John Wesley was asked why he preached so often on, “Ye must be born
again.”
He answered, “Because ye must be born again.”
Have YOU been born again? Without it you have no hope of escaping the
terrors of hell or enjoying the glories of heaven. The Lord Jesus said,
“Ye must be born again.” (John 3:7).
I. WHAT THE NEW BIRTH IS NOT
1. It is not religion.
Jesus explains about the New Birth to Nicodemus
Nicodemus was a Pharisee, a very strict religionist. He celebrated the
Passover, paid tithes, said prayers, brought sacrifices, tried to keep
the law. To HIM the Lord Jesus said, “Ye must be born again." Law
keeping, joining church, being baptized, living up to a religious creed
will not save you. There will be many in hell who did all of these
things. Will you? Ye MUST be born again.
2. It is not morality.
You may try to keep the golden rule, pay your bills, be a good neighbor,
keep out of jail, live a clean moral life, but that won't save you.
It is not recorded that our Lord said, “Ye must be born again." to
cowardly, vacillating Pilate, or to two-faced, hypocritical Judas. Why?
Because you would say, “I know miserable hypocrites like Judas, and men
like Pilate need to be born again, but I'm not like them.” I wouldn’t
betray Christ with a kiss after professing to be His friend. I wouldn't
order Jesus to be beaten and then turn Him over to a howling
blood-thirsty mob to be crucified. Gangsters, thugs, adulterers,
whoremongers, liars, drunkards, gamblers need to be born again, but not
I. I’m all right.
My friend, do you realize that God's Son spoke these words on the new
birth to a man who was doing his best to gain heaven? Without a doubt he
was neither a crook, drunkard nor gambler. He was a true husband, a good
neighbor, a man of clean morals, and religious. If he needed to be horn
again, so do you. How do you expect to make it to heaven without being
born again if Nicodemus couldn't.
3. It is not reformation.
Even if you would quit all your meanness, that would not be the new
birth. Your trouble is not on the outside, but on the inside. You don’t
need exterior decoration, but interior regeneration. Satan wants you to
rest in a false peace. We warn you in Jesus’ Name, don’t be satisfied
unless you have been born again.
II. WHAT THE NEW BIRTH IS
1. It is a mystery you cannot explain, but a reality no man can
explain away. “The wind bloweth where it listeth (pleaseth), and
thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and
whither it goeth: so is everyone that is born of the Spirit” (John 3:8).
Just as Nicodemus could not understand or explain the wind, so no man
can understand or explain the new birth.
But, the wind is a reality no man can explain away. Only a fool would
say, “I don't believe in the wind because I have never seen it, I can't
understand it. See the wind move the big limbs of an oak. Watch the wind
tear a house to splinters. You deny the reality of wind! You cannot see
the Holy Spirit. You cannot explain Him. But see His mighty power make
the harlot pure, the liar honest, the drunkard sober, the blasphemer
pray, and then try to deny the reality of it.
2. It is the work of God by which a poor, lost, guilty,
hell-deserving sinner who receives the Lord Jesus receives a new nature,
becomes a child of God and begins a new life. It is a second birth,
a spiritual birth.
Physical life begins by birth. Spiritual life begins the same way — not
by joining church and becoming religious. You cannot JOIN the family of
God, you must be BORN into it. Someone has said, “You can't make a
Christian out of anybody.” True, Christians are not made, they are born.
A birth is the coming into being of a new life which has the nature of
its parents. When you were born the first time you were made a partaker
of the old nature, the sinful nature we all received from Adam. When you
are born again you become a partaker of the divine nature (II Peter
1:4).
Is this true of you?
DO YOU have the divine nature?
No matter what kind of a religious profession you have made, no matter
how good a person you may be morally, unless you have been made the
partaker of the divine nature, you are not saved. Cod gives you this new
nature the moment you receive His Son. It is instantaneous. You can no
more be born again by degrees than you can shoot a firecracker by
degrees.
When you are born again you begin living a new life. That is what
happened when you were born the first time, you began living a life you
had never lived before.
Some think they are going to heaven just because they went forward in a
meeting. Be sure you are born again. There may be a more spectacular
change in the life of one who is a drunken, railing blasphemer, but even
in you who have not been down deep in sin, there is bound to be a change
when you are born again. There will be a new attitude towards the Lord
Jesus Christ, His Word, and His People.
