Born of the Spirit | Holy Spirit Series

We are in a series right now, walking through a subject called Holy Spirit. We're walking through the doctrine of the Holy Spirit and our goal in the eight weeks we're journeying through this together is that at the end of the eight weeks that we would not just know more about the Holy Spirit, but rather that we would know him more intimately, that we would commune with him more regularly, that there would be a relationship that gets fostered in this. And so this is the prayer. So if you're taking notes, I'm hoping you do, but more than you do, more than taking notes, which I think is an important thing, I want you to have an open heart to receive what the Lord wants to say about the Holy Spirit today, amen? This last week, we talked about the person of the Holy Spirit, that he is not a force or an it that we're trying to tap into, but he's a person that we're trying to know, that he's not just any person, he is also God, that he is the divine person and that he wants us to have a relationship with him and reveal Christ to us. And that's what we're gonna talk about today. Today, we're gonna talk about the first work of the Holy Spirit, the first work of the Holy Spirit

that happens at our salvation. Last week, we talked about this. We said that our introduction to the Holy Spirit is when we are saved. So what the Holy Spirit does is he begins to convict us of our sin and begins to show us our need for a savior and point us to Jesus. And as that happens, he is wooing us into relationship with Jesus until the moment we respond by faith. And when that happens, the Bible says we are made alive, we are born again, and we are saved in that moment. And that's what I wanna talk about today is that saving work of the Holy Spirit. So what we're gonna do is we're gonna refer to this in the words of the phrase that Jesus refers to this in, and that is to be born of the Spirit or to be born again. That's what salvation is. It is to be born again. And I wanna show you this in Titus chapter three. So if you would, get your Bibles and go to Titus chapter three. We're gonna see what Paul talks about here. And there are some of you this morning, you're gonna come to the realization that you need to be born again. Others of you are gonna come to the realization that you have been born again, but you've not been baptized after you were born again.

And others of you, my prayer is is that you would have a new desire to pray for the lost that they be born again. That's the heart for today's message. So Titus chapter three. If you're there, say the Bible is true. Titus chapter three, verse four, Paul writes, he says, but when the goodness and loving kindness of God, our Savior, appeared, he saved us. So this is a reference to the saving work of God through Christ by the Spirit. And this is another way we can say this. He calls us to be born again. That's another way we could say that. He says, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ, our Savior, so that being justified by his grace, we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life. And so there's a lot being said here. Paul is describing the work of salvation. He uses the word saves, he uses the word regeneration. He talks about being justified and having eternal life. And what he's picturing for us is showing us how God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit all work in regards to bringing us to a point of salvation. We're gonna hone in this morning

on the Spirit's part of this, but there are two foundational truths out of this passage that I want you to write down if you're taking notes. Two foundational truths about being born again that are important for us to understand, for us to experience it and to rest in that work of God in our life. Here's number one. We need to see, first of all, that we are born again by God's goodness, not our good works. We are born again by God's goodness, not our good works. Notice what he says here in verse number four again. He says, but when the goodness and loving kindness of God, our Savior, appeared. Now he's talking about the manifestation of God's love for us. So when he says the goodness of God and mercy of God appeared to us, this is a reference to the coming of Christ. So Jesus is the manifestation of God's love for us, that God loves us so much that he sent his one and only Son. So the love of God appeared for us in the incarnation of the coming of Jesus Christ. Look what he goes on to say. When this happened, he saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to what? His own mercy. Now notice what Paul is doing.

Paul is addressing one of the great misconceptions of salvation or what it means to be born again. And here's the misconception. There's a lot of people in the world today, and a lot of people in the church today, even those who would profess Christ, A lot of people who believe that your good works play a part in your salvation. And so if you ask an average person, hey, do you know God? Do you have a relationship with Jesus? Have you been born again? Have you, are you a Christian? Here's what a lot of people will say. They'll say, yeah, I think I am. So there's a little bit of like confidence, yeah, I think I am, with a little question mark. So it's like exclamation point, question mark, right behind it, right? And then you begin to dive into that, and you say, okay, tell me about your answer. They're gonna say, well, you know, I'm not perfect, but I really try to do the right thing. Like I go to church, I pray to Jesus, I love Jesus. I try to do, now I'm no saint, I'm not perfect, but I really try my best to do, or they'll say something like this. Well, I'm not perfect, but man, like I know a lot of people, they're a lot worse off than I am.

