The New Birth: How Can These Things Be?

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Now, we are looking at the new birth, the new birth, and this is actually part three.
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How can these things be? How can these things be? That's the question that Nicodemus asks. And we continue our series on the new birth regeneration through the
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Gospel of John. So if you have your Bibles, please turn with me there as we continue our study.
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And after this message, we're going to have communion. It's first of the month, and we'll try to stay with that schedule as much as we can.
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Lord willing. John chapter three. John chapter three. John chapter three is, by the way, a very, very important section in this wonderful fourth
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Gospel, and it's a key chapter from the entirety of the whole Bible itself, 66 books of inspiration that's compiled into one book, the
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Bible. But chapter three is paramount, isn't it? It is key. It is very important in of itself, and in this chapter, we have tremendous revelation that's given to us by our
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Lord Jesus Christ on the new birth, and may God help us all. May the Lord help us in His mercy and grace to have ears to hear what the
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Spirit is saying to the church. And I'm not saying it just because I'm ministering here and you're there.
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This really needs, this chapter really needs to be emphasized everywhere in all churches, being what it means to be born again of the
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Spirit of God. And Jesus tells us, He tells through Nicodemus, a man that was very, very religious, very active, a man that supposedly was a teacher of the
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Jews of Israel, and we see this here.
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So John chapter three, I'm going to start with verse one,
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I'm going to stop at verse 15. Now, I'm telling you, this is a privilege this morning to open up this wonderful gift that Redeeming Grace Church has given me.
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I can't thank you enough. Telling Brother Zach here earlier this week what a gift it is to have, and as you well know, all of us know, we need not to take for granted this book, do we?
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As Spurgeon has said, it has come to us on a sea of blood, folks.
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Many, many martyrs. William Tindall was one of the ones that gave his life and they literally burned him to the stake and strangled him at the same time because all he did, he translated the
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Word of God from Greek, Arabic, Hebrew, into our
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English language. What a price has been paid. And not only him, there's been many,
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John Wycliffe before him, and then you have Tindall, and you have these men that have stood, and at that time the
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Catholic Church, if you came against the authority of the Catholic Church and you stood on the Word of God, you were basically given over as a martyr.
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They branded them as a heretic. But these men gave their lives and we must never forget that this
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Word of God has come to us at a great price, amen? Well in saying that, this is a wonderful translation.
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The LSB is a more recent translation, the Legacy Standard Bible translation, and it is the closest to the original
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Hebrew and Greek, so I thank God for this wonderful translation I'm reading to you this morning, amen? This Word, a wonderful gift, a wonderful gift to the
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Church, the greatest actually outside of, right along with salvation. How can we know about salvation unless we have the
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Word of God? It is God's Word. His revelation that God teaches us and shows us how we can enter into the
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Kingdom of God. And we'll see, we'll see exactly what the Lord says as we have been studying.
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John chapter 3, verse 1 to 15. Hear the
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Word of the Lord. Now there was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the
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Jews. This man came to Jesus by night and said to him, Rabbi, we know that you have come from God as a teacher, for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him.
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Jesus answered and said to him, truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the
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Kingdom of God. Nicodemus said to him, how can a man be born when he is old?
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Can he enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born? And Jesus answered, truly, truly,
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I say to you, unless one is born of water and the
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Spirit, he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God. That which has been born of the flesh is flesh.
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That which has been born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, you must be born again.
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The wind blows where it wishes and you hear its sound, but do not know where it comes from and where it is going.
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So is everyone who has been born of the Spirit. Nicodemus answered and said to him, how can these things be?
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And Jesus answered and said to him, are you the teacher of Israel and do not understand these things?
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Truly, truly, I say to you, we speak of what we know and bear witness of what we have seen and you do not accept our witness.
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If I've told you earthly things and you do not believe, how will you believe if I tell you heavenly things?
