Come to the water, whoever is
thirsty. Drink from the fountain, another
one's dry. Jesus, our living one, gives
you his mercy. Come to the river that flows
through the city. For from the throne of the Father
and Son, Jesus our Savior says, Come and drink deeply. Drink from the pure and exhaustive
well. Come to the fountain without
any money. My lot is given. without any cause. Jesus, the gracious one, welcomes
the weary. Jesus, the selfless one, died
for the Lord. Stretch out your hand, Phil,
you'll come to the prayer. Jesus is such a compassionate
Savior. Draw from the grace that flows
freely from Him. Come to God, Savior. ? The God of salvation ? ? God
has provided an end to sin's strife ? ? Why will you suffer
the law's condemnation? ? ? Take the free gift of the
water of life ? Please turn in your Bibles to
the Gospel of John. John chapter 3. There are many things in our country, in our land,
in our lives, that we think are needed. This day in which we live, there
are so many things going on, and we imagine that we need something. to be done. We need something, someone to
do something. But my message this morning,
I've entitled, The Need of the Hour. The Need of the Hour. Let's begin reading in verse
1 of John 3. 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. Numerous times in this book we see the phrase, God our Savior. And that means that God is our
Savior as God our Father. We know that God the Father is
said to be our Savior. And we know that God the Son
is said to be our Savior. But God is our Savior in the
triunity or the trinity of his sacred persons, which means that
God, the Holy Spirit, is also our Savior. In the book of I
John, John records these words. For there are three that bear
record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost,
and these three are one. That may be a mystery to you,
that God is one God, but yet he manifests his grace and power
through a trinity, or through three sacred persons, Father,
Son, and Holy Ghost. And I'll confess to you that
it's a mystery to me, too. But it is exactly what the Bible
says. And if I could understand, if
I could explain, if I could fully define my God, He would not be
much of a God at all. He's greater than we are. But this book plainly says that
the Father made a choice among men. He chose that people in
Christ before the foundation of the world. He acted as a sovereign,
granting His mercy and grace to whom He would, and therefore
we have them referred to as His people. The Father chose them. before the world began. He loved
them with an everlasting love. They are His children. And then we read also the Son,
who came in human flesh as the Savior of His people. He shall save His people from
their sins. He came into this world and died
a substitutionary death in their place, laid down his life for
them, shed his blood for them, and did all that the scripture
says about him in this glorious person and work. So if that be true, and it is
absolutely true, What now? What now? Well, first of all, we obey God's
command, which is now to go and preach the gospel, not just any
gospel, but we are to go and preach the gospel to every creature,
to everyone we have opportunity to, to everyone that he opens
the door to, we go and freely, we don't offer anything, but
we go freely and declare the gospel. We preach the gospel
to everyone. But the truth is, The reality
is, as the old hymn says so clearly, all is vain unless the spirit
of the Holy One come down. That hymn speaks about brothers
coming and preaching the gospel. It speaks of people coming together,
the saints of God, and praying for people. But it speaks another
truth that is undeniable. All is vain unless the Spirit
of the Holy One come down. In other words, unless the Spirit
of God awakens unless the Spirit of God gives spiritual life,
unless the Spirit of God, who is the revealer of divine truth
in us, unless He gives faith, it will all be in our experience
as vain, meaning nothing. Because when we read in Romans
3, when Paul gives so succinctly this characterization of all
of us by nature, he says, there is none that understandeth. There is none that seeketh after
God. There are many people like this
man who are religious. There are many people identified
with what is called Christianity. There are many people who make
professions of morality and religion, but there aren't many people
who are born of the Spirit of God. And that is the need of the hour. In the light of eternity, in
the light of our being in this condition naturally, In the light
of how we really are, this is the need of the hour. It is for
the Spirit of God to work. That's exactly what Christ is
saying to this man, Nicodemus. When Nicodemus comes to him telling
him all he knows, it's as if Christ is oblivious to what he
says, and he says to Nicodemus, ye must be born again. You have to have a spiritual
rebirth. You don't have the eyes or the
feet of true God-given faith. And when we look at the Scripture,
this is what we find throughout all the New Testament, and this
is what we find in the Old Testament in a picture and a type. The
language of Scripture is that we must be born from above. It says that we must be begotten
of God. It says that we must be born
of God. We must be brought forth by God
the Spirit. And this is essential to salvation. This is essential to knowing
the true God. Surely, we know that the Father's
work in salvation, His initiating and choosing and all that He
does, we know it's essential to salvation. And we surely know
that all the Son did in dying for His people and shedding His
blood in the payment of their sin, we know that that is essential
to salvation. And just as essential and necessary
is the work of God's Spirit in applying that salvation, in making
known or revealing that salvation. But this work in our day has
been replaced by the inventions of false religion, such as decisionism. All you have to do to know God
is make your decision for Christ. All you have to do is decide
that you'll do something. Decide that you'll accept Him.