And I know some people, they go to church, and I think I'm better than them. And when I look at my life, I don't think I'm so bad. And so what happens is, is that they give an answer that's not an answer. Because when you ask someone, do you have a relationship with Jesus? And they say, yeah, kinda, I think so, I hope so. I do some good stuff. What's happening in that moment, you're seeing the reality that when you begin to answer the question of whether you're in a relationship with God, on the basis of your goodness, there is no answer that comes with confidence. And here's what I mean. So let's say, for instance, that you're a person that says, yeah, I think I'm in a relationship with God. I go to church, and I do some good stuff. And man, I'm not as bad as other people. Man, you should have known me a few years ago. I'm a lot better than I was then. I've kinda grown up. And when you ask someone that question, then follow up the question and ask this question. Well, listen, so if your goodness is what you're trusting in, how good is good enough? Like, when do you know you met the quota of goodness for you to be able to with confidence say, I'm good enough? Most people will look at you like you're crazy.

And so then you start asking questions. Okay, there's 10 commandments. There's 10 commandments. You got 10 of them, all right? How is God grading how we live according to the 10 commandments? I mean, he's like, if we get three out of 10 right, I mean, 30%, is that gonna be good enough? Maybe there's three or four in there that are more important than others, and we really try at those, and we know we stink at the others, but we do the important stuff. I mean, who determines that? I mean, is God like a 50%-er? I had a professor in college. He graved everything on a curve. No one made a test in his class. Very rarely, they make a grade on his test that was higher than about 60%. You were an A student if you made 60%. I was in the 25%, and I got a C. Then there was always that one student in the classroom that studied, and they got a 90, and now my C turned into a D. Thank you, right? Like, is that how God does? I mean, it's just like, we're doing pretty good, and I think I'm doing pretty good, and then you meet someone, and you're like,

oh, they're really good, and I hate them now, because now all of a sudden, you realize my goodness isn't good enough. See, the problem with this is that when we use the goodness scale, there is no way to measure that. I mean, does God have a scale in heaven, and all our good deeds are on one side and bad deeds on the other, or is it like a mortgage payment where you got so much that you owe God in your debt, and every good works, you're making a payment, and then what happens, though, if you have a bad day? Like, yeah, I did three good things, I did four bad things. Tomorrow, I need to do some better things. Is God like, oh, I'm just out of the payment on the back end of that mortgage you got, right? Is that how it works? You see, what happens is is that when we begin to follow that way of thinking that my goodness is how I have a relationship with God, it'll lead you down a trail where you come to the conclusion that there's no way I can know that I have a relationship with God. There's no way I can be guaranteed that I can go to heaven because there is no measurement that I can be compared to to know if I've done enough,

but here is what the Bible tells us, and this is the great news of the gospel, is that we are not saved by our good works, but by God's goodness. This is what Paul says right here. But when the goodness and loving kindness of God, our Savior, appeared, He saved us. He caused us to be born again, not because of good works we've done in righteousness, but according to His own mercy. You see, our sin nature, listen, we are so sinful that the only hope that we have is for someone to step in and do for us what we cannot do for ourself. You say, what do you mean? You see, when you take the pathway to your own goodness, to a relationship with God, here's what you're doing. You're minimizing the seriousness of the condition you are spiritually without Jesus. Say, what do you mean? I want you to see what Paul writes in verse three. Right before he gets to this, he says this. He's describing the Christian before Jesus. So that means if you don't know Jesus, this is you. Notice what he says here. He says, for we ourselves were once full. Foolish, disobedient, led astray, slaves to various passions and pleasures, passing our days in malice and envy, hated by others and hating one another.

