:9-11; Luke 3:21f.; Acts 10:37f.). Denial of this is logically denial of the incarnation, which leads to docetism. The Augustinian “gospel”, however, in its obsession with sin, especially original sin, has for centuries hidden this from our eyes. (Carson, p.197, seems somewhat at odds with himself. Though he notes the natural or metaphysical “distance between human beings and God and the axiom that like produces like”, he goes on to maintain that “The plural ‘you’ sets Jesus over against not just Nicodemus, but the entire human race.” In saying this he is apparently indicating in true Augustinian fashion that since Jesus did not sin he did not need to be born again. If this is so, however, he is implicitly contradicting himself. For if the difference between us and God that is being entertained at this point is the difference between flesh and Spirit and is natural not ethical, then, since Jesus himself is flesh, it necessarily applies to him as much as it does to Nicodemus and the rest of us. Why then the ‘you’?, it may be asked. The simple answer is that Jesus was already born again and the very first to be so, since he alone had inherited the promise of life by keeping the law, as we have already seen. Cf. Mt. 3:17; 19:21.) The essential point being made by the NT writers is that Jesus alone of all mankind achieved his victory over the world in the weakness of the flesh (Rom. 8:3; Heb. 2), something that Paul, like the rest of us, failed lamentably to do (cf. e.g. Rom.7). So if righteousness, which can only be gained by keeping the law (Dt. 6:25; Ezek. 18:5-9; Rom. 2:13; 1 John 3:7), is the indispensable precondition of regeneration, as the Scripture surely teaches (Gen. 2:17; Lev. 18:5, etc.), Jesus alone achieved it (1 Pet. 3:18), and of this John the Baptist was painfully aware (Mt. 3:13-17).

(It is perhaps somewhat misleading to think of Jesus attaining to righteousness and life exclusively by keeping the law and remaining sinless. For him, as a true son of Abraham, Gal. 3:16, and the true Israel, faith and obedience (law-keeping) went together, Rom. 3:31, cf. Gen. 17:1; 18:19; 22:18; 26:5; Jas. 2:18-26. In his case there was no either/or but a both/and, cf. Gal. 3:2,5.)

Perfection

If my contention that in John 3:6 Jesus is making a distinction between nature (flesh) as created ‘by hand’ and nature (spirit) as created ‘not by hand’ (cf. Heb. 9:11,24), or, in other words, between our present earthly and our future heavenly constitution (cf. 1 Cor. 15:42-50; 2 Cor. 4:16-5:5)*, then we are given a different perspective on various matters that have in the past been governed by Augustine’s faulty ideas. For a start, we can distinguish between our natural bodies of flesh that die and see corruption because of sin (Rom. 8:10) and hence need redemption (Rom. 8:23), and our heavenly or glorified bodies which will be like that of the exalted Christ whose body did not see corruption because he did not sin (Phil. 3:21; 1 John 3:2). Here it is not a question of receiving ‘immortal flesh’, surely a blatant contradiction in terms, but a radical transformation (1 Cor. 15:35-57) involving the culmination of the perfecting process which God had in mind from the start (2 Cor. 5:5). In other words, if it has always been the plan of God to present us blameless, that is perfected in spirit (cf. Heb. 10:1,14; 12:23; 1 Pet. 4:6), before him in Christ (Eph. 1:4), it has also been his purpose to perfect us corporeally too (Mt. 13:43; 2 Cor. 4:17; 5:1-5; 1 John 3:2, cf. John 17:24). (It needs to be remembered that we are perfected in the flesh, which cannot inherit the kingdom of heaven, in this world. The seed of Adam becomes the mature physical man just as the acorn becomes the mature oak, cf. 1 Pet. 1:23. Needless to add, both experience death and corruption like the naturally corruptible earth from which they are taken.)

The Material Creation

Next, it is possible at this point to argue that if the body needs redemption on account of sin, then so does the material creation, the earth in particular, which, according to Augustinian orthodoxy, has been under a universal curse because of Adam’s sin. The problem here is that Jesus implicitly denies this in John 3:6 precisely. On the assumption that what I have already said above is correct and that sin is not on the horizon, the earth, like the flesh which derives from it, is incapable of redemption and regeneration since it lacks permanency by nature (Heb. 1:10-12, cf. 7:3; 9:11,24). It too lacks the ability to, so to speak, “enter a second time into (its) mother’s womb”, that is, begin again. In other words, recreation, restoration or repristination for the earth, as for the flesh, though definitely not the body, is out of the question. God is not going to return to the beginning and repeat a botched plan of salvation (cf. Heb. 10:1,11). He is simply going to perfect what he had in mind from the start even in spite of sin (cf. Ex. 32:11-14). Paul puts the issue in a nutshell when he says that the perishable (or naturally corruptible) cannot inherit the imperishable (the naturally incorruptible, 1 Cor. 15:50, cf. 2 Cor. 4:18). Since the earth had a beginning it must have an end (cf. Heb. 7:3,8,16,24f.): it is, in other words, naturally and purposely, that is, by divine intention, temporal and its end, like that of the physical body is destruction. This is exactly what Scripture constantly emphasises (Gen. 8:22; Isa. 51:6,8; Heb. 1:10-12; 12:26-29; 2 Pet. 3:7,10-12, etc.). Like the flesh, which derives from it and gains its character from it, the earth is by the very fact of its creation impermanent and corruptible. It was never intended to last forever; it is intrinsically temporal and not eternal. Its provisional and obsolescent character is as clearly taught as that of the law whose use terminates at death (Mt. 5:18 contrast 24:35; Rom. 7:1-6; 2 Cor. 3:11; Heb. 1:11; 8:13). So on the basis of the evidence at our disposal we are forced to conclude that it is not sin that is the primary problem but nature. Sin simply prevents the nature of man made in the image of God from being perfected, as is implied as early as Genesis 2:17. On the other hand, since Jesus did not sin, his nature as representative man, unlike Adam’s, was perfected (Heb. 2:10; 5:9, etc.). He alone became the Perfect Man (Eph. 4:13, cf. 2:15; Gal. 3:28) and so achieved the likeness of God (Mt. 5:48; Heb. 1:3), and this fitted him for glory. On the impermanent earth? By no means (cf. Heb. 7:26), but in the eternal heaven which was his goal from the start. His intention, as John and the author of Hebrews in particular make abundantly clear, was always to return to his Father’s side as perfected man (John 3:13; 6:62; 14:28; 17:5; Luke 13:32; Heb. 1:3; 4:14; 6:19f.; 7:26; 9:24, etc.) with his people in train (Heb. 2:9-13; 1 Pet. 3:18; Rev. 3:21). And thus, in accordance with his desire, we shall be glorified with him there (John 6:37-51; 10:27-29; 12:26; 14:6; 17:24; Rom. 5:2; 8:29f.; 1 Cor. 6:14; 2 Cor. 4:14; 11:2; Eph. 1:10; 2:18; Col. 1:5,12f., 22,27; 1 Thes. 4:14-17, etc.). Truly have we, whose personal perfection has been frustrated by sin, been redeemed (Cor. 6:20; 1 Pet. 1:19; Rev. 5:9), rescued and perfected in Christ (Heb. 10:14). Despite undeniable personal inadequacy (cf. Gal. 2:16, etc.), in Christ we become more than conquerors (Rom. 8:28ff.).

Barth and Brunner

To reason in this way leads us inevitably to the dispute between Barth and Brunner regarding natural theology. Such was his (Augustinian) antipathy to nature that Barth, as is well known, maintained that regenerating grace replaced it. In my view, however, Brunner was correct to maintain that grace does not so much abolish nature as perfect it, gratia non tollit naturam sed perficit (cf. Brown, p.85). What is destroyed is the body of flesh (2 Cor. 5:1, cf. the material and the spiritual temples, Mark 14:58; Rev. 21:22), not the body as such which is subject to redemption (Rom. 8:23, cf. 1 Cor. 15:44,46). With regard to Jesus, who did not sin and who rose physically from the grave (Luke 24:39, cf. John 20:17), we can safely draw the conclusion that his body of flesh was not so much destroyed, i.e. did not see corruption (Acts 2:31; 13:34), but, in light of 1 Corinthians 15:50ff., was transformed at his ascension (Acts 1:9; 2 Cor. 4:18) in accordance with the original promise implicit in Genesis 2:17. (I must add here that in view of the evidence I am completely mystified by the widespread notion that Christ’s body after his physical resurrection was his spiritual glorified body. As John 10:17f. indicate, Jesus’ resurrection was as physical as that of Lazarus who later died again, Luke 24:39; John 20:27, and denial of this seems to me to betray fundamental misunderstanding and illegitimate indulgence in spiritualisation. It must be insisted with equal vigour that Grudem’s belief, p.859, that Jesus is incarnate in heaven is a basic error. If, as Paul clearly indicates in 1 Corinthians 15:35ff., we need transformation, then so did the incarnate Jesus. The only alternative to this is denial of the incarnation.)

Sanctification

So while the new birth by the Spirit is preparation for and guarantee (2 Cor. 1:22, cf. Eph. 1:13) of the heavenly life to come, it is also the means by which the moral transformation of our earthly lives takes place (Tit. 3:3-7). As was asserted above, acceptance of Christ as Saviour leads to justification by faith alone (Rom. 5:1f.,9f.). But the faith alone by which we are justified does not remain alone: it is always followed by our being led by the Spirit of God with a view to personal sanctification (Rom. 8:14-17). And we are solemnly warned that without holiness we shall not see God (Heb.12:10,14). This being so, it is imperative that we put to death what is EARTHLY in us (Col. 3:5, cf. Rom. 6:6; Gal. 5:24; 6:14) and strive with might and main to avoid making provision for the flesh in order to gratify its desires (Rom. 13:14; 1 Pet. 2:11). It should be noted, however, that the giving of the Spirit arises from our acceptance of Christ’s death on our behalf, forgiveness of sins and justification. Clearly, if life is promised only to the righteous (cf. Rom. 1:17; Gal. 3:11, etc.) and righteousness is imputed by faith, then the conclusion that sanctification follows on justification is unavoidable. Historically speaking then, the traditional order of salvation (ordo salutis), which has given priority to regeneration, has resulted in dogmatic disaster and turned theology on its head: it has confused the beginning with the end. Apart from the doctrines of repentance and baptism, for example, it has in certain circles placed an inordinate weight on election, which has been seen not simply as a unilateral act of God (which it is: Rom. 9:6-13; 11:1-6), but as the implicit abolition of all human activity in response to the gospel. In other words, in the NT, while human beings under a Spirit-induced conviction of sin are urged to repent and believe even before (Mark 1:4f.,15) as well as after the outpouring of the Spirit following the ascension of Christ (Acts 2:38), traditionalists, like the contemporaries of William Carey, have gone so far as to deny the legitimacy of evangelism. Even today devotees of Reformed theology have to defend the free offer of the gospel and not always with conviction or ready acceptance. But such is the result of a doctrine of regeneration based on erroneous dogmas like original sin.

Salvation History

I have already referred to the fact that in the OT regeneration (or life or the granting of the Spirit, cf. Gal. 3:2-5) is a promise implied first in Genesis 2:17 and made explicit in Leviticus 18:5 and numerous other texts throughout the Bible. This surely suggests that, contrary to Augustine, man was not created perfect. Rather perfection, both moral flawlessness under the commandment and maturity or completeness, was his goal. In other words, as modern scholars seem to recognise in part, salvation history was in evidence from the start. Man was not created static and required to maintain a flat uniformity; rather he was made in the dynamic image of God and thus required to gain his likeness (cf. 2 Cor. 3:18). He was hence subject to development by nature. Far from being perfect or mature, Adam was spiritually, if not physically, a baby as a comparison between Genesis 2 and 3 and Deuteronomy 1:39 and Numbers 14:29-35, for example, make plain. Not only did Adam not have the law at his creation but he had to be given it when he arrived at understanding. And it was the commandment or law that put him on probation and tested his heart like that of Israel at a later stage (e.g. Dt. 8:2,16). Once he did receive it, he, again like Israel, failed to keep it. And instead of bringing him the life it promised it brought him death just as it did to Israel (Dt. 30:17f.) and to Paul in his day (Rom. 7:9f.). On the other hand, had he kept the commandment, he would have gained life. How do we know? Because the second Adam did keep it, the whole law of Moses in fact, and he certainly gained life by so doing (Mt. 3:17). In fact, he went on to fulfil all righteousness (Mt. 3:15), achieve perfection (Mt. 19:21, cf. 5:48) and was thus fitted to sit at the right hand of his heavenly Father (Heb. 1:3; Rev. 3:21).

No one to my knowledge has outlined the development that characterised the life of Jesus better than B.B.Warfield (pp.158ff., cf. pp.223ff.). Yet even he with his Presbyterian and Reformed background and strong emphasis on Augustinianism failed to appreciate its significance and theological importance (cf. J.Orr, p.70). H.W.Robinson, however, refused to be stampeded by the Augustinian view and drew the conclusion that “we must regard regeneration as the normal and ‘natural’ completion of what was begun in the first birth” (p.327). B.F.Westcott also recognised that development or progress was intrinsic to man apart from the Fall (The Epistles of John, p.308) and asserted both that “man was made in God’s image to gain His likeness (p.306) and that there is “a ‘making perfect’ which is correlative with ‘salvation’” (p.313). If this is true, then it is undeniable that Jesus himself, in accordance with his own dictum as God incarnate (John 3:6), had to undergo, or rather attain, the new birth (cf. Mt. 3:13-17). In other words, during his life in the flesh he necessarily experienced the testing and perfecting process ordained by his Father, as Hebrews especially makes clear. And in light of the markers or institutions of Jewish life to which he was subjected in his circumcision (Luke 2:21) and his bar mitzvah (Luke 2:41ff.), his regeneration was also an essential part of his spiritual development or, perhaps better, his punctuated progress towards the kingdom of heaven (cf. Gal. 4:4f.). Not without reason does the author of Hebrews refer to Jesus as the pioneer of our salvation (2:10; 5:9; 6:20; 12:2) who himself passed the test, conquered and achieved his predestined goal (1 Pet. 1:20; Rev. 3:21, cf. 5:5; Heb. 9:24; 1 Pet. 3:18). (Predestination is not mechanical. Just as some are fitted by their evil works for destruction (Rom. 9:22; 1 Cor. 6:9f, etc.), so some are fitted by sanctification for life (Rom. 6:22; Eph. 2:10). Divine sovereignty does not negate human responsibility.)

If it is true then that human life begins in the flesh with a view to its completion in the spirit (cf. 1 Cor. 15:46; 1 Pet. 4:6), then recognition of our inherent development both as individual and community is paramount. Scripture makes it clear that though believers are ultimately heirs of God (Rom. 8:17) and potential owners of all the estate, we begin as slaves (Gentiles, cf. Lev. 25:39ff.; Neh. 9:36), become servants (if we are Jews, though even Gentiles nowadays go to school to learn the ‘law’) and eventually sons (Rom. 8:14; Gal. 3:19-4:7).

Ideas Associated with Original Sin

If what has been written above is basically correct, then at this point it is worth spending a moment examining various ideas associated with the traditional or Augustinian view. For a start, it is constantly claimed in evangelical popular literature that the reason why we sin is that we are born sinners and on that account need to be born again (e.g. Roberts, p.47). There is in the event apparent Scriptural support for this view – the proverb of 1 Sam 24:13, for example. Jeremiah 13:23, John 8:34, Romans 6:16 and 2 Peter 2:19 would appear to endorse this. However, all these texts refer to sins personally committed: they do not explain why we sin in the first place. The usual explanation, contrary to explicit biblical teaching (Dt. 24:16, etc.), is that Adam’s sin was either transmitted or imputed to us; but there is a mass of evidence pointing elsewhere. We have only to ask why Adam and Eve themselves sinned, for they certainly had no alien sin imputed to them. The deception of the devil apart, the answer is clear: it is first intimated in Genesis 3:6 and finally highlighted in Romans 7, especially verse 14. The plain truth is that whenever the flesh (i.e. our Adamic nature) collides with law, it capitulates. In other words, first Eve’s then Adam’s sin (cf. 1 Tim. 2:14) is repeated by all of us (cf. Rom. 3:23; 5:12). Since the commandment, like the law is transgenerational, we all succumb at least to some degree to fleshly temptation (cf. Jas. 1:14f.). In contrast, Jesus alone of all men and women subjected like our first parents to probation (Gen. 2:17) triumphed over temptation to the end (cf. Mt. 4:1-11, cf. Rom. 8:3). For the rest of us the point is this: once we sin, even if only in one area (Jas. 2:10), we forfeit the life promised to us by the commandment (cf. John 8:34). From that point on, as Adam and Eve discovered, the way to the tree of life is barred (Gen. 3:22-24) and cannot be recovered except in Christ (John 14:6; Heb. 10:19f.; Rev. 22:14). In him alone was the promise of life fulfilled and in him alone can it be fulfilled for the rest of us (cf. Heb. 2:14f.). For in him we are through faith justified, regenerated, sanctified and finally raised (2 Cor. 4:14, etc.). As God intended, Jesus is absolutely indispensable for salvation (Isa. 45:22f.; Phil. 2:9-11).

The War between Flesh and Spirit

As I noted above, it has long been held in the church that the flesh as such is evil. A recent popular writer informs us “that man’s ‘flesh’ (his innate human nature) is sinful. He is born that way.” This, however, cannot be true since, first, the flesh is created by God out of the earth and, second, it became the earthly tent of Christ himself. However, it is still held that the war between flesh and spirit referred to by Paul (Gal. 5:17, cf. Eph. 4:22), Peter (1:2:11, cf. 2:1:4) and James 4:1 arises out of the fact that the flesh is sinful and hence makes the new birth an unavoidable necessity (cf. Art. 9 of the C. of E.). The problem here is that the same war occurred principially in innocent Adam and Eve and even in sinless Jesus. If it is true that God cannot be tempted (Jas. 1:13), then the indisputable fact that Jesus was tempted must be a direct consequence of his incarnation. As flesh he was as susceptible to temptation as the rest of us, and in his case the war between flesh and spirit, exacerbated by the fiery darts of the devil, was titanic and terrible. For all that he triumphed (Rom. 8:3; Heb. 2); so if he needed to be born again, that is, inherit life, it was certainly not because of his sin. Again we are drawn inexorably to the conclusion that the new birth is a ‘natural’ requirement, though admittedly one that can be and is in the case of all but Jesus thwarted by sin, stemming from our creation as flesh which cannot inherit the kingdom of heaven (John 3:6; 1 Cor. 15:50, cf. 1 Pet. 1:23).

If it is true that nature, and not original sin or the so-called Fall in Adam, prompts this war, then what is its origin? To answer this question we must go back to Genesis 1. There in verses 26-28 we read that man is made in the (spiritual) image of God to exercise dominion over the physical creation. The relevance of this appears in 2:7 which teaches us that physically man is made from the earth and is therefore clay (Job 10:9), earth or dust (1 Cor. 15:45-49; 2 Cor. 4:7). To pinpoint the issue which seems to have been universally missed by writers on theological themes, since man is made up of two components, flesh and spirit **, the former is meant to be ruled by the latter. It is not just our physical environment that requires cultivation and dominion, but our own bodies (cf. James 3:2). Our uncontrolled or undisciplined ‘lawless’ flesh reverts as readily to wilderness or chaos as untilled land does (Prov. 24:30ff.; Isa. 6:11; Ezek. 36:33-36, etc.), and when the spirit is completely absent, as in death (Jas. 2:26), then it gives way to total corruption (Gen. 3:19; Job 34:14f., cf. Rom. 8:19-25) and is fit only to be burned (cf. Heb. 6:7f.).

Jesus Alone Victorious

In contrast to his sinful fellows Jesus fulfils the divine purpose of subjecting everything, including his own body of flesh, under his feet and, having achieved perfection (James 3:2), is as a consequence crowned with glory and honour. The reference to his death (Heb. 2:9) makes it clear that Jesus’ victory is on behalf of his fellow man and ensures their salvation too. This is the glory of the gospel. What is more, it makes it clear beyond cavil that only Jesus, who alone lived life in the flesh without sin, can act as the Saviour of mankind. And for pluralists to argue that the exclusivity of Christianity is based on a few texts like John 14:6 and Acts 4:12 is radically to misconceive the nature of the situation. The truth is that the entire Bible militates against the idea. Briefly, Jesus is a man apart – unique, matchless, incomparable and peerless. As the Word made flesh he was sent by the one true God to accomplish the divine salvation that was promised in the OT (Isa. 45:22f.; Rom. 14:11; Phil. 2:9-11). And the notion that the flesh or the natural man will ever boast before God is scouted absolutely by the NT (cf. Rom. 3:19f.; 1 Cor. 1:29; Gal. 2:16, etc.). All born of woman, Jesus apart, crumble before (the) law, as even Job and his companion appeared to realise (4:17; 15:14; 25:4).

The Weakness of the Flesh

If it is true that fleshly man through weakness lacks the capacity to keep the law (Rom. 7:14; 8:3) which leads to life (Gen. 2:17; Lev. 18:5, etc.) and that God’s intention was always that no flesh should boast in his presence (Rom. 3:19f.; 1 Cor. 1:29; Gal. 2:16), the traditional dogmas of Adam’s covenant headship of the race and the imputation of his sin are rendered redundant. If this is not so, then the reason why God should compromise his holiness by imputing Adam’s sin to his innocent posterity, when they are made in his fleshly image and hence by nature characterised by his inability to keep the commandment, must ever remain an insoluble mystery. In the event, it is far better to recognise that regeneration is not an imperative, a matter of our personal responsibility like repentance consequent on sin, but a natural necessity arising out of our earthly constitution. However, since sin to which we are all prone (Rom. 3:23; 5:12) prevents nature from achieving its intended goal, the way is opened up for God to manifest the riches of his grace in Christ (Rom. 11:32; Gal. 3:22). Here lies the essence of the gospel, which points the way to life in gratitude to God and refusal to boast in personal achievement. All the glory goes to God alone – Gloria soli Deo (Rev. 4:11).

Conversion Precedes Regeneration

If all this is true, then my contention that faith precedes regeneration answers some of the conundrums that loom so large on the traditional view. For why is conversion, that is, repentance and faith (cf. Mark 1:15; Acts 2:38), presented in Scripture as the indispensable requirement of salvation or regeneration if the latter precedes it? Simply to ask the question is to reveal the absurdity on which it is based. (It is paralleled by the equally absurd notion fundamental to Augustinianism that man, i.e. Adam, began life perfect!) For how can we be responsible moral agents under an obligation to repent if repentance is based on what is intrinsically an impossible rebirth? Such thinking undermines totally all ideas of human responsibility and reduces salvation to raw election and God himself to naked sovereignty like the god of Islam.

Next, it is extremely hard not to infer that if regeneration is applied to us before its preconditions like repentance, faith and justification are accomplished, they are rendered redundant and the door is opened to antinomianism with a vengeance. After all, why strive for what you have already got? (It might be countered at this point that I am suggesting that regeneration is a human accomplishment rather than a gift of grace, but this would be to miss my point. While it is true that Christ’s work precedes our faith (cf. Rom. 5:6,8), faith is the means by which it is applied to us personally. And while faith itself is a gift, it is nonetheless exercised by responsible human subjects.) In contrast, they become an absolute requirement if they are shown to be the essential instrumental means of eternal life, the very portals of heaven.

There is another point: Scripture not only puts repentance and faith first but constantly emphasises their imperative nature. (Regeneration scarcely appears in Paul, though adoption does.) The author of Hebrews seems to sum up the situation when he says that without faith it is impossible to please God (11:6). Why is this so? On the traditional view it is regeneration that to all intents and purposes is stressed as an imperative, not faith. The answer of course lies in the fact that faith is the instrument by which we gain a righteousness which we as sinners cannot produce ourselves but which is the indispensable prerequisite of eternal life in the presence of an all-holy God (cf. Isa. 33:14). Needless to add, it is the righteous who are justified and the righteous alone who will live (Rom. 1:17; Gal. 3:11, cf. Rev. 22:14).

My conclusion then is that, according to the Bible, regeneration is a universal human necessity arising out of our naturally temporal earthly nature (which therefore includes the incarnate Jesus) and not a moral imperative like repentance and faith stemming from our sin.

* B.F.Westcott wrote : “The words (flesh, spirit) describe the characteristic principles of two orders. They are not related to one another as evil and good; but as the two spheres of being with which man is connected. By the ’spirit’ our complex nature is united to heaven, by the ‘flesh’ to earth” (John, p.50).

** Expressed thus bleakly, this is a point of anthropology which lack of space forbids spelling out. See e.g. Guthrie, New Testament Theology, Leicester, 1981, pp.176f.

References

L.Berkhof, Systematic Theology, London, 1959.

J.Blanchard, Does God Believe in Atheists, Darlington, 2000.

C.Brown, Karl Barth and the Christian Message, London, 1967.

D.Carson, The Gospel According to John, Leicester, 1991.

W.Grudem, Systematic Theology, Leicester, 1994.

C.Hodge, Systematic Theology, Vol. 2, repr. London, 1960.

B.Lindars, The Gospel of John, London, 1981.

E.A.Litton, Introduction to Dogmatic Theology, London, 1960.

L.Morris, The Gospel According to John, Grand Rapids, 1971.

J.Murray, Collected Writings 2, Edinburgh, 1977.

J.Orr, The Progress of Dogma, London, 1897.

R.L.Reymond, A New Systematic Theology of the Christian Faith, Nashville, 1998.

H.Ridderbos, The Gospel of John, Grand Rapids, 1997.

V.Roberts, Life’s Big Questions, Leicester, 2004.

H.W.Robinson, The Christian Doctrine of Man, Edinburgh, 1911.

J.C.Ryle, Holiness, London,

B.B.Warfield, Selected Shorter Writings 1, Nutley, 1970.

J.Wesley, Forty-Four Sermons, London, 1944.

B.F.Westcott, The Gospel of John, repr. London, 1958.

B.F.Westcott, The Epistles of St John, London, 1883.

Many who regard the Bible as the word of God insist that a literal interpretation is paramount and that this is particularly so with respect to the days of creation. While it has to be conceded that we are given no specific information on this subject, various inferences from aspects of the teaching of Scripture point in a different direction. For instance, if it took more than a literal day to prepare a body for the last Adam (cf. Luke 1:26-38; Heb. 10:5) of whom the first was a type (Rom. 5:14), we can safely conclude that it did the same for the first.

Clearly the parallels as well as the differences between the two are of basic importance. For example, it should be noted that both Adams had the same Father (Luke 3:38), but their ‘beginnings’ differed somewhat. While Jesus as the Word of God pre-existed his ‘implantation’ in the womb of Mary, Adam (apart from Eve) pre-existed his implantation in Eden. What are we to make of this this? If it is assumed on the basis of various hints throughout Scripture (e.g. Job 3; Jer. 20:14-18) that Eden was the womb of mankind (the very word ‘Genesis’ points in this direction) and that Adam, apart from Eve, was implanted there (Gen. 2:8,15), we can safely draw the conclusion that Adam was the physical seed of man whose original ‘mother’ was the earth (cf. Ps. 139:15). To express the matter simply, just as David implicitly occupied two wombs, so did Adam. In other words, David clearly saw himself as having recapitulated the experience of Adam.

The notion that Adam was the ‘seed’ of the natural man (cf. 1 Pet. 1:23) would seem to receive support from David’s comment that God saw his eventual ‘frame’ even while his unformed substance was being woven in secret in the depths of the earth (as the seed is in the depths of a man’s body). It might also be added here that it was precisely in the womb of Eden that Eve derived from Adam. If this is a true interpretation of the evidence of Scripture, we shall see at once that the pattern thus established is constantly repeated. Just as God sowed the seed of man in the Garden of Eden, so does man, who is the image and glory of God, sow his seed in his wife’s womb (or garden of delight) to produce children in his image (cf. Gen. 5:1-3). This picture is surely confirmed in Isaiah 45:9f. where man is likened to God in the realm of begetting. (It might usefully be added at this point that in Scripture it is supernatural, not natural, birth that takes place in a day, Isa. 66:7-9).

On the natural level, the second Adam was created in the same image as the first (cf. Gen. 5:1-3). Their spiritual difference was worked out not at birth since both were born knowing neither good nor evil (Gen. 2:17; 3:5,22, cf. Isa. 7:15f.) but in the course of their natural life. In other words, Jesus was a true human being precisely because he derived through his mother ultimately from the first (Luke 3:38). Physically, it is a question of ‘like father like son’. Flesh gives birth to flesh (John 3:6). And since we know so little about the first, we are forced to base our understanding of him on information provided by the second. Once we do this we are led to conclude that just as Jesus, the second Adam, was subject to development over a period of time, certainly longer than a day, so was the first Adam.

Here it is perhaps worth pointing up another parallel. The word Adam means both man, the individual, and mankind, the race, implying that the individual epitomises the race or is the race in miniature. Now it is evident beyond equivocation that mankind as a race is still in the process of development: he has not yet attained to full maturity in either good or evil (cf. Gen. 15:16; Dan. 8:23). Since this is so, it seems inexorably to follow that the individual who epitomises the race must be subject to development too. What is true of the one must be true of the other. Just as the natural or physical man comes to maturity like the first Adam (1 Cor. 15:48a,49a., cf. the physical maturation of Jesus in Luke 2 *), so the spiritual man, who is made in the image of God, is perfected in the image of the second Adam (1 Cor. 15:48b,49b, cf. Rom. 8:29; 2 Cor. 3:18, etc.). With regard to the latter Scripture spells it out even more explicitly, for in Ephesians 4:13-16 (cf. Colossians 2:1-7; Phil. 3:12-15) Paul tells us that we are all together called to attain to the measure of the stature of Christ whose own individual manhood was perfected under the law and in the Spirit (Heb. 2:10; 5:8f., etc.).

The idea of development from seed to maturity is basic to Scripture and relates particularly to the subject of man’s perfection or development from birth to adulthood. First, all readers of the NT can hardly be unaware of the fact that God implants or sows his word in the hearts of his people to initiate the new birth. The parable of the sower is one of the best known of all parables and teaches explicitly that “the sower sows the word” (Mk. 4:14). Other relevant references are James 1:18,21, 1 Peter 1:23 and 1 John 3:9, for example. But the interesting point to note is that God is also said to plant people. Jeremiah is particularly rich in the imagery of planting that implies that just as Adam was taken from the earth and transplanted in the Garden of Eden so Israel was transplanted in the Promised Land, another Eden of a kind characterised by the presence of God, as a choice vine (Jer. 2:21) from Egypt (Ps. 80:8ff., cf. Gen. 49:9-12; Isa. 5:1-7; 27:2-6; Ezek. 15:1-6; 17:1-10; Mt. 21:33-41; John 15:1-8). The prophet makes further use of this imagery in 11:17; 12:2; 24:6; 32:41; 42:10, cf. 17:8; 45:4, which is also employed in Isaiah 40:24, cf. vv.6-8, and 60:21 (cf. Ezek. 16:7 and the allegory of ch. 17).

There are three OT texts of particular relevance, however, and these I want briefly to examine. First, Jeremiah 31:27 tells us that God “will sow the house of Israel and the house of Judah with the seed of man and with the seed of beast”. Here, as elsewhere the implication is that God uses seed in the normal process of procreation to reach his goal of ultimate maturity. This suggests that the likelihood of Adam being created fully mature in body and spirit in one day is virtually zero.

If we are inclined to regard this as less than convincing, it is worth taking a look at Ezekiel 36:9-11, where the picture is more clearly etched. The language of tilling, sowing and multiplying is strongly reminiscent of Genesis (see 1:28; 2:5,15). So it is reasonable to conclude that the process presented by Ezekiel, which clearly involves more than twenty-four hours, is a reflection or recapitulation of what happened at the beginning when the pattern was first established. And it might be added here that the word for ‘man’ (ESV) or ‘men’ (NIV) is Adam (see e.g. Wright, BST The Message of Ezekiel, p.286 n.41).

