Does 1 John 5:1 Prove Faith Before Regeneration?

I've been having a series of friendly discussions with an Old Truth reader named James West, who describes himself as an avid theological student and active missionary for some 50 years of ministry. He is suspicious of Calvinism and believes it to be theologically inventive at times. We are looking at some of his claims against Calvinism, one by one. The statement was made "You won't find a bible verse that says 'believe and you will be born again'", and James objected to this by replying: "Is 1 John no longer a part of Scripture? 'Whoever believes that Jesus is the Christ is born of God'". So in this post, we'll take a look at 1 John and see if it really does support James' assertion that faith precedes regeneration.

Depending upon which English bible translation you are looking at, this verse might appear to support James' assertion that faith precedes regeneration (the new birth), or it may appear to support just the opposite in other translations. For example, these are some examples of translations that may appear to support James' point of view at first glance:

"Whoever believes that Jesus is the Christ IS BORN of God", NASB
"Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ IS BORN of God", KJV
"Whoever believes that Jesus is the Christ IS BORN of God", NKV
"Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ IS BORN of God", NIV

However, in these translations, it appears that the opposite is the case - that people who believe have been (past tense) born again. Calvinists would appeal to this wording to demonstrate that regeneration occurs before faith (which is the opposite of James' point of view):

"Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ HAS BEEN born of God", ESV
"Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ HAS BEEN born of God", NRSV
"...believing that Jesus is the Christ, of God he HATH BEEN begotten", YLT
"...believes that Jesus is the Christ, out from God HAS BEEN born" WUEST

And so we can see that, so far as our English translations are concerned, there is nothing but controversy. In order for us to get to the bottom of this, we will need to look at the grammatical structure of this verse in the Greek. Dr. James White discusses this on page 287 of his book "The Potter's Freedom":

Generally such a passage would be understood to present the following order of events: 1) Believe that Jesus is the Christ, and 2) you are born of God. Yet, the original readers of this text would not jump to such a conclusion. In reality, the most literal rendering would be, "Every one believing (present tense participle, emphasizing both the on-going action as well as the individuality of saving faith, "each believing person") that Jesus is the Christ has been born of God (a perfect passive verb, "has been born by the agency of God"). In John, "the one believing" is very common, and it is no accident the the emphasis falls upon the on-going action of faith. The one believing that Jesus is the Christ has been born of God. If a person is now believing that Jesus is the Christ in a true and saving fashion, they are doing so because, as a completed action in the past, they were born again through the work and agency of God. The verb "to be born" is passive: they were caused to be born by another, that being God. They did not cause their own spiritual birth. And what is the inevitable result of being born of God? belief that Jesus is the Christ. Just as all those who are given by the Father to the Son come to the Son (John 6:37), so too all who are spiritually reborn through the work of God have as the object of their faith the Lord Jesus Christ.

Some Arminian exegetes might object to this interpretation. A means of testing the consistency of the exegesis offered of this passage would be to ask how such a person interprets these words from John:

If you know that He is righteous, you know that everyone also who practices righteousness is born of Him. (1 John 2:29)

Every consistent protestant would say, "the reason one practices righteousness is because they have already been born of Him. We do not practice righteousness so as to be born, but instead the birth give rise to the practice of righteousness". And such is quite true. But, this means that in 1 John 5:1 the belief in Jesus as the Christ is the result of being born of Him. The verbal parallel is exact: in 1 John 2:29 "the one practicing righteousness" is a present participle; in 1 John 5:1 "the one believing" is a present participle. In both passages the exact same verb in the exact same form is used. Therefore, sheer consistency leads one to the conclusion that divine birth precedes and is the grounds of both faith in Christ as well as good works.

The testimony to the fact that God's work of grace precedes any human action can be found all through the text of scripture. Luke knew it well:

A woman named Lydia, from the city of Thyatira, a seller of purple fabrics, a worshiper of God, was listening; and the Lord opened her heart to respond to the things spoken by Paul. (Acts 16:14)

In future posts we'll look at some more of the verses that James West feels disprove Calvinism, as well as his explanation of John 6:44. James West is welcome to respond in the comments section below, and I will ensure that any comments that he makes will be posted here.

Related Information:

• See 1 John 5:1 being covered on the Reformation Theology (blog)
• Read my discussion with James West on John 1:12-13
• See more verses that indicate how regeneration comes before faith
• RC Sproul discusses how regeneration precedes faith