You see, what Paul is describing in this moment is our life before Christ. Notice what he's describing here. He is not describing bad people in need of improvement. He is describing dead people in need of life. He is not describing here bad behavior. He is showing us at the very core, this is not just our behavior, this is our nature. This is our disposition toward God. So what we need is not new behavior. We can't do that if this is our nature. What we need is new nature. What we need is new life. And this is why, when you look at salvation, salvation is not praying a prayer and getting baptized. Salvation is being born again. It is being made new. It is becoming alive in Christ. Because this is the spiritual condition that we are in. Jesus did not come to this earth to give you a life renovation. He came to give you a spiritual resurrection. He came to take what was dead and make it alive. And oh, by the way, that is not a work that we can do. That is a work only Christ can do. We are dead in our trespasses and sin. And apart from Jesus intervening and doing for us what we cannot do for ourself, we are hopeless. And that's the beauty of the gospel. Say, what is the gospel in just a quick summary?

Here's the gospel. You ready for it? You're broken and you're dead spiritually. That's our condition. We're born that way. And it'd be bad news if I said, hey, that's the sermon. Amen, you are dismissed. See, the good news is that though we are dead and we are broken because of our sin, God loves us so much that he sent Christ to live the life we couldn't live, to die the death we deserve to die, and raise from the grave three days later so that by faith and trust in him, his goodness would do something that we could never do by our good works, that we could be made alive once again and have a brand new life. That is not a work that we can do. That is a work only God can do for us. So if you're here this morning and your hope of heaven, listen to this, has anything to do with your goodness. If you're like, oh yeah, Jesus is, yeah, he died, he resurrected, and I believe that, and I'm also a really good person. That second part of that nullifies the first part of that. My hope is built on nothing less than Jesus' blood and righteousness. I put my full weight of eternity on what God has done for me in Christ,

not what I do for God in myself. That's truth number one. We are born again by God's goodness, not our good works. Here's truth number two, and this is where we're gonna spend the bulk of our time together. We are born again by the work of the Holy Spirit. So how does God do this saving work of his goodness and mercy in our life? Well, he uses the Holy Spirit. I want you to notice something in the text. We're not gonna dive into it, but I want you to see something. Last week, we talked about the complexity of the Trinity, God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit. I blew your mind with a visual aid using a pretzel as the analogy, right? I got made fun of all week by my children for that, by the way. They thought it was the goofiest illustration ever. But I'm goofy, so that's fine. So the Trinity, God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit, one of the things that Titus does is he shows us that it is the Trinity that brings about the salvation. He talks about the goodness and kindness of God our Savior. This is a reference to God the Father. Toward the end of the passage, he talks about this Holy Spirit being poured out upon us by Christ the Son and the justification that he brings. And then you're gonna see the regenerating work

of the Holy Spirit. And here's the point. Paul wants us to see that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are all involved in bringing about this saving work in our life. And that's the beauty of God's grace and his glory at work in our life. I wanna talk about God the Holy Spirit. We are born again by the Holy Spirit. Look what he says in verse five. He says, he, this is God the Father's work, he saved us, not because of works we have done in righteousness, but according to his own mercy. How does he demonstrate or pour this out on us? By the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit. So this is how this salvation or being born again happens in our life. And this is the picture that he's painting here. He is describing what the Holy Spirit does in our life when we respond to the gospel. So he's gonna talk about the rebirth and the renewal that the Holy Spirit brings. So there are two truths that I wanna give you, two implications. From this passage, I'm gonna look at by the washing of regeneration, and I'm gonna look at the renewal of the Holy Spirit, and show you two implications of the being born again. Here's number one.

Number one, we are given new life. We are given new life. When you are born again, by the Holy Spirit, you are given brand new life. This is what he says, go back to that passage again. He says, by the washing of regeneration. Now, the first part of this has a little bit of a negative connotation. The washing idea is this idea of being cleansed from our sin, both past, present, and future. That our sin is washed away. It is cleansed from us when we respond by faith to the gospel, that the Holy Spirit does a work in our life that cleanses us, but he does this washing with regeneration. Now, the word regeneration is an important word, so if you wanna circle that in your Bible, underline that, say, why is that so important? The word regeneration is where we get the word or phrase born again. The word regeneration can be broken down like this, re-genesis, re-genesis. Genesis is beginning or life, and then re is this idea of again, right? So the idea of regeneration is new life, rebirth. I love one translation, new beginnings. That's one of the ways you can translate regeneration, new beginnings. The point is this, this is the phrase that is used to describe our salvation.

