Matthew 5:3: “Blessed Are the Poor in Spirit…”

INTRODUCTION:

Back in my school teaching days, I used to ask my students to write an essay for me each week. One of topics I asked them to write about was what their ambition was for their lives.

The most common ambition of these 5th, 6th and 7th graders was simply to be happy. They weren’t dreaming of fame or riches. They just wanted to be happy.

Well, those children are in their 60s or 70s now, and I hope that they have learned by now that there are more important things than “being happy”—and that happiness is not achieved by aiming at it.

Jesus gave us some instructions for what makes a “happy” life.

We call them “The Beatitudes.” “Beatitude” just means “blessing.” The Beatitudes are the first nine sentences of the Sermon on the Mount.

The first one goes like this: “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven.” Then follows: “Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.” Next: “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.” You would recognize the others.

These words are familiar, so familiar that when we hear them, we are not especially impressed.

That is because we have heard them so much that we don’t realize that they are like 9 little bombshells, demolishing the ideas we take for granted about what it takes to have a happy life.

If you asked most people, “What makes a happy life?” they might tell you that the good life is to be young and healthy, to have good friends, to have fun, to be respected, and to have enough money to buy nice things.

Many dream of winning the lottery. They think that if they had a million dollars, their troubles would be over. This, in spite of the fact that winning the lottery has ruined—not helped—many lives.

What Jesus says constitutes a happy life is just the opposite of what most people would choose.

Today I intend to talk about the first Beatitude: “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”

I. First, I want to talk to you about this first word: “Blessed.”

The word in Greek is makarios. According to my Greek lexicon, makarios has three meanings: “happy,” “blessed,” and “fortunate.”

We think of “happiness” as a feeling, but here Jesus isn’t really talking about feelings.

He’s talking about a reality that is more than just a feeling. So our translation uses the word, “blessed.” Or equally good would be the word, “fortunate.” The meaning is, “How fortunate are those who are poor in spirit!”

Even if they don’t always feel happy, the poor in spirit are blessed—because they are fortunate. They have the best in this life—and in the life to come.

II. People can be poor in different ways.

A. Some people are poor because they’ve not got the things necessary for life.

When Jesus was on earth poor people were much more likely to be attracted to him than rich people.

Rich people are actually at a disadvantage when it comes to responding to the gospel.

That is why Jesus warned so often about the danger of riches. Three of the four gospels record Jesus’s saying: “It is harder for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.”

It is hard for a rich person not to think that he or she is somehow better than other people. Rich people get their way in the world. People respect them because they are rich.

To have plenty of money makes a person feel comfortable in his world and it dims his hope for something better to come.

Another time Jesus said, “Blessed are you poor, for yours is the Kingdom of God” (Luke 6:20).

B. But Matthew has it a little different. As we have read it, Matthew quotes Jesus as saying, “Blessed are the poor in spirit…”

Now, I think that Jesus, like every other preacher, said similar things at different times. And one time he said, “Blessed are the poor in spirit,” and another time he said, “Blessed are you poor.”

When Jesus says, “Blessed are the poor in spirit…” he isn’t limiting his blessing to those who are poor in money. This is good for us. We aren’t literally poor, but we can have the blessing of the “poor in spirit.”

One may have money and be poor in spirit, and one can have no money and be proud and forgetful of God.

Jesus told a story about two men who went to the temple to pray. One looked up to God and said, “God, I thank you that I am not like other people: thieves, rogues, adulterers. …I fast twice a week; I give a tenth of all my income.”

But the other man—a despised tax collector—could not look up to God but bowed his head and beat his breast and simply said, “God be merciful to me, a sinner!” (Luke 18:9-14).

Now the tax collector was probably had more money than the Pharisee, because Pharisees weren’t generally rich. But Pharisees tended to be proud. They knew they were more righteous than most people.

Many tax collectors became wealthy. But this tax collector knew that before God he was poor and needy, and he begged God for forgiveness.

And Jesus said that the sinful, but repentant, tax collector went back to his house with the gift of salvation, while the self-righteous Pharisee went home unchanged.

