Good morning. Good morning. Good morning. Nothing.
This is turned on. So there we go. Thank you. All right.
All right. We'll try that again. Good morning. Good morning.
Good to have you here today. I know it's a little tricky days when unexpected ice and conditions. So it's wonderful that we can get together and thank the Lord that we are here. Let's take a moment and turn to the Lord in prayer.
Father, thank you this morning for bringing us here. We thank you for safety on the roads. We thank you that we have been able to come to meet and maybe we'd be encouraged as we look into the Word of God to know more about the Lord Jesus Christ that we may become more like him. And if there are any who are among us who don't know him as their Lord and Savior, I mean today they ponder these things and do business with God and be saved.
We ask for help in looking at this passage today and maybe done so in a way that brings glory to Christ. I'm asking his name, amen. So a while back, and I don't know how far or how long I'm going to go with this, but I started kind of I read through the Gospel of John a couple of times. And so I thought I will just select a few portions of the Gospel of John and do some messages on them.
First we looked at John chapter 14 where Jesus said in my Father's house are many rooms or mansions and I go to prepare a place for you. He said, believe in God, believe also in me. And the key word in the Gospel of John is believe. So the whole point of this is to speak to you and to speak first and foremost to me as I read the Scriptures that I may believe, that I may believe as a believer that I will believe in putting my trust in the Lord for everyday life.
And if you are not a believer that you will be convinced from the Word of God to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and be saved. So today I'd like to look if we could at a few verses in John chapter three, John chapter three, and we will just look at the first eight verses. So if you have a Bible or if you don't, I will put the ESV translation up here for you. That's on.
Here we are. John chapter three verse one. Now there was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. This man came to Jesus by night and said to him, Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God.
For no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him. Jesus answered him, truly, truly I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Nicodemus said to him, how can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born?
Jesus answered, truly, truly I say to you, unless one is born of water and of the spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh. That which is born of the spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you or do not be surprised that I said to you.
You must be born again. The wind blows where it wishes and you hear it 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. God will bless his word when it is read.
Spurgeon writes these words, if I were asked to read to a dying man who did not know the gospel, we should probably select this chapter as the most suitable one for such an occasion. And what is good for dying men is good for us all. For that is what we are. How soon we may actually be in the gates of death.
None of us can tell. This is one of the most important chapters in all of the scriptures, John chapter three. Most people know John chapter three verse 16. Most people have understood that verse from childhood.
You actually, I do not know if you see it so much now, but for a time there, you would see sporting events. People would hold up big placards. John three, 16. I recently went to a concert here in Halifax and the singer has become a believer and he has got John three, 16 tattooed on his arm.
So on the arm where he sings and holds the microphone. So that everybody in the audience is seeing John three, 16. So it is the most popular verse of all of scriptures. It is actually one of the most profound verses of all of the scriptures.
Because it describes fully the love of God, the sacrifice of Christ and the hope of eternal life for those who will believe in him. So I want to look today at this encounter we were reading of a record of a meeting or an interview between the Lord Jesus Christ and a man named Nicodemus. Now the meeting occurred at night and it is one of the most famous and compelling conversations in all of the scriptures. It is an influential man coming and he is curious and he has got a spiritual hunger that drove him to come and meet Jesus Christ.
He wanted to know more about the Lord Jesus Christ and he had recognized the Christ to come from God. And then Jesus just comes right out and answers the question of his heart and it really puzzled him. In Jesus' words in this chapter separate all of humanity into two groups, into two groups. Those who are born again and those who are not.
You see that is the only division God has among people. God doesn't view people as black, white, as rich, poor, educated, uneducated. He doesn't view people that way. God views people as people.
But within all of people he sees us as those who are born again and those who are not. And that is the only distinction as you read through the scriptures. There is only that distinction. Those who believe and those who do not believe.
Right from Genesis through the revelation. That is what you will read. And Jesus is making this clear in this chapter. So I am going to just jump right into this account.
The man named Nicodemus. So who was Nicodemus? I found it very interesting to read some outside the scripture historical background on Nicodemus. He was a religious man.
He was a Pharisee. And he pledged to keep the whole law. All the law. In fact, he was a man we spoke yesterday in the men's study of having a righteousness of your own which is not a righteousness at all.
