The Gospel Call and True Conversion (Recovering the Gospel Book 2)

by Paul David Washer

We would do well to remember that the Hebrew idea of hearing includes not only the act of listening but also the act of obeying.

Love for Christ and the keeping of His Word does not procure His indwelling, but rather they demonstrate its reality. We know we have been born again and indwelt by Christ through the Spirit because we have a love for Him that was previously nonexistent, and we demonstrate a new relationship with His Word that is marked by increasing obedience to it.

A. W. Tozer was right: “Were all human beings suddenly to become blind, still the sun would shine by day and the stars by night, for these owe nothing to the millions who benefit from their light. So, were every man on earth to become atheist, it could not affect God in any way. He is what He is in Himself without regard to any other. To believe in Him adds nothing to His perfections; to doubt Him takes nothing away.”30

In light of Scripture’s assessment of fallen man, the biblically trained mind does not ask how God can set Himself against men, condemn them, or even consign them to eternal separation. Rather, he asks how God can love men, justify them, and bring them into an intimate relationship with Himself without casting doubt upon His own virtue or integrity. After all, a person brings his morality into question by the relationships he indulges and the company he keeps.

God has no need of relationship, since the Father, Son, and Spirit have existed in perfect fellowship with one another throughout eternity. The infinitely bountiful God did not create the world out of some divine need but out of His superabundance.

God saves evil men because He loves them, and He loves them because He is love.

The glory of the gospel is not that God saves worthy creatures whose beauty draws out His love and makes it impossible for Him to live without us. The glory of the gospel is that God saves vile and wretched sinners who have utterly defiled themselves, evoking disdain and abandonment from all except a God who is love.

God saves people for His own sake and according to His own good pleasure.

God does all that He does in order that He might reveal the fullness of all that He is to His creation, and that He might be esteemed, worshiped, and enjoyed as God.

Charles Hodge writes, “Men have long endeavored to find a satisfactory answer to the question, Why God created the world? What end was it designed to accomplish?… The only satisfactory method of determining the question is by appealing to the Scriptures. There it is explicitly taught that the glory of God, the manifestation of His perfections, is the last end of all His works.”6

Jonathan Edwards writes, “Thus we see that the great end of God’s works, which is so variously expressed in Scripture, is indeed but ONE; and this one end is most properly and comprehensively called, THE GLORY OF GOD.”7

A. A. Hodge writes, “Since God Himself is infinitely worthier than the sum of all creatures, it follows that the manifestation of His own excellence is…the highest and worthiest end conceivable.”8

Charles Spurgeon writes, “God must have the highest motive, and there can be no higher motive conceivable than His own glory.”9

God does not seek His own glory apart from His creatures’ greatest good. In fact, the greatest good God could ever accomplish for His creatures and the greatest kindness He could ever show them is to glorify Himself—to direct and work in all things s...

If God is of infinite value, splendor, and beauty, then it follows that the most valuable, most splendid, and most beautiful gift He could ever give to H...

Behold the power of God in the salvation of His church and in the conversion of each of its members! Without fail, those whom He calls, He also recreates; and those whom He recreates, He also cleanses; and those whom He cleanses, He also indwells; and those whom He indwells, He also causes to walk in His statutes and makes them careful to observe His ordinances.

genuine biblical conversion will yield its fruit in the life of every believer—although the fruit may vary, and some will bring forth a hundredfold, while others bring forth sixty, and still others only thirty.7 Nevertheless, they will all bring forth fruit, and by their fruit they will be known.8 This certainty is not primarily a result of their commitment, but a result of the nature of conversion.

God will draw His people away from the moral corruption of this fallen world, and He will bring them unto Himself. The Christian will gradually grow apart from the ideals and pleasures of this present age, and he will learn to walk with God and cling to His commands.