There is a new birth that happens. There is a new life that's given. I want your eyes right here just for a second. I don't want you to miss this. The Bible tells us that there is something so radical that happens in the life of an individual when they truly, by faith, respond to the gospel of Jesus Christ and are saved that the only way that it can be described is like this. You are born again. You're a brand new person. You're no longer the same. The Bible says the old is gone and the new has come. Something so radical happens in our life that we are never the same again. We are literally born again. This is why I have a hard time with people who live life on their own terms and they live with no desire or pursuit of God and they say that they are Christians on their way to heaven and when you press into that, you say, well, tell me about that confidence that you have and they point back to some prayer they prayed when they were younger or some baptism they experienced. No evidence of their life being transformed. But pointing back to some moment in their life that has bore no fruit whatsoever. You see, why is there such a problem with this? Because the Bible says if anyone's in Christ, they're a new creation.

The old is gone and the new has come. There is a brand new life. This is why I love the picture of baptism. We baptize in the eight o'clock service. We're gonna be baptized in the 11 o'clock service and there's some of you today that you need to decide to be baptized. Here's why I love baptism is because baptism gives us a picture of the resurrection is that whenever someone gets in the water over there and they declare their testimony, this is where I was before Christ and then I met Christ and he transformed me. I surrendered my life to him. He is my Lord and then they're baptized. It says we baptize you in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, buried in the likeness of his death and raised to walk in the newness of life. What's the idea there? The idea is is that when we trust Christ as our Lord and Savior, we are dead and buried with Christ and just as Christ came out of the grave, we have been resurrected to a brand new life. That's why baptism is such a significant part of the life of a believer. It does not save us, but it tells the world that we are saved and it gives a living example, an illustration of the new life that we have in Christ. The person that goes under the water stays there

and there is a brand new person that emerges declaring that I have new life in Jesus Christ. We are given a new nature. I'm sorry, a new life. We are also given a new nature. So that's the second implication of being born again. So what happens when we're born again? Well, first of all, you receive a new life. You are made alive, you are born again. Secondly, you receive a new nature. Notice what he says again in this passage. He says by the washing of regeneration, that's that sin's being washed away, I'm born again and when I'm born again, the Holy Spirit also gives me renewal. This renewal is a kind of a dual way that it plays itself out. Renewal as in I am renewed and I'm being renewed. Here's what that means. Not only was I born with new life, but I received a new nature, with new energy. I received a new life, I received a new energy. appetites, and new desires, and new pursuits. I received a new life, I received a new energy. And now because I've got a new nature, there is this new life that I live, and now this new life is becoming more and more and more like Jesus. This is the point that Paul is making here. This new life gives me a new nature,

and this new nature brings about a new way of life. We call this in the church world sanctification. Say, what is sanctification? Sanctification is a church word that literally means to become more like Jesus. It is to become more like Jesus day by day by day. And whenever someone is born again, they receive new life, they receive a new nature, and now there is this process where day by day I'm becoming more and more like Jesus, and this is the work of the Holy Spirit in the life of a Christian. The Holy Spirit's job in your life, one of his roles in your life, is to as you live, he's gonna teach you how to live in your new identity, how to live in your new nature, how to look more and more like Jesus. No longer is it you trying to will yourself into living a better life. Now you have the Holy Spirit doing this work, watch this, not from the outside in, which is what we do, but from the inside out. This new nature is being implemented into your life. You were born again, you received a new nature so that you can look more and more like Jesus. Now this is a work in progress, amen? An imagery came to my mind this week, I was talking to Craig and he was like, man, let me show you this insight,

I thought this was brilliant, I'm using it, but I'm giving him credit, all right? So I learned this this week, if you were to take the DNA of a caterpillar and you were to take the DNA of a butterfly, what you would discover is it's the same DNA. So like if you took a caterpillar and you took the DNA and you sent it to a science lab, you know what they would do when they report back? Say, hey, what kind of insect is this? They would say, that's a butterfly. You're like, no, it's a caterpillar. No, it's a butterfly. Say, why is that so important? So because the caterpillar contains everything that is essential to becoming a butterfly. And it's in process of becoming the butterfly. But it hasn't fully realized its potential or capability. But all of the nature of a butterfly exists in the caterpillar. It's just in a process of that nature being applied so it can become, watch this, what it already is. When you are born again, you are given new life. You are given the life of Christ. You are given the nature of Christ. Now what you are hasn't been fully revealed, but you are a work in progress. So watch this, you have within you the DNA of Christ and sanctification by the work of the Holy Spirit. This new nature is being worked out in you