Decide that you'll make Him something. And there is nothing farther
than the truth of God's Word than this. Salvation is not based
on our decision. It's based on His decision. Someone asked a man one time,
when did you make your decision? He wisely answered, I didn't
make my decision. I was decided upon. God decided on me. God does it
all. And then another thing, instead
of acts of man's so-called free will, it's been replaced by reformation. All you got to do is change your
life. All you have to do is reform
morally. All you have to do is become
a religious person. But none of these things and
none of the shadows of these things have to do or a part of
the new birth. It's been replaced by not only
decisionism and reformation, but it's been replaced by rituals
and formal acts. All you got to do to be born
again is walk down to the front of the church. All you have to
do is be baptized. All you have to do is join our
church. All you have to do is raise your
hand or pray a sinner's prayer or all these such foolish things. Can you imagine Paul or as he
was Saul on the road to Damascus responding to such things? He would have killed the preacher,
had him stoned that said such a thing. But he could not resist,
he could not deny, he could not defeat the overwhelming power
of the Spirit of God and his work that he was performing him. But the truth is, most people,
just like this man Nicodemus, most people are thrice dead. Number one, they're dead spiritually
because they died in Adam. As it says, in Adam, all die. Died to God, just like Adam did
in that garden. Died to having any understanding
or fellowship with God. Went and hid himself in the trees
in the midst of the garden. He died, and the Bible says that
we all died in him. We all died in the one who represented
us. And then they're dead spiritually.
Dead from birth. Come forth from the womb, as
the Bible says, speaking lies with deceitful hearts. Dead, absolutely dead in trespasses
and sins. That's what the Bible says. It
doesn't say we're just sick or have not the ability to do one
thing or the other. It says that we, as far as God,
as far as truth, as far as spiritually is concerned, we're dead. That's
our natural state. Twice dead then. But most people
are like this man was, thrice dead. He's dead in a false religion. And the evidence of that, Dead,
is that he thinks he's alive without the Spirit's work. He
thinks he knows God. He thinks he feels God. He thinks that he loves God. But rather than loving God or
knowing God, all he has been given is a false God, a God of
man's invention, a God of his own design and desire, and that's
the God he loves, but he's dead to the living God. He's sitting on somebody's church
pew. He's got his name on somebody's
church row. Everybody around him thinks he's
a good Christian. He's all that anybody could ask
for, just like Nicodemus was. This was a good man. This was
a teacher in Israel. This was a man that thought he
knew God. He had so many things that he
was right on, but he must be born again. He must be born again. And the truth is, because most
have never heard the truth, they've never heard the gospel
of God. They've heard the remedies and
the rules and the prescriptions of men. They've heard about somebody
named Jesus, but they don't know anything about who he really
was, what he really came to do, and how he really saved sinners. They're dead. And they don't
know the truth. And because of that, they've
never been born of the Spirit. That's what this is talking about,
being born of the Spirit. In other words, they have not
the life of God in them. They have not a living faith,
which is the gift of God. They have not a desire to know
the truth as it is in Christ Jesus. They like to hear a health
and wealth gospel. They like to hear an encouraging
message. They love to be inspired, as
they say, but they don't long after God himself. Have you ever seen puppies being
born or little pigs being born? What
is the first sign maybe of their living? It is when they begin
immediately to search after nourishment and food. They begin to look
to where the mother is providing the food. They do it instinctively
because they're alive. And if we don't desire the truth,
If we don't desire to hear the truth about God, if we don't
desire to hear the truth about who we really are, if we don't
desire to hear the truth about Jesus Christ and what he has
actually done, we don't have life. That's the food of God's sheep.
