04-17-2021 – Derek Yarber – New Birth, Old Angle (Gospel Meeting)

We’ve known about the new birth for so long. That really, I would say by this point is old news to us, but I want to revisit these old truths that Jesus gives in John, the third chapter. And we’re going to read in verses three through five, really teaches a fundamental truth. In fact, I would say it’s probably considered the fundamental part of Christianity.

John three verses three through five Jesus answers. And he says to this ruler of the Jews named Nicodemus, who comes to him by night, he says, most assuredly make no mistake about it. I’m telling you and less one is born again. He cannot see the kingdom of God Nicodemus said to him, I do not follow. How can a man be born when he’s old,

Kenny, he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born. So, and a little more of an explanatory way. Jesus unfolds the onion answering most assuredly. I say to you, unless one is born of water and of the spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. Do we understand how important this you might call it now by now old truth really is Jesus says,

I don’t care who you are. You can not get to heaven without it immediately. He may be talking about becoming a part of the church. And of course the destination of the church is heaven, but whether it’s immediate or, or eventually you can not go to heaven without being born again, you cannot go to heaven without being born of water and the spirit.

So it’s very significant for us that in this new world, we understand what this old truth entails. According to Christ, there are two aspects of being born again. And these two components of the new birth. That’s what it means to be born. Again, again, is to do something a multiple time. Now it doesn’t just have to be twice.

It could be three or more, but in this case, it’s apparent that Nicodemus has never done this a second time. So he’s talking about the second time with him. And he says to be born again, a person has to do so a water and the spirit. These are the two vital components of this old truth, the new birth, well for any birth to transpire,

there has to be the role of two agencies involved. And those two entities are a, a male and a female. I’m not about to turn this Bible study in, into an anatomy study. Okay? It’s not that, but I’ll simply say this, that the male side of things is the passing on life seed. And the female side of things is actually bearing it and bringing the child,

giving birth to the little boy or to the little girl, a birth can never take place unless the water barrier is crossed. There’s a little sack of water that keeps that baby in place. But once that water breaks, you get to the hospital because there’s nothing to keep that child from emerging into a new existence. Does it make sense why the Bible calls this a new you birth?

There are two agencies that are involved. There is the male side of things that is fulfilled by the spirit of God, always spoken of as a masculine entity, except in unique cases of, of Greek and it’s neuter, but never female. Otherwise always spoken of as a masculine agency, he passes on the seed of life. Jesus says that seed is the word of God.

That’s implanted into the fertile soil of our hearts, Luke chapter eight, verse 11. And then you have a watery side of things. The female role, which I believe is expressed and baptism. Have you heard that explanation of the new birth before? I think it makes a lot of sense. There are different viewpoints of it. There are different ways of biblically addressing it.

I can prove that biblically it’s a hundred percent accurate. I have no doubt about that, but we’re not going to look at the new bird from this angle to not what we’re going to do with what Jesus taught about this old truth is we’re going to go back to times, actually quite ancient. And even long before our mom has ever gave birth to us,

we’re going to look at, at the new birth from an old, old, it’s an ancient angle and not the birth of each one of us individually, but the birth of the entire human race, how it came to be and what that has to do with the new birth of which Jesus speaks and John the third chapter. So why is it collectively considered that as a people,

as a whole, not only individuals, but as a whole, we all need to be born again. There is a reason behind it that makes a lot of sense, but I’m telling you, we have to go way back in scripture to find it. And that location is in Genesis. The very first chapter. That’s when human beings for the first time come onto the scene,

Genesis chapter one verses 26 and 27. Then God said, let us speaking to the other members of deity, let us make man in our image, according to our likeness and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air and over the cattle, over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.

So God created man in his own image, in the image of God, he created him, male and female. He created them and it’s down in verse 31 when God sees everything that he had made. And indeed he States it was very good. God creates All things that are found in this universe, including the universe itself and six 24 hour periods.

That’s something, isn’t it. Everything that we’ve known, everything that we’ve observed, everything that we’ve studied going back in history six days and God takes care of all of it. I don’t have any doubt that he could have used six seconds for that matter six milliseconds to do all if he’s so pleased. But he, he intended to set up this system is weak system that,

that we have, and he put it into place. And six days he made all things. And at the end of everything, it stated it was good. Sometimes even in the same day, it was good. And then later in the day it was good once more. And so we see that throughout the creation, but there is a uniqueness that’s found in the creation of humanity.

