November 20 Daily Devotional

Bible Verse

"...the God in whom he believed, who gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist" (Rom. 4:17).

Devotional

The commencement of spiritual life is sudden.

Beware of imagining that you can confine the Holy Spirit to a certain prescribed order in this or any other part of his work. He is sovereign; therefore he works according to his own will. We would not say that all conversion is a sudden work. There is a knowledge of sin, conviction of its guilt, repentance before God on account of it; these are frequently slow in their advance. The awareness of them may be gradual.

But the first communication of divine light and life to the soul is sudden, as sudden and instantaneous as was the creation of natural light—"And God said, Let there be light, and there was light" (Gen. 1:3). He but spoke the word, and in an instant chaos rolled away, and every object and scene in nature was bathed in light and glory. It is as sudden as was the communication of life to Lazarus—"Jesus cried out with a loud voice, 'Lazarus, come forth!'" (John 11:43). He but spoke the word, and in an instant "the man who had died came out, his hands and feet bound with linen strips, and his face wrapped with a cloth" (John 11:44). So is it in the first communication of divine light and life to the soul. The eternal Spirit says, "Let there be light," and in a moment there is light. He speaks again, "Come forth," and in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, the dead are raised.

The cases of Saul of Tarsus and of the thief upon the cross afford striking illustrations of the suddenness of the Spirit's operation. How sudden was the communication of light and life to their souls! While he may have used many instruments that led up to this point, it was no long and previous process of spiritual illumination. In a moment, and under circumstances most unfavorable to the change, at a period when the rebellion of the heart rose the most fiercely against God, "a light from heaven, brighter than the sun" (Acts 26:13) poured its transforming radiance into the mind of the enraged persecutor; and a voice, conveying life into the soul, reached the conscience of the dying thief. Both were translated from darkness into light, "in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye" (1 Cor. 15:52).

Do not overlook this wise and gracious method of the blessed Spirit's operation in regeneration. The means may have been simple. Perhaps it was the loss of a friend, an alarming illness, a word of reproof or admonition dropped from a parent or a companion, the singing of a hymn, the hearing of a sermon, or some text of Scripture winged with his power to the conscience. In the twinkling of an eye, the soul, dead in trespasses and sins, was made alive and translated into newness of life.

Oh blessed work of the blessed and Eternal Spirit! Oh mighty operation! Oh inscrutable wisdom! What a change has now passed over the whole man! Overshadowed by the Holy Spirit, that which is begotten in the soul is the divine life—a holy, influential, never-dying principle. Truly he is a new creature, "old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new." Let it not be supposed that there is, in the subject, any previous preparation for this change. There can be no preparation for light or life. What preparation was there in chaos? What preparation was there in the cold clay limbs of Lazarus? What in Paul? What in the dying thief?

The work of regeneration is supremely the work of the Holy Spirit. The means of grace may be employed—and they are to be diligently employed—in accordance with God's purpose. Yet they are not to be deified. They are but means, "no help at all" without the power of God the Holy Spirit (John 6:63). Regeneration is his work, and not man's.

I heard the voice of Jesus say,
"Come unto me and rest.
Lay down, thou weary one, lay down
thy head upon my breast."
I came to Jesus as I was,
weary and worn and sad,
I found in him a resting place,
and he has made me glad.

(Horatius Bonar, 1846)

Be sure to read the Preface by Octavius Winslow and A Note from the Editor by Larry E. Wilson.

Larry Wilson is an ordained minister in the Orthodox Presbyterian Church. In addition to having served as the General Secretary of the Committee on Christian Education of the OPC (2000–2004) and having written a number of articles and booklets (such as God's Words for Worship and Why Does the OPC Baptize Infants) for New Horizons and elsewhere, he has pastored OPC churches in Minnesota, Indiana, and Ohio. We are grateful to him for his editing of Morning Thoughts, the OPC Daily Devotional for 2011.