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That's why we've got to know God's word and why theology really, truly does matter. Why? I love to to preach God's Word and why I try to do it so passionately. Because it's not just facts or things that that don't really matter to the day to day program of our lives. They literally matter in everything we do, every environment we live, every relationship that we are in.

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Brenton
Welcome back to further. I'm Brenton Grim. Chris is back today. How are you doing? Great.

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Chris
I am looking forward to talking about one of my favorite passages in the Bible.

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Brenton
Yeah, it's a good one. probably most quoted, right? We're not. We're not quite there yet, but.

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Chris
Yeah, well, I mean, it's all really one. If we can think about sermon or conversation, but, we just simply did not have enough time and, yeah. So and many of you probably think it went too long as it was so, so, anyway.

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Brenton
Yeah. So you're going to finish out John three next week, right?

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Chris
I'm not going to finish the whole chapter. We're going to go through 21. we will start at 16 and and work through a little shorter section. but yeah, we actually have three more messages in John chapter three, and we're taking our time through these, early, early chapters, but I think it's well worth it.

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Brenton
Yeah. Good. Okay. I want to start out you you had said that, you know, 45 years ago, the term born again Christian became popular. What do you think the reason was for that?

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Chris
Yeah. Let me go back in history here a little bit. And I actually, originally was thinking about opening this sermon with this, a little bit of background, but, once again, time just, prevented that. But, it's interesting, the day that we live in with all the political turmoil and we can really think that, you know, today is like, it's crazier than it's ever been before.

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Chris
But those who were alive, roughly like 50 years ago, may remember that it was arguably just as crazy. Back then, you had come out of the sexual revolution. Vietnam was going on, and then you have, President Nixon and the Watergate scandal. And, where I'm going here, is that the kind of a chief hatchet man for, Nixon was a guy named Charles Colson, and he actually ended up being the fall guy because he actually went to prison for for his work there while he's in prison.

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he comes to faith. And in 1976, he writes this book called Born Again. And, around the same time, there is a relatively unknown, man who becomes president by the name of Jimmy Carter. And Jimmy Carter began to call himself a born again Christian. And so this, phrase was kind of born into the, American lexicon, so to speak.

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And and so it just began, to, to be used and be thrown around. And it really in some ways is, synonymous with, with, with evangelical, which actually is, I think is problematic, too, because now, yeah, 45, 50 years later, we have a lot of people who consider themselves evangelicals would call themselves evangelicals, but are not actually born again.

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They're not truly believers. They just go. It's almost more of a political label that they take on. Then, anything else. And it's it's become very, very problematic because the, the true church, often gets identified with these people who call themselves Christians, but they, most of them don't go to church. they, don't believe the Bible is the word of God.

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They don't believe Jesus is the only way to salvation, but they get labeled evangelical because they they they've actually taken that, that label in and on themselves. And so it's it's actually a, a, a very big issue in, in my opinion.

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Brenton
Interesting. So, you know, go back to late, late 70s again when, when this was first really becoming popular was, was it a good thing. I mean the like looking back, the idea would have been, you know, you have your kind of nominal Christians that are just labeled as Christians and then they a certain group of people would have taken on this like we're born again Christians.

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Brenton
So we're actually separating from the nominal side of things. Was that what it actually was at the beginning?

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Yeah, I think so. and, you know, Charles Colson, his conversion was very significant. He he's impacted a lot of people for Christ. start a ministry called Prison Fellowship that's, still operating today, doing amazing things. And so there was a lot of good, in that time. And it was it was good to. Yeah, to make this division, so to speak, or to clarify, we're coming out.

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We're not nominal, like just in name only. So we're going to, you know, born again Christian, but that.

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Brenton
Yeah.

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Then, just, you know, confuses things. I think eventually.

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Brenton
Yeah. Well, I don't know that that happens to every time. Eventually. I think it's usually enough that. Sure.

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You know, I, I just wanna be clear, like, we, we are evangelical Christians. And it's interesting literally last night, so Zane has this assignment, for, for school, and we're doing some research on it, and, and really trying to decide whether he should participate in it or not. And, in the article that he's reading, it's brought up evangelical Christians and he says, what's an evangelical Christian?

