Born Again, Part 2

Regeneration is the work of God for the helpless (Romans 5:6), hopeless (Eph. 2:12) and dead (Eph. 2:1) and it can not be planned, programmed or predicted. So Jesus said, “The wind blows where it wishes and you hear the sound of it but do not know where it comes from or where it is going. So is everyone who is born of the Spirit” (John 3:8).

So it is in our regeneration. Like a man awakened from death, we will do nothing other than live. Our first inhale is to take in Christ, our first exhale is to say, “I believe!” We open our eyes from the sleep of spiritual death and the first thing we see is Christ in His saving goodness and glory. It is akin to creation, so Paul says. “For God, who said, “Light shall shine out of darkness,” is the One who has shone in our hearts to give the Light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ” (2 Cor. 4:6).

This does not happen in a vacuum or in our sleep, but rather God uses the means of the gospel to bring about this new birth. So v.6 above is preceded by v.5 “For we do not preach ourselves but Christ Jesus as Lord …” Or as Peter put it, “for you have been born again not of seed which is perishable but imperishable, that is, through the living and enduring word of God” (I Peter 1:23).

Regeneration establishes spiritual life in us and leads first to our initial repentance and faith (conversion) and then inevitably to changes in desires, behavior and character. It is the divine spark of life that one moment we are without and the next moment we have that makes us new creatures who know God, having been born of God. No wonder we cry out, “Abba, Father.”

Like the discussion between Jesus and Nicodemus teaches us, this act of God is essential and often missing among many religious folk and church attenders yet is as thoroughly biblical and essential as any of our great doctrines of the faith. How we 21st century American evangelicals have lost our way here, I’m not entirely sure. I’m convinced it is what many struggling “Christians” and perennial “back sliders” are missing and why they never grow. They are still dead and dead things don’t grow, they just decay!

Even a “non-theological” book like James, known for its eminent practicality, has this blunt statement about the new birth or regeneration – “In the exercise of His will He brought us forth by the word of truth, so that we might be, as it were, the first fruits among His creatures” (James 1:18). Notice whose will is held forth as the cause of being brought forth. Notice the means.

Of course this is all rooted in the Old Testament, specifically Ezekiel 36 – 37. God promises there a national revival or salvation of Israel in the end times. What He plans to do for Israel in the new covenant is what He has already done for all who are in Christ in this age. “Moreover, I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will be careful to observe My ordinances” (Ezek. 36:26-27).

The great vision of the valley of dry bones all lays the groundwork. “Thus says the LORD God, “Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe on these slain, that they come to life.” So I prophesied as He commanded me, and the breath came into them, and they came to life and stood on their feet, an exceedingly great army” (Ezek. 37:9-10).

Paul carries it further. In Eph. 2:1-10, he first describes the unsaved as “dead in your trespasses and sins in which you formerly walked …” Into this grave of spiritual death came the power of God to raise the dead. “But God, being rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ …” (vv.4-5).

Finally, Titus 3:3-7 lays it out so clearly. In verse three, the problem. In verse four, the gracious solution in history when God sent Christ to accomplish the work of redemption. In verse five, the act of God in time to apply the work of redemption – “He saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit.”

Where the gift of physical life gives us the capacity to enjoy God’s many and massive gifts, the gift of spiritual life gives us the capacity to enjoy God Himself, to know and commune with Him, to actually obey Him from the heart and worship Him in spirit and in truth. It makes all the difference in the world.
“Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.”

Pastor Chris McKnight
Kerrville Bible Church