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 thee. The Lord 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 when it cometh.
When it cometh, and whither it goeth, so is every one that is
born of the Spirit." Nicodemus answered and said unto him, How
can these things be? I'm going to leave for Michigan
in the morning. One of their daughter-in-laws
is a daddy. may be gone before they get there. Wayne Carrick
is his name, and I've enjoyed his fellowship very, very much
over the years and when I was up there. But he has contracted
some autoimmune disease here a little while back. And last
time I saw him, he was a very sick man, and I didn't realize
he was that sick. But he got a good hope. He loved
the gospel, loved to hear the gospel preached. He even filled
in for Jim occasionally. His wife, sweet as she could
be, beautiful daughter. Fifty-nine, Mary's age, and that's
young. Tonight I want to continue talking
about the work of the Holy Spirit. And tonight I want to talk about
His work in regeneration. And regeneration, of course,
what it means is creating life. And what it is, beloved, is that
God puts a new disposition in a man's heart, a new disposition
in a man's soul. Before he's regenerated, he does
not have a disposition, a heart to know God, a heart for anything
spiritual. He does not know God, does not
want to know God, is not interested in the things of God. And what
God does is He creates in that soul a new disposition, a disposition,
a spiritual disposition, to know God, to seek God, desire God,
and understand His Word. And He calls it giving a new
heart. But there's three things I want
you to know in the Scriptures, the word regeneration. As far
as what God does for sinners, only mentioned one time over
in Titus chapter 3, that God, by the worsening of regeneration
and renewing of the Holy Ghost, hath begotten us. And so regeneration,
another word for it, is new creation, or a new birth. And when it's
our Lord says you must be born again, that means that you have
a brand new birth. And he calls it here being born
again. And that's what regeneration is, is having a new birth, bringing
into existence a man who never existed before, a new nature,
a new believer, a new man with a spiritual man. Now, he's made
a spiritual man. By nature, man is passive in
this, passive in this. And here we see that the instrument
of the new birth or the producer of the new birth is here in verse
6. In verse 5, our Lord said, Except
a man be born of water and of the Spirit. The Spirit is the
agent that God uses for a man to enter into the kingdom of
God. And then He said in verse 6, That which is born of the
flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.
That which is born of the Spirit becomes a spiritual man. And I tell you, look over here
with me in John 6.63. I want you to see this. This is so necessary, the new
verb, the regeneration. Regeneration, John 6.63. It is the spirit that quickens.
Mr. Pink in his work on the Holy
Spirit, it's the title he gives about the Spirit's work, the
spirit quickens. That means he brings life. There's
death before he brings life. And then he says here also, you
know, the flesh profits nothing. The flesh can bring nothing to
this. The flesh can add nothing to it. The flesh don't change. Our old nature doesn't change.
But he brings into existence a nature and a spirit, that spiritual
man that never existed before. And so the words that I speak
unto you, they are spirit and they are life. Now, beloved,
there's an order that God follows in this new creation or this
regeneration. And I think Genesis chapter 1
and verses 1 through 5 just gives us just a little insight into
it. You know, it's just as I try to deal with this just a little
bit, Genesis 1, 1 through 5. You know, it is imperative that
there be a new birth. Our Lord said, except a man be
born again. Born again. Born again. Nicodemus said, how can that
be? Now, most people think that being born again is something
that they themselves must effect, that they can do it by some deed
or some act. But the Scriptures tells us,
except a man be born again, he can't even see the kingdom of
God. Now, you can tell a fellow how bright the sun is. He can
even feel its effect. But if he's blind, he can't see
it. You can tell him how bright this light is in here, and the
color of the walls, the color of the carpet. But if he's blind,
he can't see it. And that's why without the new
birth, without the Spirit doing something for a man, he can't
see the Kingdom of God. Describe it to him. Describe
Christ to him. But he can't see Him until God
gives him eyes to see. And He gives him that in the
new birth. The new birth. But look what
it says here in verse 1. In the beginning, God created
the heaven and the earth. And that's what has to happen
to us. God has to create. And that's why it's called a
new creation. And Paul says we're created in Christ Jesus. Paul
told the Galatians that circumcision availeth nothing to uncircumcision,
but a new creation, a new creature in Christ. Now, if a new creature,
that means that's a creature that didn't exist if he's new.