so that all of who you are is being worked out until you become it in maturity. Isn't that beautiful? I love how John says this in 1 John 3, verse two. He says, beloved, listen to this. Beloved, we are God's children when? Now, so he's talking to Christians. Beloved, he's not talking to unbelievers. But he's talking to believers. Beloved, we are God's children right now. You've been given new life. You've been adopted into the family of God. You've been born again into a spiritual family. And what we will be has not yet appeared. In other words, we're a work in progress. We are God's children, but we're not fully matured. We're a caterpillar becoming a butterfly. Now watch this. But we know that when he, Jesus, appears, we shall be like him because we shall see him as he is. Anybody looking forward to that day? So in light of that, what do we do? Verse three. And everyone who has this hope in him purifies himself as he is pure. So what do we do? In light of the fact that God has created a new nature that's being by the Spirit formed into the image of Christ that will one day be complete, what do we do? We join the Spirit's work in sanctification

by yielding to him. Like this week, I was overwhelmed by this because I started thinking about my own life, like I'll celebrate in two weeks my 30th spiritual birthday. 30 years I've known the Lord. And when I look back on my life and I look back at the last 15, 20 years and I look at where I was and where I am today, even where I was three years ago or maybe six months ago to where I am today, like I just look back and I say, man, Jesus, thank you for your work. Like there's no explanation of the transformation that's happened. But then I look at Jesus and I'm like, yeah, but I ain't there yet. So what do I do? I trust the one, listen, I'm not who I was, I am not who I will be. I am a work in progress, so what do I do? I trust the one who has made me new. And I let his nature begin to be lived out of my life through the inward work of the Holy Spirit. Say, so how do I do this? What does this actually look like? I'm glad you asked. I'm gonna show you this. I'm gonna, if you would, turn your Bibles to Ezekiel 36. Ezekiel 36, so what does that look like?

How does this transforming power work, and how do I, this new nature, this new life being lived out from this new birth, how does that work itself out? Ezekiel is gonna show us. Ezekiel is writing to God's people in the Old Testament who are in captivity by their enemy because of their rebellion to God. They try to obey and they fail. They try to obey and they fail. They try to obey and they fail, and here's why they keep failing. It's because God never intended for the law, the external commands of God, to make us right with God. What the law does is shows us that we're not right with him. Like the commandments show me that I'm broken. And so God's people are now in captivity because they need a new heart, they need to be born again, and so what Ezekiel does is he describes to them what's coming in Christ, what we now get to experience in the new covenant that we just talked about from Titus, and Ezekiel does a great job of describing this. Notice what he says, Ezekiel 36, verse 25. He says, I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. What Ezekiel is pointing to is he's pointing to the day when Christ, by his shed blood, would wash away our sins. God is saying there's a day coming where I'm gonna cleanse you from what?

From all your uncleannesses. And then I'm gonna do this work inside of you where I cleanse you from the idols and the things that are in your life, and so you're gonna be washed and made clean, and then I'm gonna continue the process of cleaning you and washing you. Now how does this happen in our life? Look what happens in verse 26. He says, and I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. This is describing the new nature, the new life that we have in Christ. And I will remove the heart of stone. Now what is the heart of stone? It's our sin nature. So the heart of stone is describing, what is a stone? A stone is dead, it's lifeless. A stone is hard. What he's saying is without Christ, your heart is dead, you are spiritually dead. And your heart is hardened. What does it mean for our heart to be hardened? We are indifferent toward the things of God. We wanna live for ourself and pursue what we desire to pursue. We have no heartbeat for the things of God, why? Because our heart is of stone and it's dead. He says, but there's a day coming where I'm gonna take away that heart of stone

