Systematic Theology, by Louis Berkhof - New Leaven

have reversed the order. Even Maccovius, Voetius, and Comrie, all Supralapsarians,
follow the usual order. Several considerations prompted Reformed theologians in
general to place calling before regeneration.
a. Their doctrine of the covenant of grace. They considered the covenant of grace as the
great and all-comprehensive good which God in infinite mercy grants unto sinners, a
good including all the blessings of salvation, and therefore also regeneration. But this
covenant is inseparably connected with the gospel. It is announced and made known in
the gospel, of which Christ is the living center, and therefore does not exist without it.
Where the gospel is not known the covenant is not realized, but where it is preached
God establishes His covenant and glorifies His grace. Both the preaching of the gospel
and the administration of the covenant precede the saving operations of the Holy Spirit,
and the believer’s participation in the salvation wrought by Christ.
b. Their conception of the relation between the work of Christ and that of the Holy Spirit.
The Anabaptists failed to do justice to this relation. Christ and His redemptive work are
presented to us in the gospel. And it is from Christ, as the Mediator of God and man
and as the meritorious cause of our salvation, that the Holy Spirit derives everything
which He communicates to sinners. Consequently, He joins His work to the preaching
of the gospel and operates in a saving way only where the divine message of
redemption is brought. The Holy Spirit does not work apart from the Christ presented
in the gospel.
c. Their reaction against the mysticism of the Anabaptists. The Anabaptists proceeded on
the assumption that regeneration effected not merely a renewal of human nature, but an
entirely new creation. And this being so, they regarded it as impossible that anything
belonging to this natural creation as, for instance, the human language in which the
Word of God is brought to man, could in any way be instrumental in communicating
the new life to sinners. As they saw it, regeneration eo ipso excluded the use of the Word
as a means, since this was after all only a dead letter. This mystical tendency was
strongly opposed by Reformed theologians.
d. Their experience in connection with the spiritual renewal of adults. While it was a
settled opinion that covenant children who die in infancy are reborn and therefore
saved, there was no unanimous opinion as to the time when those who grew up became
partakers of the grace of regeneration. Some shared the opinion of Voetius that all elect
children are regenerated before baptism, and that the new life can, even in adults,
remain concealed for many years. The great majority, however, were loath to take that
position, and held that the new life, if present, would reveal itself in some way.
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