Nicodemus would fall into this class. He pledged to keep the law. Not just the first five books of the Old Testament but the Mishnah and the Talmud and the oral laws as well. Now you might think, okay, well there's 10 commandments.
Well you read through the Levitical laws and you read through the 613 that are given us in the scripture. But beyond that, those teachers and the rulers of the law, they made up a bunch of laws. They made a ton of laws. They called them the oral laws.
And they put them in texts called Mishnah, the Gomara, and other codes that they did. Things like love and ethics, on work, on the Sabbath. In fact, you were only allowed to carry certain weights of things on the Sabbath. Like a teaspoon of oil.
That would be it. Anything beyond that you were violating the Sabbath laws. They even had laws for how you went to the bathroom. I mean, it was, don't, you don't face Easter West.
I mean, it was, you know, all of that stuff, all kinds of, all kinds of things that were outside of what the scripture said. So Nicodemus would, it would be his desire to keep all of these laws. Nicodemus was also very rich. According to the Talmud, which is a historic Jewish document, he was one of the four richest men in Jerusalem.
In fact, what may have triggered this encounter, I'm not sure, but if that was a very influential wedding where Jesus did his first miracle, he likely was there. He was a very influential man. He was, in fact, one of the top four richest men in Jerusalem at the time. In fact, in John chapter 1939, we read that he brought myrrh and alos to the burial of Jesus.
That would be very costly. That is not just something anybody could do. You would have to be a wealthy man to do that. He also was a ruler.
His name in Greek is Greek, and it means victor over the people. He was a ruler. He was a teacher in Israel. In fact, he was one of the most famous and sought-after lecturers on the law at the time.
He was very well schooled. He was very well respected and, again, rich and religious. He was a member of the Sanhedrin, the elite religious rulers of the day. He also was respectful of the Lord Jesus.
He came and he called him Rabbi when he met with him. The other thing, he came out of curiosity. He wanted to know who is this? Who is this man that is doing these great miracles?
Also, he also helped and assisted Joseph of Verimathia, as I already mentioned, he brought alos and but he also came at that time to help bury the Lord Jesus. He was very respectful of the Lord Jesus, and he was connected with Joseph of Verimathia as part of the council. Now, what's interesting is he came and he met Jesus at night. He used to sing a song.
A ruler once came to Jesus by night. And I remember that song. It was ringing through my head all week as I was thinking about this message. I couldn't get that song out of my head.
I don't know if you know it or not, but it was a good one. And so he came at night. Now, I read at least a half a dozen reasons why he came at night. He was scared.
He was scared somebody would see him. He came because, you know what, I know I have sinned and I need to go and confess it. Things like this. He came out of fear at night.
But actually, in all likelihood, he was a very busy guy, very busy guy. He was the top guy in the lecture circuit. He was very busy with his involvement at the temple. He was very busy in all that he did.
And so was Jesus. And they probably had very full days. Their outlook calendar was full all day long. And so the only time he could get some alone time with the Lord Jesus was to go and see him at night.
And so he came in for this interview, this appointment with Jesus at night. You know what, it's not important about when he came. It's not important whether it was night or daytime or even what motivated him, whether it was fear or whether that's the only time that worked for him or whatever it was. The important thing is he came.
That's the most important thing is that he came to Jesus. Those of us who are believers all look back at a time when we came to Jesus. We came to him. We should be really delighted when we hear the people come to Christ, whatever their motive was.
Whether they came out of fear, whether they came out of, I just heard the gospel for the first time in this dawn on me. Yeah, that's what I want. There's all kinds of different reasons why people come to Christ. But ultimately, we need to be joyful when they do come.
I remember I had a friend of mine when I was a new Christian. He said to me, he said, you Christians are all the same. I said, how's that? He said, you all come to Christ when you're needy.
You're all needy and you come to Christ. And I said, you know what, you finally figured it out. You're a hundred percent right. He said, it's like, it's like there's nothing else in your life.
And now you just need this one thing to hold onto. And you come and you cling to Jesus Christ. And I said, you understand the gospel, my friend. And he looked at me like, are you kidding me?
