Born Again: Nicodemus and the New Birth

Gracious Father, we thank you for the holy scriptures, their precepts, promises, directions

and light.

In them may we learn of Christ, grasp his truth, and have grace to follow in his steps.

Amen.

Let me tell you of how I came to believe in Jesus.

My extended family are not Christian.

I grew up not going to church, not believing in God.

But I always had big questions, even when I was young, what's the purpose of life?

Why am I here?

Then when I was 15, my friend asked me, do you believe in God?

I said no.

And she was very quick and said, why not?

And I didn't have a good answer.

She then spent the next hour telling me about the God that she believed in, the God of the

Bible, how he created the world and how he loved me.

Now this scared me.

I did not like the idea that there was a supernatural being that knew everything that I did.

Because I knew, I'm not quite sure how I knew, but I knew that I didn't measure up.

After this conversation, I started praying.

And after about a week, I thought, if God doesn't exist, I should stop praying.

It's a waste of time.

But if God does exist, I somehow knew, God at work, somehow I somehow knew that I needed

to live my life for him.

And God led me that night to believe that yes, he does exist.

And I prayed and said, God, I'm going to live my life for you, whatever that means.

And I didn't know what that meant at the time.

But I wasn't yet a Christian because I hadn't heard about Jesus.

I went to youth group and I was given a copy of the New Testament.

It was a level 27, maybe you're familiar with that.

And through reading that, I read it in a week.

And through conversations with my youth group leaders, I learned of Jesus.

I learned of how he died for my sin, that even though I didn't measure up to God, and

I still don't measure up, Jesus paid for my sin on the cross in my place.

I learned how I needed to look to Jesus and believe in him.

And in November of 1999, I became a Christian.

I said sorry to God for my sin.

And I thanked Jesus for dying in my place on the cross.

That was the hour I first believed and the moment that I was born again.

Now being born again is something that happens to every Christian.

We're going to look more closely today at what it means to be born again, and how every

one of us needs to be born again.

Now over the next four weeks in the lead up to Easter, we're going to be looking at the

Gospel of John.

And as we read the Gospel of John, we have to read it knowing that John has written it

with a very specific purpose.

And he tells us that purpose in John chapter 20, verse 31.

John 20:31

But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God,

and that by believing you may have life in his name.

And so we're going to look at Jesus's interactions with four people over the next four weeks

so that we can know Jesus, believe in him, and have life in his name.

And the first person we're looking at today is Nicodemus.

So please turn with me to John chapter 3 in your Bibles, or you can follow the reading

John 3 · chapter mention

in your pew sheet.

Now it's important to know that just before this, Jesus has been doing signs.

He's turned water into wine.

He's predicted he's going to destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days.

And we're told that he's been doing other signs as well.

And here we meet Nicodemus.

And Jesus knows Nicodemus.

Jesus knows what Nicodemus is in Nicodemus's heart.

He knows what Nicodemus needs.

And in turn, he knows what we all need to be born again.

And so that's our first point this morning.

We need to be born again.

Now Nicodemus in verse one, he's a secret inquirer.

He's a Pharisee.

He was one of the religious leaders, considered a committed member of the local synagogue,

a faithful and upstanding member of the community.

He's seen Jesus' signs and he's curious.

He wants to know more.

But he wasn't ready to be seen to be coming to Jesus publicly yet.

And he's not the only one.

It appears that he's representing a group of like-minded people.

Because he says in verse two, rabbi, which means teacher, we know.

That's not just him.

It's a group of him, a group of people like him.

He says, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God.

Spurred on by the fact that Jesus is doing signs that could only come from God, Nicodemus

is drawn to Jesus.

Now today, there are Nicodemuses.

There are people who are interested in Jesus, people who want to know more, but aren't willing

yet to be seen at church or to be seen as inquiring.

They might be your neighbor, your friend, your family, curious about Jesus.

You might have heard reports of a younger generation showing interest in Jesus across

the UK and across the US.

Young people are starting to come to church, starting to believe in Jesus.

Many people have written this generation off, but God hasn't.

There will be people who are in Rockhampton who will be interested in Jesus, like Nicodemus,

and we might not know who they are.