We are not poor. We have enough to eat and a comfortable place to stay and money to pay our bills—but we are also needy. We need God.

We know how far short we have come from being all that God intended us to be, and, like the tax collector, we bow our heads and cry out, “God be merciful to me, a sinner.”

III. Now it’s time to talk about what it means to be “poor in spirit.”

A. One translation has it this way: ““Blessed are those who know they are poor.”

When the great Martin Luther came to die it is said that his last words were: “We are beggars; this is true.”

Luther was a great man. He was successful. He was admired.

But Luther realized that before God he was a beggar.

Everything he had that was worth having was what God, in his mercy, had given him.

To be poor in spirit is the opposite of being “rich in spirit.”

To be rich in spirit is to be self-sufficient, pleased with myself, to have a feeling of superiority—not perfect, but better than most people.

To be rich in spirit is to be constantly aware of the faults of other people and mostly blind to my own.

To be rich in spirit is to think that I deserve to have my share of good things and to suppose that my wealth, health and success are evidence of my goodness.

To be poor in spirit is to be empty and open before God.

To be poor in spirit is to have a deep sense of my sin and need. It is to know my helplessness and God’s goodness.

To be poor in spirit is to have plenty of room for God in my life. It is to have Jesus so fill my heart that I become small in my own eyes—and Jesus becomes great.

If I am poor in spirit, I live in the presence of God. I will be open-handed and open-hearted. I will know in the depths of my heart that what I have is not mine but God’s.

To be poor in spirit is to be like Jesus.

In Philippians 2, St. Paul writes this:

In lowliness of mind, count others better than yourselves.

Let each of you look not only to your own interests,

but also to the interests of others.

Have this mind among yourselves, which you have in Christ Jesus,

who, though he was in the form of God,

did not count equality with God a thing to cling to,

but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant,

being born in the likeness of men.

And being found in human form,

he humbled himself and became obedient unto death,

even death on a cross

(Philippians 2:3-8).

Someone said, “God wants to give us something, but our hands are too full.”

Or maybe we should say, “Our hearts are too full”—too full of feelings of self-satisfaction…goodness…superiority.

We are too often, like the Pharisee in the temple, thankful that we are not like other people.

We forget that we are sinners and need God’s mercy as much as the worst sinner in the world.

It’s only when we realize our spiritual poverty that we are willing to accept the gift of life that God is holding out to us.

“Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound,

That saved a wretch like me.

I once was lost but now I’m found,

Was blind but now I see.”

The man who wrote that understood his spiritual poverty.

And because he understood his spiritual poverty, he could experience God’s amazing grace.

CONCLUSON

“Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”

The “Kingdom of Heaven” simply means God’s Kingdom.

God’s kingdom is where God rules.

If God is ruling your life, you are living in God’s kingdom—even while you are still in this world.

And someday you will experience the Kingdom of God in its glorious fullness.

In this world we have trials and tribulations. Sometimes we are walking through the valley of the shadow of death.

But we are blessed, because we have the riches that can never be taken away.

We are rich because we have God, and God is enough.

Once I was riding in an elevator in a retirement center where a lot of rich people live.

It is a luxurious place and no one can go there unless they have plenty of money.

But riding in the elevator I heard one woman say, “This is a very sad place. Everyone here has a sad story.”

We all have sad stories, whether we are rich or poor, but if we have Jesus we are blessed anyway because we can look forward to everything that is good and pleasant.

A hospital chaplain left the hospital shortly before noon on Ash Wednesday to attend a service at a nearby church. As part of the worship, the minister inscribed on the chaplain’s forehead a cross made of ashes mingled with oil. He returned to the hospital, ashes still in place, and began to visit the patients. One of the patients, a woman, noticed the ashes on his forehead and, thinking it was a smudge of dirt, grabbed a tissue, moistened it, and said, “Come here, Hon, you’ve gotten into something.”

The chaplain artfully avoided the tissue and explained: “No, they are ashes. They’re supposed to be there.” She looked at him, puzzled.

