Regeneration

Scripture treats the change at the root of a saved life as something only God performs and only God can sustain. The Old Testament names it as a heart taken away and a heart given, as a circumcision Yahweh himself does, as living water flowing from a sealed source. The New Testament gives it the title Paul puts on it once explicitly — the washing of regeneration — and elsewhere calls it being born anew, brought forth by the word of truth, begotten of God, made a new creation. The figures cluster: a stone heart for a heart of flesh, an old man crucified and a new man put on, a grain of wheat dying so that fruit may follow, a buried believer raised in newness of life. Under all of them stands the same claim: the act is divine in origin, total in scope, and it issues at once in a different way of living.

A New Heart Promised

The Old Testament prepares the doctrine in the language of the heart. Moses already locates the problem one layer in from behavior and prays for what he cannot legislate: "Oh that there were such a heart in them, that they would fear me, and keep all my commandments always, that it might be well with them, and with their sons forever!" (Deut 5:29). The remedy is announced as Yahweh's own work. Israel is to circumcise the foreskin of their heart and stop being stiff-necked (Deut 10:16); but the same book assigns the act to God: "And Yahweh your God will circumcise your heart, and the heart of your seed, to love Yahweh your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, that you may live" (Deut 30:6). Jeremiah keeps both sides. He calls Judah to do the act — "Circumcise yourselves to Yahweh, and take away the foreskins of your⁺ heart" (Jer 4:4) — but eventually concludes that the heart's deceit is past human cure: "The heart is deceitful above all things, and it is exceedingly corrupt: who can know it?" (Jer 17:9).

The prophets accordingly name God as the one who must do it. Jeremiah's new covenant locates the change inside: "I will put my law in their inward parts, and in their heart I will write it; and I will be their God, and they will be my people" (Jer 31:33), the corollary being that no one will any longer need to teach his neighbor "Know Yahweh," because the knowledge will be intrinsic, "from the least of them to the greatest of them" (Jer 31:34), and that the iniquity that necessitated the act will be remembered no more. Jeremiah elsewhere puts the same promise in the simplest form: "I will give them a heart to know me, that I am Yahweh: and they will be my people, and I will be their God; for they will return to me with their whole heart" (Jer 24:7).

Ezekiel gives the figure its sharpest line. The change is described as a transplant: "And I will give them another heart, and I will put a new spirit inside you⁺; and I will take the stony heart out of their flesh, and will give them a heart of flesh" (Ezek 11:19); and again, "A new heart also I will give you⁺, and a new spirit I will put inside you⁺; and I will take away the stony heart out of your⁺ flesh, and I will give you⁺ a heart of flesh" (Ezek 36:26). The water-and-Spirit pairing that the New Testament will repeat is already in Ezekiel's mouth: "And I will sprinkle clean water on you⁺, and you⁺ will be clean: from all your⁺ filthiness, and from all your⁺ idols, I will cleanse you⁺" (Ezek 36:25), followed by "I will put my Spirit inside you⁺, and cause you⁺ to walk in my statutes, and you⁺ will keep my ordinances, and do them" (Ezek 36:27). The order in Ezekiel is the order Paul will keep: cleansing, new heart, indwelling Spirit, obedient walk.

David in Psalm 51 prays the act on himself in advance: "Create in me a clean heart, O God; And renew a right spirit inside me" (Ps 51:10), and follows the petition with the petition for restored joy ("Restore to me the joy of your salvation; And uphold me with a willing spirit," Ps 51:12) and the promise of a converted teaching ministry ("Then I will teach transgressors your ways; And sinners will be converted to you," Ps 51:13). The verb "create" is not metaphorical decoration — it asks for the same kind of act that opens Genesis. Wisdom registers the same doctrine in proverb-form: "The law of Yahweh is perfect, restoring the soul" (Ps 19:7).

The Inward Circumcision

Paul takes Ezekiel's water-and-Spirit pair and Deuteronomy's heart-circumcision pair and welds them together. The Jew, he says, is not the one with the outward sign: "he is a Jew who is one inwardly; and circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit not in the letter; whose praise is not of men, but of God" (Rom 2:29). To the Colossians the figure is taken further: in Christ the believer has been "circumcised with a circumcision not made with hands, in the putting off of the body of the flesh, in the circumcision of Christ" (Col 2:11). The Old Testament figure is no longer a metaphor for piety but the cipher for what has actually happened in the believer's history. The covenant sign that Abraham received on his flesh has been internalized and discharged.

