IS CONVERSION NECESSARY?

Abstract

Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new." 2 Corinthians 5:17. A FEW days ago I was preaching in Lancashire upon the putting away of sin by our Lord Jesus, and the consequent peace of conscience enjoyed by the believer. In the course of the sermon I related my own conversion, with the view of showing that the simple act of looking to Jesus brought peace to the soul. Now, the diocese of Manchester is presided over by a bishop who has a deservedly high place in public esteem for his zeal, industry, and force of character; and, feeling that he did not agree with me, he has very properly taken an opportunity to warn the working men whom he addressed against drawing improper inferences from my story, and he has done this in a manner so courteous that I only wish all discussions were conducted in the same spirit. The best return I can make for his courtesy is to enlarge upon the subject, and carefully guard his utterances from injurious inferences, even as he has protected mine. The idea of controversy is not upon my mind at all, nor have I any other feeling towards Bishop Fraser than that which is honestly expressed in a hearty prayer that God may bless him; but I am thinking of the many who will read his remarks who, I trust, may afterwards read mine: and as the point is one of the utmost conceivable importance, and deeply concerns the souls of our hearers, it is well that neither should be www.biblesnet.com -Online Christian Library misunderstood, and that by all means a truth so vital should be brought into prominence. The bishop does not doubt for a moment that my own conversion was correctly described by me, and that like cases have occurred at other times: but he fears lest others should suppose that they must be converted in exactly the same manner. In that fear I fully participate, and it has ever been a special point with me to show that God's Spirit calls men to Jesus in divers ways. Some are drawn so gently that they scarce know when the drawing began, and others are so suddenly affected that their conversion stands out with noonday clearness. Perhaps no two conversions are precisely alike in detail; the means, the modes, the manifestations, all vary greatly. As our minds are not cast in the same mould, it may so happen that the truth which affects one is powerless upon another; the style of address which influences your friend may be offensive to yourself, and that which leads him to decide may only cause you to delay. "The wind bloweth where it listeth." The Holy Ghost is called "the free Spirit," and in the diversity of his operations that freeness is clearly seen. Again and again have I warned you against imitating others in the matter of conversion, lest you be found counterfeits, and it is well when another voice unites with me in the warning. Yet in all true conversions there are points of essential agreement: there must be in all a penitent confession of sin, and a looking to Jesus for the forgiveness of it, and there must also be a real change of heart such as shall affect the entire after life, and where these essential points are not to be found there is no genuine conversion.