He told her the meaning of Ash Wednesday, that the minister places ashes on our foreheads as he says, “From dust you came and to dust you shall return.” They remind us that God was with us when we were weak and sinful. They represent our acknowledgment of our mortality and our sin and our need of God.

The woman thought for a moment and then she said, “I think I want some of that.” The chaplain slowly reached to his forehead, borrowed some of the ashes, and with his finger traced on her forehead the sign of the cross.

Let me end with these lines Isaiah’s prophecy, written hundreds of years before Jesus came. But I believe that these words were in Jesus’s mind when he said, “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven”:

Thus says the high and lofty One

who inhabits eternity,

whose name is Holy:

“I dwell in the high and holy place,

and also with him who is of a contrite and humble spirit,

to revive the spirit of the humble,

and to revive the heart of the contrite.”

(Isaiah 57:15)

If we are poor in spirit—if we are humble and lowly in heart, God dwells with us and we are already part of his realm. To us the Kingdom of Heaven is a reality even while we are in this world, and the more empty our heart is of love for the fleeting pleasures of this world and the more full it is of the love of Christ, the more sure we are of our glorious destiny.

The world may call it a “pie in the sky, by and by,” but we can see it from afar.

Soon it will be Christmas, when we commemorate a time when, in an obvious way, God’s reality entered ours. And Jesus calls us to himself to partake of the life of that other world which is eternal—a world that is normally hidden from sense and sight but is more real and permanent than all that we see and feel.

Dear Jesus, teach us our spiritual poverty so that we may embrace your Kingdom—so that we may find our rest in you. Fill our lives with your love and peace. Prepare us for Glory.

Philippians 2:14-15: How to Shine Like a Star in a Dark World

INTRODUCTION

Dorotha Bartman was a resident here at Village Ridge. She was in her 90s when we met her here. She departed to be with Jesus a couple of years ago at the age of 99.

Dorotha was totally deaf but she never missed a church service. It was because of her deafness that I began writing out my messages, so that she could have a copy to follow as I spoke. Although Dorotha had lost her hearing, she could still speak. She took part in each of our services by reading an inspirational story or a poem to us at the beginning of each service. She had a good clear voice and we all enjoyed her contributions.

One Sunday she told us this story:

There was a man who was 92 and blind. His wife of 70 years had recently died. A friend agreed to take him to a nursing home.

After waiting some time in the lobby of the nursing home, he smiled brightly as the nurse told his room was ready. As he maneuvered his walker into the elevator, his friend gave him a description of his little room.

“I love it!” he exclaimed, with enthusiasm.

“But you haven’t seen it yet,” his friend protested.

“That doesn’t have anything to do with it,” he replied. “Happiness is something you decide on ahead of time. Whether I like my room or not doesn’t depend on how the furniture is arranged—it’s how I arrange my mind. I have decided to love it.”

He explained that this was a decision he made every morning when he woke up. Each day, he said, he could lie in bed, mourning the difficulty he had with the parts of his body that no longer work—or he could get out of bed and be thankful for the parts that do.

Dorotha told us this: Each day is a gift, and we should focus on the happy memories we have stored away—just for this time of life. She said, “Life is like a bank account; you withdraw from what you have put in.”

I. St. Paul wrote his letter to the Christians at Philippi while in prison, chained to a guard. He would have had reason to be downhearted at the time when he wrote that letter.

A. But this is the letter in which he writes: “Rejoice always, and again I say, rejoice” (4:4) And again: “Even if I am to be poured as a libation upon the sacrificial offering of your faith, I am glad and rejoice with you all. Likewise you also should be glad and rejoice with me” (2:17-18)

Today I would like to talk a few lines of advice St. Paul gave his friends in Philippi.

He wrote, “Do all things without grumbling or questioning, that you may be blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation among whom you shine as lights in the world” (2:14-15).

“Do all things without grumbling or questioning…”

It’s easy to fall into the habit of majoring on the things (and people) that disappoint us.