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And no one has ascended into heaven, but he who has descended from heaven, the
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Son of Man. And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the
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Son of Man be lifted up, so that whoever believes will in Him have eternal life.
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Let's bow our hearts together in prayer as we seek our
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Lord's face and blessing together within this hour of worship.
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Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your glorious name, and Lord as your word has said in Samuel, speaking of Samuel, speak
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Lord, for thy servant hears. We pray that your blessed
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Holy Spirit, who is the teacher, the true teacher of all your truth,
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I pray Lord that you will take your word from the hearing of our ears to our very hearts today.
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Lord, I pray that each and every one of us here today will be changed forever. And if some here has not been born anew,
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Lord, we pray that your Holy Spirit will mysteriously show them and take the scales off their eyes and grant to them repentance and faith to come into thy kingdom.
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Lord, you are so willing to do this, but your Holy Spirit must do it. Lord, we thank you.
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Change us more into the likeness of Jesus Christ from glory to glory and we pray for this for your honor and glory in Jesus' name, amen.
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Well, praise God. John chapter 3, as I've already said, is paramount and it's very important.
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Nicodemus inquires of Jesus, and it says in verse 1 -3, as we've already looked at, but I want to give a little backdrop of this.
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Now there was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. This man came to Jesus by night and said to him,
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Rabbi, we know that you have come from God as a teacher, for no one can do these signs.
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Notice he's looking at the signs that you do. He's looking at the doing unless God is with him.
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Jesus turns this upside down on him and surprises him.
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What is really important here is the kingdom of God. The kingdom of God.
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What is the kingdom of God? Nicodemus comes to Jesus by night, as we've looked at that, and for what reason, we're not for sure, probably not to be embarrassed.
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Maybe he wanted a long conversation with the Lord. We don't know actually, but what's important is, it's already been mentioned, he came.
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That's what's important. He came to Jesus. Make sure that we come to Jesus.
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That's what really matters. So he comes to Jesus by night as one of those superficial believers mentioned in John 2, 23 -25, as we've looked at.
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Nicodemus falls in this category. Now when he was in Jerusalem, speaking of Jesus, at the
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Passover during the feast, many believed in his name. Many believed in his name when they saw his signs.
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Notice that. Nicodemus is in this category, which he was doing. And then it says in verse 24, but Jesus on his part was not entrusting in himself to them, for he knew all men, and because he had no need that anyone bear witness concerning man, for he himself knew what was in man.
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And this is Nicodemus. This is Nicodemus. The Lord refused to accept
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Nicodemus' profession. He refused it because it was based on the signs and miracles which he had witnessed.
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Because verse 2 in chapter 3 plainly tells us that. Then Jesus went straight to the real issue.
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Isn't it wonderful about our Lord? He doesn't beat around the bush. He goes straight to the heart.
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And that's what Jesus does for all of us and for every person. Even a seeker, so to speak.
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It's really God that seeks. Nicodemus didn't know this at the time, and we don't know it.
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Or any Armenian knows it. And if you're not familiar with Arminianism, it's based upon Jacob Arminius that basically believed in early church history that man comes into the kingdom of God by his own free will.
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It's sad to say that this is taught by and large in all churches today, most churches.
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At one time, most churches in earlier church history believed more
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Calvinistic, and Calvin basically believed that it was not by man's free will, but by God's will.
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And that is correct. And Calvin did not come up with that theology, did he?
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Actually Calvin was coming against what Jacob Arminius, the tulip, came about of the backdrop of what
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Jacob Arminius was basically teaching against God's will. And, of course, that side of the camp basically looks, well, we're not robots, we got a will.
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We can choose and do whatever, well, in one sense we do have a will. Of course, we're not robots.
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I like what R .C. Sproul says, God doesn't bring you into the kingdom kicking and screaming against your will.
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But what really matters here is that God, when he does an operation of the spirit of God, there is a transformation so great that it takes place, he causes our will to some way be bent into God's will, but it's the spirit of God that does the work.
