Welcome to Reign of Grace. This
program is brought to you by Reign of Grace Media Ministries,
an outreach ministry of Eager Avenue Grace Church in Albany,
Georgia. It is our pleasure and privilege
to present to you the gospel message of the sovereign grace
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for today's program. welcome to our program today
i'm glad you could join us and if you would like to follow along
in your bibles with the message today i'm going to be preaching
from john chapter three john chapter three we're going to
be talking about the new birth you must be born again the title
of the message today is god's regenerating grace god's regenerating
Now the word regenerating means life-giving. So we're talking
about God's regenerating grace, God's life-giving grace. And
this is the third message in sort of a series I've been doing
concerning issues of prerequisites for entering salvation. I mentioned this in the last
two messages how I received a note, an email from a man who said
that I would not preach repentance as a prerequisite for entering
salvation, and he's right. I don't preach repentance as
a prerequisite for entering salvation. I certainly do preach repentance,
but it's not a prerequirement. That's what a prerequisite is,
a prerequirement that a sinner must fulfill, act
upon, or work in order to qualify that sinner to enter salvation. Now, when I talk about repentance,
I always talk about it in the context of faith also. Faith
and repentance. Because faith and repentance
come together, both are the gifts of God. And so we enter into
salvation by means of, and there's a difference now, by means of
faith and repentance. But neither one of those gifts
of God's grace, works of the Spirit, neither one of those
are prerequisites that we must muster up within ourselves. in
order to qualify for salvation. It's God-given means by which
we enter salvation. And I'm gonna prove that to you
from scripture now. You gotta go to the Bible. But
basically, when it comes to entering what the Bible describes as a
state of salvation, All right, what are the prerequisites? And
in the Bible, we're given three prerequisites for a sinner to
enter the state of salvation. And the state of salvation, are
you saved? And you've heard me say on this
program many times, there's only two types of people in this world. There are sinners who are lost
in their sins, and then there are sinners saved by grace. So there's the state of being
lost, and then there's the state of being saved. So how do you
come from being lost to being saved? And we often hear people
today talk about somebody getting saved, and sometimes that can
be a little misleading because what they're referring to is,
well, they made a decision for Christ, or they gave their heart
to Jesus, And those terms are okay if you understand what the
Bible means about entering salvation. It is not salvation conditioned
on my cooperation, my believing, my giving my heart to Jesus.
Those are things that happen within a sinner by the power
of God. So think about it this way. The
first prerequisite that I mentioned for salvation is God must choose
who he's going to save. And I know people don't like
to hear that. That's God's electing grace. But you get that message
I preached two weeks ago on that issue. God's electing grace. If God had not chosen His people
for salvation, none of us would choose Him. And I'll show you
that today. And then the second prerequisite,
and of course it means not only just God choosing a people in
some arbitrary way, like throwing the dice or something, no, no.
God chose his people in Christ because God must be just in whatever
he does. And then the second prerequisite
is God's redeeming grace because righteousness has to be established.
Whatever God does, whether he condemns sinners or justifies
sinners, whether he sends sinners to eternal damnation or brings
them into glory with himself. He must be just. in doing so
because that's His nature. God must be a just God as well
as a Savior. He must be righteous as well
as merciful and loving. There is no love, mercy, or grace
from God outside of Christ. That's where we come to God's
redeeming grace. Redemption by the blood of Christ. That's the prerequisite, you
see. Sinners have to be redeemed by the blood. Sinners have to
be justified before God, declared not guilty and righteous in God's
sight. Based upon Christ, righteousness
imputed. Well, the righteousness of Christ,
which is the merits of His obedience unto death as the surety and
substitute of His people, That righteousness, Christ, is not
only the ground of a sinner's justification before God, but
it's also the source and the power of regeneration, the new
birth, life-giving. And here's the third prerequisite
for entering salvation. Now look at John chapter 3. And
Christ here, the Lord Jesus Christ is being confronted or being
visited by a man named Nicodemus. Look at verse 1. There was a
man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. Now this
man was a Pharisee. He was a ruler. He was one of
the judges. Probably sat on the court of
what we call the Sanhedrin or Sanhedrin, which was the Jewish
court, the religious court that heard cases that brought the
people who had problems or accused of crimes were brought before
this court. So this was a man who was high up in religion.