When we complain about each other, we forget that we irritate other people as much as they irritate us. We’re just much more aware of the faults of others than we are of our own faults.

It’s like the headlights of an approaching car. You remember driving down the highway at night and encountering a driver who neglected to dim his lights. The brightness blinds you.

But if it’s you who forgot to dim your lights, you are unaware of it until the approaching driver flashes his lights at you.

Sometimes we complain about things we really should be thankful for.

We may complain about a disappointing meal. But we should be thankful that we get enough to eat. Remember how, when you were a child and were complaining about your turnips (or whatever), your mother would remind you of the starving children in China who would be thankful just to have something to eat?

Sometimes we complain about things we can’t do anything about. What’s the use of complaining about our health, the weather, the government, or that the younger generation is going to the dogs?

The more we talk about what’s wrong, the worse we feel, and the worse we feel the worse we make everyone around us feel.

Sometimes we complain about God. We’re discontented with the way he’s running his world.

We think he should do something about our troubles. Instead we might ask God to show us the meaning of our afflictions and disappointments.

B. Complaining has less to do with the circumstances of our life—how much trouble we are facing—than it has to do with our attitude toward life.

I remember a friend in a nursing home who said this to another resident who was expressing her discontent about something or other. She said, “We just can’t take that attitude.” Content has more to do with attitude than circumstances.

Remember the man in Dorotha’s story. He said, “Happiness is something you decide on ahead of time. Whether I like my room or not doesn’t depend on how the furniture is arranged—it’s how I arrange my mind. I have decided to love it.”

Have you heard this bit of verse?

Some murmur when their sky is clear

And wholly bright to view,

If one small speck of dark appear

In their great heaven of blue:

And some with thankful love are filled,

If but one streak of light,

One ray of God’s good mercy, guild

The darkness of their night.

C. The story is told of a man in Budapest went to his rabbi and complained. He said, “Life is unbearable. There are nine of us living in one room. What can I do?”

The rabbi answered, “Take your goat into the room with you.”

The man was stunned, but the rabbi insisted. “Do as I say, and come back in a week.”

A week later the man came back looking more distraught than ever. “We can’t stand it,” he told the rabbi. “The goat is filthy.”

The rabbi then told him, “Go home and take the goat out, and come back in a week.”

A week the man came back to the rabbi, his face alight with pleasure. “Life is beautiful. We enjoy every minute of it—now that there is no goat.”

When we are feeling sorry for ourselves, it is good to remember that it could be worse. There are those who are less fortunate than we are.

Someone said, “I complained about the shoes I had to wear, until I saw a man with no feet.”

II. Now notice the reason why Paul says we shouldn’t grumble and question.

A. “…so that “you may be blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation.

Children resemble their parents. God’s children should be like God.

Other people should be able to see the family resemblance.

As God’s children we should be the nicest, pleasantest, most considerate people around. Then we are like Jesus. Then we behave like children of God.

B. “...children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation among whom you shine like lights in the world.”

In most translations, “Lights in the world” is translated “stars in the world.”

The stars are lights in the dark sky. Christians are the lights in a dark world.

Sailors find their way over the dark seas by looking at the stars. Christians can show the way to God by shining like stars in our world of sin and darkness.

Nowadays we are so used to electric lights shining everywhere that we can hardly remember that in our youth we could look up at a black sky, in which multitudes of stars shone like diamonds in the sky. Remember the Big and Little Dippers and the Milky Way?

When I was in the army in Korea, we had no electric lights. We were warned never to strike a match at night because the enemy could see that tiny flash that would give our position away—even if he was miles away.

Or the lights could be thought of as the little oil lamps people used in their homes. Do you remember these lines that Portia speaks in Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice?

“How far that little candle throws his beams!

So shines a good deed in a naughty world.”

I think Shakespeare had been reading his Bible.

At our last service at Village Ridge we sang this old Sunday school song:

“Jesus bids us shine, with a clear, pure light,

Like a little candle, shining in the night.

