Go to the third chapter of the
book of Titus. The third chapter of the book
of Titus. I'd like to read the first seven
verses. The first seven verses. Put them in mind to be subject
to principalities and powers, to obey magistrates, to be ready
to every good work. to speak evil of no man, to be
no brawlers but gentle, showing all meekness unto all men. For we ourselves also were sometimes
foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving divers' lust and pleasures,
living in malice and envy, hateful and hating one another. But after
that the kindness and love of God our Savior toward man appeared,
not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according
to His mercy He saved us by the washing of regeneration and the
renewing of the Holy Ghost, which He shed on us abundantly through
Jesus Christ our Savior. that being justified by his grace
we should be made heirs according to the whole of eternal life. Now as I read my text this morning
I find in verse 3 where the Apostle Paul speaking here says, for
we ourselves also were sometimes foolish, disobedient, deceived,
serving divers lust and pleasures, living in malice, envy, hateful,
and hating one another. He reminds these believers that
he's writing to and reminds Titus, the servant of God, that we had
a past. that we all had a past. Now everyone
who knows the Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity and truth knows
that there was a time when they did not know the Lord and when
they did not have everlasting life. They know there was a time
when they were outside of the redemption of the Lord Jesus. And we read over in the book
of Peter, just hold your finger there in Titus, In chapter 4
and verse 3, Peter mentions this. He says, For the time past of
our life may suffice us to have wrought the will of the Gentiles
when we walked in lasciviousness, lust, excess of wine, revelings,
banqueting, and abominable idolatries. He mentions the time past of
our life. He said that's sufficient. We
lived in that day and time in sin, we were in bondage, we had
the spirit of disobedience in our hearts, and he said that
time we spent was sufficient. We don't need to go back to that.
And we need not, and we better not go back to that. And then
Paul, in the book of Ephesians chapter 2, and in verse 2, he
says this. He says, we're in times past. Speaking of the history of these
believers, these Ephesian believers, he said, "...ye walked, according
to the course of this world, according to the prince of the
power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children
of disobedience, among whom also we all." had our behavior in
times past in the lust of our flesh fulfilling the desires
of the flesh and of the mind and were by nature the children
of wrath even as others. And so Paul would remind Titus
of the fact of this that we had a past And that was a past that
we're not proud of. It's a past that revealed what
we were in a state of nature. It revealed our sinfulness and
our wickedness. But then he goes on to say, but
after that the kindness and love of God our Savior toward man
appeared. He says there was a time when
the kindness and love of God was manifested in the person
of our Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. God's love for people
that we've described already in these three passages that
we've read. People that were foolish, disobedient,
deceived, and serving divers' lusts and pleasures, living in
malice, envy, hateful, and hating one another. God revealed His
kindness and His love by sending a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. Isn't it wonderful that God did
not stay up in heaven and send us some good advice, but He came
down in the person of His Son and got involved in saving such
wicked sinners as we are, bringing us out of sin and death into
spiritual life. And then Paul goes on to say,
not by works of righteousness which we have done. No, no, no,
no. It didn't have anything to do
with our works. It didn't have anything to do
with what we could do, nothing whatsoever. God has embraced
us in His Son, the Lord Jesus, and He put us in His Son, He
accepted us in His Son, but it didn't have anything to do with
our righteousness. Now, beloved, we need to learn
the lesson where our salvation lies, where it lies, where it
came from. It does not lie in ourself, and
that's what Paul means here when he said, not by works of righteousness
which we have done. It does not lie in ourself. Now
though you can sift yourself over and over as with a sieve,
and you will not discover one atom of saving matter in yourself. Everything that you do find in
yourself, you can just throw it on the dunghill because there
isn't any saving efficacy to anything that you've ever done,
anything that you're about to do. Salvation has got to be provided
for you And it is provided for you in the Lord Jesus. Brother,
sister, there is not one grain of grace in a hundred ton of
human nature. You can look and you can sift
and you can try to find it, but it's not there. There is no grain
of grace in you. You can go on sifting, sifting,
sifting to all eternity, and you'll find only that which will
damn your soul to eternity in you. not by works of righteousness
which we have done. Now if you ask any saved person
that's been taught by the Spirit of God, he will tell you, he
will tell you plainly that the Lord Jesus Christ is his salvation. That it was the love of God,
the mercy of God that appeared in the person of Jesus Christ.