At the end, it stated about people that people were found to be very good. And here’s why, because humanity was made in God’s own image, That Hebrew Term Selam, it means a Carving or a shaving off. It may actually be the place from which we get our expression, a chip off the old block. Whenever we’re talking about a son of a father or a daughter of a mother,

we are a chip off the old block. Whenever it comes to God, we were carved as a Witler would do, have you ever seen people who can take a single block of wood and they can make an image? That’s so like the original thing, it just blows you away on the way down. I asked him prior just to make sure. Sure.

And I thought, wait a minute, Larry. Not, not my, my dad, Larry. He’s great, but he’s not that talented. No, there’s this one back here, Larry Turner. I thought I haven’t seen it at home believe before, but I’ve heard all about it. You need to show me and you need to take me fishing too,

by the way. But you need to show me that sometime. I would like to see some of the work you’ve done. I’ve seen other people that have done it, and I’m not talking about, you know, you, you carved this and you carve that and you carve this and you screw it, you nail it or you glue it together and that’s impressive of itself,

but from one block of wood to make such exquisite carving so that it looks like the original, You know, that is you and I, we have Been made to look just like The original There’s the animal side of us. That’s like everything else out there, but there’s a uniqueness to us so that we’re made to be just like God himself. And because God is absolutely perfect in every way,

that could only mean that we were made to be absolutely perfect in every way. Just like it. It’s simply remarkable. Isn’t it? The only way Mission God had for us as I did the hard part, I made you just like me, just keep it there. That’s all that you have to do. Okay. Well, how did we do with that?

Not very Well. In case you’re wondering by the sixth chapter of Genesis, it stated in verses five and six, that the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth. And that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually so that the Lord was sorry that he had made man on the earth. And he was even grieved to his heart.

I don’t believe at all this state’s a change of purpose and God’s mind, God knows all things. And he knows what humanity would do. Rather it States a change in disposition when he first makes people so happy, so excited, everything’s perfect. And then we mess it all up and there’s like nothing good left on the planet. And he’s like, Oh,

what’s going on here? He’s upset as opposed to happy, which is what he originally was. And the reason he’s upset with us and because of the poor choices that every one of us has made, God made us without flaw in the beginning. And then we became by our poor choices, his flawed creation. The Bible says a few times in the old Testament,

speaking of the earth, it calls us The womb. Well, that’s an interesting concept, isn’t it? It isn’t implied Metaphor. A metaphor is when you compare two things, but you don’t use like, or as, and it’s implied that this earth is like a mom and I, and that’s probably from where we get the concept of mother earth. And I don’t mean that in an evolutionary way of thinking,

I believe it in the implied metaphor, biblical way of stating things that there’s a sense in which this place is an earth or this place is a mother and it gave birth to us. But you understand why it is that we needed to be born again. God made us absolutely perfect. Whenever the human race was born, we messed it up. And so we needed to go through the process all over again,

to be perfect as we were in the beginning. That’s why we need to be born again. Okay. But how does the Holy spirit fit into all of this in terms of, from the perspective going all the way back to the beginning of creation, we will get there. But first we need to talk about the water. What role does water have in the new birth with an old perspective,

Original creation? Well, it’s in Genesis. This is chapter one, chapter two in verse seven, where the Lord, God formed man of the dust of the ground. And he breathed into his nostrils, the breath of life. And that’s when and where man became a living, being every one of us has the same material composition. We are really wet dust And we’re very refined.

What does, But in our material side of things, we are wet dust. And when given enough time, eventually our bodies break down to originally what they were. And you can’t hardly tell the difference between our stuff in the soil. And that’s because it’s the same stuff that is out of what we were originally made. We are refined dust. That’s,

super-duper wet. That’s who we are. That’s what we are on the material side of things. But the question is this, where did God get that dirt to form human beings, perfect human beings. And the first place Chapter one of Genesis verses nine and 10 God said, let the waters under the heavens be gathered together into one place and let the dry land appear.