That's the food, that's the manna from heaven, that's the food
of God's sheep, that's the greener pasture. We seek after the milk,
the sincere milk of God's word. And having no spiritual life,
they do not desire this nor spiritual fellowship. That's why any of
these churches will do. That's why anybody or anything
in religion is just fine. You ask how people can accept
and join and be a part of some of the most outlandish religions
that there are. The reason is they're yet dead. They've never been born of God's
spirit. The ark landed on Mount Ararat,
and one of the first things Noah did was he sent out a raven and
he sent out a dove. The dove came back. The raven
could live on the carrion and the deadness and the putrefying
things that were there destroyed in the flood, but the raven could
not because it was just different. The raven came back because it
couldn't find any satisfaction in those things. And unless God does a work in
our heart, unless he comes in the power of his spirit, we'll
be like the raven. We'll live on these dead things,
which is no life at all, rather than the life of God in Christ. and void of the spirit. Christ
tells this man, you can't see. You can't even see. You can see
all these other things in religion. You can be satisfied. But apart
from God's work in your heart, you cannot see and you cannot
enter into the kingdom of God. You cannot value them for what
they are. You cannot embrace them. You
cannot trust in them. You cannot rely on them. The
things of God, just the things of this world. When Paul says of his own people,
he says they have a zeal for God. Oh, I'd be the first to
say that there are many in religion that are zealous. They have a
zeal for God. Don't say they're not sincere.
Don't say that they're not zealous. They have a zeal for God. But
this is what Paul said of his own people and what he was saying
of his own self apart from Christ. They are ignorant of God's righteousness. How do you know that, Paul? How
can you make such a judgment like that? Well, the Bible calls
on us to judge righteous judgment, which is to judge based on what
God says. So it is not really us that makes
the judgment, but God who makes the judgment. And he said, they
are ignorant of God's righteousness because of this. They're going
about to establish their own righteousness. While I was in Oregon, I walked by in an antique store
a case. I love to look at those little
cases, you know, they have little small things in them and I'll
just, I'll peruse the old thing. I see little tidbits of history
and antiques and stuff like that. And I came across a Sunday school
pen. You know anything about Sunday
school pens? I had one. And first you started
with the first year pens, and then you started with the wreath,
and then you started putting all those little bars down until
they hung down. I looked like a third world general. Qaddafi didn't have anything
on me. What was that? Going about to
establish our own righteousness, thinking that in some way we
were pleasing God, thinking that in some way we were building
steps to heaven or laying up stores in heaven, doing things
like this, going about. But he says that all these are
dead works. As a matter of fact, anything
you do to get in good standing with God, anything that you do
to add to salvation or add to the work of Jesus Christ, anything
and everything you do personally to be saved or to add to that
salvation, it's a dead work. You say, preacher, what do you
mean by dead work? I mean that rather than working life to you,
it's working death to you. Death to you. These Ephesians that we read
about in chapter 2, Paul says, you were dead in trespasses and
sins. That is the condition which grace
meets, which Christ met, which the Father met, and which the
Holy Spirit actually meets. He comes to us when we're dead. Some dead out in immorality. Some dead as hell's angels. Some
dead as whoremongers and drug addicts. But most, because most
are religious, most dead in a false religion. They've been there since childhood. They've never heard the real,
true gospel. They've been there a long time,
mom and daddy and uncle so-and-so believe this, and my mom and
dad and... My friend, unless the Spirit
of God comes to us and give us life, we'll die in those things. The religion I was in where I
got all of those Sunday school pens, somebody said, well, doesn't
that count for anything? Yes, it counts for sin. Nicodemus was spiritually dead,
and it's evident from the conversation. He, like most, did not know the
king. He calls him rabbi. You know what a rabbi was? Just
about the same thing that Nicodemus was. That's what we want. We want
a God who is our equal or less. That's where such things as free
will and choice and all this kind of stuff come in. We won't
be able to, like Silly Putty, make a God that we can handle. But He's not a God. The God of
the Bible is not a God that we can handle. He's the God that
handles us. He's the potter. We're the clay. He said, Rabbi, that means teacher. Was Christ a teacher? Yes, he
was. Was he a good moral man? Yes,
he was. Perfect. Was he a martyr? Yes, in a sense, he was. But
my friend, he's much more than that. And Nicodemus looked at
that man, and he didn't know who he was. God in flesh. God in flesh. Not just a good
man. Not just a historical figure. God in human flesh. And he knew
some true things, there is no doubt. But he didn't know him
who is the truth. He didn't know him who is the
truth. And there's no truth apart from
Christ. I'm always amazed at what a man
can preach and what people can know of some true things, but
they don't know the truth. Listen to these. Whenever Christ was talking to
Martha and Mary at the death of Lazarus, he says to Martha,
I am the resurrection and the life. He that believeth in me,
though he were dead, yet shall he live. Now listen to this statement. Whosoever liveth and believeth
in me shall never die. Believest thou this? In other words, it is not like
men say, so much in our day, most in our day, that if you
believe, God will give you life. No. Unless God gives you life,
you won't believe. Whosoever liveth and believeth,
they get the cart before the horse. He's got to make you alive before
you can believe. He's got to come to this deadness
and quickness that we might believe. And Nicodemus, he didn't know
the difference between flesh and spirit, as we see in verse