In Hosea 2:23 God is said to sow him (or her) for himself. Again the image of sowing suggests the process of creation. Thus D.A.Hubbard (TOTC on Hosea, p.90) says that the positive use of the word Jezreel (v.22) implies God’s gift of fertility in his land. He goes on to point out that the Hebrew zr’ describes pregnancy in Numbers 5:28. So once more a lengthy process of more than 24 hours is involved.

The mills of God may grind slowly but they do so nonetheless surely (Isa. 64:4) as he works out his historical plan of salvation from beginning to end (Isa. 46:10f.). In light of this and apart from other difficulties it causes, I suggest that the notion of creation in six twenty-four hour days is alien to the entire Bible. Only a dogmatic stand on a literal interpretation that runs counter to all the biblical evidence at our disposal can possibly appear to justify it.

* See B.B.Warfield’s essay on The Human Development in Selected Shorter Writings, ed. Meeter, Nutley, 1970, p. 158ff.

Romans 8:12-25		2 Corinthians 4:7-5:10
Creation or creature (vv.19f.)		Body (creation in miniature)(4:7,11,16)
Glory (vv.17f.,24f.)		Glory (4:17-5:1,4)
Futility and bondage to decay (vv.20f.)		Futility (4:7-10) and bondage to decay (4:11,16)
Suffering (v.17)		Affliction (4:17)
Groaning (vv.22f.)(Note the groaning (LXX stenazo) of Ex.2: 24; 6:5; Judges 2:18)		Groaning (5:2,4)
Adoption as sons (vv.14-17, 19,21,23)		Adoption (implied:4:14,17,cf.3:18; 4:6)
Destruction implied (vv.20f.), cf.1 Thes.5:3		Destruction (5:1)
Redemption (vv.17,21,23)		Redemption (4:14; 5:1)
Hope in the unseen (vv.20,24f.)		Hope (implied: 4:18; 5:5). Cf. faith in the unseen: 5:7, cf. Heb.11:1
Expectancy (vv.19f.,23ff.)		Expectancy (4:18; 5:2,4,9)
Confidence (8:15f.)		Confidence (5:6-8)
Eternity in heaven (vv.17,21, cf.24f.)		Eternity in heaven (4:17; 5:1, cf. 5:8
Holy Spirit the guarantee (vv.16,23)		Holy Spirit the guarantee (5:5)
Plan and purpose of God (v.20)		Plan and purpose of God (5:5)
Patience in waiting (v.25)		Patience (4:18; 5:6-9)

What is striking about both of these passages is the lack of explicit reference to sin unless we regard Romans 8:13 and 2 Corinthians 5:10 as such. This being the case, it is reasonable to suppose that Paul, like the author of Hebrews (1:10-12), is concerned with nature or creation irrespective of sin. Nonetheless, to be in this creation, in the physical body (2 Cor.5:6,8f.), is to be separate from the Lord (Rom.8:24f., cf. vv.35,38f.). And since creation is given over to futility, decay and ultimate destruction, to love this world or this age (Rom. 12:2; 2 Tim. 4:10) is to sell an eternal spiritual heritage (Rom. 8:18; 2 Cor. 4:17) for a temporal mess of pottage (1 Cor. 7:31; 2 Cor. 4:18; 1 John 2:15-17).

For an OT version of the above note Pss. 102:25-28 and 103:14-18.

All attentive readers of the Bible can hardly fail to become aware that restoration (along with, for example, recapitulation, Gen. 5:1-3, repetition, cf. Heb.10:1-4, etc., reproduction, Gen. 19:31; Heb. 7:23, and death, Jos.23:14; 1 K. 2:2 and corruption, Ps. 102:25-27; 103:14-18) is one of the fundamental features of the OT. A glance at “restore” in a concordance will confirm this impression even though there is an easily explained overlap of the concept in the NT. The difference between the two prompts the question as to why this is so. The answer really requires a book or books explaining among other things biblical covenant theology. I have argued for many years that all traditional covenant theologies known to me are false to the Bible. In summary, I contend that while there is definitely no covenant with the material creation, there are three dispensational covenants (Noah, Moses, Christ) and two basic promises (Abraham and David). The covenants with Noah and Moses are by nature temporal and provisional and relate to this world or the present age; only that with Christ is permanent or eternal and relates to the age to come. The covenants with the race are epitomized or summed up in the mature individual, that is, in Jesus, the second Adam (see espec. Gal. 4:4f.; Eph. 1:10).

My purpose here is to provide basic notes (which are obviously open to elaboration and supplementation) indicating that while restoration, repetition and reproduction are of the essence of the Old Testament, removal and replacement are in contrast prime features of the New. In other words, the difference between earth and heaven and flesh and spirit is fundamental, and the progress from the one to the other is implied throughout the Bible (1 Cor. 15:46; Heb. 11:10,16; 13:14, etc.).

Old Testament – New Testament

1. The temporal corruptible creation, God’s footstool, is replaced by heaven, God’s eternal throne
(Gen. 1:1; Isa. 57:15; 66:1; Rom. 8:18-25; Heb. 1:10-12; 12:27).

2. The temporary earthly Eden, the womb of the race where God is present and active (cf. Job 31:15), is replaced by the permanent heavenly Eden, the ‘bosom’ of the Father
(Gen. 2-3; John 1:18; Rev. 21-22).

3. Earthly seed in creation/procreation is replaced by spiritual seed in the NT
(Gen. 2:7f.; 1 Pet. 1:23; 1 John 3:9).

4. The Noachian covenant, though guaranteeing constant earthly restoration, is “everlasting” only in a this-worldly sense, that is, until God’s purpose is fulfilled when it will be replaced by the permanence of heaven, the throne of God
(Gen. 8:21f.; 9:16; Isa. 40:6-8; 51:6; 54:9f.; Jer. 31:35-37; 33:20-22; Heb. 1:10-12).

5. The temporal earth, though “good” in that it serves God’s purpose (cf. Gen. 2:9; 3:6), is eventually destroyed and replaced
(Gen. 1:31; 1 Tim. 4:3f.; Heb. 6:7f. ; 2 Pet. 3:7.10-13).

6. The present (evil, Gal. 1:4) age is replaced by the age to come which already exists
(Luke 20:34-36; Eph. 1:21; Heb. 6:5; 12:27).

7. The land (or city), though capable of temporary restoration (e.g. after exile), lacks permanence and is replaced by heavenly land and the abiding city
(2 Chron. 7:14; Ezek. 36:33-36; Heb. 11:10,16; 13:14).

8. The temporal Promised Land cannot provide a permanent rest and is replaced by heavenly rest
(Heb. 3 and 4; Rev. 14:13).

9. The fleshly first Adam being earthy lacks permanence and is replaced by the second Adam, the man of heaven
(1 Cor. 15:45-49).

10. The fleshly body, though capable of temporary healing and restoration, is like the earth destroyed and replaced by a spiritual body
(Gen. 2:7; 1 K. 13:6; 1 Cor. 15:35-56; 2 Cor. 5:1f.).

11. Since flesh and blood cannot enter the kingdom of heaven, fleshly generation must of necessity lead to spiritual regeneration
(John 1:12f.; 3:1-8; 1 Cor. 15:50).

12. Life in the flesh is absence from the Lord; life in the spiritual body is home with the Lord
(2 Cor. 5:1-8, cf. John 14:2f.).

13 Resurrection of the body in this world always involves temporary restoration. For entrance into the next, it requires redemption and/or replacement
(2 K. 4:18ff.; John 11; 20:17; Rom. 8:23; 1 Cor. 15:42-57).

14. Just as physical birth requires spiritual rebirth, physical restoration, which is by nature impermanent, requires spiritual replacement
(1 K. 13:6; 2 Chr.24:13; John 3:1-8; 1 Cor. 15:45-49).

15. What is “hand-made” (e.g. the material creation, Isa. 45:12; 48:13, including man, Job 10:8; Ps. 119:73) is replaced by what is “not hand-made” (Heb. 9:11,24, etc.).

16. Physical circumcision (cheiropoietos) in the OT is replaced by spiritual circumcision (acheiropoietos) in the NT
(Gal. 5:2; Col. 2:11).

17. The old covenant can be renewed and even restored but in the fullness of time it is fulfilled by Jesus and replaced by the new covenant
(Ex. 19; Dt. 5; Jos. 1, 8,24; 2 Chron. 15:3; 17:9; Jer. 31:31-34: Mt. 5-7; 2 Cor. 3; Heb. 7-8).

18. The provisional law of Moses in the OT gives way to the Spirit of Christ in the NT
(John 1:17; Rom. 7-8, cf. Dt. 18:18; John 7:39).

19. The tabernacle or tent gives way to the material temple. When it was destroyed by the Babylonians it was rebuilt or restored (cf. 2 Chr. 24:13). However, after its destruction by the Romans, it was replaced by Christ himself
( John 2:19-21, cf. Mark 14:58; Rev. 21:22).

20. Redemption “by hand” (cheiropoietos) in the OT gives way to redemption which is “not by hand” (acheiropoietos) in the NT
(Dt. 4:34; Eph. 1:7; Col. 1:14).

21. The kingdom of the Jews is destroyed and replaced by the kingdom of Christ
(Ex. 19:5f.; Mt. 8:11f.; 21:43; 1 Pet. 2:9).

22. Like the earth itself, the old Jerusalem is destroyed and replaced by the heavenly Jerusalem
(Gal. 4:26; Heb. 12:22; Rev. 21:1f.).

23. Earthly citizenship is replaced by heavenly citizenship
(Phil. 3:20; Heb. 12:22).

24. David’s earthly throne gives way to his heavenly throne
(Luke 1:32f.; Acts 2:30-36).

25. Baptism by water signifying repentance is replaced by baptism of the Spirit
(Mark 1:8).

26. Distance and/or nearness in the OT give way to presence in the NT
(Eph. 2).

27. The image of God in which we are created is matched with likeness in Christ at the end
(Gen. 1:26f.; Rom. 8:29; 2 Cor. 3:18).

28. Imperfection or immaturity in the OT gives way to perfection in the NT
(1 Cor. 13:10-13; Heb. 1:3f.).

29. The earthen pot which belongs to this world is destroyed, but its treasure is saved
(2 Cor. 4:7; Mt. 6:19f.; 1 Pet. 1:3f.).

30. Earthly suffering and bondage to corruption ultimately give way to the permanent glory of heaven
(John 16:21f.; Rom. 8:18-25; Rev. 21:4).

31. Death, corruption and sin in this age are replaced by life, holiness and incorruption in the age to come (John 11:25f.; 2 Tim. 1:10).

32. Temporary salvation in this world is replaced by eternal salvation in heaven in the presence of God (Judges; Rev. 21,22).

33. The temporal inheritance of land and all it implies in the OT becomes a heavenly eternal inheritance in the NT
(Rom. 8:32; Heb. 9:15; 11:8-16).

34. The temporary perennially repeated sacrifices of the OT are fulfilled in the once-for-all sacrifice of Christ
(Heb. 10:14, etc.).

35. The temporal covenants of the OT are replaced by the eternal covenant of Christ (Heb. (13:20).

Concluding comment

It scarcely needs to be added that if the material creation including the flesh (cf. Gal.6:8) lacks a permanent covenantal guarantee (or is a closed naturalistic system), it is inevitably futile
(Ecclesiastes; Rom. 8:18-25; 1 Cor. 15:12-19; 2 Tim. 1:10).

The background

Augustine of Hippo who died in 430 A.D. maintained that the new birth was the cure or antidote for original sin:
He said that God sent his Son “so that those who believe in Christ might be absolved by the washing of regeneration from the guilt of all their sins – both the original sin they have inherited by birth, to counter which, in particular, rebirth was instituted ….” (Needham, The Triumph of Grace, p.251, cf. pp.59,121,286, 293, etc.).

Augustine also taught that the flesh is sinful (e.g. pp.123,149, etc.) and that all those born as a result of carnal lust or concupiscence are therefore evil (pp.121f.). In contrast, though Jesus was truly flesh he had no human father, but, born of the Virgin Mary, he was innocent (pp.122,127,132, etc.).

The Reformers inherited the ideas of Augustine and accepted his notion of original sin. Thus they and their successors regarded the flesh referred to in John 3:6 as evil (see e.g. Hodge, ST, 2, p.242). They argued that all those born flesh by natural birth are evil and on that account need to be born again.

Now clearly if all this is true, Jesus, who was not born as a result of carnal desire in the normal course of nature, was not subject to original sin and in fact never sinned throughout his earthly life, did NOT need to be born again.

In more recent times, however, scholars have concluded that John 3:6 is not referring to sin at all but to the contrast between the earthly (perishable) and the heavenly side of us (see e.g. Leon Morris, John, p.219 and notes).

If this is true, the picture changes. For Paul tells us in 1 Cor. 15:50 that flesh and blood, that is the earthly or natural side of our nature sinful or not, cannot inherit the kingdom of God. The implication is that he is simply endorsing in a different context and in different words the teaching of Jesus in John 3:1-6.

Now since Jesus was clearly human, that is, flesh and blood, and a true child of Adam (Luke 3:38) as a result of his incarnation and even died in the flesh (1 Pet. 3:18), he also needed to be born again. And this is surely the implication of the teaching of Matthew 3:13-17. Why then was Jesus baptized?

In the NT, baptism signifies repentance (John the Baptist), faith and the spiritual new birth. Now clearly, as John the B. recognized, Jesus, not being a sinner, did not need his baptism of repentance (Mt. 3:14). What he (cf. Nicodemus) did not recognize, however, was that as flesh and blood Jesus did need the outpouring of the Spirit to enable him to fulfil all righteousness, to be perfected in the image of God (cf. Mt. 5:48; 19:21) and to complete his mission here on earth which included dying for our sins. It was therefore as one who had fulfilled the law that he was granted eternal life (or new birth) in accordance with the OT promise (Gen. 2:17; Lev. 18:5; Dt. 32:47; Ezek. 20:11,13,21, etc.). He thus experienced the blessing of the Spirit without measure (John 3:34) as the acknowledged Son of God (Mt. 3:17).

In John 3:1-8 Jesus tells us that all those who are flesh, that is all human beings born of woman, must of necessity be born from above. Now if Jesus himself was flesh, a true human being born of woman (cf. Gal. 4:4), then inevitably he needed to be born again (from above) in preparation for his entry into the kingdom of God. To deny this is to lapse back into an old heresy of the church called docetism which denies that Jesus was truly man. Little wonder that John in particular warns his readers to acknowledge that Jesus has come in the flesh (1 John 4:1-3; 2 John 7).

There are various other arguments that can be used to support the notion that Jesus was born again. One relates to what Jesus says of John the B. in Matt. 11:11. There he tells us that John was the greatest born of women. Now in view of the fact that John himself recognized that Jesus himself was greater than he was (Mt. 3:11), Jesus must have meant that John was the greatest MERELY born of woman. The implication of this is that Jesus himself was not only born of woman but was also born of the Spirit.

Another simple argument can be based on Galatians 4:1ff. where Paul contends that even a son when he is a minor experiences first slavery, then servanthood and finally mature sonship. While it may be true that Jesus was never enslaved to the “elementary principles of the world” (ESV) he was certainly in the house of bondage, Egypt (Mt. 2:14f.), then under the law (Lu. 2:41ff.) and was finally acknowledged as God’s own Son (Mt. 3:17). Since Christians strongly maintain that men and women are not sons of God by nature, they are bound to conclude that spiritual sonship can only occur by means of adoption and the new birth. On the other hand, to argue that Jesus was God’s son by nature is to miss the point, as I shall now endeavour to show.

In Mt. 3:17 when Jesus is baptized with the Spirit, God says he is well pleased with him. Why? The only possible answer is that Jesus, as man and a true Jew, has kept the law of Moses to perfection and thus proved himself to be a true son, in fact, the one and only Son. With him function matched ontology. According to Lev. 18:5 (cf. Gen. 2:17, etc.) keeping the law was the means of attaining life, but no one in the OT succeeded in this (1 K. 8:46; Ps. 130:3; 143:2, cf. Gal. 3:3,5). In contrast, Jesus did, and so he was baptized at the time set by the father, which signified the end of his stint under the law (cf. Gal. 4:2). This surely demonstrated his acceptance and status as God’s Son. If no one else realized this, the devil certainly did. Hence his all-out attempt to undermine him by means of temptation (Mt. 4:1-11).

Many other arguments could be used. For example, John 3:3,5,6,7 all make it plain that the new birth is a NATURAL necessity which brings man to the maturity God has planned from the beginning. If the need to be born again arose merely from sin, Jesus would surely have used an imperative as he did when he urged people to repent (Mark 1:15; Luke 13:3,5).

To sum up, traditional theology failed to recognize that revelation is progressive. Thus our forebears understood Scripture, and man likewise, as a flat uniformity. Development and hence diminished responsibility is basic to man (see e.g. 1 Cor. 13:11, etc.), and God
made provision for this. A true covenant theology, which is also dispensational, as even Calvin recognized (Inst. 2:11:13), makes this plain.

Why Was Jesus Baptised?

Over the years various answers have been given to this question but none to my knowledge has proved convincing.

Matthew 3:13-17 and Acts 2:1ff.; 10:44-48

Anyone coming to the NT for the first time who compared Matthew 3:16-17 with Acts 2 and 10 might reasonably conclude that the picture is basically the same and that baptism points to or signifies rebirth.

Difficulties and background

Traditionally the idea that Jesus was subject to the new birth has been regarded as anathema. Why?

John the Baptist

First, it is asserted six times in the NT that John the Baptist baptized with water while Jesus baptized with the Holy Spirit. Furthermore, it is explicitly stated that John’s baptism was a baptism of repentance (Mark 1:4). Even John himself was reluctant to baptize Jesus since he apparently recognized (a) that Jesus had no sins to repent of, and (b) that he himself needed Jesus’ baptism of the Spirit (Mt. 3:14). For all that Jesus tells him to proceed, and as a result of his action God pours out his Spirit on his beloved Son with whom he is well pleased.

Augustine of Hippo

Next, in the fifth and subsequent centuries Augustine of Hippo (d.430 A.D.) had an enormous influence on the church in the West. Though his mother Monica was a Christian, he had a pagan education and, early in his career, he embraced Manicheism which taught that matter, including the flesh, was evil. Though he later claimed to have renounced Manicheism when he became a Christian, Augustine nevertheless went on to assert that all those who were born naturally, that is, as a result of what he called ‘carnal lust’ or ‘concupiscence’ inherited Adam’s sin and were hence evil. As the offspring of the Virgin Mary, Jesus, though truly flesh, was innocent.

The Church and John 3

As a consequence of these views the conclusion drawn by the church from Jesus’ discussion with Nicodemus in John 3 was that the new birth was the antidote of original sin (see e.g. Needham, p.251, etc.). In other words, since our first natural or fleshly birth involves sin, we need to be born again. Indeed, since baptism normally signifies new birth, Augustine went so far as to teach that all babies who remained unbaptised went to hell. Thus his dogmas of infant baptism and baptismal regeneration haunt the church to this day.

(My wife is a twin. Her sister died when she was 10 days old. Her mother was not a Christian but such was the superstition of the time that she had her dying daughter baptized.)

Catholics, Protestants and Original Sin

Though today even Catholics may try to soften aspects of Augustine’s teaching, the fact remains that many, including Protestants, still believe in original sin and that the new birth is a dire necessity to counter it.

The Twentieth Century

To my knowledge, since 1880 at least when Bishop Westcott’s commentary was published, scholarly understanding of John 3 has changed. While it is true that Paul sometimes uses the term ‘flesh’ to imply sin, it is almost universally held that John does not (see e.g. L.L.Morris, John, p.219 and notes). This being so, it is recognized that what Jesus is doing in John 3:6 is contrasting our earthly or physical (natural) side with the spiritual heavenly side. Thus, since we are fitted to live on the earth by deriving from the earth, so we must be fitted for heaven by deriving from heaven. In other words, we must undergo a spiritual birth by being born from above (cf. Gal. 4:26) in preparation for eternal life in the presence of God (cf. John 1:12f.). In conformity with this, in 1 Corinthians 15:50 Paul tells us plainly that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God.

The Consequence of the Modern Understanding

If we assume that the modern understanding of John 3 is correct and that the flesh in itself is not evil, then it has logical consequences, one in particular, that theologians for various reasons* seem reluctant to make especially with regard to 3:6.** What Jesus actually says is “That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit” (ESV). But if Jesus himself was flesh, then he himself had to be born again. To deny this is to deny that he was incarnate, that is, flesh, which the NT, John in particular (1 John 4:1-3; 2 John 7) regards as a basic essential of the gospel.

Conclusion

I conclude then that when Jesus was baptized and God poured out his Spirit on him and publicly acknowledged him as his Son, Jesus, whom the author of Hebrews calls the pioneer and perfecter of our faith (Heb. 12:2 RSV), was born again. Like God (Dt. 1:30) and Joshua (Dt. 31:3) in the OT, Jesus went before us and blazed the trail of the regenerate life, as Hebrews especially makes plain (cf. Mt. 19:21).

So what is called for in these days is a paradigm shift in our understanding of Jesus. The docetic Jesus of traditional ecclesiastical dogma must give way to the truly human or incarnate Jesus of the Scriptures (see espec. Heb. 2).

A simple syllogism:

Major premise: All who are born of the flesh need to be born again (John 3:3,5,6,7).

Minor premise: Jesus was born of the flesh (Luke 1:42; Gal. 4:4).

Conclusion: Therefore Jesus must have been born again.

Finally, what needs to be understood is that just as Jesus’ righteousness is the foundation of our righteousness (justification by faith, Phil. 3:9), so Jesus’ regeneration is the foundation of ours (Gal. 4:5-7, cf. John 3:16,36; 1 John 2:23-25; 5:11f.). Apart from it, we could never hope to be born again and together with him become the children and heirs of God (Rom. 8:15-17, cf. Gal. 4:1-7).

*Some perhaps simply don’t see the implication. I fancy, however, that creeds, confessions, church tradition, church affiliation, pride, prejudice, money and fear of reactionary fundamentalist traditionalists also play a large part.

** Berkhof (Systematic Theology, p.472) maintains that Jesus statement in John 3:3 “is absolute and leaves no room for exceptions”. The same is surely even more obviously true of John 3:6.

The so-called Christian worldview seems to be derived more from Augustine than the Bible.

Though there is much more to say, I would make the following points:

1. Death is implicit in Genesis 1:1. In contrast with the eternal Creator, the temporal creation has a beginning and therefore an end (Rom. 1:23, Heb. 7:3, cf. 1:10-12, etc.). So for the creature who stems from the earth and follows its pattern as creation in miniature, there is inevitably a time to be born and a time to die (Eccl. 3:2, cf. vv.18f.).

2. The word “good” in Genesis 1 means “suited to its purpose” (Eccl. 3:11, NRSV, REB, NASB, of being inhabited, Isa. 45:12,18, of being under the dominion of man, Gen. 1:26,28, Ps. 8:5f.; Heb. 2:8f., and hence of bringing many sons to glory, Heb. 2:10ff.; Rom. 2:7, cf. Rom. 8:18-25). Thus Eve’s “apple” was “good” (Gen. 3:6, cf. 2:9; 1 Cor. 10:26; 1 Tim. 4:3f.). Having served their purpose created things will eventually wear out, reach their use-by date (Lu. 12:33; Col. 2:22; Heb. 1:11) and be removed (Heb. 12:27; 2 Pet. 1:14; 3:7,10-12; Rev. 20:11; 21:1,4, etc.).

3. Food (Gen. 1:29) implies death (note especially Ps. 104:14,21, cf. Job 4:11; Ps. 147:9; John 6:27, etc.) as does procreation/reproduction (1:11f., cf. Heb. 7:23). There is no marriage in heaven or the age to come, because there is no death (Lu. 20:34-36). Grass is a symbol of death throughout the Bible (Jas. 1:10f. etc.), and all flesh is grass (Isa. 40:6-8; 1 Pet. 23-25). Man cannot live on bread alone (Mt. 4:4).

4. Death, like reproduction (Gen. 19:31), is “the way of all the earth” (Jos. 23:14; 1 K 2:2).

5. Adam derived from a temporal earth and was hence created mortal flesh (Gen. 6:3; Rom. 1:23; 2 Cor. 4:11, etc.). As one who was also made in the image of God, he was promised eternal life (that is, escape from mortality or “bondage to corruption”) if he kept the commandment (Gen. 2:17, cf. Ps. 8:5f.). He didn’t, and as a consequence lapsed into the dust (Gen. 3:19, cf. Ps. 104:29; 146:4). Even Jesus as man was mortal. He underwent a normal human development (Lu. 2:41ff.) and at just over thirty looked as if he was approaching fifty (John 8:57, cf. 2 Cor. 4:16)! If he had remained on the earth he would have died, but in contrast with the first Adam he kept the commandment, the whole law in fact, and inherited life in accordance with the promise (Gen. 2:17; Lev. 18:5; Mt. 19:17, etc.). Though he gave his mortal flesh for us (1 Pet. 3:18), he rose again from the dead and ascended transformed into heaven where he ever lives to make intercession for us.

6. Romans 8:18-25, like John 3:1-7 and 1 Corinthians 15:45-50, does not mention sin and should be correlated with Genesis 1, not 3 as tradition has it.

7. According to Paul, everything in this naturally corruptible world is futile (cf. Rom. 8:18-25) if Christ has not been raised (1 Cor. 15:14,17). He and he alone conquered the world (John 16:33, cf. Rom. 8:31-39; Heb. 2:5-9) and brought life and immortality (incorruption) to light for the first and only time in all history (2 Tim. 1:10). Apart from him, no fleshly sinner can be justified (Rom. 3:20; 1 Cor. 1:29; Gal. 2:16; 3:10f.; Eph. 2:9) and so inherit life (Rom. 5:21, cf. Heb. 2:9).

Though most Christians seem to have recognized that the last enemy in this age is death, they have failed to recognize that it was also the first. Though Adam was promised life, death threatened him from the start (Gen. 2:17). As implied above he was created corruptible. Even Jesus in the flesh grew older (Luke 2:42ff.; John 8:57). But since he kept the commandments promising life he escaped though he freely laid down his life for his sheep (John 10:17f.; 1 Pet. 3:18). Paul was all too aware that as soon as knowledge of the law (or commandment) was attained in childhood, it spelt death (Rom. 7:9f.). Indeed, the essence of its ministry was death (2 Cor. 3) not life (Gal. 3:21) though it promised it (Rom. 7:9f.). We might add that since salvation was planned in eternity suffering and death were necessarily involved (cf. e.g. Rev. 13:8)*, but “this slight momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory” (2 Cor. 4:17, cf. Rom. 8:18,24,25).

I leave the reader to ponder the implications of these points.

* In the words of J.D.G.Dunn, “Paul, of course, does not intend to charge God with defective foresight” (Romans 1, 384).

During the fifties when I first began to take a serious interest in the Christian faith, no doctrine of what was considered an errant Bible was more vigorously attacked and ridiculed than the virgin birth, or, better, the virginal conception, of Jesus. While I was always intuitively convinced that Scripture constituted the word of God, it was not until later, especially when I read J.I. Packer’s “’Fundamentalism’ and the Word of God” and J. Wenham’s “Our Lord’s View of the Old Testament”, that I would have accepted Jesus’ unusual conception simply because Scripture taught it (cf. Machen, who stresses the importance of the authority of the Bible, p.382). Even though logic points unerringly to the truth enshrined in the virginal conception, it is doubtless worth spending time looking at the biblical evidence for it.

First, there can be no doubt at all that Matthew taught it. He makes it plain that Mary was pregnant “before they came together” and as a result of the work of the Holy Spirit (1:18). Matthew then depicts Joseph as implicitly requiring an explanation for his betrothed’s condition and having his fears allayed in a dream. Next Matthew ventures to support his belief in Jesus’ extraordinary origin with an appeal to the Old Testament prophecy of Isaiah 7:14. It is hardly surprising that the meaning of this verse has been vigorously attacked, but not very convincingly. The contention that (a) the OT has simply a young woman in view, and (b) that she was a contemporary of Isaiah’s scarcely undermines the traditional view. The point Isaiah was making was that the child would be ‘a sign’, and to Matthew the Immanuel (‘God with us’) figure apparently suggested an assimilation of Yahweh and Christ. Furthermore, the larger context in Isaiah indicated the presence of the supernatural (cf. 9:2-7). So far as Joseph was concerned, his ready submission to his dream parallels Mary’s own reaction in Luke 1:38. And Matthew then adds for good measure that Joseph did not ‘know’ his wife until she had given birth which suggests that he had been given specific information on the subject.

If Matthew had been on his own, there would be more room for questioning his teaching, but Luke is equally unequivocal in his commitment to Jesus’ virginal conception (1:27,31,34f; 2:5,21). So far as he is concerned, the fact that he was a doctor by profession carries weight even if we allow for the fact that his training and knowledge would fall far short of that of modern specialists. Luke’s insistence on the meticulous nature of his research (1:1-4) also inspires confidence as does the fact that, as a Gentile, he would not be accused as might Matthew of artificially exploiting Isaiah 7:14 to support the virgin birth. On the other hand, if he is in error regarding Jesus’ birth about which he is so specific, our trust in him on other matters is seriously jeopardised.

The miraculous character of the birth of Jesus as well as that of John the Baptist is underscored by Luke’s rather detailed recording of the respective visions of Elizabeth and Mary. The very least that can be said about these is that they make a definite point, and unless this point is taken the narratives become superfluous. (Cf. Machen who says that the reason for the rise of the strange belief of the virgin birth was fact, p.269). Luke further underlines the supernatural nature of the birth of Jesus by recording the words of Gabriel to the effect that with God nothing is impossible (1:37). It is these words which produce an attitude of total submission in Mary, as noted above.

The inference is frequently drawn that since Mark and John make no mention of the miraculous nature of Jesus’ conception (though the point made in John 8:41 is suggestive), the doctrine is false. This is a very weak position to take, and like all arguments from silence it needs to be treated with great caution. No writer can be expected to reproduce every detail every time he writes. In any case, the point at issue may be outside his immediate perspective since other matters dominate his horizon (cf. John 21:24f.). Furthermore, on the assumption that he knows his readership, he is at liberty to take certain matters, which are common knowledge, as read. Having said this, it is important not to ignore John’s emphasis on the identity of Jesus especially at the beginning of his gospel. Having asserted his unity with the Father in chapter 1:1-4 John insists in verse 14 not only on the Word becoming flesh but on his glory as the only Son of the Father. While it must be conceded that this is not tantamount to a confession of the ‘virgin birth’, like verse 18 it is certainly in harmony with one. To put the matter otherwise, if the Word of God really did become flesh, a supernatural conception can hardly be cause for surprise. Furthermore, if God intended to save his people (Isa. 45:21-25) by a man (Jer. 30:9,21; Hos. 3:5; Ezek. 34:23f.; 37:24f.; Heb. 2:10-18), then the notion of the incarnate Word makes good sense.

In Galatians 4:4 Paul tells us that Jesus was ‘born of woman’ but it is doubtful whether this in itself has any significance. The same phrase is used by Job, for instance, but all he apparently means by it is ‘genuinely human’, that is, ‘flesh and blood’ (Job 15:14; 25:4). The plain fact is that Paul nowhere alludes directly to Jesus’ birth of a virgin.*

It is here, however, that some writers speculate about the possibility of parthenogenesis, the asexual reproduction of an embryo without male fertilisation. It is difficult to see the point of this conjecture unless the intention is to deny the supernatural. In any case, to speculate along these lines is in effect to undermine the authority of Scripture and to set us adrift on a sea of subjectivism. As we shall see further below, while it may be true that parthenogenesis does occur as a natural phenomenon in certain types of lizards and other creatures, for example, it cannot be true of Jesus. In his case the Y chromosome was necessary for his genuine manhood. If I understood correctly the segment ‘Why Sex’ in a recent American TV production ‘Evolution’, he would otherwise have been a clone, and hence a girl!

