Ye Must Be Born Again

Alright. Amen. John three. To begin this morning, we're going to read down through verse 21 as Jesus continues his ministry in Judea at this time. Portion of his ministry not recorded in the other three gospels just here in the book of John.

Verse one, 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 a 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. 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.

Thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh or whither it goeth. So is everyone that is born of the spirit. Nicodemus answered and said unto him, how can these things be? Jesus answered and said unto him, art thou a master of Israel and knowest not these things? Verily, verily, I say unto thee, we speak that we do know and testify that we have seen and ye receive not our witness.

I have told you earthly things and ye believe not. How shall ye believe if I tell you of heavenly things? And no man hath ascended up to heaven. But he that came down from heaven, even the son of man which is in heaven. And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so, the son of man, must the son of man be lifted up, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have eternal life.

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. God sent none not his son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through him might be saved. He that believeth on him is not condemned, but he that believeth not is condemned already because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten son of God. And this is the condemnation that light has come into the world, and men love darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil. For everyone that doeth evil hateth the light neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved.

But he that doeth truth cometh to the light and his deeds may be made manifest that they are wrought in God. Let's go to the Lord in prayer once more. Thank you, Lord, again for your word. May you use it miraculously. Today by the power of your spirit in the hearts of your people.

And if there be one here today that is yet to trust Christ as the Lord and savior of their life, to put their soul in your hands, to forgive their sins. I pray that today would be their day of salvation. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Now, I'm going to go back to John chapter two and verse 23.

And we're going to read through verse 25. This is leading into John three. Now when he was in Jerusalem at the Passover, in the feast day, many believed in his name, in Jesus' name, when they saw the miracles which he did. But Jesus did not commit himself unto them because he knew all men and needed not that any should testify of man for he knew what was in man. So this is kind of the introduction to John chapter three.

Remember, there are no chapter and verse divisions in the original documents, original writings of scripture. Those were added later and so one just flows right into the other. We read here that Jesus continued with certain miracles while he was in Jerusalem. He'd come there for the Passover and now he was doing miracles. He had just previously ran the the money changers and others out of the temple who were using it mainly as a means for gain and not as a place of worship.

We looked at that a couple weeks ago. And so he continues to do miracles and there were many that professed faith in him who who were interest or interested or at least curious. But he was still careful in his interactions with them. Knowing that some were not genuine in their interest and others were not trustworthy, later we will find out that many of the leaders decided quite early on that Jesus needed to go. And Jesus didn't need somebody to come and tell him, you know, they're they're plotting against you.

Because Jesus is who? Jesus is God. And Jesus could read their hearts and mind. Jesus knew what was going on behind his back. And so he was careful.

It was not yet his what? It was not yet his time. His time would come. It was not yet his time. And so he was careful in his interactions in Judea and Jerusalem in that day.

This led to the nighttime inquiry of a man named Nicodemus in verses one and two. We find that Nicodemus is a Pharisee. What does that mean? Well, that means he is a very religious and pious man. He made great effort to try to keep the law, not only the law of Moses but many laws that they had added to the law of Moses.

Many outward things like ceremonially washing his hands all the time and fasting once or twice a week and he was also probably very as he is called a teacher by Christ later in the passage in verse 10. He was probably very familiar with the scriptures. This wasn't a man who was a a just a casual observer of the scriptures or of the religion of the Jews. He was very serious about it. He knew the Old Testament scriptures probably better than most of us.

He is called the a ruler of the Jews, which means he was probably part of the ruling body in Jerusalem called the Sanhedrin. So he was a man of note. He was a man of authority. He was a man who knew the scriptures. He was very pious.

He was conservative. What we would call conservative in his theology. He believed that the Old Testament was indeed the very word of God. He took it quite literally. A matter of fact, he took it so literally that sometimes he missed the point because he was all concerned about the letter and not the spirit of the law.

And we see that in his response here. He came to Jesus by night. He came to speak with Jesus alone away from the crowds and possibly the prying eyes of his peers. It maybe that he just wanted personal time with Jesus so that that they could talk without the distractions. It could be that he was a bit concerned about others of the Pharisees and particularly those of the Sanhedrin who had already decided that they were not going to believe in Jesus.