from your flesh and I'm gonna give you a heart of flesh. What is a heart of flesh? A heart of flesh is a heart that's beating, that's alive. It's a heart that's soft and it's tender toward the things of God. So he's talking about this new heart, what he's talking about is a new life that has a new nature. So how does this new heart with this new life, this new nature, work itself out? Look what he says in verse 27. And I will put my, capital S, Spirit. Everybody say Holy Spirit. And I will put my Spirit within you. And what is the Spirit gonna do in me? He's gonna cause me to walk in his statutes. And he's gonna help us to be careful to obey my rules. Now notice what's happening here. This is how the process of sanctification works. Is that God, we are born again, given new life, new heart, new nature, new heart. And the Holy Spirit then empowers, that's the life of the heart, he empowers us. And now here's what happens. The Holy Spirit from the inside out begins to create new appetites and new desires and new hungers. He creates a love for Jesus, a love for others, a love for God's church, a love for his word, a desire to please him.

Like now all of a sudden, there's a new nature with new appetites, it's happening. And it's not something that I create, it's something that he creates inside of me. That's the work of the Holy Spirit. This is why we wanna use the phrase being born again because this is what being born again looks like. You say, how do I know if I'm born again? Is your heart alive to Jesus? You have a heart that beats and yearns to please him, not to earn his favor, but because you are. Does God already have his favor? Is there an appetite for God's word? Is there a love for worship of God's people? You see, this is what happens when a person's life is ignited by the power of the Holy Spirit. They're a changed person with new appetites. And I'll just tell you, in my own personal life, this happened to me. I was raised in church and I knew the story of Jesus. Man, I knew ins and outs of the story of Jesus, but I was at a hard heart. And I was indifferent toward the things of God. And as I got older, the Holy Spirit began to reveal, and some of y'all know my story, began to reveal I needed Jesus and I just rejected, rejected, rejected, rejected. The more I rejected, the harder my heart got. And the more I was aware of my emptiness, the more I looked for other things to fill the void

and the emptiness in my life. And I started living a very immoral lifestyle. A lot of choices that I regret, off the path that God had for me. And I'll never forget that moment in my life when the Lord just ignited me by the Holy Spirit. I was empty, I was miserable, yet I was living a life of complete rebellion. Here's what's crazy about the immoral life I was living. Like I knew my parents had certain morals and standards. And so when I would walk in sin, I would never feel like a shame before the Lord. I would be like, I just hope mom and dad don't find out because they'll be really disappointed in me. That was the extent of my conviction. It was just like, don't let mom and dad find out. I don't wanna get caught because they're gonna be disappointed. But I had no problem sinning whatsoever. And then something happened. I was sitting like on second or third row at a service like this, and Holy Spirit spoke to me so clearly and something happened. I went from belief about Jesus to all of a sudden, I was like, I wanna surrender everything to Him. I'm done living the life I was living. I'm done living for me. See, what was that? That was the introduction to the Holy Spirit.

He'd been calling me and wooing me. And in that moment, He ignited faith in my heart. And in that moment, like I just came to the altar. I couldn't get here fast enough. And I remember getting before the Lord. And I just said, I need you to take my life. I need you to take all of it. Like I'm miserable. I don't have a relationship with you, but I want one. And here's what I believe. I believe that I was saved before I left my seat. I believe that I was saved the moment I said, yes, I'm all in. And it was just this moment of, I think what happened in that moment was I was born again. I received new life. And I'll just tell you, I couldn't describe. The altar was about this side of the altar. And I remember getting up and I just, I knew my life was different. I didn't know how, I didn't know what. I was really never discipled growing up. So when like, I mean, I knew the Bible, but I didn't know like the ins and outs of my faith that I'd grown up in. I just knew something was different in my life. And I remember like not knowing, okay, there's a new life. You don't live and do what you did. So over a couple of weeks, I started having those old appetites.

And so I would begin to pursue back into those relationships. And the moment something was different, the moment I began to begin to take steps into the life I used to live, something inside of me broke. And I couldn't articulate, I can articulate it now. It's almost as if there was something saying, that's not who you are anymore. You're different. I remember going, God, what is wrong with me? Like I used to enjoy these things. Now I find myself wearing this conviction. And like, it's not about mom and dad knowing, it's about, I mean, I feel like God is disappointed. And like, he has something different from my life. In that moment, what was happening? And I couldn't describe, I didn't know what was happening. Here's what was happening. I was born again, just a few days earlier. And because I was born again, I received a new life with a new nature. And this new nature had new appetites. And now the spirit of God was in me. And he's saying, no, you want to please the Lord. You don't want to do the right thing because mom and dad may find out. It's because I know. I began to want to read my Bible. I used to have to go to church.