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I've talked to so many people about this and they fight up against it. And you know the same.
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But time and time and time again, and what Jesus is going to be telling Nicodemus is that salvation has nothing to do with you.
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It has nothing to do with how religious you are. It has everything to do with what
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God has done. And that's what separates all the religions, by the way, if you notice, in this world that is basically man -centered and trying to get to God.
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God has come and condescended from heaven to bring us up to God.
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He has done it. And this is what Christianity is. And it has separated,
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Christianity has separated from all those religions of the world that try and try whatever they may do to get to God.
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God has, in his great love, has come to us in Jesus Christ.
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That's the gospel. And Jesus is going to be telling Nicodemus this.
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He's basing everything upon, notice how he begins, Rabbi, he tells him, he addresses him as a teacher, we know that you have come from God.
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Now he acknowledges that, as a teacher. For no one can do, but he gets this wrong here, but no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with them.
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And Jesus answered and said to him, and notice Jesus begins to say, truly, truly, amen, amen.
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In other words, this is a statement, Jesus is correcting Nicodemus' false theology.
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I say to you, unless one is born again, born from above, what he's saying, he cannot see the kingdom of God.
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Now later on he says, enter, but notice, he cannot see it. Nicodemus has blind eyes, folks.
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This is the world. They're blind, and not only are they blind as we saw, and we will see once again from Ezekiel, they're dead.
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They're dead men walking. Oh, they're alive and they run about doing things as we do physically, but inwardly, spiritually, they're dead in their sin, trespasses and sins, separated from God.
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And they may go to church. They may be, we consider kind and nice people, but they're separated from God.
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There's no peace of God. They don't have peace with God. Therefore, they cannot know the peace of God.
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First, they must have peace with God, and that comes by being justified by faith alone in the person and the works of Jesus Christ.
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Now, Nicodemus gets to the heart of the matter, doesn't he? And I love that about our
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Lord. He gets straight to the real issue that plagued this very religious man, this man, by the way, that was a hypocrite, a hypocrite.
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You know, the ultimate hypocrite is really Satan. He's the ultimate hypocrite because he knows the
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Word of God, but he does such a twist on it, and he uses the
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Word of God and twists it and confuses people from what the
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Word of God. We were talking about this on the way to church this morning, really. That's why it's so important to understand
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Genesis. Because really, if you go back to the false study of Genesis, what has happened is
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Satan has always, he's never changed his strategy, has he? Because it works for him.
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Has God said? Has God said? What is he doing? He's slandering
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God's character. He's throwing doubt on the Word of God.
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And this is what people have been doing ever since then. And this is what
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Satan has blinded people. Paul made it very clear. The God of this world has blinded the minds of them that do not believe.
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Their minds are blind. It's like going up to a blind person, do you see what
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I'm talking about? No, they can't see, they're in darkness. They're in darkness because they don't see the spiritual truth that a born again person sees.
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And it takes the spirit of the living God. And I'm telling you folks, this is why we're so dependent upon God in prayer, because we cannot cause a person to come into the kingdom.
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You can even give the gospel, and we think, oh, if I could just talk to him, then we should. We should give the gospel, we're commanded to give the gospel.
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But still, even that. This is why we rely on God in prayer.
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Only God can bring a person to see and enter into the kingdom of God by His power and His Holy Spirit.
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No other way. Jesus gets to the real issue of this hypocrite's life, and that was the transformation that Nicodemus' heart, that he needed by the new birth, and it's called regeneration.
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It's a miraculous new birth, that we,
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Nicodemus as Nicodemus, as Nicodemus, must be born from above.
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And by the way, it's an act of God by which
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God Himself imparts through His Holy Spirit eternal life to those who are dead in trespasses and sins, as I've already mentioned.
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Jesus answered His unasked question. And as we've looked at this, isn't it wonderful?