And it was so, and God called the dry land earth and the gathering together of the waters. He called seas. And when it’s finished, God has always sees that it was good. Of course, God’s going to take that dust and use it, make it really wet. And he’s going to, as a master sculptor, make our bodies that as we see them today and all the vital systems,

which comprise it, but before he could do that, he had to get the dirt. There was no dirt that was showing across the entirety of the globe. We’re spoiled today because we see a, about a quarter of the Earth’s surface is made up of dirt. It wasn’t that way in the beginning, There was dirt. Yes, but it was hidden.

It was underneath water. And to get the dirt, to use it, to make perfect people, God had to call it born out of the water. Does it make a little more sense now? Why the new birth of humanity in it it’s needed to get people out of water. That’s where God is. I originally got the substance to give birth to the human race.

And in the end he could say, you are perfect. And when we mess things up, he has to send us back down into the water and call us out of it so we can ever be perfect and right with him again. Now, what about the Holy spirit? What kind of role is it that the spirit plays in this process? Well,

we need to go back all the way to the very, very beginning, still Genesis the first chapter, but this time verses one and two in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form And void and darkness Was on the face of the deep geometrically. Speaking. If you’re looking at the earth from a two dimensional perspective,

it is a circle. If you’re looking at it from a three dimensional perspective, it is a sphere. It’s not a perfect sphere. A sphere is a little bit longer than that. It is wide, but it’s near a perfect sphere. It has to be that way in order for life to exist in this place. But before life existed on the planet,

It was not the perfect sphere that we know right now. The picture says that the earth had no form. It was void. If you want to look at the earth like a sports ball, It was like a basketball. There it is now. But originally it was not that way. It was like a deflated basketball, soccer ball, volleyball, kickball,

and you’ve ever had one of those managed frustrating when you go to We’ll play with it because there is nothing that you can really do with it. It doesn’t do what it’s supposed to do. It’s not very useful. That’s true of the earth in the beginning to God Makes it, but it doesn’t have its current shape. It’s boy, there is no wife.

And a big part of that has to do with the fact it has not been molded into the sphere. That’s going to be necessary for life to exist. It’s mentioned that this place is dark. God’s going to have to use dirt in order to make land creatures. There is no dirt that’s readily available just yet. And so you have a planet because it’s misshapen.

It can’t be used. You have a planet because it is dark. Life cannot exist there. You have a planet because there is no ground showing. And there is none that is readily available. You can’t make light Just yet. So God’s going to take care of that. But it’s really Interesting that the specific Terrific person of the Godhead that is mentioned in the first chapter of Genesis,

it’s only one person that’s ever mentioned. My name. I I’m not implying by that. That he’s the only one involved. Anytime God acts all three persons of deity to, or Always involved and in tune with one another, you look Throughout scripture and it’s always the father Who determines what God is going to do. He makes the decisions. He calls the shots.

It’s also why we pray to him. He makes the decisions. It is always Jesus. The son who carries out what it is that the father has decided It needs to take place. That’s why Jesus has always stated to be the hands-on creator of all things. That’s why Jesus is born of a woman. That’s why Jesus dies on the cross. That’s why Jesus is raised.

That’s also why Jesus is coming back again. The Holy spirit is always the Avenue or the medium through which better stated Through whom Christ acts out, what it is. Father has determined needs to take place. What’s really interesting though, about Genesis chapter one is that there’s only one person of deity who specifically mentioned by name at the end of the day. First two of Genesis one.

It’s the spirit of God that is hovering over the face Of the waters. Hmm. Wonder what it is that he’s doing around the water. Well, if you’ll notice in verse three, once the, the presence of the spirit is found something profound is going to be generated right after this remark. If you have the presence of the spirit, verse three it’s,

then that God says, let there be light and boom. There is lights So important for light to arrive on the same because you can’t have life without light. And so light needs to, pre-seed The why the life now I’m curious, how is it? If you want to get lights, wherever it is that you’re in your house, how do you find that?

Now you might have one of those really fancy houses and you want light, you know, and the light comes on. I don’t have one of those. Although I have a really fancy house where if I want light to come on, I get up from my comfortable seat. I walk over to the wall and I push a button. You might have a fancy switch like this one as well.

It’s, it’s the old-fashioned manual way, right? Of doing things. But you want light. You have to go put some effort into it to get it. God’s so powerful. Then when he wants light, he says, come on. And that’s exactly what it does. It’s the spirit and fuse word of Christ that calls light out of darkness. God,

It’s so powerful. All he has to do is just say it. And the creation obeys his voice for that matter, all he has to do is just speak it. And a creation comes into being when formerly there was no creation that blows my mind, but that’s the power of God. And that’s the power of the spirit infused word. It can call a creation into being when formerly it wasn’t there.