Before taking a second look at Paul’s teaching, it is worthwhile asking why the virgin birth appears in Scripture at all, especially since many deny its necessity (see e.g. Green, pp.63f.**). Is it enough to suggest that it merely points to and undergirds the incarnation? Historically this has certainly not been the case. Both Roman Catholics and Protestants have traditionally argued that it obviates the entail of original sin (see e.g. Litton, pp.190ff.; Machen, p.395). Catholics, however, have found it necessary to take this a step further and ‘sanctify’ Mary’s own birth and attribute to it the rather grandiose title of ‘the Immaculate Conception’. The problem with this is not simply that even Mary, the mother of Elizabeth’s Lord (Luke 1:43), refers to God as her Saviour but that it logically requires infinite regress. When the perpetual virginity of Mary is also advocated, it is difficult not to believe that the bounds of probability have been crossed (cf. Mark 3:32f.). For all that, Augustine went so far as to inveigh against all who are born of ‘carnal lust’ as if it, in itself, were sinful (see Needham, pp.46,122,127,142, etc.).

There can be little doubt that historically the primary reason given for the ‘virgin birth’ has been original sin. If it is true that sin can be transmitted (or imputed) from parent to child, then had Jesus’ birth been normal, he would have been born sinful. It must be doubted, however, in view of Scripture’s teaching in general, whether the dogma in question is admissible. The plain fact is that it is riddled with problems on the one hand and in patent contradiction of a great deal of biblical teaching on the other. Apart from noting that sons cannot be punished for the sins of their parents (Dt.24:16; 2 K. 14:6; Job 21:19-21; Jer. 31:29f.; Ezek.18, etc.) and that, assuming the falsity of the immaculate conception, Mary would have passed on her sin to Jesus if they can, we are forced to conclude that original sin is as much a delusion as original righteousness. The two dogmas stand or fall together and neither can be justified on biblical grounds. So, since I have written a great deal on this subject elsewhere, I take the liberty of dismissing it as a credible reason for the virgin birth to which it is nowhere related in the Bible. In doing this, however, I find myself saddled with the burden of finding the true explanation. In the event, it poses no great problem. Once it is recognised that Augustine, whose influence on the Western church was enormous, has been the source of so much misunderstanding, it is not difficult to see the answer.

In his dispute with Pelagius, Augustine was unquestionably correct to assert the indispensability of divine grace as opposed to human works in salvation. Regrettably, however, as Article IX of the C of E indicates, he failed to appreciate the essential correctness of Pelagius’ insistence on imitation. This was excusable to a point since (a) he operated with a poor Latin translation of Romans 5:12ff., and (b) apparently assumed that imitation necessitated personal knowledge of Adam’s existence (Needham, p.50). Clearly ‘repetition’ would have been a better word for Pelagius to use and, given that the Bible has a very great deal to say about the repetition of sins (e.g. Acts 7:51), it would have been much more appropriate. Despite this Augustine, not to mention his followers down to our own day, while admitting the notion of ‘corporate personality’, ought to have had a greater appreciation of the difference between community and individual and/or solidarity and separation in biblical history. It is this that brings us to the crux of the matter. As a human being Jesus was at once the same but different from the rest of us. As a genuine son of Adam (Luke 3:38) he was, according to the author of Hebrews, in every respect tempted as we are, yet without sinning (4:15). In the words of Peter, he committed no sin (1 Pet. 2:22) and hence never became the slave of sin (John 8:34). This surely indicates, first, that he was not subject to original sin, which can only suggest that it never existed, and, secondly, that he kept the law apart from which there is no sin (Rom. 4:15; 7:8, etc.). But it does something more. It points to the real reason for the virgin birth.

This brings us back to Paul. I mentioned above that Paul makes no direct reference to the virgin birth. The question is, however, did he believe it? The mere fact that Luke was his companion on some of his missionary journeys would strongly suggest that they were agreed on the matter. We can go further. For those with the eyes to see, Paul gives us indirect evidence for the virginal conception, which is surely incontrovertible, for it is he who portrays Jesus as the second Adam (1 Cor. 15:21f.; 45-49, cf. Rom.5:14). If it is asked how Jesus could be a second Adam there can be only two possible answers. First, in light of the first Adam’s failure, he would have had to expunge history, wipe the slate clean, start again de novo and re-enact without sin the life of Adam as the progenitor of the race or, secondly, to recapitulate it as his son. Since, as we have noted above, he was indeed Adam’s son (Luke 3:38) who entered history in full flight, the latter is clearly our answer. But if this is so, certain facts become undeniable. The most obvious one is that the Augustinian dogma of original sin, which has hidden recapitulation from sight and virtually banished it from the vocabulary of theology (most dictionaries contain no reference to it!), is false. This is further borne out by Gregory Nazianzen’s dictum that what is not assumed is not healed (cf. Heb. 2). In other words, to atone for original sin Jesus would have had to assume it as a baby. And while this would have made him like his brothers, it would have disqualified him from acting as Saviour from the start (Heb. 2:11,14f.). On the other hand, if the virgin birth made him free of sin, he would have been different from the rest of humanity by nature. So clearly the virgin birth refers to something other than original sin.

Observant readers of Scripture will have noticed that just as Adam began life in innocence (he knew neither good nor evil since he had no knowledge of law apart from which neither sin nor righteousness are possible), so do all children (Dt.1:39; Isa. 7:15f.). But we can go further. Just as Adam was taught the law by his heavenly Parent (Gen. 2:17), so all children, especially Jewish children, are taught by theirs (Dt. 4:9; 6:4ff.; Ps. 78:5-8). (It is perhaps helpful here to remember that Adam refers to both the individual and the race.) And it follows from this as surely as night follows day that just as Eve first, then Adam broke the law, so do all their children (1 Kings 8:46; Ps.130:3; Eccl. 7:29; Ezek. 28:15; Rom. 3:23), not simply because they are made in their image (Gen.5:1-3) and naturally follow their pattern of behaviour but because they are conditioned by their bad example and have to contend with the added impact of their sin (cf. Ex. 20:5f.; 34:6f., Num. 14:18; Rom. 5:12ff., etc.). Yet while community solidarity is a truism in Scripture, so is the possibility of individual separation (e.g. Gen. 12:1; Ps. 78:8; Ezek. 20:18; Zech. 1:4, cf. Lev. 20:24-26). This being the case, the way was clear for Jesus, the stronger than the strong man, to triumph where all others suffered defeat. It should be noted, however, that if original sin was true, Jesus as a son of Adam would have been necessarily caught in the net and disqualified from the outset.

My conclusion then is that Paul must have held to the doctrine of the virginal conception of Jesus. Since the first Adam was the son of God (Luke 3:38, cf. Gen.5:1) who stemmed from the earth, so Jesus also was the Son of God who, though the man from heaven (cf. John 3:31; 6:62, etc.), as incarnate stemmed from the earth via Adam and Eve, Abraham and David (cf. Ps. 139:13-16), whose root and shoot he was (Rev. 22:16), through his mother (cf. Mt.1:1; Rom. 1:3; 9:5). Thus Jesus became the second Adam and in this way, since he epitomised the race (cf. Eph. 1:10), he was able to recapitulate the entire history of man and atone for the sins of the whole world (1 John 2:2, cf. Heb. 9:15; Rev.13:8). What the virgin birth points to is neither sin nor the evil of sex or “carnal concupiscence” nor even, primarily, to deity (pace Gromacki, who subtitles his book ‘Doctrine of Deity’). Rather is underscores the fundamental humanity of the man of heaven (1 Cor. 15:47-49), as the word ‘Adam’, which we remind ourselves yet again means inclusively both mankind and the individual, itself implies.

A final question must be answered: Was the virginal conception of Jesus necessary? Machen was in no doubt about this (p.396) but others, as we have seen, are not so sure. Earlier I referred to the possibility of God wiping clean the slate of first Adamic history by starting again. God himself even suggested a similar move to Moses presumably in order to test him (Ex. 32:10; Num. 14:12; Dt. 9:14). This, of course, was impossible, since it would have necessitated the failure of the plan of salvation promised to Abraham, as Moses perceived (Num. 14:13-16). We are forced then to conclude that in becoming the second Adam by recapitulation Jesus not only saved future generations but past ones as well (cf. Rom. 3:25; Heb. 9:15; 1 John 2:2). This is simply to underline the sheer necessity of the virgin birth. To atone for the sins of the race (cf. Heb.11), including those of Adam and Eve from whom he stemmed, Jesus had to be Adam’s archetype or antitype (cf. Rom.5:14), and just as Adam had God as his Father so necessarily did he (cf. Luke 3:23-38). Or, to put the issue more pointedly, if Jesus was not born of a virgin and had a human father, he was not, and could not be, the last or second Adam, the incarnate Son of God and the Saviour of the world.

* According to Bock (p.60 n.13), in an article in the Scottish Journal of Theology 41 (1988), pp. 177-89, C.E.B.Cranfield maintained that the implications of the Virgin Birth are present in Rom. 1:3; Gal. 4:4; Phil. 2:7; Mark 6:3; John 1:13; 6:41-42.

** One of the problems with this position is that if Joseph was the father of Jesus, then he had sexual relations with Mary before they were married, in which case Jesus was born as a consequence of fornication (John 8:41)! The latter reference perhaps had an even more sinister significance.

Conclusion

In the final analysis the Virgin Birth of Jesus, the second Adam, points to the recapitulation of the creation of Adam. The latter was plainly created by God from the earth and so was dust (Gen. 2:7, cf. 1 Cor. 15:47-49). Jesus was created from Mary who, like all the progeny of Adam and Eve, was also dust (Ps. 78:39; 103:14, etc.). What the Virgin Birth underlines is not Jesus’ sinlessness, that is, his avoidance of original sin, but his genuine humanity as the Word made flesh. And it was in the flesh that he uniquely triumphed (Rom. 8:3; Heb. 2:14f.; 1 Pet. 2:22; Rev. 5:5). Gloria Soli Deo.

Footnote

I originally arrived at my conclusions regarding the virgin birth through reading Luke 3:38. For quite some while I thought my views were unique and hence to be seen as tentative. I eventually discovered, however, that uniqueness is a rare quality (Eccl.1:9). As a lad of 11 or 12 I once heard John Lawson speak in a Methodist Church at the Toll Bar, Great Casterton, near Stamford, England. I remember being told he was a Cambridge scholar and one to be emulated. It was not until I was living in Melbourne many years later that I finally caught up with his book on “The Biblical Theology of Saint Irenaeus”. Only then did I discover that Irenaeus held the recapitulation view regarding the virgin birth almost two thousand years ago (see pp. 150ff. I do not, however, subscribe to some of Irenaeus’ rather fanciful thinking with regard to the Virgin Mary). Since then, of course, Augustine has come on the scene and virtually eclipsed Irenaeus to the serious detriment of the church in certain respects (cf. Denis Minns OP, pp. 135f.).

References

D.L.Bock, Jesus According to Scripture, Grand Rapids, 2002.

M.Green, The Message of Matthew, Leicester, 2000.

R.G.Gromacki, The Virgin Birth, Grand Rapids, 1974.

J.Lawson, The Biblical Theology of Saint Irenaeus, London, 1948.

J.G.Machen, The Virgin Birth of Christ, London, 1958.

D.Minns OP, Irenaeus, London, 1994.

N.R.Needham, The Triumph of Grace, London, 2000.

J.I.Packer, “Fundamentalism” and the Word of God, London, 1958.

J.W.Wenham, Our Lord’s View of the Old Testament, London, 1953.

Note: For more on the VB see C.J.Collins, The God of Miracles, Leicester , 2001, p.100 n.15.

Bible readers are familiar with the idea that Abraham is both the physical and the spiritual father of Israel. Paul expounds this idea very clearly in Romans 9:6-13 and by implication in Romans 2:28f. According to 4:11f., Abraham received circumcision as a sign or seal of his righteousness by faith. The purpose of this, says the apostle, was to make him the father of all who have faith apart from circumcision and likewise the father of those who are not only circumcised but also exercise faith as he did before he was circumcised.

In Galatians 4:21-31 (cf. 3:15-26) the apostle posits two covenants symbolized by Sarah and Isaac on the one hand and by Hagar and Ishmael on the other. If we go back to the source of Paul’s material in Genesis, we shall find that God made both Sarah and Hagar very fruitful. Despite her barrenness Sarah is promised that she will become a mother of nations and that kings will come from her (17:16). And Hagar is also promised great fertility (16:10) even though her offspring will not form part of the covenant people destined to become a blessing to the world (Gen. 17:19-21, cf. 12:3; 18:18, etc.).

In this passage Paul makes another point of fundamental importance to our understanding of Scripture. In distinguishing between Ishmael and Isaac who were both the children of Abraham, he points out that Ishmael was not only born according to the flesh but was in fact a slave by birth. In contrast, Isaac was not merely the child of Sarah the free woman but as the child of promise he also enjoyed ‘spiritual’ birth. (Clearly he was not born again but his birth exceeded the capabilities of his father and mother, and to that extent it was supernatural.) Thus Paul avers that it was the latter, not the former, who would receive the spiritual or eternal inheritance (cf. Heb. 9:15). While the child of the slave woman would eventually be cast out, the child of the free woman, even though he experienced the slavery or bondage of childhood temporarily (4:1), would remain in the house forever (Gal. 4:30, cf. John 8:35).

(Since the Davidic covenant is like the covenant with Abraham a covenant of promise, it is scarcely surprising that David also has two seeds, Solomon and ultimately Jesus who was his greater Son (cf. 2 Sam. 7:13; 23:5; Ps. 89:27-29). They, however, do not have the same typological significance as Abraham’s sons. Jesus was, of course, also Abraham’s seed, Gal. 3:16,18,29)

While this teaching is clear enough, it is not usually appreciated that the notion of physical and spiritual seed goes even further back than Abraham. In Genesis 1 it is emphasized that both the vegetable and the animal world is propagated according to type. While plants yield seed and trees bear fruit in which is their seed (1:12), sea and sky swarm with fish and birds respectively (1:20-22), and the earth produces an abundance of various kinds of animals. Even man himself is urged to be fruitful and multiply (1:28) in his bid to exercise dominion over all creation. Truly is creation both prolific and blessed. But there is a problem. In contrast with the eternal Creator who has neither beginning nor end, creation has a beginning and so is temporal. Furthermore, all creatures great and small are dependent on every green plant for food. And though grass sometimes typifies fruitfulness in the Bible (e.g. Ps. 92:7,12; 103:15), as food it more often symbolizes death (e.g. James 1:10f.). It is not merely perishable as such (John 6:27) but it also guarantees that whatever depends on it is likewise perishable (Isa. 40:6-8). Thus the animals themselves become food that God supplies (Gen. 9:3; Ps. 104:21,27).

It is little wonder then that Jesus is later to say that man cannot live on bread alone but on every word that proceeds from the mouth of God (Mt. 4:4, cf. Dt. 8:3). Here is a hint if ever there was one that man made in the image of God is what the theologians call an anthropological dualism. Though, admittedly, as body and soul he is to be regarded as monistic, as flesh and spirit he is dualistic. If he is to survive beyond this temporal world of which he is a part into eternity and the presence of God, he must, as Jesus told Nicodemus, be born of God (John 1:13f.) from above (John 3:1-8). On the natural level he is like Adam (1 Cor. 15:45-49) and, made in his image (Gen. 5:1-5), he cannot inherit the kingdom of God (1 Cor. 15:50). Only as he is supranatural or spiritual in the image of Christ can he live forever.

In light of all this it is not at all surprising that the NT elsewhere differentiates between two seeds. Peter tells his Christian readers in 1 Peter 1:23 that they have been born again not of perishable seed but of imperishable through the living and abiding word of God. James by implication endorses this comment (1:18), and the author of Hebrews (4:11f.) appears to be on the same wavelength.

In his first letter John also can think in terms of believers in Christ being the offspring of God, not simply in a general or natural (Acts 17:28) but in a spiritual sense. He goes so far as to say that God’s seed (sperma) remains in him who is born again (3:9). This is surely a confirmation of John’s record of the teaching of Jesus in John 3:1-8 (cf. 10:28-30; 1 John 2:19; 5:18). If we are born of the Spirit, we are anointed by him (1 John 2:27) and have him dwelling within us as God’s guarantee (2 Cor. 5:5) and seal (Eph. 1:13; 4:30) of our (eternal) salvation. Truly is God our Father and we his children (1 John 3:1-3, cf. Rom. 8:14-17).

In 2:10 (cf. v.8), however, the apostle goes even further and distinguishes between the children of God and the children of the devil and illustrates his point by reference to Cain and Abel (v.12). It is noteworthy that Jesus had made the same distinction in one of his confrontations with the Jews when dealing with the children of Abraham (John 8;31ff.). On the physical level Jesus is far from denying that those who opposed him were true children of Abraham. On the spiritual plane, however, matters were far different. While they claimed that God was their Father (v.41), they failed to act as if he were. Unlike Abraham who rejoiced to see his day (v.56), they sought to kill the One whom God had sent (vv. 39f.,42). Thus Jesus concludes that their real father was the devil who was a murderer and a liar from the beginning (v.44).

It may be asked at this point what that beginning was. Doubtless Jesus had in mind not the origin of the devil in what was arguably a pre-mundane fall but the encounter between our first parents and the devil. In Genesis 3:15 in what is known as the protevangelium two seeds appear for the first time when God says that he will put enmity between the serpent’s seed and Eve’s, seed. The conflict that began then has raged ever since but, thank God, we as Christians know that the woman’s seed (cf. Gal. 4:4) has in fact bruised the head of the former, and ultimate victory is assured (cf. Mt. 13:37-43).

At the end of the day, our works betray our true origin (Mt. 7:17-20). Those who do what is good imitate Jesus and his Father; those who do evil imitate the devil (3 John 11). Jesus came into the world specifically to destroy the works of the devil (1 John 3:8), and when the purpose of history is finally fulfilled that destruction will be complete. In the universal judgement to come (Acts 17:31; Heb. 9:27), the two seeds will have come to maturity and borne fruit as sheep and goats (Mt. 25: 31ff.) or as the children of God and the children of the devil (1 John 3:10). The former will inherit life in the heavenly city, the latter will suffer destruction outside (Rev. 21:8; 22:15)

Though it has enjoyed wide currency in the history of the church, the suggestion that regeneration takes precedence in the order of salvation (ordo salutis), cannot be sustained. It puts the cart before the horse, the goal before the kick-off.

First, John 1:12f. is frequently misunderstood, though its natural interpretation would seem to suggest that belief precedes the new birth (cf. 7:39; Acts 2:38, etc.). While there may not be a causal relationship between faith and the new birth, faith’s priority would seem to be a scriptural axiom (cf. e.g. Heb. 11). Why so? Because the indispensable prerequisite of the gift of new birth is righteousness (Lev. 18:5; Dt. 6:24f.; 32:46f.; Pr. 4:4,13; 7:2; 19:16; Ezek. 18:5-9; 33:15f.,19; Acts 5:32; 1 John 2:17b,29; 4:14; 5:1, etc.), and, as every good evangelical knows, since we can’t provide our own, Christ’s righteousness is received by faith (Phil. 3:9; Rom. 9:30;10:5, etc.). In other words, it is not until we are justified (accounted righteous) by faith in Christ that we are by the grace of God born again (cf. John 3:15f.,36; 1 John 5:11-13). Putting the issue starkly and simply:

No faith = no righteousness = no life.

While Galatians 3:2,5,14,16-18,21f.,26, for example, all indicate the priority of faith, in Romans also Paul is quite explicit. In 5:17 he tells us that those who receive the free gift of righteousness (obviously by faith) reign in life (cf. John 1:12). In verse 18 he says that one man’s (i.e. Christ’s) act of righteousness leads to justification and life, and in verse 21 he endorses this by asserting that grace reigns through righteousness which leads to eternal life. In chapter 6, Paul continues in like vein when he affirms that obedience leads to righteousness (v.16), righteousness to sanctification (v.19) and sanctification to eternal life (v.22). The same view is implicit in the so-called golden chain of salvation (8:30, cf. Tit. 3:7).

There are many who are afraid that denial of the priority of regeneration undermines divine grace. They seem to forget, however, that true faith is the gift of God (Eph. 2:8). While it is essential to insist on this, it is also important to recognise that at this point human responsibility comes into play. For faith, like repentance, which is also the gift of God (Acts 5:31; 11:18), is exercised in us and by us (cf. Phil. 2:12f.). In contrast, the new birth excludes human responsibility since it is a unilateral or monergistic act of God. In it, as in our natural birth, we play no part. This being so, apart from other serious logical consequences, to maintain that the new birth comes first makes election arbitrary and reduces us to automata or robots. In contrast, Romans 8:29f. make it clear that predestination is anything but mechanical.

This leads to other matters of prime importance. First, if regeneration, which involves sanctification, is the cause of faith, then sanctification precedes justification. This means that justifying faith is not alone! But to say this is to undermine the very foundation of the Reformation. Second, and this point is absolutely critical, if regeneration comes first, then God regenerates, that is, gives eternal life to, the ungodly. This, Scripture from beginning to end, will not allow. The idea is implicitly refuted as early as Genesis 3:22-24, when the now ungodly Adam and Eve are barred from access to the tree of life. As Genesis 2:17 and the oft-repeated Leviticus 18:5 clearly teach, only the righteous can receive eternal life. This is the basic reason why sinners need to be justified by faith in Christ. Having no righteousness of our own, we need to receive his as a free gift of grace (Rom. 5:15-17; Phil. 3:9).

So, it is fundamental to recognise that though God justifies the ungodly, the very last thing he does is regenerate them. To do so would make them like God – but evil (Gen. 3:22). The thought is blasphemous!

The order of salvation embraced by many is founded on the erroneous dogma of original sin. But if this basic premise is false, inevitably an Augustinian conclusion is too. Neither the Jews nor the Orthodox have ever adopted the so-called Christian interpretation of Psalm 51:5. Galatians 3:22, like Romans 11:32, simply proves that we are all sinners. And, without denying a la Pelagius that Adam’s sin is a contributory factor (Rom. 5:12ff.), the reason why is amply indicated in the NT. After all, Adam’s sin was not the cause of Eve’s!

Since they are created by God (Job 31:15, etc.), blessed by the Saviour (Mk 10:16, cf. Gen. 18) and know neither good nor evil (Dt. 1:39) children are innocent and cannot be otherwise until law impinges on their minds (Rom. 4:15, cf. Gen. 2:17; Rom. 7:8-10). So, provided we nurture them appropriately, we may safely leave them in the hands of a faithful Creator (1 Pet. 4:19) bearing in mind that while they are capable of faith, their responsibility is diminished like that of Paul (1 Cor. 13:11) whose ignorance (1 Tim. 1:13) at a later stage in his career gave way to knowledge of Christ as Saviour.

Finally, it might usefully be added that in Romans 1:17 and Galatians 3:11 Paul quotes Habakkuk 2:4: “The righteous shall live by faith” (ESV). If for a moment we drop “by faith”, we shall see immediately that it is the righteous who will live. In Galatians 3 Paul is of course at pains to demonstrate that we attain to righteousness by faith and not by the works of the law. Righteousness is nonetheless indispensable. While God may, in apparent contradiction of Ex. 23:7 and Prov. 17:15, justify the ungodly (Rom. 4:5), he certainly does not regenerate them! If he did then, as noted above, they would be eternally characterised as such. In any case, if our goal is eternal life (cf. Mt. 19:16) and we are regenerated before we are justified, why bother with justification at all? It, like the process of sanctification, becomes redundant, so let us eat, drink and be merry for never shall we die!

Clearly, the traditional order of salvation in both its Catholic and Reformed form is antinomian to the core, and it is scarcely surprising that that this has ever been the tendency of infant baptism and the notion of baptismal regeneration particularly. In Scripture, however, the saints, that is, the regenerate, are those who first repent, believe, keep the commandments of God and bear testimony to Jesus (Rev. 12:17; 14:12).

I conclude that “justification by regeneration”* is contrary to the clear teaching of the Bible, not least because it undermines justification by faith alone. According to Jesus himself, keeping the commandments, that is, obedience (Dt. 6:25; 1 John 3:7), is the way to life (Mt. 19: 17, cf. Gen. 2:17). And since we as “flesh” are completely unable to keep the commandments (Rom. 3:19f.; 1 Cor. 1:29; Gal. 2:16) as God intended, we are inexorably driven to Jesus who alone of all men who ever lived succeeded in pleasing his Father (Mt. 3:17; John 5:30; 8:29, cf. 1 John 3:22) in the flesh (Rom. 8:3). So without the Son by whose “alien righteousness” we are justified by faith (Phil. 3:9), we do not have the Father (1 John 2:23; 3:23; 5:11-13; 2 John 9).

* The expression “justification by regeneration” is used by S.B.Ferguson in “The Glory of the Atonement, pp. 431f., ed. Charles E.Hill & Frank A. James III, Downers Grove, 2004.

Christians are well aware that they are called to follow Jesus as the moral exemplar of their faith (cf. 1 Pet. 2:21) and hence to be conformed to his moral image (Rom. 8:29; 2 Cor. 3:18), but they seem to be less aware that they are to take on his likeness and follow wherever he goes (Rev. 14:4) in other respects. This arises from an undeniable docetic strain in their Christology and from deficiencies or misunderstandings in traditional theology in general.

But if, as the author of Hebrews avers, Jesus, as a true son of Adam (Luke 3:38), was like us in every respect, sin apart (Heb. 2:17; 4:15), the pioneer of our salvation (Heb. 2:10; 5:9; 6:20; 12:2) and the first born of many brethren (Rom. 8:29, cf. Heb. 2:11), he and we must share common markers.

Jesus’ Birth, Childhood and Adolescence

The truth of this is easily demonstrated in Jesus’ minority. Once he had been conceived, he gestated for nine months in Mary’s womb. Like all human beings he was thus born of woman (Gal. 4:4), though like Adam he had a heavenly Father (Luke 3:38). As the baby of a Jewish family he followed its normal pattern. He was first circumcised on the eighth day (Luke 2:21) and, apart from his presentation in the temple, we next learn that like his heathen ancestors before him he spent time in Egypt (cf. Mt. 2:15). On his return he resided in Nazareth (Mt. 2:23). Again, like all Jewish boys he became a son of the commandment at the age of thirteen (cf. Luke 2:41-52).

Keeping the Law

Since law-keeping, like attending school (cf. Gal. 3:25 KJV), is not the most dramatic of activities, we know practically nothing of his life under the law except that he kept it without fault or flaw. Proof of this stems from his public acknowledgement by his heavenly Father who, at his baptism, owned him as his Son (Mt. 3:13-17). In other words, for the first time in the history of mankind a man had uniquely fulfilled the condition of (eternal) life first promised to Adam in the Garden of Eden (Gen. 2:17) and re-enforced by Moses and the prophets (Lev. 18:5; Dt. 11:26-28; 30:15-18; 32:46f.; Ezek. 20:11,13,21, etc.). It is at this point that Jesus ceases to recapitulate the life of his forefathers and begins to forge the regenerate or Christian life as the acknowledged Son of God and to fulfil all righteousness (Mt. 3:15) on his path to perfection (Mt. 5:48; 19:21). Here, instead of being a follower, he becomes a pioneer intent on achieving as man the perfection (completeness, maturity) of God (cf. Mt. 5:48, cf. Lev. 11:44f., etc.). Otherwise expressed, he was concerned to prove his pedigree by matching his ontology with function or action.

Jesus’ Baptism and Ours

In light of this it is vital to note that his baptism, like Abraham’s circumcision, which sealed his justification by faith (Rom. 4:10-12), occurred after and as a consequence of his having kept the law. As Paul would later emphasise, righteousness or justification must precede life (cf. Rom. 5:21, contrast Adam who was cut off from access to the tree of life once he had sinned, Gen. 3:22-24). Alternatively expressed, the way to life was narrow; it depended on keeping the law (Mt. 19:17, cf. 7:14). So Jesus’ baptism became the prototypical and paradigmatic baptism for all who put their trust in him. Even though John the Baptist served as God’s human instrument in his baptism, repentance for the sinless Jesus was unnecessary (cf. Mt. 3:14f.). On the other hand, since he was flesh (that is born of woman and a true son of Adam, Luke 3:38) and could not by nature enter heaven (1 Cor. 15:50), his new or spiritual birth from above was as intrinsically necessary as it was for all who followed him (cf. John 3:1-8). Jesus’ own comment that unless a man (cf. v.4, Gk. tis, anyone, vv.3,5) is born again  or of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God does not allow for exceptions, even himself. Only by adopting a docetist stance can we argue to the contrary. (See further my Baptism Revisited)

The Regeneration of Jesus

Though Adam was promised life if he kept the commandment, like all his fleshly posterity, he failed (cf. Rom. 5:12). By contrast, since Jesus as the second Adam did keep the commandment, the entire law of Moses in fact, he was considered righteous  (cf. Dt. 6:25; 1 John 3:7, etc.) and so inherited life (cf. Gen. 2:17). In view of the fact that according to the OT no one was righteous (1 K. 8:46; Ps. 14:1-3), it was Jesus who fulfilled the promise originally made to Adam for the first and only time. In light of this we have no alternative but to recognize that just as righteousness is the free gift of God to all who have faith in Jesus, so is the eternal life promised on the fulfillment of its condition (Rom. 5:17; 6:23; 1 John 5:11-13). Truly may it be said that Jesus, as the acknowledged Son of God, is the firstborn of many (adopted) brethren (Rom. 8:29; Heb. 2:10f.). And just as the regenerate Jesus overcame the world (John 16:33; Heb. 2:9; Rev. 5:5, 12f.), so do we who believe in him (1 John 5:1-5; Rev. 3:21, etc.). In clarification of this it might be appropriately added at this point that God’s  acknowledgement of Jesus as his Son at his baptism corresponds with and bears fruit in our adoption (Rom. 8:15; Gal. 4:5f.). Adoption is in other words the Pauline equivalent of the Johannine new birth or regeneration. If Jesus, the man, was a son, the Son, he necessarily underwent regeneration.

The Anointing of the Spirit

Jesus was anointed by the Spirit. In Luke 4:18f. (cf. Isa. 61:1f.) he claims that  God’s Spirit is on him and that he has been anointed to preach good news to the poor (cf. Acts 10:38). His anointing constituted him Messiah, the anointed King. It is a wonderful teaching of Scripture that believers too are anointed (1 John 2:20,27). Paul, for example, was a preacher appointed (Acts 26:17f.) and empowered by the Spirit (Acts 9:17) like the original apostles (Acts 2) to preach to the Gentiles who were in darkness (Acts 26:17f., cf.; Col. 1:13; 1 Thes. 1:9f.). But there is more to be said. Just as Christ the Anointed One is depicted as reigning as King, so his followers are promised rulership or a kingdom along with him (Rev. 3:21, cf. Luke 12:31f.).

The Sealing of the Spirit

According to John 6:27 Jesus was sealed with the Spirit. The suggestion is that it occurred at his baptism. If this is so, then we too are sealed at our baptism. It can be said for certain that the Spirit is active in giving us new birth. But a seal is a mark of approval and ownership and was commonly used in ancient times for branding or marking slaves. Paul goes so far as to say that if we do not have his Spirit, we do not belong to Christ (Rom. 8:9). On the other hand, he indicates that if we have truly believed in him, we have indeed been sealed with the promised Holy Spirit (Eph. 1:13) as a mark of authentication and ownership (cf. 1 Pet. 2:9).

The Guarantee of the Spirit

Though the NT writers fail to say so explicitly, the seal of Jesus by the Spirit at his baptism guaranteed the success of his mission to redeem those who believed in him (Mark 10:45) and to return to glory with them as God’s adopted children in tow (cf. Acts 5:31; Heb. 2:10; 1 Pet. 3:18).

In 2 Corinthians 1:22 Paul refers to the seal of the Spirit as a guarantee of preservation or security till the day of redemption (cf. Eph. 4:30). This thought is implicit in Philippians 1:6 where the apostle tells his readers that that he who has begun a good work in us will bring it to completion. The same thought is made more explicit in 2 Corinthians 5:5 where Paul says that God has prepared us for eternal life in transformed bodies by giving us the Spirit as a guarantee. And it is still further underlined by his insistence that the seal of the Spirit serves as a guarantee of our inheritance until we actually acquire full possession of it (Eph. 1:14).

