George Warnock — Anthropology
George H. Warnock’s The Vision and the Appointment (b9) centers on the transformation of man as divine appointment. The anthropology is not merely a doctrine of human essence in itself, but a doctrine of recreation in Christ—wherein the old man is crucified and the new man is brought forth as pneumatic birth and ontological reality. This stands in sharp contrast to moral self-improvement soteriology.
Ontological Recreation, Not Moral Reformation
At the heart of Warnock’s anthropology lies the claim that the “new man” is not a reformed old man, but a genuinely new species, formed after the image of God. This builds on 2 Cor. 5:17 and Eph. 2:15:
“We are not calling men to clean up the old nature, nor to discipline the flesh into submission. We are announcing the death of the old man and the creation of a new man in Christ — a new species, formed after the image of God.” [b9, Ch. 3]
Warnock explicitly resists any form of Pelagianism—the notion that man can improve himself through moral effort. Rather, the transformation is entirely God’s sovereign work, received by faith. The basis is Gal. 2:20: “I am crucified with Christ; nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me.”
The Crucifixion of the Old Man
The anthropological reality in Warnock’s theology is that the old man is not repaired or improved—he is crucified. This is not a gradual process of moral growth, but a radical death-and-resurrection. The old man (the natural, self-sufficient man) is precisely the fundamental obstacle that God’s image in us must drown.
The implication is that the new man has no continuity with the old man, but is a genuine recreation. This presupposes:
- A definitive separation of old and new identity
- A pneumatic (Spirit-derived) birth, not a self-produced renewal
- A sovereign divine action as the operative power
Birth “From Above”—Pneumatic Reality
Warnock grounds this anthropological transformation in John 3:3: “Ye must be born again.” This is not a psychological or moral change, but a pneumatic reality—an actual birth by the Spirit of God.
The “born from above” (pneumatic) anthropology rules out:
- Birth “of blood” (ancestry, ethnicity)
- Birth “of the will of the flesh” (sexual procreation, natural biology)
- Birth “of the will of man” (human initiative, self-effort)
This means that human identity in Christ does not flow from human willpower or moral discipline, but from God’s pneumatic action. Man is receiving not producing.
Transformation as Divine Appointment
Warnock’s anthropology orders all human transformation under the framework of divine appointments. In Chapter 2 he distinguishes paradigmatic figures—Abraham, Jacob, Moses—whom God chose before they understood their destination.
“God appoints the end before the performance. The believer’s task is faithfulness in the appointed season of waiting.” [b9, Ch. 2]
Jacob’s transformation—the name-change from “supplanter” to “Israel” (“God rules”)—is not the result of Jacob’s own self-improvement, but of God’s sovereign shaping. This is an anthropological principle: man cannot shape himself; only God can transform human nature.
Theodicy and the Suffering of the Righteous
In Chapter 7, Warnock treats Job as an anthropological paradigm: righteous suffering as part of God’s appointment of man, not as punishment for sin.
“Job did not suffer because of his sin, but because of his righteousness. God boasted in his servant before Satan—and that boast drew the adversary into the picture. The furnace was God’s appointed means of bringing Job into a deeper knowledge of Himself.” [b9, Ch. 7]
Warnock distinguishes two kinds of suffering:
- Self-inflicted suffering—from ignorance, unbelief, or sin
- Divinely appointed affliction—sovereign shaping of the elect
The “furnace of affliction” is thus not an anomaly in God’s treatment of man, but an appointed means to transformation. The outcome is that Job “knew his God in a dimension of power and wisdom such as he had never known before his afflictions”—deeper pneumatic union with God.
Anthropological Keys
Warnock’s b9 position on man:
- Human nature: Subject to God’s sovereign shaping and recreation
- Image of God: Reborn and restored in Christ through pneumatic birth
- Transformation: Not moral improvement but ontological death-and-resurrection
- Free will: Subordinate to God’s appointments; faithfulness in the appointed time is the anthropological task
- Suffering: May be part of God’s appointment for deeper knowledge of Himself