I. Everyone agrees that man needs to be radically changed.

The Bible is quite clear as to the necessity of the new birth. My friend, Doctor Berry, frequently asked, “Do you know why Jesus said, ‘you must be born again’?” And of course, his answer was, “Because you must be born again.” George Whitefield preached over two thousand times on John 3:3. When asked why he preached so often on being born again, he replied, “Because you must be born again.” 

All churches believe you must be born again, but they radically disagree on what it means and how it happens. The Roman Catholic, Lutheran, Episcopalian, and Church of Christ all believe this happens through baptism. This is why they believe baptism is essential to salvation. Even Sigmund Freud had a doctrine of the new birth. He called it “an abrupt change in the continuity of the growth of the personality.” Boy meets girl – boy falls in love – boy radically changes life style – boy is born again. In America today, we are told that over forty percent of our citizens have had a “born again experience.” If this is true, it must be the kind that Freud talked about. Most of the misunderstanding of the true nature of regeneration grows out of a failure to see why the new birth is absolutely essential. One will never understand the what and the how until one clearly sees the why.

II. Why is regeneration, or the new birth, so essential?

The nature of God demands it. God cannot fellowship or approve of anything that is not perfect. No one can stand in his presence without a total absence of sin and a positive robe of righteousness. We are sinners by nature and practice, and a holy God has no choice but to reject us. We need a spiritual birth that changes us and makes us acceptable to God.

The nature of the sinner necessitates a new birth. To be happy in heaven, a sinner needs a new nature. Heaven would be a hell to a sinner without a new nature. Even if all his guilt was pardoned and a righteous standing imputed to him, until he is given a new nature, he would hate heaven. A friend has two sons that were constantly trying to impress their father that they loved Jesus and wanted to go to heaven. One day, on the way home from church, he asked them if they knew what heaven was like. When they had no answer, he explained that in heaven they sing a lot, they pray a lot, and they worship a lot. One of the boys said, “It sounds a lot like a church service.” The father said, “Yes, that is a good description.” The other son said, “You mean it’s even longer than our church service?” About that time, I suspect that someone had changed his mind about going to heaven. 

Actually, the sinner cannot even want to believe the gospel until he is first born from above. Some of the verses that speak of man’s cannots were covered in the study of depravity. Only one of them will be reviewed here. A comparison of three texts will reveal why a man needs to be born spiritually before he can believe. 

But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned. (1 Cor. 2:14)

Even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you. (John 14:17)

These be they who separate themselves, sensual, having not the Spirit. (Jude 19) 

One cannot receive and believe something about which he knows nothing, and one cannot know something that is totally beyond his ability to apprehend. 1 Corinthians 2:14 specifically states that a lost man cannot (that is, he does not have the ability to) understand spiritual truth, and therefore it is impossible for him to believe that truth. John 14:17 shows why this terrible reality is true. The lost man can only experience what he can touch, taste, feel, smell, etc., and God is not known by physical senses, but through the Spirit. Jude 19 is one of the best descriptions of a lost man that you will find in all of the Word of God. A lost man is merely a natural man who is totally limited in experiences to what his natural instincts can teach him. The sum total of his knowledge and experience is that which he can learn through his physical senses. This is what “sensual” means. They who worship God must do so in “spirit” as well as truth, and the lost man does not have ability to receive spiritual truth. He has all of the attributes of physical life but does not have the Spirit and can know nothing of spiritual life. He needs to be born of the Spirit before he can see, hear, feel, or experience spiritual things.

Man “died” spiritually in the garden when he sinned. The Holy Spirit, the spiritual life of God in man, left Adam, and he died spiritually. Now man is merely a “natural” man without the capacity to experience spiritual things. Regeneration is the Holy Spirit, or the life of God, coming back into the sinner and empowering him with spiritual life and ability.

As we mentioned, every church agrees on the necessity of the new birth, but they differ greatly on why it is essential and how it takes place. It is impossible to understand the why without grasping the truth of total depravity and its effect of total spiritual inability.

III. Exactly what is the new birth?

First of all, it is a literal implanting of life, as in conception, that gives real life. It is the cause of life and is evidenced later in a birth taking place. We are using “birth” to include conception and actual birth. The point is that we are talking about spiritual implanting by the Holy Spirit that gives spiritual life. Just as there is physical birth that gives physical life, so spiritual birth gives spiritual life.

Secondly, this birth is “from above.” God is the sole author of this birth. The same Greek word translated again in John 3:3 is translated from above in John 3:31. Now it is true that the new birth is “second” in that it is after the first birth—first physical, then spiritual. However, the emphasis in the Scripture is not on the order or sequence of the birth but rather its source. It is from above. It is not from within us; it is not from around us; it is from above. It is a life-giving birth from God that comes down to us by his power. This new birth has nothing to do with heredity, education, environment, culture, or church ceremonies; it comes directly from God alone.