And it says in verse 2, the same came to Jesus by night. came
not in the day. Now that's probably so he wouldn't
be seen because Jesus did not have a good reputation among
the Pharisees. They hated him. But this man
apparently saw something that the others didn't see. We don't
know exactly except what he says here. It says in verse two, the
same Nicodemus came to Jesus by night and said unto him, Rabbi,
which is a term that would be used for a teacher. one of the
Jewish rabbis, the Jewish leaders, like a pastor or a bishop today. And he says, we know that thou
art a teacher come from God. Now Nicodemus, even though a
lot of the Pharisees pronounced a curse upon Christ, he said,
we know you're a teacher come from God. He says, for no man
can do these miracles that thou doest except God be with him.
So Nicodemus apparently recognized Jesus of Nazareth to be a real
teacher sent from God who performed miracles that he knew that no
man could perform except God be with him. Now, it's important
that we understand that Nicodemus did not recognize Jesus of Nazareth
as being the Messiah. There are a lot of people who
say later on Nicodemus did come to faith in Christ and to accept
Jesus as his savior, as they say. But we don't know that for
sure. There's nothing in the Bible
explicitly stated to tell us that. But I know this, right
here he didn't know this, and there's something that was missing
with Nicodemus that he couldn't see. Now he had physical eyes,
He came by night to Jesus and recognized him as a teacher sent
from God. But there's something here that
he's not seeing. Something here that he's not
hearing. And listen to what Christ told him in verse three. Jesus
answered and said unto him, now listen, verily, verily, that
means truly, truly, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again. Now that word again, you might
have a concordance in your Bible and it says from above. Except
a man be born from above, he cannot see the kingdom of God. You see, Jesus Christ is the
Messiah. who came into the world to establish
the kingdom of God, the spiritual kingdom of God, by virtue of who he is. He is God in human flesh. He is God with us, the Word made
flesh. See, Nicodemus didn't see that.
He said, I know you're a teacher sent from God, because you couldn't
do what you're doing except God be with you. You know, the prophets
perform miracles. But they weren't God in human
flesh. They weren't the Messiah. They
weren't the Savior. And so Nicodemus, he's not saying
you're the Messiah, you're the Savior. He said God is with you.
Well, God is with all of his people. And whether they perform
miracles or not. But certainly this person that
Nicodemus is confronting, he said God is with you. So here
is Christ telling him that unless you're born again. Now, what
is the new birth? Well, that is a spiritual rebirth. It's called in some circles,
regeneration. See, we fell in Adam into sin
and death. And as a result of our fall,
our ruination in Adam, we are born naturally spiritually dead. We don't have spiritual life.
We don't have spiritual knowledge. We don't, by nature now, as we're
naturally born, we don't have spiritual eyes to see spiritual
things, the things that glorify God and honor Him, His way of
salvation. That's why the Bible says, there's
none that seeketh after God, no, not one. They seek a God,
but it's a God like themselves. By nature, we don't have spiritual
ears to hear the reality, the glory, the beauty of the gospel. You see, we hear the doctrines
and we can hear things, but by nature, he tells us down in verse
19 that we hate the truth because it exposes us for what we are.
So here's Jesus of Nazareth, the one who's come into the world
to establish the kingdom of God by virtue of who he is, God manifest
in the flesh, Emmanuel, God with us. In other words, Nicodemus
said, except we know God is with you, what he didn't see is that
Christ is God with us. He is God in human flesh, God-man. And he came to establish the
kingdom of God by virtue of who he is and by virtue of what he
would accomplish in the salvation of his people, the redemption
of his people, to put away their sins and establish the only righteousness
by which God could be just to justify them. See, the kingdom
of God is a kingdom of righteousness, justice. And that righteousness
comes not by us or through us, it comes through Jesus Christ. He is the king who holds the
right scepter, the righteous scepter. And that scepter is
a scepter of righteousness. And so that's what happens here.
And so he says, he says, except a man be born again, he cannot
see the kingdom of God. Now this new birth is the life
giving spirit that comes forth from Christ. to give the resurrection
life of Christ to a dead sinner, literally raise that sinner from
spiritual death to spiritual life. And you know what he does? He gives that sinner a new heart.
Ezekiel described that. A new heart, a new mind, a new
affections, a new will, new desires, new goals, a new conscience,
cleansed by the blood of Christ. He, the Bible in John 16 talks
about how the Holy Spirit convicts of sin. In other words, when
we're born again by the Spirit, he says, except a man be born
again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. That is, he can't see
spiritual truth about who God is. God is holy and just and
righteous. Yes, he's loving and merciful
and gracious, but he must be both. He must be both a righteous
judge as well as a Savior. He must be a just judge as well
as a Heavenly Father. You see that? How can He be both? There's only one ground upon
which God can be both a just God and a Savior, and that's
the imputed righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ. That's
the merits of Christ's obedience and death. That's His blood.