Isn't that right? That's why it's called a new
birth. That's why it's called regeneration. And then he says,
no, God has to create. It's a creation of God. And one
thing that man can't do, he cannot create life. He can do a lot
of things as a rational being, but he cannot create life. He
can use life when he's got it. He can exert life when he has
it. He can manifest life when he
has it, but he can't create it. And only God can create life,
and that's what he does in the new birth. He creates life. And
watch this, and the earth was without form and void. Darkness
was upon the face of the deep. And that's what we are without
Christ. That's the way we are without Christ. That's the way
we're formed. We didn't have no form. We were void of the
Spirit of God. Void of the understanding of
the things of God. Void of life. Void of sight. Void of hearing. Void of everything
that would enable us to even understand the Scriptures or
anything about it. And darkness? Oh my, what darkness! The Scriptures tells us that
we were darkness. You were darkness. The light
shined in darkness. And what does it say? Darkness
didn't comprehend it enough. We were darkness. And oh, beloved,
in this sense here, so we were darkness. So what in the world?
It was up on the face, down on the depth of our soul. And the
Spirit of God moved. That's what has to happen. The
Spirit of God must come and He must move. He must come and He
must bring out of that chaos. He must bring out of that darkness.
He must bring out of that void. And then God said, God said,
and this is what the new birth is instantaneous. God said, let
there be light. Instantly there was light. And
that's what happens in the new birth. Instantly a man's born
again. It's not a process. It's instant. And oh, God saw
that the light was God said, let there be light. And I think
somebody read that Sunday here. He said, in him is the fountain
of life and in his light we see light. And then it says, and
God saw that the light was good. The work that God does when he
puts light in a man's soul is God's work. And he says that's
a good work. That's a good work. God has begun
a good work. It's a good work. God said, let
there be light. He said it was good. And then look what happened. God saw the light. It was good. He divided the light
from the darkness. And that's what He does. He brings
us out of the darkness and puts us into the light. That's what has to happen to
us. And oh, beloved, I'll tell you back over in John. That's
what our Lord said, except a man be born, born again, born from
above, Nicodemus said, how can a man when he's old, this is
the natural man of understanding, how can this be? How can a man
when he's 50, how can a man when he's 25, how can a man when he's
60, how can a man when he's 70, how can a man when he's 75, how
can he be born again? We were all born once, but how can
you have another birth? And that's what Nicodemus is
thinking, how can I have another birth? I've had one, I can't
have another. And our Lord says, that which you come from your
mother's womb is never going to be no better, except a man
be born of the Spirit. He can't enter, he can't see.
And oh beloved, and then when he talks about entering, you
know, an everlasting life, that this is a spiritual realm. And that's what he says, that
which is born of the flesh is flesh. Look over in John 1.12
with me just a moment. You know, that's what David said,
I was shaping in iniquity and in sin did my mother conceive
me. I mean, man is born a sinner. He's born without God. He's born
without Christ. He's born without righteousness.
He's born without an understanding of either one of them. In fact,
he's fenced off. You know, when God fenced off
Sinai, and nobody can approach unto it. And we're fenced off
from God, and we can't get close. We don't know the way. You can
tell somebody Christ is the way until you turn blue in the face,
but they won't know the way until God gives them life. Look here in John 1.12. 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." Now, here's the explanation of that.
Here's the exposition of that read from the verse of Scripture.
How did you receive him? How did you become a son of God?
How did you believe on his name? First of all, you had to be born,
which we're born. Not of blood. Not of generation
from generation to generation. You can baptize children, sprinkle
children, do all you want to do. But my children inherited
the same nature that I did, and they must be born again the way
I was. They kept my blood. The blood they got from me is
sinful blood. And so the blood they're passing
it on from generation to generation don't work. Nor the will of the
flesh. The flesh can will it all it wants to. People can say,
oh, you've got to cooperate, if you'll just choose, if you'll
just let God do it. The will of the flesh! The flesh
can't will anything good. The flesh can't will anything
right. Paul said, I know that in me
that is in my flesh dwells no good thing. The carnal mind is
enmity against God. They that are in the flesh cannot
please God. So we are born not of the blood,
nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man. I'm a man, and I have a will. And I've got this spiritual will
now. I've got this spiritual nature. And in this spiritual
nature of mine, I will that there's people in this service tonight
that would embrace Christ. I willed that my son would come
to a service and embrace Christ, that my daughter would, that
your husbands and your wives would. I willed it would happen.
