The necessity of the new birth for entering the kingdom of God is the central claim in the passage, which expounds on Jesus' conversation with Nicodemus in John 3. The sermon explains that birth determines nature, nature determines appetite, and appetite determines character and vision, illustrating this with the contrast between a vulture and a miner. It emphasizes that the new birth is not a mere change of heart or outward reformation but a divine impartation of life through the Word of God (water) and the Holy Spirit. The message concludes by highlighting that this spiritual rebirth, a creation of a new man, is entirely God's work and is essential because humanity is born spiritually dead and under God's curse.
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Let us turn in our Bibles to the Gospel by John chapter three, and we shall begin reading at verse one. These Lord's day mornings, we're going to be dealing with the subject of the new birth. We started this subject last Lord's day morning. We're continuing it today, and in the will of the Lord next Lord's day morning, we shall again look at the subject of the new birth. John three, verse one. There was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. The same came to Jesus by night and said unto him, Rabbi, We know that thou art a teacher come from God.
For no man can do these miracles that thou doest except God be with him. Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, except the man be born again. He cannot see the kingdom of God. Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter the second time into his mother's womb and be born? Jesus answered, 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. That which is born of the flesh is flesh. And that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.
Marvel not that ascendant to thee, ye must be born again. The wind bloweth where it willeth, or elisteth. And thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth, so is everyone that he is born of the Spirit. Nicodemus answered and said unto him, How can these things be? Jesus answered and said unto him, Are thou a master of Israel, and knowest not these things? Verily, verily, I say unto thee, we speak that we do know, and testify that we have seen, and ye received not our witness. If I have told you earthly things, and ye believe not, how shall ye believe if I tell you of heavenly things?
And no man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the Son of Man, which is in heaven. And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, Even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life for God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. Let the Lord bless the reading of his word. Let us pray. Now, Father, having read thy precious word, We ask you to open our hearts, our understanding, our minds to comprehend that which you have given unto us.
We thank thee again for our Lord Jesus Christ, the one who is the Son of Man, the one who shall receive from thee the ancient of days a kingdom and glory and power, but the one who died on Calvary's cross, in order that we might have a life and have it abundantly. Reveal thyself to us. Grant our God that we shall be able to see spiritual truth today. And in order that this may be accomplished, we recognize we cannot do it of ourselves. You have to do it.
And we ask you to do it as we wait upon thee, not because we deserve it, but for thy great namesake. Amen. We studied last week in our introduction to the subject of the new birth. We examined a little verse in the book of Job, chapter twenty-eight, verse seven, that says there is a path that no foul knoweth and which the vulture's eye hath not seen. And the eye of the vulture, which is one of the greatest telescopes of nature, In fact, it's the greatest when you consider the size of the eye of the vulture in comparison to the telescopes that man uses.
For a vulture can be flying out of sight to the human eye, and yet that vulture can see a rabbit on the hillside. It can see a bird that's dying in the bow of a tree. You talk about a telescope, the vulture has it. But you see the vulture misses the best. And in contrast to the eye of the vulture, in Job twenty-eight is the eye of the miner. The miner who erects his tunnels, who shores up the walls where he's digging, and no matter what it takes to get the best things, the gold, the silver, the rubies, the sapphires, the diamonds.
And he has the eye for good things. The vulture has the eye for gruesome things. Why? And you see, coupled with the doctrine of the new birth, is that little verse there in Job twenty-eight, verse seven, there is a path that no foul knoweth, and which the vulture's eye have not seen. Why doesn't the vulture see the diamonds? Well, it has a vulture's nature. Why does it have a vulture's nature? Birth determines nature. Birth determines nature.
And nature determines appetite. And if I get this squared away in my mind, I can understand John chapter three. All that Nicodemus, that religious man, that educated man could understand It was natural things. He couldn't see the things of the kingdom of God because in order to see the things of the kingdom of God, he has to be born again first. Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Birth determines nature. Nature determines appetite. The vulture sees the dying rabbit because it has a vulture's appetite.
The miner sees in his mind the diamonds, the silver, the gold, the sapphires, the rubies, he sees them because he has the appetite of a miner and he erects his trapezes, whatever it takes to go there to get them. And he'll get there. Why? He has an appetite for those things. It is birth that determines nature. It is nature that determines appetite. And it is appetite that determines character. What a person feeds on determines what they are. And it is character that determines vision.