That's His cross. God forbid that I should glory
save in the cross. Well see, when you're born again,
you know, the Holy Spirit teaches us that. Gives us that knowledge. He brings us from darkness to
light and He shows us our sinfulness and depravity. He convicts us
of sin. The sin of unbelief. and ignorance
and showing us that if God were to ever give me what I deserve
or earned, it would be eternal damnation. I have no hope in
myself. He convicts of righteousness
that's found only in Christ and of judgment which Christ took
upon the cross for his people to save us from our sins. And
he says, you can't see these things. You can't see Christ
in his glory. in his redemptive work, in his
righteousness, that demands and secures the salvation of all
for whom he lived, died, was buried, and arose the third day.
Well, look at verse four. Nicodemus saith unto him, how
can a man be born when he's old? Can he enter the second time
into his mother's womb and be born? Well, Nicodemus obviously
didn't see the spiritual issues of what Christ was speaking.
He thought of physical birth, a baby born. Well, obviously,
a man cannot enter into his mother's womb a second time, so Christ
tells him in verse five, 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. Now, there's a couple
of ways of looking at this in verse five. when Christ says,
accept a man be born of water. That could be referring to the
physical birth because it's a water birth, physically. So in other words, Christ would
be saying here, well, you've gotta be born physically, yes,
but that's not the birth I'm talking about. I'm talking about
the spirit, the spiritual birth. You've gotta be born of the spirit,
born of God, born from above. That's the prerequisite to enter,
he says, to enter into the kingdom of God. The new birth is the
prerequisite, see. Regeneration and conversion is
the requirement. Faith and repentance come in
regeneration and conversion. I'm gonna show you that in a
minute. When a sinner is born again by the Spirit, he is brought
under the word of God and brought to believe it, believe in Christ,
to receive Christ and repent of himself, repent of his sins. And that's the way he enters
in, but it's not a prerequisite. You don't have it before the
new birth. You don't have it in you. I don't have it in me
naturally to believe. You say, well, he made a decision
for Christ. Well, if he truly did make a
decision for Christ, that means he was first born again by the
Spirit. Listen, unless we're born again
by the Spirit, we can't even see what to believe, who to believe,
and what to repent of. You can't see, he says. And so
that could be the physical birth and the spiritual birth. But
now some commentators say that this water here refers to the
water of the word. And so Christ would be saying,
except a man be born of the word and of the spirit, he cannot
enter in the kingdom of God. Now what that would mean is this.
The Holy Spirit in the new birth uses the word of God, the gospel,
to bring a sinner into the state of salvation, into the kingdom
of God. For example, in Romans chapter
one and verse 16, listen to this. Paul said, for I am not ashamed
of the gospel of Christ, for that gospel is the power of God,
the dynamite of God, unto salvation to everyone that believeth, to
the Jew first, and the Greek also, or the Gentile also, for
therein, verse 17, for therein is the righteousness of God revealed
from faith, that is from the doctrinal teachings of the gospel,
to faith, to God-given faith that the Spirit gives, For as
it is written, the justified shall live by faith. That's how
we live, by faith, God-given faith. Well, the Gospel Word,
in the hands of the Holy Spirit, in the power of the Holy Spirit,
is the power of God unto salvation. In other words, Christ sends
forth the Spirit to give life from Christ, the resurrected
life of Christ, under the preaching of the Gospel. And so he's saying,
except a man be born of water, the word, and of the spirit,
he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. Look at verse six of
John three. That which is born of the flesh,
that is physical to physical, is physical rather, and that
which is born of the spirit is spirit. So marvel not that I
said unto thee, you must be born again, or born from above. And
then verse eight, he makes this statement. He says, the wind
bloweth where it listeth. The wind blows where it will.
Thou hearest the sound thereof, you hear it, but canst not tell
whence it cometh and whither it goeth. So is everyone that
is born of the Spirit. That's kind of like saying this,
as I preach the gospel to you, I don't know if the Spirit's
gonna give you eyes to see and ears to hear. I don't know. But
I know that if you're one whom God chose and one whom Christ
redeemed, who's justified based on his righteousness imputed,
the Spirit at some point in time in your life is gonna come and
he's gonna give you life. And the only way we're gonna
know it is by the evidences. And what are the evidences? Faith
in Christ and repentance of dead works and repentance of our sins.