I used to want to go to church. My life began to transform in a very real way. And what was amazing about this moment in my life is that no one had to tell me that something was different. I knew it, because the spirit was alive inside of me. And I would love to tell you my journey was over then. Man, it was ups and downs. It was good seasons and seasons of disobedience. But in every season, with the ups, it was Christ at work in my life. With the downs, it was my resistance of the Holy Spirit, but the Holy Spirit was evident in my life. Why? Because I was a new creation. And it all began in a singular moment. You see, being born again is a definitive thing in our life. It's where the Holy Spirit, in a moment, you're not progressively born again. You're radically, in a moment, born again. So the question for you this morning, there's really three groups I wanna talk to, there's some of you in this room that you need to ask yourself the question, has that ever happened in my life? Have I ever been born again? And notice, I'm not asking you, did you walk an aisle and pray a prayer, or did you get baptized? What I'm asking is, is that, was there a moment where you received

new life and a new nature? You see, this is the evidence and the assurance of our salvation. The evidence and assurance of my salvation is not in a prayer that I prayed, it was in the fact that I know I was born again. And the evidence of the Holy Spirit transforming me from the inside out, I can look back, and so when I doubt my salvation, I don't look for, I prayed a prayer, I look for the changed life that came from that moment on. And the evidence of the transformation is the evidence that God kept His word, that when I responded by faith to Him, that He would save me. There's some of you in this room, you're not certain whether you've been born again. Couple of questions I would ask you to wrestle with, is one, do you love Jesus? I don't mean like, yeah, Jesus is great. I mean, do you love Jesus? Like, personally. Like, some of you need to come to the realization that you're fond of Jesus, but you don't think about Him during the day, you don't desire, like, I want to please Jesus. Do you love His word? Do you love church or is church like, I just gotta do it, it's Sunday. My wife will be disappointed, my husband disappointed,

parents will be disappointed. Or is there a growing love, like, I want to be, do you love to worship? See, those are all evidences of the new nature, are there desires for you to please the Lord when no one knows? See, if those questions are like, no, I don't think that I love Jesus, I don't think I, it could be that you need to examine whether you've been born again. New life, new nature. You're not completed, but you're a work in progress. Is the progress happening in your life? Others of you in this room, I'm sure you're thinking, well, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know. I don't know, I don't know, I don't know. Others of you in this room, you're realizing today that what you've looked at for your salvation wasn't actually your salvation. What you're recognizing is, is that there was a prayer you prayed and then there was that moment where you were born again. A couple of weeks ago, we baptized a young lady who says, we asked her about her salvation. Yeah, I was saved at 19 years old. Like, awesome, tell us about that. Well, nothing really changed in my life,

I kind of just lived and did my thing. And then about three years ago, man, something happens, I just came before the Lord and I surrendered everything. And what happened then? Everything changed. And I'm like, sister, 19, God may have started a work, but three years ago, you were born again, got baptized to tell the world she was a follower of Jesus. Some of you are gonna come to the conclusion today that that's where you are. You're born again, and now you need to be baptized so that on the right side of that being born again, you can tell the world you belong to Jesus. So I'm gonna ask you to bow your heads, that's the first two groups. So bow your heads. If you're in this room this morning and you're wondering, I don't know that I'm born again, I'm uncertain if that ever happened in my life. I've been in church, I believe in Jesus, but I can't look at a moment in my life where I go, man, I was made alive in Christ. Or maybe you know I haven't experienced that. You've been trying with your goodness and good works. I'm gonna tell you, today is a day of spiritual birth. If there is a desire inside your heart, and I was like, that's what I want. I wanna be born again. I wanna be made alive in Christ.

