Born Again

Bible verses - John 3:1-21 copied from the Living Bible version which is written in the language of the everyday modern man.

After dark one night a Jewish religious leader named Nicodemus, a member of the Pharisees, came for an interview with Jesus.

"Sir'," he said, "we all know that God has sent you to teach us. Your miracles are proof enough of this."

Jesus replied, " With all the earnestness I possess, I tell you this: Unless you are born again, you can never get into the Kingdom of God."

" Born again!" exclaimed Nicodemus. "What can you mean? How can an old man go back into his mother's womb and be born again?"

Jesus replied, "What I am telling you so earnestly is this: Unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the Kingdom of God.  Men can only reproduce human life, but the Holy Spirit gives new life from heaven; so don't be surprised at my statement that you must be born again! 

Just as you can hear the wind but can't tell where it comes from or where it will go next, so it is with the Spirit.  We do not know on whom He will next bestow this life from heaven."

"What do you mean?" Nicodemus asked.

Jesus replied, "You are a teacher, and yet you don't understand these things?  I am telling you what I know and have seen - and yet you won't believe Me.  But if you don't even believe Me when I tell you about such things as these that happen here among men, how can you possibly believe if I tell you what is going on in heaven for only I, the Messiah, have come to earth and will return to heaven again. 

And as Moses in the wilderness lifted up the bronze image of a serpent on a pole, even so I must be lifted up on a pole, so that anyone who believes in Me will have eternal life.  For God loved the world so much that He gave His only Son so that anyone who believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life.

God did not send his Son into the world to condemn it, but to save it.

There is no eternal doom awaiting those who trust Him to save them.

But those who don't trust Him have already been tried and condemned for not believing in the only Son of God.  Their sentence is based on this fact:  that the Light from heaven came into the world, but they loved the darkness more than the Light, for their deeds were evil.

They hated the heavenly Light because they wanted to sin in the darkness. They stayed away from that Light for fear their sins would be exposed and they would be punished.  But those doing right come gladly to the Light to let everyone see that they are doing what God wants them to." (end of Bible passage.)

Friend, Nicodemus was a teacher of  the Jewish religion.  He was familiar with the Scriptures and yet did not recognize that Jesus was the Son of God.  He saw the  miracles and He knew the history of Jesus's life as word of Him was spread far and wide in all the communities. He easily could have compared the Scriptures to the claim of the people, that the Messiah had come.

The simple people knew and understood but the learned and those with high standing ( rich) could not see.

It is the same today.  But, the Spirit chooses those the Father claims and shows them glimpses and words like those above to enlighten their minds and encourage their hearts so that they can know their Messiah.

Friend, today He has spoken to you!  You must be born again of the Spirit.  Are you willing?  Yes or no.....