That's the evidence. Now go over to John chapter one
and let me show you that. The Bible teaches that by nature,
none of us will believe. None of us will repent. And the
only way we're going to come to believe and repent is if God
sends the Spirit, sends the Holy Spirit to give us that new birth. to birth us again. You know,
people today, I know there was a famous preacher who wrote a
book on how to be born again. And basically, in the book, he
says, well, here's how you're born again. You believe, and
then you're born again. That is not what the Bible teaches. Let me show you. Look at verse
eight, or verse nine, rather. He's talking about the light.
And who is the light? Christ is the light. He spoke
of John the Baptist who bore witness of the light. And he
says in verse nine, he said, that was the true light, Christ,
which lighteth every man that cometh into the world. Now what
he's talking about there is physical light. And it says in verse 10,
now look at, and somebody says, well, that means everybody has
that new birth or that light. No, look at verse 10. He was
in the world, Christ. And the world was made by Him,
Christ the Creator. And the world knew Him not. Do you see that? By nature, we
don't know these things. By nature, we're deceived and
ignorant. We're in darkness, okay? And
it says in verse 11, He came unto His own, and His own received
Him not. They wouldn't receive Him. Now,
a lot of people go to that verse, they say, well, that means he
came to his own nation. Well, he did come to his own
nation. He came according to the flesh,
to the seed of David, a Jew, and the Jews received him not.
But the Bible tells us that the Gentiles rejected him too. You
can read about it in Acts chapter four and verse 26. Everybody
who was anybody turned thumbs down on him. You see, the Bible
teaches us that if God were to come down here and gather us
all together and say, now how many of you of your own free
will would choose me? None of us would choose him.
That's what the Bible teaches. And if you think you would rise
above the crowd and choose him, you think too highly of yourself.
You've not been convinced of sin. You don't have eyes to see
the reality of who you are. So look at it, he came unto his
own and his own received him not. But look at verse 12, but
as many as received him, to them gave he power. Now that word
power is the right to become or to be called the sons of God,
even to them that believe on his name. Look at verse 13, which
were born not of blood, not flesh, not inherited, say, not pedigree,
nor of the will of the flesh, that's the works of the flesh,
we weren't born because of works, nor of the will of man. You weren't
born because you freely, by your own free will, chose to be born,
no. Which were born of God, born
from above. You see, you must be born again,
Christ, or you cannot see the kingdom of God. When we're born again by the
Spirit, under the preaching of the gospel, we're given eyes
to see and ears to hear what we didn't see and hear before.
Christ told his disciples in Matthew 13, he said, blessed
are your eyes, for they see. Blessed are your ears for they
hear. Faith cometh by hearing and hearing
by the word of God. You see that? Hearing doesn't
come by faith. Faith comes by hearing. Now who
gives me that hearing? God does. Born of God. It's not of blood. It's not of
my physical pedigree. It's not of the works of the
flesh. It's not even of my own will. God changes my will. by giving me eyes to see things
that I didn't see before and ears to hear things that I didn't
hear before. You see that? Somebody said,
well, you're saying that God drags people to himself against
their will. No, we're not willing before
we're born again. But God doesn't drag us to Christ
against our will. You know what he does? He changes
our will. He makes us willing, the psalmist
said, in the day of his power. Let me tell you something, if
you're willing to come to Christ for salvation, for righteousness,
for eternal life, for all salvation and its blessings, if you're
willing to come to Him as He is, as revealed in this word,
as you are revealed in this word, I'll tell you what happened.
If you're willing to come to accept Him and receive Him, believe
in Him and repent, you've been born again. from above, because
except a man be born again from above, he cannot see these things. He cannot enter into the kingdom
of heaven. That's the prerequisite. It's
God's electing grace. It's God's redeeming grace. It's
God's regenerating grace. And so you seek the Lord and
find him in the word. Hope you'll join us next week
for another message from God's word. We are glad you could join us
for another edition of Reign of Grace. This program is brought
to you by Reign of Grace Media Ministries, an outreach ministry
of Eager Avenue Grace Church in Albany, Georgia. To receive
a copy of today's program or to learn more about Reign of
Grace Media Ministries or Eager Avenue Grace Church, write us
at 1102 Eager Drive, Albany, Georgia. Contact us by phone at 229-432-6969
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today and may the Lord be with you.