And the miner has a vision for things. Why? Because he has a miner's appetite. And why does he have a miner's appetite? He has a miner's appetite because he was born with an inclination for those things. Now our Lord said to Nicodemus a religious man, a man who had probably gone through many of the ceremonies of Israel. He said to him, you must have a new birth. You must be born again because you need a new nature. It is birth that determines nature. And in order to get the new nature, you have to have a new birth.
This is why the new birth is so important. Now last week we examined what it means that unless a man is born again, unless a man has a new birth, is regenerated, he cannot see the kingdom of God. We simply stated it means that salvation is all of God, that God must perform the birth, he must do the work, if you and I are ever going to be able to comprehend spiritual things. I sat in amazement last night as I read an article in the magazine. There are a number of books, if you were to visit my library, there are a number of books by a certain author on my shelf, and that man died this past March first.
I was told about him years ago when I preached with Stacey Woods. We were together at Greenwood Hills, and Stacey Woods told me the greatest preacher I ever listened to in my life was Dr. D. Martin Lloyd-Jones. He said it's an amazing thing when you go into his church. It's a tremendous church, a great, massive place in Great Britain. He says two-thirds of the audience are men. Only one-third are women. He said he'll preach till he's through. They have no choir.
They have no special music. They'll sing one or two hymns. And when Dr. Jones comes out, The first thing he does, he prays, and he prays for fifteen or twenty minutes. He begins by adoring God, the attributes of God. And after he's finished adoring God for his attributes and his glorious person, the writer of this article said, it seems he tears away from your heart everything. to the open gaze of the God with whom we have to do.
And after he's through with that, in his prayer, he speaks of the mercy of God. How God in mercy came out in the person of our Lord Jesus Christ to redeem sinners like us. Here's a man who never gave an invitation. He despised the invitation system. And the reason he despised it was this, because evangelists admit that ninety percent of those who come forward in gospel meetings are never regenerated anyway. Dr. Lloyd-Jones says the other ten percent would have been had they not come forward.
So why bother with all that? He said, unless God does it, friends, it isn't done. Unless God regenerates, friends, nothing is accomplished. God has to do it. And we can go through all the motions, friends, but we come right down to it. Here's a man, Nicodemus. Here's a man. He was religious. He was educated. He was a ruler. But he was lost. And our Lord said to him, Nicodemus, that which is born of the flesh, is flesh.
But that which is born of the Spirit is Spirit. Dr. Martin Lloyd-Jones, that he said of him, he never got involved in evangelistic campaigns. Never got involved in them. He preached. And this man said on a Sunday morning, when that man was through, when he was through praying, You look at your watch, he was praying for twenty minutes, and you thought it was two. And you were conscious of one thing. You were in the presence of the God with whom we had to do. When he said at the close of his meeting, at the close of the meeting, he said, Go to the Lamb of God before he comes for you.
For he's full of mercy. He's waiting to save. That's how I closed the meeting. He said, and he never went to the door to shake hands with anybody. He said, I'm going to be in my office. If someone wants to see me, come in. And he normally dealt with souls all afternoon. I ask you, friends, is this what we want? Do we want reality? Do we want reality? Our Lord was speaking about reality when he spoke to Nicodemus. I bowed my head in worship when I thought of, here's a man.
Here's a man, he didn't care what other people thought. He had convictions that what the Word of God said was true. This man, Eric Fife, who wrote the article, he said the one thing impressed you when you heard the man preach. He never talked about himself. He never told jokes. He never told anecdotes. It was the one thing that he gave you, the Word of God, and he usually only preached on one verse in a message. He expounded what that verse said. Friends, why say all this?
I said all that to say this. Our Lord says, you must be born again. And birth determines nature. Nature determines appetite. Appetite determines character. And beloved, we're either have a new birth and we're born of God or we're like Nicodemus was. Notice I put it in the past tense, like he was religious, going through the motions, but no reality of divine life and no real appetite for fellowship with a living God.
Now notice what our Lord speaks to Nicodemus. Here in the third chapter, Our Lord says to him in verse five, accept a man be born of water and of the Spirit. He cannot enter the kingdom of God. So we want to dwell this morning on the instrument that God uses in performing the new birth. He says, accept a man be born a water. Regeneration, being born again means to be born a water. Now, the moment that Certain people read that verse. The only thing they think of, no, I have to be baptized. Well, you get that thought out of your mind immediately.