Now how does Jesus respond to Nicodemus' comment?

Jesus says,

Nicodemus has seen the signs of Jesus.

It's hinted to him that Jesus is from God, but if he's to truly see and understand Jesus,

Nicodemus needs to be born again.

Now Nicodemus is confused.

How can someone be born when they are old?

Surely they cannot enter a second time into their mother's womb.

And at that point we're thinking, well, that is a very good point, Nicodemus.

That just does not happen.

Once you're out, you don't go back in, and that's to the great relief of the mother.

Clearly, that is not what Jesus is talking about.

And so Jesus says again, listen carefully.

Truly, I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless they are born of water and the Spirit.

Entry into the kingdom of God requires water and spirit, a new birth, a spiritual birth.

To understand this, it's actually helpful to look back to prophecies in Ezekiel 36 and

37, where God promises to cleanse his people from their sin.

And he uses the image of sprinkling of water to clean and wash them.

And then we see God bring back to life a valley of dry bones by his Holy Spirit.

To be born of the water and the Spirit is to be given new life, to be cleansed, to be

forgiven from sin and right with God, to be a new spiritual being.

And Jesus highlights the heavenly nature of being born again in verse six.

He says, flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit.

Two different things, flesh and spirit, like comparing the taste of apples to the taste

of oranges.

They're two different things, fleshly birth, spiritual birth.

And Jesus is saying to be born again, we need this spiritual birth.

And in verse eight, he likens it to the wind.

You can't see the wind, but you know it's there.

Just like when someone is born again, you can't see it, but it's there, it's a reality.

When I walk the kids to the school, the parents of the other students there, they're not turning

and pointing at me going, oh, there's someone who's born again, because they can't see it.

But I know because I believe in Jesus that it's there.

And so like Nicodemus, we ought not to be surprised that Jesus is saying that we need

to be born again.

If we are to be fit for heaven, we need the Spirit of God.

We need a total transformation.

We need a spiritual rebirth.

And that's because of the sin that we have in our hearts.

We do not have the resources to make ourselves right with God.

We need God to act on our behalf to save us.

And this is the reality, without belief in Jesus, we will not see, we will not enter

the kingdom of heaven.

And so we need to carefully listen to Jesus, who knows what's in our hearts, who tells

us that we need to be born again.

And so this leads us to our second point.

How are we to be born again?

Nicodemus, he doesn't understand.

Verse 9, he asks, how can this be?

Nicodemus is there, he's hearing Jesus' words, but he's not comprehending.

Have you ever tried to do a flat pack, put together a flat pack product where the instructions

have been originally written in like Swedish or Chinese, and then they've been translated

into poor English, and you're scratching your head going, I just don't know.

That's what Nicodemus is doing here with Jesus.

He's just not understanding.

But he should understand, Jesus says, verse 10, he's Israel's teacher.

Of all people, it should be clear to Nicodemus, but he doesn't understand because he hasn't

been born again.

He's of the flesh, trying to understand the things of the spirit, and he cannot.

If we have to understand the things of the spirit, we need Jesus to reveal that to us.

And Jesus can reveal it, because he is from heaven.

Verse 11, Jesus says, we speak of what we know, and we testify to what we have seen.

When Jesus says we, he's referring to himself and God the Father.

And Jesus testifies from his experience.

He's come from heaven.

He is uniquely qualified to teach us heavenly things.

He knows that we need to be born again.

We need to be born of the water and of spirit.

So Jesus says in verse 13, no one has ever gone into heaven, except the one who came

from heaven, the son of man.

Jesus is uniquely qualified.

And then Jesus gives us the key to how we are to be born again, and it's not by going

again into our mother's womb.

Instead we get this story about Moses and a snake.

Verse 14, just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the son of man must

be lifted up, that everyone who believes may have eternal life in him.

We're born again by the son of man, the heavenly man, being lifted up on the cross and believing

in him.

See the image of Moses lifting up the snake in the wilderness comes from ancient Israel

when they were wandering in the desert.

It's recorded in the book of Numbers in chapter 21 in the Bible, God's people were grumbling

against God.