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Well, evangelical Christian is supposed to be someone who believes in the the inerrancy of Scripture. who believes that you have to repent and place your faith in Jesus Christ in order to be saved. And he believes that we should share the gospel, and evangelize. I mean, that's essentially what an evangelical is supposed to be. but I, I hesitate at times to, you know, to call myself an evangelical anymore simply because it has a very especially today, it has a very specific connotation of what an evangelical is.

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It means that you vote this way, and you are for these things. And, those things are not always what. Yeah. I, or I believe Christian should necessarily be before.

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Brenton
Yeah. Well, that that's certainly a common thing you hear politically is the evangelical vote. Right. And we'll kind of know what that means in the Bible Belt and. Right.

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Yeah. But think about it like, like this and and not to get into a political podcast here, although I'm sure or our listenership would go up if, if we did. But there are supposedly 80 million evangelical Christians in the United States. if there really were 80 million born again people and as, as we talked about on Sunday, who are whose lives have been changed and were, following Jesus, don't you think our country would be in a lot better place?

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Yeah. I mean, think about this. If there were 80 million communist in, the United States and some people are going to say there are like, there's not, maybe socialists, but then I communist, if there are 80 million, we would be a communist country. Yeah. Right. Yeah. And, and so I just bring that out to, to, to show that, that labels are just, I think they're, they're, they're deceiving.

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And we got to be really careful about how we use them and what, what terms really mean.

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Brenton
Interesting. Yeah. Well another, another time for nuance I suppose.

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We'll have some questions next week probably.

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Brenton
That'd be great. Okay. moving on to, John three. Jesus really uses some fairly cryptic language here when talking to Nicodemus. in verse five he says, unless one is born of water and the spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. And, you know, this I think this verse can be, understood in different ways, has been understood in different ways.

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Brenton
what would you say Jesus means by the water in the spirit?

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Yeah. I can give you kind of the three main views here. One would be that water and spirit means flesh and then flesh and blood and then the spirit. So, you know, natural birth and supernatural or birth of the spirit. the other view would be that Jesus is talking here. Water is is baptism. and the view that I, brought out on Sunday is the view that Jesus is referring to, the work of the spirit because, he is referencing, thinking of Ezekiel 36.

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And I, took some time on, on that passage there. And the reason I went with that, that last of you is, I think that, I don't don't think Jesus here is trying to contrast physical birth and spiritual birth. And in that verse, I also don't think that he's primarily talking about baptism. I do, as I said, I think there is an allusion to baptism here.

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But we gotta we gotta remember. We gotta think of the context here. Nicodemus would not have been thinking baptism. When Jesus says water in the spirit, he maybe it heard about John the Baptist. but as Jesus goes on to say later, you know, you're the teacher of Israel. Meaning Nicodemus was was was maybe the most prominent, the preeminent, like rabbi in all of Israel.

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And he he says, you're that teacher and you don't you don't know about these things. And and in other words, he's saying, you know, the Old Testament scriptures. How do you how how was this, like, surprising you here? And so I think he's pointing this to his Nicodemus, here's this. He's going to be thinking of about the Old Testament.

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And that's why, and I think when we look at that, Ezekiel 36 is like, there's coming a day when I'm going to pour my spirit out and he'll clean, clean you, wash away your sins and he'll give you a new heart. And I think Jesus is saying, hey, impart that day. Is that that day is here.

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Brenton
yeah. Okay. So, yeah, he's really talking about, you know, the purification of their sins through, through metaphorical water. And then also through, you know, the work of the spirit.

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Which baptism, which baptism symbolizes. So I think it's is best of you primarily these. Oh 36 and this is all the work of the spirit. And then baptism is, as an illustration of that. Now, of course, there are those who would would take more, believe more about baptism than, than we do. We believe baptism is a symbol.

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Yeah. And there are those who would say it's more than a symbol like that, that they're washed away. our sins are washed away through the waters of baptism. And there would be some who believe actually, the water like it literally happens. there others would say, you know, that that it happens. The spirit does that as, as you're going through the baptism.

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So, so.