Because when you think of this passage, except a man be born of water, our Lord is not talking about being baptized. It cannot mean water baptism by any means. because if baptism is necessary to salvation, then no one was saved before the days of John the Baptist. You don't read baptism in the Old Testament. No one was saved before John the Baptist. And I can't imagine Abraham not being saved, for the Word of God says, the Lord Jesus is the speaker, that in the kingdom we're going to sit down with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
We're going to sit with them. But Abraham wasn't baptized, as we understand baptism. Furthermore, if baptism is a necessary prerequisite to the forgiveness of sins, then all who died from the time of Christ, or all who died before the time of Christ, they're lost. You see, the Word of God teaches otherwise. For if baptism is necessary to salvation, then those who are Quakers but believe are lost because the Quakers do not believe in baptism. They do not practice it. And those who are saved among the Salvation Army really aren't saved.
They're lost if water baptism is necessary. You see, heaven's door would be shut to the repentant thief, the thief who died with the Savior, of whom copper wrote, The dying thief rejoiced to see that fountain in his day. And there may I, though vile as he, wash all my sins away. And that dying thief is lost if baptism is necessary, for he wasn't baptized. You see, the Lord Jesus didn't baptize anybody. John chapter four, verse two, and there's a reason for it. Our Lord was wise. His disciples baptized, but he didn't.
But what does it mean except a man be born a water? Water in this text is used emblematically. It is an emblem, a type of something else. Water in the text speaks of the Word of God. It is a type of the Scriptures. I'm going to ask you to turn with me to prove this to at least four Scriptures in the Word of God. We're going to come back to John three. The first of which is a hundred nineteen psalm. Psalm one hundred nineteen is a great psalm on the Word of God. Continuously through the hundred nineteen psalm, we have the Word of God extolled for its activity, its worth, its glorious revelation.
And in Psalm one nineteen and verse fifty, we read these words. This is my comfort in my affliction, for thy word hath quickened me. Now the word for quickened means hath made me alive. Ephesians two one, you hath he quickened, you hath he made alive who were dead in trespasses and in sin. Thy word hath quickened me. Psalm one nineteen verse fifty. Now turn to first Corinthians chapter four. First Corinthians chapter four and verse fifteen, where we have a tremendous verse that delivers us and keeps our minds and our hearts proper as to what it means to be born of the Spirit.
Paul is writing to the Corinthians, to whom he preached the gospel, who believed and were saved, and he says to them, For though you have ten thousand instructors in Christ, yet have ye not many fathers. For in Christ Jesus I have begotten you through the gospel. How were the Corinthians begotten? How were they born again? They were born again through the gospel. And the gospel is the word of God. The gospel is the word of God. Now from the little epistle of James. James chapter one. James one verse eighteen.
And this is a tremendous verse, for this verse says, Of his own will begetty us with the word of truth. Of whose will? Of God's will. He quickened us, ha, with the word of truth. It is the word of God that quickens the believer. the Word of God. One more passage. Turn over to First Peter, chapter one, verse twenty-three, where Peter, speaking of the new birth, says, being born again, not of corruptible seed, That's how we were born the first time, naturally.
It was corruptible seed. But the second birth, being born again, this is what our Lord spoke to Nicodemus of, being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible by the Word of God, which liveth and abideth forever. Verse twenty-five says, But the Word of the Lord endureth forever. And this is the word which by the gospel is preached unto you. Notice we are born again, huh? By the seed of the word of God. The water our Lord spoke of is emblematic of the word.
Now the word of God is seen in Scripture under various figures. It is spoken of as a lamp. in the hundred nineteen psalm and the hundred and fifth verse. Thy word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my pathway that he's spoken of as a lamp because it illuminates. The word of God is spoken of in Jeremiah twenty three twenty nine as a hammer because it breaks. It's spoken of as a hammer that breaks the rock in twain. In Ephesians chapter five it's spoken of as water. that we might be cleansed by the washing of water by the word because it cleans us.
