Galatians
3:10-14 For
all who rely on works of the law are under a curse; for it is written, “Cursed
be everyone who does not abide by all things written in the Book of the Law,
and do them.” …the law is not of faith, rather “The one who does them shall
live by them.” Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse
for us—for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree”— so that
in Christ Jesus the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles, so that we
might receive the promised Spirit through faith.
If Jesus is to regenerate
me, what is the problem He is up against? I have a heredity I had no say in; I
am not holy nor likely to be holy by my own efforts. If all Jesus Christ can do
is to tell me I must be holy, His teaching plants despair in me.
But Jesus Christ is a
Regenerator, the One who can put into me His own holiness. Now I can begin to
understand what He means when He says that I must by holy. Redemption means
that Jesus Christ can put into any person a disposition that is already in
Himself. His standards for me are based on His disposition, His nature. His
teachings are for the life He puts in me. The moral work on my part is to be in
agreement with God’s verdict on sin in the Cross of Jesus Christ.
The New Testament teaching
about regeneration is that when a man is struck by a sense of need, God will
put the Holy Spirit into his spirit, and his personal spirit will be
transformed by the Spirit of Christ. The moral miracle of redemption is that
God can put into me the new disposition from which I can live a life pleasing
to Him.
Just as the disposition of
sin entered into the human race by one man, Adam, so now the Holy Spirit
entered the human race by another God-Man, Jesus Christ. Redemption means that
I can be delivered from the sin I have in me and through Jesus Christ I can
receive a new nature from His Holy Spirit.