But the will of man, honey, it's not of him that willeth nor of
him that runneth, but it's of God that's yours first. But all
this birth has nothing but God. Born of God. Born of God. And oh, beloved, and I tell you,
if this is true now, we can't come into the kingdom of God,
without the new birth, without regeneration. And this is true
now and always will be. Always will be. Unregenerated
men have no desire, no love, no knowledge, no appreciation
for the things of God, no more than they can leave it in. He
said, you mean to tell me you're a master of Israel and you don't
know any of these things? You know, you've heard that old
saying, boy, I feel like a fish out of water. Well, you take a fish out of
water. Have a gold plate. I mean, solid
gold plate. Take that fish, lay him on that
gold plate. Put some flowers all around him. Perfume him so
he don't smell like a fish. Turn on some beautiful music
for him. Let him hear his favorite music.
Whatever. Turn on that music. Let him listen
to that music. Oh, that's such good music. Will that fish be happy? Will
it be content? Will it enjoy the flowers, the
perfume, the gold plate, the music? No. It's out of its environment.
Its environment's in the water. And that's the way we are. We
cannot enjoy the things of God. We can't enjoy a gold plate,
the flowers, The music, the perfume, do what you want to with the
man. He's out of his environment, and the new birth makes us fit
to enjoy God. And without that, we won't enjoy
Him. We'll be like that fish out of
water. That's why people say, I just don't get anything out
of the surfaces. I just don't get anything. Well, of course
they don't. How can they? Oh, what is this character of
regeneration? What's the character of the new
birth? And there's much, much confusion upon this. And I'll
tell you, I think this is one of the most important things.
I'll tell you, we really, people need to understand this. The
average person thinks a new birth is something that he can affect.
A moral reformation. You hear about people all the
time saying, I made a change. You know, a man can quit drinking
and cease being a drunkard by an act of his own will, but he
can't enter the kingdom of God by an act of his own will. And
so, you see, it's not a moral reformation. It's not becoming
religious and joining a church and starting to pray and reading
the Bible. Nicodemus was religious, a master
in Israel. What it is, it's a change of
heart. It's a change of heart. And this,
you know, people say, well, they said it like this, I have a change
of heart. But I'll tell you what, what it is, it's not even a change
of heart. It's a new heart. It's a new heart. It's on, you
know, this change of heart that people say, well, it's unscriptural,
it's anti-scriptural. And let me tell you this about
the new birth. The new birth is God not taking anything from
the sinner. I mean, I'm still Donnie Bell,
and you're still who you are. I've got my personality, I've
got my old nature. And this is why it's so hard
when a person is first converted and first is regenerated and
starts growing in the grace of God, is that when he starts realizing,
man, I just have the awfulest thoughts and this awful nature
and these awful feelings, he says, surely I must not be a
child of God. That's because the old man is
still with us. What God does is He brings into
existence a new man. And so you know, God doesn't
remove anything from the sinner. What He does is He imparts a
new nature into the sinner. It's just like in my first birth,
I received the nature of my parents. In the new birth, I received
the nature of God. We're made for takers of the
divine nature. It's Christ in you. The Spirit
of Christ is in you. And oh, beloved, and the fundamental
law of God in creation is that light produces light. Ain't that
right? Light produces light. Flesh produces
flesh. Spirit produces spirit. Born of God. And I tell you,
the character of the new birth, it isn't the reformation of the
outward man. It's not the education of the
natural man. It's not the purification of
the old man, but it's the creation of a new man. New man. And oh, beloved, let me say,
new life, and I'm going to say some things here that I hope
that we can understand. When we talk about quickening,
that means you're dead. It's a passing from death unto
life. Here we are again, and we've passed from this death
into life. And there's no in-between between
life and death. No in-between. There's no limbo
period. Is that not right? When you're
dead, then you have life. And when you have life, when
there's physical life, when you're dead, there's no middle ground.
Life or death. And the new life is not imparted. because a man perceives the truth.
But he perceives the truth because new life is imparted. You don't
perceive the truth, and that's not the new life, but you perceive
the truth because life is imparted. You know, when God gives you
life, you can't understand truth and perceive truth until God
gives you life. And let me tell you something,
a man is not regenerated because he first believed in Christ,
but he believes in Christ because he has been regenerated, because
he has been born again. Let me tell you, do you know
that parable of the seed? Where the Lord, you know, says,
you know, he goes out, the sower goes out, and he sows by the
wayside among the stony ground. Now, the seed's good. The seed's
good. Nothing wrong with the seed.