So just as Jesus was baptized, born again (from above and fitted in principle for heaven) and publicly acknowledged as God’s Son, so are we who believe in him (John 3:16; Rom. 8:14-17, etc.); just as he was anointed by the Spirit for service (Luke 4:18f.; Acts 4:27; 10:38), so are we (2 Cor. 1:22); and just as he was sealed by the Spirit as a mark of ownership and safe-keeping (John 6:27), so are we (Eph. 1:13f.; 4:30, cf. 1 Pet. 1:3f.). Since Jesus was at once a prophet, priest and king, nothing less can be said of us who follow in his steps until we reign with him in heaven (1 Pet. 2:9; Rev. 3:21; 5:10, etc.). Truly, just as Jesus was sent by the Father, so we in our turn are sent by Jesus (John 20:21).

But we can go even further. Just as Jesus was crucified and raised, so are we with him (Rom. 6:1ff.; 1 Cor. 6:14, cf. Gal. 5:24). Just as he ascended to the Father, so shall we ascend in our turn (1 Pet. 3:18). Just as he was exalted and glorified so shall we be (Rom. 8:17). Just as he was transformed and given a body of glory, so shall we be (Phil. 3:21). As he lives, so shall we live (John 14:19). Where he is, we shall be also (John 17:24; Rev. 3:21). Thus as a bridegroom he will present us all together as a bride to the Father (2 Cor. 4:14; 11:2), and in the end God will be all in all (1 Cor. 15:24-28).

Perfection

Truly the redeemed will have followed Jesus wherever he has gone blazing a trail into heaven itself (Rev. 14:4, cf. John 14:2). The image of God they had at the beginning will have been perfected in his likeness in Christ (Rom. 8:29; 2 Cor. 3:18; Heb. 1:3). Truly may we say with John, see what love the Father has given us that we should be called his children (1 John 3:1). Glory to God alone!

The Correspondence between 2 Peter 3 and Hebrews 12:

2 Peter 3		Hebrews 12
Repentance urged (v.9)		Repentance urged (v.25a)
Divine warning (cf. 2:5ff.)		Divine warning (vv.20f.)
then (3:5f.) and now (3:7)		then and now (vv. 25f.)
Fleshly passions of the ungodly (v.3)		Ungodly passions (v.16)
Previous judgement a warning of future judgement (v.6)		Previous judgement a warning of future judgement (v.25b, cf. 2:2f.; 3:17f.; 10:28ff.)
Holiness urged (vv. 11,14)		Holiness urged (vv.10,14,28b)
Future judgement by fire (vv. 7,10-12)		Future judgement by fire (v.29, cf. v.18)
Destruction (vv.7,10-12)		Removal (v.27, cf. 1:10-12; 8:13; 10:9b)
New heavens and new earth (v.13)		City of the living God (vv.22-24; 11:10; 13:14, heavenly country (11:16)
Patience of God (vv.9,15)		Patient endurance of men (6:12; 10:36;12:25a,28) re God (note 10:37,13:5b-6)

Summary of the Curse

(1)     The cultural mandate, which calls on man who is made in the image of God to exercise dominion over creation, implies that the natural world is inadequate in itself. This is further borne out by Adam’s tilling the ground before sin had entered the world (Gen.2:5,15, cf. 3:23, etc.) and points unerringly to Romans 8:19-25 where sin is not mentioned. In other words, the corruption of the material creation is natural and can only be escaped from by fleshly man if he remains personally sinless as Jesus did (Acts 2:27; 13:35,37).

(2)     First Eve then Adam failed to exercise dominion over their own flesh, which is part of the natural creation, and thus suffered the consequences. They were hence enslaved in sin (John 8:34; Jer. 13:23; Rom.6:16,19; 2 Pet. 2:19), deprived of access to the tree of life, as all sinners are (Rom.3:23; 5:12, cf. Heb.2:8f.) and consequently relapsed into the dust from which they were taken (Gen.3:19).

(3)     Nowhere in the whole Bible is it suggested that the entire creation suffered the effects of Adam’s personal sin. The very idea is an absurdity underlined by the failure of Jesus’ personal triumph to reverse the situation (cf. Heb. 2:8).

(4)     Genesis 5:29 is admittedly less clear but, in view of the pattern already evident in the case of first Adam then Cain, we are forced to infer that Lamech had to endure the results of his own sin (or at very least those of his immediate ancestors, cf. Ex. 20:5) and failure to rule as he should have done.

(5)     The flood is presented as a ‘natural’ event which overwhelms the wicked, though not Noah who, though a sinner, is justified by faith and rescued by God. This, of course, is the picture of what happens at the end of history when Jesus rescues or plucks his believing saints from the burning (1 Thes. 1:10; 4:15-17; Heb. 6:7f.; 9:28; 2 Pet. 3:5-7,10-13; Luke 17:26-30; 2 Thes. 1:7f., Jude 23, cf. Ps.21:8f.).

(6)     Note Hebrews 6:7f. The thorns and thistles at the end are people (see 2 Sam. 23:6; Mt. 13:40-42; John 15:6; Heb. 10:27, cf. 12:29). As in Isaiah 5:1-7 the harvest God is looking for is not being produced. In other words, Hebrews 6:7f. represents a fusion of a limited curse (Gen. 3:19; Dt.28:15ff.) and the ban or total destruction by fire (Gen. 19:24; Dt. 7:5,25; Jos.6-8; Mal.4:6; Rev.22:3). From this there is no renewal (cf. Dt. 29:22ff.).

(7)     According to Scripture, the earth will, local famines and earthquakes apart (Mt.24:7f., cf. Gen. 41:25ff.), be productive right up to the moment of its destruction (Mt.24:35; 2 Pet. 3:7, etc.) as was intimated in Genesis 8:22. See also Mt.24:38; Lu. 17:28; Rev. 18:1ff., cf. Mt. 6:19f.; 1 Pet. 1:4, etc.). In view of this we cannot but conclude that the only ‘cosmic curse’ alluded to in Scripture occurs at the end of the world when earth finally gives way to heaven.

Why Babies Are Not the Subjects of Salvation:
Since babies who know neither good nor evil are totally ignorant, especially of law, and since the definition of sin is transgression of the law, they cannot be sinful (1 John 3:4; 5:17; Jas. 2:9-11). In view of this, salvation for babies is meaningless: they don’t need it.

It may be wondered, however, if they are saved in the sense that they go to heaven. The answer to this would appear to be a plain negative. Since they are flesh (John 3:6) and are born of the flesh (John 1:13) from perishable seed (1 Pet. 1:23), they cannot inherit the imperishable (1 Cor. 15:50).

Since babies lack all knowledge, they therefore lack faith, which is built on knowledge. The author of Hebrews writes that without faith we cannot please God (11:6).

According to Genesis 2:17, Lev. 18:5, Luke 10:28, etc., life is promised to those who keep the commandment or law of God. Since infants do not know the law (cf. Rom. 3:19f.; 7:1,7), they cannot keep it in order to be justified (Dt. 6:25; 1 John 3:7). Therefore, lacking both the ability to keep the law and to exercise faith, they have no way of attaining to justification, which is the indispensable prerequisite of life.

God requires us to be blamelessly righteous or perfect in his sight. Babies have no means of attaining to perfection until they develop moral consciousness and either obey the law or exercise faith. In the providence of God all who come to knowledge of the law are promised life if they keep it. If we say with Paul that the law which promised life proves in the event to be the instrument of death (Rom.7:9f.), nonetheless personal failure opens up the way for faith. It is reasonable to argue that Adam and Eve were justified by faith. Though they broke the law which led to death, they perhaps believed the promise (Gen.3:15). In other words, the very knowledge that makes for sin also provides a basis for faith.

When Paul says that he was, like Adam and Eve, ‘alive’ BEFORE he received the commandment (Rom.7:9), clearly that life was not eternal or it would not have been promised to him (cf. Gen. 2:17; Lev. 18:5, etc.). What he means is that he was not yet subject to death as a sinner (Rom.8:10). Like all human beings, he still had to be put on probation under the law (cf. Dt. 8:2,16) and in the event prove incapable of keeping it (cf. Romans 7).

So, while the death of an infant may be extremely distressing to its parents, its mother in particular, we must never forget that the child itself has no conscious existence. It cannot miss what it has never experienced.

It is sometimes said, especially by anti-abortionists using a bad argument to support a good cause, that babies are persons. It is difficult to see how such a view can be substantiated. If personhood, which differentiates us from animals, involves the ability to think, talk, feel, pray, classify, make choices and so forth, then babies are seriously deficient and can be regarded only as potential persons. They are imperfect (immature) by nature and, like the baby Jesus himself, have to be perfected (Heb. 5:8f., etc.).

On the assumption of a parallel or correspondence between Adam as both individual and community, it should be noted that no covenant was made with Adam. The inference from this would appear to be as follows: just as no covenant was made with Adam at his creation, so no covenant is made with babies and infants who know neither good nor evil (Dt. 1:39, etc.). On the other hand, just as God blessed Adam at his creation (Gen. 1:28), so Jesus blessed little children (Mark 10:16) as potential members of his kingdom Mark 10:14).

Why Babies Die

As one who denies the Augustinian dogma of original sin I am sometimes challenged to explain why babies die if they are not considered sinful at birth. Questioners seem to think they have got me over a barrel at this point, but they are a little premature. The answer is, in fact, quite simple.

Years ago when I first realised that original sin is not and cannot be taught in the Bible, I also realised that the death of babies required an explanation. At the time I argued on the basis of the covenant God made with Noah, which embraces both man and beast. Since men, like Noah himself, attain to understanding, they have the ability to put faith in God’s gracious promise respecting creation and thus be justified (cf Heb. 11:7; 2 Pet. 2:5). Babies, however, are like the animals in that they know neither good nor evil (Dt. 1:39; Ps. 32:9, cf. 73:22) and so cannot believe. The inference must therefore be drawn that both babies and animals, lacking law, sin, righteousness and faith, die in the ordinary course of nature, which has been subjected by God himself to futility irrespective of sin (Rom. 8:19-25).(1.)

While I still see nothing wrong with this argument, it can, I believe, be clarified and supplemented somewhat more directly and forcefully. According to A.A.Hodge (pp.122f.) followed by E.J.Young (p.115), Genesis 2:17, though cast in somewhat negative terms, is in actual fact a promise of life. On reflection, this is precisely the implication of what Paul says in Romans 7:9f. where he contemplates the early part of his own life. His contention is that so long as he was without (an understanding of) the law or more specifically the commandment, he was ‘alive’. But when the commandment came, even though it promised life (cf. Lev. 18:5; Mt. 19:17, etc.), it proved to be the instrument of his death as it had been in Adam and Eve’s case.

So babies who die, before they receive the law which promises (eternal) life (cf. Neh. 9:29; Rom. 2:13; 10:5; Gal. 3:12, etc.), do so in the same manner as the rest of creation (cf. Eccl. 3:19f.) which, not being eternal, is doomed eventually to pass away (Mt. 5:18; 24:35; 1 Cor. 7:31, etc.).

This conclusion points to something else. Traditional theology has usually taught, doubtless more on emotional than rational grounds, that all, or at least elect, infants are saved. However, this calls for comment: (a) babies being born of the flesh are initially flesh whatever their potential (John 1:13; 3:6, Cf. 1 Cor. 15:46)*; (b) since they have no understanding whatsoever and hence lack the commandment that promises life, they are inevitably devoid of faith apart from which they cannot please God (Heb. 11:6). So (c), unable by nature to do good or evil (cf. Rom. 9:11) and lacking all faith they cannot be justified. The only inference we can reasonably draw from this is that, if they die, their spirit returns to God who gave it (Job 34:14f.; Eccl. 12:7), and their bodies relapse into the dust from which they stem (Gen. 3:19; Eccl. 3:20; 6:3-6, cf. Ps. 49:12,20).

(* Animals are flesh (cf. Isa. 31:3, etc.) and without understanding (Ps. 32:9). Man too is flesh but he is also made in the image of God. In other words, he is an anthropological dualism, cf. Guthrie, New Testament Theology, pp. 176ff.. As flesh he cannot enter the kingdom of heaven (1 Cor. 15:50) but as spirit he is like God and hence salvable. As Paul says, he is first flesh and then as he develops under the power of the Spirit he is spirit, 1 Cor. 15:46.)

To sum up, infants, who lack all moral consciousness and knowledge of the commandment or law, cannot possibly be either sinful (Rom.4:15) or righteous (Dt. 6:25; 1 John 3:7 ) and consequently go neither to heaven nor hell. They, like the animals as part of a transient creation (Ps. 49:12,20; Ecc. 3:19ff.), simply cease to exist (2 Cor. 4:18).

The WCF’s assertion that elect infants, dying in infancy, are regenerated and saved … (see 10:3) is not only not taught in the Bible but cannot be if it is consistent with itself. A.A.Hodge, writes (p.174): “If infants … are to be saved, they must be regenerated and sanctified by God without means.” But this, first, begs the question; and, secondly, is contrary to biblical teaching, which underlines the use of means (and for a number of profound theological reasons). Election and predestination are never arbitrary and mechanical, nor is regeneration. Hodge is misled by Augustine’s view that sin in Adam must be rectified by regeneration in Christ (see e.g. the article on federal theology in Baker’s Dictionary of Theology, p.218). But blood (the cross) NOT regeneration is the Bible’s answer to sin (though not the power of sin). The fact is there can be no regeneration apart from righteousness (Lev. 18:5, cf. Rom. 5:21). As Paul tells us in Romans 6, obedience leads to righteousness (v.16), righteousness to sanctification (v.19) and sanctification to eternal life (v.22). And since no one was righteous (Rom. 3:10) before Christ (Mt. 3:17), regeneration is exclusively a new covenant phenomenon (cf. 1 John 5:11-13).

Hodge goes on: “If God could create Adam holy without means … he can certainly make infants regenerate without means.” Again he begs a huge question. Where is it taught that Adam was holy? Surely holiness and righteousness were Adam’s goal not his starting point (cf. Gen. 17:1; Lev. 11:44; Eph. 4:23f.; Col. 3:10, etc.). Why else was he given the commandment? Hodge, like the Reformed in general, has put the cart before the horse. If Jesus, the second Adam, had to be perfected, how much more the first!

So, according to the Bible, the use of means is paramount.

(The whole subject of infant salvation is intriguing and provides an interesting insight into the faith of our forefathers. Apart from Hodge, it is worth consulting Boettner’s The Reformed Doctrine of Predestination, pp. 143ff. and Webb’s The Biblical (sic!) Doctrine of Infant Salvation.)

References:

A.A.Hodge, The Westminster Confession of Faith, London, 1958.

E.J.Young, In the Beginning, Edinburgh, 1976.

Baker’s Dictionary of Theology, Grand Rapids.

Though Reformed (federal) theology has frequently argued for a covenant with Adam, there is no biblical evidence for one. In light of this it is perhaps not surprising that John Murray, for example, denies that what he calls “the Adamic administration” has covenantal status (Collected Writings 2, pp. 47ff.). This raises the question of why this is so. The point seems to be that Adam, though an individual is also a corporate personality. In other words, there is a parallel between Adam, the individual, and his posterity, the race. Though Adam, the individual, is portrayed as a physical adult, since he at first does not know the law (or commandment) and hence knows neither good nor evil, he is spiritually a child (cf. Dt. 1:39; Isa. 7:15f.; Heb. 5:12-14, etc.). Since then he represents mankind in its infancy, no covenant, which implies a degree of mutuality or reciprocity, is made with him. Once, however, childhood is attained, a covenant which is capable of being understood and responded to, as in the case of Noah, from whom the filth of infancy is cleansed by the flood (cf. 1 Pet. 3:21), becomes a real possibility. Otherwise expressed, children, but not infants who know neither good nor evil, are capable through faith of becoming covenant children and as such the subjects of salvation.

It is worth noting that nowhere is it suggested a la Augustine that infants who are ignorant of (the) law and hence know neither good nor evil are capable of sin (cf. Dt. 1:39; 1 K. 3:7-9, etc.). On the other hand, it is frequently asserted that we all sin from our youth (Gen. 8:21; Jer. 3:25, etc.) and it was with Noah, the sinner, that the first covenant was made. In light of this, it would appear that, the first man Adam apart, a covenant relationship is first struck up with children who are capable of responding to simple commands, naming animals and recognising rainbows. In other words, no covenant operates until the onset of rationality. Looked at the issue from a racial standpoint, even the heathen who have knowledge and reason are capable of faith. And the Augustinian idea that they are all damned en masse (cf. Westminster Larger Catechism, Qu. 60) is to be firmly rejected. Human beings, even under the covenant with Noah, are differentiated by their works (Rom. 2:1-11, etc.). Babies can only be differentiated physically.

The Implications of Infant Salvation

If God deals directly with and regenerates infants who lack all moral consciousness, means are excluded. In contrast the Bible tells us that in order to gain life (Gen. 2:17; Lev. 18:5; Mt. 19:17, etc.) we either keep the law or believe in Christ (Heb. 11:6, cf. Rom. 7:18; 8:8). Righteousness whether by faith or law is the indispensable prerequisite of entry into heaven.

The Bible also teaches us that without holiness we shall not see God (Heb. 12:14). So by what means, it must be asked, do infants acquire holiness when they are born, like Adam and Eve, knowing neither good nor evil? (It must be said here that our forefathers, following Augustine, believed that Adam and Eve being part of God’s ‘good’ creation, were holy and righteous by nature. (Logically, this means that all babies are righteous and holy since Paul maintains that creation is still ‘good’, 1 Tim. 4:3f. Pushing logic still further we end up believing in universalism since the prerequisite of eternal life is holiness and righteousness!) This notion was clearly based on a palpable misunderstanding. The word ‘good’ in Genesis 1 almost certainly means, as the LXX’s ‘kalos’ implies, suited to its purpose (cf. Gen. 2:9; 3:6, and see e.g. Wenham, Genesis, 1-15, p.18. Moral goodness, righteousness, holiness and indeed sinfulness all have to be acquired.)

The Bible also tells us that babies are born by the will of the flesh (John 1:13) and are in fact flesh (John 3:6), that is, in the same image as Adam (Gen. 5:1-3) who epitomises flesh (1 Cor. 15:21f.,45ff.).

We further learn from the Bible that the flesh, which is born of corruptible seed (1 Pet. 1:23), is perishable or corruptible by nature (1 Cor. 15:45ff.) apart from sin (Rom. 8:18-25; Gal. 6:8; Heb. 1:10-12). This is evident from the animal world, which is governed not by the law but by nature or instinct. Thus man is like the beasts which perish (Ps. 49:12,20; Eccl. 3:18-20). In other words, he is physically, as opposed to spiritually, incapable of regeneration (John 3:4-6; 1 Cor. 15:50). So, to say that babies, who are flesh, go to heaven is: (a) to deny the explicit teaching of Scripture which tells us that we are physically corruptible by nature because we spring from a corruptible earth (Heb. 1:10-12. In the Bible heaven and earth stand in stark contrast to eachother, cf. Mt. 5:34f.;6:19f., etc. Our beginning is earthly but our goal or destiny is heavenly.); (b) to fill heaven with flesh! What do I mean? Writing in his “The Office and Work of the Holy Spirit” in 1843 James Buchanan commented that “one half of all children that are born into the world die in early life”. If his observation was correct and babies go to heaven as he believed, we are forced to infer that, since according to Reformed orthodoxy (Larger Catechism, Qu.60; WCF 10:4, etc.), all the heathen, non-Christians, Jews and most Catholics are not born again, heaven is largely made up of babies! John and Charles Wesley, whose mother had some 20 babies most of whom died, will now be acquainted with a large number of brothers and sisters they never knew here on earth. The problem with this is that Paul tells us flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God (1 Cor. 15:50).

Another unavoidable implication of infant salvation is that Pharaoh and Herod were the great benefactors of mankind because they killed infants who went to heaven. Had they lived the latter might well have lost their salvation on account of their sin like the heathen and non-believing Jews and Gentiles who happen to be the majority of the human race.

Furthermore, if babies go directly to heaven without enduring any of the trials, tribulations and suffering that is the common lot of those who live (cf. no cross no glory), no wonder that Job (3) and Jeremiah (20) are caught wishing that they had never been born! The same must go for many more of the human race who, Augustinian orthodoxy tells us, will inevitably be damned despite having endured appalling pain, oppression and deprivation all their lives. I suggest that the Bible with its emphasis on diminished responsibility (e.g. Luke 10:12ff.) presents a different picture (see e.g. Luke 16:20; Mt. 22:9f.; 25:34-40). Regrettably this line of reasoning prompts the question as to why, if unconscious babies can go to heaven without being subjected to testing, the same is not true of the rest of us. Well might we ask, why suffering? To put the issue another way, if infants can be regenerated apart from means, why was the plan of salvation involving moral consciousness and probation ever implemented? Logic would surely lead us conclude that it was wholly unnecessary and the incarnation and atonement superfluous. God could have created us perfect from the start. Strange though it may seem, this is precisely what traditional Augustinian thought holds to be true. No wonder that its devotees find Adam’s sin a profound mystery and a complete enigma!

If God acts apart from means (repentance, faith, etc.), there is neither responsibility nor accountability. See further below.

Since babies are incapable of performing works of any kind and are never subjected to trial and testing (Dt. 8:2,16; Jas. 1:12, etc.), the judgement, which is based on works (Rom. 2:6-11), is redundant. Yet Paul tells us that the judgement is universal (Acts 17:31; 1 Cor. 4:5; 2 Cor. 5:10).

If babies are regenerated and go to heaven, they are perfected even before they have begun the process of perfection. The donkey is in front of the carrot again. According to the Bible, perfection (Eph. 1:4; Phil. 3:12ff.) or conformity to the image of Christ, who himself as man had to be perfected or conformed to the image of his Father (Mt. 5:48; Heb. 1:3; 2:10, etc.), is the goal of our creation (Rom. 8:29f.; Eph. 1:4-6). This being so, babies who die are clearly in the providence of God never intended to attain that goal. Since they never receive the promise of life through the commandment (Gen. 2:17; Rom. 7:9f.) God is under no obligation to fulfil it. As flesh they die in the ordinary course of nature from disease for disaster apart from sin (unless one believes in original sin, of course).

Regeneration in the womb is a semantic and logical absurdity. How can one be regenerate before one is generate? This again is part of the cart-before-the-horse theology which the Bible specifically denies when it insists that flesh precedes spirit (1 Cor. 15:46, cf. Gal. 3:3).

According to Scripture righteousness is the indispensable prerequisite or precondition of life or regeneration (Gen. 2:17; Lev. 18:5; Ezek. 20:11,13,21, Rom. 10:5, etc.). Righteousness is impossible apart from (a) keeping the law (Dt. 6:25; 1 John 3:7), or (b) faith in Christ. If we accept original sin (which of course is impossible since it requires that sin occur before law, cf. 1 John 3:4, cart before horse again), then ‘sinful’ babies are regenerated in their sin and hence eternally cemented into it. What a contrast this is to Adam and Eve who, once they had sinned, were deprived of access to the tree of life (Gen. 3:22-24). Infant salvation apart from faith and righteousness implies antinomianism on the one hand and the redundancy of justification and sanctification on the other. Again we must ask, why the cross?

If babies who are flesh can go to heaven, then so can our cats and dogs. Those who hold church services for their pets are not so wide of the mark as we thought! The only problem is that the entire animal kingdom, which the Bible insists is perishable (Ps. 49:12,20; 1 Cor. 15:50), will be there too. If it is said in reply that babies are made in the (potential) image of God, it must be countered that behavioural conformity to that image is also required (Rom. 8:29, etc.).

Infant salvation implies that man is static rather than dynamic, a flat uniformity in fact. It lacks appreciation of what theologians nowadays call salvation history (heilgeschichte) or the forward movement or development of both the race and the individual. Above all, it fails to understand biblical covenant theology, and this is a prime source of much confusion.

Finally, while my point could be vastly elaborated, I would argue that God’s elevation of infants, who are flesh and know neither good nor evil, to heaven, is, biblically speaking, impossible on the one hand (1 Cor. 15:50) and hardly calculated to glorify God on the other. How different from, say, Paul’s assertion in Ephesians 1:5-7, for example, and his claim that before God no flesh will boast (Rom. 3:19f.; 1 Cor. 1:29; Gal. 2:16; Eph. 2:9).

See further below.

Ruminations on Infant Salvation
by Dr. Alan Clifford in ‘Evangelicals Now’, March 2001.

Dr. Clifford’s brief biblical survey with its various references is to all intents and purposes useless. He virtually admits this at the start of his article when he says that the Bible does not speak directly, or indirectly and inferentially, on the subject.

This means almost inevitably that if his understanding of the Bible in general is at fault, so will be his inferences. That Dr. Clifford’s worldview is more Augustinian than biblical soon becomes evident in the course of his article.

At the start of his section entitled ‘The Salvation of Infants’ he says that the basis of their salvation is the same as that for adults, i.e. God’s free, unmerited favour alone. He then uses Ephesians 2:8 as a reference. The problem here is that grace is exercised through faith of which infants have none.

He then denies that infants are innocent but fell in Adam. The hurdle to be overcome this time is that Romans 5:12ff., unlike Augustine, (cf. Vulgate’s ‘in quo’, ‘in whom’), fails to mention that we are ‘in Adam’ (cf. 1 Cor. 15:21f. and note Lloyd-Jones’ ‘essential difference’, Romans 5, p.227, which implicitly contradicts p.217) as we are ‘in Christ’ BY FAITH.

He then informs us that infants are potentially disposed to sin, reminding me of the feminist charge that all men are potential rapists. But potential sinners are not guilty and he rightly says that eternal damnation is based on actual sin (though note, Lloyd-Jones, Ephesians 2, p.57).

The problem here, however, is that he has departed from Augustinian orthodoxy which decreed damnation (Art. 1X of the C of E and WCF, V1). To his credit Lloyd-Jones was somewhat uncertain, though he tells us, contrary to the text, that we are under condemnation because we are ‘ children of wrath’
(Ephesians 2, p.57).

Dr. Clifford then informs us on the basis of his admittedly inconclusive evidence that infants must (sic) be saved!

We then learn that regeneration is necessary* but this can occur in the womb. In other words we can be regenerate before we are generate! In support of this he cites Jeremiah and John the Baptist as examples of prenatal regeneration. Three points must be made here. First, since regeneration or eternal life is a promise of God to law keepers (Gen.2:17; Lev. 18:5, etc.) and no one in the OT kept the law, Jeremiah (like David before him, Ps. 51:10) was manifestly not born again but looked forward to a time when many would be (31:31-34). Secondly, John the Baptist confesses his own need to be baptised by Jesus (cf. Mt. 3:11) when he is called on to baptise him (3:14).

Thirdly, Jesus insists (a) that fleshly rebirth is out of the question (John 3:4-6), and (b) that spiritual rebirth depends on either keeping the law or having faith in him (see Mt. 19:16-21; Luke 10:25-28; 18:18).

See also Gal. 1:15 and Romans 9:11. Predestination, like regeneration, though a unilateral act of God, is never mechanical and arbitrary: means are always involved.

*At this point Dr. Clifford appears to desert the orthodox Reformed order of salvation when he tells us, quite correctly, that adults are born again through hearing and believing the word of God. No horse before the cart here!

Dr. Clifford argues from God’s kindness to animals and birds to his kindness to children – a strange form of argumentation if ever there was one. Perhaps he has forgotten as a famous Lincolnshire poet once put it that ‘nature is red in tooth and claw’, and that all the beasts perish (Ps. 49:12,20).

He then proceeds to ask another strange question: “At what age does this comforting teaching re infant salvation cease to apply? Hasn’t he put the cart before the horse? In light of the Genesis account of the experiences of Adam and Eve his question should surely be: At what age does salvation become a real possibility? If man is created, first, flesh (cf. 1 Cor. 15:46), which by nature even apart from sin cannot enter the kingdom of heaven (1 Cor. 15:50; John 3:5), it is the latter question that requires an answer. It is not until moral consciousness dawns and the law (or better, the parental command) promising life is given that the door to eternal life, as opposed to mere biological existence, opens up. In the event, we all know what happens (Gen. 3 and Rom. 7:7ff.). But while the law promising life brings death, it also makes faith, which is also based on knowledge, a real possibility.

At this point we can refer to Dr. Clifford’s prison population analogy from which he also rather strangely deduces the salvation of infants. A better analogy would surely be God’s chosen people Israel. The Jews remained part of the community until they were exiled or excommunicated for gross transgression. The truth is, however, that this teaches us nothing about infant salvation, only that the children are not punished, though they may well suffer for the sins of their parents (Num. 14:18,33, etc.). (Dr. Clifford alluded to Deuteronomy 1:39 at the start of his piece but failed to note that it undermined the dogma of original sin which is often the mainspring of concern about infants. Conversely, infant death is the foundation of the dogma (see espec. Lloyd-Jones, Romans 5, pp. 203, 205f.; J. Murray, Romans, p.189ff., etc.).

Dr. Clifford ends up picturing the salvation of aborted children which contrasts strangely with the possible damnation of their parents. He would have done better either to have resorted to ‘the inscrutable wisdom of God’ (Lloyd-Jones, Romans 5, p. 249) or realised that the salvation of infants who, like the animal creation, have experienced no moral life whatsoever (cf. Ps. 32:9; Is. 31:3), is an impossibility. Since they have never begun the process of perfection, their unperfected spirit returns to God (Job 34:14f.; Eccl. 12:7), while their bodies lapse back into the dust from which they were taken (Gen.3:19; Eccl. 3:20).

My conclusion is that those who die in infancy, having experienced no moral life whatsoever and not having taken on or even begun their conformity to the image of God, are neither condemned nor saved. They are simply one further illustration of the fact that the material world has been subjected by God himself to death and decay apart from sin (Rom. 8:18-25).

Letter (unpublished) to ‘New Life’ (Australia) following correspondence on the issue of abortion.

The Editor of New Life,
PO Box 267, BLACKBURN 3130.

While Dr Gawler’s letter on abortion (NL,3/9/98) has much to commend it, especially as ammunition against abortion on demand (cf. W.L.James in the same issue), she goes much too far.

She argues that “a fertilised ovum, an embryo or foetus’ is not a potential human life but a human life with great potential, and then goes on in the next paragraph to move from the fertilised ovum to embryo to baby to person who is ‘now with the Lord’. I should be more than a little interested to know how she would support such ideas from Scripture.

The truth is that Dr Gawler is begging a very large question. Writing in his “The Office and Work of the Holy Spirit” in 1843, James Buchanan commented that “one half of all children that are born into the world die in early life” (BoTT ed. 1966, pp.114f.) and went on to speculate about what provision had been made for their spiritual life and eternal welfare. He concluded on the basis of some rather questionable theologising that even infants are fit and capable subjects of divine grace. Dr Gawler apparently has no doubts either, but I wonder if she has followed the logical consequences of her belief. For if infants and even embryos are to find a place in heaven, there will be an awful lot more of them than there will of ‘born again’ believers, especially when we have excluded, as tradition requires us to exclude, the heathen, non-Christians, Jews and perhaps all Catholics or Protestants, certainly of the nominal variety, according to one’s stance (see e.g. Larger Catechism, Qu. 60; WCF 10:4, etc.). This is not the picture painted in the Bible. And while I can entertain the belief that my wife’s mother, who was a good woman and a believer in God but not a Christian, will find a place in heaven, I hold no hope at all for her twin-sister who died when she was ten days old. Salvation for her would be meaningless.

What is my problem? The Bible makes a strong distinction between flesh and spirit. Foetuses and even infants, who know neither good nor evil, are clearly morally innocent and have not yet begun (or at best barely begun) to take on the image (or likeness) of God which is their potential if they live. If they succumb to the futility that God himself has imposed on nature (note Gen.1 and Rom. 8:19ff.), they go neither to heaven nor hell (certainly not the latter as Augustine falsely taught). It is only when they are capable of exercising faith that they are in a position to please God (Heb. 11:6), and until then they cannot be justified.

