By Mark W. Christy, PhD
Over the course of three letters, John Newton set forth to establish three “stages” in the “progressive work of grace” within those who become true converts to the Christian faith.[1] For each stage, he offers what he believes to be the most common elements as he realizes that the Lord may work in unique and special ways as He seeks to mature those who are His. As a man of the Word, his stated goal was to draw his comments from what can be found in Scripture. In this article, the maturation stages of Christianity as proposed by Newton will be discussed in detail alongside some additional evidence from Scripture that will be added to further support his contentions.
According to Newton, new converts are “instantaneous[ly]” saved and filled with sufficient understanding unto salvation. At this precise moment, believers become convicted of sin. This, he argues, only occurs in conjunction with their coming into an awareness of God’s holiness. To be clear, Newton does not believe this recognition of truth is sourced in outward stimuli even while he, of course, understands that it will accompany the preaching of God’s Word. Rather, he sees conversion as a work of the Holy Spirit within the person being saved. As he puts it, “No outward means, no mercies, judgments, or ordinances, can communicate such a discovery of God, or produce such a conviction of sin, without the concurrence of this Divine light and power to the soul.” His position on this matter fully accords with what has been revealed in the new covenant. In 2 Corinthians 3:6, Paul says the “new covenant” is founded solely on the work of the Spirit who “gives life.”[2] The Lord confirms this covenantal work of the Spirit in Jeremiah 31:33: “I will put My law within them and on their heart I will write it; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people.”
As a caveat, Newton informs his readers that it is quite possible for both true confessors and those who falsely feel themselves to have been saved to demonstrate various outward “desires and endeavors.” In the Parable of Sower (explained in Luke 8:11-15), Jesus Himself demonstrates this sad reality whereby false converts show some sort of initial seemingly positive changes after claiming to have received salvation only to fall away sooner or later. In this parable, some receive the gospel with joy and others go on to perform some works, and yet neither reaches maturity but instead fall away in the face of testing. Due to the initial appearance of joy and works among false confessors, other believers, Newton adds, “may be unable to judge with certainty upon the first appearance of a religious profession, whether the work be thus deep and spiritual or not.”
To aid converts in a proper assessment of their salvation, Newton urges the use of Scripture as a means to aid converts in developing to a level of maturity such that their salvation can be proved. As true converts turn to Scripture, they will find themselves to be understanding, affirming, and then applying it. The fault line that separates true from false converts at this point is found in the biblical condemnation of evil. Those who are indeed redeemed will find themselves being made aware of and convicted of their sin all the more as they encounter God in His Word. Along with this, Newton contends that they will be drawn to the excellencies of Christ and encouraged by the promises of God revealed in Scripture such that each of them “waits diligently in the use of all means appointed for the communion and growth of grace” and finds himself/herself “longing, waiting, and praying, for a share in those blessings which he[/she] believes [God’s people] enjoy.”
In the midst of the earnestness of heart whereby the faith of new coverts remains steadfast, Newton claims they struggle with “ignorance and legal[ism]” along with fears concerning the persistence of God’s love. The combined effect of these harmful agents greatly burdens new converts almost from the start. Before long, Newton maintains that the newly discovered “comforts” received from interaction with God and His Word will be incorrectly applied by new coverts such that they feel themselves being invited to rest in their newfound security instead of undertaking the call to “press forward.” In response to this error of thinking the battle with sin has been put to rest, “the comforts [of God] are withdrawn” from the convert.
David recounts just such a treatment at the hands of God: “O Lord, do not rebuke me in Your anger, nor chasten me in Your wrath. Be gracious to me, O Lord, for I am pining away; Heal me, O Lord, for my bones are dismayed. And my soul is greatly dismayed; But You, O Lord—how long? Return, O Lord, rescue my soul; Save me because of Your lovingkindness” (Ps 6:1-4). Later, he goes on to ask a series of questions in Psalm 13:1-2 that reveal the inner turmoil wrought by such actions by God: “How long, O Lord? Will You forget me forever? How long will You hide Your face from me? How long shall I take counsel in my soul, Having sorrow in my heart all the day? How long will my enemy be exalted over me?”
David’s plight during the removal of God’s comforting presence is also experienced by Job, despite his being deemed by God to be “a blameless and upright man, fearing God and turning away from evil” (1:8). This righteousness possessed by Job must have been a precious gift of grace, as it is for all who are truly converted. Job, however, did not just rest on God’s inner work of grace, which makes a person righteous; rather, he made conscious choices in line with that work so as to train himself in righteousness by “putting to death the deeds of the body” (Rom 8:13; cf. 13:14; Eph 4:17-24, 31; Phil 2:12-13; Col 3:8-14; James 1:21; 1 Pet 2:1-3).
