Reply to Questions.
Zion's Advocate, November 1898, Vol. 37, No. 11.
Lostantville, Indiana, September 27, 1898.
Dear Brother Daily: -- We had the best association I think we have
had for a long time. Elder Cash from Missouri was with us. Elders
Moffitt from Illinois, Lines, P. T. Oliphant, J. H. Oliphant,
Arthur Hackleman, W. Chastain, J. M. Thompson, and a number of
others. We regretted that you were not there.
I submit a few questions to you and would be pleased to have you
write upon the subject when you feel disposed.
1. In what sense were we the sons of God, designated as his sheep,
before Christ died for us and before we were born again?
2. When does the adoption take place?
3. What distinction do you make between the begetting of the
children of God and the birth?
William H. Crouse.
Question 1. God's people were his before Christ died for them, and
before their regeneration, only in a covenant sense. In that sense
they were given to Christ, for it was promised that a "seed" should
serve him; it shall be accounted to the Lord for a generation. They
shall come, and shall declare his righteousness unto a people that
shall be born, that he hath done this." Psa. xxii. 30, 31. As the
people referred to in this promise had not been born when the
promise was made, they could not have been his in a vital or living
sense. They were his in a covenant sense and in that sense they
were given to Christ by promise. Thus "the children of promise are
counted for the seed." Romanx ix. 8. They "are the children of
promise as Isaac was." Galatians iv. 28. God appeared to Abraham
one year before the birth of Isaac, and promised him Sarah should
have a son. He said to him, "My covenant will I establish with
Isaac, which Sarah shall bare unto thee at this set time in the
next year." Genesis xvii. 21. The Spirit inspired Paul to frame
this into an allegory, by which he illustrated that the Spiritual
family of God are the children of the free woman, or new covenant
of grace, not children of the bond woman, or old covenant of works,
and by which he forever established to a demonstration the doctrine
of election as we believe and teach it today. Peter proclaimed this
same doctrine, saying, "Ye are the children of the prophets, and of
the covenant which God made with our fathers, saying unto Abraham,
And in thy seed shall all the kindreds of the earth be blessed."
Acts iii. 25. The seed referred to in this passage is Christ, and
all the kindreds of the earth here spoken of are the children
promised of "every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation."
Revelation iv. 9. The Father said to the Son, "Ask of me and I
shall give thee the heathen for thine inheritance, and the
uttermost part of the earth for thy possession." Psalms ii. 8. This
is equivalent to saying that such request was made and answered. It
is taught that God fore knew his people, therefore they did not
exist with him from eternity.
There are many forms of expression used in the bible to convey to our minds an idea of what is done for this people in changing them from the natural state in which they are born into the world, to a spiritual state in which they are caused to exist as the living family of God. Thus they are said to be delivered as prisoners from a prison. Isaiah lxi. 1. In this they are utterly helpless and necessarily passive. They are said to be quickened and raised from the dead. Ephesians i. 1. In this they are likewise necessarily passive, and the work is performed entirely by him who alone raises the dead. They are said to be created anew. Ephesians ii. 10. In this they can not be consulted even, and can not render the least aid, for God is the only Creator, and the work of creation is such as to entirely exclude any thing done by that which is being created or by a fellow creature.
They are said to become dead to the law and married to Christ. Romans vii. 4. They are also said to be born again, or born from above. John iii. 3. In each of these representations the change illustrated is the sole work of him who first gave being to the things that exist. This is so self evident that any attempt to prove it to be true seems entirely superfluous. We will now offer some thoughts on the idea of being born again. It cannot be that we are born of God in every respect just as we were born of Adam as his offspring. The attempt to carry this figure too far would involve us in difficulties and absurdities from which there would be no escape. Adam stands as the head of the human family, but he was the father only of his immediate children, who in the course of time, became fully his equal, and some of them produced children as Adam did, and thus became heads of families. It cannot be that God is the Father of his family in exactly this same way, for then he would be not only Father, but Grandfather, Great-grandfather, &c., and his children and grandchildren, and great-grandchildren would ultimately become his equal, and there would be an innumerable number of Gods all upon an exact equality.
This reductio ad absurdum shows the fallacy of an attempt to carry the figure beyond what the word of God authorizes us to do. It is dangerous to deal in speculations. This course has given birth to many false doctrines that have grown up in the church as troublesome and poisonous weeds. The truth is, God is represented as the Father of all his children, who are all said to be not only born of him, but are also said to be created, raised from the dead, delivered from prison, and married to him. These various forms of representation are employed in the scriptures to teach us that God alone deserves the praise of his people having become what they are, and they all stand as unanswerable arguments against the Arminian doctrine. For if it is proper to say that they are created, raised from the dead, and born again, in being regenerated, it follows that they could not have assisted in the least in that work and that their wills were not even consulted about it. But while these truths, so abundantly taught in God's word stand as insurmountable difficulties to Arminianism, they are as much opposed to the erroneous doctrines of Two Seedism and Eternal Vital Unionism. If the devil is the father of one portion of the human family in the same sense that God is the Father of the others, and they are fathers just as Adam is, then there will be a great crowd of devils and Gods in the end, and God will deserve no praise for providing for the salvation and support of his children, for he was obligated to do all this for them because of their eternal relation to him as his offspring. The truth is, as we have already shown, that in covenant God engaged to ransom from the power of the grave, to redeem from death, those whom he foreknew. As they stood in this covenant relation to him Jesus became their surety and paid the debt in full satisfaction to divine justice. The Spirit in God's own time, quickens those for whom Christ died, and they become the real, living children of God.
Question 2. To adopt is to take a stranger into one's family as son and heir, giving him a title to the privileges and rights of a child. Thus God is represented in his word as adopting poor fallen sinners of Adam's race into his heavenly family, so that they are declared to be "no more strangers and foreigners but fellow citizens with the saints and of the household of God." Man is a dual being, possessing a soul and a body. As an alien sinner, his entire person is separated from God, and in that state he is a child of wrath. When God quickens his soul and raises him from a state of death in sins, the Spirit of adoption is sent forth into his heart crying, Abba Father. This Spirit is called the Spirit of adoption (or Spirit of sonship as the original signifies), because by it the alien sinner is made a son of God by adoption. The body is yet carnal, and must be changed, which change will be affected at its resurrection from the dead. It is that for which the children of God wait: "waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our bodies." As the adoption of the body takes place at the time it is raised from the dead, by analogy we reason that adoption of the soul takes place when it is quickened by the Spirit.
Question 3. To be born really signifies to be produced or brought into life. The word has come to be applied, however, by common usage, to the bringing forth of that which already has being and life. According to the former, which is the primary and real signification of the term, no distinction can be made between the begetting and the birth. To say that one is begotten of God in this sense, is to say that he is born of God. According to the latter there is a distinction, the soul being quickened by the Spirit and caused to travel in a mourning state until the time of deliverance from trouble. It depends upon what one means to express by the term birth, then, whether or not he is authorized to make a distinction. Where it is said in the scriptures that we are born of God, it is the same as saying that we are begotten of God; that is, that God is our Father.
J. R. D.
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