THE NEW BIRTH
ACCORDING TO A REPORT published a few years ago by the American Religious Identification Survey from Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut, 75% of Americans identify themselves as Christian. Despite these findings, only about 40% of Americans confess that they have been "born again." This seems to reveal a widespread misunderstanding about the necessity of the new birth to those who would desire to know God. I would like to offer here an explanation of the new birth which, I hope, will be helpful in clearing up some of the mystery about it for those who have not experienced it, or who are not sure if they have.
The necessity of the new birth is clear enough. Jesus Himself said, "Except a
man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God." (John
3:3). This is a step that cannot be
skipped if we expect to have a place in the Kingdom of Heaven some day. In fact, it is the very first step that we
must take in our quest to know God.
Every other step is meaningless if we have not first been born again. Baptism will be pointless, church membership
will not be helpful, and good works will not get us anywhere in our quest to
actually know God. Even reading the
Bible will prove difficult if we have not been born again. It is essential, then, that we are born again
before we can even begin to understand or please God. A baby who is yet in its mother’s womb can’t
possibly comprehend that there is a whole new world that is awaiting them once they
are delivered. Likewise, a soul who has
not experienced the new birth can’t understand that there is also a whole new
world awaiting him or her.
Like the germ of life that resides in every kind of seed, you
and I have a spirit that is lying dormant inside of us waiting for the proper
conditions to spring into new life. The
spirit is our innermost being, and it is encased by our soul and by our fleshly
bodies in much the same way that the life of the seed is encased by its shell
or outer layer. Once the seed is buried
in the ground, the earth, sun, and rain soften its shell and allow the life
inside of it to germinate and send forth a plant shoot. The seed must die to what it was before in
order for it to become a plant. We, too,
must renounce the things of our past life in order to awaken spiritually and be
born again. Once that inner life
germinates, it spends the rest of its life reaching toward the light and
drinking of the rain from heaven. The ultimate result of its growth and maturity
is to produce fruit of various kinds.
The things that we have done outside of Christ hinder us from
spiritual growth. We must die to our
selfishness, our bitterness, our bigotry, our hatred, our lust, our dishonesty,
etc. We all carry around guilt from
things that we have done in our lives that we regret. We may even be weighed down with a burden of
addiction or chained by depression. We
cannot loosen ourselves from such bondage by resolving to do better. We need a Savior, a Deliverer, and a
Healer. When we willingly bring all
those things to Jesus Christ and lay them at His feet, trusting in His mercy
and love, He freely receives us and washes us from our guilt and shame. The new life that emerges from this
experience transforms us into someone completely different than we were
before. As one Bible writer put it, "…if any man be in Christ, he is a new
creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become
new." (2 Corinthians 5:17).
Like a worm or a caterpillar wrapping itself in a cocoon and later
emerging as a beautiful moth or butterfly, we must make the choice to turn our
back on what we have been in order to become something we never dreamed we
could be.
Our new man immediately begins to reach toward the Light
which is the source of his/her new life, and toward the Rain from Heaven that
nourishes that new life. The Word of God
(the Bible) becomes alive and speaks directly to the spiritual man in a way
that it couldn’t before. As he or she
grows, they will reach a level of maturity where they will begin to produce
fruits of the Spirit like love, joy, peace, faith, patience, goodness, and self-control. These will give purpose to life and replace
all of the selfish ambitions that existed before. As Jesus said, “I tell you the truth,
unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single
seed. But if it dies, it produces many
seeds." (John 12:24 NIV).
There was a man who came to Jesus with many questions. He was a religious man and to all appearances
seemed holy and devout; but he knew inside that Christ had something that he
didn’t have, and he was curious what it was and how to get it. Before he could even ask his first question
of the Lord, Jesus confronted him with this statement: “Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot
see the kingdom of God.” (John 3:3).
They could have had an endless conversation about right and wrong and
how to serve God and how not to, but Jesus knew that none of those things would
matter if the man wasn’t born again. The
new birth is the starting place of any spiritual journey, and this was the
thing that would make everything else come alive.
The man was confused and asked Jesus how a man could be born
after he was old. Was it possible for
someone to enter back into their mother’s womb and be born a second time? Jesus answered him by saying, “I tell you the truth, no-one can enter the
kingdom of God unless he is born of water and the Spirit. Flesh
gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit.” (John 3:5, 6
NIV). In other words, Jesus was saying
that you can’t go to heaven without first being born of water (our first birth
when we were surrounded by amniotic fluid in
our mother’s womb), and then being born of the Spirit (our second birth which
is spiritual). The flesh can only
produce something that is fleshly and of this world. The Spirit, however, produces something that
is spiritual and not of this world.
This is why the new birth is not just an intellectual
decision that we make. We don’t one day
decide to go to church and call ourselves a Christian. It won’t work. I recently heard of a man who identifies as a
dog. He had a special furry suit made
that he wears, he sleeps on the floor, and he moves around on all fours instead
of walking upright. No matter how hard
he tries or how firmly he believes it, he cannot become a dog because he was
born a man. Likewise, no matter how hard
we try, or how firmly we believe it, we cannot become a Christian simply by
doing Christian things. We must be born
again. Jesus said to the religious man, “The wind blows where it wishes, and you
hear the sound of it, but cannot tell where it comes from and where it
goes. So is everyone who is born of the
Spirit.” (John 3:8 NKJV). The Spirit
of God works invisibly in the hearts of people.
Like the wind, we can’t see it; but we can see the effects of it and hear the sound.
Jesus reproved this religious man, saying, “Are you the teacher of Israel, and do not
know these things?” (John 3:10 NKJV).
There are many religious people today who also don’t know these things.
There
are many changes that take place after we are born again. We are much more sensitive to spiritual concepts. Our conscience becomes more attuned to God's
will and His still, small voice within us.
The Bible becomes alive to us, and speaks to us in intimate ways. We desire fellowship with those who have also
experienced the new birth. We become
aware of God's closeness to us, and it becomes easy to talk to Him and hear Him
speak to our hearts. Our understanding
of truth is awakened. Also, we begin to
be made aware of the spiritual warfare that is taking place for our soul. All these things and many more begin to
change in our lives. Others may begin to
notice the change in us even before we ever utter a word about it. It is because this new divine life that is in
us becomes like a light in the darkness, and it cannot be hidden. Jesus said, “For God so loved the world, that
He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not
perish, but have everlasting life. For
God sent not His Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world
through Him might be saved.” (John 3:16, 17). Jesus came into the world as a man like us to
pay the penalty for our sins. When He
shed His blood on the cross it was for our
failures and for our
disobedience. That blood is a powerful
cleaning agent for sin, and by it we are washed clean again and become innocent
like a new born baby.
Comments
Post a Comment