6. I think about it, he knew some
true things about Jesus. He said, no man can do the things
that you do unless you come from God. Well, the first thing wrong
with that is he didn't know he was God. And the second thing
is he looked at all these things externally that Jesus was doing,
and that was the basis of his confession. All these things
like feeding a multitude and healing the sick and raising
the dead, you can believe all those things and still be lost. He said, how can a man? be born
when he's old? How can he enter the second time
into his mother's womb and be born? Christ was talking about
spiritual things, but he only understood them naturally in
the outward realm. The Bible says the flesh profiteth
nothing. Every day of our lives, we naturally,
naturally want to think that it profits something. Just a little bit. If you do something for somebody,
If you give them something, if you help somebody, you know,
you just want to think that what you did counted a little bit. The flesh profiteth nothing. And I'm telling you there's only
one way you'll ever believe that. is if the Spirit of God seals
it to your heart, makes you to know it as the truth, makes you
feel it as the truth, the flesh profits nothing. Paul said, I
know in me that is in my flesh dwelleth no good thing. Oh, Paul, you're so much better
than the rest. When will we understand that
being better outwardly than the rest is still not good enough
for God? Who's holy? Who's perfect? Who can receive and accept nothing
less? People grow up being taught that
which is not true. They tell their children, in
order to make them behave, they say, don't you want to go to
heaven? If you want to go to heaven,
you better not do things like that. If you want to go to heaven,
you better do this and that and the other, whatever is convenient,
whatever you want them to do. That's a lie. That's just a lie. Because nobody will go to heaven
based on anything that they do. If that were the case, Christ
died in vain. And false religion is always
fleshly, it's always outward, it's always emotional, it's always
ceremonial, it always gratifies the flesh. We're going to make Brother So-and-so
a deacon so he can have a title. We're going to make Sister so-and-so
a chairwoman. Why? So they can have something
to glory in. So they can have something to
tug on their lapels and say, oh, what a good boy, good girl
am I. But there's one thing I want
you to see here. And that Christ, to this man,
he, unlike Billy Graham, who wrote a book entitled How to
be Born Again, Christ never tells Nicodemus
how to be born again. Never tells him. I can't tell you how to be born
again. I can tell you who can born you
again if he's, as we say, a mind to. He did not tell him how. Why? Did you have anything to
do with your first birth? Did you help your mother? Did
you make any decisions in where you would be born? No. And the need is not for us to
do something to cause this, but for us to look to God, the Spirit,
who alone can do it. That's why we say that's the
need of the hour. We preach, as He commanded, for
His glory, for what He'll do with His Word. But if that's
all anybody hears is me, you haven't heard much. I can't give you life. I can't
give you faith. I can't open your eyes. I can't give to you understanding. But how did Christ say that the
Spirit of God would work? How does He work in the new birth?
Look down at verse 8. He likens the working of God's
spirit to the wind. As a matter of fact, I believe
spirit in the Greek is something like pneuma, which has to do
with breath or wind or something like that. Look at what he says. The wind
blows where it will. That's what that means. and you hear the sound of the
wind, but you cannot tell where the wind comes from or where
the wind goes, so is every one that is born of the Spirit. How does the spirit work? Well,
there's one thing about it. If he uses the wind as an example,
you'd have to say he works sovereignly, which means that he works in
who, when, where, how, he, will. You have no control over it. I have no control over it. The wind blows where it will.
I found out this in the Dalles in Oregon, spending a week there. The wind blows there. Blows up
that Columbia River Gorge. On a nice pretty sunshiny day,
24 miles an hour sometimes. Blows. You know, I couldn't control
that wind. I don't really like a winter
day, a windy day. But I couldn't stop it. I couldn't
control it. That's the way the Spirit of
God is. You can't make the Spirit of God do anything. Much as I
preach and desire that the Spirit of God work in somebody's heart,
especially my own children and family, I've got no control. And he works quietly. Unseen. Wind blew all the week while
I was out there, but I didn't see it one time. That's the way the Spirit of
God works. In the heart. Unseen. Somebody gets a reformed
life and somebody says, the Spirit of God's got hold of him. Maybe
not. Maybe not. And he works powerfully. Who can resist the wind? You can resist it. Bob, you can't
resist it successfully. That's why we call it irresistible
grace. You can resist grace, you can
resist God, but you can't, if he sets his mind to do something,
you can't resist him successfully. He'll either save you or damn
you. That's so unlike the boisterous. the tongues, the emotionalism
of false religion. Somebody said, well, I'm telling
you, they were falling out in the pews, they were screaming
and shouting and all this kind of stuff. Boy, the spirit of
God was at work. No. A spirit was at work, but not
the Holy Spirit. And the way I know that is that
the Holy Spirit, according to John 14, according to John 14, does altogether
something different. Look in John 14 and verse 26,
Christ again. John 14, verse 26, but the comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, the
Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall
teach you all things." Most places where the Spirit
is emphasized, there is the greatest ignorance you can imagine. They feel this, they sense this,
they do this, but they don't know and understand anything
about the truth. He shall teach you all things
and bring all things to your remembrance whatsoever I have
said unto you. Now here you got to be careful. Because there's a lot of people
around in the world that are saying that the Spirit of God
told them this, that, and the other. Fresh revelation from the Spirit.
