New Birth

Human nature is too bad to be improved, too dilapidated to be repaired. Here is a cracked bell. How can it be restored? By one of two methods. The first is to repair the bell, to encompass it with hoops, to surround it with bands. Nevertheless, you can easily discern the crack of the bell in the crack of the sound. The only effective way is to remelt the bell, recast it, and make it all new; then it will ring clear. And human nature is a bell, suspended high up in the steeple of creation, to ring forth the praises of the Creator. But in the fall in Eden the bell cracked. How can it be restored? By one of two ways. One is to surround it with outward laws and regulations, as with steel hoops. This is the method adopted by philosophy, as embodied in practical statesmanship, and without doubt there is a marked improvement in the sound. Nevertheless, the crack in the metal shows itself in the crack of the tone. The best way is to remelt it, recast it, remold it; and this is God’s method in the Gospel. He remelts our being, refashions us, makes us new creatures in Christ Jesus, zealous unto good works; and by and by we shall sound forth His praises in a nobler, sweeter strain than ever we did before. Heaven’s high arches will be made to echo our anthems of praise.