I said, no, I'm not kidding you. That is exactly what it is. We come to Jesus in our time of greatest need. Nick and him is called Jesus Rabbi.
He thought he was being respectful, making Jesus as equal. But he doesn't realize who he's talking to. Jesus didn't come from God. Jesus is God.
He's not talking to a man who's just come to represent God. He's not talking to a man who has reached a pinnacle in God's eyes. He's talking to the God of heaven. It's not that you're a teacher that came from God.
You are the God of heaven. That's who he is. And then he says, as we read in that first verse, I'll go back to it, it says, we know, we know. It says in verse two, we know you're a teacher come from God.
For no one can do these signs. You do unless God is with him. We know. So who is in that group?
We don't know. We don't know who's in that group. Maybe others in the Sanhedrin. Maybe Joseph, Verimathy and Nicodemus got together and said, like this guy is, there's something different about him.
There's really something different. He's got to be from God. So it was more than just Nicodemus, the thought this. And so he maybe was going on possibly he was coming as a on behalf of more people to get the goods on who Jesus Christ is.
Don't know. Jesus had been in Jerusalem doing signs, Nicodemus witnessed these things. He saw that Jesus knew that the truth, knew the truth in a way that he had not known it. And he wanted to get to the bottom of it.
His curiosity brought him to the Lord Jesus. And then what happens is very interesting. Jesus answers the question that wasn't asked. Nicodemus says, surely you're a teacher who's come from God.
Who can do these signs unless they come from God? And Jesus just turns to him and he says, truly, truly I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. I didn't ask any questions, but you got an answer. Do you know why?
Because Jesus knows what's in the heart of man. He knew that this is the burning question in the heart of Nicodemus. If you're from God, am I doing the right thing that I will be part of the kingdom of God? How do I know for sure that I will see the kingdom of God?
And Jesus answered him, unless you are born again, you will not see the kingdom of God. You see, you have to go back to John chapter 2 verses 23 to 25. You got Zestor's, Granddaughter, the other here. Jesus had just gone through this, he was in the past over feast, chapter 2 verse 23, 25.
And many believed in his name when they saw the signs that he was doing. But Jesus on his part did not entrust himself to them because he knew all people. And there was no one to bear witness about man for he himself knew what was in man. So here he is sitting across from Nicodemus and Nicodemus is showering the compliments on the Lord Jesus and Jesus sitting there.
I know what the question is in your heart and I'm going to answer it right now. Unless you're born again, you'll not see the kingdom of God. When Jesus says the words most assuredly, our clue is that these next words are the most important words that you're going to read because it's Jesus himself saying them. And he says most assuredly, you can go to the bank on this.
This is the truth. So what is this new birth? This new birth? Born again, what does it mean?
It means to be born from above. It means to be born a second time. And Nicodemus is like, whoa, what do you mean by this? You see, for Nicodemus and most of the Jews, what they thought when they were born, I'm of the seed of Abraham.
That guarantees that I'm going to be passed on through this faith of Abraham. Being the son of Abraham through heritage guarantees me heaven. As long as I keep the laws, it was widely believed that the Jews, they believed that they only needed the first birth to be born a Jew, to be born of Abraham. To keep the Jewish laws, but Jesus is saying, you need to be born again.
He doesn't say you need to be born again and keep the laws. He doesn't say anything of such. He doesn't turn to him and says, you've got a great heritage, but you need to be born again. Nothing.
He says, the only thing you need, the only requirement is that you're born again. And then you will see the kingdom of God. Without it, you will not see the kingdom of God. You see, the problem that Nicodemus had is the same as what we all have.
Ephesians chapter 2 verse 1 says, and you were dead and your trespasses and sins. You were born, D.O.A. When we arrived in this world, little baby, tiny little baby, you were born separated from God by sin. Later, you developed in that and you followed your sin in nature and you pursued the actual sins.
But we were born in sin, in the state of sin. And then we go further in the state of sin and we commit sins. But sin separates from God. And every single person, Jew and Gentile, is born in sin and is separated from God.
And they need to be born again. Jesus doesn't say you need religious reform to bring new life. He doesn't say, try your best and that'll bring new life. He doesn't say any of that.