Though there are doubtless many valid arguments against abortion on demand, we really must keep things in perspective and recognise that foetuses are at best only potential human beings in spite of what Dr Gawler would have us believe. (I would argue that the new Archbishop of Sydney, speaking on TV in April, 2002, is simply wrong to call foetuses persons). It is only when children gain a knowledge of good and evil through law or commandment, like Adam and Eve, that their prospects of being like God, i.e. taking on his image, are of real significance. Until that time the difference between man and animal is purely physical or one of kind (cf. Gen. 1:24. Note how Scripture refers to ‘all flesh’, for example, in Gen. 6:17. See further Psalm 49:12,20; Eccl. 3:18ff.). In other words, Scripture posits a fundamental distinction between the seed and its fruit (pace Dr Sarfati who tries to undermine Mr McHarg’s point by resorting to a false comparison. There is a world of difference between a seed (sperm) and a five-year-old boy, and it is quite illegitimate to compare the two. The plain fact is that the embryo is non- sub- or pre-human and has none of the features which differentiate it from an animal in contrast with a child who has developed some understanding, cf. Ps. 32:9; Isa. 31:3, or, if you like, taken on some spiritual significance).

In the last resort, there are clearly times when abortion is permissible, perhaps even necessary. To deny this seems to me to undermine the entire medical enterprise and to deny in principle the cultural mandate of Gen. 1:26,28. For if one is not at liberty to save a mother’s life at the expense of a foetus (cf. Dt. 22:6f.) or, in these days when serious problems with foetuses can be detected, even abort one, then, if we are to be consistent, it is illegitimate to act (“interfere with nature” or exercise dominion) in other areas too. And it is surely wrong to appeal to Exodus 21:22f. and other verses like 2 Kings 8:12; 15:16 and Amos 1:13, to undermine the case for abortion per se. So much of what Andrew Lansdowne wrote hardly applies to abortion undertaken for adequate reasons but to the wanton destruction of God’s handiwork. Where this is deliberately undertaken for personal convenience or for some other frivolous reason, the perpetrators can hardly expect to be treated with impunity.

But it hardly enhances the anti-abortion cause if we fail to make necessary distinctions between foeticide and culpable homicide even if both are wrong. The plain fact is that the foetus is not yet in the image of God, while the person, as a reasoning, thinking, speaking, moral creature certainly is.

The reason why there is so much dispute over matters such as abortion and millennialism, for example, is that too little attention is paid to the context which is in fact the whole Bible. The abortion issue must be seen in the light of what is said about man as a whole. He is a dynamic not a static creature with his physical origins in the dust: he is first flesh and then spirit (1 Cor. 15:42-50). And according to Jesus, as well as Paul, it is his spirit, not his flesh, that is saved (John 3:3-7)!

In conclusion then, we must beware of trying to support good causes with bad arguments. What Christians should be fighting is not abortion as such but the wholesale slaughter of potential human beings for frivolous reasons in defiance of the preceptive purpose of God.

Yours faithfully, HKS.

I believe that Evangelicals often unwittingly contribute to the politically correct view that Christ is only one way among many.

Let me state first what is biblically and historically true: Christians who have been born again through faith in Christ alone are saved in the NT sense of the term (Luke 1:68-79; 2:30-32, etc.). This, however, is not and cannot be eternally true. After all, the Bible makes it pellucidly clear that the OT saints, including John the Baptist, though justified by faith, were not born again and hence were not the recipients of NT salvation (cf. Mt. 3:14; Heb. 11:39f.). It was only after the Spirit had been poured at Jesus’ exaltation to the Father’s right hand (cf. John 7:39) that the OT promises (Dt. 29:4; 30:6, etc.) were fulfilled (Acts 2:14ff.). As Paul indicates in Galatians 3:2,5, the Spirit who regenerates is received only by specific faith in Christ and not by keeping the law (cf. Acts 2:38; Rom. 8:9; Eph. 1:13). Even for Abraham the blessing was only a promise (Gal. 3:14,18, cf. John 8:56; Heb. 11:13). Just as he personally never inherited the Promised Land during his earthly existence (cf. Acts 7:5), so he never experienced NT salvation (though note Hebrews 11:39f.).

The problem is that Christians, in the grip of a false covenant theology of one kind or another, have simply assumed that regeneration, rather than faith which is relative, is first in the order of salvation. This inevitably means that all who are not born again are damned – an inference which simply cannot be sustained, first, because it means that the number of those who are ultimately saved is lamentably small, second, that sin has triumphed over grace and, third, unregenerate believers like Abraham before Christ were also damned despite clear teaching to the contrary (e.g. Mt. 8:11). Even that much misunderstood passage, Romans 5:12-21, tells a different tale and insists that “where sin increased, grace abounded all the more”. To confine this to quality as opposed to quantity is to attribute a mere Pyrrhic victory to Christ. For not only does my Bible teach me that God so loved the world but also that men and women (and surely children of understanding, if not infants!) from “every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages” (ESV) will cry “Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne and to the Lamb!” (Rev. 7:9) in contrast to those who worship the beast (Rev. 13:7f.). In other words, as Jesus intimated in the judgement scene in Matthew 25:31ff., even many who never knew him will be sheep (see verses 37-39) and not goats (see verse 44). Good and evil pervade Scripture from beginning to end (cf. e.g. the intercession of Abraham, Gen. 18:25ff.).

Clearly it is time that we abandoned the Augustinian notion that all people who do not know Christ through the Christian gospel are an undifferentiated mass of damned humanity (massa damnata or massa perditionis, cf. Westminster Larger Catechism, 60). Until we do, we do violence among other things to the sovereignty of God and his saving grace, to biblical covenant theology, to the pre- as well as the post-incarnate activity of Jesus and to the effectiveness of the plan of salvation throughout history (cf. Heb. 11 where not a single Christian figures until the ‘us’ of v.40!).

Of course, some will complain that this cuts the nerve of evangelism. Such a view reflects a misunderstanding of the issue, though I admit that it needs spelling out.

I will conclude with the rather paradoxical comment that while Christianity is rigorously exclusive (Christ only), it is also gloriously inclusive in that it embraces the world. While universalism is out of the question, nonetheless just as righteousness and peace kiss each other so in a real sense do creation and redemption.

Biblical traditionalists often tell us that both humans and animals were limited to a vegetarian diet until the Fall (capital F) of Adam. (See, for example, Ken Ham et al., The Answers Book, ch. 6). Despite clear teaching throughout the Bible that everything in this world is temporal and naturally subject to decay and death (Heb. 1:10-12, etc.), the assumption on which the assertion in question is based is that there was no death in the world until Adam sinned. This assumption is clearly false and arises from a false interpretation of Romans 5:12 which refers to rational man alone, for only he could break the law and earn death as wages (Rom. 6:23). What else, however, can be said by way of reply?

First, the traditional view is an argument from silence. Though Genesis 1:29 says nothing about meat, it does not necessarily exclude it. Even if it is argued that it does, Isaiah 40:6 tells us that all flesh is grass and so is potentially on the menu.

As products of a temporal creation (Gen. 1:1) grass and green plants symbolise transience and death throughout Scripture (Gen. 1:29; Num. 22:4; 1 K. 18:5; Ps. 37:2; 92:7; 102:4,11; Isa. 40:6-8; 51:12; Luke 12:28; Jas. 1:10f.; 1 Pet. 1:23-25, etc., and note especially Job 40:15, Ps.106:20 and Isa. 31:3 which also point to the inherent or natural perishability of the flesh). We need to remember this when Jesus talks of the food which perishes in John 6:27 (cf. 4:14, and note Mt. 15:17!), for he is contrasting earthly material food with the heavenly spiritual variety. In his temptations in Matthew 4 he quotes Deuteronomy and underscores the fact that man made in the image of God who is both flesh, like the animals, and spirit needs to feed not simply on bread, or perishable food, but on every word that proceeds from the mouth of God. And elsewhere, like the prophets, he contrasts the natural or material and intrinsically ephemeral creation with the abiding word of God (Mt. 24:35). This is why it is of paramount importance for us to lay up for ourselves treasures in heaven (cf. 6:19f.; 1 Pet.1:4,7). If we are what we eat and our diets consist exclusively of perishable food, then they herald certain death as they do in the animal world. On the other hand, if we foster the spiritual side of our nature, then eternal heavenly life is our prospect (cf. Gal. 6:8). This is what was implicitly promised in Genesis 2:17 as the Westminster Confession of Faith recognised, at least in principle (7:2).

It follows from all this that the attempt by fundamentalist traditionalists to distinguish between vegetable and animal death on linguistic grounds is bound to fail (cf. e.g. The Answers Book, pp.32,92. Ham et al. claim, without proper support, that there is a ‘theological’ rather than a natural distinction between plant and animal life. Cf. Isa. 40:6 again, and see e.g. Thiselton, 1 Corinthians, p.1283.). The truth is that the Bible links death with food in general. Both vegetable matter (manna) and flesh (quails, see Ex. 16), as Jesus makes indisputably clear in John 6, are perishable food that cannot possibly perpetuate fleshly existence indefinitely, least of all sustain the spirit. They do not endure to eternal life (6:27) as the death of herbivore, carnivore and omnivore alike testifies (Ps. 49:12,20; Eccl. 3:18-20; 12:7, cf. Rom. 8:19-25). .

Next, Genesis 9:3 certainly legitimises the eating of meat by man. There is no suggestion here, however, that it has any connection with sin (see further below.) A more probable explanation is that it reflects a natural extension of diet for those growing in maturity. The progress from milk to meat is natural to many mammals. In view of what is said, even metaphorically, in 1 Corinthians 3:2, Hebrews 5:12-14 and 1 Peter 2:2 this cannot easily be denied. After all, the word ‘Adam’ refers to both the individual man and mankind, so what is true of the individual is doubtless true of the race.

There is another problem with the fundamentalist view. First, we are told in Psalm 104:21, set in a passage strongly reminiscent of Genesis 1 prior to Adam’s sin, (cf. vv.27f.; 145:15f.; Job 38:39-41) that it is God who provides prey for the lions, and the impression we can hardly fail to gain from this is that the process is entirely natural, that is, designed by God at creation, and totally unrelated to sin in a world ruled by divine providence. If we deny this, then presumably we have to posit a naturalistic evolutionary process that gave lions teeth, claws and a change in diet. In other words, the fundamentalists who are supposed to epitomise anti-evolutionism are hoist on their own petard!

Second, and much more importantly, we read in Mark 7:19 that Jesus made all foods clean (cf. Acts 10:10-15); in other words, the dietary restrictions imposed on the Jews in their immaturity under the law (cf. Gal. 3:23; 4:1-7) were brought to an end. It needs to be carefully noted, however, that meat as such figures conspicuously on the Israelites’ menu. Far from being even remotely connected with sin it is to be eaten, blood and natural death apart (Lev. 17:15f.), with joy and celebration as God’s good gift (Dt. 12:15, 20-23ff.; 14:26,29; 16:11,14f.; cf. 26:11; 28:47; Mt. 22:4; Luke 15:29f.). Even the priests enjoyed their portion (Lev. 7:6,28-36, Num. 18:18, cf. 1 Sam. 9:24 for special guests, 1 Cor. 9:13; 10:18). At a later date Paul goes on to argue that as Christians we are free to enjoy the fullness of the earth (Rom. 14; 1 Cor.8-10). In fact, he goes even further and maintains that those “who forbid marriage and require abstinence from foods that God created to be received with thanksgiving” are liars (1 Tim. 4:3, ESV). And Peter (2:2:12) and Jude 10 (cf. Jer. 12:3), whose view of the flesh is most definitely depreciatory, can liken lawless men to irrational animals, creatures of instinct, born to be caught and destroyed.

My inclusion of the reference to marriage may at first blush be regarded as both superfluous and irrelevant, but I have deliberately included it because it too was a bone of contention among the Jews. When the subject of divorce was broached by the Pharisees, Jesus promptly told them that Moses permitted it because of the hardness of men’s hearts. He went on to point out, however, that at the beginning it was not so and that God’s intention was that man and wife should be one and inseparable. Now since this is the case with regard to marriage, why, on the fundamentalist assumption, did Jesus not produce a similar argument to criticise meat eating? Should he not have said that at the beginning God did not allow meat eating, least of all encourage it (cf. Acts 10:10-15), since it inevitably involved the (sinful) death of animals, and so does not permit it now? The plain fact is that he did nothing of the sort. Rather he implicitly promoted it by going fishing and earning the disparaging title of a wine bibber and a glutton in contrast to John the Baptist who was still under the law and a Nazirite to boot. Truly is wisdom justified by her deeds (Mt. 11:19)!

Reference to blood above brings up another subject. It seems passing strange that if animal death as such was the consequence of Adam’s sin, God should use animal sacrifice so extensively in his people’s cultic worship. If animals, along with the entire created world, are the victims of sin in some sense, they are clearly not without blemish (cf. Dt. 17:1) and so are unfitted to foreshadow the innocent and perfect Lamb of God himself (1 Pet. 1:19). Would their use then not suggest sin being used to cast out sin or Satan to cast out Satan (cf. Mt. 12:24ff.)? It is no use here appealing to the fact that Jesus was made sin (2 Cor. 5:21). He was indeed, but, like the scapegoat in Leviticus 16:20ff., he was able to bear away sins (Ps. 103:12) only because he himself was completely innocent (Isa. 53:6f.; 1 Pet. 2:23-25). If we accept the traditionalist presupposition that the normal death of animals is itself the result of sin, then spilling their blood in sacrifice cannot possibly serve as a fit substitute for the death of sinful man. *

So, speaking personally, I have no qualms. I feel completely and thankfully free to eat both meat and vegetables as the products of a still ‘good’ creation (1 Cor. 10:30-33; 1 Tim. 4:4), and, provided it is not a stumbling block to others, I will have a glass of wine too (Rom. 14:14,21)!

* Since writing this article I have noted that S.B.Ferguson, in “After Darkness, Light”, ed. R.C.Sproul Jr. p.77, writes as follows: “By means of the sacrifice of an impeccable animal in the Mosaic economy, God pointed his covenant people forward to the reality of an impeccable incarnate sacrifice as alone adequate to bear the weight of the exchange (Heb. 9:6-14; 10:1ff.).” It might be added, in case the point is lost on the reader, that the word ‘impeccable’ literally means ‘sinless’, ‘faultless’, ‘not liable to sin’.

When we celebrate the Lord’s Supper, we frequently hear the words ‘until he comes’ (1 Cor. 11:26). We are thus reminded, if at no other time, that along with the incarnation, the crucifixion, the resurrection and the ascension, Christ’s coming again is a fundamental part of the gospel which we ignore at our peril. Yet ignore it we do. Preachers seldom preach on it, and few mention it when discussing their basic beliefs. Perhaps it is something of an embarrassment which, in view of the weird and wonderful ideas that it has engendered, is hardly surprising.

It has been claimed, however, that the second advent is predicted some 300 times in the NT and referred in almost every book. Clearly then it was regarded as being of prime importance in the early church, a time of severe persecution; and it surely merits close attention in our own times.

Few have done more in recent years to stress Christ’s second coming than Premillennial Dispensationalists, found mainly among the Plymouth Brethren in the UK but quite widely, it appears, among Baptists in the USA. In this they are much to be commended. Regrettably, they have disputed among themselves about various aspects of the issue such as the millennium and especially the tribulation. They have also come up with ideas which appear to undermine the teaching and the credibility of the Bible. But more on that below.

Three words are used in the NT to define the second coming:
parousia, a Greek word used regularly in English, which means arrival or presence (e.g. 1 Thes. 4:15);
apokalypsis, revelation (1 Cor. 1:7);
epiphaneia, appearance (1 Tim. 6:14; Tit. 2:13).

With these in mind we shall be able to appreciate better what is involved. But that is precisely the question, What is involved? There seems to be a good deal of difference of opinion and confusion about this, and it is worth our while spending time trying to sort it out.

The Resurrection

First, if we take Jesus’ life and death on the cross as read, we need to focus attention on his resurrection. Though it is frequently denied, there can be little doubt that the Bible teaches a physical resurrection. The mangled, crucified body that was entombed is the one that three days later was raised as Jesus predicted (John 2:19; 10:17f.). The gospel writers, Luke and John in particular, go out of their way to underline this. Luke appears to be concerned to show at the beginning of both his gospel (1:1-4) and his sequel, the Acts of the Apostles (1:1-3), that the accuracy of his reporting is of paramount importance. At the end of his gospel he leads us to believe not only that Jesus rose again but, having done so, appeared in the flesh to his disciples. In chapter 24 he describes the walk to Emmaus and its dramatic impact on Cleopas and his companion. And even as the latter were narrating the story of their encounter with Jesus to the eleven, he came to them, drew attention to his physical scars, invited them to touch him, ate with them and proceeded to teach and commission them (24:36ff.).

It is worth noting that at a later date while talking to Cornelius, Peter focussed explicitly on this incident and thus underlined its veracity (Acts 10:39-42).

John also is concerned about truth (21:24), and seems intent on demonstrating to his readers the physical reality of Jesus after his resurrection. He portrays Mary Magdalene visiting the empty tomb, then holding on to him when he comes to her (20:17). Later, John’s description of Doubting Thomas is calculated to impress on us the fact that Jesus had not only risen but was both spiritually and physically alive. Thomas’ hesitations were overcome by audible, visible and tangible evidence that could not be denied by a rational man. In chapter 21 John presents us with yet more details which confirm the basic truth of Luke’s portrayal in his gospel (24:36-42).

When we add to the testimony of Luke and John, not to mention that of Matthew and Mark, the emphasis that Paul puts on the physical resurrection of Jesus especially in 1 Corinthians 15, it is perhaps surprising that even in evangelical circles there has been a tendency on the part of some to undermine the orthodox view at least by implication. F.F.Bruce, for example, apparently believed a la Bultmann that Jesus’ exaltation (enthronement) coincided with his rising from the dead and, as a consequence, that his later appearances were “visitations from that exalted and eternal world to which his ‘body of glory’ now belonged” (p.40). The more liberal J.A.T.Robinson expressed his view as follows: “All the appearances, in fact, depict the same phenomenon of a body identical yet changed, transcending the limitations of the flesh yet capable of manifesting itself within the order of the flesh. We may describe this as a ‘spiritual’ (1 Cor. 15:44) or ‘glorified’ (cf. 1 Cor. 15:43; Phil. 3:21) body … so long as we do not import into these phrases any opposition to the physical as such.” It would seem to me, however, that Robinson’s ideas are positively quixotic, containing within themselves the seeds of their own destruction. Though they perhaps fall short of the notion of ascension from the cross (see e.g. Reymond, p.577), the lines along which both Bruce and Robinson think undermine the traditional view that Christ rose physically (in the flesh) from the dead which has all the hallmarks of truth on its side, as we have seen above.

In light of what has just been said, there is little wonder that N.L.Geisler, despite harbouring extremely serious errors of his own, rejected so vehemently the ‘spiritual’ view of M.J.Harris. Having dealt more or less successfully with the sudden and sporadic post-resurrection appearances of Jesus, he concludes his chapter on the evidence for the physical resurrection of Jesus with the assertion that it is overwhelming confirmation that he rose again in the same visible, material body he possessed before (p.141, cf. p.165).

While, in view of this evidence, I find myself compelled to support Geisler’s strong advocacy of the physical resurrection of Christ, at the end of the day I am nonetheless forced to regard Geisler as a very dubious ally in general. The truth is that his ‘victory’ over those who adopt a spiritualising view comes at too great a cost. For against all reason, and certainly the evidence, he seeks to differentiate between mortal and glorified flesh especially when dealing with verses like 1 Corinthians 15:50 (see e.g. pp.41,122,185) which was apparently a view held by Berkhof, for example (p.346). The consequence of this is that he attributes to Jesus an imperishable physical resurrection body but denies that it was invisible and immaterial (p.128). In taking this position Geisler would seem to be flatly contradicting what Paul says in 2 Corinthians 4:18. For there the apostle insists that what is seen is transient and what is unseen is eternal (cf. Rom. 8:24f.; 2 Cor. 3:11). So it becomes clear that in the last analysis Geisler and many others, especially premillennialists, are trying to have their cake and eat it. On the one hand, they want a Christ with a genuine ‘flesh and bones’ resurrection body which by its very nature is both visible and mortal (1*), while, on the other, they want a transformed, even glorified, Christ who has not yet ascended to his Father and become invisible. Unwittingly, Geisler is hoist on his petard. Having criticised Harris in particular for spiritualising Christ’s body, for all his protestations to the contrary he has implicitly done the same himself. For it is impossible, biblically speaking, to have a fleshly physical body which is immortal and imperishable. And no one stresses this fact more than Paul (1 Cor. 15:35ff.; 2 Cor. 4:7-5:10, etc.). The sad truth is that Geisler, along with many others, has a radical problem with his worldview. For him, material transience stems from sin; in the Bible it stems from nature as God made it (Isa. 51:6,8; John 3:1-8; Rom. 8:19-25; Heb. 1:10-12; 7:3,16,24; 12:26-29). According to Scripture, Adam, as representative man deriving from the earth (Gen. 2:7), was born mortal (Gen. 2:17; 3:19) into a world characterised by mortality. But as one who was also made in the image of God he was promised (eternal) life if he kept the commandment. He failed, and thus brought death to himself and to all who followed in his footsteps (Rom. 3:9,12,23; 5:12ff.).

The Ascension

Having established the genuine physicality of Jesus after his resurrection, I want now to examine the ascension.

First, it is important to note what can be learnt from the somewhat matter-of-fact account of what was really a stupendous and significant event in Acts 1:1-11. Jesus is taken up from the apostles (cf. Mt. 28:16) in the power of the Father, symbolised by the cloud. Verse 11, which records the words of the two men (angels), tells us that the Jesus whom they, the apostles, have seen ascend into heaven will come (eleusetai) in the same manner they have seen him go into heaven. Contrary to Bruce who says they had seen him go in glory and in glory would he return (p.41), we learn here that Jesus, who went visibly from their presence then disappeared (became invisible?), will eventually return. This low-key, unembroidered description of what occurred in fulfilment of Jesus’ own predictions (John 3:13; 6:62) informs us basically that his eventual return from heaven will be personal and visible (cf. Rev. 1:7). Questions like the following are not answered: Will he come back looking exactly as he did when he ascended? Or, Will he resemble an ordinary, non-descript thirty-three-year-old man of flesh and blood who has simply been immortalised and rendered incorruptible (cf. Isa. 53:2)? Or, As the King of kings will he have a crown on his head and reign on David’s throne in Jerusalem for a thousand years? Or, Will he come back to earth at all? It is only elsewhere that some important details and clues are provided.

From Luke 21:27 we learn of something that was conspicuously absent at his ascension, that is, on his return Jesus will be seen on a cloud in power and great glory or, in the words of Matthew, he will come in the glory of his Father and accompanied by his angels (16:27; Mark 8:38). Furthermore, far from being visible only to a few, his appearance will be revealed to all who are alive at the time (Rev. 1:7). (Glimpses of the glory of God appear in the OT, e.g. Ex. 24:16f.; 2 Chron. 7:1-3. Re Jacob and Moses, see below.) What this adds up to is that further examination of the teaching of Scripture soon makes it apparent that his return, though similar to a degree, in other respects stands in violent contrast to his departure from this world. We need to learn to what extent and why.

In Acts 2:36 Peter tells his hearers that God has made the Jesus they had crucified Lord and Christ. In other words, Jesus, the Man, had been raised and exalted apparently to the Godhead, and this idea seems to receive support from Revelation 3:21, which clearly represents him as sitting on his Father’s throne. Even ordinary believers are seen to be reigning with him (see also 2 Tim. 2:12) and glorified with him (Rom. 5:2, cf. 8:18; 2 Cor. 4:17). Hebrews 1:3 virtually identifies Jesus with God (cf. John 1:1-4), and Colossians 1:19 and 2:9 tells us that the fullness of deity indwells him bodily making it possible for his servants to see the ‘face’ of God whom no one has seen or can see (Rev. 22:4; John 1:18; 1 Tim. 6:16). When Jesus himself in his so-called high priestly prayer talks of being glorified with the glory that he shared with the Father before the world began (John 17:5) and, what is more, praying that those who had been given to him should see his glory (17:24, cf. Isa. 33:17ff.; 66:18f.), various questions are prompted regarding his appearance and his nature in heaven. These become all the more pertinent when we realise that contrary to the widespread assumption that resurrection implies immediate transformation, exaltation and even glorification, the evidence points to the fact that Jesus was NOT glorified until his ascension (cf. John 20:17). For, if he was still visible and ‘flesh and bones’, he could not, according to Paul, enter the kingdom of heaven without being changed (1 Cor. 15:50-53).

In light of the information we are given in John 17:5 and 24, it would seem that we are forced to this conclusion. But there is more. John 7:39 informs us that the Spirit could not be poured out until Jesus had been glorified. This is supported by Acts 2:2f.,33 when the Spirit comes in recognisable form after the ascension in fulfilment of the promises made in John 14:16 and 15:26, for example. Again we are led to infer that Jesus was not glorified till he reached heaven. This is well, since it is difficult to believe that the glorious body or body of glory that Paul talks about in 1 Corinthians 15:43, and which is in contrast with the one that is sown in dishonour (cf. Phil. 3:21), is to be regarded as being identical with Jesus’ resurrection body. Indeed, the latter was so unremarkable that it did not even merit description. In other words, Christians have all too willingly adopted the view that all glorification involves is immortality and incorruptibility. But there is surely more to it than that.

Let us listen for a moment to Berkhof: “The resurrection of Christ did not consist in the mere fact that He came to life again, and that body and soul were re-united. If this were all that it involved, He could not be called ‘the first-fruits of them that slept,’ 1 Cor. 15:20, nor ‘the firstborn of the dead,’ Col. 1:18; Rev. 1:5, since others were restored to life before Him. It (the resurrection of Christ) consisted rather in this that in Him human nature, both body and soul, was restored to its pristine strength and perfection and even raised to a higher level, while body and soul were re-united in a living organism. From the analogy of the change which, according to Scripture, takes place in the body of believers in the general resurrection, we may gather something as to the transformation that must have occurred in Christ. Paul tells us in 1 Cor. 15:42-44 that the future bodies of believers will be incorruptible, that is, incapable of decay; glorious, which means resplendent with heavenly brightness; powerful, that is instinct with energy and perhaps with new faculties; spiritual, which does not mean ethereal, but adapted to the spirit. From the Gospel story we learn that the body of Jesus had undergone a remarkable change … it was nevertheless a material and very real body, Luke 24:39. This does not conflict with 1 Cor. 15:50 … but He was endowed with new qualities perfectly adjusted to His future heavenly environment” (p.346).

If we accept Scripture as our authority, we cannot but conclude that Berkhof is guilty of error at various points here. At the very least, what he says prompts a number of pertinent questions. First, his reference to human nature being restored to its pristine strength and perfection reflects his uncritical reliance on the wholly unbiblical ruminations of the sin-obsessed Augustine who apparently saw Adam as some sort of physical and spiritual Adonis (cf. e.g. City of God, 14:26). Next, the change he talks about is not nearly so remarkable as he claims, as we have already seen above. When we compare the post-resurrection Jesus, scars apart, with the Jesus as he was before his crucifixion, there is little apparent difference between the two. Where is the splendour and majesty that Berkhof leads us to expect? There is nothing even comparable with the transfiguration, let alone anything that we might anticipate to be celestial glory. All we have, apart from clear indications of continued earthly corporeality, are some sudden appearances and disappearances which, in light of the Acts of the Apostles (e.g. 8:39), are not even necessarily miraculous, and certainly no evidence of his perfect adjustment to his future heavenly environment. The latter in any case begs serious questions, for how can Berkhof know this is the case?

Difference Between Heavenly and Earthly Bodies

This brings us to the next point. Apart from inferences we can draw from what Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15 and 2 Corinthians 4 and 5, as it happens we are given other clues in Scripture that heaven and heavenly bodies are considerably different from earth and earthly bodies. First, it is noticeable that Paul’s encounter with the ascended Christ, his then unacknowledged risen Lord, is in strong contrast with Jesus’ appearances to the rest of the apostles. This is only hinted at in 1 Corinthians 15:8, but Acts 9,22 and 26 present a fuller picture. What, as opposed to whom, Paul actually saw we are not told, but whatever it was, the light, which was brighter than the mid-day sun, blinded him. Apart from noticing that this did not occur at the transfiguration, nothing comparable eventuated during the time that Jesus spent with his disciples after his resurrection. It was surely here after the ascension that the change in Jesus’ body would seem to be, to use Berkhof’s word, ‘remarkable’. It reminds us of the OT emphasis on the fact that no one could see God and live (Gen. 16:13; Jud. 6:22), thus both Jacob (Gen. 32:22ff.) and Moses (Ex. 33:12ff.) respectively were protected by the darkness and the hand of God himself. Paul, however, is temporarily blinded. (It is noticeable that Paul’s companions were unaffected even though they saw the light, Acts 22:9. Such ‘vision’ as they had was clearly limited, cf. Marshall, p.355.)

Perhaps even more to the point is the picture painted in the book of Revelation, full of symbolism though it is. Apart from the contrast between the Lion and the Lamb, we need no great powers of perception to note how Jesus is not only identified with God the Father at many points (e.g. 6:16; 7:10,17), but actually resembles him as a consuming fire. Thus in 1:14, 2:18 and 19:12 (cf. Dan. 7:9) Jesus has eyes like fire. More will be said on this below.

Before going any further it is important to take up another point mentioned above by Berkhof. He says that we can gather something of the nature of Christ’s transformed resurrection body from the analogy of the change that occurs in the bodies of believers in the general resurrection. But can we? The truth is that there is no analogy. Berkhof seems to have forgotten that whereas the bodies of the saints who die return to dust (cf. Gen. 3:19), that of Jesus did not experience corruption, as both Peter (Acts 2:27) and Paul (13:35) are at pains to point out. Why? I believe that there at least two reasons: (a) if Jesus had not risen from the dead, we would have no knowledge of the acceptability of his atoning sacrifice on our behalf. The resurrection was proof positive that Jesus was a man approved by God (Acts 2:22), if not the Jewish leaders (Acts 3:17).

But (b) why was it not possible for Jesus to be held captive by death (Acts 2:24)? We are not told specifically but the reason must be that Jesus did not die for his own sins but for ours. This means that so far as he himself was concerned, as the second Adam he had kept the law, lived a sinless life in the flesh and was not liable to death in accordance with the promise made to the first Adam (Gen. 2:17, cf. Lev. 18:5; Ezek. 20:11.13.21; Mt. 19:17; Rom. 2:13; 10:5, etc.). What Ezekiel refers to as the statutes of life (33:15) had been kept in his case which means that, once his work of expiation and propitiation had been completed, death no longer had any claim on him personally. Thus he rose again in the self-same body in which he died to continue his life until the time set by the Father (cf. Gal. 4:2) for his ascension and transformation.

If Adam Had Not Sinned

This, of course, prompts what for some is the thorny question of what would have happened to Adam if he had kept the commandment and not sinned. Geisler, who is a thoroughgoing restorationist, tells us that he would have lived forever in the material body in which God created him (p.167). In saying this he is following Augustine for whom corruption is the consequence of sin, and transformation simply consists of endowment with immortality and incorruption (see Hughes, p.171, who quotes from Civitas Dei, X1V,3 and De Peccatorum Meritis et Remissione, 1,2). But this simply cannot be correct if it is true that the entire material creation has been subjected to death, corruption and ultimate destruction apart from sin (Mt. 5:18; 24:35; Rom. 8:19-25; Heb. 1:10-12; 12:26-29, etc.). This inevitably includes the earthly body which like the material temple suffers physical destruction (Mark 14:58 and 2 Cor. 5:1 on which see especially Hughes, p.164, who notes the remarkably similar language of these two verses). The unavoidable inference then is that just as the material temple, “made by hand” is replaced by a one “not made by hand” (John 2:19; 1 Cor. 3:16; 6:19; Rev. 21:22) so the physical body is likewise replaced by a spiritual one. We should not wonder at this since our present earthly body, the body of our humiliation, would seem to be ill-suited for the freedom and glory we anticipate will be ours in heaven (cf. Phil. 3:21).
(Do writers on this theme ever consider the implications of John 6:27; Matthew 15:17 and 22:30, for example?).