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Brenton
I guess thinking about, you know, how Nicodemus would have taken this, how would this have kind of come in, in contrast to his worldview at that point in salvation? You know, if he's if he's coming strictly from the Old Testament, would that have been a shock to him?

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Well, obviously, I think it is. It is a shock because he's going like, how how can these things and be how is this possible? What's when the world is going on here? And Jesus again critiques him for not understanding. So he you know, Jews at that time believe that Jews that that unless Jews were guilty of apostasy or some great idolatry, which are in many ways same thing, they were all they were in the kingdom.

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Okay, so this idea that they that you, you weren't in the kingdom or wouldn't be in the kingdom unless you were born again, it's just completely foreign to, it shouldn't have been, Jesus says, because of, again, passages like Ezekiel 36, but it was completely foreign because they believed, and of course, this guy here, if anybody, would have been a part of the kingdom of God, I mean, if he's not part of the kingdom of God, then is anybody part of the kingdom?

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And so he's he seems to be relatively humble, but there's no doubt that he thinks that he's he's already in.

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Brenton
Yeah. Well, it kind of reminds me of Paul, right, that he's saying, you know, I'm the I'm the foremost of the Jews here. And if anyone's going to get in because of that, it's going to be. Yeah. And yet he's fighting against.

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Yeah. It's it's very much the same thing. And so, you know, thanks for bringing that up because I think, you know, you tax nine of Damascus Road. It took Paul literally the mean he, he was completely blind to this and in and it took the Holy Spirit, I mean took Jesus appearing to him and and the Holy Spirit coming in and, regenerate in.

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Brenton
Yeah. Okay. So going on with the the cryptic nature of this conversation, verse eight, he says, the wind blows where it wishes and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the spirit. What is he talking about?

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Yeah. I mean, I think the analogy is, is pretty simple is you you don't see the wind, we can't see the wind. We can see the effects of the wind. So I mean, we've got right now as we sit here, this Hurricane Milton has just gone through Florida. Nobody saw the wind. Right. But there's we can look at and can see the effects of the wind.

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I don't know if it needs to be more, more complicated than that. And the Holy Spirit is like, we can't see the spirit. He is a spirit. But we will always see the effects of the spirit. And and I think I, I could have emphasized this more on, Sunday in the in the message is like to say that the spirit comes and gives us new birth and we're a believer, but there's no outward evidence of that.

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Is is in direct opposition to the point Jesus trying to make here is that we in, the Holy Spirit comes in. A lot of times we don't even realize, I think, what exactly like it happens and all of a sudden our eyes are open. We see Jesus for who he really is. and we don't even know, like, one moment we're in darkness, the next moment we're in light.

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How exactly did that happen? But we we just know that it happens because it it there are effects that that take place in that which is which is why I believe so strongly that this idea that you can be a believer and there just be no significant change in your life is just I think it's just completely foreign to, to to Scripture.

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Brenton
Yeah. Okay. Yeah. We'll get back to that in a little bit. But, okay. So if we take a step back and kind of look at this conversation as a whole, I think, I think that we see that Jesus isn't real polite to Nicodemus and the way he handles this conversation. you know, Nicodemus comes to Jesus and actually it says he came.

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Brenton
He came at night, which is which is interesting. I think you missed that before. Maybe you woke him up. But, so you come to Jesus to give him a.

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Night out and you go to bed early?

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Brenton
I don't know, that could be why he was kind of upset here.

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He's godly. So he went to bed early. Probably. There you go.

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Brenton
Well, what does that say about me? so he comes to Jesus to give him really a compliment and is essentially, you know, asking him to join the Religious Leaders Club. Jesus completely ignores that compliment and jumps straight into theology. later he he kind of throw some jabs at him by saying, are you the are you the teacher of Israel?

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Brenton
And yet you do not understand these things. Why do you think he's aggressive with Nicodemus here?

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Yeah, I don't know. I can only suppose make some, you know, give some ideas here. I but I think it it's in part because Jesus knows how serious that this, this issue is. And there's no room for, playing, nice when it comes to this conversation. And, and basically, you know, Nicodemus says, hey, you're a good teacher.