And here in John our Lord says, accept the man be born a water. To be born a water means that we are quickened by the word. Of his own will begot he us with a word of truth. The word of God is necessary in the new birth. As each of us who are here in the natural have two parents, a mother and a father. Every one of us have two parents. It takes two to produce a child, the mother and the father. In the spiritual it takes two to produce a new birth.
Except a man be born of water, the Word of God, and then second, and the Spirit. The Spirit is the generator of the new birth. Accept a man be born of the Spirit. The Holy Spirit is the begetter. The Word of God is the seed. The Holy Spirit is the begetter. He takes the seed of the Word of God. and he produces a new life quickening us to life in our Lord Jesus Christ our Lord said to Nicodemus you must be born again John six sixty three our Lord said to the multitude in his great discourse on the bread of life he said it is the spirit that quickeneth the flesh profiteth nothing it is the spirit Now, just as you had two parents, a mother and a father, for natural birth, you had two parents for spiritual birth.
The Word of God is a seed. The Scripture says so. Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible by the Word of God, except a man be born of water and of the Spirit. So we have the two parents in the spiritual. The word of God and the spirit of God. Now this truth is illustrated in the opening verses of Scripture. You all know how the Bible begins. In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. And the earth was without form and void.
And darkness was upon the face of the deep. Everything was dark. And God said. That's the word, God speaking. And God said, what did he say? Let there be light. And there was light, for this text says, and the Spirit of God moved. The next verse. The Spirit of God moved. My friends, in the preaching of the Word of God. And apart from the preaching of the Word of God, there's going to be no conversions. The Word of God is important. For it is the Word of God and the Spirit of God that produces the new birth.
Nobody ever is born again otherwise. Except a man be born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. So we see the truth of John three illustrated on the opening verses of the word of God. No wonder our Lord said to Nicodemus, if I have told you earthly things and ye believe not, how shall you believe if I tell you heavenly things? We need the new birth. Now, for a few moments, let us consider why we need the new birth, the necessity for the new birth.
It is necessary. Our Lord says, accept a man be born again. And this is what hurts, friends, when we talk to people, when we tell them the necessity for the hearing of the Word of God. It hurts because people are content to be religious apart from life. God is not. interested in the flesh. Our Lord said to Nicodemus, that which is born of the flesh is flesh. But that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Now, except a man be born again, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.
This is why the new birth is so necessary. By the first birth, by my natural birth, that birth that carries with it a birthday that people like to remind me how many I've had. And when you get to a certain stage in life, they like to remind you how many you've had. You see, especially if you're foolish enough to play a game like tennis and the guy puts it over your head and you run after it, but you're just too slow. You know, they remind you that you have had so many birthdays. You see what I'm driving at?
But by virtue of my first birth, I entered into the world of sinful creature. I had physical life, but I didn't have spiritual life. Now, the Bible talks about the natural man, and the natural man does not possess spiritual life. The natural man, friends, is not ignorant. The natural man can be well educated. The natural man is not feeble. The natural man is not sickly. The Bible says a natural man is dead.
He's dead toward God. He's not only ignorant. He's not ignorant. He's not feeble. He's not sickly. The Bible says he's dead. There's no spark of the divine in anybody by nature. Now that may shock some of you. for there's a current teaching abroad that everybody has a spark of the divine in them, and all it needs is a little fanning. The Word of God says just the opposite. The Word of God says there is nothing good in man that God is interested in. Man is spiritually dead because of sin. Ephesians two, speaking to believers, those who have been born of God, he says, you hath he made alive who were dead in trespasses and sin.
There was a time in my life that I was dead toward God. I wasn't ignorant. I wasn't feeble. I wasn't sickly. I was dead. And my friend, if you're here this morning and you have never been born of God, I tell you kindly, you're just as dead as I was, for the Bible says so. Our Lord said this to Nicodemus. He was religious. He was a ruler of the most religious nation on earth, but he was dead toward God. He said, Nicodemus, you must be born again.
There's another reason why the new birth is necessary, and that is that the sinner is a member of the old creation, and the old creation is under the curse of God. And he's under the curse of God because everyone in the old creation is related to Adam. And we are taught that birth is a gateway to life. It was naturally... And our Lord says, birth is a gateway to life spiritually. You must be born again. Now what is the character of the new birth? You see, man's problem is within.