Thirdly, it is “new” in the sense of REgeneration. It is the sovereign implanting of life in the place of death. Two of the words which are used in the New Testament to describe the new birth or regeneration are born and begotten. They convey the fact of giving life through birth. Other words used are regeneration and renewing. These words show that life is put back into a place where it once was but where there is now only death. The Holy Spirit regenerates our hearts in the same sense that we regenerate a dead battery. Another phrase is quickening or making alive; “you hath he quickened who were dead in trespasses and sin” (Eph. 2:1). Regeneration is a “raising up” and bringing into being a “new creation.” We could say, “The Holy Spirit brings dead sinners out of the grave of death, and resurrects the dead to life.” Again, it is the idea of giving life to replace death. The new birth is literally a spiritual resurrection out of the spiritual death of sin. What Genesis 1:26, 27 was to physical creation, the new birth is to spiritual creation. 

Comparing Genesis 5:1–3 with James 1:18 will help us to understand this by providing a picture of the nature and effect of regeneration. 

(1) This is the book of the generations of Adam. In the day that God created man, in the likeness of God [that likeness was not physical but a moral, rational, volitional likeness] made he him; (2) Male and female created he them; and blessed them, and called their name Adam, in the day when they were created. (3) And Adam lived an hundred and thirty years, and begat a son in his own likeness, after his image; and called his name Seth. (Gen. 5:1–3)

Of his own will begat he us with the word of truth, that we should be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures. (James 1:18)

God created a son in “his own likeness,” and Adam begat a son in “his own likeness.” What does that mean? In both cases, it means there is a definite likeness between the father and the child. Adam’s son looked like him, talked like him, walked like him because that son was Adam’s true offspring. That son bore the physical image of his father. God created a child who had God’s nature and bore God’s spiritual image. That child was a physical creation, but he was also a spiritual being with a nature that saw and appreciated God in all of his works. Just as Adam’s child was his true offspring and bore the physical image of his father, so Adam, at his creation, bore the spiritual image God. However, that original likeness to God was forever lost when Adam sinned. Regeneration is God “begetting” one anew in his image and making him his eternal spiritual child.

The first man, Adam, was created in the likeness and image of God. After Adam sinned, he begat a son in his own likeness, after his image. James tells us that Christians have been begotten by God. Ever since Adam fell, both God and men have been begetting true children in their own respective likeness and image. The children begotten, in both cases, share their father’s life: bear his image, looks, nature, appetites, etc. In other words, through physical conception, one acquires physical life and bears the nature and likeness of his human father; and through spiritual conception, one acquires spiritual life and bears the nature and likeness of his spiritual Father, even God himself. In both cases there is true life, true birth, and in both cases, the child born is the true offspring of its parent. The Christian is God’s child (John 1:12). We are God’s seed (Isa. 53:10; 1 John 3:8). Just as Adam communicated to his posterity, in physical birth and life, his looks, appetites, habits, motivation, and image in physical conception, just so God implants spiritual life and communicates his nature, likeness, motivation, and desires in his seed, and they become a “new creation” by spiritual birth.

In James 1:18 we read, “Of his [God’s] own will begat he us with the word of truth….” Christians are called sons of God. Just as Adam begat a son in his own likeness by procreation, so in regeneration God begets children in his own image from among sinners. He communicates to the “begotten ones” his likeness, his spiritual looks, and his desires. His children bear his image. They are truly God’s offspring and bear God’s likeness. 

Now obviously the first question that one ought to face and seriously consider is this: have I been born of God? One may use a physical birth certificate as proof of birth, but one cannot use either a birth or baptismal certificate to prove any divine pedigree! We should ask ourselves: Do I bear the image of God? Am I a true Christian? Have I been born again? Do I have spiritual life?

When we are truly born of God, we bear God’s spiritual image just as surely as we bear the physical image of our natural parents. We are “like God” simply because we are his true children. This should be evident in the way we think and live. Christians disagree about many ideas; nonetheless, there are some things that are true of every Christian who ever lived or will live. Let me explain. Some churches do not believe in mixed bathing. Many Christians do not believe that you can smoke and go to heaven. Other Christians believe that women ought not to wear makeup or cut their hair. (Why do preachers always pick on the women?) There are Christians who believe, and do not believe, all kinds of tenets. There was a man on the radio preaching against “loving the world.” He was not doing half bad until he decided to clearly explain what God meant by “worldly.” He said, “Now any fool who is honest with the Bible knows that God is talking about playing baseball.” He then went into a tirade against baseball. One may smile, but I would suspect that any given church may have some ideas that are just as strange. 

To repeat, I know that Christians disagree on many things, but I still insist that there are some things that are true of every Christian who ever lived. It does not matter if he is ten years old or one hundred years old; whether his face is yellow, red, black, or white; whether he lived in the fifth century or the twentieth century; or what his cultural or denominational background is or was. When a person is born of God, there are some things that simply must accompany his conversion. 

Let me illustrate. I had the unforgettable privilege of visiting the mission fields in Africa. Once I was preaching in a place where four different tribes with different dialects were in attendance. There were four different translators. It took an hour to preach a fifteen-minute sermon. Several times I became so engrossed in observing the different faces as the different translators spoke that I forgot what had been said. I had never seen any of those people before that day, but I could have gone through the entire congregation of about two-hundred and fifty people and without a single mistake, pointed to any person and identified the tribe to which that particular person belonged. How? Each person had a tribal mark cut into his face. When they were seven years old, slashes were cut into their faces which left welts or scars. The number and direction or slant of the slashes was different in each case. You may have seen pictures of this in missionary meetings. Each tribe had its own mark. When a child is born into that tribe, he is marked so that no matter where he goes, he bears the tribal marks of his birth. 