Born Anew

In John 3 Jesus puts the doctrine to a teacher of Israel as something Israel's own scriptures had already taught. To Nicodemus the requirement is absolute: "Truly, truly, I say to you, Except one be born anew, he can't see the kingdom of God" (John 3:3). Pressed to clarify, Jesus restates it in Ezekiel's idiom: "Truly, truly, I say to you, Except one be born of water and spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God" (John 3:5). The flesh-spirit cleavage runs through the next verse — "That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit" (John 3:6) — and the universal demand is restated: "Do not marvel that I said to you, You⁺ must be born anew" (John 3:7). The Spirit's action is sovereign and untraceable: "The wind blows where it will, and you hear its voice, but do not know from where it comes, and where it goes: so is everyone who is born of the Spirit" (John 3:8). Nicodemus' bewilderment ("How can these things be?", John 3:9) is met with an indictment that this should not have been new material: "Are you the teacher of Israel, and do not understand these things?" (John 3:10).

The prologue had already named the source: "But as many as received him, to them he gave the right to become sons of God, to those who believe on his name: who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God" (John 1:12-13). The triple negation — not blood, not flesh, not human will — closes off every natural antecedent of the new birth.

Made Alive from the Dead

Paul's preferred figure is resurrection. Where the Old Testament said new heart, Paul says new life. To the Romans: "We were buried therefore with him through baptism into death: that like Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we also might walk in newness of life" (Rom 6:4); and on the Spirit's role, "if the Spirit of him who raised up Jesus from the dead dwells in you⁺, he who raised up Christ from the dead will give life also to your⁺ mortal bodies through his Spirit who dwells in you⁺" (Rom 8:11). Israel's restoration he reads in the same key: "if the casting away of them [is] the reconciling of the world, what [will] the receiving [of them be], but life from the dead" (Rom 11:15). And in Romans 7 the same change is described under the contrast of letter and spirit: "we have been discharged from the law, having died to that in which we were held, in order to serve us as slaves in newness of the spirit, and not in oldness of the letter" (Rom 7:6).

Ephesians and Colossians say the same thing in the perfect tense — it has happened. To the Ephesians Paul writes that they were "dead through your⁺ trespasses and sins," and that God "raised us up with him, and made us to sit with him in the heavenly [places], in Christ Jesus" (Eph 2:1-6). To the Colossians: "you⁺, being dead in your⁺ trespasses and the uncircumcision of your⁺ flesh, you⁺, he made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses" (Col 2:13); "If then you⁺ were raised together with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God" (Col 3:1); "you⁺ died, and your⁺ life is hid with Christ in God. When Christ will be manifested, [who is] your⁺ life, then you⁺ will also be manifested with him in glory" (Col 3:3-4).

The figure runs back into Jesus' own teaching. The grain of wheat will not bear fruit unless it dies (John 12:24). Paul puts the same agricultural image to the Corinthians on resurrection: "You foolish one, that which you yourself sow is not quickened except it dies" (1 Cor 15:36). Galatians condenses the dying-and-living to a single autobiographical sentence: "it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me: and that [life] which I now live in the flesh I live in faith, [the faith] which is in the Son of God, who loved me, and delivered himself up for me" (Gal 2:20). Ezekiel's vision of dry bones is the controlling Old Testament picture: "the breath came into them, and they lived, and stood up on their feet, an exceedingly great army" (Ezek 37:10). The prodigal son's return is told in the same vocabulary: "for this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found" (Luke 15:24).

The Epistle to Diognetus carries the figure into the Christian community: of the Christians scattered through the cities of the Empire it writes that "they are unknown and are condemned; they are put to death, and made alive" (Gr 5:12).

Old Man Off, New Man On

The corollary to being raised is the casting off of the former life. Romans names what is dismantled: "our old man was crucified with [him], that the body of sin might be done away, it no longer to serve us as slaves to sin" (Rom 6:6). Ephesians and Colossians put the imperative into the believer's own mouth: "put away, as concerning your⁺ former manner of life, the old man, that waxes corrupt after the desires of deceit" (Eph 4:22); "do not lie one to another; seeing that you⁺ have put off the old man with his activities" (Col 3:9). Peter pleads the same break with the past: "the time past may suffice to have worked the desire of the Gentiles, and to have walked in sexual depravity, erotic desires, winebibbings, revelings, carousings, and horrible idolatries" (1 Pet 4:3).