But unless you were born again, you cannot see the kingdom of God. It is something to be born from above. We must be born from above. You see, when the Lord Jesus saves you, He doesn't just reform you.
He transforms you. He gives you a new life. We read in Corinthians that if anyone is in Christ, they're a new creature. The old is gone, the new has come.
Any of us who have experienced this new birth, and that's most of the people in this room, can go back to a time and remember. When you had a life that was not following God, not following Christ, you had no hope and without God in this world. And then the moment you're born again, everything changes. You're a new person, with new desires, a new creature, a new creation.
In Colossians chapter 1 verse 13 and 14, it says, he has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins. That is the new birth. That's what it is to be born again. So the question that Nicodemus comes up, he says, so how can a man be born when he is old?
How can he enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born? So let's look at the method of the new birth. Jesus explains it here. He says, Jesus answered him and said, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.
Nicodemus said to him, how can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born? Jesus answered, truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh.
That which is born of the spirit is spirit. It's not speaking of baptism. It's not speaking of a baptismal regeneration. It's not speaking, in fact, Nicodemus wouldn't have understood the New Testament baptism, it wasn't practiced at that time.
So it's not speaking of that. Jesus himself did not baptize anyone. So if he's talking about baptism, why is he talking about it? He doesn't practice it.
He doesn't do it. It's talking about a change, an absolute change in heart, a change in the person, as if you were born once and then you're born again as another person, as a new creature. In Ezekiel, chapter 36, verse 24, I didn't put, oh yeah, I did put the verse up. There we are.
We read this. This is speaking ahead, prophetically. Ezekiel writes, I will take, this is God speaking as Ezekiel wrote it, I will take from you, I will take you from the nations and gather you from all countries and bring you to your own land. So you're speaking to Israel, but there is, there is a illustration in this that effectively speaks to how we become born again.
I will sprinkle clean water on you and you shall be clean from all your uncleanness and from your idols, I will cleanse you. I will give you a new heart and a new spirit I will put within you and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I will put my spirit within you and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules. That describes fully what the new birth is.
It's the removal of that heart of stone that resists God, that walks away from God, that is conquering to God, that causes us to follow sinful desires and put a new heart that believes and follows God and has a desire for God, a hunger and a thirst for God. You see, physical birth, which is spoken of being born of water, is a physical birth. When you're driving your wife to the hospital nine months or whatever, it may be into her pregnancy and she says, oh dear, my water broke, right? My water broke.
That's the first birth. That's the physical birth. You're born of water. Born of the spirit is a spiritual birth.
It's completely different. It's a new birth. First birth is necessary for physical life. You don't have a first birth.
You're not here. You just aren't. But if you have a first birth, you are alive as a human being. A second birth is necessary for spiritual life.
In order to follow God, to follow Christ, you need a new birth, a spiritual birth. You can renounce and reform all your sins and addictions. You can forsake your lusts in which you indulge. You can conquer evil habits, but no person in the world can make themselves to be born of God.
You just cannot do it. Even if you could make yourself to be born again, you would still not enter heaven because of the scripture. And the Lord Jesus' word says, unless one is born of the spirit, he cannot seize the kingdom of God. This new birth can only come from the spirit of God.
It is the only way to be born again. Jesus Christ is very, very clear here. He says, you must be born again. You must be born again.
He doesn't say, here's an option for you. I know you're religious. That might work for you. But you might want to think about being born again.
He doesn't say that at all. He says, you must be born again. You cannot emphasize that enough. It's the words of the Lord Jesus Christ.
You must be born again. I'm going to have a gift for you. I'm going to be finished early. And you can go home.
That's going to be nice. So he gives an illustration. Jesus says in chapter 3, verses 7 and 8, do not marvel at us at you. You must be born again.
The wind blows where it wishes and you hear it 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. You know, the wind is an interesting thing. I live on the eastern shore.
We all live on the eastern coast. And we know what it's like. We're in Hurricane Alley. And what, besides a lot of rain, what do you get with hurricanes?
Wind, Sam. Yes, that's right. Thank you. Sam, the scientist.
We get wind. Now, there's a book that was written, who was seen the wind? Remember that? The Canadian author.