And so he came by night. This could also represent the spiritual condition of the religious Jews as many were blind to the truth and to the light of Christ. And they preferred to stay away in darkness as Christ will say later in the passage. But thankfully, Nicodemus, he found time. Even in the dark, he still came to Jesus.

He came to Jesus for answers. He addresses Jesus as rabbi or a teacher come from God, a a master in Judaism of his day, a title of extreme respect. He came to him somewhat humbly, and he showed him the respect that at least he was due as a prophet or a great teacher come from God. But it seems that Nicodemus in his heart knew that there was something he was he was missing. There are a lot of people that sit in will be sitting in pews today who are sincere.

They are religious. They go to church because, well, that is the thing that you must do. They try to follow the law, but they don't know the savior. They don't know salvation by grace through faith in Christ. And yet, some of them, like Nicodemus, know there's something they're what?

There's something they're missing. There's something. And indeed, there's a lot of people that are searching today. In their heart, they know there's something they're missing. There's a void, whether they're religious or irreligious.

We see that in our world today. There is an uptick in spiritual interest, but sadly, that spiritual interest is often in things that are not related to the truth of God's word. They need to hear the gospel. They need to get a a track in their hand. They need for someone to tell them there is a savior and salvation and peace and joy and hope are not found in following just a list of things that you must do.

But it's in a person, in the person of Jesus Christ who came to save sinners. The main reason that Nicodemus gave for his tacit belief or curiosity were the miracles of Christ. He had seen Christ do miracles and it was a sign, particularly of an Old Testament prophet and signs that were given by Old Testament prophets that would reveal who the Messiah was. And so he saw Jesus doing these miracles and he thought to himself, I think, could this be the Messiah? He was waiting for the Messiah.

He understood from the Old Testament that one day the Messiah would come and save Israel. He was waiting for that day. He was looking for that day. I hope we as Christians are looking for the day when Jesus returns to take to drake his people onto himself and returns to take the kingdom of this earth. I hope we are looking for that day that Jesus promised when he went away that he'll come again and receive us unto himself.

We ought to be looking for that hope. Nicodemus was, but he wasn't yet sure that Jesus was that person. He said, we know. He said to Jesus, we know. We know that thou art a teacher come from God.

We know the miracles that you do. I'm not sure who was included in the we. Evidently, there were others of his crowd maybe that felt the same way he he did, but were not yet courageous enough to come seek speak to him or pursue him. It's also a confession that the Pharisees did recognize the signs of the Messiah. They were just too proud or too afraid of their peers to come to Jesus and be saved.

There are too many people that are going to spend an eternity in hell. They they knew. They really did know, but they were too proud to walk an aisle. They were too afraid of what their peers thought to put their faith in Jesus Christ, to come to Christ as their Lord and savior. Let that not be you.

Praise God. It wasn't Nicodemus, and we find out later in the gospels that he was one who took Christ's body off the cross. It would seem indeed that Nicodemus had become a believer and had become, as we'll talk about, born again as Jesus will tell him in this passage that he must do. So, as we continue on, let's look at the necessity and nature of the spiritual birth as we continue with this conversation. Just two men talking the side of the street, it would seem in the dark, one night on the city streets of Jerusalem.

Jesus displayed immediately divine knowledge in his salutation in verse three. After Nicodemus said, no man can do these miracles that thou doest except God be with him. Jesus immediately said to him, verily, verily, I say to thee, except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom. Didn't wait for Nicodemus to ask a slew of questions. Jesus immediately went to the heart of the point.

Nicodemus, you must be born again. He knew that there was a void in that man. He knew that he was searching. He said, let me go ahead and tell you what you're searching for, what you're missing. You must be born again.

I'm sorry to say there's many people sitting in churches today, Orthodox and Catholic churches, who are not being told that they must be what? Born again. They're doing the works of the church. They're faithful to come. They take the Eucharist.

They go to confession. They haven't been born again. Salvation is not a process that takes your entire life. There's a moment in time when you place your soul in the hands of Jesus Christ to save you from your sin and be your Lord that you are born again as Jesus will will tell us here in the passage today. As he told Nicodemus.

In the following verses, he repeats over and over again the necessity of the spiritual birth absolutely necessary for entrance into the kingdom of God. Did the Pharisees believe in the kingdom? Yes, they did. They were trying to get into the kingdom. The their their drive was to make it into the kingdom.