The new man is then put on. Ephesians: "put on the new man, that after God has been created in righteousness and holiness of truth" (Eph 4:24); Colossians: "have put on the new man, who is being renewed to knowledge after the image of him who created him" (Col 3:10); and again, by way of inner anatomy, "you⁺ are renewed in the spirit of your⁺ mind" (Eph 4:23), "though our outward man is decaying, yet our inward man is renewed day by day" (2 Cor 4:16), and the still more general "be transformed by the renewing of the mind, that you⁺ may prove what the will of God is — that [which is] good and acceptable and perfect" (Rom 12:2). Ephesians reframes the new man corporately too: he is the unity Christ creates out of Jew and Greek — "that he might create in himself the two into one new man, [so] making peace" (Eph 2:15).

Diognetus exhorts the inquirer in the same vocabulary: "Come, then: cleanse yourself from all the reasonings that preoccupy your mind, cast off the custom that deceives you, and become as it were a new man from the beginning" (Gr 2:1).

A New Creation

For Paul the change is so total that one of the words for the original creation will do. "Therefore if any man is in Christ, [he is] a new creation: the old things are passed away; look, they have become new" (2 Cor 5:17). To the Galatians: "neither is circumcision anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creation" (Gal 6:15). The Old Testament had already declared that Yahweh works in this register — "Look, the former things have come to pass, and I declare new things; before they spring forth I tell you⁺ of them" (Isa 42:9); "Look, I will do a new thing; now it will spring forth; will you⁺ not know it? I will even make a way in the wilderness, and paths in the desert" (Isa 43:19) — and the eschatological scope of the same act is announced as the creation of "new heavens and a new earth" in which "the former things will not be remembered, nor come into mind" (Isa 65:17). Revelation closes the canon with the same word from the throne: "Look, I make all things new" (Rev 21:5).

A new creation deserves a new song. The believer pulled out of the pit is given one: "And he has put a new song in my mouth, even praise to our God: Many will see it, and fear, And will trust in [the Speech of] Yahweh" (Ps 40:3). Those who wait on Yahweh "will renew their strength; they will mount up with wings as eagles; they will run, and not be weary; they will walk, and not faint" (Isa 40:31).

The Means: Word, Water, Spirit

Scripture is careful to name the instruments. Titus uses the technical term: God "saved us, through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit, which he poured out on us richly, through Jesus Christ our Savior" (Titus 3:5-6). The work is not the believer's: "not by works [done] in righteousness, which we did ourselves, but according to his mercy" (Titus 3:5). James names the word: "Of his own will he brought us forth by the word of truth, that we should be a kind of first fruits of his creatures" (Jas 1:18). Peter sets word and seed together: "having been begotten again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, through the word of God, which lives and stays" (1 Pet 1:23), with the prophetic foil that "All flesh is as grass, And all its glory as the flower of grass. The grass withers, and the flower falls: But the word of the Lord stays forever. And this is the word of good news which was preached to you⁺" (1 Pet 1:24-25).

The water imagery is older than the New Testament's appropriation of it. Yahweh is "the fountain of life: In your light we will see light" (Ps 36:9). Wisdom is "a fountain of life, That one may avoid the snares of death" (Prov 13:14), and so is "The fear of Yahweh" (Prov 14:27). The covenantal indictment of Jeremiah is that the covenant people "have forsaken me, the fountain of living waters, and hewed out cisterns for themselves, broken cisterns, that can hold no water" (Jer 2:13); the curse on those who depart is that they will be "written in the earth, because they have forsaken Yahweh, the fountain of living waters" (Jer 17:13). Zechariah promises the eschatological remedy as a fountain "opened to the house of David and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, for sin and for uncleanness" (Zech 13:1), and "living waters will go out from Jerusalem; half of them toward the eastern sea, and half of them toward the western sea: in summer and in winter it will be" (Zech 14:8). Isaiah turns the figure into an open offer: "Ho, everyone who thirsts, come⁺ to the waters" (Isa 55:1); "with joy you⁺ will draw water out of the wells of salvation" (Isa 12:3).