And he is our salvation. And if he will explain himself
as to the Browns, of His salvation and the reason why He's saved
and the very foundation upon which He's built, He will look
away from Himself and He'll point you always to Jesus Christ and
Him alone. Because there's no other name
given among heaven and earth whereby we must be saved but
by the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Do you know and trust
this Savior that has appeared Now, have you come to lean on
the Lord Jesus Christ? Have you come to love the Lord
Jesus Christ? Now beloved, if any man love
not our Lord Jesus Christ, let him be anathema maranatha. Let
him go to hell if he doesn't love the Lord Jesus Christ. If
he doesn't lean on Christ, if he doesn't believe on Christ,
then he must perish and perish forever. All that saves us lies
in the person of this, in the glorious person of our Lord and
Savior Jesus Christ. Salvation flows from God's mercy. His mercy flows from His love,
and His love flows from His goodness, and His goodness flows from His
own infinite love. Nature, beloved, so salvation
has appeared and it's because of the kindness and the love
of God that it's done so. There wasn't anything in us that
induced God to send it down to us. God in His absolute mercy
and love revealed it. But not by works of righteousness
we have done, Paul says, but according to His mercy. He saved
us. According to the divine mercy,
He saved us by the washing of regeneration and the renewing
of the Holy Ghost. Now there is one word here in
verse 5 that I want to talk about this morning, and that is the
word regeneration. It says the washing, he did it,
he saved us by the washing of regeneration and the renewing
of the Holy Ghost. Now, beloved, we know that the
laver here mentioned when it says washing of regeneration,
that that laver that cleanses men from sin is the blood of
Jesus Christ. And this blood of Jesus, Paul
says, is applied in regeneration. It is applied in regeneration.
And then he mentions the renewing of the Holy Ghost. And certainly
the Holy Spirit of God baptizes everyone who comes to know the
Lord in regeneration into the family of God, into the church,
into the body of Christ. They're baptized by the Holy
Spirit into the body of Christ. They're made alive by the incoming
and the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. But regeneration. Regeneration. I want to talk to you about this
this morning. I believe it to be needful. I
believe it to be necessary. Now the word regeneration is
a good Bible word. It's a good Bible term. And it's
one of the doctrines of the grace of God. Now the word regeneration
comes from a Greek word which means to birth again, or it means
the new birth. Now practically speaking, and
I want you to get this, I want you to listen to it very carefully,
regeneration is the impartation of divine life that makes the
sinner willing to come to Christ in faith without which it would
be totally impossible for him to come. Now, if you get that,
then I believe that you probably will be able, before we're done
this morning, to say, I think I got an inkling about what the
preacher was talking about. Now, regeneration again is the
impartation of divine life that makes the sinner willing to come
to Christ in faith without which it would be totally impossible
for him to come. The sinner has got to be made
alive. He's dead in sin, he must be
made alive. Now we need this lesson on regeneration. The professing churches need
to hear this doctrine proclaimed, and I believe it needs to be
proclaimed in the power of the Holy Spirit, regardless of how
rough and uncouth it might sound to talk about these things, I
think the churches need to hear this lesson on regeneration. If you do not have regeneration,
you have no spiritual life. You don't have any. You're not
alive unto the things of God. You're not alive in Christ unless
you've been regenerated by God's Spirit. You've not come to Christ
yet. No, you've not yet come to Christ.
You say, I think I've come. I believe I've come. I hope I've
come. But if you're not regenerate,
then you have not yet come to Christ because an unregenerate
man cannot come to Christ until he is given life by the Spirit,
so therefore you're not saved, you're still in your sin, and
you're in a state of nature under the just condemnation of a thrice
holy God. Now we hear about a lot of things,
but what we need to hear about, I think you will agree with me,
maybe in a moment, we need to hear about regeneration. We need
to hear about life, and how to get life. Now regeneration, number
one, presupposes death. presupposes death. Just as there
can be no resurrection without the death of the body, there
can be no regeneration apart from the death of the soul. Now,
we believe that our Lord Jesus Christ died. We believe he died. We believe he was buried and
we believe that he was raised from the dead. We believe that.