Jesus’ Post-Resurrection Body Adamic

My conclusion then is that Jesus post-resurrection body was still first Adamic, manifestly adapted to earthly conditions and still in need of transformation or replacement to fit it for the presence of the Father (John 17:5).

If it is asked why this is so, the answer doubtless is to be found in the nature of the plan of salvation as may be inferred from what Paul says in 1 Thessalonians 4 and I Corinthians 15:35ff. In the former passage believers are confronted by the problem of those of their loved ones who have already died and are in the process of decomposition. Will the latter miss the wonder of the parousia, the appearance of the Lord of Glory? No, says Paul. As a matter of fact they will rise first and (implicitly) be changed (cf. 1 Cor. 15:37,42-44). In other words, their resurrection and their transformation will not only be instantaneous but simultaneous. So far as survivors at the parousia are concerned, there will be no resurrection since they have not died, but, stresses Paul, they will certainly be changed (1 Cor. 15:51-55). When we bear these things in mind, it becomes immediately apparent that Jesus, whose own resurrection and transformation are a two-stage affair like conversion (i.e. repentance and faith) and regeneration in the early church, is at once (pace Berkhof) the first-fruits of those who have fallen asleep and also the first-fruits of those who, like a sinless Adam, never die. In other words, just as Abraham was at once the father of both his physical and his spiritual children, so Jesus is the forerunner or pioneer of both the dead and the living. However he is viewed, he is pre-eminent in the salvation of all (cf. Rom. 14:9).

It seems to me that traditional theologies have run into trouble because they have involved the confusion of nature with sin, physicality with corporeality and resurrection with transformation. If these elements of confusion like that of flesh and spirit and sin and grace, are overcome, then much that has been difficult to understand in the past becomes relatively plain, as I think I can demonstrate below.

Nothing is more clearly taught in Scripture than that God became man. The incarnation is a fundamental reality apart from which Christianity does not make sense (1 John 4:1-3; 2 John 7). According to Hebrews 2, for example, the purpose of this was that Jesus should be put into the position of being able to bring many sons to glory (2:10). The author thus presents him to us as reigning in heaven (Heb. 1:3,6; 2:5; 6:19f., etc.) as the author and pioneer of his people’s salvation who, having prepared the way for them into his Father’s house (Heb. 9:23f.; John 14:2) will return not to deal with sin but to complete their redemption and deliverance (9:28; 1 Thes. 1:10. In comment on the latter Bruce also refers to 4:16; 2 Thes. 1:7 and Phil. 3:20 and adds, “Christ is at present exalted with God; it is from the presence of God that he will be revealed in glory”, p.19. At the end of his note, p.20, he refers to 5:10 where we are told that Christ died for us in order that we might live with him, cf. 1 Pet. 3:18. Bruce says that this is the most explicit statement in the Thessalonian letters of the saving purpose of the death of Christ, p.114).

What Happens When Christ Appears?

First, it is worthwhile recapitulating what we have discovered so far:

Jesus rose physically from the grave and was essentially as he was before his crucifixion which was, after all, an interlude in his life undertaken on our behalf.

He had NOT and could not have undergone transformation.

After 40 days his visible, hence his physical (2 Cor. 4:18), ascension occurred. However, in view of Paul’s teaching in 1 Corinthians 15:50, it was immediately followed by his transformation and glorification.

He was now characterised not only as the first to rise (permanently) from the dead but also as the pioneer or precursor of those who will be alive at his coming (2*).

I have already noted above that on his entrance into the presence of his Father, Jesus was to all intents and purposes identified with God and was seated with him on his throne (Heb. 1:3; 8:1; 10:12; 12:2; Rev. 3:21; 22:3, etc.). It follows naturally from this that when he returns, it will be in the glory of the Father (Mt. 16:27; 24:30; Mark 8:38; 14:62). But not only so. On his arrival like a thief in the night (1 Thes. 5:2; 1 Cor. 1:8), he will be accompanied by his angels and the ‘naked’ souls of those who have already died (1 Thes. 3:13; 4:14).

Rescue and Redemption

In light of Mark 13:27 and 1 Thes. 4:14,16, we can conclude that having issued a universal call (cf. Mt. 24:31; 1 Cor. 15:52), he will first of all raise and transform the bodies of the dead (note 1 Cor. 15:23,37,42-44), that is, ‘redeem’ the bodies of the souls who accompany him (Rom. 8:23). Though many will have reigned with him in heaven, that is, been at home with him (2 Cor. 5:8) for a ‘thousand years’ (Rev. 20:4), their salvation will now be complete. They will not merely see him as he is but be like him (Mt. 13:43; 1 John 3:2; Phil. 3:21).

Then, with our eyes fixed firmly on 1 Thessalonians 4:15,17 and 1 Corinthians 15:51-55, we learn that believers who are still alive will be summoned into his presence by ascension (note the word) in the air in instantly transformed bodies. In this way all will be together – a vital situation since, in accordance with the plan of salvation, all must be harvested (Mt. 13:24ff.; Rev. 14:14ff.) and presented together as one, as the body of Christ, the Bride of the Lamb (Eph. 5:27, cf. Mt. 22:1-10; Rev. 19:7-9). This teaching is seldom recognised or, at least, acknowledged, but it is clearly taught in Scripture (1 Cor. 15:24; 2 Cor. 4:14; 11:2; 1 Thes. 4:17; 2 Thes. 2:1). Paul talks of presenting the Corinthians as a pure virgin to her one husband (2:11:2), and in Colossians 1:22 he claims that Christ’s own intention is to present his people holy, blameless and irreproachable before God (cf. Eph. 1:4). So, while it is true that we are perfected individually (Col. 1:28), we are also presented as a body, perfect before our God (Eph. 5:27; Heb. 11:39f., cf. 12:22-24).

Judgement

The order of events presented above is vital for another reason: for if Jesus comes in the glory of the Father like lightning (Luke 17:24; Mt. 24:27), he also comes in wrath (Mt. 24:29f.) and as a consuming fire which no material thing can withstand (Heb. 6:7f.; 1 Pet. 1:7; 2 Pet. 3:7,10-12). Thus, as at Sodom and Gomorrah when the cities themselves were destroyed (Gen. 19:25, cf. Mt. 22:7), creation as such is overwhelmed by fire and removed (Heb. 12:27-29; Rev. 16:18-21; 20:11; 21:1). While believers love the appearing of Christ (2 Tim. 4:8) since it betokens their redemption, disbelievers succumb to the avenging Lord in flaming fire (Luke 3:17; 2 Thes. 1:7f.; Heb. 10:27, cf. Rev. 14:18) along with the lawless one who will be slaughtered by the fiery breath of his mouth and annihilated by the sheer splendour of his glory (2 Thes. 2:8, cf. also Isa. 66:14ff.).
(On Rev. 14:18 Mounce’s comment is apposite: “The angel who had charge of the fire commands the angel with the sharp sickle to gather the vintage. This follows closely the parallel command in the previous vision to reap the harvest of the earth. Joel 3:14 is the model for both. Like the grain that has turned golden and must be harvested immediately, the grapes are fully ripe. The time for judgment is now!, p.280).

The picture is one of rescue (Jude 23a, cf. Isa. 43:2), deliverance (Heb. 9:28) and corporeal redemption for all believers throughout history (Heb. 11:39f.) and total destruction for disbelievers. On the one hand the kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of Christ where he will reign eternally (Rev. 11:15), on the other, the material realm symbolised by Babylon on which so many set their store collapses, is judged and is permanently destroyed (Rev. 17:16; 18:1-24; 20:11; 21:1).

It would appear that only after creation has been dispensed with does the general judgement, pictorially described in Matthew 25:31ff. and Revelation 20:11f., take place. It is a judgement by works, and while believers may suffer loss (1 Cor. 3:12-15), only disbelievers will experience the second death (Rev. 2:11; 20:6). Whether this involves eternal conscious punishment or not is disputed, but it is clear that character is fixed for ever (Rev. 22:11) (3*). There is no second chance.

Concluding Comments

Finally, there remain certain other matters to be cleared up. Berkhof apparently thought that unless Jesus underwent transformation at his resurrection, he was not its first-fruits. This conclusion is surely erroneous. At least two points need to be made: (a) the NT is at pains to indicate that Jesus’ death was genuine; it was both for real and for sin (2 Cor. 5:21) and hence it was followed by a genuine resurrection; (b) deaths like that of Lazarus, as I have half-jokingly said elsewhere, were not mortal in that they did not involve sin. They were temporary restorations for the glory of God (John 11:4). Lazarus rose only to die again thereby reaping the wages of sin and experiencing corruption (cf. Rom. 8:10). The difference between him and Jesus is fundamental.

Next, I find it necessary to underline still more firmly the fact that Jesus could NOT have been transformed until he ascended for two basic reasons: first, he himself said that he had the power to lay down his life and take it again. Clearly, in so doing, he was fulfilling his own summary of the law which was to love God and his neighbour as himself. Indeed, he was going further, for his love resembled the perfection of God himself (Mt. 5:44-48). He was not merely laying down his life for his friends (John 15:13) but for his enemies (Rom. 5:8,10). The point at issue, however, is this: in claiming to lay down his life and take it again John 10:17f.) he is implying that there is no change involved. The life he surrenders is precisely the life he receives back. His was a true resurrection (restoration) from the dead. His putative transformation, however, would have been a denial of his physical resurrection.

Secondly, if Jesus was the second Adam, he had to be perfected as such in strong contrast with the first who manifestly failed to achieve perfection. Jesus’ earthly work culminated on the cross when he uttered the words “It is finished” (tetelestai, John 19:30). As we saw above, if the first Adam had never sinned, he would have eventually, that is, in God’s good time (cf. Gal. 4:2), have inherited the promise implied in Genesis 2:17 and been perfected by transformation to fit him for the divine presence. The same must be true of the second or true Adam of whom the first was only a type (Rom. 5:14). If it is a fact that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God (1 Cor. 15:50, cf. 1:29, etc.), then Jesus necessarily underwent transformation at his ascension. (To deny this is to deny his incarnation, 1 John 2:22; 4:1-3; 2 John 7.) And it is at this point, and not a moment before, that life in the flesh on earth ceased forever for him who was already morally and now permanently or spatially separated from sinners by being exalted above the heavens (Heb. 7:26, cf. Bruce, p.157 n.88, deSilva, p.75, Robertson, p.79).

As Hebrews 7:28 indicates, Jesus was perfected forever, and consequently there can be no possibility of his coming back to earth to reign over sinners (cf. 9:28; Acts 13:34). So, to contend that his transformation occurred at his resurrection is at one and the same time to introduce contradictions into the teaching of Scripture and to disqualify Jesus from his status as the second Adam, the first-born of creation (Col. 1:15) and the very image of God (2 Cor. 4:4) in whom all things are united (Eph. 1:10). And that is manifestly to go beyond the pale.

If what has been written above is anything like the truth, it is in stark contrast with much of what passes for biblical teaching today. Historically, lack of an adequate covenant theology has done much to blind the eyes of writers on eschatology as on a good deal else. Added to this has been the huge problem created by the false worldview arising out of Augustine’s dogmas of original perfection, righteousness, sin, fall (usually spelt with a capital ‘F’ to emphasise its importance!) and cosmic curse. These five are all deeply suspect and interlinked, and when they are allied to an almost universal Docetism (4*) which in effect, if not in intention, has denied the true humanity of Jesus, it is inevitable that our understanding of basic elements of the total gospel message has been obscured. Indeed, whole ‘theologies’ have been devised that fly in the face of the plain meaning of crucial texts. Thus John 3:6, not to mention 1 Corinthians 15:50 and 1 Peter 1:23, on its own rules out the widespread notion that there can be physical regeneration; 2 Corinthians 4:18 requires us to jettison a purged and restored material universe; Deuteronomy 24:16 excludes the Augustinian understanding of original sin; Romans 8:20, and arguably Genesis 3:17 itself rightly interpreted, undermines the universal ‘cosmic curse’ accepted by many, and so on (5*).

Perhaps one of the worst errors has been the idea that Jesus underwent transformation when he rose again from the dead making him immortal and incorruptible while still visible and in the flesh – and on earth to boot, thus opening up the way for him to return from heaven to reign on what will, according to Scripture, be a non-existent throne in a non-existent Jerusalem on a non-existent earth. The plain fact is that, biblically speaking, immortal and incorruptible flesh, physicality or materiality is a contradiction in terms. We must then in the interests of truth abandon all ideas of a millennial earthly reign by Christ, glorified in the flesh(!), on logical let alone exegetical grounds. (To say this, however, is not to abandon without further consideration the hope of still further evidence on earth of Christ’s rule from heaven. We still do not know the time of his return, nor do we know exactly how things will pan out in the rest of history assuming the second coming does not occur in the near future. Since the interpretation of the NT always remains open to correction, we do well to be cautious, not least because various misapprehensions held sway at the time of Christ’s first coming.)

To cut a long story short, I would contend that the following are simply wrong:

The perfection of the original material creation

Restorationism

New, that is, fresh creationism

A literal interpretation of the OT apart from NT spiritualisation.

A literal millennium

A secret rapture

The church’s non-participation in the tribulation at the end of the age

The identification of the flesh with the body

The identification of what is sown with what is raised, or, in other words, the idea that physical seed produces spiritual bodies (cf. 1 Cor. 15:37. 43f.; 1 Pet. 1:23; John 1:13)

Denial of spiritual corporeality

The idea that in heaven flesh is essential to manhood

Physical regeneration or re-incarnation of some kind

Material incorruptibility and fleshly immortality

The simultaneity of Jesus’ resurrection and transformation.

All these seriously hinder our understanding of Scripture and our eternal destiny. While a great deal more evidence needs to be scrutinised with care, we need to recognise that tradition, especially when it is enshrined in creeds and confessions, must always be subjected to rigorous criticism. As Jesus implied in John 16:13 (cf. 14:26; 15:26), while the gospel may not change, our understanding of it certainly does.

1* If Jesus was ‘flesh and bones’ when he rose again, he was still technically mortal. (I take it that Romans 6:9 is a general comment which, though true, is not specifically relevant to the point at issue.) What needs to be remembered is that, as one who had passed the test, completed his work and never transgressed any commandment, Jesus inherited the promise of life and could not reap the wages of sin which is death. He was preserved from death by God himself, as Adam would have been if he had never sinned. But the mere fact that he was getting older (John 8:57) in conformity with the corruptible creation from which he physically stemmed (Heb. 1:11) made his ascension and transformation a necessity (John 20:17, cf. 1 Cor. 15:50ff.). The view expressed by Grudem that Jesus rose to a life in which his physical body was perfected and no longer subject to weakness, ageing and death but able to live eternally must be rejected (p.609) along with other related ideas (e.g. pp.831ff.,859). Physical perfection or maturity is attained in this life as the whole of nature testifies (cf. B.B.Warfield on the Human Development of Jesus. See too Travis who is equally mistaken when he says, “The resurrection body of Jesus is the designer’s pattern for the resurrection of his followers. After Jesus rose from death he was no mere ghostly figure, nor was he simply a physical body returned to life. His body was transformed, suitable for life in a new and glorious environment.” Cf. Berkhof above. Again, how can Travis know this? Has he been to heaven (cf. Rom. 8:24f.; 1 Cor. 2:9; 2 Cor. 4:17)? Jesus’ visibility excludes his view.)

2* As a matter of fact Jesus was preceded by Enoch and Elijah. Why? We can only guess. Since Enoch was a Gentile, Elijah a Jew and Jesus a Christian, so to speak, perhaps we are meant to infer that each covenant group is represented among the men and women of every tribe and nation that are saved. Having said this, we must consider that Elijah’s ascension was not strictly parallel. First, there were perhaps polemical reasons for the demonstration of God’s power involved (cf. Lazarus’ resurrection, John 11:4), and, second, in some ways Elijah’s ascension resembled Christ’s return rather than his exodus from the earth. See Dillard’s thought-provoking comments and references. Perhaps both these ascensions were intended to inspire hope in OT saints.

3* If punishment is eternal, Revelation 22:11 (cf. Dan 12:10) perhaps gives us a clue as to what it is like. The wicked, according to the general teaching of Scripture, live lives dictated by the flesh (see e.g. Rom. 1:18ff.; 1 Cor. 6:9f.; 15:32b; Gal. 5:19-21; 6:7f.; 2 Pet. 2:12-14; Rev. 21:8; 22:15). When fleshly bodies and appetites that dominated their lives on earth have been destroyed (cf. Rom. 16:18; 1 Cor. 6:13; Phil. 3:19; 1 John 2:15-17), their spirits are left with nothing but empty craving and unfulfillable dreams. Like the kings and merchants of the earth (Rev. 18:9-19), they hunger, or rather burn as Dives did (Luke 16:19ff.), for satisfaction. But if their character is fixed, there can be none. Inside the kingdom of God there is fullness of joy and eternal pleasures (Ps. 16:11); outside it there is darkness, anguish and gnashing of teeth. Clearly the subject requires more thought and study.

4* If the liberals did nothing else for us, they taught us to recognise the true humanity of Jesus.

5* It is disturbing to learn that the belief that all creation will be transformed is common in evangelicalism (see Hosier, p.16). This supplies yet further evidence that the teaching of John 3:6, Romans 8:24f., 1 Corinthians 15:50 (cf. vv. 53,54), 2 Corinthians 4:18 and 1 Peter 1:23 has not been taken to heart. It also suggests that false understanding of Romans 8:19-23 is prevalent, along with failure to appreciate that the new heavens and the new earth (Isa. 65:17; 66:22) are a somewhat earth-centred OT way of referring to the eternal world which, like the age to come, already exists (cf. John 14:2f.; Heb. 6:5, etc.) along with its righteousness (1 Pet. 3:13; Mt 6:10) but which has still to dawn for us. As Paul said, to remain in the (fleshly) body is to be away from the Lord (2 Cor. 5:8).

References

L.Berkhof, Systematic Theology, London, 1959.

F.F.Bruce, The Book of Acts, London, 1954.

F.F.Bruce, Commentary on Hebrews, London, 1964.

D.A.DeSilva, Perseverance in Gratitude, Grand Rapids, 2000.

R.B.Dillard, Faith in the Face of Apostasy, Phillipsburg, 1999.

N.L.Geisler, The Battle for the Resurrection, Nashville, 1992.

W.Grudem, Systematic Theology, Leicester and Grand Rapids, 1994.

M.J.Harris, From Grave to Glory, Grand Rapids, 1990.

J.Hosier, The End Times, London, 2000.

I.H.Marshall, Acts, Leicester, 1980.

R.H.Mounce, The Book of Revelation rev. ed., Grand Rapids, 1998.

R.L.Reymond, Systematic Theology, Nashville, 1998.

O.P.Robertson, The Israel of God, Phillipsburg, 2000.

S.Travis, End of Story, Leicester, 1997.

The quotation from J.A.T.Robinson appeared in D.Geivett and G.Habermas, In Defence of Miracles, Leicester, 1997, p.273, from Interpreter’s Dictionary, 4:48, Nashville, Abingdon, 1962.

Postscript

While in the process of writing the above, I had begun to read O.P.Robertson’s “The Israel of God” (see references). I did not finish it until after I had completed my work. Robertson’s final chapter on Romans 11 (pp.167ff.), however, prompts further comment.

Robertson, leaning to some extent on Ridderbos (pp. 359f.), produces a cogent argument in favour of the view that ‘all Israel’ in Romans 11:26 means the fullness of Israel (11:12) and the Gentiles (11:25) TOGETHER.

I myself have always tended to this understanding and over the years have annotated my Bible with references like Romans 2:28f.; 9:6; Galatians 6:16 and others relating to Israel’s repentance like Deuteronomy 30:1-6; Jeremiah 31:31-34; 50:20; Ezek. 16:60-63, etc.). Yet another reference, which to my knowledge seems to be regularly overlooked, is Revelation 6:11, and it noticeably underlines the togetherness and interdependence of Jew and Gentile that is Paul’s concern. What is more, it impinges directly on the parousia. On examination, there can be little doubt that the martyrs stem from the ‘servants’ (normally the Israelites) and their brethren (Gentile Christians?) together, and it is only when their tally, to use Beasley-Murray’s word (p.136), is complete that the judgement (6:10) will occur along with the parousia (6:12-17).

The point that needs to be stressed is that the church or Israel of God seen in Revelation in OT terms (note especially 7:4-8 and see Wilcock, p.80, and his quotation of Morris, p.114) is made up of both Jews and Gentiles who are indissolubly related. Yet historically and even presently Israelites and Gentiles have been at loggerheads despite the fact that the dividing wall of hostility between them has in principle been broken down (Eph. 2:11f.). The official church, the medieval church in particular, has even savagely persecuted the Jews. So, what, humanly speaking, is the root of the problem? I would suggest that the fault lies on both sides. First, Paul himself makes it clear that the Jews have been blind to the significance of their own covenant (2 Cor. 3:14f.) and hence have been involved in inevitable disobedience (cf. Jer. 31:32). Elsewhere, Peter indicates that all is not well in the Christian camp either (2 Pet. 3:15ff.), since many have failed to understand the depths of Paul’s writings which deal particularly with the status of the Jews. And history makes all too plain the fact that the church itself has been signally judaised and Christians disobedient.

When we consider that just as Israel began in babyhood, grew but failed to attain the maturity required (cf. Ezek. 16; 43:1; 46:3, etc.), so, recapitulating the Jewish experience, the church too began in babyhood (1 Cor. 3:1-4; Heb. 5:11-6:3, etc.) and has also failed to reach maturity. On reflection the reason is by no means surprising, for maturity for both depends on their being one, becoming one new man (Eph. 2:15) in the unity of the faith (Eph. 4:4f.;11-16). But one has only to be aware of the chaotic state of affairs in evangelical theology today to recognise that maturity, implying consensus in the faith (Eph. 4:4-6), is, to use the old cliché, conspicuous by its absence. However, if we love Christ’s appearing, we must all examine ourselves and rectify the situation. It is simply not good enough for us as Christians to expect the Jews to accept Christ as their Messiah and join forces with us. We must clean out our own Augean stable. As I expressed it in my booklet “The True Faith” “Above all, when the church repents and owns it blindness, we can hope that the Jews will do so too (cf. 2 Cor. 3:14ff.). If they do, we may well look for great blessing (Rom. 11:12,15,25f.).”

It is vital then for us to ensure that we Christians, on the one hand, outgrow some of the blatantly unbiblical beliefs that are perverting our understanding of the faith as a whole and, armed with the true gospel, seek, on the other, to bring light in repentance, humility and compassion to the Jews who are an essential constituent of the election of grace. While it is true, as Robertson says, that “the conversion of the Jews will enrich the experience of the gospel by the Gentiles immeasurably” (p.191), it is even more important for us to recognise that apart from them we cannot be made perfect (Heb. 11:39f.).

This postscript, which doubtless requires great elaboration, is intended to make at least five basic points:

The traditional Dispensational hiatus between Israel and the church is biblically speaking impossible; together they form one man (Gal. 3:28; Eph. 2:15; 4:13);

The earthly land of Israel (like the earthly Davidic kingdom, cf. Luke 1:32f.; Acts 2:29ff., etc.), which is as subject to spiritualisation as it was in the days of Abraham (Heb. 11:10,14,16), is largely irrelevant to God’s salvific purposes. As Robertson and countless others have indicated, Paul does not regard it as worthy of mention in Romans 9-11. The destiny of both believing Jew and Gentile is heaven and the presence of Christ, not a spot on the modern political map;

Jews and Gentiles are mutually dependent. We need eachother just as disobedient children we both need the mercy of God (Rom. 11:32);

The riches of the world are dependent on our unity;

This unity must occur in its intended fullness prior to the return of Christ.

Finally, it strikes this present writer at least that Robertson himself evinces a strange inconsistency in denying restoration with respect to the land of Israel and the earthly Davidic kingdom (p.191) but embraces it so far as the cosmos is concerned (pp.113,194f.).
(For a convincing overview of Romans 11, see Reymond, pp.1024ff.)

Additional References

G.R.Beasley-Murray, Revelation, repr. Grand Rapids, 1983.

L.L.Morris, Revelation, London, 1969.

H.Ridderbos, Paul An Outline of his Theology, Grand Rapids, 1975.

M.Wilcock, The Message of Revelation, Leicester, 1975.

The usual question people ask is: Where was Eden? Here, however, I am deliberately asking: What was Eden? The simple answer to the latter is that it was a specially prepared place into which God placed Adam, the first man (Gen. 2:8). In the previous verse we are informed that God formed him of dust from the ground, and a consequence of this is that we tend to see God as a potter (cf. Job 10:8f.; 33:6; 2 Cor. 4:7) not least because we are all the work of his hands (Job 10:3; 14:15; Ps. 119:73). But this is by no means the only image used in the Bible, for Job 10:11, Psalm 139:13 and15 portray God as a knitter or weaver, and what he once did in the depths of the earth is itself reflected, re-enacted or symbolically repeated by what he continues to do in the womb (cf. Gen. 30:2; Isa. 49:1; Jer. 1:5, etc.). That God forms in the womb is clearly stated in Isaiah 43:1,7 (44:2,24, 43:1,7; 49:1,5; Dt. 32:6; Job 31:15), though here, since the reference is to Israel, the language is doubtless metaphorical. Nonetheless, it might well be argued that since Israel’s origins are likened to formation in the womb, the same must be true of mankind (Adam) as both individual and community.

Adam and the Garden of Eden

As has just been noted, however, Adam, once formed of and in the earth, was then placed by God in the Garden of Eden, elsewhere known as Paradise or a garden of delight or pleasure. In view of this, it is a reasonable conclusion that he represented the (perishable) seed of mankind (Ps. 139:15, cf. John 1:13; 1 Pet. 1:23) who was placed in the womb to produce the ‘fruit of the womb’ (cf. Gen. 30:2; Dt. 7:13; Ps. 128:3f.; Luke 1:42, etc. It is intriguing to note that in Dt. 28:4 the ‘fruit of your body’ is juxtaposed with ‘the fruit of your ground’, cf. v.11), and it was in Eden precisely that Eve, the mother of all living (Gen. 3:20), was created or formed from Adam’s side suggesting that it, i.e. the garden, was “a type of archetypal sanctuary where God was uniquely present in all his life-giving power” (Wenham, p.86). This understanding of the matter is supported by what happened in the case of the second Adam, the heavenly man, who was ‘placed’ or ‘planted’ in Mary’s womb at his incarnation. And just as the Spirit of God ‘hovered over’ the face of the waters at creation (Gen.1:2, ESV) so he did over Mary’s womb (Luke 1:35, though here a different word is used). Through his mother Jesus became a true human being, born of woman and hence flesh (cf. Gen. 3:15; Job 14:1; Gal. 4:4; Heb. 2:14). Furthermore, through her he became a son of Adam (Luke 3:38), of David and of Abraham (Mt. 1:1) according to nature.

Eden the Womb of Mankind

To my knowledge the Bible nowhere explicitly refers to Eden as the womb of mankind (though Ezek. 28:13-15 certainly implies that to be in Eden is to be in the womb), and it may be complained that the evidence on which the assertion is based is purely inferential. This must be conceded but, as we shall see, there is a good deal of evidence.

First, there are hints in Job 3 where Job in his distress regrets the day of his birth (cf. 5:6f.; 14:1f.) and emphasises the fact that he came forth from his mother’s womb (vv.10f., cf.10:18f.; 31:15). Yet in 4:19 Eliphaz and in 10:9 Job himself recall, like the Psalmist (103:14, cf. 78:39), that they are made of dust or clay (cf. Job 33:6), in other words replicas of Adam at creation (1 Cor. 15:48f.; 2 Cor. 4:7). This immediately points up the fleshly nature of the second Adam who was born of woman (Gal. 4:4, cf. Job 14:1) and therefore of the earth – a fact that is far from being denied when Paul contrasts the two in 1 Corinthians 15:45-49.

Like Job, Jeremiah suffers much and laments the fact that his mother gave him birth (20:14) instead of keeping him in her womb where by implication he was blessed like Adam in Paradise (v.17, cf. 1:5; Rom. 9:11). Then in verse 18, in words that are reminiscent of the Genesis 3:17-19, he refers to days of toil, sorrow and shame (cf. Job 3:11ff.; 5:6f.). Clearly Jeremiah’s life is to some degree a reflection, repetition, replication, re-enactment or recapitulation of that of his original progenitor.

Nakedness

A striking feature of Adam and Eve in the Garden was their nakedness (Gen. 2:25; 3:7,10f.). Nakedness is noted elsewhere in the Bible, that is, in Job 1:21 (cf. Eccl. 5:15; 12:7). What is actually said here is that Job came naked from his mother’s womb and will return there. But that is impossible (cf. John 3:4-6) unless we recognise once more that, as in Psalm 139:15, the earth is the original womb of Adam (Gen. 3:19; Ps. 30:9; 146:4; Eccl. 3:20). Certainly, nothing is said here about a garden, but we all know that babies are naked during gestation and in some parts of the world even later (cf. Ezek. 16:7,22,39). On the other hand we may think in terms of passing naked at death (cf. 1 Tim. 6:7, cf. 2 Cor. 5:3f.) into the next world or heavenly paradise as a result of the second birth. Whatever the case, so far as Adam and Eve are concerned, since they are clearly childlike adults, they are clothed before they leave the garden (Gen. 3:21).

Moral Innocence

Yet another feature of the womb noted in Scripture is that embryos are incapable of either knowing or doing good and evil (Rom. 9:11). Like Adam and Eve, they do not know the law (Isa. 7:15f., cf. 8:4), and where there is no law, there is no sin (Rom. 4:15, etc.). But when they do come to know it as a result of parental teaching some time after birth and weaning (cf. Dt. 4:9; Ps. 78:5-8), they break it and become transgressors (cf. Gen. 8:21; 1 Tim. 2:14; Rom. 3:23; 5:12; 7:9f.). This point is vital to Paul’s argument in Romans 9 regarding election, which excludes moral status.

No Return

The implication of God’s planting a garden (Gen. 2:8) is that the world outside is distinctively different and needs to be brought under man’s control. Clearly, once man was cast out of Eden, what before resembled an idyllic and almost parasitic existence (though note 2:5,15) was abruptly and permanently terminated. (In view of the fact that Eden was no longer inhabited and tilled, the conclusion must be drawn that it degenerated into or was reintegrated with the wilderness, cf. Isa. 6:11, etc. So the question, Where was Eden? referred to above, will presumably never be precisely answered.) Once outside, there is no going back (Gen. 3:24). There is no more re-entering Eden than there is one’s mother’s womb (cf. John 3:4-6). And as Paul discovered, the way to the tree of life is barred once sin has been committed and the promise forfeited (Rom. 7:9f.). The need to till the ground outside Eden (Gen. 3:23) would clearly involve much more effort than had been necessary earlier (cf. the umbilical cord and the baby sucking milk from its mother’s breast). However, he was now alienated from fellowship with God, from Eve and from the ground, which for him was cursed, a situation arising from and exacerbated by his continuing moral turbulence (cf. Gen. 4:11f.; John 8:34). Having said this, however, it is noticeable that fertile land like the garden of Eden appears elsewhere in Scripture, as Genesis 13:10, Numbers 16:13, cf. 11:5, and Isaiah 36:17 indicate, suggesting that the cosmic curse tradition has foisted on us, even if it existed, did not operate universally. In other words, Eden was a special place banishment from which had disturbing consequences like those experienced later at the time of the Exile.