The Song of Songs already calls the beloved "a fountain of gardens, A well of living waters, And flowing streams from Lebanon" (Song 4:15). Jesus claims for himself what the Old Testament had said about Yahweh: "If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that says to you, Give me a drink; you would have asked of him, and he would have given you living water" (John 4:10). Revelation closes the New Testament's water-thread at the throne: the Lamb "will guide them to fountains of waters of life: and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes" (Rev 7:17); and in the city, "he showed me a river of water of life, bright as crystal, that proceeds out of the throne of God and of the Lamb... And the Spirit and the bride say, Come. And he who hears, let him say, Come. And he who is thirsty, let him come: he who will, let him take the water of life freely" (Rev 22:1, 17).

The Spirit completes the means. Where Jesus said "born of water and spirit" (John 3:5), Paul says "renewing of the Holy Spirit" (Titus 3:5). The new heart of Ezekiel is paired with "my Spirit inside you⁺" (Ezek 36:27). The mind is renewed (Rom 12:2; Eph 4:23) and the inward man is renewed day by day (2 Cor 4:16); the agent in each case is the Spirit who indwells.

Marks of the Regenerated

What was begun in this act issues in a different life. The Johannine epistles draw the line plainly. "Whoever is begotten of God does not sin, because his seed stays in him: and he can't sin, because he is begotten of God" (1 John 3:9). "Whoever believes that Jesus is the Christ is begotten of God: and whoever loves him who begot loves him also who is begotten of him" (1 John 5:1); "whatever is begotten of God overcomes the world: and this is the victory that has overcome the world, [even] our faith" (1 John 5:4); "who is he who overcomes the world, but he who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?" (1 John 5:5). And the test of love: "Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of God; and everyone who loves is begotten of God, and knows God" (1 John 4:7).

The fixed heart of the renewed person produces what Jesus calls fruit "with patience" — the seed that fell on good ground is glossed as "in an honest and good heart, having heard the word, hold it fast, and bring forth fruit with patience" (Luke 8:15). David sees the same thing inwardly: "My heart is fixed, O God, my heart is fixed: I will sing, yes, I will sing praises" (Ps 57:7). Nehemiah's confession looks back at Abraham as the prototype: "you found his heart faithful before you, and made a covenant with him to give the land" (Neh 9:8). Chronicles describes the regathered remnant as "such as set their hearts to seek Yahweh, the God of Israel" (2 Chr 11:16).

Instances of Conversion

The narrative books register specific cases. King Saul, leaving Samuel, is described in a single tight sentence: "when he had turned his back to go from Samuel, God gave him another heart: and all those signs came to pass that day" (1 Sam 10:9). The Gerasene demoniac, who in the tombs "was crying out, and cutting himself with stones" (Mark 5:5), is found by his neighbors "sitting, clothed and in his right mind" (Mark 5:15) — the change of state is described in those four words. Zacchaeus' encounter with Jesus is named on the spot: "Today has salvation come to this house, since he also is a son of Abraham" (Luke 19:9). To Peter Jesus assigns the role of the converted-converter: "I made supplication for you, that your faith does not fail; and you, when once you have turned again, establish your brothers" (Luke 22:32).

The Samaritan woman is a sustained case. She begins by deflecting — "I have no husband" (John 4:17) — Jesus answers, "You said well, I have no husband: for you have had five husbands; and he whom you now have is not your husband: this you have said truly" (John 4:17-18); and she ends by going to the city to tell what she had earlier been at pains to conceal: "Come, see a man, who told me all things that I ever did: can this be the Christ?" (John 4:29).

James puts the doctrine into practical form: "if any among you⁺ errs from the truth, and one converts him; let him know, that he who converts a sinner from the error of his way will save his soul from death, and will cover a multitude of sins" (Jas 5:19-20). Sirach writes the same instinct as a series of imperatives. "Do not be ashamed to turn from iniquity, And do not stand before a rushing stream" (Sir 4:26); "Do not delay to turn to him; And do not put it off from day to day. For suddenly his indignation will go forth; And in the time of vengeance you will be consumed" (Sir 5:7); "to those who repent he grants a return, And comforts those who lose patience" (Sir 17:24); "Turn to the Lord and forsake sins, Supplicate before his face and lessen offence" (Sir 17:25); "Turn to the Most High, and turn away from iniquity, And vehemently hate the disgusting thing" (Sir 17:26); and most directly, "Turn from iniquity, and purify your hands; And from all transgressions cleanse your heart" (Sir 38:10).