On Free Will and New Birth (1)

By freedom, I mean the ability and strength to do what is good. Any liberty and ability to that which is good is only from the Spirit. The defence of Martin Luther and others who wrote of this freedom is sound and good, that the will of man is slavish altogether without the Spirit of God.
A liberty to supernatural objects comes from supernatural principles. Nothing moves above its own sphere; nothing is done above the level of activity that God has put into it. A natural man can do nothing except naturally, for nothing can work above itself by its own strength. The soul of man has no liberty at all to that which is spiritually good, without a supernatural principle that raises it above itself. The Spirit of God puts a new life into the soul of a man. When he has done that, that life is preserved against all opposition; and together with preserving that life, it applies that inward life and power to individual works. We cannot perform these works without the inciting power of the Spirit of God. The moving comes from the Spirit of God. As every individual moving in the body comes from the soul, so the Spirit puts a new life, applies that life to the soul, and applies the soul to every action.
Too many divines hold that the Holy Spirit works only by way of persuasion upon the soul, from outside the soul; but he does not enter into the soul or alter it; he does not work as an inward worker, but only as an outward persuader, suggesting and enticing. But this is too shallow a concept for so deep a business as this. He puts a new life into the soul; he takes away the stony heart and gives a fleshly heart (Ezek. 36:26). These phrases of Scripture are too weighty to attach to them such a shallow sense, as only to entreat, as a man would entreat a stone to come out of its place. But the Spirit puts a new life and power, and then acts and stirs that power to all that is good.

Devotional Readings taken from Puritan Richard Sibbes 'Refreshment for the Soul.'
Glorious Freedom, pp. 42-43 [47-48]
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