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CONVERSION AND GROWTH IN GRACE
or she has opposed the process of growth; but if the process is
not so retarded it leads to a new creation. Psychologists of
religion point out that the emotional storms and physical
disturbances occurring at puberty encourage inward conflicts
to produce a state of tension favourable to resolution by a
religious decision. Religious crises in middle age are not
unusual and may be partly accounted for in somewhat similar
terms.
But nobody becomes a Christian for these reasons alone, nor
indeed as a result of religious teaching or the appeals to
suggestion of popular ‘revivals’.
When a conversion occurs it is because God has been at
work. No inner-worldly causality can be acknowledged here.
Certainly God operates in and through the human material;
but the movement that precedes conversion is the result of a
lowering of personal resistance to the reviving, sustaining and
vitalising forces flowing from another world; and when at
length they produce a new creation it has a significance beyond
psychological explanation.
The Risks of Schematising
There is no reason to expect that a conversion process will
follow the same course in every case and it is misguided to
suppose that uniform characteristics will always mark its climax.
The spiritual counsellor must recognise that in different
people the spiritual birth of the soul is differently portrayed.
It is quite wrong, therefore, to regard an instantaneous
conversion as work of God, and one that occurs slowly and
imperceptibly as a natural occurrence. To do so is to shift the emphasis
from the continuing work of Grace to the psychological
changes that occur in a moment of crisis or decision. On the
other hand, there is evidently a difference between assuming
that an instantaneous conversion is necessary and believing in
its possibility. That instantaneous conversion can occur is an
essential Christian belief.
It is important to insist on this. In the care of souls the truth
must be taught with power and conviction that it is possible
for a person to seek God, find Him and be accepted by Him
now—at this moment. If this Gospel could not be preached
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