And the seed can't change the nature of the soil. The soil
has to be good before the seed will ever germinate in it. And
only God can make the ground good. You put seed, sow seed
all over the place, but if the ground's not good, the seed won't
do any good. And there's nothing wrong with
the seed. The seed ain't gonna change the
nature of the ground and the soil. And that's what God does,
beloved. He changes the soil. So when
the seed comes, it'll germinate. and all good. Before the word
can enter the heart, the understanding there must be life. Let me show
you something in Acts 16.14. This is, going to fool around in the rain
here in a minute, eh? Acts 16.14. See, the Holy Spirit does His
work. A man can't understand the Word, receive the Word. The
natural man understandeth not and receiveth not the things
of the Spirit of God. And until life is imparted, a
man will never receive the truth. He won't understand the truth.
It won't enter his heart. And look what it says here in
Acts 16, 14. A certain woman named Lydia,
A seller of purple in the city of Thyatira, which worshiped
God, heard us." Now watch this, "...whose heart the Lord opened."
Now, the Lord opened her heart then that she attended other
things which were spoken by Paul. She would not have attended other
things spoken by Paul until the Lord opened her heart. She couldn't. She would have just sat there
and heard a preacher. She'd done this every week. But God opened
her heart, gave her life, regenerated her, gave her that heart, and
then she could understand what Paul was talking about. Then
she received the things that Paul was talking about. And that
wasn't until the Lord opened her heart. Men are not quickened by the
Word. They must be quickened or given life in order to receive
and understand the Word. The Word is not what quickens
us, the Holy Spirit quickens us. And you can't receive the
Word and believe the Word until you're first quickened by the
Spirit of God. Let me show you that in Jeremiah 24.7. The Word doesn't quicken us. We must be given life, must be
born again. That's why the Lord said to Nicodemus,
if that which we speak and know, that's what we're talking about.
And you don't understand it. I'm telling you about heavenly
things, and you're on the earth, and you understand only earthly
things. Look what he said here in Jeremiah
24-7. This is what I'm talking about.
I will give them a heart to know me. For we never know him, he's
got to give us the heart. And we'll know that he is the
Lord, and then we'll know, and they shall be my people, and
I'll be their God. And watch this, and they shall
return unto me with their whole heart. But he's got to give us
the heart to cause us to turn unto him. He has to give us the
heart to know him. That's what he's done with Lydia.
He opened her heart, and then she attended unto the things.
And all the origin of life is utterly impossible to the creature. He can receive life, He can nourish life, he can use
it and exhort it, but he can't create it. That is born of the
Spirit of the Spirit. And let me make a few comments
about that. The Spirit is sovereign. And I'll tell you, I meant to
say this at the beginning, only God's elect is who the Spirit
regenerates. Only God's elect is the people
upon whom God works. Only God's elect is the people
that the Spirit of God regenerates. He does not go out into this
world trying to win everybody. That's what he says, the will
of the flesh, the will of man. I got a letter today from some
people telling us how we can be more missionary, how we can
make our missionary daughter go further, and how we ought
to be doing this and doing that. And I said, I've got the answer
to it. You let me bring my family over there, and we'll start with
you, and we'll stay with you, and we'll go through you, too.
You understand it all. Going to go in souls. The Holy
Spirit is the only person who has ever brought a soul to Christ,
to see Christ, to understand Christ. And all those things,
before a person can actually understand what's being told
and heard, it has to have life first. And it's the Spirit, and the
Spirit is sovereign in this business. The Spirit blows who He will. The Spirit blows where He will,
list of all whom He listens. And, O Beloved, in this new birth
by the Spirit of God, this regeneration is of a power. It's a power,
the same power that raised Christ from the dead. It's the same
power that creates life in us. It's the same power that quickens
us. And, O Beloved, we are His workmanship,
God's workmanship. You know, when Lazarus, it's
a passing from death unto life, and that takes a power, and Lazarus,
I'm going to tell you something, like Lazarus, he did not know
Christ was outside. He didn't even know he was dead.
