CONVERSION AND REGENERATION: A TOTAL CHANGE IN AN INDIVIDUAL, PART 1

According to Millard J. Erickson “the evangelical position hold that salvation is a total change in an individual that progresses through sanctification toward glorification.”1 I agree with the evangelical position. For me, personally, there was a point where I took the step of faith to say ‘Jesus, come into my life and be my Lord and Savior’. That made me go from being spiritually dead to becoming alive in my spirit to the Spirit of God! This was my conversion , turning to God, and I know there was a transformation that took place at that moment. That was 43 years ago! Before that point, there had been about a period of a year where the Holy Spirit was knocking at the door of my heart: “Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with Me.”( Revelations 3: 20); and I did not understand completely then that this was God as up till that time I had not believed in a God. But when I took the step of faith in believing and confessing Jesus as Lord and Savior, after some personal revelations by Him, and after I heard the message of salvation, I knew I had become born-again! I believe I was baptized with the Holy Spirit then, and I was ‘born again’ or ‘regenerated’ , but I had a subsequent experience , not many months later, when I started speaking in tongues spontaneously. After a year, I was baptized in water. I know I was like a broken mirror, all pieces scattered in disarray, and little by little , at the teaching of the Word by my pastor and with the leading and illumination of the Holy Spirit, the pieces of my body, soul and spirit came to be put back together in place. I am still becoming the person that God made me to be! I am becoming that person for His purposes and He is not done yet! Restoration has come slowly in the form of healings. He has liberated me from sicknesses, fears, confusions, anxieties to name a few!

According to New Dictionary of Theology “ In Christian theology conversion may be distinguished from spiritual rebirth, or regeneration. Conversion is the act of turning from sin and self towards God through Jesus Christ, often as the result of some form of Christian proclamation!”2 In the Bible, salvation is seen as occurring when a person confesses that Jesus is Lord and believes that He was raised from the dead, as seen in the following Scriptures: “Because if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.” (Romans 10: 9); and “For everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.” (Romans 10: 13). I believe that conversion takes place at this point, because a person is saying ‘yes’ to God, putting all their loyalties to the living God, even though they might not know Him completely! So at conversion, there is an initial response to God’s work in Jesus Christ. It is a step of faith that a person takes to believe!

NOTES
1Millard J. Erickson, Christian Theology,(Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2006),901
2Sinclair B. Ferguson, David F. Wright and J.I. Packer, eds., New Dictionary of Theology, (Downers Grove: Inter-Varsity Press, 1988), 167