This post has been brewing in my mind for a while now, so in honor of our youth group's recent "Regenerate" youth weekend, I decided that now was as good a time as any to write it.
One of the foundations of evangelical Christian faith is the idea of regeneration (i.e. "being born again," "getting saved," "being changed," "becoming a new creation," and a host of other terms that we use). Regeneration is the belief that, for Christians, there is a moment in time when a person who is spiritually dead (Eph. 2:1) is drawn by the Holy Spirit of God (Jn. 6:44) and spiritually resurrected (Eph 2:5), becoming spiritually alive while still having a physical body and mind which are affected by fleshly desires. There are different ways of articulating this, but this is how I've come to understand it.
Over the years I've run into many folks who have very strong convictions about the doctrine of regeneration. For various reasons, some loath the idea that Christians might somehow be capable of walking in righteousness in ways that are impossible for non-believers. On the other side of the issue, some Christians are arrogant about their supposed "moral superiority." Both of these groups forget that it is Christ's righteousness - both positionally and practically - which is the source of Christian obedience.
The stickiness of the doctrine of regeneration (as in many Christian doctrines) is found in the "already-not-yet" aspect of it. Jesus says in John 3:3 that a person must be regenerated in order to "see the kingdom of God." Paul says, as noted above, that Christians have already been raised up with Christ (Eph. 2:5), and in 2 Cor. 5:17 he famously says that we are, at the present time, "new creations." That's the already. First Cor. 15:2 states that we are in the process of being saved by the gospel, an (depending on how you take Romans 7) the apostle also envisions a great struggle between the flesh and the resurrected spirit. That's the not-yet.
One of the most central passages to the doctrine of regeneration is Ezekiel 36-37, wherein the prophet says, "I will sprinkle clean water on you and you shall be clean from all your uncleanness, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove your heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules."
Most theologians that I've read agree that at least the majority of this passage is fulfilled at the moment of a Christian's conversion, yet the last phrase presents a practical challenge: Is God currently causing all Christians at all times to walk in His ways? We know this can't be the case, because we all still struggle with sin (see e.g. 1 Jn. 1:8-10)
There are a couple of ways we could approach answering this question. We could say that the intent of the prophecy was not to say that believers would walk perfectly in His ways but that they simply now do actually walk in His ways to some extent, whereas before regeneration this was an impossibility.
I believe, though, that since Ezekiel 36 is eschatological, and since it is written from the perspective of an OT prophet (looking forward to Christ), it is probably better to see this prophecy as being fulfilled "already-but-not-yet," beginning with the first coming of Christ and being completed with His second coming.
What does all this mean? It means that there are aspects of regeneration that occur in time and space at the moment of conversion. I think most would agree with this. Yet there are also aspects of regeneration that will not occur until we receive our resurrected bodies (i.e. walking in his ways perfectly).
So the question I am wrestling with right now is whether or not (what we call) "sanctification" is a the process by which God takes a Christian from the initial effects of regeneration to its final effects. In other words, is there any sense in which a believer can say, "I've been regenerated (at conversion). I'm being regenerated (through sanctification), and I will be regenerated (through resurrection)?"
I hope I'm not nose-diving into some heresy I've not seen before.
What do you think? Help me out here.
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