Dr. Charles Stanley: The
title of this message is "What is the Meaning of Being
Born Again?" Lots of people have different
ideas and attitudes about it, but what does the Word of God
say? What matters is God's attitude,
what He means by that term, and its effect upon all of us. Because the truth is God wants
all of us to be born again, to be prepared to go to heaven. So somebody says, "Well,
what difference does it make?" I'll tell you what difference it
makes. The Bible says, "It's appointed
unto man once to die, and after this the judgment." It makes a difference what you
and I believe. And God has given us this
awesome passage of Scripture in a conversation between Jesus and
a very outstanding Jewish Pharisee, a Pharisee who had
been listening to Jesus and watching Him, more than likely
because he came to see Him in the evening, in the night,
the Bible says. And so therefore, he was either
very busy or he was afraid that his fellow Pharisees would see
him or hear that he had been visiting some Nazarene who was
talking about ideas that were foreign to them. So, I want us to read this
passage of Scripture and then I want to be sure that when this
message is over, you know what it means to be born again, how
that can take place in your life, and the importance of it
for your whole eternity. So, if you will, turn to the
third chapter of John, and let's start with the first verse. The Scripture says, "Now there
was a man of the Pharisees, named Nicodemus, a ruler of the
Jews," he had a high office, "this man came to Jesus by night
and said to Him, 'Rabbi, we know that You have come from God as a
teacher, for no one can do these signs that You have unless God
is with him,'" which says he'd been watching, he'd been
listening. In fact, in the seventh chapter,
Nicodemus is found defending Jesus in a situation where his
fellow rabbis and so forth were criticizing Him. And then, of course, he shows up
at the Garden Tomb. And so, "Jesus said to him,
immediately, 'Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born
again he cannot see the kingdom of God.' And Nicodemus said to Him,
'How can a man be born when he is old? He cannot enter a second time
into his mother's womb and be born, can he?' Jesus answered, 'Truly, truly, I
say to you, unless one is born of water and of the Spirit he
cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh
is flesh, that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not be amazed that I said to
you, "You must be born again."'" Then He gives him an
illustration, "'The wind blows where it wishes and you hear the
sound of it, but do not know where it comes from and you
don't know where it is headed, so it is with everyone who is
born of the Spirit.' Nicodemus said to Him, 'How can
these things be?' Jesus answered and said to him,
'Are you the teacher of Israel and do not understand
these things? Truly, truly, I say to you, we
speak of what we know and testify of what we have seen,
and you do not accept our testimony. If I've told you earthly things
and you do not believe, how will you believe if I tell you
of heavenly things? No one who has ascended into
heaven, but He who descended from heaven: The Son of God.'" Now, think about this Jewish
leader slipping around in the evening, probably does not want
to be seen, or maybe he was too busy, one of the two, and asking
Jesus about what He was talking about. And so, the process of doing so,
Nicodemus learned something. And he immediately says to
Jesus, "I know that You're a man come from God." Now, he may have heard a few
things Jesus said, but he said, "I know that You're a man come
from God because nobody could do what I've seen You doing unless
God is with Him." Now, you would have thought
Jesus would have said, "Thank you very much," or something
like that, but Jesus immediately answers and says, "Truly, truly,
I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom
of God." And so, naturally, Nicodemus
responds by saying, "How can this be, how can you be born
twice? How can you be born a second
time from your mother's womb?" And so, He begins to answer him. So, I want us to think about the
fact of what Jesus said, "Except a man be born again he cannot
see the kingdom of God." That if you intend to go to
heaven, you'd better be born again. That's the only way you're going
to get there. And so, Jesus sets forth this
time with him to explain to him what it means. So, I want to give you a simple
definition of being born again. Being born again is the act of
God by which He imparts eternal life to those who are dead in
their trespasses and sins. And when we accept Him as our
Savior, that's when the change takes place. All of us need to be born again. When He talks about the kingdom
of God, He's referring to the sovereign rule of our God over
all of creation. So, He answers some questions
rather quickly. And when He says, "I'm telling
you, unless you are born again, you'll never see the kingdom
of God. You won't understand it and you
won't see it." So immediately, He has
Nicodemus' mind and heart. And if I were you, I would
listen very carefully. Because what Jesus said to
Nicodemus, He says to everyone who is willing and wise enough
to listen. Because, "Except a man be born
again he cannot see the kingdom of God." He will not understand it, nor
will he enter into it. Very, very important to
understand the truth of this message. And so, when He said, "Unless a
man's born again he cannot enter the kingdom of heaven," the
implication was that, "Nicodemus, with all of your
education, all of your popularity, all of your power,
you're not going to be there unless there's a change in your
life," which had to be a humbling event for Nicodemus,
for this itinerant preacher to tell him he wasn't going
to heaven. But think about it: except a man
be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. He'll not enter into heaven,
which means that every single one of us need to understand
what that means. If we intend to go to heaven,
remember this, you will not get there by your good works. You will not get there by
believing in some religious idea or believing in some religious
person. Only through a new birth
