In a world full of troubles, it can be difficult to maintain sight of the most fundamental questions. Anxieties about tariffs, the rise of violence in our cities, arguments about immigration and quandaries about the corruptions of our government fill our phone screens, our podcasts and our everyday conversation. To think about these things is good, even necessary, but it should never come at the price of neglecting the greatest questions of life. These questions concern the very foundations of the universe, and reach beyond the confines of time, space and matter. Though a man or woman devote his life to developing the best theories and practices for promoting peace, safety and prosperity in our cities and yet if that man has no real understanding of God, of objective truth and of eternity, his ignorance eclipses even the most brilliant of his accomplishments. This is a mere restatement of what was preached by the Savior of men when He said, “For what shall it profit a man if he gains the whole world and lose his own soul?” His own soul! A man might impact the lives of millions and yet must honestly answer this question from His God on the last day, “What did it profit you?” This is the question hinting at man’s greatest need. A man needs not merely to better his financial prospects, nor even to better the circumstances of his fellow man, a man needs the saving, the rescuing, the re-creating of his own soul and justification before God.
In John 3, we read the famous account of the Lord Jesus conversing with the renowned Jewish rabbi, Nicodemus. They spoke of eternity, of life, of the Kingdom of God, of the Spirit, of the flesh and of regeneration. “Marvel not that I said unto you, ‘Ye must be born again’” (Jn 3:7) said the Lord. That’s it. This is the answer to man’s greatest need given in a simple phrase, “Ye must be born again.” Consider the following.
There is A Need
First, there is a need, “Ye must be born again…” It is necessary. Much of life is built on options. A man can choose “A” or “B;” a woman can pursue course “1” or “2.” One man pursues law and another seeks training in education while still another enrolls in the trades. Not all choices have right or wrong answers, but in the case of the greatest need of man, there is a “need,” a very definitive something without which a person will lose his soul. Although many choices fill our lives, there are yet some unyielding needs which simply must be filled if we are to live (food, oxygen, love, etc.). But for some reason, our culture emotionally tolerates and even celebrates that type of rigidity in the physical realm while at the same time it revolts against the necessities of the spirit. Jesus Christ said, “Verily, verily I say unto thee, unless a man be born again, he cannot see the Kingdom of Heaven” (Jn 3:3). This runs totally counter to the culture of our day which believes that “All paths lead to God,” a culture which, according to the Bible, it is flatly mistaken. There is a law written, rigid and unyielding. “Ye must be born again.”
The Need is Personal
Second, this need is personal, “Ye must be born again.” Interestingly, the Greek pronoun is plural, meaning that, although speaking to directly to Nicodemus, the Lord is directing His words beyond him to all who hear or read it, “You [all] must be born again.” In everyday life, speakers converse referring to nebulous groups like “them” or “some people” or at least to others who are not present. Often, the purpose of speaking this way is to make a point to one’s hearer(s) while not alienating him from the cause being presented. Phrases like, “There are some who believe…” still communicates a point but lets an audience know that the speaker believes that his hearer is outside his critique. But “Ye must be born again” takes direct aim at the hearer. Indeed, it takes aim at you. Jesus Christ is presenting this need not to “them” or to “some” or to “Democrats” or to “Republicans” but to you. It’s meant to make you think. He’s meaning to force you to carry the full weight of His words and to deal with them. So let me ask you, have you? Have you taken an hour out of your very full life to think about you and God? Have you considered whether you have achieved this need? “Adam, where are you?” was the first question God asked humanity, and every time the Word is preached, His question echoes still. Therefore He says, “Ye must be born again.”
The Need is for a Miracle
Third, this personal need is for a miracle. “Ye must be born again.” Consider what the need is not. Christ does not say, “You must understand some things” nor “You must do some things.” This is as much as to say that the problem of being excluded from the Kingdom cannot be solved by intellectual enlightenment nor by behavioral adjustment. Of course it is absolutely essential for men to know certain things and indeed to do certain things in order to be considered a Christian, but that is not what makes him a Christian. His knowing and doing are fruits of a greater work. What Christ is speaking of is a need that can be filled only by a miracle. Nicodemus understood the weight of what the Lord was saying even if he did not fully understand specifically what He meant, “How can a man be born when he is old? can he enter the second time into his mother’s womb, and be born?” (Jn 3:4). That’s it, “a second time…” Nicodemus’ life had begun and had been running on for some years now. His life was replete with experiences, with adjustments, with habits, with physical and spiritual change, with sins and regrets, he had been born already and now he needs something “a second time.” How can these things be? I think of Ezekiel 37, that great chapter recording the prophet’s vision of the valley full of dry bones. That there were bones meant there was life once, but now it was gone. Even the moisture, the slightest of evidence of vitality, had been evaporated by the elements and now there was no more life in those bones than the rocks and dust in which they lay, for they were “very dry.” The Word of God then comes to Ezekiel, “son of man, can these bones live?” (Ezk 37:3). It is impossible! How shall a man be born when he is old? How can the bones live? Indeed, they cannot apart from the miraculous work of the Spirit of God, “The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit” (Jn 3:8).
The Need is Only Sovereignly Met
Fourth, this personal need for a miracle is sovereignly met, “Ye must be born again.” Notice that it is a passive verb, “be born again.” The Lord is not saying that man must do something but that something must be done to him if he would see the Kingdom. Now I have a unique name, and often when I first meet people they comment on my name and how they like it. Something I often think about during those times is how little I had to do with choosing my name. How much less my involvement in my birth. I was completely passive in the process. Something had to happen to me. Indeed, something must happen to me or else I had never known existence, never breathed earth’s air, never felt love, never known God. And yet, no matter how needful it was, there was absolutely nothing that I could do to make this miracle happen to me. My life had to be given to me. So too, even as I must be born in order to know anything of life; even so I must be born again of the sovereign God in order to know anything of eternal Life.
Conclusion
This is man’s greatest need. It is piercingly personal and lies impossibly distant from the grasp of even the ablest mind or the strongest will. If a man or woman fail to have it, he or she cannot see life and shall most certainly perish in the second death of God’s judgment; yes, in hell. So how shall a man be born when He is old? Can these dead bones live? The fifth point is that the implication behind this command, “Ye must be born again,” is that God does supply this great need for men. He did it to that woman, Lydia, who lived long ago and of whom the Scripture says He “opened her heart…” (Acts 16:14). It happened too to the believers who received the first letter from Peter for he tells them that God has begotten them again to a lively hope (1 Pe 1:3). It happen to them and it has happened to millions since the world began. Read the rest of Ezekiel 37 and you see that in the proclamation of God’s Word and by the omnipotent power of the Spirit, that even the driest bones must live again. Read the rest of John and what you see is that Jesus Christ Himself is the resurrection and the life, “he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live: And whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die” (Jn 11:25–26). If this strikes your heart then you must look to God who alone can do this for you. Ask Him for this. Beg Him for it for truly, “Ye must be born again.”
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