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Thoughts of a saint and slave
by Sam Isaacson
One of the biggest truths about becoming a Christian for me has been the fact that I am now able to call God my Father. By His grace we are adopted into His family, become His sons and daughters, and therefore brothers and sisters in Christ, fellow inheritors of the Kingdom of God. In our studies of how we are created in the image of God we have reached the point at which we can look at a pivotal concept in Christian thinking, that of being born again. I remember a friend of mine once telling me how she was glad that she was a Christian in a proper church, and not one of 'those born again ones' - I think that this feeling is held by many who would bear the name Christian around the world. Let's look at the Bible and see what God has to say:
'Now there was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. This man came to Jesus by night and said to him, "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.” Jesus answered him, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the Kingdom of God.”' John 3:1-3
The coming Kingdom
The words used by Jesus here are intrigiuing. He spoke of the coming Kingdom, and stated that those who are not born again will not see it. This should come as a wake-up call to us - as Christians we have been promised eternal life (John 3:16) and an inheritance along with all the saints (1 Peter 1), so the fact that only those who are born again will see the Kingdom should lead us to the conclusion that we are only Christians if we have been born again. Nicodemus, the man Jesus was talking to in this account, found this confusing and even asked, 'how can a man be born when he is old?' and we would do well to acknowledge the fact that this question is a sensible one. We are happy to band around the term 'born again' without thinking about what it actually means - and thankfully Jesus explained that in a bit more detail to help Nicodemus understand.
'Unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the Kingdom of God.' So this new birth is not a physical birth, as our first birth is. Rather, this new birth is one 'of water and the Spirit' - but what does that actually mean?
Water and the Spirit
The concept of water and the Spirit being linked closely occurs in Matthew 3 and Luke 3, in the words spoken by John the Baptist, who pointed out that although he baptised in water, Jesus would be the one to baptise with the Holy Spirit. Being born again, therefore, is an analogy for the new birth we experience through two Christian events, water baptism and Spirit baptism. We saw a few weeks ago that baptism is both a sign of our salvation and a symbol for our obedience to Jesus, and Spirit baptism is our empowering that is brought on by the infilling of the Holy Spirit. As a result we see what we looked at in the last couple of weeks, the fruit of the Spirit.
The results of the new birth and the family resemblance
What is the result therefore? We will not look in too much depth at any of these because I would like us to go deeper in the next weeks, but being born into this new family means a lot in terms of our creation in God's image. Being born again gives us a new start and a regenerated heart - we have new desires because we are a 'new creation' (2 Corinthians 5) with a new Father and therefore take on His likeness more and more. It is natural that people in a relationship will develop one another's traits and characteristics - I am from the north of England and my wife is from the south, but since being married I have noticed that Anna has pronounced some words with a northern accent...although we are not yet at the stage of wearing matching jumpers! Being God's son or daughter and being filled with His Spirit awakens in us new characteristics that belong to God.
In addition the fact that you and I share a heavenly Father means that we are brothers and sisters, meaning that we have a reason for unity, and it does not take us too long of reading any of Paul's letters before we encounter the phrase 'unity of the Spirit' (see, for example, Ephesians 4). We become united, as the Trinity is united, as we bear God's image and grow in our awareness of our part in His family.
We could continue adding benefits to this but I will close with a final thought, which we will re-encounter in the weeks to come. Being adopted as God's children means that we each get our own personal relationship with Him, as any child would have with a perfect father, and as a result receive gifts that have been specially crafted for each one of us. Certain attributes of God have been packaged up for us personally as individuals, in a particular manner which suits us perfectly! Just something to think about but in the meantime have a quick look at 1 Corinthians 12 if you want your appetite whetted!
Being a member of God's family is wonderful and requires us to embrace that, by taking joy in our Father, welcoming new brothers and sisters, and actively developing unity.
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