In this world of darkness, we must shine,

You in your small corner, and I in mine.”

One way we can shine for Jesus is by our grateful spirit.

If we have a grateful spirit, we will refuse to grumble and complain.

When we are grateful, we make ourselves happier, and we make those around us happier too.

When we are discontented, grumpy and sour, we spread our misery to those around us.

When bad things happen, we may not feel cheerful or grateful, but we can still refuse to grumble and complain.

God doesn’t require that we be always bubbling over with happiness. Jesus said, “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.”

At one time Paul was so distressed that he wrote, “We were so utterly, unbearably crushed that we despaired of life itself” (2 Corinthians 1:9). Another time he wrote that he was “sorrowful, but always rejoicing” (2 Corinthians 6:10). So even Paul, and even Jesus became discouraged. The important thing is to keep trusting God, and living out our faith.

CONCLUSION

Sometimes when you go to the doctor, the doctor will ask you to stick out your tongue, and put that little wooden paddle on your tongue and ask you to say, “Ahhh.” Evidently a good doctor can tell something about what ails you just by looking at your tongue.

In the same way God looks at our tongues. Many of our sins are sins that we express with our tongues.

We are particular about what we put into our mouths. But Jesus says that it’s a lot more important what comes out of our mouths than what goes in. He says, “The good person out of the good treasure of the heart produces good, and the evil person out of the evil treasure produces evil; for it is out of the abundance of the heart that the mouth speaks.”

If someone collected my words or your words and sorted them out, what proportion would be compliments, or words of encouragement, or sympathy, or thankfulness? And what proportion would be words of criticism, faultfinding, discontent, self-pity?

One of the nicest compliments I have ever received was unintended. We were at breakfast and someone was pointing out the faults of another person. I remarked that maybe we didn’t understand that person’s problems—maybe there are reasons why he is so unhappy and disagreeable, reasons that we don’t know.

My friend said, “Oh, you are always making excuses for people.” I was pleased to hear that—even though it wasn’t intended as a compliment.

Jesus even made excuses for the people who drove nails through his hands and hung him on the cross. He said, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.”

A friend of mine likes to quote this saying from Confucius, the ancient Chinese sage: “When we see persons of worth, we should think of equaling them. When we see persons of contrary character, we should turn inwards and examine ourselves.”

So when we see people who are filled with kindness, or wisdom, or thankfulness—let’s try to be like they are.

And when we see people who are bitter, or cross, or crabby, or ungrateful—let’s look within and see what sins we need to repent of. And if we look hard enough, we’ll always find some sin to confess and forsake.

That will help us be humble and helpful and grateful—and to shine for Jesus in our dark world.

John 3:1-8: How Many Birthdays Do You Need?

INTRODUCTION

When I was a child I remember that some of the families we knew had a second verse to the Happy Birthday song. It went like this:

Happy birthday to you;

Only one will not do.

Born again means salvation;

How many have you?

Have you ever been asked, “Have you been born again?”

In many churches the term “born again” is used sparingly.

But in other circles, such as the one I grew up in, preachers very often preached the gospel in terms of being “born again.” I think that some of our preachers didn’t know how to talk about salvation in any other terms.

But some people are disturbed by the question: “Have you been born again?” It creeps them out.

One of my friends has a stock answer to that question. She says, “No, I did it right the first time.” But she doesn’t understand what “born again” means.

Actually, the phrase only occurs a handful of times in the Bible. St. Paul never uses the words in any of his letters, and they never occur in the book of Acts or the first three gospels.

St. Peter mentions the term “born anew” in his first letter, and St. John uses the term “born of God” in his first letter.

But the preachers of my youth would always go to John 3—the story of Jesus and Nicodemus—and preach on the verse 3: “You must be born again!”

I want today to talk about that story and explain what that phrase—“born again”—means—and doesn’t mean.

The story begins this way: “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”

I. First of all, let’s go in our imaginations to that scene John describes.

A. Nicodemus was not typical of people who are attracted to Jesus. Nicodemus was an important man, an educated man, a ruler in Israel. He was a Pharisee, and we often read in the gospels of the hostility of the Pharisees to Jesus.

