Does Immediate Regeneration Commit a Person to No-Means Theology?

Harold Copping, "Lydia of Thyatira."  Image from WikiMedia Commons.

Does a commitment to immediate Spirit regeneration also commit a person to a view that denies the role of the gospel in salvation?  I don't think so.  Let me explain in terms of my theological commitments.

First of all, I am committed to immediate Holy Spirit regeneration.  I believe the analogy to birth (or begetting) strongly implies that as we have nothing to do with our natural birth, neither to we have anything to do with our spiritual birth, in terms of bringing it about.  It also seems to be implied by Jn. 1:12-13 and 1 Jn. 5:1 (I've read attempted rebuttals to this, but I'm completely unconvinced of the merits of such arguments).  

I am also committed to what seems to me the undeniable fact in the New Testament that justification comes by the instrumentality of faith, and faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God (Rom. 3:21-27; 4:1-16; 5:1; 10:4-17).  I've argued for this extensively in other places, so I won't belabor the point here.  Assuming this reality, it seems to me that we should not call a person saved until they have come to faith in Christ (Gal. 2:16), since to be unjustified is to be condemned, and to be condemned is to be unsaved, under the wrath of God (Rom. 1:18). 

Another Biblical truth to which I am committed is that calling in the sense of the Divine summons to faith (Rom. 8:30; 2 Thess. 2:13-14) includes both regeneration and conversion.  Regeneration is the Divine part of the call and conversion the human response (in terms of repentance and faith).  These two movements - God toward the soul of man in regeneration and man toward God in conversion - are welded together in the effectual call (cf. Jn. 6:44).  We should not therefore separate the two, should not separate what God has joined together, as if there are scads of people out there who are regenerate but not converted.  The purpose of regeneration is conversion.  It is why the apostle John can say, "For whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world: and this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith" (1 Jn. 5:4).  Everyone born of God, not just some, but everyone, overcomes the world. But how is this done?  Through faith.  You cannot separate the two.

But, as Paul puts it, faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God (Rom. 10:17).  The least we can say, in light especially of the previous verses (13-15), is that the preaching of the gospel is the normal means by which God brings his elect to faith.  Putting all this together, it means that though the gospel itself does not regenerate a person, we should expect the regeneration of the soul to occur in the context of the preaching of the gospel since the purpose of regeneration is conversion and conversion ordinarily occurs by means of the preaching of the gospel.   

The example of Lydia is apropos here.  We read, "And a certain woman named Lydia, a seller of purple, of the city of Thyatira, which worshipped God, heard us: whose heart the Lord opened, that she attended unto the things which were spoken of Paul" (Acts 16:14).  Lydia attended to the things spoken by Paul - given the next verse where she is baptized, this is clearly descriptive of conversion, a conversion wrought by means of Paul's preaching.  But what made this possible was the fact that God opened her heart.  This is regeneration.  But note: God opened her heart so that she attended to the things spoken of by Paul.  In this passage we are told explicitly that the purpose of regeneration is conversion.  If people would remember that, it would help us to see that one can hold simultaneously to an immediate (no-means) regeneration and to gospel means in conversion, and that we shouldn't expect to have one without the other.