The following notes are taken by myself from a sermon preached by Rev Paul Dowling of Whiteabbey Congregational (Reformed) on October 18/15 upon his return to preaching after a serious illness.
Christian Essentials: You Must Be Born Again
John 3:1-8 "There was a man of the Pharisees, named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews: The same came to Jesus by night, and said unto him, Rabbi, we know that thou art a teacher come from God: for no man can do these miracles that thou doest, except God be with him. 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. Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter the second time into his mother's womb, and be born? Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again. The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit."
Everything that is in the bible is important. Everything. Church practice is important or it wouldn't be in the scriptures. Some things are more than important, they are absolutely essential. What brings the essential things home is when we are unwell. When I was unwell, after I was unwell I thought much about the essential things in the bible that we must be clear on. The first night when I was taken in the ambulance to the hospital to intensive care, that night when the doctor said that I was seriously ill, and then when the pain came and my blood pressure went down to 50/20, it just came into my mind, "maybe this is it". And immediately following that thought, was the thought "are you ready to meet God?" and immediately following that was this "all I know is I am trusting in Jesus Christ alone and if that is not good enough there is no salvation". The one thing that matters is this, are you trusting in Jesus Christ, nothing else counts for anything. There is nothing in me or you, there is nothing in any one of us that will commend us to God except being in God's way of salvation, Jesus Christ, and that is the essential thing.
What does it mean to be saved? These are the things we should be clear on. What is the Gospel? How do you describe a saved person, a Christian? What is a true Christian? What is the distinctive characteristic of a real Christian. Is a Christian just somebody who is very nice? Well, a Christian should be nice but that is certanly not the main thing. There are lots of people in the world who are nice but they are not Christian, so the distinctive characteristic cannot be niceness. What about love? Maybe that is the distinguishing characteristic? Well, no it is not because there are many people in the world that love and they are not Christians. Love is the outflow of a Christian life. When believers love one another it is a great witness but love, nor niceness, nor religious duty, nor faithful attendance at a place of worship, none of these things are the distinguishing characteristic of a Christian. Because Hindus and Muslims and Buddhists can do all these things. None of these things can be used to identify true Christians. Is there something then about a Christian that sets them apart, that makes them different from every other type of person. Yes there is. And it is their doctrine. It is what a Christian believes. In our wishy-washy day most ministers stay away from doctrine. These days it is unpopular to define what a real Christian is, but it is biblical and right that the distinguishing mark of a true Christian is the gospel that they believe in. That is the only thing ultimately that marks out a Christian. Doctrine or the theology that they trust in. What they believe is distinct from any other religious grouping in the world. If you don't believe certain things you are not a Christian. It doesn't matter what some people say, if you don't believe the gospel you are not a Christian. What a Christian believes is unparalleled in any other religion.
In Acts 8, when the Ethiopian eunuch is returning home in his chariot through the desert and reading in Isaiah 53, and Philip comes along and explains the gospel to him, when the Ethiopian man wanted to be baptized as a Christian, Philip did not say "will you love one another, will you do your duty, will you be faithful in your place of worship", he just said this, "If thou believest with all thine heart" ..the condition of being baptized as a true believer was true belief in the gospel of Jesus Christ. And because the Ethiopian eunuch believed that, he was defined as a Christian and Philip baptized him. This is more important than anything else.
What does it mean to be saved? To be a Christian means to be born again.
What is born again? This is that you must be made spiritually alive by God to be a Christian. Human beings as we know from Ephesians 2 are dead in sin. We are dead to God, we have no spiritual life. Human beings are actually servants of sin, dead in trespasses and sins. There is none that doeth good, no not one. We are born into this world as sinners, we are born physically alive, but spiritually dead to God, not interested in God. John 3 is a key passage on being born again because Jesus says in John 3:6 "That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit." Just flesh is born of flesh. Because we are sinners by nature, a change, a transformation has to happen that is so dramatic that the bible calls it a new birth. That has to happen. Because we are dead in sins, we must be changed, we must be made anew, we must be born again, given new life. We are sinners by nature but at the new birth or being born again, we get a second nature added to us, the divine nature. God lives inside us. We are a new creation. Ephesians 4:24,"And that ye put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness." Colossians 3:9-10 "Lie not one to another, seeing that ye have put off the old man with his deeds; and have put on the new man, which is renewed in knowledge after the image of him that created him." a new creation, a new birth.
How does this happen, how are we born again, how do we do this. We don't. Jesus answers the question how in John 3 twice, in V5 he says "of the spirit", in V6 he says "of the spirit". In John 1:13 it is "born of God." We are born of the spirit of God. This teaches us of God's sovereignty in the new birth. This is something that we don't do but that God does to us. John 1:13 says "Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God." So in our regeneration, when we are born again, it is not our will, but it is by God's will by God's Spirit. John 3:8 "The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit." That is a marvelous verse. The wind blows where it wants to. You can hear it, the sound of it, but you can't tell where it came from or where it is going. So is every one that is born of the Spirit. In other words, the Lord is saying that we have no more control over our new birth than we have over the wind. So is every one that is born of the Spirit, it is God's work. It is a sovereign act of the Spirit of God. By the word of God. 1 Peter 1:23 "Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever." James 1:18 "Of his own will begat he us with the word of truth, that we should be a kind of first-fruits of his creatures."
If you put yourself under the word of God, than that is the very thing, when it is applied to a human heart by the Holy Spirit, that is the means by which people are born again. God the Holy Spirit causes the new birth, but he uses the word of God under preaching, under reading the bible yourself, or listening to sermons, reading the word of God.. the Holy Spirit is never going to use the clever words of man. We are born again by the word of God. That is why the devil is so happy when the word of God is removed from wayside pulpits and from schools and from public places and replaced with the words of men. What Satan wants to do is make sure that the word of God is removed from every place possible. It is a sad fact that many churches are doing nothing but helping Satan in this whole area. They have left the path, they have lost their way, they have lost the gospel.
Why do we need to be born again? Well, you could go into many reasons but there is no need for any clever arguments. It is enough reason to say that we need to be born again because Jesus says in John 3:7 the little word "must" Ye "must" be born again and must is not an option. Its an absolute essential. You "must" be born again. The Lord says that the person who is not born again, will never see God's kingdom. V3 "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." V5 if a man is not born again he cannot enter the kingdom of God. V5 "Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God." No one is in God's kingdom without regeneration. In other words, to be born again is a distinguishing mark of a true Christian. Every single Christian is born again. It is a must, and if you are not born again you are not a Christian.
We go from being dead in sin to God to being alive to God and we become dead to the world. If any man be in Christ he is a new creature, old things are passed away, all things become new. It's a line that is drawn, there can be no deviation.
Are you a Christian? Are you born again? the answer to both questions is exactly the same, it is either yes or no.
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The above is based on notes made by myself from the sermon By Rev Paul Dowling of Whiteabbey Congregational (Reformed) at Sermon Audio.
http://www.sermonaudio.com/sermoninfo.asp?SID=10181595882
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