It can call light out of darkness. When all there was is darkness. That’s the power of the spirit and fused word. And here’s what it means for us In the next life. Jesus Says in John chapter six, Verse 33, it is the spirit who gives life, the flesh Profits, nothing. And the words that I speak to you, they are spirit and yes,

they are life. Jesus has the power to give us life when formerly we’re dead. And it’s very simple, the process by which he does. So it’s the spirit infused word that is used to produce life in us. The same word that was used to produce lights when formerly there was just darkness. So life could exist. Anyway, that’s the power of the word of Christ as provided by the Holy spirit.

I want us to look Back in Genesis chapter one, just one more time. Before we cross over and we Finish up in the new Testament, Genesis chapter one and verse four, God saw the light that it Was good And God divided the light from the darkness He had to do. So the two don’t have anything to do with one another. In fact,

You look up the definitions of these two concepts and lights is yes. Illumination. Yes, it’s brightness, but it’s also the add true light is the absence of darkness. You look up darkness and it’s simply the absence of light. You can’t have true of the one and also Have the other they’re so different from one another. This is physically true, but it’s far more important,

spiritual Than what it is physically. If you have, I have spiritual darkness, true darkness. You cannot have light. And if you Have true spiritual lights, you cannot have darkness And light Is required to have. I have spiritual life. Now Crossing over to the new Testament. I ask you to consider what’s written in first, Peter chapter two, verse nine,

and the significance Of this concept, Peter writes to Christians telling them, but you are a chosen generation, A Royal priesthood, a whole Holy nation, his own special people that you may proclaim the praises of him who called you out of darkness and into his marvelous light. It was necessary for him to do so because without lights, you don’t have any life.

Anyhow, How’d you get you out of the darkness and bring you into the light to give you the opportunity to Live, to give you The chance to be reborn as the human race was born in the beginning, but not until light was instituted out of the darkness through the power of the spirit. Given word Of Christ. Notice Where in Peter’s first epistle,

we’re going to stay there. What I want to do though, is to rewind to the first chapter and read what he says at the end. And it was not forget that that God didn’t break up the chapters. Okay? A lot of times there’s a flow of thought and people say, I’m running out of breath. Let’s stop there. But God wasn’t running out of breath.

And he had more things to say about that. Well, that’s, what’s going on here. It’s the same overall topic. But back in chapter one, verses 22 and 23 separated by just a few verses, he says, you have purified your souls in obeying the truth. That is the word of God. According to John 17, 17, notice through the spirit,

how is he connected to this thing? It is infused with him. He’s the one who’s provided words. He’s given it. You’ve obeyed the word of God through the spirit and sincere love of the brethren. He goes on to say having been born again, not of corruptible seed, but incorruptible through the word of God, which lives and abides forever. And I believe this is an illusion to the concept of our individual births.

Every one of us came to be because, and part of a role of a father passing on the seed of life. But that seed of life is corruptible. He could only generate life for us. That would last for a certain time. The seed of the Holy spirit, the word of God, however, is much different by this seed entering into our heart And germinating fertile ground.

It can produce life that lasts forever. You see the concept of being born again on an individual basis is a very biblical one. But now I want us to go back to the more ancient thought and see how it ties in to this old teaching of Christ as well. We’re going to conclude with this Bible passage, second Corinthians five and the 17th verse second Corinthians five 17 there Paul writes,

If anyone is in Christ, Location means everything spiritually. You’re putting in a business by the way, location is they say location, location, location. It’s true. Religiously too. Location is everything. According to Ephesians two, if you’re on the outside of Christ, you have no hope. You are without God And you don’t have a fighting chance, but Ephesians one says,

if you have the right location and you’re in Christ, you have the forgiveness of sins, The riches of his grace and access to every spiritual blessing locations, everything and religion, just like as well and business. If anyone is in Christ, listen to this. He is a new creation. That concept of creation is an old thought. Where’s the first place in the Bible,

you know, and you’ve read of that. That’s in Genesis. The first chapter, if anyone’s found in Jesus has been relocated to where the Lord is no longer outside, but now inside of him, he or she is a new creation. You’ve gone through Genesis one all over again. So that the old things, the ways that you’ve messed up, your imperfections they’ve passed away.

