In The Master's Service

Print this page

DOES THE SPIRIT WORK WITHOUT THE GOSPEL?

Elder T. L. Webb, Sr. (deceased)  From the book, "Little Things"

Dear Brother Cayce. I am asking you, or some of the other brethren, to help me a little. My church goes by the name of _____. They claim the Holy Spirit does not act in salvation only in connection with the preached gospel. They believe the Holy Spirit quickens the dead sinner into life, but never separate and apart from the gospel. They teach that the gospel is the power of God unto salvation and that no one is ever converted or saved without the preached gospel. My request is that you, or some of the brethren, will write a short piece on this subject in 'The Primitive Baptist.' I differ with them on their teaching, but not able to meet them on the subject, as I would like. The truth is all I seek. Your brother in Him, I hope. W. M Anderson, Jamestown, La.

REMARKS

It is not my job to try to explain the deep, doctrinal problems, which we receive. I turn them over to Brother Cayce, and I try to see after the little things. But as this has been turned over to me, I suppose Brother Cayce has not time just now to see after it. So I am willing to offer a few little thoughts on the subject and am perfectly. willing for anyone else, who wishes to, to write on it.

No doubt there are more of the Lord's people confused and bewilderd over the above subject than any other. The trouble is a wrong division, or application, of God's word. That is, taking Scriptures that are addressed to God's people and applying them to the dead sinner. There never has been a conditional plan of redemption offered, or advocated, any other way. In this way many of the Lord's little children have been deceived. For this reason, together with other reasons, the true gospel is essential, and should be preached, to save God's people from deception and from error. No one will deny that God's people are saved from error through the preached gospel. No one will deny that God's people are converted by the preached gospel. But we do deny that anyone ever has been regenerated, or born again, by, or through, the preached gospel.

Has God ever saved a sinner independent of the preached gospel? Yes. He never has saved a dead, alien, sinner any other way. The first sinner that God ever saved was saved without the preached gospel. If not, who was the preacher? The first infant that God ever saved was saved independent of the preached gospel. If not, who was the preacher? and how did He get the infant to understand what he preached? In order for anyone to be saved by preaching that one must, to say the least of it, hear and understand that preaching. For this reason we say that to hinge the eternal destiny of lost souls on the preached gospel would not only lose the infant, idiot, all those who died before the gospel was preached and all who die in heathen lands, where there is no gospel, but it would lose everybody. Proof: John viii. 47 and 1 John iv. 5, 6: "He that is of God heareth God's words: ye therefore hear them not, because ye are not of God."

"They are of the world: therefore speak they of the world and the world heareth them. We are of God: he that knoweth God heareth us; he that is not of God heareth not us. Hereby know we the spirit of truth and the spirit of error." If the first thing is to hear the gospel and the one that is not of God (the dead sinner) positively cannot hear it, how can he be saved by it? It would be impossible. "Who then can be saved?" "With men this is impossible, but not with God, for with God all things are possible." -Matt. xix. 26. It is not impossible for the dead sinner to hear the voice of the Son of God when He speaks to give life. Yet the dead did not hear Jesus when He preached the gospel. In one way they heard Him; in another way they did not hear Him. He said to some, "Why do ye not understand my speech? even because ye cannot hear my word." -John viii. 43. So it is today when the gospel is preached, the dead hear the sound of the gospel but they do not and cannot hear it spiritually, or understandingly. Hence Paul says, "The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned." -I Cor. ii. 14. The gospel is a thing of the Spirit. Therefore, the natural man (the dead sinner) cannot understand it. He can hear and understand the preacher that is of the world and naturally enjoys it. So the Bible says, "They are of the world; therefore speak they of the world and the world heareth them." The preacher that says the dead sinner can hear and understand his preaching admits that he is of the world and not of God. The apostle says, "He that is not of God heareth not us."

The truth of the matter is: regeneration, obtaining life, or being born again, is not a teachable proposition. "It is the Spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing." -John vi. 63. But does the Spirit quicken one independent of the preached gospel? It does if the preacher is flesh, and I have never seen any other kind. If the above text is the truth, then the preacher does not profit anything in the work of quickening. If he does not profit anything in the work of quickening, then he does not profit anything in saving dead sinners. Every case on record in the Bible where people have heard, received and been saved by the preached gospel they were previously regenerated, or born again, by the independent work of the Spirit of God. Cornelius was born of God before Peter, or any other preacher, ever preached to him. Proof: Acts x. 35. He feared God and worked righteousness. "If ye know that He is righteous, ye know that everyone that doeth righteousness is born of Him." -1 John ii. 29. Here is one plain case where one was born of God before he ever heard the gospelhence independent of the gospel. Indeed the "gospel is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth," and in it is a revelation "from faith to faith," but it is never the power of God unto salvation to the unbeliever, or dead sinner. The believer is born of God (1 John v. 1) and had passed from death unto life before the gospel was the power of God unto salvation to him - John v. 24 - hence was already saved from wrath through Christ before he heard the gospel. So the revelation in the gospel is always from "faith to faith," and never from faith to unbelief.