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He really answers His unasked question because Jesus is discerning
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His innermost being. He's discerning His heart. Unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.
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Nicodemus' eyes must be supernaturally cut on. The scales must be removed by the
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Spirit of God. And Nicodemus could not do that within himself.
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He could not do that within his own power and ability, and this is where Jesus continues to go.
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And the kingdom of God, Jesus is speaking specifically of the kingdom of salvation, the spiritual realm where those who have been born again by the divine power through faith, by the
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Spirit, the water, who now live under the rule of God, mediated through His Son.
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And Jesus made it crystal clear that no matter how religious, how much religious activity someone might have done, how religious they might be, no one can enter into the kingdom of God without experiencing the personal regeneration of the new birth.
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And I'm telling you, folks, this should be at the top priority of everyone, even many people in churches, sad to say.
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You can learn the language. I've seen this, folks. I've heard people can recite scripture after scripture far better than I can.
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And I've even heard them pray like apostles and yet live like a devil.
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Why? Because they don't have a new heart. That's what matters, folks.
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And this is what Jesus is getting to. Look at verse 4, Nicodemus said to Him, how can a man be born when he is old?
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Can he enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born? Jesus answered, truly, truly,
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I say unto you, unless one is born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.
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He cannot enter into it. Jesus is really giving a shocking statement, far, far more than what
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Nicodemus actually expected. How can a man be born when he's old?
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He doesn't really understand the analogy Jesus is giving, but it's really a simple analogy. You had nothing to do with your first birth, you have nothing to do with your second birth.
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He cannot enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born, can he? No. Nicodemus did not understand.
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He did not interpret Jesus' words right. He replied in the context of the
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Lord's analogy, how can he start all over and go back to the beginning?
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How? How? Jesus was telling him that entrance into God's salvation, into the realm of salvation was not a matter of adding something to all his efforts, but rather him abandoning and cancelling everything and starting all over.
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That would shock a lot of people, wouldn't it? That's been in the churches for 50 years, and that does not know the
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Lord Jesus Christ is personal and has surrendered to His Lordship.
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They say, oh Jesus is my Savior, but they continue to live as they always lived. And He is
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Savior, but I'm telling you this folks, He's not Savior, and you can't divide
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Him from His Lordship. He is Lord, and Jesus Christ is
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Lord over all. He's Lord of all, and every knee shall bow, every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is
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Lord to the glory of God the Father. He's Lord, no matter what. So we are to submit to His Lordship and come and abandon everything and starting all over, starting anew.
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That's what Jesus is telling him, you must begin anew. You must dump your religion.
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Paul did that. He said it was all manure. Dunk! To come to God means we come bankrupt, we come empty.
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Didn't Jesus say that in Matthew 5? The very first beatitude on the
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Sermon on the Mount, blessed are the poor in spirit. And what did
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He say? For theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Those that come to Jesus, poor and bankrupt in spirit, what
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He's saying is, you come at the bottom of the barrel. You come recognizing that you can do nothing to enter into that kingdom.
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We cannot add to it. It takes the Spirit of God to even help us to see that we come poor, blind, and naked so that we may be rich in Christ, broken.
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That word poor means we come broken. We abandon everything.
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At the same time, Nicodemus clearly could not grasp the full meaning of what it meant.
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Jesus was making the entrance into the kingdom of God on something that could not be obtained through human effort.
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This is so important, isn't it? And this is basically what He's saying to him.
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If spiritual rebirth like physical rebirth was impossible from human effort, then where did that leave the self -righteous
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Pharisee since the system in which he had placed his hope was powerless to save him.
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Far from memonizing the demands of the gospel, Jesus challenged this Pharisee.
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I love these passages all through the gospel where Jesus challenges people.
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And He always challenges them to the very core of their being, like the rich young ruler. So important.