experience because you wouldn't be fit for heaven, living in sin
and die and go to holy heaven, which God has prepared for His
children. So, Nicodemus asks Him for an
explanation. What do You mean by this? And so, the explanation of the
phrase, being born again, is real simple. He says--the word being born
again translates to mean being born from above. You know all about the law. You know all about the
synagogue. You know all about these things. We're talking about something
that's from above. And the truth is you and I need
a relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ whereby whatever is
going on in our life, we are prepared to live it wisely and
we're prepared to die and know exactly where we're going. And I wonder how many people who
are listening, who are sitting right here, believe in your
heart that you know where you're going when you die. Because you see, death's not
a choice. It's an inevitable experience
all of us are going to face. The question is: are you willing
to face it? Now, Jesus said, "Unless you're
born again, you're not ready." You say, "Well, I don't know
whether I believe that or not." Listen to me, whether you
believe it or not does not make it true or false. The Bible says it. God says it. It is the truth. Something has to happen in the
human heart in order to prepare us to go to heaven. So, the explanation. Jesus talks about being born
again. So, he's heard Jesus talk
before, but now this is something that he doesn't
understand. So he asks the question, "How
can a man be born a second time, enter his mother's womb?" And so, Jesus says to him, he
says, "Unless a man is born of water and of the Spirit." Now, there are people who
believe that verse means to be baptized. Baptism does not save you. It is what we do because we have
been saved. And so, when Jesus speaks here
of being born of water and the Spirit, what is He talking
about? Talking about birth. So, a woman understands the
water at birth. And so he says, "It's not enough
that you have been born physically." And even though you're a Jew,
and all the education and all that you have to brag about,
none of that is it. And the truth is, not a single
person has anything that they've ever accomplished in life, or
ever desired in life that takes the place of the experience of
being born again. So, what he had to do
immediately was to bring Nicodemus, this trained, learned
Pharisee, to the realization nothing he knew, nothing he had,
nothing he'd ever done or nothing he would ever do would
make it possible for him to get to heaven. There was an experience that he
desperately needed and was hungering for, looking for,
longing for and didn't know it. So, he could say to him, "Except
a man be born again he cannot see the kingdom of God." Now, what did that do? It said to this awesome man of
education, it challenged him to the point that He was saying to
him, "You're a bankrupt man. You don't have anything that's
going to get you to heaven. Something else needs to happen
in your life. You can't do anything at this
point to go to heaven. And if you're trusting in your
schooling, your teaching, or your living, it won't work." And I would say that to you. It doesn't make any difference
what you've done, how many churches you've been to. You may even be a pastor. The only way you and I are going
to heaven is by the same way Nicodemus was going to go, and
that is to be born again. We understand the first birth. But Jesus put it in a way that's
unmistakably clear. He could have said, "Unless you
do this, that, or the other." And so, we would have attempted
to do this, that, or the other. But He said born again. There must be a transformation
within your heart in your life that is so absolutely crystal
clear that you will know without a shadow of a doubt that you've
experienced this or not. And so, for his entire life, for
example, he had been taught it was good works, following
the law. And they were so meticulous
about following the law, it was all about what they did, not who
they were on the inside. And I'm afraid that there are a
lot of people today who fall into the same category. You go to church. Maybe you've been baptized,
sprinkled, anointed on. You give a lot of money or
a little bit of money. You try to be good. You defend your life. And you say, "I don't have to go
to church all the time. I don't have to belong to this. I don't have to belong to that. I live a good life. And why wouldn't God accept me?"
Because you don't go to heaven by being good. You're not nearly as good as you
think you are. Because if you were, you would
have accepted Jesus Christ long ago, you would have been born
again already. And so, He's saying to
Nicodemus, "I know who you are. I recognize what you've done,
but none of that's going to work," which was a terrible
blast to Nicodemus's pride and to his learning and to his life. I don't question the fact that
Nicodemus was a good man; good-- think about this, he'd already
watched Jesus from a distance. And he'd hear him, watch this
now, probably most of those Pharisees had at some time or
the other slipped in on the outer circle of a group who were
listening to this man who was healing people, healing the
blind, the sick, I mean, everything, and so they were
curious. Watch this, they listened, they
watched, they walked away. Jesus spoke the truth. Nicodemus listened, watched,
and decided he'd find out. Is it the truth or is it not
the truth? There are many people who
listen, think about it, walk away. More than likely, you have
listened some times at some pastor speaking, and you've
turned it off, walked away. The most horrible thing
Nicodemus could have done this night was to say, "Born again,
forget it," and walk away. But he'd listened to Jesus. He knew there was something
about him. And so, he took a risk,
a reputational risk to show up, to talk to this Nazarene, this
itinerant preacher, this person who was so popular that people
everywhere were listening to Him. And so, Jesus, in answering his
question, answered his question and He did so in a way that
he fully understood. His entire life he believed,
just like many people today. All their life they've been