The Promised Land

This leads to another point. Writers have often noted that the Promised Land or the land flowing with milk and honey is another, or type of, Eden, a sanctuary or temple, itself a sanctuary (Ezek. 8:6) of God (Ex. 15:16f.; Ps. 78:54; Mal. 3:1, cf. v.12).* Here again, while the blessings of obedience are immense (cf. Gen. 2:17 and Dt. 28:1-14), the supreme curse stemming from sin and rebellion is death in the wilderness of exile (Gen. 2:17; Dt. 30:15-20; Jer. 22:26f.; 44:14, etc.). For the children of Israel, returning to Egypt (Num. 14:3; Acts 7:39) was out of the question (cf. Dt. 17:16) even if it too was in some ways reminiscent of Eden (Num. 11:5; 16:13). In future, it was a punishment or curse, not a blessing (Jer. 24:8; Hos. 7:16; 8:13; 11:5, cf. Acts 7:43). Going backwards is regarded as a heinous sin throughout the Bible (cf. Jer. 7:24; 15:6 and e.g. Galatians; Heb. 11:15). In contrast, advancing to the goal of the Promised Land (Dt. 1:8,21, etc.) or, as Bunyan would remind us, progressing like pilgrims to the celestial city, is fundamental to our life here on earth (Heb. 11:13; 13:14). So, despite various OT passages like Isaiah 51:3, Ezekiel 36:34f. and Amos 9:13-15 which might suggest earthly restoration, in the NT all hope in a return to a mythical golden age or an earthly utopia or Eden is implicitly repudiated. So our goal is the heavenly land or city that dominated Abraham’s (Heb. 11:8-16) and Jesus’ vision (Heb. 12:1-2, cf. John 14:2; 17:5,24). Return for them too was out of the question as it was for Paul (Phil 3:13f., cf. Heb. 3:1).

So just as Eden, the womb of mankind, was the place or sanctuary where God was present, so Israel (Lev. 26:11f.), especially Zion and the temple (Dt. 12:5,11; 1 K. 8:13, etc.), was the place where he dwelt. It was holy ground (Jos. 5:15). It is therefore no surprise that exile was seen as a calamity like ejection from Eden. Yet even there the God of all the earth was himself a sanctuary to his people (Ezek. 11:16). But exile apart, rest even in the promised land was not permanent (cf. Heb. 3-4). Since it was earthly, it was by its very nature imperfect and incomplete (cf. 1 Cor. 15:50b).

Perfection

The biblical doctrine of perfection has been much neglected under the influence of Augustine on the one hand and Wesleyan perfectionism on the other. However, it is highly relevant to our present theme. If it refers to maturity and completion as suggested, for example, by James 1:4, then it inevitably implies imperfection (immaturity) at the start (Heb. 6:1; 1 Cor. 3:1f.). This is in fact spelt out in Genesis where Adam and Eve were spiritual children or, in racial terms, embryos (cf. 1 Cor. 3:1; Heb. 5:12-14) who knew neither good nor evil (Gen. 2:17, cf. Dt. 1:39; Num. 14:31; Isa. 7:15f.; Rom. 9:11, etc.). Of course, this was not intended to be a permanent state of affairs, which is one of the reasons for the giving of the commandment (2:17, cf. Dt. 8:2,16). While it promised (eternal) life, it in fact produced death (cf. Rom. 7:10). For all that, it set our first parents, like the devotees of Moses at a later stage of salvation history, on a somewhat uncertain road to maturity whether for evil (Gen. 15:16; James 1:15) or for good (cf. Dt. 4:9; 11:26f.; 30:15ff.; 1 Cor. 14:20; 3 John 11, etc.). And despite sin and the vicissitudes of life, all of us are called to finish our course (Luke 13:32; Acts 20:24; 2 Tim. 4:7) and achieve perfection in Christ (Heb. 2:10; 5:9; Phil. 3:12-15, etc.). In this world, from the womb to the tomb we are pilgrims and exiles (1 Pet. 2:11; Heb. 12:1) seeking the culmination of our God-given life in heaven (Heb. 11:13). In other words, our end is greater than our beginning (cf. Hag. 2:9).

Paradise Regained

Commentators often remark on the similarity that exists between Genesis 2 and 3 and Revelation 22 in particular. Clearly in the latter, the Eden or paradise we once experienced is re-experienced in enhanced form as it was to some extent in the well-watered and fertile Promised Land flowing with milk and honey (cf. Dt. 6:10f.; 8:7-9; 11:10-12). So it is not simply the original restored, as an over-literalistic interpretation of the OT might lead us to think (Isa. 51:3; Ezek. 36:35), for the wheel does not come a literal full circle as in paganism, but it achieves its end or objective in perfection (cf. Rev. 2:7; 3:21). It is in fact a different, spiritual, transcendent, heavenly or glorified Eden of which the first, like Adam himself (Rom. 5:14), is only a type (cf. Heb. 8:5;9:11,23, etc.). How then can it reasonably be symbolised by the womb? Isaiah paints a picture which has the original Eden as its background. Here Mother Zion (cf. Heb. 12:22) not only gives birth to her children painlessly and instantaneously (66:8, cf. Gal. 4:26; 1 Cor. 15:51f.) but also, as the exquisite maternal imagery indicates, provides “a self-contained system of total supply” (Motyer). In Revelation 22, however, apart from having some of the same features of the old one, like the presence of God, the tree of life, fruit trees and the river, the new Eden has one outstandingly different characteristic which reminds us immediately of the womb, that is, the menstrual cycle of autonomous fertility and fruit bearing (Ezek. 47:12; Rev. 22:2), reminiscent of the year of Jubilee celebrated in the Promised Land (Lev. 25:10-12,19). Doubtless the most important features of both Genesis and Revelation are the presence and fellowship of God but with the added bonus in the latter of vision (Rev. 22:4, cf. Ps. 27:4; Mt. 5:8; John 17:24). These are the goal of practically the whole of Scripture. As Jesus himself indicated, eternal life is to know the only true God and the Christ he has sent (John 17:3). It is with God that we are intended to dwell in intimate fellowship (Rev. 21:3,4,7,22,23; 22:3-5) and to be covered by his protective wings (cf. Ps. 36:7; 57:1-3; 61:4; Mt. 23:37) as was promised at the start of the journey (Gen. 17:7; Ex. 6:7; 25:8; 29:45; Lev. 26:12, etc.). There is little wonder that our heavenly paradise (cf. Luke 23:43), characterised as it is by the divine presence, protection, provision and restored (but enhanced) fellowship, resembles, among other things (e.g. John 14:2f.), the womb — even more so than Abraham’s bosom (Luke 16:23). (Jesus of course stemmed from and returned to the bosom of the Father, John 1:18.) For with God is the fountain of life (Jer. 2:13; 17:13) and in his presence we feast and drink in perpetual joy from the river of his delights (Ps. 36:8f.; 16:11, cf. Mt. 8:11). But the supreme blessing is of course that the Lord himself is there (Ezek. 48:35; Rev. 21:3,22) as he was when he made us (Gen. 1:26,28; 2: 7ff.; 3:8ff.; 30:2; Job 31:15; Eccl. 11:5; Isa. 44:24; Jer. 1:5; Mal. 2:10, etc.).

Creation and Procreation

There is yet another point to make. As created in the image of God man is meant to act like God in various ways. One of the most elemental of these is in procreation. It was suggested above that after his creation in the earth Adam was sown like a seed in the Garden of Eden (cf. the incarnation and second Adam’s entering Mary’s womb). This being so, since he is the image and glory of God (cf. 1 Cor. 11:7-9,11-12), man is called on to re-enact God’s act of creation in procreation (Gen. 1:26-28, cf. Isa. 45:9f.). While he cannot go back to Eden himself (cf. Gen. 3:24; John 3:4), he can rejoice over his bride and sow his seed in his wife’s garden of delight (cf. Isa. 62:3-5; Prov. 5:15-19; Song 4:5,12,15; Dt. 24:5, cf. Mal. 3:12) ** to produce children made in his own image (cf. Gen. 5:1-3) as God had done before him. Ultimately, as Paul indicates, the mystery of marriage (Eph. 5:32) is a spiritual one (1 Cor. 6:17) and we who are the seed of the word (Mark 4:14,20; Jas. 1:18,21; 1 Pet. 1:23; 1 John 3:9) are like a bride over whom the bridegroom rejoices (Isa. 62:5; Heb. 12:2). It might usefully be added here that God is the greatest of all sowers, for he created the earth to be inhabited (Isa. 45:18; Jer. 27:5). Where it is uninhabited and unsown (Jer. 2;2) it is a desolation (Isa. 6:11, etc.). The same is true of a woman who has no husband; she too is desolate (cf. 2 Sam. 13:20). But even she, like the eunuch (cf. Jesus in Mt. 19:12), has wonderful prospects of fertility on the spiritual level (Isa. 54:1-7; 56:3-5, cf. Gal. 4:27; Mark 4:20; John 15:5) and, as a true daughter of barren Sarah, is enabled to produce ‘spiritual’ children (Gal. 4:26f.). For God’s word will not return to him void (Isa. 55:11, cf. 45:23).

Creation in Travail Awaiting Restoration of Fellowship

I have already pointed out that the earth was the womb of Adam at creation ***. In an extended sense it remains so throughout history. Both Jesus and Paul use the image of pregnancy to describe events at the end-time. Jesus refers to birth pangs (Mt. 24:7f.) and the new genesis (Mt. 19:28, cf. Tit. 3:5), and Paul tells us in Romans 8:18ff. that creation as a whole, including ourselves (cf. 2 Cor. 5:2-4), is in travail awaiting the grand finale, the glorious liberty of the children of God (cf. the year of Jubilee again, Lev. 25:10). To use slightly different but related imagery, sowing will lead to harvest time (Mark 4:26-29). Eventually the earth, having served its purpose of producing and nurturing the full number of the sons (children) of God (cf. Rev. 6:11), will be reaped and its fruit gathered and garnered (Mt. 3:12; 13:30; Jas. 5:7; Rev. 14:14ff.) or burnt (Heb. 6:7f.; 2 Pet. 3:7, 10-12). When this occurs, Eden, despite natural futility (Rom. 8:20) and sin, will, through the risen Christ (1 Cor. 15:12-20; 2 Tim. 1:10), have reached its intended goal of transformation and perfection (cf. Isa. 61:10f.; Rev. 11:15). Then bridegroom (Adam/Jesus) and bride (Eve/church) will dwell in nuptial intimacy and Edenic bliss in the Father’s house, temple or garden-city forever (John 14:2f., cf. Ps. 16:11; 23:6; 36:8f.; 37:4; 65:4; Rev. 21:1-4,22; 22:1-5).**** Here God’s people will be sheltered by God’s glorious presence (Isa. 60:19; Rev. 7:15; 21:3) serving as a wall of fire (Zech. 2:5, cf. Isa. 33:14ff.) reminiscent of the flaming sword which prevented sinful Adam and Eve from re-entering the original Eden with its access to the tree of life (cf. Gen. 3:24). Now, since nothing unclean can enter (Rev. 21:27), the curse or ban will no longer apply (Rev. 22:3).

So we may finally conclude that the destiny of what is conceived in the womb is the house of the eternal Father who never dies even if there is, as in the case of the Prodigal Son, temporary alienation.

* It is interesting to note that while Adam and Eve, once they had been banished from Eden, could not return (Gen. 3:24), the exiled Israelites could, once they repented, return to the Promised Land. This again suggests that Eden is the womb of mankind to which return is impossible (cf. John 3:4). On the other hand, and in violent contrast, from the heavenly Eden there is neither ban nor banishment (Rev. 22:3-5).

**It is worth noting that Ezekiel’s wife, like the temple or sanctuary (vv. 21,25), is referred to as “the delight of your eyes” (24:16, cf. Mal. 3:12).

*** It has often been observed that the Bible never refers to Mother Earth or Nature. The reason usually given, and doubtless correctly, is that since all the nations tended to worship nature and to regard it as a mother, the term might well have led unsuspecting Israelites into idolatry.

**** Cf. Acts 17:28. In the words of Brian Hill, Emeritus Professor of Murdoch University in Western Australia, in comment on Psalm 27, “He (God) is our true habitat“ (SU Bible Notes, July, August, September 2000). Cf. Acts 17:28.

The Old View

Traditionally, we are told that in the beginning God created a perfect world which was inhabited by the perfect human beings Adam and Eve. Despite this, God put the pair on probation, and even though the commandment he gave them warned of death (Gen. 2:17), in due course Eve broke it with Adam’s connivance (Gen. 3:6).

This sin had catastrophic implications, for the whole material universe was brought under a permanent curse as a result of it (Gen. 3:1ff.; Rom. 8:19ff.). Since death was the wages of sin (Gen. 2:17; Rom.6:23) and Adam was regarded as the covenant head and representative of the race, all human beings were subsequently born sinful ‘in him’ and hence subject to death even from birth (Rom. 5:12ff.).

Fortunately, though he himself was truly human, a son of Adam (Luke 3:38) and born of woman (Job 15:14; Gal. 4:4), Jesus, God’s Son, mysteriously (it is usually said by means of the virgin birth) avoided the transmission or imputation of Adam’s sin and became the covenant head of all the elect who, by the miracle of the new birth, put their trust in him.

He thus became their Saviour.

Brief though this outline is, it suggests serious distortion of what the Bible itself actually teaches and promotes a thoroughly unbiblical worldview. What then is true Christianity and the gospel it promotes?

The True View

In the beginning the eternal God created the temporal heavens and earth with human salvation ultimately in view (John 17:3; 1 Cor. 2:7ff.; Eph. 1:4,11; 2 Tim. 1:1,9; Tit.1:2; 1 Pet. 1:20; Ps.8:5). Creation was termed ‘good’, that is, literally beautiful or fit for its intended purpose (cf. Isa. 45:18; Mt. 5:45; Acts 14:17). On the other hand, it was manifestly imperfect in that it was neither eternal (cf. Heb.1:10-12; 7:3,16,24f.,28 and Gen.8:22; Ps.102:25ff.; Isa. 51:6,8; 54:9f. 65:17; Mt.5:18; 24:35; 2 Cor. 4:18, etc.) nor an end in itself (Col.1:15-20; 1 Cor. 15:24-28; Phil. 2:9-11). In other words, all creation had been subjected to corruption in hope from the start (Rom. 8:19-25).

Since, as first created, all human beings are ignorant of law, they know neither good nor evil and hence remain morally innocent until the law in some form makes an impact on their developing minds (Gen.2:17; 3:5,22, cf. Dt. 1:39; 1 Kings 3:7; Isa. 7:15f., cf. 8:4 and note Rom. 4:15; 7:8). Like Jesus himself they need to be perfected, that is, brought to maturity or completion (cf. Luke 2:41ff.; Mt. 3:15; 5:48; 19:21; Heb. 2:10; 5:8f., Jas. 1:4, etc.). Since they are created in God’s image, their goal is to take on his likeness (Eph. 5:1, cf. Mt. 5:48; Col. 3:9f.). Thus they are all put on probation by means of commandment or law (Gen. 2:17; Dt. 8:2,16; 30:15-20). Though they themselves as flesh are physically part of a naturally autonomous, recalcitrant, futile and corruptible creation (note Gen. 2:5,15; Rom. 8:19ff.), they are called to exercise dominion over it (Gen.1:26,28). This forms the background of the war between flesh (earth, this age) and spirit (or Spirit, heaven, the age to come, cf. Gen. 4:7; Gal. 5:16f.; 1 Pet. 2:11; James 4:1, etc.). In the event, the flesh or human nature, being weak (Ps. 78:39; 103:14; Mt.26:41), succumbs to temptation (Gen.3:1ff.; Jas. 1:14f.) and runs riot (Gen. 6:5ff.). As Paul implies in Romans 7:14, whenever flesh and law collide, the flesh gives way to some extent and man is enslaved by his own sin (John 8:34; Rom.6:16; 7:7ff.; Jas. 2:10; 2 Pet. 2:19f., etc.).

In Romans 7:9f. Paul elaborates on teaching in Genesis. The commandment (cf. Gen. 2:17) that is first apprehended by all human beings when as children they achieve rationality and moral consciousness, is a promise of life and a means of escape from the universal corruption and destruction to which the material creation is headed once it has served its purpose (Mt. 13:37-43; 2 Pet. 3:7,10-12; Rev. 14:14ff.; Rom. 8:19ff.). Failure to keep it means relapse into creation’s inherent corruption (Gen. 3:19; cf. Rom. 8:10; Gal. 6:8), and the only way of evading spiritual death is by acceptance of or submission to the grace of God (Rom.11:32; Gal. 3:22, cf. Ps. 68:20; 49:7,15).

The good news is that all who put their trust in and confess Christ will be saved. For he alone of all men, as the true Son of God, was able to keep the whole law and exercise dominion over the earth (Heb. 2:9) including his own flesh (cf. James 3:2). Thus in accordance with the divine promise he not only received the Spirit or eternal life for himself (Mt. 3:17, cf. Gal. 3:2,5) but also earned it for his fellows (Heb. 2:9ff.). His fulfilment of all righteousness (Mt. 3:15) culminated when he lay down his life (John 10:17f.; Phil. 2:8) as a sacrifice for the sins of his people (1 Pet. 3:18).

So, in a world universally subjected to corruption (Rom. 8:19ff, cf. Jos. 23:14; 1 K. 2:2), Jesus brought life and incorruption (Gk.) to light for the first time (2 Tim. 1:10). And this, says Paul, constitutes the basis of his gospel (v.11, cf. Rom. 1:16f.).

Since man cannot keep the law which promises life (Gen. 2:17; Rom. 7:10) in order to achieve the righteousness (Dt. 6:25; 1 John 3:7) required by a perfect Creator as the indispensable precondition of new birth or eternal life (Lev. 18:5, etc.), the gospel or good news that Christians proclaim is that Christ has done it for us (see espec. Gal. 3:10-14; Rom. 8:3). He has at once borne our sins and provided us with what Luther called an ‘alien righteousness’ by which to justify us before God (cf. Phil. 3:9).

This has always been the divine intention. Far from providing the means for any mere human being, who is flesh, to boast in his presence by law-keeping (1 Cor. 1:29; Rom. 3:19f.; Gal. 2:16), God has made it certain that he alone will be the Saviour of his people (Isa. 45:22) in Christ (Isa. 45:23; Phil. 2:5-11; 2 Cor. 5:17-19; Rom. 11:32).

It is worth noting that the so-called exclusivism of the Christian gospel message, far from being based on one or two isolated verses like John 14:6 or Acts 4:12, is the very essence of biblical teaching which applies to all mankind universally. For – Only Jesus, the man, the second Adam, the only Son of the Father, never sinned (Heb. 4:15) but kept the law (Mt. 3:17; John 6:38; 15:10) and thereby inherited the divine promise of eternal life (Gen. 2:17; Lev. 18:5, etc.).

Only Jesus, the last Adam and man’s representative, having conquered (John (16:33; Rev. 5:5) and fulfilled all righteousness (Mt. 3:15), was ever in a position to lay down his life for his fellows (cf. Ps. 49:7f.; Ezek. 14:14ff.), rise from the dead and be crowned with glory and honour (Heb. 2:9ff.; Rom.2:7).

Only Jesus, the one mediator between God and man (1 Tim. 2:5), was able to enter the very presence of God to act as our eternal high priest (Heb. 6:19f.; 7:24ff.; 10:19-25, etc.) and bring us to him (1 Pet. 3:18; Heb. 9:24; Rev. 3:21).

Only Jesus has the power to send the Spirit and grant life to those who put their trust in him (Mt. 11:27; John 15:26; 17:2; 1 Cor. 15:45b; 1 John 5:11f.).

Only Jesus is able to return in the power and glory of God (Mt. 16:27,etc.) to rescue his own (1 Thes. 4:13ff.; Heb. 9:28) from the destruction that awaits the material universe (Mark 13:27; Heb. 12:27; 2 Pet. 3:7,10-12; 2 Thes. 1:7-10; Rev. 20:11; 21:1,4, etc.) at the end of history (Mt.13:37-43).

Recently, representatives of the Jehovah’s Witnesses called on me. In a rather hurried conversation they told me that the word ‘trinity’ was not to be found in Scripture and was therefore an ecclesiastical invention. I assured them that the Trinity was essential to an adequate understanding of the Bible and that the evidence for it in the NT was pervasive and compelling.

Evangelical Christians, especially in the Reformed camp, make much of the concept of “the Fall”, and constantly refer to a “fallen creation”. Here I do have a problem, since not only is the term missing from Scripture but the traditional idea too seems to be absent (though note falling into temptation, judgement, etc. in James 1:2, cf. 1 Tim. 3:6,7; 6:9; Heb. 10:31, etc.) (1*). Why then does it exercise such profound influence? The answer is to be found in the history of dogma.

In the course of its history, Western Christendom was powerfully affected by the teaching of Augustine of Hippo, not least at the Reformation. Not only was Luther an Augustinian monk before he became a Reformer, but Calvin, who had an impressive knowledge of Augustine, was also much under his sway. So what did Augustine teach?

He held that in the beginning God made a perfect creation and perfect human beings, Adam and Eve, to rule over it. Despite their original holiness and righteousness, the latter (mysteriously) “fell” into sin, the original sin. As a consequence, the whole of creation under their dominion was placed under a curse and it too was regarded as “fallen”. Thus, though Scripture fails to mention it, “the Fall” came to dominate theology, and Augustinians became obsessed with sin to the exclusion of other basic considerations (see espec. Westminster Confession of Faith ch. 6 and Art. 9 of the C of E).

What does the Bible actually teach? It tells us that the eternal God brought the material creation into existence. Though it was termed “good”, that is, it was created to serve a purpose (cf. Gen. 2:9; 3:6; Eccl. 3:11), it was necessarily temporal, for otherwise it would have been on a par with its Creator and without beginning or end (cf. Heb. 7:3). The temporal and hence “imperfect”, that is, inadequate, incomplete or defective, nature of creation, the footstool of God, is brought to our attention throughout Scripture (see e.g. Ps. 90:2; 102:25-27; 103:14-18; Isa. 34:4; 51:6,8; 66:1; Mt. 24:35; Heb. 12:27; Rev. 21:1, etc.), not least by the fact that man, himself a creature, is under the sovereignty of God given dominion over it. In the mind of Paul, being naturally temporary and corruptible, creation was subjected like all that is physically visible (Rom. 8:24f.; 2 Cor. 4:18) to futility from the start (Rom. 8:19ff.) and is in strong contrast with the invisible eternal world or heaven (cf. Heb. 1:10-12, etc.).

How does this impact on our perception of the traditional “Fall”? We need to understand that as created, far from being perfect, righteous and holy, Adam, being totally ignorant of law, was as flesh (cf. Gen. 6:17), like the animal creation in general, without understanding (Ps. 32:9, etc.). Hence, knowing neither good nor evil he was morally neutral. Like a (spiritual) baby, in the course of his development, he was given knowledge of the law (or more specifically the commandment) which was at once a promise and a threat (Gen. 2:17). On the one hand, it promised (eternal) life (which necessarily implies escape from earthly and hence fleshly bondage to corruption) if it was kept and, on the other, death if it was not. As we all know, Adam failed to keep this commandment and as a consequence became prey to the futility and corruption of the creation he had been called on to master (Gen. 3:19). Since this commandment was transgenerational (2*) like the law of Moses which followed it (Dt. 4:9; Ps. 78:5f., etc.), all mankind with the single exception of Jesus, the second Adam, gave way to temptation and sin (Rom. 3:23; 5:12). They likewise succumbed inexorably to death (Rom. 5:12) and the law of the physical creation (Rom. 8:20).

If this is true, the idea of “Fall” in the traditional sense is alien to Scripture. Adam and Eve, in contrast with the devil who fell like lightning from heaven (Luke 10:18), did not enjoy any Miltonic “high estate” of righteousness from which to fall (cf. Rev. 2:5, 3*). While it may be argued that as God’s creatures they enjoyed fellowship of a very immature kind with the God who brought them into being (cf. Gen. 30:2; Job 31:15, etc.) and from whom they became alienated on account of their sin, they were initially created innocent, that is ‘good’ like the rest of creation (cf. 1 Tim. 4:4), and simply failed to attain to the righteousness (Dt. 6:25; 1 John 3:7) and hence to the life the commandment originally promised on condition of obedience. Consequently they returned (fell!) like the rest of the animal creation, which was also flesh, to the dust from which they were taken (Gen. 3:19; Eccl. 3:19f.). And like our first parents, as Paul tells us in Romans 3:23, we, their posterity, all, with the notable exception of Jesus (Heb. 2:9), sin and come short of the glory of God to which we are called (Gen. 2:17; Ps. 8:5f.; Rom. 2:7,10, etc.). As a consequence, as sinners we all earn our wages in death (Rom. 5:12) and undergo complete physical corruption.

While we may doubt the traditional understanding of the fall of Adam, the idea of fall is, as we have seen, by no means entirely foreign to Scripture. For example, we read in Hebrews 3:12 of the warning to believers against falling away (departing) from the living God (cf. 1 Tim. 4:1, and note Galatians 1:6-9 which refers to the turning away of the Galatians who had been evangelized by Paul). Here the idea seems to be that through faith in Jesus Christians have been restored to the (embryonic or Edenic) fellowship (4*) with God they had at their creation in the womb (Job 31:15, etc.) but, like their OT predecessors, they may now be tempted to stray and become unfaithful yet again (3:13). According to the author of Hebrews in particular, perseverance or endurance, even in times of hardship and persecution, is essential for those who intend arriving safely at the heavenly city (Heb. 11:10,16; 12:22; 13:14). Descent or fall into apostasy (cf. Gal. 5:4; Heb. 6:4-6; 10:26-30; 2 Pet. 3:17) is a real possibility for all professing Christians, and needs to be guarded against.

A similar kind of fall is posited by Paul of Israel in Romans 11:11 (cf. v.22) where he uses the word paraptoma (vb. parapipto) to signify transgression which leads to the loss of a God-given position (cf. Mt. 21:43; Acts 1:6) (5*). Here Paul’s concern would appear to be the total rejection of Israel, God’s own people, a notion regularly countered in the OT by the denial of the “full end” (as opposed to disciplinary punishment, cf. Ps. 89:30ff., etc.), reserved for the lawless and faithless (see e.g. Lev. 26:44; Jer. 30:11 and note Num. 14:35). Despite much evidence of sin, which will be overcome by Christ, Paul concludes that all believing Israel will be saved (Rom. 11:26).

Having said this, Scripture does entertain the idea of our having fallen, or rather, come short of the image (likeness) of God. Dunn suggests there is ambiguity as to whether Paul’s reference in Romans 3:23 is to a glory lost (cf. Augustine) or to a glory fallen short of (pp.93f.). The recognition that Adam, who had no knowledge of (the) law by which human beings become either righteous by obedience or unrighteous by disobedience (Dt. 6:25; Rom. 2:13; 1 John 3:7; Rom. 4:15; 7:8, etc.), was created innocent tips the scale in favour of coming short of the glory of God to which he was called (cf. Gen. 2:17; Ps. 8:5). Paul especially stresses that our initial call is to attain to the glory of God (Rom. 2:7,10, etc.) as Jesus did (Heb. 1:3; 2:9) by keeping the law and obeying the commandments of his Father (John 8:29; 14:31, etc.) despite trial and temptation. In other words, Augustine’s concepts of original (Adamic) righteousness, holiness and perfection are prime examples of putting the cart before the horse. They confuse the beginning with the end. If the second Adam was not perfect (complete, mature) by nature but had to fulfil his Father’s will in order to be perfected (Mt. 19:21; Heb. 2:9f.; 5:8f.; 7:28), how much more the first! The plain truth is that we all begin in innocence (Dt. 1:39, etc.) but fail to attain to the likeness of God because of our defective moral development (Rom. 3:23; 5:12). This is in sharp contrast to Jesus, as noted above, with whom the Father was well pleased (Mt. 3:17) and who obtained glory and honour in accordance with mankind’s original vocation (Gen. 1:26,28; Ps. 8:5; Heb. 2:9). But this was basic to the purpose of God from the start. He never intended that ‘flesh’ should justify itself before him by the works of the law (Rom. 3:19f.; 1 Cor. 1:29; Gal. 2:16; 3:11). Rather his plan was that all should come short of their own accord so that he could exercise his mercy on all in Christ (Rom. 11:32; Gal. 3:22; Phil. 2:9-11). Thus, not without reason did the prophet call on the ends of the earth to turn to God and be saved (Isa. 45:22f.).

So I conclude that the traditional “Fall”, not to mention the inherently contradictory notion of the imputed sin of Adam for which the wages of death are paid (Rom. 4:1-8; 5:12; 6:23), is false to Scripture. Adam and Eve may have been physically adult (perfect, mature, cf. 1 Cor. 15:46), but spiritually they were mere babes who had to grow up and be perfected (cf. Heb. 12:23). Their endlessly repeated paradigmatic sin (cf. Ps. 106:6; Isa. 65:6f.), which we might be inclined to dismiss as a mere peccadillo characteristic of children (cf. Gen. 8:21; Jer. 3:25, etc.), is nonetheless symptomatic of mankind’s perennial problem – his failure to exercise dominion in accordance with the will of God. Even if we, like Adam (Gen. 2:15,19f.), have some success in taming nature (cf. the Canaanites in the Promised Land), we abysmally fail to control ourselves and hence come short of perfection (James 3:2-5). In other words, we all sin (Ps. 143:2; Rom. 3:23) in our youth (Gen. 8:21; Jer. 3:25, etc.) and earn the wages of death by our works (Rom. 5:12; 6:23). As Paul graphically intimated with regard to himself, despite his best intentions he lacked the ability to control his own earth-derived flesh (Rom. 7:14). Like Adam, as a child he failed to keep the parental commandment (Rom. 7:9f.). But while Adam took the devil’s way in an abortive attempt to become like God (cf. Phil. 2:6), Jesus, the second Adam, remained faithful to the divine intention (cf. Mt. 4:1-11). Thus, having finished his course and the work he had to do (Luke 13:32; John 6:38; 17:4), he was glorified at God’s right hand (Heb. 1:3, etc.). And it is in him alone that men and women in general fulfil their calling and receive the crown of life promised to Adam at the start (Gen. 2:17; James 1:12, cf. 2:5; 1 Pet. 5:4; Rev. 2:10).

Food For Thought

Finally, it is worth observing that while Satan could fall from heaven (Lu. 10:18), it is more than a little difficult to understand how Adam could fall from the earth (Gen. 2:7).

1* Nonetheless popular Reformed writers make “the Fall” central to their theology. See, for example, R.C. Sproul’s “Chosen by God, 1986.

2* Apart from being implied in Romans 7:9f., this is nowhere explicitly taught, but it is a necessary inference from the transgenerational nature of the law of Moses which had to be taught to children (Dt. 4:9; Ps. 78:4-8, etc.) who, like Adam, are born knowing neither the law nor good and evil (Dt. 1:39, cf. Isa. 7:15f.; 8:4).

3* The Augustinian notion that “we lost our righteousness in Adam” must be rejected as patently unbiblical. In a sense, we may regard creation in the image of God as man’s “high estate”. But the traditional notion that Adam lost the image as opposed to the likeness of God (came short of his glory) is belied by Genesis 9:6 and James 3:9. Dunn draws attention to the fall of the king of Babylon depicted in Isaiah 14:12-15 and that of the king of Tyre in Ezekiel 28:16f. (p.81 n.7).

4* That babies who are created by God (cf. also Job 34:19; Ps. 139:13-16; Jer. 1:5, etc.) and know neither the law nor good nor evil (Dt. 1:39; Num. 14:3,29-33, etc.) follow (or recapitulate) the pattern established by Adam and Eve (and under their influence, Rom. 5:12-21), seems to me to be beyond reasonable dispute. The tendentious translation/interpretation of verses like Psalm 51:5 which occurs in NIV, REB, NRSV needs urgent overhaul (cf. KJV, RSV, NASB, ESV).

5* The word paraptoma, along with hamartia and parabasis, is used in Romans 5:12ff. If it has any significance as “fall”, it is certainly not from original righteousness. The only moral quality that can be attributed to Adam is his sin. Cf. 3* above.

Reference

J.D.G.Dunn, The Theology of Paul the Apostle, London/NewYork, 1998.

