More From Dr. Piper on the Ordo Salutis

This is a follow up to my previous posting "Dr. John Piper on Ordo Salutis" (See here). The following citations from Dr. Piper are from "Born Again Through the Living and Abiding Word" (here). In my previous posting I showed that Piper was, as brother Mann commented, "wishy washy" on the ordo salutis. He could affirm that life came by faith union in one breath and then speak of regeneration preceding faith in another. In the following citations we will see more of this same incongruity. 

Said Dr. Piper:

"One of the unsettling things about the new birth, which Jesus says we all must experience in order to see the kingdom of God (John 3:3), is that we don’t control it. We don’t decide to make it happen any more than a baby decides to make his birth happen. Or more accurately: We don’t decide to make it happen any more than dead men decide to give themselves life. The reason we need to be born again is that we are dead in our trespasses and sins."

This is a common argument for the born again before faith view. It denies that regeneration or rebirth results from a decision of the will to be born again. Were we guided by reason alone, we might agree with Piper and others who make such an argument. But, is faith not an act of the will? Is it not a choice? One of the other metaphors for the saving experience is through union with Christ as illustrated in marital union. Do the marital partners not choose to be married? Do they not choose to become one? And, does not communion follow union? Those who put the new birth before faith, and before marital union, rely not on scripture (for no scripture asserts the presupposition) but upon logic and from making physical birth to be in every way like spiritual birth. That would be pressing the metaphor too far.

Though the dead, logically, do not "decide to give themselves life," yet this is not how the scriptures present it. Rather, the scriptures do exhort the spiritually dead to regenerate themselves. (See my posting "Make You A New Heart" here). The way they do this is by a choice to come to Christ. Marital life follows a union that was effected by a union entered freely by faith. How God effects or brings about such a choice in spiritually dead souls is a point of debate between Calvinists (Predestinarians) and Arminians (free willers). But, it is going too far to suggest that there is no choice in being reborn. The words that Christ spoke to Nicodemus, who was not born again when Christ spoke to him about it, was all with the intention of producing in Nicodemus the will to be born again.

From the above citation it appears that Piper wants to put regeneration and receiving spiritual life prior to faith, and prior to the decision to follow Christ. But, let us hear him further.

"Something has to happen to us. Jesus said we must be born again (John 3:3). The Holy Spirit has to work a miracle in our hearts and give us new spiritual life. We were dead and we need to be made alive. We need ears that can hear truth as supremely desirable, and we need eyes that see Christ and his way of salvation as supremely beautiful. We need hearts that are soft and receptive to the word of God. In short, we need new life. We need to be born again."

So far so good. But, Piper should be careful in entertaining the error that the sinner lacks a physical ability to hear, see, and know. God does not give ears and eyes in rebirth but makes the same ears, and the same eyes, and the same heart to do what they are morally unable to do. If lost sinners have no ears, no eyes, no hearts, then to admonish them to hear, see, and feel would be foolish and cruel. No, the sinner has eyes, but these they have closed to the truth. They have ears but those ears are "dull of hearing," needing healing. God changes the heart, yes, but it is not an exchange. The same heart is changed and become new.

Said Piper:

"The way this happens (as we have seen in the first six messages in this series) is that the Spirit of God supernaturally gives us new spiritual life by connecting us with Jesus Christ through faith. The new spiritual life that we receive in the new birth is not separate from union with Jesus, and it is not separate from faith. When God in the riches of his mercy and the greatness of his love and the sovereignty of his grace chooses to regenerate us, he gives us new life by uniting us to Christ. “God gave us eternal life, and this life is in his Son” (1 John 5:11). Our first experience of this is the faith in Jesus that this life brings. There is no separation of time here. When we are born gain, we believe. And when we believe, we know we have been born again. When there is fire, there is heat. When there is new birth, there is faith."

Here is the wishy washiness that characterizes Piper on this subject. In the above citation he both puts faith before life (my view) and also puts it after life. He says faith brings life and says life brings faith.

Next he asks - "How does God regenerate us? How do we take part in it?" He says:

"You might think I would say that we don’t take part in it, because we are spiritually dead. But the dead do take part in their resurrection. Here is an example of what I mean. When Jesus stood before the grave of Lazarus who had been dead for four days, Lazarus had no part in imparting his new life. He was dead. Jesus, not Lazarus, created the new life. In John 11:43, Jesus says to the dead Lazarus, “Lazarus, come out.” And the next verse says, “The man who had died came out.” So Lazarus takes part in this resurrection. He comes out. Christ causes it. Lazarus does it. Christ brings about the resurrection. Lazarus acts out the resurrection. The instant Christ commands Lazarus to rise, Lazarus does the rising. The instant God gives new life, we do the living."

I agree with these words and would add these thoughts. Regeneration is not a "zapping," like being zapped with electricity. It is not merely "depositing" something within a man as our Hardshell brothers believe, and is what their Two Seed forefathers believed. Those old Two Seed Hardshells taught that regeneration was the depositing within the "Adam man" an eternal child of God, who comes down from heaven and enters into the Adam man. 

Christ enters the core being of a believing sinner when he believes and joins himself to Christ. That is what the scriptures teach plainly. If one wants to deny it because he says it is illogical, then he shows that he is guided by reason for his faith, that he leans upon his own understanding. If we rely on reason for faith, then we will not believe in any miracle in the Bible. 

I wish that Dr. Piper would totally divorce himself from the born again before faith view and not speak out of both sides of his mouth on this important issue. That is my prayer. One may view this critique of Piper as a case of Calvinist Fly Swatting (see my previous post on this).