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What It Takes to Be Saved – Man’s Part - To Be Born Again
What It Takes to Be Saved – Man’s Part - To Be Born Again
Mike Willis
In John 3, a prominent ruler among the Jews named Nicodemus came by night to visit Jesus. He said, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God, for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him” (John 3:2). Jesus replied, “ ‘Truly, truly, 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, ‘Truly, truly, I say to you, UNLESS ONE IS BORN OF WATER AND THE SPIRIT, HE CANNOT ENTER THE KINGDOM OF GOD’ ” (John 3:3-5). We notice and emphasize that Jesus Himself made the new birth (being born of water and the Spirit) a condition for salvation.
This is not the only passage that speaks of conversion as a new birth. Paul wrote, “But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, HE SAVED US, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the WASHING OF REGENERATION and renewal of the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that BEING JUSTIFIED BY HIS GRACE we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life” (Tit. 3:4-7). The word “regeneration” (Greek: palingenesia) means “experience of a complete change of life, rebirth of a redeemed person” (BDAG, 752).
Peter compared conversion to a new birth. He wrote, “HAVING PURIFIED YOUR SOULS BY YOUR OBEDIENCE TO THE TRUTH for a sincere brotherly love, love one another earnestly from a pure heart, since YOU HAVE BEEN BORN AGAIN, not of perishable seed but of imperishable, through the living and abiding word of God” (1 Pet. 1:22-23).
There are other passages of Scripture that allude to the change that conversion brings to one’s life as a new birth, a new creation: (1) “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a NEW CREATION. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come” (2 Cor. 5:17). (2) “For neither circumcision counts for anything, nor uncircumcision, but A NEW CREATION” (Gal. 6:15). (3) “We were buried therefore with him BY BAPTISM into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in NEWNESS OF LIFE” (Rom. 6:4). Other passages could be cited.
There is but one act in the New Testament that may be associated with water and might be compared to being “born again”—baptism! Jesus Himself made water baptism a condition for entrance into His kingdom, the church that He Himself built. Using the phraseology of Romans 6, no one can enter the kingdom unless he first dies to sin (in repentance) and is buried (in water baptism) so that he may be raised from the deadness of living in sin to experience the resurrection of newness of life. Have you been born again?
In the last verses of Mark, Jesus explicitly states what the figure of being born again means: “Go into all the world and proclaim the gospel to the whole creation. WHOEVER BELIEVES AND IS BAPTIZED WILL BE SAVED, but whoever does not believe will be condemned” (Mark 16:15-16). If you have never been baptized into Christ for the remission of your sins, you have not experienced the new birth—a birth that one must experience to enter the kingdom of God!