Are you SURE you have been born again?
You may not know the exact day or hour you trusted Christ, but you
should be able to say, “I know NOW I am born again.” If you are not
certain about this most solemn matter I beg of you to tell the Lord
Jesus that you receive Him now. Then read John 3:36 and believe it. “He
that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life.”
III. WHY YOU MUST BE BORN AGAIN
1. Because the Lord Jesus Christ said so.
That ought to settle it.
2. Because you have a sinful nature.
The nature we all receive from Adam is fallen, corrupt, totally
depraved. God says the heart of man is desperately wicked and deceitful
above all things. With this old nature you could not enjoy yourself in
heaven.
If you can’t find any pleasure in a prayer meeting now, how can you
expect to enjoy heaven hereafter?
Heaven is a holy place. When you are born again God gives you a holy
nature that you might enjoy yourself in heaven, a holy place.
3. Because you cannot save yourself
“For by grace are ye saved through faith: and that not of yourselves: it
is the gift of God: not of works, lest any man should boast" (Eph.
2:8,9).
“Not by works of righteousness which we have (lone, but according to His
mercy He Saved us” (Titus 3:5).
Now don’t skip lightly over these two quotations from God’s Holy Word.
Read them again and again until the truth grips you. You cannot save
yourself you MUST be born again.
IV. HOW TO BE BORN AGAIN
John 1:11-13. “He came unto His own, and His own received Him not. But
as many as received Him, to them gave He power to become the sons of
God, even to them that believe on His Name: which were born, not of
blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of
God."
1. It is not of blood.
You are not a Christian just because your parents may be. You do not
inherit salvation from your parents. Even though your folks may be
saved, if you have not been born again you are lost.
2. Nor of the will of the flesh.
It is not by your own efforts and will power. You will fail. So why not
stop trying? Instead of trying, trust, receive, depend upon the One who
died and rose again.
If I'd ask some of you if you were a child of God, you would say, “I
don't know for sure, but I’m trying to be, in my poor weak way.” Now
suppose you ask Johnny Jones if he is the son of Mr. and Mrs. Jones and
he’d answer, “I am not certain, but Tm trying to be, in my poor weak
way.” How silly. He is not their son because he tries to be, but because
he was born into their home. If you are a child of God it is not because
you are trying to be, but because you have been born into His family.
3. Nor of the will of man.
It is not brought about by any of man's religious creeds, systems or
ceremonies. No man or organization can do anything to you that will make
you a child of God. Join what you will, go through ceremony after
ceremony, memorize creeds, and try to keep the rules and regulations of
man-made systems, but it will not save you.
I heard a man testify, “I have been the president of the men's Bible
class in our church for the past two years, but I didn’t get saved until
just two months ago." For twenty-two months, the president of the men's
Bible class; a member of the church, believing in God and the Bible, but
lost, because he had never been born again.
4. But of God. The Lord Jesus said you must be born “of the SPIRIT.”
It is Cod's work, not yours. It is a miracle. Only God can perform it.
If God has not done a work in your life you are not born again. Your
part is to believe God’s record about you, that you are lost and in need
of Christ, and receive Him as your Lord and Saviour. He died at Calvary,
satisfying the righteousness and justice of Cod, that He might take your
sins and punishment upon Himself. He arose and is seated today in a real
body of flesh and bone as God's Man at the right hand of the majesty on
high and He is offered to you as God's salvation. When you receive HIM
you will be saved for Paul says we are “children of God by faith in
Christ Jesus” (Cal. 3:26).
A personal friend of mine, preacher of the Gospel, told me that he was a
Sunday School superintendent before he was saved.
A lady told me she was a church member 88 years before she was saved.
Before it is eternally too late I beg of you again for your sake, your
family's sake, for Jesus’ sake, do not trifle with this thing.
Bow at the feet of the risen Lord and toll Him you receive Him now. “He
that hath the SON hath life, and he that hath not the San of God hath
not life” (I John 5:12).
END
CAUTION: I do not support the BIBLE TRACT INC. ministry (which Evangelist Paul J. Levin founded in 1938), because they promote a false gospel of “TURN AWAY FROM SIN” to be saved. The Holy Bible teaches that we are saved solely by BELIEVING THE 'GOOD NEWS' ('GOSPEL') of Jesus Christ crucified buried and risen, and nothing else is required for salvation. It matters what we believe and teach!