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So He challenges them to come to admit
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His spiritual bankruptcy and to abandon everything
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He was trusting in for salvation. Everything. Well, now, as we looked at last
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Lord's Day, 5 -7, I'm not going to go through the whole but just scratch the surface here, but we looked at it in great detail.
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Well, Jesus answered, truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of the water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.
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That which is born has been born of the flesh is flesh. That which has been born of the Spirit is spirit.
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Do not marvel that I said to you, you must be born again. Water and spirit.
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Water and spirit. And this often referred to symbolically in the Old Testament as spiritual renewal and spiritual cleansing that only the
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Holy Spirit can do. Let's read it again. Go with me to Ezekiel 36. I cannot emphasize this enough, and this is exactly where the
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Lord goes with Nicodemus. And He says, you should know these things, Nicodemus.
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He didn't really know it. He was a teacher of the law. He didn't know it. Notice verse 36, begin with verse 22, and listen to the
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Word of God in the Old Testament through this prophet, Ezekiel. 36, begin with verse 22, therefore
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I say to the house of Israel, thus says the Lord, Yahweh, it is not for your sake,
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O house of Israel, that I am about to act, but for my holy name which you have profaned among the nations to which you have come.
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God says this, I will prove the holiness of my great name, which has been profaned among the nations, which you have profaned in the midst, and then the nations will know that I am
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Yahweh, declares the Lord Yahweh, when I prove myself holy among you in their sight.
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And notice what He says, I will take you from the nations, gather you from all the lands, and bring you into your own land.
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The picture is, notice, God is doing this. God is doing this sovereignly.
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It's sovereign grace. It's not something we do. And Nicodemus should have known this.
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This is what the Lord is saying. And Jesus, I really believe that Jesus no doubt had this text in mind when
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He was speaking to Nicodemus. And then He says, I will take you from the nations, gather you from all the lands, and bring you into your own land, and then notice in verse 25, then
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I will sprinkle clean water on you. What does water do? It cleanses us.
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I'm sure everyone had a shower before we came to church, right? And it would cleanse and wash our outer bodies so we don't stink.
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It's embarrassing if we stink, right? But it's even more embarrassing if we stink before God.
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And this is what it's talking about, inner cleansing. How can we cleanse our innermost being, our soul?
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And the Lord is saying, I will, notice He says, I will sprinkle clean water.
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I guess that's where the mold of sprinkling comes in, right? On the outer baptism, but we won't go there.
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But anyway, you will be clean. I will cleanse you from all your uncleanness and from all your idols.
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That's what really counts. God is going to cleanse us from all these other idols that are apparent at first in our lives.
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And God says, I'm going to cleanse you from it. Moreover, and it's beautiful, I will.
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Notice how many times the Lord says, I will. I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you.
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And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.
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Have you ever heard people say, I'm going to give my heart to Jesus? That's wrong theology, folks. It's not us giving.
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It's God's giving. For God gave His Son. God gives us a new heart.
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God gives all the riches of heaven through Jesus Christ. Isn't that glorious?
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Isn't that glorious? I will give you a heart of flesh.
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What does that mean? I'm going to give you a tender heart. You'll have a new heart of compassion.
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You'll love the things that I love, God says. You'll love me with all your heart.
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See, that's what He does. Any wonder why people don't love God? They need to be born again.
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They need a heart that causes them to love God, that they have a desire to love God.
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You can't tell a person that's dead in their sins and blind to sin to love God. They don't know how.
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It takes the Spirit of God because even Paul says, the love of God has now been shed abroad on your heart by the
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Holy Spirit. And that's how it happens. Isn't it wonderful? Verse 27,
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I will put my Spirit within you and cause you to walk in my statutes. And you will be careful to do my judgments.
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And you will inhabit the land that I gave to your fathers. And so you will be my people and I will be your
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God. So wonderful. Verse 29, moreover, I will save you from all your uncleanness.
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God saves us from all of our uncleanness. And I will call for the grain and multiply it and I will not bring a famine on you.