My friend, I assure you that the same thing is true of “God’s tribe.” Every Christian carries the tribal marks written in him by the Holy Spirit in regeneration. There are some distinguishing tribal marks on the people of God. When the Spirit of God brings the new birth, he always writes the proof of his work in the heart and experience of every “begotten one.” 1 John sets forth nine tribal marks; we have only listed four of them, which are true of every child of God. We may disagree about many facets of doctrine and practice, but every Christian wants to please God. He loves the revealed law of God and is committed to keeping it with all of his heart because it is the law of his heavenly Father and his Savior (1 John 2:3, 4). If a person does not love the brethren, he ought to doubt his salvation (1 John 3:13–16). Why is John so emphatic? Because the new birth communicates the nature of God to his offspring. This is one of the ways to test one’s conversion. 

A friend of mine from years past was a fine lawyer who worked as a district attorney for some time. A young lady came to him and accused a certain man of being the father of her baby. The man denied it and refused to marry her or do anything to help financially. At that time, it was difficult to prove in court who the father was if the mother had slept with more than one man. Five men testified that they had slept with this girl within the time frame of when the girl had become pregnant. It seemed impossible to prove that the accused man was really the father. When the baby was born, it had a very strange looking forehead. Instead of going straight up, the baby’s forehead went back at about a forty-five degree angle. My lawyer friend had the mother sit where the jury could clearly see the baby’s strange forehead. The accused man also had a strange forehead. In fact, his forehead was identical to the baby’s. It also went back at a forty-five degree angle. The jury listened to all five men testify that they had slept with the girl. They listened to all of the technical, legal, and medical arguments. They looked at the baby, and they looked at the man, and said, “You are guilty.” They knew that man was that child’s father because the father’s physical image was stamped in the child. My friend, the same is true in the spiritual realm. The Father’s image is stamped in every one of his children. Do you and I bear the marks of the image of God in our hearts and lives? Do we exhibit the proof of the work of the Holy Spirit in the way we think and act? Can you and I prove our divine pedigree? Can we prove that we have been regenerated? Have we been born of God? Someone has said, “If there was a law that forbid being and acting like a Christian, would your life furnish enough evidence for you to be convicted?”

I must digress for just a moment and insist that regeneration is not merely a theological doctrine about which to argue. It is a spiritual experience that is essential to true conversion! God, by his power, works and writes his very nature in our hearts and lives, and he always leaves “living proof.” I fear some reformed people preach their own election. They think that understanding and talking about sovereign grace is the same thing as experiencing it. Being born again is not something you believe; it is something that you personally experience. You do not look at either your birth or baptismal certificate to see if you are part of the elect of God. Do not examine your denominational creed or your knowledge of the doctrines of grace to discover your election. Honestly examine your heart and life to see whether the Holy Spirit of God has given you spiritual life. Have you been spiritually and powerfully drawn to know, love and worship God himself? That is the vital question.

This is what Jesus meant in John 6:44, 45. Too often verse 44 is used to prove “total inability” [and it clearly does so] and verse 45 is ignored. John 6:44 and 6:45 must never be separated, either in our theology or our experience. Look carefully at the verses beginning with verse 44:

“No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him.…” In John 6:37, Jesus has just taught the doctrine of election. The Jews started to murmur at him. In essence, he responded, “You want to murmur at what I said. I’ll really give you something to chew on.” He then hit them with the doctrine of total depravity. “No man can come to me, except the Father…draw him.…” (verse 44). Jesus does not stop there. He goes on to declare the truth of irresistible grace in verse 45. “It is written in the prophets. And they shall be all taught of God. Every man therefore that hath heard, and hath learned of the Father, cometh unto me.” Notice the comparison in these two verses. John 6:44 says, “No man can come,” and John 6:45 says, “Every man who learns of the Father…comes to me.” Drawing, hearing, and learning in these verses all refer to the same thing. Whatever “drawing by the Father” means in verse 44, the same thing is meant by “learned of the Father” in verse 45. Verse 44 is teaching inability. “No man can …unless…” Verse 45 is teaching effectual calling. “Every man does…when …” Verse 44 is affirming total inability, and verse 45 is showing that regeneration brings men to Christ in spite of that depravity.

Every man who “hears” or “learns of the Father” will always, without exception, come to Christ in faith, and no sinner ever will come, apart from the special regenerating work of the Holy Spirit. The new birth from God is a work that always produces saving faith and salvation. However, I repeat, we are talking about an experience and not just an abstract doctrine over which we argue. I ask you once more: Are you a Christian? Have you been born again? Or I could ask: Do you bear the marks, the pedigree, the tribal marks of the work of the Holy Spirit in your life? Regeneration is nothing less than the giving of spiritual life to a dead sinner. It is literally “being born of God.”