Extra-biblical revelation. He said, the Spirit, the Comforter,
when He comes, He'll teach you the things that I have said. All past tense. We believe what
Christ has said. We have the record of what He
has said. And the reason why it's good
that we believe what He has said is because He's unchangeable. He hasn't changed on anything.
There's not a gospel that's more relevant to our present hour
and situation than what Christ has already given us. He reveals
the things that He has said. Look over in John chapter 16,
verse 13. Christ said, how be it when He,
the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into
all truth." You say, that's a tall order. All truth. God's people are guided into
all truth. Why's that? How can that be?
Because all truth is in Christ, the truth. It all pertains to
Him. It all exalts Him, for He shall
not speak of Himself. He's not speaking of Himself.
He's speaking of Christ. The Spirit of God is where they're
talking most about Christ. Not politics, not morality, not
all these other things, but the Lord Jesus Christ. But whatsoever he shall hear,
that he shall speak, and he will show you things to come, he shall
glorify me." Brother Henry, that was always
the charge again. He doesn't preach anything but
Christ. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. For he shall receive of mine,
and show it unto you. And the things that the Father
hath are mine. Therefore said I, that he shall
take of mine, and shall show it to you." How do I know if
the Spirit of God is working if he's showing Christ to sinners? If he's telling them more about
Christ, if he's teaching them more about Christ, it's always
the Lord Jesus Christ. That's an unending subject. That's an unfathomable depth
there, an infinite truth as it is in Christ Jesus. He reveals Christ. and His accomplished
work for those that it was done for. That's the covenant agreement
with the Father and with the Son. The Father chose them, the
Son died for them, and the Holy Spirit in that covenant agreed,
covenanted to reveal it to them, manifest it to them, give them
faith to believe it. And he does it using the word. I listened to a message. I believe it was yesterday morning.
I just wanted to hear a fellow who's near death. I didn't ever know
much about his preaching, but I listened to it. And it was a lot of stories. A lot of illustrations, homey
illustrations. We all like to be entertained
by after-dinner speakers who tell these funny stories and
anecdotes and stuff. There was not a lot of Christ. He does it using the word of
truth, the gospel. James said, of his own will. begot he us with the word of
truth. There's some people who believe
you can be born again and never know it in this life. Never hear
the gospel. That's not what this book says.
Of his own will begot he us with the word of truth. And the evidence of the new birth. Everybody's always wanting evidence. The evidence of the new birth, and the list goes on, and you
will quit smoking, and you will quit drinking, and you will quit
this, and you will do this, and you will no longer do this. That's
the big thing. But you name one thing that you
say a sinner won't do, and I'll take you somewhere in the Bible
and show you where one did it. One of God's people did it. Because
we're weak. But he's not. He keeps every
one of his children. And the evidence of this new
birth is faith in Christ alone. You know David? Remember David? King David. Sweet psalmist of
Israel. Man after God's own heart. He
made a lot of mistakes. He sinned a lot. He numbered
the people of Israel. Disobedience to God. He committed
adultery with a woman who wasn't his wife. He had her husband
sent to the front to be killed. And he lays down on his deathbed. How's he going to have any peace?
How's he going to have any rest facing death and eternity? He said, God made with me an
everlasting covenant and it's ordered in all things and sure
That covenant in Jesus Christ that depended on His work and
not mine, that covenant ordered in all things and sure, and this
is all my salvation. This is it. This is it. Faith in His blood plus nothing. Faith in His death, in His work,
in His righteousness, in Him saving us all together. My hope is built on nothing less
than Jesus' blood and righteousness. I dare not trust the sweetest
brain, but wholly lean on Jesus' name. Those who are born of God receive
Christ as He's set forth in the world. They don't start out receiving
Him like that. They don't start out receiving
this sovereign Christ who came to die a sin of the Father for
those that the Father gave Him.