We believe it as a doctrine and we believe it as a personal spirit
taught truth. That we are, that the Lord Jesus
Christ actually died and that he was raised from the dead.
We believe it. And this is to our justification. But there can be no resurrection
without death. And so the Lord Jesus Christ
died, was buried, and God, hallelujah, raised him from the dead. And
there can be no regeneration apart from the death of the soul.
Now, generation means life. And we talk about the book of
Genesis, and that is the book of the generations of human life. This individual begat that individual,
and all the begats in the Bible are generative begats. Speaking of generations of people
to whom life has been given, physical life. Life cannot be
given where life already is. If somebody already is alive,
then you can't give them life. They have it already. The only
way there can be generation is that it is preceded by nothing. The only way there can be regeneration
is that it is preceded by death. If there's any life, there cannot
be any generation. And if there's any spiritual
life whatsoever, even a spark, There can be no regeneration. So regeneration supposes death. There must be death involved
before a person can be regenerated in a scriptural sense. And death
is involved according to what the Word of God teaches. In Genesis
2 verse 16 and 17, it tells us that God placed Adam and Eve
in the Garden of Eden, and they had all they needed to be happy
and to be content. And God said to them, of every
tree in the garden, thou mayest freely eat. You can freely eat
of every tree in the garden, yet God withheld one thing from
them. He said to Adam, here is a particular
fruit on a forbidden tree. Don't eat the fruit of that tree. He said for in the day that thou
eatest thereof, thou shalt surely die. Leave it alone. You live. Eat it and you die. But Genesis chapter 3 and verse
6, and let me read that to you. Genesis 3 and 6 says, And when
the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was
pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise,
she took the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her
husband with her, and he did eat. Now then, Beloved Adam did
not die physically at that time. Adam ate this fruit, but he did
not die physically at that time. He lived many years after this. He did not die as a husband at
that time. He died spiritually at that time. God said, surely, without fail,
without exception, you're going to die if you eat this fruit. Now, it means, here's what it
means to me, and I believe in a biblical sense, this is exactly
what it means for Adam to eat that fruit and to die on that
day. It means that every inclination
and every desire and every motivation to live for God, to fellowship
with God, to walk with God, died in Him at that time. It died
out in Him. It died out in Him. It was not
there anymore. You know that he ran from God
and he hid. He had no desire anymore to fellowship
with God, to walk with God in the cool of the evening. He had
no desire to commune with God. After this, it all died out in
him, and so he was dead. Have you ever wondered what's
wrong with us? How did we ever get into the
fix that we're in? How is it that we have such a
difficult time reading the Word of God, setting aside time to
read and meditate and study the Word of God? How come it is that
we're so prone to wander away from the things of God? We're
so prone to fall after things of the flesh? Why is that? It's
because We all died in Adam. Every inclination we had toward
God and toward living for God and fellowship with God and walk
with God, it died out in our father Adam. And therefore, it
died out in all of his prosperity. He was a representative man,
you know. So it happened to all his offsprings. The same thing. They were born
God-haters. They were born Christ rejecters,
they were born drinking iniquity, like a dog drinks water out of
a mud hole. And we come forth from our mother's
womb speaking lies. Nature, our nature was bent. bent toward the things that God
hates, were bent toward sinning and rebellion against God. And in Ephesians 2.1, it says
that you were born into this world dead in trespasses and
sin. Born that way, dead in sin. Not sick, my friend. Dead, dead,
spiritually speaking. You can look at it. You hath
he quickened, Paul said. The word means to make alive.
Those Ephesians, they were dead when they were born in a state
of nature, but Paul said that God has quickened you. He made
you alive. The word means that. It means
to make alive. It carries with it the meaning
of a spiritual resurrection. Paul said, you have God given
a spiritual resurrection. You say, you mean to tell me
that we're spiritually resurrected? Absolutely. We've already experienced
a resurrection if we've been regenerated. or have you been
resurrected one time? We really have. And I tell you,
that's Bible truth. And it's wonderful if we be risen
with Christ. Paul talked about it through
his writings, and we have been risen, we've been raised up with
the Lord Jesus. That's what he's talking about.