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These are promises that God gives, so glorious. Now, Nicodemus should have known these things.
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Jesus shows them exactly. It's through the water and the
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Spirit. There's no other way. Makes me also think when we see Jesus down on the cross, it's interesting that when a
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Roman soldier took a spear and pierced his side, and what came out of Jesus' side? Water and blood.
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Folks, can you look at that? And say, oh Lord, that water and blood came pouring out.
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Oh, whoever, the man that wrote, I can't pronounce his name, but the writer of Rock of Ages knew exactly what to say in that song.
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Let the water and the blood from that ribbon side flow. Be of sin the double cure.
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See, that's the double cure we need. And I don't know about you, even in being a born again child of God, it continues.
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Not that you try to get into salvation, or that's come to a child of God.
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Right now, it's sanctification. I think people's got it all backwards. I know the Roman Catholic Church has it backwards because they try to do, do, do into the kingdom like the cults do, but it's the other way around.
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You come into the kingdom of God and then sanctification follows. It's synergistic.
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In other words, that's what the theologians say, it's the Holy Spirit doing the work within us, but we are to come alongside and discipline ourselves in the things of God and continue to continue.
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And that even takes the Spirit of God, but there's a continuing on our side on sanctification. But regeneration, folks, all of God.
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It's all of God. Well, let's look at, continue to what the
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Lord says, because our time, my time is short because we have communion.
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Christ's point was no doubt unmistakable. Without the spiritual washing of the soul, a cleansing accomplished by the
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Holy Spirit through the Word of God, no one can enter into the kingdom of God. And this is what he's saying.
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That which is born of the flesh is flesh. That which is born of the Spirit is Spirit. Even if a physical rebirth were possible, it would only produce flesh.
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Even if it could be possible. And also, as I mentioned last Lord's Day, the sin nature has to be dealt with.
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And this is how the Lord deals with our sin nature. And thus only by the Holy Spirit can produce the spiritual rebirth required for entrance into the kingdom of God.
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Regeneration is entirely God's work unaided by any human effort whatsoever.
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And folks, isn't that why we boast in the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ? Because it's all at the cross of the
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Lord Jesus Christ where He purchased our salvation. This is where He bought us.
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We sung about it this morning, victory in Jesus. And I thank God for a wonderful song like this.
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We do have victory in Jesus. And through the blood of Jesus Christ, does that mean we have victory every day?
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Well, we should strive to that in sanctification, but our total victory will be won when we're on the other side and glorified.
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As for then, as of now I should say, we are in that battle of Romans 7.
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It's a very real battle, isn't it? And sanctification is a very real battle.
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And I think of this quite often in my own walk with the
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Lord. I see more of my sin because the
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Spirit of God has turned the lights on in my heart. I saw it first, and you saw it when you first come to Jesus Christ and say, oh, my sin, my sin.
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Oh, the bliss of this glorious thought. My sin, not in part, but the whole. And Jesus dealt with that sin completely and entirely.
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He took it all upon himself. And in my personal sanctification, when
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I say, Lord, I need this cleansing, that's why Luther believed it was important to preach the gospel to ourselves every day to remind us of these great truths.
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Repentance is not only a one -time act, but it's a continual act. And it doesn't mean we're earning our salvation.
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No, it means when we come to salvation, we realize the depth of our sin. So that's important.
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Look at verse 9 -10. We see Nicodemus doubting. Nicodemus answered and said to him,
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How can these things be? How can these things be? Jesus answered and said to him,
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Are you a teacher of Israel and do not understand these things? And Jesus is referring, you should know them.
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Jeremiah 31 -31, Ezekiel, the prophets, you should know this.
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Truly, truly, I say to you, we speak of what we know, bear witness of what we have seen, and you do not accept our witness.
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If I told you earthly things you do not believe, how will you believe if I tell you heavenly things?