We all look pretty good on the outside. Well, most of us look pretty good on the outside. You know what I'm saying. But our problem isn't on the outside. are problems on the inside. Man's problem is within. And God isn't interested in in the dressing up of the outside. He's interested in putting life on the inside. Now, the new birth, friends, is not becoming religious. That's not the new birth. In fact, the new birth is not even a change of heart. someone uses the expression some people do you have to give give your heart to Jesus you've heard that James McKendrick the Scottish evangelist who is a great preacher he said what would he want with a dirty thing what would he want with a dirty thing you see friends the problem of our the heart of our problem is a problem of the heart man by nature is dead.
The problem a man is within. The new birth is not becoming religious. The new birth is not even having a change of heart. That sounds pretty strong, doesn't it? You see, the new birth is not removing something from the sinner. It's not changing something within the sinner. The new birth, friends, is communicating something to the sinner that he never had before. It's life. Oh, the day that I got saved for him was the day I got life. Before that, I was dead.
Dead toward God. You see, birth determines nature. Nature determines nature. appetite. Appetite determines character and character determines vision. Why do I have an appetite for the things of God? Why are we unable to see wondrous truths out of His word? Why, because I have a capacity now for it. Didn't have it before. May I state that once again? The new birth isn't removing anything from the sinner.
The new birth isn't changing something within the sinner. The new birth is communicating something to the sinner. And God is the only one who can do it. My dear friends, you may clean up the outside. A man who has beaten his wife and been a drunkard. If only he'd clean up, people think, friends, he'll just be a clean sinner. He needs a new birth. He needs to have the life that only God can communicate to him. That's what he needs. Now, three more things plus one, and I'm going to be through.
The new birth is not the reformation of the outward man. That's not the new birth. The new birth is not the reformation of the outward man. The new birth is not the education of the natural man. Oh, we hear today, they only had education. Education is supposed to lift everybody out of the doldrums that they're in, the doldrums of society, and everything will be all right. The new birth, friends, is not the education of the natural man. For the more, the new birth is not the purification of the old man. The new birth, friends, is the creation of of a new man.
If any man be in Christ, he is a new creation. It's the creation of a new man. That's what Ephesians two, verse ten says. It says, for we are his workmanship, emphasis on his. I'm not my own workmanship. I'm not what I am by pulling myself up on my bootstraps. We are what we are by the grace of God because we are His workmanship created in Christ Jesus unto good works. Nothing short of a new creation will ever satisfy God.
I need the new birth. So do you. So do you. May I just spend a few moments in closing? Dealing with Nicodemus. Nicodemus asked a tremendous question in John three. John chapter three and the end of verse eight, he said, or in verse nine, excuse me, the ending of the verse. Nicodemus answered and said unto him, How can these things be? All friends, God says, I need a new birth.
I cannot produce it. Neither can you. It must be of God. Nicodemus looked at the Lord. Nicodemus was a religious man, friends. All his life he had studied the law. He looked at the Lord in utter amazement, and he said, How can these things be? Do you know that that question he's asked twice in the Word of God? How can these things be? And do you know that each time it's asked, it has reference to birth? And each time it is answered in the same way, the first time it was asked, it was asked by the sweet virgin of Nazareth, Mary.
When the angel of the Lord appeared to her and told her that she's going to become the mother of the Savior, when he told her that she said, How can these things be? Seeing I know not a man. And the answer was, the Holy Spirit's going to come upon you. The power of the highest is going to overshadow you. Therefore that holy thing which shall be born of you shall be called the Son of God. And then the angel Gabriel said, Mary, you have a cousin, don't you? Yes. Elizabeth. You know how old she is? She's way too old to have a child. And Zechariah's Too old too.
But she's six months pregnant. For with God, nothing is impossible. What did our Lord do? The angel used an illustration to teach Mary how. How can these things be? Nicodemus said to the Lord, when he said, Nicodemus, you must be born again. Nicodemus said, how can these things be? Our Lord said, Nicodemus, as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, you're acquainted with the Old Testament scriptures. Here's the Word of God, friends. You see, it takes two parents, the Word and the Spirit, as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up.
I'm the Son of Man. Our Lord spoke of himself as a son of man. That expression in the Bible has referenced the three things. It has referenced to his coming into the world, he's going to the cross, and he's coming again in power and great glory. He is the heavenly personage, the son of man who goes to the ancient of days. Daniel chapter seven, verse thirteen.