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You know, it's obvious that God is with you. And I think Jesus wants to make it really clear you're missing it. Like it's it is it is much, much more than that. And I think the, the parallel here is people just want to kind of add Jesus to like you. He's my copilot, add them to my life or what liberal Christianity does.

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He's a good teacher. and denying, who he truly is and what he truly came to do. And so I just think Jesus is like, I'm not, there's there's no there's no room here to, be to lack clarity about the significance of what we're talking about.

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Brenton
Okay. So what what can we learn from that? Then what what guidelines would you.

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Put in place? yeah, I think we have to be careful because we're we're we're not. Jesus. We also don't know, the tone that Jesus used, and and so, but I do think that we we need to be clear, and we need to be careful that we don't, you know, I think sometimes we're to, we're too worried about offending people.

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So we we. That doesn't mean that we shouldn't care about offend people. And I've said this before. If people are going to be offended, we don't be offended by the by the gospel and by the cross and all that kind of stuff. But that at times can lead us to just kind of waffle on being direct and and being just abundantly clear about.

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No, you're not you're not a good person.

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Brenton
Yeah.

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I'm not a good person. You're not a good person. No, we don't need a little bit of self-help. We don't need to turn over a new leaf. No. And just being really plain simple, and, you know, and Paul says, first Corinthians one, we we preach crucified, Christ crucified, which is a, foolishness to the Greeks and is a, stumbling block to the Jews.

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But to those who are being saved is the power of God. And, Paul, Romans one I'm not ashamed of the gospel for this power of God's salvation to everyone who believes. And so I think we we need to be more, confident and and courageous with the gospel and not to feel like we have to give in to, what, what, you know, and meet people halfway.

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Brenton
Yeah. Agreed. Yeah. Well, so I think we need to realize that this is actually a life and death issue.

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And right now with Paul.

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Brenton
Well, yeah.

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Yeah, I mean, we probably talk a lot about this, and I think we we want to be I, I do think Galatians six Paul says, you know, let your speech be always be gracious season with salt. So you may know how to answer everyone. and so there are different, you know, Jesus says there's a bruised reed.

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I'm not going to lie. breaker I'm not going to sniff out, you know, and so who is in front of us?

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Brenton
Yeah, yeah.

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Right. And now the woman. And it's interesting because we're going to see the woman at the. Well, Jesus is also pretty direct with, with her, but he's a little he's a little more tender with her.

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Brenton
Well, yeah. And I think we, we certainly see a difference in Jesus of how he handles religious leaders versus not religious leaders. Yeah, right. He he's going to hold the people that are teaching to a higher standard than he would to people that have been maybe deceived by people that have taught them.

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no. That's good. I agree.

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Brenton
Okay. So kind of getting back to, the effect of the spirit in our lives, you said the the new the new birth results in a radically changed life. what evidence of this change should be visible in a person who has been born again?

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Yeah. I do want to say here again, this does not. When we say radically change life doesn't mean a perfect life. Doesn't mean a life without struggle. Doesn't mean that we won't wander away from the Lord at times. it doesn't mean that, you know, that we don't still battle and struggle with sin. So I just want.

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I want to say that, but the New Testament, much of the New Testament, actually.

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Brenton


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Tells us what this evidence looks like. The the fruit of the spirit. Paul, Ephesians four, Colossians three put off and put on. and I think a great place to go is the sermon on the Mount, where where Jesus is saying, you know, and this is actually really relevant to our passage is like, this is this is the King life and the kingdom of God.

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he starts with the Beatitudes and then talks about all kinds of different things anger, lust, you know, and on, on and on. And, and so I think we go to the scriptures and we, we can clearly see if we're willing to, to be honest and to look at all is like, what does this, change life look like?

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but with all that being said, I, I, I've actually been thinking about this, a fair amount. And I think what it really comes down to, is something we talked about on Sunday, but it's repentance and faith in Jesus and I, I will start in primarily talking about the repentance like, in I think it was Martin Luther who said, for the believer, repentance is a way of life.

