Scriptural New Birth and Justification

Dear Weekly Readers!

Here is the follow-up to last week’s teachings.    May God Bless your week!

Scriptural New Birth

In like manner, the power of the resurrection of Christ from the dead is manifested by the Holy Spirit through the preached Word of the Gospel to a sorrowful and sin-burdened soul:

...be of good cheer; thy sins be forgiven thee (the essence of the Gospel being the forgiveness of sins - Matthew 9:2).

It is by believing this Word that a repentant person receives a spiritual new birth, as Peter writes:

Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which Iiveth and abideth forever (1 Peter 1:23).

Also, at the beginning of his epistle:

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to His abundant mercy hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead (I Peter 1:3).

Jesus likens the travail of spiritual new birth to that of a woman about to deliver a child:

A woman when she is in travail hath sorrow, because her hour is come: but as soon as she is delivered of the child, she remembereth no more the anguish, for joy that a man is born into the world. And ye now therefore have sorrow: but I will see you again, and your heart shall rejoice, and your joy no man taketh from you (John 16:21,22).

Thus, a person who has died spiritually needs to be begotten again in order to be restored to life, that is, to be spiritually born again. Nicodemus, to whom Jesus said,

Marvel not that I said unto thee, ye must be born again (John 3:7)

...is an example of such a person. Despite the fact that he was esteemed among the Pharisees as a great religious leader, as Jesus made reference to this in His question to him:

... Art thou a master of Israel, and knowest not these things? (John 3:10)

...nevertheless he was spiritually dead. This was because of unbelief, as Jesus said,

If I have told you earthly things, and ye believe not, how shall ye believe, if I tell you of heavenly things? (John 3.12).

Another example of a spiritual death is where one has, as the prodigal son, taken

...his journey into a far country, and there wasted his substance with riotous living (Luke 15:13).

Having lost his spiritual life (the "substance" which is righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Ghost), and thus having died, he needed to be born again spiritually in order to be made alive again.

For this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found. And they began to be merry (Luke 15:24).

The word of the Gospel of Christ to a thirsting soul is a

...voice as the sound of many waters (Revelation 1:15)

... which, together with the Spirit, brings forth a spiritual birth:

Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God (John 3:5).

This is the living water of which Jesus told the woman of Samaria, who could understand only the natural water that she had been drawing from the well of Jacob.

Jesus answered and said unto her, Whosoever drinketh of this water shall thirst again: But whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life (John 4:13,14).

Children having parents (or guardians) that are true Christians are indeed blessed. Such parents have in them these wells of water springing up into everlasting life.

...Jesus stood and cried, saying, if any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink. He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water (John 7:37,38).

...the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts (of believing parents) by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us (Romans 5:5).

This love constrains them to bring their children up in the

...nurture and admonition of the Lord (Ephesians 6:4).

...Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God (Matthew 4:4).

Children (as well as adults) need this wholesome spiritual nourishment in order to grow in grace and to remain alive and healthy spiritually, and to be

...rooted and built up in Him, and stablished in the faith... (Colossians 2: 7)

...as it is written, The just shall live by faith (Romans 1:17).

Jesus said of the little children:

… for of such is the kingdom of God (Mark 10:14).

Therefore, a childhood Christian, not having departed from the true faith, has no need to be reborn to enter into the kingdom of God from whence he has never departed.

...I have written unto you, young men, because ye are strong, and the word of God abideth in you, and ye have overcome the wicked one (I John 2:14).

The kingdom of God cometh not with observation: Neither shall they say, Lo here! or lo there! for, behold, the kingdom of God is within you (Luke 17:20,21)

But as it is with all true believers, children in their early years of life also become conscious of the infirmities of the flesh. For this reason, they too find a need to hear the reassuring word of the Gospel, as the Apostle John has written:

I write unto you, little children, because your sins are forgiven you for His name's sake (I John 2:12).

This is possible as it is written:

Seeing then that we have a great high priest, that is passed into the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our profession. For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need (Hebrews 4:14-16).

And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season; his leaf also shall not wither; and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper (Psalm 1:3).

Justification

Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ: By whom also we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God (Romans 5:1,2).

As it was with the disciples of old, so it is today with a person who has been born again

...unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead (I Peter 1:3).

He is now able to see and understand with his heart, by the light of the Holy Spirit, that his sin debt was truly paid by Christ, the sacrificial Lamb of God, as the Prophet Isaiah writes:

... the Lord hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all (Isaiah 53:6).

He died to atone for the sins of fallen man,

Who was delivered for our offenses, and was raised again for our justification (Romans 4:25).

And having fulfilled the righteous and holy demands of the Law,

He said, it is finished: and He bowed His head, and gave up the ghost (John 19:30).

The understanding of a person who has thus been raised with Christ is no longer the product of the fleshly mind of man. It is replaced with that which Jesus gives by His Spirit:

Then opened He their understanding, that they might understand the scriptures, and said unto them, thus it is written, and thus it behooved Christ to suffer, and to rise from the dead the third day (Luke 24:45,46).

For who hath known the mind of the Lord, that He may instruct him! But we have the mind of Christ (I Corinthians 2:16).

The TOPIC for the next time we use these writings will be Sanctification and the Holy Spirit.