Discourse of the Word, the Instrument of Regeneration

Of his own will begot he us with the word of truth, that we should be a kind of first-fruits of his creatures.—James 1:18.

I have chosen this text to treat of the instrument of the new birth.

The apostle having advised them (verse 13, ‘But let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God: for God cannot be tempted to evil, neither tempts he any man’) not to charge God as the author of any temptation to evil, showing it to be contrary to the nature of God, who is infinite goodness and righteousness; for as he cannot be tempted with evil, so neither can he tempt any man; and declaring the true cause and spring of all evil to be inherent in ourselves, even that lust which is riveted in our nature, which he calls our own lust, - verse 14, ‘But every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed,’ - he takes occasion from thence to show the order of sin’s working. Sin is first conceived by that original corruption in our nature, and formed and brought forth into action; and when it is finished, and grows into a habit, it ‘brings forth death,’ verse 15. To remove this error, which some in those days had sucked in out of a natural self-love that man has to excuse himself, and remove the cause of sin far from him, the apostle shows that God is the author and fountain of all the good we have: ver. 17, ‘Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, nor shadow of change.’ God being the infinite Father of lights, who has no eclipses or decreases, no shadows or mixtures of darkness, but always shines with a constant and settled brightness, of this goodness has given a great evidence, in conferring the choicest mercy upon us, even a new begetting through the gospel, and thereby the relation of children to him, that we might be consecrated to him as the first fruits and a peculiar portion. Of his own will, “bouletheis; by his mere motion, induced by no cause but the goodness in his own breast. (1.) To distinguish it from the generation of the Son, which is natural, this voluntary; of his own will, not naturally, as he begot his Son from eternity. (2.) Not necessarily, by a necessity of nature, as the sun, to which he had compared God before, does enlighten, and enliven, when matter is prepared to receive his quickening beams; but by an arbitrariness of grace. (3.) Not by any obligation from the creature; the will of God is opposed to the merit of man. The new creation answers to election; the first purpose was free, the bringing that purpose to execution is free whatsoever obligation there is, results not from the creature, but from himself, his own immutable nature, which has no variableness, nor shadow of change. “Begot us,’ “apekuesen”, or brought us forth, for the same word “apokuei”, ver. 15, is translated ‘brings forth.’ ‘By the word of truth’, a title given to the gospel both in the Old and New Testament: in the Old, Ps. xiv. 4, ‘And in thy majesty ride prosperously, because of truth,’ or ‘upon thy word of truth,’ in the New Testament, Eph. i. 13, ‘In whom you also trusted, after you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation.’ So 2 Cor. vi. 7, and 2 Tim. ii. 15. And it is called truth by way of excellency, as paramount to all other truth. (1.) Either, by an Hebraism, the word of truth; that is, the true word. (2.) Or rather, by way of eminency, as containing a higher truth, more excellent in itself, more advantageous for the creature, than any other divine truth; wherein the highest glory of God, the sure and everlasting happiness of the creature, is set forth; a word which he has ‘magnified above all his name,’ Ps. cxxxviii. 2.