You Must Be Born Again

March 23, 2020

“Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, Verily, I say unto thee, except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” John 3:3. KJV.

Jesus told Nicodemus that everyone must be born again to see the kingdom of God. How could Nicodemus not understand this statement? He was a teacher and spiritual leader in Israel, yet he didn’t grasp what Jesus was talking about. When Jesus explained that people need to be born again to enter the kingdom of God, Nicodemus was stunned. He knew the Word of God inside and out and could cite chapter and verse, but he still didn’t understand Jesus’ words.

Very often, religious leaders are blind to God’s work. Could that still be true today? How teachable is your average pastor or priest? How open to learning is your typical scholar, Christian author, or theologian? In Jesus’ day, this group of elitists killed Him out of envy and because He refused to follow their false teachings and evil practices.

Do you understand what Jesus is saying? What is He telling us? Tragically, many people who claim to be Christians might have completely wrong ideas about Jesus’s message. Most have not been taught the real meaning. How many Christians today can clearly explain what it means to be born again?

What does being born again notmean?

1. Regeneration or being born again doesn’t consist in God implanting or creating any new physical or bodily organ or appendage or any new mental power or faculty. God created you with what you need; it just needs to be used in the right way.
2. Being born again doesn’t consist in any new abilities from God that pertain to feelings, emotions, senses, appetites, or tastes. Your physical nature remains as it was created and given to you at conception and birth. If something changes in the act of being born again, which amends our natural state, we are not aware of it. It is not like getting a new toe or finger or a new internal organ, which would be easy to notice.
3. Being born again doesn’t mean that our initial birth into this world was without a spirit, mind, and body that has emotions, intellect, and a will. All three components make us a unique living soul created in the image and likeness of God. And being born again does not mean a change in substance in any of these three powers or faculties.
4. Being born again doesn’t mean that you trust that Christ paid the penalty for your sins and that your repentance from sin is optional. It doesn’t mean that you can make Christ your Savior but not your Lord. Many Christians believe that we can make Christ our Savior and not our Lord and be saved. I think that is a great deception and that it is rampant in the organized evangelical church.
5. Being born again doesn’t mean that you believe specific facts or doctrines about Jesus Christ, irrespective of your ultimate intention and the end for which you live.
6. Being born again doesn’t mean that you now have a get out of jail free card concerning ongoing sin. God is an impartial judge. The wages of sin are eternal death to everyone who sins, but the gift of God is eternal life, Romans 6:23.
7. Being born again doesn’t mean that infant baptism (sprinkling) makes a child a born-again son or daughter of God, as the Roman Catholic Church teaches. The rite of baptism (water immersion) represents repentance, which is the washing away of sin and turning to God. Repentance is therefore a condition that must be met for the forgiveness of sin, and the outward sign is baptism. The rite of baptism can be a mere formality (form) over substance. Substance is repentance from sin. Form never saves, but substance does. The person who is living a righteous life is the repentant person. The person who is living a wicked life, after being baptized as an infant or adult, is an unsaved, unrepentant soul.

What does being born again mean?

1. To be born again is to have a new heart. A new heart is 1) a new Godly and not selfish end for which you live, or 2) a change in what you treasure most in the world, or 3) a new ultimate intention, or 4) a new purpose for living. A new heart implies that your entire moral character or your moral nature becomes like new. It implies nothing at all about your physical makeup. You do not literally get a new heart that circulates blood throughout your body. Before a person is born again, they have a wicked heart. A wicked heart is a heart that loves self supremely.[i]
2. To be born again is to make a very radical change or choice in your ultimate end or purpose for your life. It is to choose serving and loving God over serving self-interest above all other priorities. It is to install God as the King, Lord, and Savior of your life. We have an entirely new moral, not physical, character. When a person changes the end for which they live, they will produce radical changes in their moral life and how it is lived, the reverse of what life was like before new birth. Being born again is the fruit of repentance and faith. Law breakers become law keepers out of supreme love for their God. It is so radical, it is like being born again.
3. Being born again is called being born from above because it is God, by His Holy Spirit, who persuades us to make this voluntary moral change about who we will serve and love supremely. If this is not true, voluntary backsliding would be impossible and obedience would be involuntary, eliminating all vice and virtue.
4. Being born again is a new beginning or a fresh start with God; old things have passed away, and all things have become new. It is such a radical change that it can be and should be expressed as being born again or having a new heart. It is the start of a reconciled relationship with God. Old things such as selfishness, disobedience, and sin have passed away. New things such as holiness, obedience, and righteousness are new in your life. It is the beginning of supreme love for God and not self. It is like you are a new person internally because you are morally born anew. Externally, you retain the same physical body and all your other characteristics.
5. Regeneration or being born again consists in a change from self-gratification and excessive self-love as the end for which you live, to love or benevolence as the end for which you live. Before regeneration, all of us live to please ourselves first and foremost. It is the most crucial driving force in our lives. If it feels good, we do it without regard to the morality of it. With regeneration, we voluntarily change that to God being the most essential driving force or purpose in our life. We begin to live for Him and make His will, His plans, His pleasure (not our pleasure), and His glory the most critical part of our lives. We are born again, not in any physical sense, but in a very literal moral sense, as we now act as a new creation.