Doesn’t God have the right to do as He pleases with His own? If we belong to Him by the twofold claim of creation and redemption, doesn’t He have the right to separate us from the herd of humanity and claim us for Himself, for His good pleasure, and for His eternal purposes? The Scriptures answer all these questions with a resounding and unapologetic yes.

the most loving thing God can do for His people is keep them from other loves that cannot truly statisfy and will only lead to their great harm.

justification and sanctification are always found together. Justification makes sanctification possible, and sanctification is the evidence that we have been justified.

God is not as some would suppose Him to be: a derelict and disinterested father. He will not allow His children to run the streets of this world unattended. He is not a hired shepherd who is unconcerned about the wanderings of His flock. However, those who believe that a Christian can walk in a continuous and unaltered state of carnality all the days of his life are making just such an accusation! Rather than exalting the grace of God, they are turning it into a license for sin.33 Rather than exalting the forbearance of God, they are portraying Him as an uninvolved or impotent father. Rather than exalting the gospel, they are declaring it void of power. This great error results in the unbelieving world’s blasphemy. As the apostle Paul wrote, “The name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you” (Rom. 2:24).

The doctrine of regeneration refers to the supernatural work of the Spirit of God whereby the spiritually dead sinner is made alive, his radically depraved nature is transformed, and he is enabled to respond to the gospel call with repentance and faith in Jesus Christ.

the sinner is spiritually dead and unable to respond to divine stimuli. This lack of ability does not excuse him from guilt or make him any less responsible to God, because his inability is his own doing. The sinner cannot respond positively to God because he will not. Although he possesses the necessary capacity to both know God and understand His revealed will, he suppresses what he knows to be true.8 His love for unrighteousness and desire for autonomy makes him so hostile to God that he simply cannot bring himself to acknowledge Him or obey His law.

Charles Spurgeon used the following illustration to demonstrate the true nature of the unconverted and the power of regeneration. Imagine that we place two dining options before a pig. On one side of the room, we set a table with the finest food available to us. On the other side, we place a trough of slop on the floor. The pig is then set free to choose the option it most desires. To the astonishment of city folk—but not to the farmer, who knows pigs—the specimen runs straight for the slop without giving the slightest thought to the lavish meal on the other side. It then plunges its head into the trough and eats with reckless abandon until its desires have been satisfied. It suffers no ailment from the refuse it has gulped down, and bears no shame before others for its behavior. In fact, it has acted in perfect conformity with its nature. It has done exactly what a pig should and will always do. However, for the sake of argument, let’s say that we have the power to change the nature of the swine and transform it into that of a human. What will be the result of this supernatural and ontological change? First, what the human had only moments before desired would now repulse him. The horrid smells that he had not noticed would become acute. Second, he would pull his head out of the trough and vomit up the filth for which he had previously hungered. There are some foods palatable to swine that the human stomach simply cannot bear. Third, he would realize that others had notic...

We must stake the whole of our ministries upon the biblical fact that the gospel is the power of God unto salvation, and we must preach it with the greatest confidence, clarity, and boldness.23

Every time we preach to the people of this world, we must see ourselves as Ezekiel walking in the valley of dry bones.24 If we are asked, “Can these bones live?” we must defer to the sovereignty and strength of God alone. The might that is required for the resurrection that is needed is beyond human power, and it is not effected by the will of man. The wind blows where it wishes, and we hear the sound of it, but God alone knows where it comes from or where it is going.25

The true church is not as immoral and godless as the culture that surrounds it. Though not yet glorified, the true church is marked by holiness, devotion, and obedience.

The church is not relevant to the world because we look and act like the world or share its interests. We are relevant because we seek to submit ourselves to Christ in every aspect of life, and He transforms our interests, actions, and appearance. It is our distinction from the world that makes us relevant, and the greater our distinction, the greater our relevancy. The distinctiveness of salt causes it to impact the thing upon which it is poured. The unique qualities of light distinguish it from darkness.

We would do well to remember that the church belongs to God, and it is Christ’s bride. We have no authority to do what seems right in our own eyes. We must submit to the lordship of Christ and care for the church in accordance with His Word. We must minister to God’s people in God’s way.