They were unhappy with the food and the drink that he was providing them.

And so God justly punishes them by sending venomous snakes among them.

The snakes bit the Israelites and as a result, people died.

But then when the Israelites confessed their sin and in answer to Moses' prayer, God provided

a way of saving them.

And this is from Numbers 21, the Lord said to Moses, make a snake, put it up on a pole

and anyone who is bitten can look at it and live.

So Moses made a bronze snake, put it up on a pole.

And when anyone was bitten by a snake and looked at the bronze snake, they lived.

And like all the Old Testament, this points to Jesus.

Jesus is the one who is going to be lifted up on a cross to save us so that when we look

at him, we will live eternally.

We see this confirmed in verse 16, one of the most famous verses in the Bible.

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only son, that whoever believes in

him will not perish, but have eternal life.

This is the message we need.

This is the message that saves us.

If anyone asks you, what do Christians believe?

Just pull out John chapter three, verse 16.

It's all there for God.

God is our creator.

God tells us what is good and how best to live in his world.

And he loved the world.

God loved everything in the world, especially us humans.

We were made in his image and we were created to love him and love our neighbor.

And he loved the world so much that he gave his one and only son, Jesus.

Jesus died on the cross and this was necessary because even though God loves us, we fail

to love God and we fail to love our neighbor.

That deserves God's judgment.

But when Jesus died and then rose again three days later, he made a way that we can be forgiven,

that we can be made right with God so that whoever believes in him shall not perish,

but have eternal life.

So we have a choice.

We can choose to keep not loving God by rejecting his son.

And it says in John chapter three here that we will perish if we choose that.

We will be judged for our lack of love of God and others.

And whoever believes in Jesus and trusts him for forgiveness will have eternal life

and live forever with him.

That's what Nicodemus needed to hear.

It's what we need to hear.

It's what Rockhampton needs to hear.

We need to look to Jesus and be saved and have life forever.

Now, there's a couple of things that it's worth just us thinking about from this passage

as a result of what we've heard.

And the first is that just being a churchgoer does not make you born again.

Just taking the Lord's supper does not make you heavenly.

Just trying to be good won't get you into heaven.

Now, the only way to be born again is to believe in Jesus, to look to him.

And to do that, you have to make a conscious choice to look to him, to believe in him.

And I know that here today that there are many people who are born again.

You believe in Jesus and praise God for that.

And if we believe in Jesus, we are born again.

And like the wind, others might not see it, but it's there.

We are now of God's kingdom, looking forward to eternal life.

Someone might walk into church off the street today and look around at us, a bunch of ragtag

people, but we're so much more than that.

Because if we believe in Jesus, we're born of the water and the spirit, we're born again,

we are saved, we have eternal life forever.

We are actually of God's kingdom, and we are waiting for God to bring in his kingdom fully,

where we will be with Jesus for all eternity in heaven.

As we look to Jesus, he was lifted up on the cross for us.

The last little implication is because we are born again, we join Jesus in his mission

of sharing the good news.

And as we do that, there will be people like Nicodemus who at first don't understand.

He will understand later, but he's not there yet.

As we share the gospel, we're holding out a heavenly reality, because people need the

spirit of God to reveal to them that they need to be born again, that they need to believe

in Jesus.

And so we need to pray that as people hear this message, that they will receive it.

And we shouldn't be surprised that today in our skeptical culture, sometimes people

need to hear about Jesus five times, 10 times, 15 times, 20 times.

And then there'll be people like myself who just need to hear it once.

But it's the message that saves.

We need to hold this message out, because what is at stake is eternal life.

What we have is the message that God loved the world, that when believed leads to being

born again.

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only son, that whoever believes in

him will not perish, but have eternal life.

Let's pray.

Heavenly Father, we thank you that you love us so much.

We thank you that you loved us so much, you sent your son into the world to save us.

We don't deserve it, and yet you did it anyway.

You showed us your grace.

So Lord, this morning, we ask that you'll give us hearts and minds to look to Jesus

who died on the cross to save us, so that we can have eternal life.

We pray this in Jesus' name, amen.