And the first resurrection spoken of, I believe, in the book of
Revelation is talking about this spiritual resurrection that we
have as the people of God being quickened out of sin's death.
and to live. We know what a physical resurrection
is. That's when a dead body gets
up out of the grave and walks and lives again. You who were
dead, Paul said, He, God, quickened. They were renewed by the Holy
Ghost. They were reborn. They were rebirthed. They had
a new beginning in the Spirit. God implanted into those lost
souls His Spirit being. his life, and they began to live
spiritually. What a day! What a day! Hallelujah! What a day! When we began to
live spiritually. I never will forget it. I was
changed. God changed me when I began to
live spiritually. When I was spiritually resurrected. And if you had a true experience
of the grace of God, you were changed when God saved you and
delivered you. That, my friend, is regeneration.
It presupposes death, don't you see? And so we were dead, but
now we're alive in the Lord. Now, there is one spark of life. If there is one spark of life,
there can be no regeneration. And I want you to get this, and
don't ever forget it as long as you live. It's a foundational
truth. If there is a spark, as much as a spark of life in a
sinner, you can't have any regeneration. We're talking about dead. We're
talking about dead, dead, twice dead, plucked up by the roots,
graveyard dead. That's what we're talking about.
The sinner is as dead as the cherry sitting on him. He's dead,
I'm telling you, and there isn't any way that we can get around
that. If there is one little bit of
spark of life in him, then he cannot be regenerated. Now, there are many of the professing
preachers of our day, they profess to be preachers of the gospel,
who insist on that little spark of life being in a center before
salvation. They teach that there's just
a little something in a center that would enable him to take
the first step toward God. Something in the center that
would incline him to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ even
when he's in a state of nature. But brother, sister, I think
that you will say amen to the doctrines of grace when you realize
how dead you are without Christ. Now, I have to emphasize this.
I've got to say these things because there are some people
that are saying just the opposite of this, that the sinner's got
a spark of life in him and he don't have it. And regeneration
presupposes death. And when you realize how dead
you are outside of Christ, and that's what your problem is.
You say, I don't understand a thing in the world about this business
of the gospel. I don't understand that. No mystery
to me. I understand why you don't. You
say, well, you know, somehow or other I just can't crank this
old body up to want to love God and do what I ought to do. Well,
no mystery. No mystery. You're dead in sin. Absolutely dead in sin. How can
a dead man see? You say, I can't see these things.
Well, how can he see? Well, he cannot. How can he understand? How can a dead man hear? How
can a dead man feel? How can a dead man move toward
God when he is D-A-D, dead, dead? How can he do these things? Well,
we know that he cannot. Somebody said, Preacher, you
make me uncomfortable saying that word dead, using that word
dead so much. Well, I didn't invent the word.
And it's a Bible word, and if you don't like it, your argument
is not with me, but it's with God. It's with the Lord. This
is a Bible word. Now this doctrine of regeneration
will not be beautiful to your eyes until you realize that men
are what? Dead. Dead. In a state of nature. That's why men hate the free
grace of God. That's why they hate it. That's
why they despise it. If they ever really hear what
you're saying, if you ever really drive the nail so deep that they
can't get around hearing what you're saying, they'll hate the
free grace of our God. Now most Baptist preachers, they
will preach that the sinner is dead, but most of them don't
believe it. Most of them don't believe it.
You can tell by the way they act they don't believe it. Because
they're giving an invitation to lost people like those lost
people had life already. And telling them they can come
up front and get life. No, my friend, that won't work.