He didn't know he was dead. He didn't know Christ was standing
outside his tomb. He didn't know Christ was fixing
to give him life. But before anything could ever
happen, Christ had to give him life, and when that life was
given to him, then he could respond. Life must come first. And then,
beloved, and I'll tell you what, he didn't cooperate with Christ
either. He didn't say, well, you got
me on my feet now, what else? No, that's not the way it is. And then, not only that, but
it's a creation. Therefore, if any man be in Christ,
it's a new creation. created in Christ Jesus. We're
God's workmanship. God done this. And I say this
about it, it's instantaneous. I mean, when God regenerates
a soul, it happens like that. All of a sudden, somebody be
sitting there and they say, I see. I understand. And there's no, there can be
no reaction until there's life. There can be no faith. I'll tell
you, I've told you about this before. People come up here and
try their best to tell me about how wrong we are and how false
we are and how our message is wrong and how that this gospel
and predestination and election and sovereign grace and man being
dead and totally unable to do anything, how wrong it is and
how much in error we are. And I told a fellow one time,
I said, when you leave here, and this is what he said, he
says, you must believe before you can be born again. You must
repent before you can be born again. And I told him before
he left, I said, whatever you do, I said, you tell everybody.
Don't you leave here and tell them that I'm telling something
that's not true. The difference between me and
you is is that you think you must repent and believe before
you're born again. And you must be born again before
you can believe, before you can ever repent. And I said, that's
the difference between me and you, so don't you go away from
here misrepresenting me. You're doing something to get
God to do something for you. God has to do something for us
before we can ever react and respond. And I'll tell you, this life,
this quickening is the same for all. You know, when a person's
born, when we have this new birth, it's the same for everybody.
It's exactly the same for everybody. All that will come from the new
life is in the new life. All that we'll ever need. But
I'll tell you what, everybody's born into this world and into
the kingdom of God the same way. Now, there's a difference in
our perception. There's a difference in our understanding
after the new birth, after regeneration. But there's no difference in
the initial work itself. That new heart, that new life,
that spiritual man. Our growth is different after
that. Some grow real fast, some grow real slow, some grow just
a little at a time. But every single soul comes into
the kingdom of God just exactly alike. What he told Nicodemus
is the same for all of us. And the quickening and the giving
of life is just the beginning, just the beginning of God's work.
That's just the beginning. When God gives us life, quickens
us, the giving of life is just the beginning of God's work of
grace in our soul. But let me show you this, the
inner man, over 2 Corinthians 4, 16. And once we're regenerated,
once we're quickened, and once we start growing, once we start
responding, when the Word of God begins to teach us and instruct
us and manifest this life of God in us, by repentance, by
faith, by righteousness, and by prayer and by desire, Manifest
in life. For none of these things give
us life. They're evidence of the life in us. But then God
begins this work in us. Look what it says here in verse
sixteen. But though for which cause we
faint not, but though our outward man perish, yet the inward man
is renewed day by day. That inward man must be renewed
day by day. Huh? And that's why our Lord
told Nicodemus, marvel not that you must be born again. Don't
be amazed. Don't be amazed. Don't be amazed. And oh, beloved, our Lord, you
know, with the wind, the Holy Spirit works where He will and
where it pleases. And our Lord has hid the beginning
and process of life, but that we live, we know. But how, we
cannot tell. We just know when it comes. We
just know when it happens. Huh? You just know when it happens. I don't know how else to explain
it. But when He gives that light,
you're going to start, you're going to hear with different
ears. You're going to see with different eyes. You're going
to have a heart that wants to know God more than anything else.
Because He put that heart in you. He took that understanding,
that minded heart of wanting to say, That's us, that's us.
And beloved, and it's just, I don't know if you know, life is just,
life is just, bam, you got it. Then once you have it, it starts
manifesting itself. But it won't manifest itself
until you got it right. Oh, blessed Savior, gracious
God in heaven, Lord, this work of the Holy Spirit in men's heart
is something that only you know when it's done, where it's done,
how it's done. But it's done. You come and give
a man a new heart. You come and cause him to pass
from death, death, lifelessness, hopelessness, utter
powerlessness, and cause him to pass into life, to come with
new breath, new heart, new soul, new mind, new will, new affections,
new understanding, a consciousness now of God, consciousness of
sin, consciousness of the need of Christ, an understanding of
the Word we never had before. Oh, Father, work this work in
your people here. God do the work in your people.
we're asking Christ's holy name. Amen. Amen.