A physical kingdom, an earthly kingdom promised to the Jews. Open to good Jews alone as they thought though the Old Testament seems to indicate the Gentiles would have a place in that kingdom as well and which is clearly the case in the New Testament. But Nicodemus, he believed in the kingdom. He believed in the resurrection. Some of the others did not.

Nicodemus, a Pharisee, believed in the resurrection and that he would get maybe to partake in the kingdom. He was looking forward to that. He was striving for that. Sadly, the Pharisees were not concerned so much with the inward nature and character of a person. They were concerned more with the what?

With the outside. Not a spiritual transformation from the inside, but an outward obedience and confirmation to the law. Jesus called them whited sepulchers. What is a whited sepulcher? Well, it is a tomb wherein lies a dead body.

And on the outside, it is beautiful and ornate. And inside, as Jesus said, it's full of dead man's bones. It's full of rot and decay. Oh, it's pretty on the outside, but inside, it's dead and dying and corrupt. And that's what Jesus had to say about the Pharisees in general.

They were like whited sepulchers. All they did everything right on the outside. The problem was where? On the inside. Jesus said in Matthew chapter five, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you shall no case enter into the kingdom of heaven.

What does that mean? Well, that means you have to keep the law even better than they do. No. That's not what Jesus was saying. Jesus wasn't saying they had to outdo the pharisees and washing their hands and and these type of things.

Jesus was saying there needed to be an inward transformation. They needed the righteousness of who? Of Jesus Christ. For their righteousness was and is insufficient, and so is ours. We can only be saved by taking on the righteousness of Christ by faith.

You must be born. You must be born again. The word born again can be translated born anew or born from above, emphasizing the nature of the new birth. Born anew. Born different.

If any man be in Christ, he is a what? A new creature. Old things are passed away. Behold, all things are new. Born from above.

Not born from earth but born from where? From heaven. Born of heaven. Something different from your physical birth. Your spiritual.

Your spiritual birth. In John four, Nicodemus says, how can I how can I be born when I'm old? And Jesus said, except a man, in verse five, be born of the water and of the spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, that which is born of the spirit is spirit. Marvel not, I said unto thee, you must be born again.

Now, theologians argue over what it means to be born of water in verse in verse number five. Some say, well, that means baptism. Baptism. Well, does it say you have to be baptized? No.

It doesn't say that. Okay? So God wanted to say that. He could say that. He didn't say that here.

I don't think this means baptism. Some say, well, it means the word of God. And indeed, we know that Paul as Paul says in Romans one sixteen, he's not ashamed of the gospel of Christ for it is the what? The power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth. Yes.

The word of God is powerful. Faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the what? The word of God. They need to hear the truth. It cleanses the soul.

It convicts us. It it, enlightens us and brings us to Christ. Yes. It could be speaking of the word of God. But rather, I think, actually, that if you read verse five and verse six together, I think born of water is speaking of physical birth and born of the spirit of speaking of spiritual birth.

It's not because we're born out of water physically when we are born physically. And it's not enough. It's not enough to be born of water. We also have to be born of the what? We also have to be born of the spirit.

That which is flesh is flesh. That which is spirit is spirit. That which is born of the flesh is flesh. That which is born of the spirit is spirit. Marvel not that he say, ye must be born again.

Nicodemus and many others were counting on their physical birth as Jews to be their first step into entering the what? The kingdom. Some thought it was the only necessary step to enter the kingdom. I'm a Jew. I'm okay.

No. They were sinners who needed a what? A savior. They too needed to be born again. It didn't matter whether they were a Jew who was not particularly religious or who one who spent every waking minute of the day reading the law and trying to make sure they live by every every little law, many of which they had added.

No. Being born of the water, physical birth is not sufficient. You must be born spiritually. You must be born again. It's not enough to be born of the first Adam.

You must be born of the second Adam, who is Jesus Christ. The first Adam failed. The second Adam succeeded. In verses three through five, we read the word cannot. You cannot enter or cannot see the kingdom of God in verse three.

In verse five, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That word cannot depicts a complete, utter inability. It is the opposite of dunamai. Dunamai speaks of the mighty power of God. In God, all things are possible.

This is the opposite. We are completely without what? Without ability, without power. There is nothing that we can do apart from becoming the children of God by faith. You cannot save yourself.