We got to believe what this Bible teaches. I know most of us has
not gone past this saying that we do a few things bad. Now we do a few things bad, but
we are not as bad as dope peddlers and pimps and prostitutes and
the like. Say we're not quite as bad as
those people, but where do we find a man that'll say I'm dead? I'm dead to God. I'm dead to
all things spiritual. I'm dead to them. I don't have
the ability to come out of my grave. I'm in my grave, the grave
of sin. I don't have the ability to get
out. I'm not able. I'm not able to get out. Where
is the sinner that will fall prostrate at the feet of the
Lord Jesus Christ and declare, I'm dead, oh Lord. Life is with
you. Resurrection is in your power. Resurrect my poor dead soul and
give me life. Give me life. You know, every
dead man stands in need of one thing. Would anybody know what
that is? Life. Life. A dead man needs life. Well, you don't need a suit of
clothes and a bottle of cologne. He needs life, that's what he
needs. You remember in Mark 10, when
the Lord Jesus called Blind Bartimaeus to him, and he said to Bartimaeus,
Bartimaeus had been crying out for mercy, and he said, what
wilt thou that you would have me doing to you? And Blind Bartimaeus
said, that I might see, that I might see. That was his greatest need. Now
Blind Bartimaeus, he was a... And Blind Bartimaeus probably
needed some food. But you know what he said? He
said that I might see. That was the urgent need. That
was the need. He needed to see. And what good,
listen to me now, is all these things that we think so much
of that we pamper ourself with in this life if we're dead. What
good are all those things? We need life, is what we need. What good is a good home, a job,
clothes, if you're dead? What good is it? What good is
a good education if you're dead? What good? Well, look in the
mirror, my friend. Have you ever looked in the mirror?
And tell yourself, now I've just got through bathing, I've just
got through putting on the best clothes I've got, but I'm dead. What good is it? What good is
it? And I've been trying to get educated,
and I'm dead. The truth is that we need regeneration
above all else. We need life. Now there are three
illustrations in the Bible of this truth that I want to point
out to you this morning, and we'll hurry on. try to get you
out on time. The first picture of this, and
if you can hold your finger in our text, you can turn over to
the book of Ezekiel chapter 37. The book of Ezekiel chapter 37,
and it is my obligation to illustrate this truth that
I've been talking about. And I want to begin reading here
with verse 3. of chapter 37 of Ezekiel, and
he said unto me, that is, the Lord said unto Ezekiel, the prophet
of God, son of man, can these bones live? Now, Ezekiel has
been carried out by the Spirit of the Lord, and he's been set
down in the midst of the valley, which was full of bones. And
Ezekiel said in verse 2, and he calls me to pass by them round
about, and behold, there were very many in the open valley,
and lo, they were very dry. What Ezekiel saw, when the Lord
carried him out by the Spirit into this valley, he saw all
of these bones, and he saw that they were very dry, but he missed
the issue. That's not the issue, that there
were many bones, and that they were very dry. The question is
asked in verse 3, Son of man, can these bones live? Can they live? That's the issue
at hand. And now notice in verse 5, he
says down in the middle of the verse, I will cause breath to
enter into you, and ye shall live. Alright, in verse 6, down
toward the end of the verse, and ye shall live. And then in
verse 8, He says that there was no breath in them. And then in
verse 9, he says, O breath, he said, come from the four winds,
O breath, and breathe upon these slain, that they may live. You see, that is the issue. And
then in verse 10, So I prophesied as he commanded me, and the breath
came into them, and they lived, and stood upon their feet an
exceeding great army. Now he prophesied unto them,
Calm, O breath, enter into them. That's when men live is when
God breathes in them the breath of life and that takes place
in regeneration. God is chosen through the foolishness
of preaching to save them to believe and God is pleased to
breathe His breath into the souls of men as the gospel is proclaimed
and they're brought out of their death and they're cleansed in
the blood of Jesus from their filth and their pollution and
they're washed in regeneration. Now then, these people, here
they stood, they were like a great army. God had put flesh upon
them, sinew and so on. And here they were, but they
had no breath. There was no breath in them, in verse 8. But there
was no breath in them. Now you know, now this is a picture
of a sinner, a dead sinner. Here he is, he's dressed up.
