Justification and Regeneration Quotes

“Heaven above is softer blue, Earth around is sweeter green; Something lives in every hue Christless eyes have never seen. G. Wade Robinson”
― Charles Leiter, Justification and Regeneration

“All sin is twisted and ugly and vile. We should be shocked at how wicked men are and how callous we have become to that wickedness. We are used to it! The first baby ever born grew up to murder his own brother.[22] And human history ever since has been one long stream of constant warfare, lust, hate, torture, rape, perversion, abuse, and brutality. It is a blessed thing that we do not know in detail the sins that were committed just last night in our own town or city. Such knowledge would be too defiling to bear.”
― Charles Leiter, Justification and Regeneration

“The new convert must then take a stand on the miracle that has transpired in his life [regeneration] and explain, 'I no longer love the things I once loved; I no longer do the things I once did. I am no longer Simon; I am Peter. I have become a new man!”
― Charles Leiter, Justification and Regeneration

“It is highly significant that when Paul thinks about salvation, our being “saved by grace through faith,” he thinks in terms of a creative work of God. Christians are specifically said to be God’s “created workmanship”! If our concept of salvation is just that a man “makes a decision”—steps out of the line of those on the way to hell and into the line of those on the way to heaven—we’ve got a very defective view of salvation. Christians have been “created in Christ Jesus”!”
― Charles Leiter, Justification and Regeneration

“The true Christian will never use grace as a “license to sin”; he already sins more than he wants to!”
― Charles Leiter, Justification and Regeneration

“Justification takes place in heaven, in the courtroom of God. Regeneration, on the other hand, takes place on earth, in the heart of man. Justification is a declaration by a Judge; regeneration is an act of creation by an omnipotent Creator.”
― Charles Leiter, Justification and Regeneration

“Notice also, we are not saved by faith in general; we’re saved by faith in Christ. Some people trust in a past “decision,” but a “decision” will not pay for our sins! Some trust in baptism, a past emotional experience, or even their supposed “faith.” One elderly man who gave no evidence of true conversion, when asked if he was ever bothered by the thought of eternity, answered, “No, I’m not bothered at all, because the Bible says if you have faith you’ll be saved, and I have plenty of faith.” In what was this man trusting? Not in Christ or His blood, but in his own “faith.” The trust of a Christian is entirely different. If suddenly the floor were to drop out from under all of us at this moment, every true Christian would cry out “Lord Jesus!” None would cry out “My faith!”
― Charles Leiter, Justification and Regeneration

“To say this, is just to say that the true Christian remains in a justified state at all times. Why? Because he has a whole new standing with God. The Christian is no longer a criminal under the wrath of God; he is a son under the care of a loving Father.[28] As it is with any loving father, God sometimes has to chasten His children, but chastening is altogether different than judicial punishment. Strictly speaking, punishment is suffering inflicted for the satisfaction of justice. Chastening, on the other hand, is suffering inflicted for the good of the offender. There is a vast difference between the two!”
― Charles Leiter, Justification and Regeneration

“God’s wrath is not a temporary loss of self-control or a selfish fit of emotion. It is His holy, white-hot hatred of sin, the reaction and revulsion of His holy nature against all that is evil.”
― Charles Leiter, Justification and Regeneration

“Every sinner is a fugitive from justice. Regardless of the present condition of his heart, he has objective guilt, outside himself, in the eyes of God’s law. He may not have any “guilt feelings,” but he stands “guilty” or “condemned,” nevertheless. All his past crimes cry out for their penalty to be paid and justice to be satisfied. This cry is anchored in the very character and being of God, in His attribute of justice or equity. It”
― Charles Leiter, Justification and Regeneration

“Not all the blood of beasts, On Jewish altars slain, Could give the guilty conscience peace, Or wash away the stain. But Christ, the heavenly Lamb, Takes all our sins away, A sacrifice of nobler name And richer blood than they. My faith would lay her hand On that dear head of Thine, While like a penitent I stand, And there confess my sin. Isaac Watts”
― Charles Leiter, Justification and Regeneration

“Man’s Ultimate Problem For a proper understanding of both justification and regeneration, we must begin where the Bible does, and that is with sin. All sin flows from man’s perverse desire to put himself in the place of God—to be the center and measure of all things and to “know” for himself what is good and what is evil.[1] According to Titus 3:3-7, men in their natural state are “foolish, disobedient, deceived, and enslaved to various lusts.” Their lives are characterized by “malice, envy, and hate.” Far from recognizing this state of affairs, lost men imagine themselves to be “basically good,” unless God in mercy reveals to them the true condition of their blackened hearts. Sin is the ultimate and only problem of humanity. It is my ultimate and only problem and your ultimate and only problem.”
― Charles Leiter, Justification and Regeneration

“For we also once were foolish ourselves, disobedient, deceived, enslaved to various lusts and pleasures, spending our life in malice and envy, hateful, hating one another. But when the kindness of God our Savior and His love for mankind appeared, He saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit, whom He poured out upon us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that being justified by His grace we would be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life.” Titus 3:3-7”
― Charles Leiter, Justification and Regeneration

“The Church in contemporary America does not need more strategies, steps, or keys to the Christian life. The Church needs truth, and more specifically, the great foundational truths of historical Christianity.”
― Charles Leiter, Justification and Regeneration