You can't you can't come to church enough. You can't read your bible enough. You can't pray enough. You can't get baptized enough. There's nothing you can do.

There's nothing you can do to save yourself. You must be born again. Only God can save you by his spirit through faith in his son. He goes on. As Nicodemus is still struggling to understand, He said, Nicodemus is like this.

The spirit is like the wind. It's unseen. Yet, it's very real and very powerful. I stood out on that front porch a couple years ago in the midst of oh, now I can't remember the name of the hurricane. It starts with an m.

Milton. Milton. Yeah. I stood on the front porch during Milton. The winds were blowing right around a 100 miles an hour.

Now, they were they were blowing directly out of the north so I could actually stand outside on the porch and watch the way the rain wrap around and crash together out there in Walgreens parking lot as the church shielded us. Not only did we see the rain blowing around the church, we also saw pieces of the roof flying past the church coming off the children's church room sadly. That was mainly just wind. Yeah, the rain did some damage but it was the wind that did the main damage. And apart from the things flying through the air and the rain, you still can't see the what?

The wind. You can only see the effects of the wind. The holy spirit is real. The holy spirit is active. The holy spirit is God.

And he does mighty, miraculous, powerful things in our world. He changes people from the servants of sin and bondage to Satan, and he delivers them, frees them, and brings life back into them that Satan has stolen away. The spirit, like the wind, is unseen but very real and powerful, and his effects are profoundly experienced in the lives of those affected thereby. Those who, what, believe. This Nicodemus lacked as a loss today, especially those whose faith is in their own in their faith in their own intellect exceeds that of their faith in an unseen God.

And there are many many geniuses, many educated people in this world. A matter of fact, the higher your education, the more likely you are, statistically speaking, to reject the God of the Bible because you're putting your faith in the wrong thing. Now, it's not not wrong to get an education. It's a good thing. But but you have to remember, you know nothing.

God knows everything. We need to trust in the one who created the world, who sent his son, who rose again. Sadly, many in Jesus' day struggled with that, and sadly today many do as well. In order to feel the effects of the Holy Spirit, you must come to Jesus. You must put your faith in someone greater than yourself, the one who made you and the one who died to save you.

Second in verses nine through 13, we see it goes on to describe the nature of Jesus' teaching, which Nicodemus found hard to understand in verse nine. He continues, Nicodemus said unto him, how can these things be? Jesus answered and said unto him, art thou a master of Israel and knowest not these things? In other words, he could have seen them in the Old Testament. We can go back and look at all those passage in the Old Testament, particularly Isaiah 53 where it talks about the savior and many passages that talk about needing the mercy, the mercy of God because we're sinners who need his mercy.

But he goes on, Verily, verily, I say to thee, we speak that we do know and testify that we have seen and ye receive not our witness. I have told you earthly things and ye believe not. How shall ye believe if I tell you of heavenly things? And no man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even so the son of man which is in heaven. What is Jesus saying?

Jesus saying you're following the wrong people. Your trust in your own intellect and powers of deduction pale in comparison to the person that you're standing talking to. Jesus came from heaven. Jesus is the son of God. Jesus knows these things firsthand.

So Nicodemus, listen to me, Jesus said. I know what I'm talking about. Your friends in the Sanhedrin and the Pharisees, they haven't been there. They haven't experienced relationship with God. Yes.

They know a lot of facts. They can quote a lot of verses, but they don't really know. So listen to me. He goes on in verse 14. I had a little more to say there, but the clock is against me.

Verse 14. Don't look at the clock. Verse 14. As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the son of man be lifted up, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have eternal life. So now Jesus gets to the nuts and bolts.

What does it mean to be born again? Well, first of all, he goes back to an illustration from the Old Testament. Numbers twenty one nine. Oh, let's see. I'm a there you go.

Numbers twenty one nine. That's what I want. Numbers twenty one nine, it says, and Moses made a serpent of brass and put it upon a pole, and it came to pass that if any had bit if a serpent had bitten any man when he beheld the serpent of brass, he left. They had sinned against God. God had sent fiery serpents among them.

They bit many of the people. They were dying. There was no remedy. There was no medicine. There was nothing they could do to what?

Save themselves. But look in faith at a bronze serpent and a pole. And it really didn't have that much to do with the serpent or the pole. It had to do with putting their faith in the promise of God that if they would just look in faith and trust him that he would what? That he would save them.

