The Salvation Stimulation | by Emory Cooper

Psychologist B. F. Skinner claims that every human action can be explained as a response to—and in anticipation of—stimuli from outside a person. To change, then, "no one can begin with himself; and if he could, it would certainly not be by changing his consciousness...It is the environment which must be changed" (Skinner, About Behaviorism, final two paragraphs). Now assume that Skinner's claim is true, and change comes merely through the addition and subtraction of stimuli. Assume simultaneously that men can be saved by grace through faith according to Scripture. The Bible says that in order for true conversion to take place, man only has to hear the Gospel and respond to it in repentance and faith (Acts 3:19; 16:31). However, not all men who hear embrace the Gospel; many reject it. Hence this question arises: what stimulus is required for a sinner to change, to place his trust in Christ?

Specifically, there are three potential answers to this question. First, the Christian must have heard the gospel under special circumstances. Yet practically there are no "special circumstances." Christians and reprobates have come from the same walks of life and grown up in the same environments; each have experienced the same common stimuli, but with different responses. Second, Fate or Chance must have planted a spark of special wisdom in Christians, making them "wise" enough to react more properly to the Gospel than "foolish" reprobates. Yet Scripture declares that "[t]here is none righteous, no, not one: There is none that understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God" (Romans 3:10-11). The Bible also teaches that all men in their natural state "were dead in trespasses and sins;...and were by nature the children of wrath, even as others" (Ephesians 2:1-3); and dead people should not be able to properly "respond" at all! This leads to the third option: for a sinner to respond to the Gospel, God has to "quicken" him—not just stimulate him, but resurrect him spiritually and provide him with the heart and faith to respond to that stimulation. "Even when we were dead in sins, [God] hath quickened us together with Christ, (by grace ye are saved)" (Ephesians 2:5). Therefore, though behavioral stimulation my have something to do with one's change toward salvation, ultimately "[t]he preparations of the heart in man, and the answer of the tongue, is from the LORD" (Proverbs 16:1).

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