Due to his righteousness and faithful obedience which God Himself validates, it is quite surprising when God delivers Job over to Satan’s machinations. Within this experience, Job feels as if God has abandoned him such that he becomes terrified and asks “Why do You hide Your face and consider me Your enemy?” (13:21, 24). As Job struggles to ascertain God’s reason for having removed His comforting presence, he immediately returns to a legalistic framework as the governing factor of God’s dealings with people based upon blessings for faithfulness and cursing for sin without any mature understanding of the deeper presence of sin in his fallen flesh. Reckoning himself to be innocent under his own understanding of the judicial framework governing his relationship with God and determining to have himself proved as such, Job implores God and chides Him to respond, “How many are my iniquities and sins? Make known to me my rebellion and my sin.” (13:23). This engagement with God, like many others found throughout Job’s utterances, demonstrates a maturation level that has yet to fully realize the danger of pride which plagues the sinful flesh.
Responding to Job’s incessant inquiries, God opts to forego offering any sort of direct response and instead plies Job with questions which ultimately reveal Job’s ignorance. Before his ordeal unfolded, Job lived in amazing comfort under the full protection of God (1:10-11). During this time, Job made sustained efforts to live righteously as previously noted; even so, his state of serenity kept him from pressing deeper into his relationship with God because his experience of blessings invited little in the way of deeper reflection about himself and the nature of God. Despite this, it is clear from Job’s initial response to his unfolding ordeal that he had done some reflection, but that reflection soon gave way to an intense standoff within Job between what his experience was telling him and his understanding of God’s justice. Regardless of Job and David’s exact level of maturation, it seems certain from God’s dealings with them that, as Newton suggested, God can and does remove comforts to address the ignorance, legalism, and fears of His saints.
For the New Testament Christian still in the initial state of infancy, Newton supposes that the withdrawals of God’s comforts play out on the emotional level. With sentimental experience of God completely disengaged, the immature convert can easily find prayer to feel like a burdensome exchange falling on deaf ears. Accompanying this ominous apparition, new converts’ sense of hope can quickly dissipate. In Lamentations 3:1-18, Jeremiah recounts his own experience of what Newton considers to be common for younger believers. In this passage, he journeys through what seems like an endlessly hopeless experience where his many worldly hopes prove insufficient even while, or so it seems to him, God “shuts out [his] prayer.” At the conclusion of his ordeal, he learns humility and discovers that the only proper place for his hope in God alone: “Remember my affliction and my wandering, the wormwood and bitterness. Surely my soul remembers and is bowed down within me. This I recall to my mind, therefore I have hope. The Lord’s lovingkindnesses indeed never cease, for His compassions never fail. They are new every morning; Great is Your faithfulness. ‘The Lord is my portion,’ says my soul, ‘Therefore I have hope in Him’” (3:19-24).
During this period of great upheaval within one’s soul, Newton believes that God is teaching His Elect to found their trust in Him apart from their immediate emotional experience. To accomplish this mission, new converts have to learn to stand solidly on the Word of God alone even when there is a total absence of external stimuli to support them. As they engage God and struggle with all manner of misconceived views about God and the reasons for His current harshness (or so it feels), Newton believes that “the Lord is training [them] up” and “enable[ing]” them “to fight against sin” by distributing streams of grace upon them.
Hemmed in from all sides, new coverts find themselves forced to press forward just as God would have them do as they seek to “attain a sure and abiding sense of [their] acceptance in the Beloved.” This overwhelming motivation only further feeds their desires to attend unto God in prayer and study of His Word so they may bring their lives into proper accord with His desires. Operating in this way, they fulfill Peter’s admonition: “like newborn babies, long for the pure milk of the word, so that by it you may grow in respect to salvation, if you have tasted the kindness of the Lord” (1 Pet 2:2-3). Describing the believer who manifests such longing, Newton writes, “His zeal is…lively; and may be, for want of more experience, too importunate and forward. He has a love for souls, and a concern for the glory of God.” Demonstrating such commitment to the pursuit of God even while struggling with instability wrought by immaturity, growing converts begin to give outward evidence to the authenticity of their salvation.
