Motivation (28): I. Murray

Iain Murray (1931-), Scottish pastor, author, one-time assistant to Lloyd-Jones, and founder of the Banner of Truth Trust publishing company:

"[O]nce the Biblical doctrine of regeneration is grasped it means that no man can be a true believer who does not possess a new life 'created in righteousness and true holiness' (Eph. 4:24). According to Scripture it is quite impossible to be justified by faith and not to experience the commencement of true sanctification, because the spiritual life communicated by the Spirit in the act of regeneration (which introduces the new power to believe) is morally akin to the character of God and contains within it the germ of all holiness. Thus saving faith is never found in isolation."

--The Forgotten Spurgeon (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth Trust, 1966), 108-09.

"To claim as the work of the Holy Spirit anything that does not show itself first by purity of life is to undermine the real meaning of Christianity. What made the revivals of the early nineteenth century so powerful in the conviction and silencing of unbelief was their indisputable effects in changing men’s habits, subduing their selfishness and pride, and rendering visible the apostolic assertion, 'if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new' (2 Cor. 5:17). Joshua Bradley, writing in 1819, gives testimony to this:

"God has delivered his cause from reproach, and laid waste the systems of infidels. These are confounded, and stand with silent astonishment, to see such a striking alteration, as evidently appears in many old hardened sinners, who they thought, were inaccessible to the influences of religion. But they are not more astonished than many of the converts are themselves, to find such a change in their own feelings, views, motives, and desires. Who can behold the blessed effects of the religion of Jesus, and not be convinced of its divine original?"

--Revival and Revivalism: The Making and Marring of American Evangelicalism: 1750-1858 (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth Trust, 1994), 217.