Accounts of Jesus’ conspicuously Trinitarian baptism at his reception of the Spirit in the synoptics (see Mt. 3:13-17; Mark 1:9-11; Lu. 3:21f.) bear strong resemblance to Pentecost and the later experiences of the disciples (e.g. Acts 10:44-48). Thus the picture painted by the gospel writers makes it entirely reasonable for us to draw the conclusion that our Lord’s baptism is the archetype of all Christian baptism.

Historically, however, the Church has not seen it this way. Even the human agent of Jesus’ baptism, John the Baptist whose baptism was with a view to repentance (Mark 1:4), reacted negatively and uncomprehendingly to Jesus’ request (Mt. 3:14) and, given the latter’s sinlessness and lack of need to repent, there is little wonder. Then the inference has sometimes been drawn that Jesus’ baptism involved proxy repentance, i.e. it signified a vicarious action of Jesus on behalf of his people. This is hardly convincing since repentance for transgression is a personal matter (Mark 1:15; Rom. 2:4). If it were true, it would have catastrophic theological and moral implications (cf. Mt. 3:9). Then again, Jesus’ endowment with the Spirit can be explained as a preparation for his ministry as Messiah, which it certainly was, but if this involves a denial that his baptism was the ideal baptism (see, e.g. Beasley-Murray’s chapter The Foundation of Christian Baptism, pp. 63ff.), it inevitably raises a variety of questions. For when too much emphasis is laid on the difference between Jesus and his disciples to the exclusion of his similarity to, even identity with, them at certain points (cf. Heb. 2:14ff.), there is a great danger of lapsing into the ancient heresy of docetism which denied Jesus’ true humanity.

So it needs first to be established that Jesus was a real man. According to John 1:14 the Word became flesh (see also Rom. 1:3). He was born of woman (Mt. 1:25; Lu. 2:7; Gal. 4:4, cf. 1 Tim. 3:16; Heb. 2:14), was a true son of Adam (Lu. 3:38), a genuine Jew and son of the commandment (cf. Lu. 2:41ff.) and was made like his fellows in every respect (Heb. 2:17). Yet, in spite of being tempted like all men, he did not personally sin (Heb. 2:18; 4:15; 1 Pet. 2:22). Therefore, though naturally mortal, his body was not subject to death on account of sin (cf. Rom. 8:10f.).

In seeking to glorify his Father Jesus’ main task was to redeem mankind (see e.g. John 10:15; 15:13; Heb. 2:14; 1 John 3:8, etc.). But in order to do this he had to act AS man FOR man (Heb. 2:6-10,14f.,17f.) in accordance with the original promise made to Adam (Gen. 2:17). Once he became flesh, however, he was made weak (Mt. 26:41), dependent and susceptible to temptation (Mt. 4:1-11), sin and death (2 Cor. 5:21; 13:4, cf. Rom. 8:3). As a true man there is a sense in which his divinity became an irrelevance, for, though he was truly the Son of God, he was granted no special favours or privileges (note Mt. 4:6f.; Heb. 5:7f.). As a man he had to live and act as a man, indeed, as man perfectly at harmony with the whole law of Moses, in order to receive the life originally promised to Adam (Gen. 2:17; Lev. 18:5; Dt. 30:20; 32:47; Ezek. 20:11,13,21; Mt. 19:17; Mark 10:19; Luke 10:28; 18:18-20; Rom. 10:5). He was thus subject to the entire gamut of the law in all its forms. In other words, though like all human babies he was born knowing neither good nor evil (Dt. 1:39; Isa. 7:15f.), he had to achieve personal righteousness under the law in the flesh (see Gen. 2:17; Dt. 6:24f., cf. Rom. 8:3), for apart from it he could not inherit life (Ezek. 18:5-9, etc.). And it was not until he had received the approval of his Father at the end of his probation under (the) law (Mt. 3:17, cf. Gal. 3:24; 4:2) that he gained life in accordance with the OT promise most clearly enunciated (though constantly repeated) in Leviticus 18:5. It was at his baptism that the Spirit was said to descend and, in contrast with the OT saints, remain on him (John 1:32f., cf. 3:34). It was then that he was openly acknowledged as the Son of God (Mt. 3:17). This permanent indwelling of the Spirit surely implied not merely that he had eternal life, that is, was born from above, but that he would persevere to the end. Thus being and action, ontology and function were seen to coincide in him who walked not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit (cf. Rom. 8:4).

If this is so, then Jesus’ baptism would appear to be paradigmatic, setting the pattern for all Christian baptism. It may be objected, however, that John the Baptist on his own confession baptised only with water (e.g. Mark 1:8). While this may be true in general, it was certainly not so on the occasion of Jesus’ baptism when John clearly became the human instrument in a divine action.

It should be noted here that the indispensable precondition of what the apostle John calls the new birth or eternal life is righteousness. This is implied in Genesis 2:17 and made evident as early as the third chapter of Genesis where Adam and Eve’s failure to keep the commandment debarred them from the tree of life (3:22-24). The point of mentioning this is to underline the fact that Jesus was acting on behalf of all men and women throughout the history of the race. But as a man himself, as well as representative man, the last Adam, he had to gain life by living sinlessly in contrast with his original human progenitor, the first Adam, in order to put himself in a position to bring life to his fellows as the pioneer and perfecter of their faith (cf. Heb. 2:9-18). In other words, he had to have power over his own flesh (Rom. 8:3) in order to give eternal life to all whom the Father had given him (cf. John 17:2). While he was a servant still under the law, he was bent on achieving personal righteousness and was in no position to act on behalf of others (cf. Luke 17:7-10). Once, however, he had gained life for himself and been openly acknowledged as God’s Son (Mt. 3:17, etc.), he was not merely in his Father’s house (John 8:35) but able to serve as its very foundation for his people (Heb. 3:6). As the one who had uniquely kept the written law (cf. Ps. 143:2), he was now in a position to fulfil all righteousness (Mt. 3:15, cf. 19:21; Heb. 7:18f.). On the one hand, his goal was complete maturity or spiritual perfection as a man (Mt. 5:48; Heb. 5:8f., cf. Jas. 1:4; 3:2), on the other, his aim was to do his Father’s will by sacrificing himself on behalf of others (John 10:17f.; Acts 10:38) in an act of total commitment (John 4:34; 14:31) and supererogation. So, accepting by faith the sin of man imputed to him, he died on the cross and expiated the sins of all who put their trust in him. To them he freely gave a righteousness (justification by faith) that they were completely unable to provide for themselves (Ps. 143:2; Rom. 3:21ff.; 5:15f.; Phil. 3:9; 2 Cor. 5:21; 1 Pet. 3:18, etc.). And in this way, he opened the gate of heaven and gave them the eternal life originally promised to Adam on condition of his obedience (Gen. 2:17, cf. 1 John 2:25. Note also Rom. 5:17,18,21 where Paul maintains that righteousness leads to life.).

This brings us back to the new birth. Scripture makes it clear beyond equivocation (see espec. John 3:1ff. and 1 Cor. 15:42ff.) that regeneration relates primarily not to our sin, as Augustine taught, but to our earthly nature as flesh*. John 3:1-8, like 1 Corinthians 15:42-50, does not even mention sin. In verse 6 Jesus lays it down that what is born of the flesh is flesh and what is born of the Spirit is spirit (cf. John 1:13). But what applies to Nicodemus and to the rest of mankind must have applied equally to Jesus himself since, as we saw above when insisting that he was truly man born of woman, he also was flesh (cf. Heb. 2) and as such had to achieve righteousness under the law. Had he not been born again, he could not have entered the kingdom of God himself (John 3:5) least of all been the agent of its inauguration here on earth (cf. Mt. 12:22-32) and its very means of entry for his people (John 10:7; 14:6).

The latter point is underscored by Paul in 1 Corinthians 15:50 (cf. 1 Pet. 1:23). Having already indicated that with all human beings (and, on the assumption of his incarnation, including Jesus) the flesh or the natural or physical comes first (v.46), he adds that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God. Admittedly, Paul’s focus of attention is the body, but the idea that we can experience a spiritual change apart from a bodily one (note vv.51ff.) would torpedo his entire argument here as elsewhere (2 Cor. 4:7-5:5; 1 Thes. 4:13ff.).

Another point of fundamental importance needs to be made in the effort to support the thesis that Jesus was the subject of regeneration: Jesus alone satisfied the demands of the OT covenant by keeping the written law to his Father’s satisfaction (Lev. 18:5; Ezek. 20:11,13,21; Mt. 3:17; 19:17-21, cf. Gal. 3:2,5, etc.) and so made incorruptible life a reality for the first time (cf. 2 Tim. 1:10). It is part of the essence of Paul’s theology that Jesus is the second or last Adam (1 Cor. 15:45ff., cf. Rom. 5:12ff.). As the One who at his incarnation descended from heaven with the express intention of ascending there again (cf. John 3:13; 6:62; 16:28) with his (spiritual) fellows in train (Heb. 2:10-18), he had to pave their way by pioneering the regenerate life himself as their representative (Heb. 2:10; 5:9; 6:20; 12:2). Thus, as the second Adam, having perfectly played out his first Adamic role in the ‘flesh’ (recapitulation) as both slave (in Egypt, Mt. 2:15) and servant under the law (Lu. 2:41ff.; cf. Gal. 4:1-4), he proceeded as the man of heaven to fulfil all righteousness (Mt. 3:15) by living out the spirit of the law in his majority as a son (Gal. 4:5; Acts 2:22; 10:38, cf. Mt. 19:21; 2 Cor. 3:2-6). Clearly as a servant bent on justifying himself before his Father he could do no good (meritorious) works (cf. Lu. 17:7-10) and, like John the Baptist, perform no miracles. But as the acknowledged and Spirit-filled Son he not only went about doing good (Acts 10:38, cf. Eph. 2:10) but also eventually capped his regenerate life by dying for and redeeming his sheep (John 10:15; 15:13; Gal. 4:5-7; 1 Cor. 15:45b). On the other hand, denial of Jesus’ regeneration, typically the logical and normal outcome of keeping the law (Gen. 2:17; Lev. 18:5), leaves him still under the law, in permanent minority (Gal. 4:1ff., cf. 3:23ff.), devoid of the Spirit yet nonetheless capable of fulfilling all righteousness and thereby achieving perfection. This is an impossible position to hold. So far as the author of Hebrews is concerned, it means he was never perfected (7:18f., cf. Mt. 19:21; Phil. 3:12-15) and was therefore incapable of perfecting his fellows (Heb. 2:10; 5:9; 7:14; 12:2). Such is the fruit of the erroneous dogma of original sin and a false covenant theology which fails to see that we are all first, even apart from sin, slaves, then, if we are Jews, servants, and finally by the grace of God sons (Gal. 4:1-7).

This is all so fundamentally important that it needs to be re-iterated and re-expressed. It is more than a little difficult to see how Jesus could do good works (Acts 10:38, cf. Eph. 2:10) and redeem people under the law (Gal. 4:5) if he was still under the law himself still being tested (cf. Ex. 16:4; Dt. 8:2,16) and doing his duty (Luke 17:10). The point of his baptism was that with the outpouring of the Spirit he was now not only by nature a son, the Son, but also functionally so since he was led by the Spirit. He had kept the law which promised life and now he had gained it. His was not an adoption as ours is. Rather, he who was by nature God’s Son, born of woman (nature) and subjected to the law in all its rigour had graduated in accordance with Paul’s teaching in Galatians 4:1-7.

In the upshot, it is clear that just as Jesus’ righteousness is the basis of ours in justification, so his regeneration is the foundation of ours in life. In other words, it is impossible to be born again in this world apart from faith in Christ (John 3:16; 1 John 5:11f.). We depend on him who as a man like us became a life-giving spirit (1 Cor. 15:45) for both righteousness and life (cf. Rom. 5:21).

Reference to Jesus’ sonship, of course, only serves to underline the fact that he underwent the new birth since the one implies the other. While the church has remained blind to the implication, the devil was all too aware of the significance of Jesus’ baptism. He thus pointedly tempted him as a regenerate son, the Son (Mt. 4:3,6), just as God had tested the Israelites, collectively his adopted son (Ex. 4:22), in the wilderness long before (Dt. 8:2).

On the assumption that the reasoning presented above is in essence correct, we can now agree with Robinson that regeneration is “the normal and ‘natural’ completion of what was begun in the first birth” (p. 327). Surely this is precisely what Paul is intimating in 1 Corinthians 15:42ff., not to mention Jesus’ own teaching in John 3. It must immediately be added, however, that for us sinners it is now only ‘natural’ because Jesus himself has made it so. Apart from his own new birth consequent on his keeping the law, all other new births would be impossible because of sin. To clarify the issue, it must be said that God’s original purpose, which involved man’s glorification (Gen. 1:26,28; Ps. 8:5f.;Rom. 2:7,10; 8:28-30; 2 Cor. 3:18; Eph. 1:4f.; Heb. 2:9) and perfection (Mt. 5:48, cf. Rom. 8:29) but which was thwarted by sin, has now been effected in Jesus (Heb. 2:10; 5:8f.; 7:28; 1:3) and through him in his people both as community and individuals. (Cf. Westcott: “We cannot but believe that under any circumstances … there would have been a progress in the race, as well as in the individual, towards the gradual fulfilment of the idea of humanity…. In other words, the endeavour to follow out the normal development of the human race leads us to look for that which answers to the Incarnation, by which the completed body might be brought into a final unity of fellowship with God”, p.308. See also Warfield, who referred to Jesus’ human development as the only strictly normal development from birth to manhood, the world has ever seen, p.160).

The plain truth is then that, as Paul points out, we who are Christians follow the pattern established by the two Adams. The first, though made in the image of God, is physical (natural) and earthly, the second is spiritual and heavenly (1 Cor. 15:45-49). If we reach maturity or perfection we all necessarily conform to both on our way to heaven. Since, however, God does not permit fleshly man to boast (1 Cor. 1:29; Eph. 2:9), we all, with the single exception of Jesus (it is here, of course, that his divinity is of vital importance), fall into sin (Rom. 3:19-23). Thus Jesus alone of all men that ever lived achieved life (or the new birth and blessing of the Spirit, cf. Mt. 3:16f.), on the basis of his righteousness under the law in fulfilment of his Father’s promise made under the law (Lev. 18:5, cf. Gen. 2:17; Dt. 32:46f., etc.). And having as a man, the second Adam, gained life for himself, he was thus in a position to achieve it for his fellow men (cf. Heb. 2:10-13). If Adam sinned and brought in death, Jesus remained sinless and attained to righteousness and life (Rom. 5:12-21; 6:23; 2 Tim. 1:10).

In the last analysis, all who deny that Jesus needed to be born again are failing to appreciate, first, God’s purpose for man (Eph. 1:4; 4:13; Col. 1:28; 2:2, etc.) and, secondly, what the author of Hebrews is affirming when he says: “It was fitting that he, for whom and by whom all things exist, in bringing many sons to glory, should make the founder of their salvation perfect through suffering. For he who sanctifies and those who are sanctified all have one origin. That is why he is not ashamed to call them brothers” (2:10f., ESV, cf. also 3:1-6). This failure means that they fall prey to docetism and hence deny the incarnation. Little wonder that the latter was regarded as the most abysmal of heresies in NT times (1 John 4:1-3; 2 John 7, etc.). This being the case, it is imperative to ask why practically the whole church especially in the West has gone astray in denying to Jesus the necessity of regeneration. The answer doubtless lies, as Robinson hints in the reference above, in its uncritical following of Augustine of Hippo.

It needs to be recognised that Augustine became a colossus in the minds of Christians in the fifth and following centuries. His towering figure dominated later theologians including the Reformers (Luther, it must be remembered, was an Augustinian monk and Calvin could quote Augustine off the cuff.) While the latter rejected to some extent his ecclesiology, they accepted his doctrine of grace and regarded him as the great enemy of pernicious Pelagianism. (Pelagius emphasised free will and righteousness by works). Despite his mother’s being a professing Christian, Augustine’s early training was pagan. But worse, he adopted Manicheism and the view that the flesh was evil. Contemporary detractors like Julian of Eclanum maintained that he remained manicheistic to the end, and with good reason (see e.g. H.Chadwick, pp. 111f.). For example, it is now acknowledged by leading scholars that he regarded sex as evil (see e.g. Rist, pp.319ff.; Cunliffe-Jones, pp.162f.). Holding this view it was inevitable, subsequent to the sin of Adam, that for him desire (or carnal lust or concupiscence) and the flesh in general were tarnished. Thus to this day the church frequently regards the flesh as evil. (See e.g. Barrett, p.148, denied by Dunn, p.391. On page 156, commenting on Romans 8:3, Barrett, cf. Barth, even goes so far as to suggest that Jesus took on our “fallen nature” but constantly overcame the proclivity to sin! This is said in defiance of logic and is clearly a profound error.) But Jesus as ‘flesh’ must have experienced the normal desires of the flesh and been unavoidably caught up in the war between flesh and spirit (cf. Gal. 5:16ff.; 1 Pet. 2:11, pace Art. 9 of the C of E) common to all mankind or he could not have been tempted (cf. James 1:12ff.). If this is not the case, we are forced to conclude (a) that he was not human; (b) that he never gained victory over temptation; and hence (c) he was disqualified from acting as our high priest (Heb. 2:17f.; 4:15). However, it is quite clear that some ‘lusts’ (Gk. epithumia) are permissible (see e.g. Dt. 12:15,20f.; 21:11f. and espec. Lu. 22:15) indicating that human beings as ‘flesh’ have desires by nature (creation) like the Spirit himself (Gal. 5:17). What is forbidden, however, is the kind of ‘lust’ referred to in the tenth commandment (cf. Mt. 5:28; 2 Pet. 2:14), but this cannot be extended to what is entirely legitimate (i.e. not forbidden by the law, cf. Gal. 5:23) and intrinsically natural, despite the views of Augustine. For example, sexual relations between husband and wife are entirely legitimate, ordained by God in fact for the propagation of the race (Gen. 1:28). By contrast, however, adultery is illegitimate and is constituted sinful by the law (cf. Rom. 7:1-3).

It is also to Augustine that we owe the dogma of original sin which simply bristles with insoluble problems. (One of its fruits is the clearly erroneous view of Barrett referred to above. If it is true, we must assume that Jesus was a sinner like the rest of us, or, again, that he was not truly man.) In order to combat this patently unbiblical dogma Augustine was forced to call in the idea of infant and baptismal regeneration still so characteristic of the Roman Church (cf. Needham, pp.32-34,45,252). But Protestants need to be aware that federal and covenant theologies had their beginnings in the same dogma. Thus even the children of the Reformation make the capital error of presenting regeneration (a unilateral act of God) as the remedy of sin, especially original or birth sin (also a unilateral act of God and hence outside man’s control and responsibility). As we have seen, however, in a brief examination of John 3:1-8, Jesus pits Spirit or new birth not against sin but against nature, i.e. ‘flesh’. As the whole of the OT sacrificial system, not to mention specific NT teaching about the death of Christ, indicates the remedy for sin is blood not Spirit, atonement not regeneration (cf. 1 John 1:7; Heb. 1:3). The latter, however, is pre-eminent in sanctification.

What needs to be recognised, however, in the immortal words of Charles Wesley, is that the Spirit or the new birth breaks the power of CANCELLED sin (1 Cor. 6:11; Tit. 3:3-7). Indeed, unless sin is covered and righteousness attained (through justification by faith, cf. 1 Cor. 6:9), the new birth, which is synonymous with eternal life and the reception of the Spirit (Gal. 3:2,5), simply cannot take place (Lev. 18:5). If this is denied, we inevitably end up with unrepentant, unforgiven and unjustified sinners being granted eternal life and a place in the kingdom – a state of affairs which is directly contrary to the very essence of biblical teaching about salvation. The truth is that atonement and justification by faith MUST precede the granting of new life by the Spirit (Rom. 5:6,10,17,18,21), unless, as in Jesus’ own case, we have kept the law to perfection and have earned our Father’s ‘well done’ in our own strength (Mt. 3:17; 25:21,23). If regeneration occurred first, then sinners would be eternally cemented in their sin – a state of affairs against which God took measures at the start of history (Gen. 3:22).

Historically, the church has confused sin and grace with flesh and spirit and continues to do so to this day, and until it sorts out this muddle, doctrinal mayhem will remain a permanent feature of the church scene. So it needs to be stressed yet once more that, according to Scripture, the indispensable precondition of life (sonship) is righteousness by law-keeping as in Jesus’ case, or justification by faith in Christ in our own case (cf. Rom. 10:5f.). This being so, the pattern that believers must follow is that established by Jesus who blazed our trail and pioneered out salvation (or regenerate life: Heb. 2:10; 5:8f.; 6:20; 12:2). Whereas once, led by the devil and our fleshly passions (Eph. 2:2f., etc.), we followed the first Adam in his sin, now, having been justified by faith and led by the Spirit, we follow the second Adam in his righteousness and progressive sanctification (Rom. 6:13,16,19,22).

So, in conclusion it must be urged that if Jesus was ever ‘flesh’ (i.e. truly incarnate), as the last Adam he had necessarily to experience the new birth to fit him for heaven (cf. John 3:6; 1 Cor. 15:50). (This, of course, implies that his baptism and reception of the Spirit, like his acknowledged Sonship, Mark 1:11, anointing, John 1:41, sealing, John 6:27, overcoming, John 16:33, and so forth, were paradigmatic, see 1 John 2:27; Eph. 1:13; Gal. 4:6f.; Rom. 8:31ff., etc.) As one born of woman and knowing neither good nor evil (Isa. 7:15f.), he doubtless learned to accept the ‘no’ of his parents (cf. e.g. Ps. 78:5-8) and to be obedient in a way that the first Adam was not (cf. Heb. 5:7f.). Then as a son of the commandment (Lu. 2:41ff.), he faithfully served his apprenticeship in violent contrast with rebellious Israel whom he represented (cf. Gal. 4:5; Heb. 9:15). For this he was granted life in accordance with his Father’s promise and openly acknowledged as his Son at his baptism. Even for him eternal life was not an inalienable right. As man’s representative, the second Adam, it had to be attained by meticulous submission to the divine will (John 8:29,46; 15:10; Heb. 5:8f. 1 Pet. 2:22, etc.). In other words, as we saw above, ontology had to be matched with action or function. Otherwise, failure under the law meant banishment from access to the tree of life as it had for the first Adam (Gen. 3:22-24).

In the event, Jesus finished his work by overcoming the world (John 16:33; 17:4f., cf. Gen. 1:26,28; Ps. 8:5f.; Heb. 2:7-9; Jas. 3:2). Assuming that the ‘world’ cannot refer simply to the organised opposition of worldly men as various writers aver, he had to triumph also over the transitory forces of the created world (Rom. 8:3,39 cf. 1 John 2:8,16f.; 1 Cor. 7:31; Gal. 1:4). In order to do this completely, however, he needed, as we, his followers, in our turn need (cf. 1 John 5:5; Rev. 3:20f.), to be born of God (1 John 5:4). If we deny this, then we imply either that he overcame as a servant under the law and not as a son, the Son (cf. Heb. 3:1-6; Gal. 4:1-6) on whom the Spirit had been poured out without measure (Luke 4:18; John 3:34) or that the law can give life (contrast Gal. 3:21; Heb. 7:18f.).

On the assumption that what is argued above is in fact a true reflection of the biblical position, it is now possible to see how we owe everything to God in Christ. For in Jesus’ own case, the flesh was weak (2 Cor. 13:4, cf. Rom. 8:3; Mt. 26:41) and even he owed his ‘salvation’ to God (cf. Heb. 5:7ff.) in accordance with OT teaching (Isa. 43:3,11; 45:21f.; 48:11). Truly can it be said that no flesh will boast in God’s presence (Rom. 3:19f.; 1 Cor. 1:29). As Paul further intimates, God has consigned all men (and women) to disobedience so that he may have mercy on all (Rom. 11:32; Gal. 3:22). And that mercy is exercised in Christ, the heavenly Man, who achieved what the purely earthly man or first Adam proved intrinsically incapable of doing (cf. Rom. 7:7ff.).

So much for the argument which, reduced to its bare simplicity, is that if Jesus was incarnate, he had of necessity to be subject to regeneration in accordance with his own dictum (John 3:6) which was absolute and permitted no exceptions.

A Simple Syllogism

Major premise: All who are born of the flesh need to be born again (John 3:3,5,6).
Minor premise: Jesus was born of the flesh (Luke 1:42; Gal. 4:4).
Conclusion: Therefore Jesus was born again.

Explicit Teaching

There is yet a final question to pose: Does the NT ever indicate directly that Jesus was born again? Apart from its implication in Matthew 3:13-17, John 3:3,6 (2*) and 3:8, as far as I am aware the only texts which possibly enable us to answer this in the affirmative are 1 John 5:18 and Hebrews 2:11. (Further reflection has led me to infer its implication in 1 John 4:4. After all, in John 16:33 we read that Jesus overcame the world. So since 1 John 4:4 tells us that whatever is born again overcomes the world, we are compelled to conclude that Jesus, having kept the law overcame the world as the regenerate Son of God. He thereby enabled believers to do the same through faith in him, cf. Rev. 3:21.) Regarding the former, the expression “he that was born of God” is unique or “peculiar” (Westcott), though it might be taken to refer to the fact that Christ was “born from God historically” (De Young, p.1186, cf. Westcott on John 3:6, p.50). Stott, having stated that our begetting and sonship are different from his since the latter’s are unique and eternal, adds that they are sufficiently similar to make it possible for John to use almost identical expressions to cover both born of God and begotten of God (p. 192). This is hardly persuasive: the problem is that ‘almost identical expressions’ would normally imply similarity not difference (cf. John’s use of the word ‘begotten’ (aorist) in John 1:13. In contrast, Westcott makes two points: first, that the expression “he that was born of God” (3*) emphasises the connection of the Son with those whom he is not ashamed to call his brethren (Heb. 2:11), second, that it highlights the difference in sonship that is marked in John 5:26, for we, though possessing eternal life, do not have life in ourselves. Again, Kruse, having noted the connection between being born of God and doing right (p.114), says correctly, though despite its obvious implication (cf. Mt. 3:15; John 8:29; 15:10), that Jesus is never said to be born of God (p.171, n.195, cf. p.195, n.235). He admits, however, that 1 John 5:18 may be an exception. Later (p.195) he suggests that there is a close parallel between John 17:12-15 and 1 John 5:18. (John 17:14,16, it should be noted, are somewhat similar to Hebrews 2:11.) What is surely clear is that the text cannot refer to a parallel between the physical or incarnational birth of Jesus (note John 1:18 where the ‘one and only’ is used) and the spiritual or new birth of those who exercise faith in Christ. No such parallel exists and can only be entertained by Augustinians who believe that we, as opposed to Jesus, are born sinners. According to the Bible, the new birth is re-generation subsequent to and different in kind from natural or physical birth as John 1:13 and 3:6 make clear. (With regard to 1:13 commentators generally deny any reference to the virgin birth. See e.g. Lindars, Marsh, Ridderbos, ad loc. While Carson, p.126, points out that John differentiates between Jesus as a ‘son’ and a believer as a ‘child’ of God, Morris, p.100, says that he does not speak elsewhere about the virgin birth but has a good deal to say about regeneration alluding to chapter 3 and 1 John 2:29; 3:9; 4:7; 5:1,4,18.)

In light of the evidence it would seem reasonable to infer that the apostle is underlining the spiritual nature of both the above-mentioned expressions. If all things have been given to the Son (3:35, cf. 6:37,39) because the Father loves him (cf. Mt. 3:17; 17:5), the suggestion is that this arises out of his achievement in the flesh (John 8:29, cf. Acts 5:31 on which see Marshall, p.120, and John 3:35 on which see Morris, pp.247f.). Sovereignty of life and authority to judge relate to the true humanity of the Son of Man (cf. Westcott on John 5:26, and note Acts 17:30f.). Thus, it may truly be said that he was both the ‘founder and perfecter’ (ESV) of the salvation of all his brethren (12:2, cf. Heb. 2:10; 5:9; 6:20 and note 10:14; Acts 3:14f.; 5:31). Just as he was born again, sealed with the Spirit (John 6:27, cf. 1:32f.), resurrected from the dead and glorified, so in consequence were his followers (Eph. 1:13; 2 Cor. 4:14; Rom. 8:29f.). In other words, both of Westcott’s points are valid and interconnected. Precisely because Jesus attained to regeneration, that is, was granted life by keeping the law to perfection (Lev. 18:5, etc.), he paved the way for it to occur in all other cases through faith in him (cf. 1 Cor. 15:45b, John 5:26, cf. 1 John 5:11f.). This, surely, is the wonder and heart of the gospel.

Regarding John 5:26, it seems to me that there is a danger of over-emphasising the ontology of the Word (cf. 1:4) to the exclusion of his function as Son (i.e. man).

So far as Hebrews 2:11 is concerned, the reference to the common divine origin (cf. Bruce, Lane, NIV, NRSV, etc.), of those who are brethren, points, in the light of verses like John 1:13 (cf. Heb. 2:13), to a common regeneration. (Lane strongly stresses the solidarity Jesus enjoyed with his people and maintains: “That solidarity is affirmed in the statement that the one who makes people holy and those who are made holy are of the same family”, p.67, cf. pp.60,64) This conclusion is strengthened when we consider other references like Matthew 28:10, John 20:17, Romans 8:14-17,29 (on the latter see especially Dunn) and Galatians 4:6f., which surely rule out a common humanity, mere flesh and blood referred to in any case in verse 14 (contrast “the descendants of Abraham”, Heb. 2:16f.).

Though there is doubtless more to be said, I rest my case.

1* For Augustine the need to be born again arises from the fact that we are born sinful: ”So children derive guilt from their natural birth and cannot be liberated from this sickness unless they are born again” (Needham, p. 59, cf. pp. 251,286). The old notion that the word ‘flesh’ in John 3:6 meant ‘sinful flesh’ is now largely and rightly discarded. See e.g Morris, p.219 and notes.

2* Berkhof says of John 3:3 that the statement is absolute and leaves no room for exceptions (p.472). The same must be said of 3:6.

3* The difference between the aorist, referring to Jesus, and the perfect, relating to his people, is presumably significant. The aorist referring simply to an event in the past would suggest that Jesus’ rebirth was a ‘natural’ or ‘normal’ occurrence, uninterrupted by sin, in his progress towards perfection as the true Son of God; the perfect, referring to an event having continuing effects in the present, implies genuineness on the one hand (contrast 2:19) and, especially in the light of 1 John 1:8 and 3:9, constant guarding on the other (cf. John 10:28; 13:1).

References

C.K.Barrett, The Epistle to the Romans, London, 1962.

G.R.Beasley-Murray, Baptism in the New Testament, Exeter, 1962.

L.Berkhof, Systematic Theology, London, 1959.

H.Cunliffe-Jones, A History of Christian Doctrine, Edinburgh, 1978.

J.B.De Young, in Baker Commentary on the Bible, Grand Rapids, 1989.

J.D.G.Dunn, Romans 1-8, Dallas, 1988.

P.E.Hughes, Commentary on the Epistle to the Hebrews, repr. Grand Rapids, 1987.

C.G.Kruse, The letters of John, Leicester, 2000.

L.L.Morris, The Gospel According to John, Grand Rapids, 1971.

B.Lindars, The Gospel of John, London, 1972.

John Marsh, Saint John, London, 1968.

I.H.Marshall, Acts, Leicester, 1980.

L.L.Morris, The Gospel According to John, Grand Rapids, 1971.

N.R.Needham, The Triumph of Grace, London, 2000.

H.N. Ridderbos, The Gospel of John, Grand Rapids, 1997.

J.M.Rist, Augustine, Cambridge, 1994.

H.W.Robinson, The Christian Doctrine of Man, Edinburgh, 1911.

J.R.W.Stott, The Epistles of John, London, 1964.

B.B.Warfield, Selected Shorter Writings 1, Nutley, 1970.

B.F.Westcott, The Gospel According to St. John, repr. London, 1958.

B.F.Westcott, The Epistles of St. John, London, 1883.