In closing his remarks on this first stage of Christianity, Newton comments on the most identifiable characteristics of those who should still be considered as immature. Specifically, he observes that “this state is more usually remarkable for the warmth and liveliness of the affections.” As God’s dealings with them force them to contemplate deeper upon God as they return again and again to His Word, their understanding is chiefly affected and this brings stability to their emotions. Though lacking the solidified understanding of the mature, these young converts, in Newton’s view, retain “the advantage in point of sensible fervency.”
God continues working in the hearts of His people even as they enter what Newton perceives to be the second stage. While much of God’s earlier work continues unabetted and plays out in the lives of believers much in the same way, he asserts that there are some differences at this level. According to him, “This state…commence[s], when the soul, after an interchange of hopes and fears, according to the different frames it passes through, is brought to rest in Jesus, by a spiritual apprehension of his complete suitableness and sufficiency, as the wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption of all who trust in him, and is enabled by an appropriating faith to say, ‘He is mine, and I am is.’”
This exchange between the insecurity of youthful zeal with the security of seasoned interaction with God occurs over time by varying degrees. As this process unfolds, Newton argues that the word “conflict” (as opposed to “desire” for new converts) is the best term to describe this period in the Christian life. Whereas the faith is first expressed more in emotional categories at first, it becomes established at this point and increasingly enabled (due to becoming much better informed and practiced) to guide believers ever further in their relationship with God. In making this observation, Newton confirms that both conflict and passion pervade the lives of both new converts and those who are maturing even while there seems to be a decreased level of influence of the emotions upon more seasoned believers.
Support for Newton’s contention concerning those who are moving beyond the initial stage of Christianity can be found in Hebrews 5:14 where its writer points to diligent study of Scripture as the means of maturation such that believers’ “senses” become “trained to discern good and evil.” Earlier, it was shown that God pulls back in believers’ lives, causes discomfort to form, and then drives them to obtain their comfort through faith in His Word apart from immediate emotional satiation. This treatment by God is referred to by the writer of Hebrews as discipline. Such “discipline for the moment seems not to be joyful, but sorrowful; yet to those who have been trained by it, afterwards it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness” (Heb 12:11).
For believers, they give evidence that they have arrived at this stage by moving from the sort of momentary hopelessness observed (and mentioned earlier) at times in the lives of Job, David, and Jeremiah to warring against the sin that inhabits their own flesh. This unfolding war within believers’ persons, for Newton, was purposed by God who willingly chose not to immediately free His people “from the defilement of indwelling sin” while they remain in earthly vessels.
Having given them a “new nature,” God would now have them “watch and strive against sin…as their great and constant aim, to which they are to have an habitual persevering regard.” To aid in this battle, God, as has just been discussed, employs discipline in the life of the believer. Such chastisement at times can be in direct response to willful disobedience. This, however, is not always the case, and in fact, it is often not the case. Underlining this point, the writer of Hebrews introduces the topic of God’s discipline to those who “have not yet resisted to the point of shedding blood in your striving against sin” as opposed to those who had soiled themselves in sin (12:4).
In all of this internal upheaval, Newton points out that the struggle for maturation does not occur in a vacuum. Afterall, believers exist in a “world that is full of snares, and occasions, suited to draw forth those corruptions; and he is surrounded by invisible spiritual enemies, the extent of whose power and subtilty he is yet to learn by painful experience.” With Scripture ever in hand, second stage disciples learn to traverse these outward obstacles even while they become increasingly aware of the greatest hurdle which still remains within them.
As they experience themselves being jostled back and forth through all manner of emotionally and spiritually trying ordeals, God’s people come to know all the more clearly that “[t]he heart is more deceitful than all else and is desperately sick” (Jer 17:9). While their understanding of the contours of their own heart remains elusive for them, God knows the heart and continues to test it to see if it remains fully devoted to Him (cf. Deut 8:2; Ps 44:21; Jer 17:9-10; Luke 16:15; Rom 8:26-27). As He performs this task, believers then become more aware of anything that they may be wishing to cling to more so than God. These erring hopes, like those of Jeremiah in Lamentations 3:1-18, must then be mortified by believers by choosing to prioritize the Lord and His commands (cf. Deut 8:2; Jdg 3:4; 2 Cor 2:9).
As believers face the intensity of the Lord’s testing, they can (and some among them do) fall into egregious sins. Like Newton, Many will find themselves to have achieved “multiplied instances of stupidity, ingratitude, impatience, and rebellion, to which [their] conscience has been witness!” Based upon his own experience and his knowledge of even the most gracious and spiritually inclined among fellow saints, Newton finds this experience to be altogether common.
