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passages the conclusion is perfectly warranted that in the case of adults external calling by the
preaching of the word generally precedes regeneration. Whether they also warrant the
assertion that internal calling is prior to the implanting of the new life, is a question that need
not be considered at this point.
2. THE VIEW REPRESENTED IN OUR CONFESSIONAL STANDARDS.
Our confessional standards
also imply that in the case of adults the preaching of the word precedes regeneration, but it
should be borne in mind that they do not use the word “regeneration” in the limited sense in
which it is employed to-day. The Belgic Confession says in Art. XXIV: “We believe that this true
faith, being wrought in man by the hearing of the Word of God and the operation of the Holy
Ghost, doth regenerate and make him a new man, causing him to live a new life, and freeing
him from the bondage of sin.” Faith is wrought in man by the hearing of the Word and, in turn,
works regeneration, that is, the renewal of man in conversion and sanctification. The Canons of
Dort contain a somewhat more detailed description in III and IV, Articles 11 and 12: “But when
God accomplishes His good pleasure in the elect, or works in them true conversion, He not only
causes the gospel to be externally preached to them, and powerfully illumines their minds by
His Holy Spirit, that they may rightly understand and discern the things of the Spirit of God, but
by the efficacy of the same regenerating Spirit He pervades the innermost recesses of the man;
. . . And this is the regeneration so highly celebrated in Scripture and denominated a new
creation: a resurrection from the dead; a making alive, which God works in us without our aid.
But this is nowise effected merely by the external preaching of the gospel, by moral suasion, or
such a mode of operation that, after God has performed His part, it still remains in the power of
man to be regenerated or not, to be converted or to continue unconverted,” etc. In these
articles the words “regeneration” and “conversion” are used interchangeably. It is quite
evident, however, that they denote the fundamental change in the governing disposition of the
soul as well as the resulting change in the outward manifestations of life. And this change is
brought about not merely, but at least in part, by the preaching of the gospel. Consequently
this precedes.
3. THE ORDER GENERALLY FOLLOWED BY REFORMED THEOLOGIANS.
Among the Reformed it
has been quite customary to place calling before regeneration, though a few have reversed the
order. Even Maccovius, Voetius, and Comrie, all Supralapsarians, follow the usual order. Several
considerations prompted Reformed theologians in general to place calling before regeneration.
a. Their doctrine of the covenant of grace.
They considered the covenant of grace as the great
and all-comprehensive good which God in infinite mercy grants unto sinners, a good including
all the blessings of salvation, and therefore also regeneration. But this covenant is inseparably
connected with the gospel. It is announced and made known in the gospel, of which Christ is