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The State of the Soul

When the Spirit begins His work of grace in the soul of man, he finds the creature ins such a state as it neither can nor will contribute to the least help in the work of salvation. As the prince of this world, when he came to tempt Christ, “found nothing in him” to befriend and further his tempting design, so, when the Spirit of Christ comes, he finds little encouragement from the sinner. No party within the castle of the soul to side with him when He comes first to set down before it and to lay siege to it, but all the powers of the whole man in arms against Him! Never was there any garrison more resolved to stand out against both the treaties and batteries of an assailing enemy, than the carnal heart is against the means that God uses to reduce it to obedience.

The Convicting Work of the Spirit

Now the Spirit’s address is suited to the several faculties of the soul, the principal of which are these three—understanding, conscience, and will. These are like three forts, one within the other, which must all be reduced before the town is taken—the sinner, I mean, subdued to the obedience of faith.

1. The Spirit makes his approach to the understanding, and on it, he puts forth an act of illumination. The Spirit will not work in a dark shop; the first thing he does, in order to faith, is to beat out a window in the soul and let some light from heaven into it. Hence believers are said to be “renewed in the spirit of their minds” (Ephesians 4:23). By nature, we know little of God and nothing of Christ or the way of salvation by him. The eye of the creature therefore must be opened to see the way of life before he can by faith get into it.
2. Then the Spirit makes his address to the conscience, and the act that passes upon it is an act of conviction. Now this conviction is nothing but a reflection of the light that is in the understanding upon the conscience, whereby the creature feels the weight and force of the truths he knows so as to be brought into a deep sense of them. Most under the gospel know that unbelief is a damning sin, and that there is “no name” to be saved by but the name of Christ. Yet how few of those know this convincingly, so as to apply it to their own consciences and to be affected with their own deplored state.
3. The Spirit puts forth an act of renovation, whereby he does sweetly, but powerfully, incline the will which before was rebellious and refractory, to accept Christ and make a free and deliberate choice of him for his Lord and Savior. I say a “deliberate” choice, wherein the soul well weighs the terms Christ is offered on and, when it has considered all seriously, likes them and closes with them.

Evidences of this Convicting Work

1. A sinner truly convinced is not only convinced of this sin or that sin, but of the evil of all sin. A parboiled conscience is not right, soft in one part and hard in another. The Spirit of God is uniform in its work.
2. The convinced sinner is not only convinced of acts of sin, but of the whole state of sin also. He is not only affected by what he has done—this law broken, and that mercy abused by him—but with what his state and condition is. Many will confess they do not think by any means so ill of themselves that their state is a state of sin and death. Whereas the convinced soul freely puts himself under this sentence of death, owns his condition, and dissembles not his pedigree.
3. The convinced sinner does not only condemn himself for what he has done and is, but he despairs of himself as to anything he can do to save himself. Many, though they go so far as to confess they are vile wretches, and have lived wickedly, and for this deserve to die; yet when they have put a rope about their neck by a self-condemning act, they are so far from being convinced of their own impotency that they hope to cut the rope with their repentance, reformation, and a bundle of good works which they think shall redeem their credit with God and recover his favor. And this comes to pass because the plow of conviction did not go deep enough to tear up those secret roots of self-confidence with which the heart of every sinner is woefully tainted.
4. The convicted sinner is not only convinced of sin, so as to condemn himself and despair himself, but he is convinced of a full provision laid up in Christ for self-condemned and self-despairing ones. Without this, the soul convinced of sin is more likely to go to the gallows with Judas, or to fall on the sword of the law than to think of coming to Christ.

Copyright Jim Ehrhard, 1999. You are permitted to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that: (1) you credit the author; (2) any modifications are clearly marked; (3) you do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction; and (4) you do not make more than 100 copies without permission. If you would like to post this material to your web site or make any use other than as defined above, please contact Teaching Resources International