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It's not just a one time, thing where, you know, we we turn from our sins and we're saved. But that's an ongoing I'm turning from my my sin because we still have a sin nature in us, and it's still have it battling with us. And so, I think one of the primary marks of this change, life is like, it's a it's a humble, recognition that, while I have this new life in me, I still battle with the old life.

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And so I need to, continually turn away from that and turn to the Lord, which is, again, to put off and put on. And then Paul talks about and and, and Ephesians four in Colossians chapter three. And so, it seems to me that there are so many people, and I know that, you know, this is something I have to battle with, but we just we're not marked by, a humble penitent, repentant spirit, recognizing that we, we live before a holy God.

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And that our sin is what Neil? Jesus to the to the cross. and, and then along with that, the other side of the coin is faith in Jesus, which again, is is not a one time, just a, just a one time thing. It is a continual I'm trusting in him. I am not we talked about this ago, a few weeks ago like this.

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Sanctification is is not of our own effort either. Right? It's it's like justification. It happens by God's grace, but so does sanctification. And and so it's it's going back to the Lord and trusting in Jesus moment by moment and step by step. and that will play out in a whole variety of ways, which again, I think the, the New Testament gives us.

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And the Old Testament, quite frankly, gives us a lot of guidelines about what that looks like. But at the bottom line, it's repentance and faith and that, so often I think we just leave those two things behind. Yeah, that that is, is is, is is the life of faith. And then you think about it this way.

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Jesus and Jesus, the gospel gives us the model for our life. And the the model is death and resurrection. And so it's it's a continual dying to self and being raised, through the power of Christ into this new, new life in a day, day by day. walk with him. Yeah.

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Brenton
Yeah. I mean, it kind of takes me back to our Romans discussions about antinomianism. Right? So there there are and I think we do have a tendency to, you know, almost over, over maybe not value, but, put too much, too much emphasis on grace and, and then, then our obedience kind of goes out the window. And I think that that's kind of that antinomian approach where we, it doesn't really matter what we do because we're saved by grace.

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Brenton
but also it it it kind of takes me back to second Corinthians 13, where, where Paul tells us to examine ourselves to, to see whether you're in the faith. And so maybe that's, that's an application coming out of this message is, you know, do you have do you have fruit of being born again? Is that something that's been that's real in your life.

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Brenton


00;27;33;21 - 00;27;53;11

Yeah. I mean what what's happened also appreciate you bringing that up over these last 45 to 50 years. Is this, this other idea that you shouldn't if you placed your faith in Jesus, at some point in your life, if you believed you're saved and, and.

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Brenton
That's got your ticket.

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Punched, that's that's the end all be all. And I will finish with this, you know, this, I love this about, at least my study in in this, heading into this sermon and that eternal life, eternal life is essentially God's end time power brought into our present. So he goes about that for a second. Yeah.

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so, you know, we believe in the the Jews believed that, in the end, God's going to come and he's going to renew all things. so think about when we get to John 11, you know, Jesus and his interaction with Martha. She says that your brother will rise again. She goes, I know he'll rise again in the end and resurrection of the dead.

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And Jesus says, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me though he die, yet shall he live. And though he in all those who live shall never die. And what he's trying to get across to her is you believe in me right now. The end time, resurrection, renewal, power. It comes into the present.

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so, it's very similar, I said that eternal life in the kingdom of God or equivalent. So we believe in and this may be new to some of our listeners of the Kingdom is already, but not yet, that the kingdom came when Jesus came. But it's not fully here yet. And so one day we're going to live fully in the kingdom of God.

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But but when Jesus came that that power that he's going to use to to make all things new, you know, the revelation 21, it comes into our present. And so that life comes inside of us. That is eternal life. We don't get eternal life when we we die or sometime in the future. We get it now. And, that means again, we don't get we don't experience all of it because we're still here on this earth, and we still have our old bodies and, you know, that kind of stuff in our old sinful nature.

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But we get a we get some of it. Yeah. Where where is the evidence of, you know, that that's a free bonus material, but it's. Yeah.

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Brenton
Good. Well, appreciate it. Thanks for, thanks for your work on this. And we'll be, back next week with John 316.

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Yeah. Can't wait.

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Brenton
And, we'll talk to you guys next week.

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Brenton
In.