What does it mean to be born again?
The first thing I need to say to you is; if you have not made Jesus the Lord of your life, then you are separated from God by sin.
Ephesians 2:16 "…And that he might reconcile both unto God in one body by the cross, having slain the enmity thereby:"
In Ephesians 2:16 we see that Jesus came to put to death the hostility that was keeping us from God. You and I are the reason God sent Jesus to the cross.
John 3:16 "...For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life."
God loved you so much that He gave His only begotten Son for you.
Romans 8:3-4 "…God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, on account of sin: He condemned sin in the flesh, that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit."
2 Corinthians 5:21 "...For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him."
Jesus is the spotless Son of God. The bible says that Jesus was tempted in everything the same as we are yet He did not sin. However, God made Him to be sin for us. Sin was the reason Jesus came to earth. He died on the cross and went to hell for one reason: to pay the price for sin for all mankind and in particular for you. Once the ransom was paid and the sacrifice accepted, Jesus was raised from the dead; triumphant over Satan; and the problem of sin was dealt with once and for all.
God is not holding your everyday sin against you. There is only one thing keeping you from becoming a child of God. It is your failure to turn from your present world and your present god, which is Satan, and make Jesus the Lord over your life.
When Jesus paid the sin price or ransom for you, He became your substitute and died spiritually on your behalf. Heaven now records that you have been (passed tense) set free. It is as if you died on that cross with Jesus 2,000 years ago. That does not mean you automatically go to heaven when you die physically. Even though God sent Jesus to pay for your sin, even though right now He holds nothing against you, you can still go straight to hell. Why? It is because you have not made that one decision, the choice to receive Jesus as your personal Lord and Saviour accepting His sacrifice as yours. You have a free will and that means you have the right to choose your own destiny. God does not and will not force you to receive salvation. It is always your choice. You can, if you so choose, go straight to hell and God will not stop you. He did all He is going to do when He sent Jesus into the world.
Your choice is set before you
If you do choose to make Jesus the Lord over your whole life, God the Father will receive you as His own child. You will become a part of God’s family. He will be your Father and you will be His child with every right that comes with being a son or daughter. This is not just a figment of our imagination or some religious idea; this is a fact. It actually takes place. Jesus actually walked the earth as a man. He actually went to the cross, died there, was raised from the dead, and is alive today, seated at the right hand of God in heaven.
When you become a Christian – when you become born again – you take on the nature of God, your heavenly Father. The nature of God is life; the nature of sin and Satan is death. Jesus spoke to the people of His day and said they were of their father the devil.
John 8:44 "...You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you want to do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own resources, for he is a liar and the father of it."
2 Corinthians 4:4 "…whose minds the god of this age has blinded, who do not believe, lest the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine on them."
To accept Jesus as your Lord causes you to turn your back on your father the devil or on “the god of this world” as Satan is called. You take on a new Father, a heavenly Father; and you are born again – not physically, but spiritually. Your spirit is reborn in the likeness of God.
2 Corinthians 5:17-18 "...Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new. Now all things are of God, who has reconciled us to Himself through Jesus Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation,"
You see, you are a threefold being: You are a spirit, you have a soul (mind, will, emotions), and you live in a body. Jesus referred to this in a conversation with Nicodemus.
John 3:3-7 "...Jesus answered and said to him, Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God . Nicodemus said to Him, How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born? Jesus answered, Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, 'You must be born again."
Jesus said to him, “You must be born again.” Nicodemus replied, “What do you mean? Do I have to go back again into my mother’s womb?” Jesus answered, “No. What is born of the flesh is flesh. What is born of the Spirit is spirit.”
Being born again is a spiritual rebirth it is not a natural rebirth, which is entirely impossible. When you are born again of the Spirit of God it is a spiritual rebirth; "That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.” The Holy Ghost was sent into the earth to see that the miracle of the new birth is carried out. When you make Jesus the Lord of your life, the Holy Ghost hovers over you and causes your spirit to be recreated. Remember according to 2 Corinthians 5:17, when you accept Jesus as your Lord, you became a new creature, or new creation; old things pass away and all things become new. As far as God is concerned, at that moment, you stand before Him as a brand new person. You are reborn from sin and death to righteousness and new life.
1 John 5:1-4 "...Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ is born of God... For whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world: and this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith."
I want you to realise what happens the moment a person makes Jesus Christ the Lord of their life. In the eyes of God, they become a world over comer. Sin no longer reigns over their life. Sin is no longer their Lord. Jesus is their Lord and they can live above the satanic forces in the world.
After Jesus was raised from the dead, He stood before His disciples and said; “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth.”
Matthew 28:18-20 "...And Jesus came and spoke to them, saying, All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age. Amen."
He delegated that power to all who believed and all who would be his family and said, “Go into the entire world, and preach the gospel to every creature.”
Mark 16:15 "...And He said to them, "Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature.”
What is the gospel? The Good News that God is no longer holding your sins and trespasses against you.
