conversions

 

According to Emory Elliott, Thomas Hooker (1586-1647) "favored a more liberal membership policy [than his rival John Cotton], and he devised an elaborate preparation process that involved precise psychological stages on the way to conversion. 

 

The six essential stages of this morphology of conversion were contrition, humiliation, vocation, implantation, exaltation, and possession; and these he subdivided further.  He required that a prospective member demonstrate to him and then to the congregation a successful passage through these stages" (Cambridge History of American Literature, Vol. 1, 201). 

 

1. Contrition. Man should look into the Law of God and make an examination of his life and state according to the Law.
2. Humiliation. Conviction of conscience by which seeker realizes that he is under sin.
3. Vocation. Despair of salvation, in respect to strength of self and other creatures.
4. Implantation. True humiliation of heart, grief and fear because of sin. Confession.
5. Exaltation. First entrance into the state of saving grace. 
6. Possession. Awareness of presence of faith.