Here he is, he looks nice. Here he is, he looks as healthy
as all get out. Here he is, but there is no breath
in him. Now we'd take him into the church,
most Baptist churches would, just take him in because he looks
good. But the sinner is dead and he
has no breath in him, no life in him. And so the Lord needs
to come and breathe upon them that they may live. And so he
prophesied as he was commanded, and the breath came. The breath
came. And that is regeneration. There
can be no life apart from Him who is life. He said, I am the
resurrection and I am the life. And he that hath the Son of God,
he hath life. And so we've illustrated here
with our first illustration that the great need is life and that
you have no life apart from God breathing it into you. And this
is what causes a person to then in faith and love toward the
Lord Jesus Christ, step out to own Him and to honor Him, when
God has breathed upon them the breath of life. I invite you
to turn with me to the second illustration, to John chapter
11. John chapter 11. And let us look at verse 39 through
43. These are familiar passages,
but I want you to see it. Jesus said take you away the
stone and Martha the sister of him that was dead you know this
is a story about Lazarus and how that he'd been dead four
days and Martha said it's time to get the last all out and He
said, she said, by this time he stinketh, for it's been dead
four days. And Jesus said, the nurse said,
I nodded to thee, that if thou wouldst believe, thou shouldst
see the glory of God. Then they took away the stone
from the place where the dead was laid. And Jesus slipped up
his eyes and said, Father, I thank thee that thou hast heard me,
and I knew that thou hearest me always, but because the people
which stand by said it, that they may believe that thou sent
me. And when he had thus had spoken, He cried with a loud
voice, Lazarus, Lazarus, come forth. And he that was dead came
forth, bound hand and foot with grave clothes. His face was bound
about with a napkin. And Jesus saith unto them, Loose
him, and let him go. Lazarus will not come forth till
life is given. Now there was no way they didn't
go in with some kind of a gurney or something and get him
and bring him out. He came out when life was given.
When the Lord Jesus cried, Lazarus, come forth! Then there's life-giving
power in the command, he was quickened, he was brought to
life, and out he come. Now the Lord had to put life
in that corpse before he could obey his command to come forth.
You say, well, preachers, I've heard preachers say, I ought
to walk down the aisle, I ought to go into the inquiry room,
I ought to go do this and go to an altar, an old-fashioned
altar, a ballpanks, I ought to do this and that. But my friend,
until the Lord puts life in your soul, ain't none of that going
to do you any good. He's got to put life in you,
and then you can obey His command to step forth and to confess
Him with your mouth. If we confess with our mouth
the Lord Jesus and believe in our heart that God has raised
him from the dead, these are all the activities of a living
soul. Somebody who has already had
life breathed in and may not come to the Lord on his own.
Why? Because we've already explained he's dead. If therefore the sinner
comes to Christ, God must first quicken him. He'll come then
and convert, but not until. Not until. Now John chapter 3,
I invite you to turn there with me, and let's look quickly here.
We're not going to spend much time on this, but I want you
to look at it. This is the third illustration.
Nicodemus is told here in John chapter 3 that he cannot see
the kingdom of God except he be reborn. Except a man be born
again, in John 3 verse 3, except a man be born from above. Except
to be born from above. Well, you mean to tell me that
this is a heavenly birth it is. You mean to tell me it's a birth
that's in God's hand? It's in God's hand. It's got
to come down from above. It's a heavenly birth. There's no other way. It's got
to come down from the Lord. In the Greek, that's what it
means. Except a man be born from above, he cannot see the Kingdom
of God. Now, as I look at this, as you
look on down here in verse 6, That which is born of the flesh
is flesh, and that which is born of the spirit is spirit. Except
a man be born of the water and of the spirit, he cannot enter
the kingdom of God. Your physical birth is not enough
to get you into heaven. Not enough. We all were born
once. If you're born once, you'll die
twice. If you're born twice, you'll die once. Die a physical
death. But your physical birth is not
enough to get you into heaven. Now, some people would dispute
that. Nothing about your ancestors that impresses God. That which
is born of the flesh is flesh. Your granddad, whatever he was
worth, your position in the world, you may say, well, I'm from a
line of bluebloods. You may be from a line of bluebloods
and might even have polka dots in them. As far as I'm concerned,
it ain't going to make any difference. Not one bit of difference. Because
your physical birth is not enough to get you into heaven. You must
be born from above. You must have a spiritual birth. Well, all we are, apart from
the grace of God, is what? Flesh. That which is born of
the flesh is what? Flesh! That's all it is. Rotten flesh. Your reformation. Ah, you say, I've been working
on it. You've been working on it? You've
been trying to be better, have you? Bless your heart. You've
been trying to be better. All your reformation didn't anything
in the world except flesh! You said, I made a decision.