But Nicodemus wasn’t a typical Pharisee. Nicodemus was impressed with Jesus’s miracles and with Jesus’s teaching, and he wanted to know more.

So he came one night for a visit, and Jesus welcomed him.

Many preachers, when they preach about this story, will tell you that Nicodemus came by night because he was afraid for his reputation if he was seen with Jesus. So he came after dark, secretly, so that he wouldn’t be criticized. But from the other things we read about Nicodemus in the Gospel of John, we know that Nicodemus wasn’t a coward.

I think Nicodemus came to Jesus at night because in the daytime, Jesus was typically surrounded by crowds. He came after dark because he wanted to have serious conversation with the Lord Jesus.

Artists picture this scene in various ways. Some picture the two sitting among the olive trees in a garden at night. Others picture the two sitting in a dimly-lit room.

But the picture that I like best shows the two sitting on the low wall that ran around the roof of the house where Jesus was staying. The two men are sitting there, under the stars, deep in conversation.

A typical house of the time had a flat roof with a low wall around it. People often went up to the roof to sleep on hot evenings. An outside stairway led up to the roof. Often a guest room—called an aliyah—was up there on the roof.

Perhaps Jesus was staying in the guest room and studying or praying when Nicodemus arrived. Nicodemus could have come up the stairs to the roof without disturbing the family sleeping below in the house.

B. Nicodemus began his interview with a compliment: “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’s answer seems rude. He replies to Nicodemus’s greeting with: “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.”

Now that rejoinder puzzled me. It seems ungracious for Jesus to judge Nicodemus so quickly as one who will not see—that is, will not experience—the kingdom of God.

The fondest hope of a devout Jew like Nicodemus was to see to be alive to welcome the Kingdom of God.

I think that probably this conversation lasted for some time. The short sketch included in John just hits the highlights of the conversation.

I think that leading up to Jesus’s remark being born again was a lengthy conversation about the kingdom of God. And as the two talked about the coming Kingdom of God, Jesus realized that Nicodemus didn’t realize that he wasn’t ready to enter that Kingdom.

C. So Jesus used this startling metaphor about being “born again.” Actually, the word means literally “born from above.” Jesus no doubt was thinking of both meanings—born again and born from above.

But Nicodemus was puzzled. He didn’t realize that Jesus was speaking symbolically—or as we say “metaphorically.” And he took it literally, and he said, “How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born?”

I suspect that it took some time for Jesus to explain to Nicodemus what he meant, and John gives us just a sketch of Jesus’s remarks, which included this:

“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, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’ The wind blows where it wills, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know whence it comes or whither it goes; so it is with every one who is born of the Spirit” (vv5-8).

II. Now let’s look at how the idea of a new birth occurs elsewhere in the New Testament.

A. In the first chapter, John writes that Jesus came to his own people, the Jews, but they did not—as a nation—receive him. “But,” he writes, “those who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God; who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God” (John 1:12-13).

Here John is contrasting natural birth with a new kind of life, given by God.

In John’s first letter—near the end of your Bible—John writes this: “If you know that he is righteous, you may be sure that everyone who does right has been born of him” (2:29), and “Beloved, let us love one another, because love is from God; everyone who loves is born of God and knows God” (4:7), and again, “Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ has been born of God (5:1).

Peter also uses the idea in the first chapter of his letter. He writes, “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! By his great mercy we have been born anew to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead” (verse 3), and, “You have been born anew, not of perishable but of imperishable seed, through the living and enduring word of God” (v23).

B. St. Paul uses different language to express the idea of the new life that God gives to the believer in Christ.

In 2 Corinthians 5 Paul writes, “If any one is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has passed away, behold the new has come.”

In Ephesians, Paul writes that by nature we were dead to God, but by faith in Christ, we have been raised with him to share the life of God. He writes, “You he made alive, when you were dead through the trespasses and sins in which you once walked. …But God, who is rich in mercy, out of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead through our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ.” (2.1, 4-5).