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Nicodemus, what Jesus is doing, he's really rebuking Nicodemus for his doubt. He's doubting the
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Lord, although nothing in this passage suggests that Nicodemus was converted at this moment.
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Verse 11 strongly implies that he was not. Right? But Nicodemus never forgot his discussion with Jesus.
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Later, he boldly defended Jesus before the Sanhedrin. Go with me very quickly to John 7.
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Looking at Nicodemus, we see a little bit that there was a change in this man's heart.
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In John 7, look at verse 50.
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Nicodemus, who came to him before, being one of them, said to them, speaking to the
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Sanhedrin, Does our law judge a man unless it first hears from him and knows what he is doing?
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They answered him and said, Are you also from Galilee? They didn't like that.
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Search and see that no prophets arise out of Galilee. And everyone went to his home.
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You see, Nicodemus is defending the Lord. That's a good sign that this man was changed.
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He was born again. He also helped Joseph of Arimathea later on to prepare the body of the
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Lord for his burial. Go with me to John 19. We're just glancing at this.
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Verse 38 and 39. In Nicodemus, there he is, who had first come to him by night, also came, bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes, weighing about 100 literas, the weight of the myrrh and aloes.
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This was a custom of what they did. The Jews did in preparing the body for burial.
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So they took the body of Jesus and bound it in linen wrappings with the spices at the burial, custom of the
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Jews. Now in the place where he was crucified, there was a garden and in the garden a new tomb in which no one had yet been laid and that belonged to Joseph of Arimathea.
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Therefore, because of the Jewish day of preparation since the tomb was nearby, they laid Jesus there and of course, they laid him there in vain because three days later he rose again.
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Isn't that great? We serve a risen Christ. But Nicodemus was there, folks. Actions.
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His actions say something. This indicates the presence of genuine faith within his life.
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This indicates that the Spirit of God did a work within him. Somewhere after that memorial evening that he came to Jesus by night, from that time to the scriptures which we read,
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Nicodemus came to understand the sovereign grace of God and salvation and experienced the reality of the new birth.
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Now I'm not going to go into detail of this, but it's very important that where Jesus points
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Nicodemus and notice what he says in verse 14 and 15.
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And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, he refers to numbers, even so must the
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Son of Man be lifted up. Moses lifted up a serpent in the wilderness because they were all bitten by these serpents.
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And a healing came about for those that would look at that serpent lifted up on that pole would be healed.
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You even see this symbol with the paramedics, right? You see this? They use that symbol.
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It comes from this. And what Jesus is illustrating, it's an illustration,
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Old Testament illustration of salvation in the same way whoever looks to Christ alone in faith, that Jesus will be lifted up on the cross and even though Nicodemus did not know that Christ would be crucified, but Jesus knew it.
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And he's given the illustration. As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the
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Son of Man be lifted up. I'm sure that revelation was beyond Nicodemus and later on of course he's at the burial and I'm sure something must have clicked then.
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And then in verse 15, so whoever believes will in Him have eternal life.
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There it is, the believing. That believing doesn't mean intellectual knowledge.
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It means placing our faith completely on the Lord Jesus Christ, totally and completely.
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Nothing in my hands I bring, simply to the cross I cling, leaning on those everlasting arms and it's not us, but it's the
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Lord. Jesus would be lifted up on the cross. Christ and Christ alone, by faith alone, to the crucified
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Christ who became sin for us, that we would have
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His righteousness. Sin's deadly bite has bitten the entire human race, folks.
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And only by looking to Christ can we live and have eternal life. I like what
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Stephen Lawson says, if there's no fruit of sanctification, then there's no root of regeneration. Listen to that.
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If there's no fruit of sanctification, there's no root of regeneration. And in closing, go with me to Galatians 5 and we're going to see some of the fruits.
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And I close with this and then we're going to go right into communion. This is speaking of those who walk in the
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Spirit. Galatians 5.
