ontological recreation
Definition
Ontological recreation describes not moral improvement or psychological transformation, but the radical newmaking of a person in their being — in their existential reality. Where moralism attempts to purify the Adamic flesh and discipline attempts to form character, ontological recreation describes something fundamentally different: the creation of an entirely different kind of creature. Ontology refers to being itself, not merely behavioral change.
In George Warnock’s The Vision and the Appointment (b9), ontological recreation is Christ’s central work (Christology): not the restoration of the old self under better conditions, but the birth of a wholly new creation — “If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation” (2Cor. 5:17, Gal. 2:20). This stands opposite to the Pelagian notion that humans can improve themselves through effort.
George Warnock (b9)
Warnock draws a sharp distinction between (1) improvement of the old and (2) creation of the new:
“We do not call people to repair the old nature, nor to subdue the flesh through discipline. We proclaim the death of the old man and the creation of a new man in Christ — a new kind of being, formed after the image of God.”
(The Vision and the Appointment, Soteriology)
The caterpillar-butterfly metaphor illustrates this: not a caterpillar that learns to crawl better, but a creature that completely changes its nature and learns to fly. Ontological recreation is the work of Christ and the Holy Spirit, not the moral effort of the self.