Course, it also identified the nature of the death of Jesus Christ who would be put up on a cross on a pole that if we look to him in faith, we too will be saved. They were saved physically from snake bites but praise God, Jesus came to save us eternally from sin. Nicodemus knew that story, and that's why he mentioned it. That whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life. Verse 16, for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever believes in him should not perish but have everlasting life.

For God sent not his son in the world to condemn the world but that the world through him might be saved. He that believeth on him is not condemned, but he that believeth not is condemned already because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten son of God. Just a moment to look at the details. The Messiah is the only begotten, the unique, the divine son of God, Jesus himself. There is no other, and there is no other mediator among men whereby we must be saved.

There is only one. There is no other messiah. There is no other savior. No pastor, no religious leader, no priest can save your soul, can forgive your sin. Only who?

Only the only begotten son of God, Jesus Christ. He came to be the source of salvation, not the instrument of judgment. When he came to Earth the first time, he'll return one day in judgment. But when he came as a baby in a manger, he came to grow up and die on a cross. We were already condemned by our sin.

Jesus came to rescue us. Luke nineteen ten, for the son of man has come to seek and to save that which was lost. That's why he came. First Timothy one fifteen, this is a faithful saying and worthy of all, acceptation that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners of whom I am chief. If you're not a sinner, then you don't need a savior.

Sad to say there's a lot of people that don't think they're sinners, so they don't come to us savior. You must admit, you must confess, you must repent, acknowledge that you have rebelled, disobeyed the God who made you and that you need you need to be saved from the penalty of your sins. For the wages of sin is what? Death, but the gift of God is eternal life. He came for you, but you first must humble yourself and acknowledge that you're a sinner that needs a savior.

Nicodemus needed to humble himself and acknowledge that all the works he could do and all the titles and all the education, as Paul put it, was nothing but dung. Couldn't buy him a thing with God. Only the sacrifice of Christ. Only Jesus. It is by faith in him only that one can procure salvation he offers.

There is only one name under heaven given among men whereby we must be saved. There is only one who is the way, the truth, and the life, the only way to the father, through faith in him. For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever believes in him should not perish but have everlasting life. Either he is the way or he isn't, you can't have it many ways. God is very clear.

There's only what? One, because there's only one who died on the cross for our sins. There is only one who is the risen savior who proved indeed he is the son of God, and that one day as he ascended back in heaven, he will what? He will come again. Only Jesus.

That salvation is about more than just an earthly kingdom, but everlasting life and as such, deliverance from a perpetual death in hell. For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. One day, the books will be opened at the great white chrome judgment, and those who were dead will be judged out of those things recorded in the books, their works, and they will be cast into the lake of fire. But the last verse we read in Revelation 20, it says that those whose names were not found written in the book of life were cast into the what? The lake of fire.

What does that tell us? Well, that tells us that those whose names were written in the book of life were not cast in the lake of fire because they have everlasting what? Life and will not face everlasting death. For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. The Jesus that was standing right there before Nicodemus who would shortly, about two years later, die on the cross for his sins.

Who Nicodemus would help to take down off that cross and place in a tomb where Jesus would only be for three days before he rose again to save his soul and all who put their faith in him. We already stand condemned as Jesus said, But there is a way of escape. There is a way to be found guiltless, to be justified. There's a way of salvation, and that way is Jesus. And Jesus simply said, Nicodemus, you must believe in me, your Messiah, your savior, the son of God.

And you can enter into the kingdom of heaven, and so can you this morning. But if you're trying to get there through your own good works, your through a path that you have determined and not through the way that God has made through faith in his son, you will work at it your entire life. And one day, when you die, you will drop into hell and be cast into the lake of fire. And God does not desire that for you. Jesus doesn't desire that for you.

Whether you're religious or irreligious, whether you're poor or rich, whether you're great or small, whether your sins are are are piled a mile high, as Paul's were, you can be saved. God loves you. He sent your son. But you must come to the light. You must accept your sin, and then you must receive the only remedy, Jesus Christ.

Let's pray. Dear heavenly father, we thank you, Lord, for your precious word and for your precious son who came to die for our sins on the cross that we might have life. And we pray, Lord, if there's one here today that is