The Bible gives some specific instructions that you are to follow in order to become a Christian, or in order to be born again.
Romans 10:8-11 "...But what does it say? The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart (that is, the word of faith which we preach): that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. For the Scripture says, "Whoever believes on Him will not be put to shame."
John 6:37 "...Jesus said, All that the Father gives Me will come to Me, and the one who comes to Me I will by no means cast out."
No matter how big or small a sinner you are, no matter what you have done, you are told that you can go to Jesus and He will accept you. Once you go to Him and confess Jesus as Lord over your life, then He will cause you to be born again. He will recreate you, and the sin that has plagued you will be a thing of the past. It will be gone cleansed by the blood of Jesus. You will be accepted before God as if you had never sinned!
Romans 10:8-11 showed us that to be born again, you use your mouth and you use your heart. First, you believe in your heart that God’s Word is true; then you confess it with your mouth because of the fact that you believed God's Word to be true.
Please realise this very important fact: You do not confess you are saved because you feel saved. Feelings have absolutely nothing to do with salvation.
Let me give you an illustration:
Let us suppose for a moment that someone you trust comes to you and says, “I went to the bank today and I deposited $2,000 into your account.” How would you know that the person actually did what they said?
Let’s face it, you do not believe they deposited the money simply because you feel $2,000 richer; and conversely you do not doubt them just because you do not feel any richer. Your feelings one-way or the other really have nothing to do with it.
It all comes down to this one fact; if that person’s word is good, you will believe them, if their word is bad, you won’t.
When your salvation is involved, you are relying on God’s Word (not mans word) and God does not lie.
Hebrews 6:17-20 "...Thus God, determining to show more abundantly to the heirs of promise the immutability (unchangeableness) of His counsel, confirmed it by an oath, that by two immutable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we might have strong consolation, who have fled for refuge to lay hold of the hope set before us. This hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast, and which enters the Presence behind the veil, where the forerunner has entered for us, even Jesus, having become High Priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek."
James 1:17 "...Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning."
When God the Father says something He means it and you can believe it. He said in His Word that if you believe in your heart and confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord you will be saved. When you are saved you can not base your salvation on the way you feel. You base it on the uncorrupted, pure Word of Almighty God.
The Word of God is the only evidence you have that you are saved, but that is all the evidence you need!
The truth is that in you may not feel saved several days or weeks from now because the enemy Satan will try to convince you that you are not saved. You may begin to wonder if you were ever really saved to start with. You will have doubts; Satan will see to that! But when those thoughts and feelings come, just go back to the Word of God.
In the Word of God you will find comfort and conformation of what it said to you about your salvation. God never changes and His Word never changes it is still just as true today as when it was spoken. People may try to convince you that it did not work. Temptations may come to convince you that it did not work. Doubts will come to your mind. But all those things do not alter the fact that God’s Word is true.
John 10:10 "...The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy. I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly."
Jesus said that He had come that we would have life, and that we would have it more abundantly. The moment you make Jesus the Lord of your life will be the moment you have a desire to live and not die. You will be able to walk without fear.
When you accept the work of Jesus you will be forgiven of your sin however it is so much more than that. You will be changed from the inside out. That means your mind will change and you will begin to think more clearly than you ever have before. You will have the potential to walk out of all the hurts that have held you back in the past. You will be able to lay all your fear at the cross and allow Jesus to truly help you fulfil your destiny in the earth.
These changes are available to you, too. God is right there; ready to accept you, ready to change you. You do not have to live in sin any longer. You do not have to live a defeated life any longer. You do not have to be anything except God’s child. You can walk the road of life victoriously with Jesus as your Lord and Saviour. You won’t have to take a back seat to Satan again. You can be the head and not the tail!
I want you to join me now in praying this prayer for salvation. Do not just read it; make a conscious effort to speak these words from the very depths of your being.
The prayer of Salvation
Heavenly Father, in the name of Jesus, I present myself to You.
I pray and ask Jesus to be Lord over my life. I believe it in my heart, so I say it with my mouth: ‘Jesus has been raised from the dead.’ This moment, I make Him the Lord over my lift.
Jesus, come into my heart. I believe this moment that I am saved. I say it now: ‘lam reborn. I am a Christian. I am a child of Almighty God.’
Now, thank God for making you His child.
Colossians 1:12 "…Giving thanks to the Father who has qualified us to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in the light."
You have just been made a partaker of an inheritance from God. You have just inherited the kingdom of God!
Colossians 1:13 "…He has delivered us from the power of darkness and conveyed us into the kingdom of the Son of His love,"
You do not have to wait until you die to receive your inheritance. You are a child of God right this very moment, and you can receive all that belongs to you right now!
First John 3:2 "...Beloved, now we are children of God; and it has not yet been revealed what we shall be, but we know that when He is revealed, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is."
Luke 12:32 "...Do not fear, little flock, for it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom." We welcome you into the family of God!"
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