Well, you made a little decision, but you know what that is? That's
flesh too. That's flesh. That's all it is. What do you have, and I ask you
this question soberly, what do you have that's not flesh to
offer to God? Flesh. Flesh. God said that which is born of
the flesh is flesh. God said it's the spirit that
quickeneth, the flesh profiteth nothing. It's the spirit that
makes alive. It's the spirit that borns the
soul. That which is born of the Spirit,
regeneration, it's the sovereign work of the Spirit of God upon
a dead soul. Jesus said in John 6 and 63,
and I want to make sure I cite it, I don't know now whether
I mentioned the reference or not, it's the Spirit that quickeneth,
flesh profiteth nothing, the words I speak unto you, their
Spirit and their life, And verse 8 here is an illustration also
and an explanation of the Spirit's work. Look at verse 8 of John
3. The wind bloweth where it listeth.
Thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it
cometh, or whither it goeth. So is every one that is born
of the Spirit. You see what this text says is
that the wind bloweth where it listeth. Now the wind The Greek
word for wind is actually the same word for
the Spirit of God. It's the same word for God's
Holy Spirit. Now he says the wind blows where
it listens. You know what that word means? That means it blows
where it wants to. It blows where it wills. The
wind of the Spirit of God blows where it wills. Now, it's kind
of like the dentist said, he said, I'll make this painless
as I can, but it's got to come out. It's just got to come out. The wind is not answerable to
anyone as to when and where it blows. Is that right? Not answerable
to anyone. The wind is not dependent on
a man. Is it dependent on a man? Not
that I know anything about. In conversion, man will come
to Christ, man will exercise faith in Christ, and man will
repent of his sins, but that, my friend, is the result of regeneration. That is not regeneration. That,
I believe, is what we call conversion. The wind does not depend on faith
and repentance even. If you see this, I think you've
come a long way this morning. Regeneration is the work of God
alone in the soul. It's the breath of the Spirit
blowing on a dead soul. The regenerating work of the
Holy Spirit does not depend upon what the sinner does. It is true that you will repent
of your sin and you will come forth in faith to Jesus Christ,
but you do that as a result of regeneration, you can't say that
too much, and not as the source from which it springs. It's not the cause of regeneration. You cannot, well it does not
depend upon the sinner taking the first step as we've already
mentioned. It does not depend upon your cooperation. The wind
blows regardless of which way you blow your breath. It blows
the way that God wills. He blows in one place and does
not blow in another. Is that alright with you? Sometimes
that's really okay with us. Let it blow in Livingston. Well, this is sovereignty. Blows
in one place and doesn't blow in another. Salvation is of the Lord, thus
saith the word of the Lord. The wind is invisible. The evidence
proves its reality. Now just look at it. Here's a
man. and he's we've known him and he's like Paul described
all of us the way we walked the course of this world after the
world the things of the world and all at once something happens
something happens and after that that man's different he's different
and we know that the wind of the Spirit of God blowed on that
man's soul we know God's breathed in his nostrils we know he caught
the breath of the Spirit of God He caught the breath. And he's
different. His life has changed. He comes
forward. He says, I want to be baptized. He says, I want to
come to prayer meeting. I want to be at the next meeting.
I want to be there on Sunday morning. I'd like to sing a song.
I'd like to do this. I'd like to be used for the glory
of God. Lord, what will Thou have me
to do? We hear him crying out. We know
that the wind of the Spirit of God is blowing. And so when I
say that The evidence proves its reality. That's what I'm
talking about. The evidence. Would there be
enough evidence in your life to convict you that you are born
again, born from heaven, born from above, sinner. Enough evidence
to convict you that the Spirit has breathed upon you. That the Spirit has glowed upon
your life. enough evidence. I'm going to
tell you where the wind blows, there is some, in reality, evidence. The wind is absolutely essential
to life. One thing we must have, and all of us know it, on this
earth is atmosphere. And the Holy Spirit must move,
breathe, and blow on us. We cannot have life until He
does. Well, somebody said, what can
I do to cause the wind of the Spirit to blow on me? What can
I do? Soberly, in the fear of God,
let me answer this. What did you do to cause your
first birth? What did you do? What did you do to cause your
first birth? You didn't do anything. Nothing! You say, well preacher, you're
just making me helpless as all get out. Dead! That's what we're
doing. You're dead. You are helpless. You're helpless. You do nothing, nothing whatever
in regeneration. Tell me what Lazarus could do.
