John 3:1-8
Suggested further reading: Ezekiel 37:1-10
This change of heart is rendered absolutely necessary to
salvation by the corrupt condition in which we are all without exception
born. `That which is born of the flesh is flesh.' Our nature is
thoroughly fallen. The carnal mind is enmity against God (Rom. 8:7). We
come into the world without faith, or love, or fear towards God. We
have no natural inclination to serve him or obey him and no natural
pleasure in doing his will. Left to himself, no child of Adam would
ever turn to God. The truest description of the change which we all
need in order to make us real Christians is the expression `new birth'.
This mighty change, it must never be forgotten, we cannot
give to ourselves. The very name which our Lord gives to it is a
convincing proof of this. He calls it a birth. No man is the author of
his own existence and no man can quicken his own soul. We might
as well expect a dead man to give himself life as expect a natural
man to make himself spiritual. A power from above must be put in
exercise, even that same power which created the world (2 Cor.
4:6). Man can do many things, but he cannot give life either to
himself or to others. To give life is the peculiar prerogative of God.
Well may our Lord declare that we need to be `born again'!
This mighty change, we must above all remember, is a
thing without which we cannot go to heaven and could not enjoy
heaven if we went there. Our Lord's words on this point are distinct
and express: `Except a man be born again, he can neither see nor
enter the kingdom of God.' Heaven may be reached without money,
or rank, or learning. But it is clear as daylight, if words have
any meaning, that nobody can enter heaven without a `new birth'.
For meditation: Thank God that he intervenes in the lives of
men to save them from their state of spiritual stupor and death.
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