As the intermittent testing of the Lord continues to unfold, Newton testifies to multiple opportunities for respite as the Lord sends times of refreshing to His saints. In his words, “There are particular seasons when temptations are suited to our frames, tempers, and situations; and there are times when he is pleased to withdraw, and to permit Satan’s approach, that we may feel how vile we are in ourselves.” During these moments, as the Lord treads into our inner depths, evils that pervade the hearts of all fallen people become exposed. These include “spiritual pride,” “self-dependence,” “vain confidence,” “creature attachments, and a train of evils.”
These inward defilements remain elusive and even unbeknownst to the faithful saints until the testing exposes their presence. Confronted with the underlying awfulness of their unredeemed flesh and powerless in themselves to overcome it, believers are left with the call to repentance and the knowledge of the empowerment of the Holy Spirit (cf. Rom 7:14-25). In the moment when the light of truth shines upon them as their hearts seek after that which is not God, believers manifest the repentance that adorns their hearts as a gift of God and find themselves to be growing in the grace and knowledge of God (cf. Ezek 36:26-27; Acts 11:18; 2 Tim 2:25; 2 Pet 3:18).
Newton returns at this point to his previous remarks concerning the development of believers’ recognition of their hearts being deceitful during this second stage. Having experienced the Lord’s testing and corresponding discipline, believers remain acutely aware of “[t]he dark and disconsolate hours which [they have] brought upon [themselves] in times past.” This “make[s them] doubly prize the light of God’s countenance, and teach[es them] to dread whatever might grieve the Spirit of God, and cause him to withdraw again.” Newton continues, “The repeated and multiplied pardons which [they have] received, increase [their] admiration of, and the sense of [their] obligations to, the rich sovereign abounding mercy of the covenant.”
Trained by this divinely imposed ordeal, second stage believers grow in their love, in their willingness to forgive, in their feelings of sympathy for others who struggle, in their hatred for evil, and in their gentleness toward those who struggle with it. After having learned of the Lord’s way of dealings with those that are His, saints at the second stage become what Newton terms as “complete.” Evidence for this level of development can then been witnessed in their commitment alongside their ability to help other saints engage God faithfully as they experience His testing.
Before moving forward in this discussion of Newton’s understanding of the process of Christian maturation, once again the reader should be reminded that each stage contains elements of the others even while each level may indeed be identifiable by an overarching feature as Newton suggests. As has been pointed out, for Newton the first stage is most readily discerned by the heightened state of the emotions, while the next stage can be seen in an increasing level of turmoil wrought within believers’ hearts as they undergo God’s testing. The final stage, as Newton would have it, is one that experiences a significantly intensified state of “contemplation.”
Believers who make it to this level of maturity still retain an appropriate amount of emotional fervency for God, but their zeal has been harnessed by their knowledge of God developed through His chastening of them. For many of them, they, Newton opines, “have looked back with a kind of regret upon the time of their espousals, when, though their judgments were but imperfectly formed, and their views of Gospel truths were very indistinct, they felt a fervour of spirit, the remembrance of which is both humbling and refreshing; and yet they cannot recall the same sensations.” By moving beyond this point through the trials and tribulations encountered during the middle stage (not that these cease from believers’ experiences), mature converts obtain a deep and abiding level of assurance of their salvation. This assurance becomes strong at this level in development in part because believers become completely assured of their own weakness even while they likewise become equally assured of the strength made available through God’s grace. They, like Paul, have learned that God’s “grace is sufficient for [them], for power is perfected in weakness” (2 Cor 12:9).
To arrive at their confidence in God’s grace irrespective of whatever forces may be set against them, they have developed proficiency with the means of grace. These, Newton contends, include prayer and the study of God’s Word. Multiple passages in both testaments confirm that a maturing relationship with the Lord is directly connected with whole-hearted devotion to prayer (cf. Deut 4:29; Ps 9:10; 22:26; 27:8; 34:10; 63:1; 70:4; 91:4; 105:3-4; 119:45; Prov 28:5; Zeph 2:3; Matt 7:7-8; Luke 18:1; Rom 12:12; Eph 6:18; Phil 4:6; Col 3:1; Heb 11:6). Along with prayer, Paul supports Newton’s contention on the vital necessity of faithful study of the Word of God for those Christians who would be mature. Specifically, he informs Timothy that he “will be a good servant of Christ Jesus” so long as he is “constantly nourished on the words of the faith and of the sound doctrine which [he has] been following” (1 Tim 4:6).