His name escapes me right now. David Hanson, you might know. Who was seen the wind? Neither you nor I.
Blah, blah, blah, blah. That was great. Great 12. So I can't remember that far back.
Anyway, who was seen the wind? Have you ever seen the wind? No. You've never seen the wind.
But I've seen the effect of the wind. I definitely have seen the effect of the wind, especially at my place, as I pick up shingles after the storms from my neighbors' roofs. And I pick up brush and scrub and all that stuff that goes around from the wind. So you don't see the wind, but you see the evidence of the wind.
And Jesus uses this illustration of the wind when he's speaking to Nicodemus. He says, you know, the wind changes places. You don't see it, but its effects are observable. And then he says, so is the Spirit of God.
The Spirit of God changes people. When a person is born again, there are changes that are made in that person. And they're observable. I remember after I came to the Lord, one day I was sitting around and I'm just watching TV with my dad.
And he looked over at me and he said to me, you're different now. That was it. You're different now. I said, what do you mean?
He goes, you're just different. You're not the same. And I said, is that good? And he said, oh, he's really good.
I thought, okay, well, that was, there was observable changes in me. There was an observation that the Spirit of God was working in my life. Warren told the stories about how he used to do whatever he did. He'd cuss and swear all the time.
And then one day he noticed the evidence that the Spirit had blown through his life. I'm cursed anymore. I don't have the same desires as I used to have. I don't want to do the things that I used to do.
I don't want to use those words that I used to. Why? It's the evidence of the change by the Holy Spirit in you when you were born again. The word for, that's used here, for Spirit is Numea.
Like I said that wrong, Numa. So it's a word you get, pneumatic. So like you use a pneumatic hammer or a pneumatic drill. How's it run?
Not on electricity. It's run on air, right? Yes. You're pounding.
You see those guys with the jackhammers and they're doing this? They're not hooked up to electricity or anything else. And it's not their muscles that are doing it. It's this generator that's behind them, an air compressor, sending air through the thing.
It's the same word for pneumatic. It's the same word as what's your problem when you have pneumonia? Breathing, getting air, right? It's the same word.
Jesus says you must be born again. What are you saying to this religious man is that your status, your religion, your ethnicity, your good works count for nothing. You must be born again. George Whitfield said that he taught on this passage so much for one reason, because Jesus said you must be born again.
It's a requirement to see the kingdom of God. You must be born again. There's a little saying, and I think I put it up there, yes, born once, physically. You'll die both physically and spiritually.
Born twice. That's being born once, and then born again. Physically and spiritually. You will only die once.
Russ read that this morning, the great hope of all believers is that we will one day see him and be with him forever. If you want that eternal life, if you want that promise, that hope in this hopeless world that we're in right now, you need to be born again. And if you are born again, you will see the kingdom of God. You will see your life changed as the spirit works in your life.
You will have hope for today, and you will have the greatest hope, the blessed hope for all time of being in the presence of God. Are you born again? Jesus said, truly, truly I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. In verse seven, he says, do not marvel that I said to you, you must be born again.
I pray this morning that you are born again. And if you have been born again, you have great hope and great reason to rejoice. If you have never been born again, consider these things and do business with God and ask him to reveal from the scriptures. Read through the Gospel of John.
Read through the scriptures, and ask God to open up the Word of God to you. You may trust him and be born again. Father, thank you this morning that we can come. We can look into your Word and find these words of great hope.
The thing about the Lord Jesus is he always spoke the truth, and he clearly spoke the truth of Nicodemus. We thank you that this private conversation, this interview, has been recorded so that we can hear it, so that we can see it and see these words and clearly understand the great need of being born again to see the kingdom of God. Lord, I pray for everyone who is here. I pray this as anybody here who has never been born again, if they have never come to that point in their life, that today that they will consider this, without it they will never see the kingdom of God, without it they will face the second death.
Father, may that not be so for any person in this room. If there is such a one and they want to ask questions, that they will come to one of us and they will speak to us, and that we will take the time to explain from the scriptures the way of salvation. Thank you that you've made it so easy that anyone can understand it, that anyone can have it. Thank you for the Lord Jesus, our Savior, in his name, amen.