They’re not attached to you anymore. Instead, all things Have become new. That is if you’ve allowed yourself to be covered up with water, as the original creation was The spirit infused word of Christ in obedience and response to what he told you in that old truth, we’ll call you for no longer as flawed dirt, but flawless, refined. Cozort once again,

just like the first time brothers, I believe this teaching goes a long way. Even explaining the flood that we find in the sixth chapter of Genesis. Remember, people are brought out of water from the dirt that you used and they’re made to be perfect, absolutely flawless in God’s image. Man, did we royally messed that up by Genesis six. Everyone is such a mess.

God says the world’s not even worth saving anymore. I’m going to take these people. These eight are the best that I can find. And I’ll take those and we’ll start over from there, but consider what he did with the globe. All of the earth, he covered up with water. And second Peter chapter three verse five says the world that then existed Perished being flooded with water.

He killed it all off Because he had to start over and try to recreate everything. Once again, I know it’s going to be a little bit different than what he did the first time, but the, a new earth is going to be reborn. Peter says the old world that then existed Perished being flooded with water. Okay. Although we know all three persons of the Godhead were involved in this judgment that was brought on humanity.

Once more, I will say I find it very intriguing that there’s only one person of the Godhead. Back at that time, That’s mentioned Jenna, Chapter six, verse three, the Lord said my spirit shall not strive with man forever for he is indeed flood cash. In other words, I’m not going to keep putting up with it. I’m not going to keep fighting with people who will not do what I tell them to do.

And so he, Troy has them all say for the eight and he covers the whole place, Waist up with water, and then Notice how all of this has done. According to second, Peter, the third chapter, which later Highlights it by the word of God, spirit infused word takes care of things. It destroys all The earth and covers it all up with water,

but then God causes the earth to reemerge and the waters to recede. So the planet can be in a sense, recreated all over again, just like Genesis After one. Here’s the thing. We messed it all up again. And it didn’t take us very long to do it. So Peter says in his first epistle in chapter three and connecting these events in verses 18 through 20,

he says in verse 21, first Peter three 21, there also an anti type or a fulfillment of what took place back in Genesis six that now saves us. And that thing is baptism. It’s not cleaning up your dirty body, even though it does involve your body, but is cleaning up your dirty conscience. And that fuel that makes it all happen as the reservoir Correction of Jesus Christ.

But he says, as God did back in this time and he recreated the globe and gave a chance for there to be perfection again. And we became so imperfect so quickly in a similar fashion, he gives us The opportunity to be recreated all over again. And he calls for us now flawed dirt to go underneath the surface of water and for his space,

Your infused word, according to his instruction to call us for. And when we come out, we’re no longer darkness or light again, we’re no longer in perfect, but we’re perfect once again, because we have not just been born one time, but at this point we’d been born a second time. We’ve been born again, and I believe that’s the reason the new Testament calls this process,

the new creation, or as we just saying, Terry, a moment ago, the new creature God has caused us to reenact the original creation of humanity in Genesis. The first chapter all over again. The question is this, have you been born again? Have you been born? Not the first time, but a second time. Not of the earth,

but a heaven. Have you been born of water and spirit? Have you allowed you Your flawed self to go underneath the surface of the water? So the spirit infused word of Christ can call you No longer an imperfect creature, but perfect. All over again. Having been recreated in the very image of God, himself, just as he created you in perfection.

The first time, if you’ve gone through this process and God looks down from heaven, what does he see in you as his child? Does he look down and say, man, that, that looks just like me. Does he look down and say, that’s sounds just like me, or does he look down and say, Jim says one all over again.

But as a child of God, we don’t have to be covered back up with water any longer we’re told in acts chapter eight, verse 22, that through repentance, sincere repentance and heartfelt prayer to God, he can recreate us all over again, back into his image. How do you look tonight compared to the image of your creator? It’s an old truth.

You can’t get any older than dirt itself. And that’s how old this truth is, but it’s so needful and it’s just as applicable to a new world today as it was some 6,000 Years ago. If There’s something that’s off in your image, God can remake you to look just like himself. And he has the perfect plan to do so if you’d like to submit yourself to it tonight,

come and make that known as we stand and sing the song together.