Along with prayer and devotion to study of God’s Word, Newton argues that mature believers are further supported by their many experiences of having engaged God in the past through these same means as they struggled through all manner of difficulties and as they found themselves being trained by God in the process. Having passed through so many trying ordeals whereby they were forced to desperately seek after God and cling to Him in the process, these third stage believers have “attained clearer, deeper, and more comprehensive views of the mystery of redeeming love; of the glorious excellency of the Lord Jesus, in his person, offices, grace, and faithfulness; of the harmony and glory of all the Divine perfections manifested in and by him to the church; of the stability, beauty, fulness, and certainty of the Holy Scriptures; and of the heights, depths, lengths, and breadths of the love of God in Christ.”
This depth of awareness of the presence and majesty of God regardless of circumstance coincides with a degree of repression in the sensibilities and a corresponding gain in wise living where the mature believer’s “judgment is more solid, his mind more fixed, [and] his thoughts more habitually exercised upon the things within the vail.” With a “mind of Christ” disciplined by habitual obedience even in the midst of hardship, these final stage believers become increasingly “conformed to the image of [Christ]” such that their evangelistic endeavors become greatly enhanced (Rom 8:29; 1 Cor 2:16).
To close his remarks concerning the three phases of Christian maturation, Newton offers two qualities that are common to all three stages of growth followed by a third that is unique to the final phase. First, “[h]umility,” he observes, occurs “in proportion to the knowledge they have of Christ and of their own hearts.” At each incremental step in their journey, believers gain deeper knowledge of their own depravity and the manner in which God graciously guided them through the darkest moments of their walk with Him. Like Paul, Newton notes, they will find themselves marching deeply into maturity only to say of themselves, “It is a trustworthy statement, deserving full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, among whom I am foremost of all” (1 Tim 1:15).
This growing humility that comes with a deeper knowledge of one’s fallenness and a corresponding awareness of the marvelous grace of God is also accompanied by an ongoing development of what Newton calls “[s]pirituality” within each believer. For him, spiritual well-being is improved as one learns to place their hope solely in Christ and abandon all other hopes. As mentioned earlier, Jeremiah demonstrates his own experience which testifies to this in Lamentations 3:1-24. At the final stage, Newton argues that the spirituality of believers becomes very much aware of the tendencies of the human heart to place hope in that which is other than God. This knowledge, born by experience, brings them to think “nothing worth a serious thought, but communion with God and progress in holiness.” With their minds trained this way, their witness gains steadfastness.
With a mature expression of humility and spirituality, third stage believers become persistently focused on “the glory and will of God” according to Newton. The closeness that these believers have come to experience in their relationship with God conjoins the rising place in their hearts for the glorification of God. Over time, their thoughts of themselves have grown increasingly faint. Like Paul, these saints find themselves “having the desire to depart and be with Christ” (Phil 1:23). With such a oneness in devotion, momentary sufferings become matter of little concern much as they did for Paul: “I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish so that I may gain Christ” (Phil 3:8). With such a mindset, Newton claims the most mature among believers become devoted in prayer and actions with the will of God being done becoming the all-encompassing goal.
In conclusion, Newton has explained three stages of maturation that believers progress through including a period of pronounced emotionalism, a time of struggle, and a remaining phase of deepening contemplation. In the beginning, each believer’s lack of knowledge of God will cause them to exhibit heightened states of emotional excess. They will face conflict just as believers at all stages do, but they will tend to look for more legalistic reasons for their struggle with God. As they progress to the second stage, their studying of God’s word and their devotion in prayer will lead them to become increasingly aware of the sins of their hearts and their corresponding need to die to self. As they follow this course, these believers exhibit more commitment than before and more love for others. As they move on to the final stage, they go on manifest a deepened humility, spirituality, and devotion that begins to mirror that of Christ Himself. In the end, the glory of God becomes their only true aim.
[1]Richard Cecil, vol. 1 of The Works of the Rev. John Newton: Late Rector of the United Parishes of St. Mary Woolnoth, and St. Mary Woolchurch Haw, London: With Memoirs of the Author, and General Remarks on His Life, Connections, and Character, 3rd ed. (London: Hamilton, Adams, and Co., 1824). The discussion in this article will focus on Newton’s comments in Letters 10 through 12 of this volume.
[2]All Scripture references are from the NASB1995.