Is God the sole cause of salvation or being born again?

Regeneration is often cited as what God alone is responsible for. God creates a new heart and spirit in us. At the same time, it is agreed that sin and holiness are both voluntary moral choices on man’s part. Yet it is assumed that regeneration is anything but a voluntary moral choice on man’s part. Is that not a contradiction and a baseless assumption?

Consider the parable of the prodigal son as an example of someone being born again. The father said his wayward son was lost and dead. The son returned home (a picture of repentance), and the father then said that his lost son was found and that his dead son was alive again. None of this was physical, and all of it was moral and therefore spiritual.

Does the Bible agree with these definitions of being born again?

 “If ye know that he is righteous, ye know that everyone which doeth righteousness is born of him.” 1 John 2:29

 “Whosoever is born of God (and continues to be born of God) doth not commit sin; for his seed remaineth in him: and he cannot (continue to) sin, because he is born of God. In this, the children of God are manifest, and the children of the devil: whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God, neither he that loveth not his brother.” 1 John 3:9, 10, KJV emphasis added.

In these passages, the writer clearly indicates that being born of God is evidenced by putting sin out of one’s life (repentance) and putting righteous deeds and good works into one’s life.  Those who do not put sin out of their life are children of the devil, according to 1 John. Is that not an accurate interpretation?

Being born again requires these four entities: 1) God, 2) the Word of God, 3) someone preaching the Word of God, and 4) man’s cooperation.

I think most of us can agree that regeneration and conversion require the Holy Spirit of God, the truth of God, and the cooperation of man. Did you know that the Bible tells sinners to make themselves a new heart and a new spirit? Yes, the Bible commands us to create a new spirit as well as a new heart!

1. The following passages teach us that regeneration is the work of God, the Holy Spirit, of divine teaching, divine persuasion, and illumination, of convicting and reproving sin.

John 6:44-45; John 16:8; James 1:18; John 15:3; 1 Peter 1:22-23; Titus 3:5; 1 John 3:9; John 3:5.

• The following passages teach us that regeneration is the work of sinners.

Ez 18:31; 1 Peter 1:22; James 4:7-8; Acts 4:7-8; Acts 3:19; James 1:21; Jer. 4:14;.

• The following passages teach that regeneration is the work of men who preach the gospel and the Word of God.

 1 Cor. 4:15; Phil 1:10; James 5:19-20; Prov. 11:30; Dan. 12:3; Mark 1:17; 1 Cor.9:22;

• The following passages tell us that we are born again by the Word of God.

1 Cor. 4:15; James 1:18; James 1:21; 1 Peter 1:23.

Do all Christians agree?

There are other Christians who think that this is all wrong and that God is the prime and sole moving cause in our being born again. This idea comes from the dogma of Original Sin and Total Depravity, which teaches that mankind has no ability whatsoever to respond to the gospel. That is because we are born sinners who can do nothing but sin. Therefore, if this is true, man must be totally passive, waiting for God to raise him from the dead. They say that the timing of regeneration is all up to God, but that is not what the Word of God says.

Do not wait on God; He is waiting on you!

You are not to wait for God to do something physical to your nature before you believe and repent. Scripture says “Today” is the day of your salvation, do not harden your hearts and wait for God to do what He expects you to do right now.

Act on the Word of God now, right now.

Many who profess Christ will not believe His word, which means they act on it. “Be ye doers of the Word and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves.” James 1:22. They say they do believe His Word, but when it goes against what they want to be true, they change the Word of God to allow for their sin and compromise.

Francis Bacon was so right in saying, “men prefer to believe what men prefer to be true.” Not what is true. But what they want to be true so they can continue to live the way they want to live.

Grace and Peace,

---

1. [i] That is a heart that prefers self-gratification or selfishness over the glory and will of God. Selfishness consists in obeying or indulging fleshly desires, appetites and passions when prohibited by the express will of God. These passions, desires and appetites are not sinful in themselves. Only when these things are gratified contrary to the law of God are these sinful. Temptation is not sin. Jesus was tempted to sin but never yielded to sin.