Tell me what you're going to do on resurrection morning, honey.
Tell me what you're going to do. Tell me what you're going
to do. You ain't going to do nothing.
Nothing. Absolutely dependent upon Sovereign
God to wake us up. We're all going to go to sleep
one of these days. That's what the Bible calls it. Death is a long sleep. Sleep is a short death. We're
all going to go to sleep one of these days. And when we go
to sleep, it'll be in the hope of the resurrection. It'll be
in the hope that this God who woke us up one day and breathed
the breath of life in us will do it again. And I believe He'll
do it again. Job said, he said, though the
skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh I'm gonna see
God. I'm gonna see Him. It'll happen. It'll happen. You'll
come alive. You'll come alive on resurrection
morning. But you're dependent upon Him to make you live. Now, I want to say that you're
going to do plenty once you're regenerated. You're going to
do plenty. Obey magistrates. You're going
to probably keep a speed limit, do the things you ought to, and
all kinds of stuff that Paul mentioned to Titus. You're just
going to be a Good works, that the Father might be glorified.
You're going to be doing a lot of things once you're regenerated.
You'll be doing plenty. But this is my advice to you
this morning. If you're here and you say, I don't think the
wind of the Spirit ever blew in my direction. Well, my advice
would be to you, get under the sound of the word preached. Be
there every time you can be there. Stay under the sound of the gospel
preached. God has linked the preaching
of the gospel with the power of salvation. He's linked the
two together. And God will speak and breathe
on souls through the word as it is preached. Beg God for His
mercy with a sincere heart. Have you ever done that? beg
God for His mercy. I haven't seen any of you sinners
that could die today and go to hell before the sun goes down
this evening. I haven't seen one of you on
your knees begging God for mercy. Sincerely begging God for it. And I'll tell you what, we'll
know when the Spirit of God comes upon men in our day. We'll know
it. There'll be a mourning. There'll
be a lamenting. There'll be a wailing. There'll
be a crying out to God. That's what there'll be. When
the wind of the Spirit begins to blow and flesh is stripped
and men are brought down and brought low and brought to see
their death in sin and their helplessness and hopelessness
apart from the sovereignty of God, they'll begin to beg. They'll
begin to wail. They'll begin to cry. They'll
begin to mourn over what they are. And they'll seek God sincerely
with all their heart when that day comes. Remember that old
song, Pass Me Not, O Gentle Savior? While on others thou art calling,
do not pass me by. I can just hear a sinner, a lost
sinner crying to God, do not pass me by. While on others you
are calling, while on others you are breathing the breath
of life, don't pass me by. Don't pass me by, Lord. When
a sinner gets in that posture, then I think something has happened.
I think the wind has blown in his direction. That's what I
believe. I really believe that. Father, in the name of Jesus,
I pray that thou be pleased, Lord, to own this message, and
I pray, Lord, that we might all begin to pray as we ought to
pray, that is, that our God that resides in the heavens, that
our God who rules in the army of earth and the inhabitants
of the earth, that he will visit again, and that he will begin
to blow upon the souls of men, Lord, breathe on a lost soul
here this morning, if you haven't already. Breathe, O God, that
they may live. Visit us, O Lord, in regeneration. Oh, I pray for the power of the
Holy Spirit to come down, and that sinners will be converted,
brought out of death by the Holy Spirit's work, and they'll be
washed in the labor of regeneration, washed in the blood of the Lord
Jesus. Father, thank you again for our
resurrected, enthroned Lord Jesus Christ who has life in His hands
and He can quicken the dead, whoever He will. And we praise
you for Him. In Jesus' name, Amen.