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Actually, the whole book of Galatians is what Luther said, Romans in shorthand. Verse 16,
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But I say, walk by the Spirit and you will not carry out the desire of the flesh. So we know to walk by the
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Spirit must be born of the Spirit. Notice what he says in verse 17, For the flesh sets its desire against the
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Spirit and the Spirit against the flesh. And they're in opposition to one another so that you do not do the things that you want.
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For if you're led by the Spirit, you're not under the law. We know the law can only show us our sin and condemn us, right?
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It cannot save us. Now the deeds of the flesh are evident, which are, and then he gives a list, sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, outburst of anger, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions, envying, drunkenness, carousing.
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And notice what he says, And things like these of which I forewarn you, just as I forewarned you, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.
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And here's the hinge, folks. Notice the but. This is very important. But, the fruit of the
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Spirit. These are those that are born again, folks. And this is what follows. And this is the way the
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Christian looks like. Not in perfection, but like MacArthur says, in direction.
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The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self -control.
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Against such there is no law. Notice what he says.
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Now those who belong to Christ Jesus crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.
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If we live by the Spirit, let us also walk in step with the
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Spirit. Isn't that wonderful? In other words, you live it. You don't talk it.
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Talk is cheap. Anybody can talk it. The devil talks it. What about loving
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God? What about joy in God and having peace with God and patience and kindness and goodness and faithfulness?
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That's what he's talking about. Let us not become those who with vainglory, in other words, pride, be lifted up, challenging one another, envying one another.
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But see, we're one body, one together. And look closely, go down to chapter 6, verse 13.
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For those who are circumcised do not even keep the law themselves. But they want to have you circumcised so that they may boast in your flesh.
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In other words, these Judaizers who's trying to do this to add to the gospel. But may it never be that I would boast except in the cross of our
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Lord Jesus Christ through which the world... Notice what he says. The world has been crucified to me and I to the world.
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In other words, he died with Christ. He was buried with Christ. He's alive with Christ.
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That's the supernatural new birth. We better make sure by self -examination that this has happened within our own hearts.
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That the Spirit of God has wrought. And notice what he says in verse 15. For neither is circumcision anything nor uncircumcision but a new creation.
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There it is. There it is. A new creation. You've created all anew.
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You're a brand new person. He says it in 2 Corinthians 5 .17 If any man be in Christ he is a new creation.
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All things have passed away. And he says, Behold, all things have become new.
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New affections. A love for the Lord Jesus Christ. Obedience to God.
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A love for holiness. A love for righteousness. A love for things that everything that God loves because we love
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God. See, that's the new birth. And we cannot do that in our own power.
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It takes the Spirit of God. But that's what matters. Amen and Amen.
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Let's pray. Father, we thank you this morning for this wonderful transaction that takes place in the new birth that we receive the righteousness of Jesus Christ and we take our sin to the cross and before the
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Lord Jesus because He's the Lamb of God, your own Son. We thank you, Father, for your word this morning.
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We thank you for the new birth. And Lord, we acknowledge that it's not something we can do within ourselves.
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We are totally unable unable to do this. We don't have the ability.
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But Father, you do this through the work of your Holy Spirit. Lord, you could take out the old heart of flesh, the heart of stone and give us a heart of flesh, a new heart, a new creation as the
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Lord Jesus said your Son to this very religious man that you must be born again.
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Lord, may we make sure and examine our hearts today that we are born of the Spirit of God and that we have these new delights and these new desires that has opened up an entirely new world for us to walk in.
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May we be that light now to a dark world and point people to the cross and point people to the
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Lord Jesus Christ that was lifted up as the serpent was lifted up in the wilderness so must the
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Son of Man be lifted up. And whoever believes will in Him have eternal life.
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Lord, that's your word. That's your word and we thank you. And we thank you that you so loved the world that you gave your one and only
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Son and whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.
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We thank you for this and we bless your holy name. In Jesus' name I pray.