And in Colossians 3, Paul writes, “So if you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above…for you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God” (verses 1 and 3).

So Paul expresses the same idea of new life in Christ but uses different words.

C. So you see, “born again” is not a formula, or some kind of hoop one must jump through to become a child of God It is simply a picturesque way of expressing the idea that when a sinner invites Christ into his or her life, it is a radical change in the believer’s character, like having a new life, or being born again.

Jesus told Nicodemus: “The wind blows where it chooses, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit” (verse 8).

Maybe as Jesus and Nicodemus conversed outdoors under the stars, a breeze came up which gave Jesus a way of illustrating the spiritual awakening that occurs when the Holy Spirit of God enters into or lives.

The Spirit gives us a new way a new way of thinking. Like the wind, which comes from we know not where, what has happened to us when we meet Jesus seems mysterious and unexplainable—we can’t see it; we can’t touch it, but it is real and life changing—like being “born again.”

III. Now I want to talk about what “born again” doesn’t mean.

A. It doesn’t mean that if you haven’t had an earth-shaking experience that happened on a certain day and in a certain hour, you are not a child of God. And it doesn’t mean that if you haven't got a story about how you “got saved,” you are on your way to hell.

Some people have wonderful stories. But most of us don’t. We came to understanding gradually, often as children. But even as adults, sometimes God works slowly, and we gradually come to the realization of what it means to have Jesus in our lives.

Some people pass through a period of doubt—a lack of assurance—they want to believe but aren’t sure their faith is good enough.

One way to determine the reality of faith in your life is to look at the change Jesus is making in you. We are not saved by our good works, but real faith makes a difference in our lives.

If your faith is real, you may not feel much different, but you will notice that you are becoming more generous, less critical of others, more forgiving, more serious about your faith. You will be looking for ways to serve others.

You will probably feel a peace and joy and contentment in your heart. You will not be so afraid to think about death, because you can believe that death is the doorway to wonderful eternal life with Jesus and all God’s family, and with the saints and angels.

CONCLUSION

I have known people who had such an earth-shaking experience of meeting Jesus that they are eager to tell you how they were “born again.”

I remember my cousin Duncan. He was the genius of the family. When he met Jesus he was such a changed person that one friend who had known him before and after said, “If the new Duncan wasn’t wearing the same skin as the old Duncan, I wouldn’t have known he was the same person.”

I think of Linda, who worked with us at the mental hospital. After Linda met Jesus one of her friends said, “Linda’s changed so much, it’s scary!”

I think of my friend Jim, who I met when he was an inmate in the state prison in Mt. Pleasant. Jim was a hard-core, violent criminal, in his thirties, who was serving his ninth sentence. You wouldn’t have wanted to know Jim in his unregenerate state. He was outstandingly wicked. But while in prison Jim had met Jesus and he was a transformed man. He was mellow. The counselors loved to have him in their classes because he was so helpful and such a good example to the other inmates.

Jim has been out of prison now for more than 30 years and he has been a faithful husband and father. He has been active in his union, in his neighborhood association, and in his church. For years he conducted weekly Bible studies in a prison—separate sessions for men and women. He and his wife have given hospitality to released offenders who needed a place to stay while they got on their feet.

Jim has no doubt in his mind about at what day and hour he gave himself to Jesus and was born again.

I don’t have a salvation story, but I don’t need one. I didn’t see the sun rise this morning, but I know it is up there.

Jesus said that those who believe in Jesus have “passed from death into life” (John 5:24). The natural state of humankind is to be spiritually dead, but when Christ comes into a life we are alive with the life of God. That’s what Jesus meant when he told Nicodemus, “You must be born again.”

So if you love Jesus, and you are living your life for him, and someone asks you if you have been born again, say, “Yes indeed, I have been born again. I belong to Jesus. He’s my Savior and Lord.”

One of the best definitions of a Christian is a person who has met God in Jesus Christ and is trusting him as Savior and obeying him as Lord.