If a church is really a church and Christ is really among them, then He will be like a refiner’s fire and a fuller’s soap. He will sit as a smelter and purifier of silver and will refine His people like gold.19 However, if the godless remain in the congregation without Christ’s intervention, it is evidence that their candlestick has been removed and the church is no longer a church. Ichabod has been written over the door, for the glory of the Lord has departed.20

It is also important to note that the fear of the Lord will not only govern the Christian’s actions, but it will also have a profound impact upon his relationship with God. It will clothe him in humility. Although the Christian has been granted the privilege to call God his father, he is acutely aware that his Father is in heaven and dwells in unapproachable light as the King of kings and Lord of lords.70 Although the Christian has access to the Father and is encouraged to come before Him with great boldness, he recognizes that his access is for the sake of Christ, and he does not presume to take any liberty that has not explicitly been granted to him.71 Finally, although the Christian takes great consolation in the truth that Christ is not ashamed to call him brother, he does not claim equality with Christ or speak of Him except with the greatest admiration and respect.72 If at any time he discovers that he has in some way trivialized Christ or spoken of Him in an irreverent manner, he is struck in the heart and ashamed.

The absence of the fear of the Lord is often a sign that the people remain in an unregenerate or unconverted state.

those of us who claim to be Christian must answer several important questions that remain: Is the fear of the Lord an outstanding characteristic of our lives? Is it an observable reality in our collective fellowships or churches? Does our reverence for the Lord have a positive spiritual impact upon those around us, especially upon those closest to us? Are we faithful in our stewardship to hand down the truth of God to the succeeding generations? Are we fulfilling our lofty calling to teach our children, and are they benefiting from our example? It ought to cause us great concern if these things are foreign to us or rare among us. They are not options in the Christian faith, but evidences of it.

first, those who are truly Christians will possess one heart and unite in their affections for God and for one another. Second, they will possess one way or a singularity of purpose and conduct: they will be followers of Jesus Christ. Third, they will be marked by a genuine fear of the Lord, which will result in their own blessing and the blessing of those after them.

the most frightening thing about many of the individuals and churches that identify with evangelicalism is not that they struggle against sin, but that they do not struggle at all. The great danger within Western evangelicalism is not that it is tainted with a degree of worldliness, apathy, and self-love, but that it has no problem with the stain. In fact, the great majority do not seem even to notice that it is there. There can be only two possible causes for this blindness to such a terrible and obvious malady.

The mature believer who has grown in his understanding that salvation is all of grace will be deeply troubled by even the slightest suggestion that his salvation might be the result of his own virtue or merit. He would rather that his greatest moral failures be exposed and that he be looked upon with the greatest contempt than for someone to think too much of him and too little of Christ. Furthermore, he will disdain every accolade except that which is laid at the feet of Christ. It is for this reason that the mature Christian is not repulsed by the kind of preaching that exposes the universal depravity of man. He knows that the more darkly man is painted, the brighter the Morning Star, Christ, appears.6

The term everlasting is translated from a Hebrew word that denotes that which is perpetual, eternal, or unending.11

Our standing is final, eternal, immutable, and irrevocable. God would sooner break His covenant with day and night and change the fixed patterns of heaven and earth than He would reject His people.16

The same God who promised never to turn away from His people also promised to create in them a reverence that would prevent them from ever turning away from Him.

our sanctification resulting from regeneration is evidence of our justification resulting from faith!

Having reconciled us to Himself through the death of His Son, God now rejoices to conform us to His likeness. This is the summum bonum, or greatest good, of the Christian life. It is the highest goal and most extravagant privilege that can be granted to us. All other good things in the Christian life are established upon it and flow from it.

Let the struggling believer be comforted; let the apathetic church member be warned. The great evidence of true conversion is God’s ongoing work of sanctification in our lives. If we have been saved by grace through faith, we are now God’s “workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we should walk in them” (Eph. 2:8–10). The evidence that God has begun a good work in us is that He continues that work until that final day.28