Well, here's what I want you to do. If you've never, experience that, you can just commune with God. What I said to him was, God, I need a savior. I believe you died on the cross. I believe you resurrected, and I want my life to be surrendered to you the rest of my life. I want you to make me new. In your own words, just confess that to him right now. Just say, I wanna be made alive. I wanna submit to Jesus as my Lord and savior. Just ask him. I wanna be made alive. I wanna be made alive. Others of you are recognizing that you need to be baptized because you've been born again, but you were baptized maybe before, or haven't been baptized after that. And you need to get that right following Jesus. This is the first step of obedience. And today, here's what I want you to do. I just want you to say, dear Jesus, thank you for giving me clarity today. And I wanna be obedient to this. I wanna be obedient to baptism. I wanna surrender this to you. So if you're in the room, I'm gonna ask you to do something very courageous. No one looking around.

If you pray to receive Christ, you're saying, I wanna be born again today. I'm asking God to do that, or I wanna talk to someone about what it looks like to be born again, or I know I need to be baptized. You're in that first two categories. I'm gonna ask you to do something bold. In a moment, I'm gonna ask you to stand as a declaration. Hey, new life has happened today. I've been born again. This is a big deal, and it's a big moment in your life. We don't need to pass over that passively. We wanna pray with you and be able to encourage you. So if that is where you are, you say, today, pastor, I pray to receive Christ, or I know I need to be baptized. And here's what I want you to do right now, with no one looking, just stand to your feet. And people, eight o'clock service just popping up, saying, that's me. I wanna be born again, or I need to be baptized. Right now, that takes a lot of courage. We're gonna give you an opportunity to do that. Praise God right here, thank you. Thank you right here. Anybody else? Praise God back here. Here, praise God. So proud of you.

Say, I wanna be obedient, be born again, or I wanna be baptized. We have decision encouragers that are coming to you now. They're gonna pray with you. Justin. They just wanna encourage you and help you with this journey. Praise God. Anybody else? Say, I wanna be born again today. I desire that the Lord is stirring in my heart, and I wanna get that settled today, or I need to be baptized. I wanna get that settled today. Believers, I want you to look at me for a second. We're gonna respond in a moment of prayer. And worship is gonna lead us just for a few moments. But here's the third category. Some of you feel burdened for lost people in your life. How many of you, and don't raise your hand just because it's a church thing to do. How many of you right now have a name in your mind of someone that you're burdened for, that they need to be born again? Raise your hand if you do. How many of you feel burdened for lost people in your life? How many of you, and I don't, don't raise your hand just because it's a church thing to do. How many of you have a name in your mind of someone that you need to be born again?

Raise your hand if that's you, okay. Part of the heartbeat for today's message is for you to come to the end of yourself, and that burden, rather than you carrying that and going, man, I gotta find a way for this to happen. So here's the thing. You are supposed to share your faith. You're called to do that. God wants to use you as a messenger. You are to show your faith. You are to model what it looks like to be a Christ follower, so that when you share your faith, you need to start with an apology and then share your faith, because you know you've shot your witness. But the third part of this, this is what I hope today you're coming to realize. Your words are insufficient. If this is what the Holy Spirit and the Holy Spirit alone does, you know what that drives us? It drives us to our knees in a desperation, where we're praying, God, would you do a work that only you can do? Would you save this person? Would you, God, I'm gonna share, but if the Spirit doesn't show up, only you can give new birth in a person's life. And so you begin to earnestly pray. This is a position of desperation.

You know what I love? Last Sunday, right back here in this section, in the 11 o'clock service, when we gave an invitation, just like we just gave, a young man popped up and he is bawling. He was born again in that moment. I think he's getting baptized next week. But when I looked beside, I found out a little later why. There was another gentleman and he's bawling his eyes out. And afterwards, he told me, told one of our leaders in our church, he says, hey, the dude that stood up, we work together. He's a close. friend for one year and one week. I have prayed for him every day, asking God to give him new life. I have begged God to save him. And today he did it, one year and one week. Listen, it could be 10 years. Could be 20 years. Let's not stop praying. The Holy Spirit's work, amen? So I'm gonna ask you to stand. I'm gonna pray, when I say amen, this altar's gonna be open for you to come. If you have a person that you're praying for, come and kneel and just pray and ask God to do a work in their life. Ask him to use you, but ask him to do the work only he can do.

Father, we give this time to you. Move as you desire. We surrender, in Jesus' name, amen.