told, "You've been good, you're nice, you're sweet," this, that
and the other and so forth. And your parents have told you,
you go to church, you got baptized, "Well, son, you're all
right." None of us have been all right. All of us have sinned against
God. And the only thing that makes a
difference between us and the sinner is not that we're better
than. It's the fact that we have
accepted Jesus Christ as our personal savior. We've been born again by the
blood of Jesus Christ at Calvary. That's what makes the
difference. And so, Jesus begins to explain
it to him, and He tells him, He says, "All of your life, all
that you've done, that has not equipped you to go to heaven." So, what's the nature of this? What is the nature, what is the
whole idea about being born again? What is this experience? We say, "Well, you can't be born
physically twice." It is a spiritual experience. And so, Jesus begins to
explain it. He says, "It's a spiritual
experience. It's something the Spirit of God
does in a person's life." Think about this. Many of you who were saved, have
been saved, the Holy Spirit, first of all, convicted you
of your sin. The Holy Spirit began to help
you understand that God loved you in spite of your sin. The Holy Spirit began to help
you understand that your good works, what you were trying to
do, wasn't sufficient, wasn't adequate to make you fit for
heaven. And finally, the Holy Spirit
brought you to the place of showing you, helping you
understand what it meant to confess your sin, to repent of
your sin and trust the Lord Jesus Christ as your personal
Savior. And what He was saying is this:
it is a definite experience. And people say, "Well, I think
I'm saved. I think I'm okay." Well, what makes you think you
are? "Well," and they tell me all the
things they don't do. Or they'll tell me some of the
things they do. And I like to think about it
this way: when I think about when I was saved in a
Pentecostal Holiness church on my knees at the altar at the age
of twelve, weeping. Now, I'd been going to church
for years. But on this Sunday morning, the
Spirit of God wouldn't let me sit in my pew any longer. I got out, I was scared
to death. I went to the altar, fell on my
knees and began to weep and ask God to save me. It's a definite experience. It is an experience in which we
are convicted by the Holy Spirit. That's one of His primary jobs:
convict us of our sin and show us that the Lord Jesus Christ's
death at Calvary paid our sin debt in full, made it possible
for us to ask for forgiveness, repent of our sin, turn away
from it and be accepted by the Lord Jesus Christ. You say, "Well, that's simple
enough." Well, it is simple enough if
you're willing. And he says, "Give us eternal
life," which means we'll never perish. So, maybe you've been going to
church for years, maybe all of your life. Maybe as you look at your life,
you think, "Well, never have done anything really bad from
your perspective." And so, you look at all the good
things about your life. I don't question that. Nicodemus had a long list of
good things he'd been doing. And Jesus said to him, "Except a
man be born again," something radical has to take place
in your life. If it doesn't take place in your
life, you're not going to heaven. You say, "Well, when you were
twelve years old, was that radical?" It was radical for me. And what was radical was I
suddenly realized I needed to-- I needed my sins forgiven. And if I died without Christ,
I felt that I would be lost at twelve. Whatever the issue was, God
spoke to my heart and showed me I needed to have a change in my
life that would radically change me. That hasn't changed. Think about this: we come from
every type of religion in the world and every place in the
world, but when it comes to going to heaven, one door,
one message, one way, one confession, and that is the only
way, that's Jesus. There are many, many religions,
and many, many ways that people tell you, "You'll be all right." But there's only one way that'll
make you fit for heaven. That is confession and
repentance of sin and surrendering your life to the
Lord Jesus Christ. And He says when we do that,
we'll never perish. So, when I look at Nicodemus and
see what an awesome guy he was, and think about people today who
could give you the same kind of look at their life, on the
outside, everything looks right. God knows the inside, the truth
is all of us have sinned against God over and over and over and
over again. And so, what we do is we look at
our sin and look at what we've done, and what we've done
religiously about the Lord Jesus Christ. Then the Word of God comes
along. And when we face ourselves
against the Word of God, things change. The truth is, we all need
forgiveness. We all need to repent. We all need to surrender our
life to God and if you intend to go to heaven. So, ask yourself the question
today: just the way you are, do you think God would accept
you into heaven just the way you are? You say, "Well, I'm not
planning on going yet." Well, you may not plan on it,
but something may happen you may have to. The question is this: would you,
watch this carefully, would you be ready? On what basis do you believe
that you're ready? I can read your mind. You started thinking about all
the good things you've done, all the money you've given, all the
people you may have helped, all the kind of life you've lived. And you've never been in jail. And you've never done all of
these things, but that's not the basis of acceptance into heaven. It's not what we've done. It wasn't what Nicodemus
had done. He says, "Unless you're born
again, unless there is a spiritual experience whereby you
accept the Lord Jesus Christ as your Savior because He, the
Holy Spirit, has convicted you of your sin and made you realize
you're not ready to meet the Lord. We're either ready or not ready. The only thing that makes us
ready is our relationship to Jesus Christ. Nowhere in the Bible does it
talk about our good works. "Not by works of righteousness
which we've done, but according to His mercy, He saves us." And so, He says to Nicodemus,
"Except a man be born again, he can never see the kingdom
of God." And so, I think about the simple
illustration that Jesus gave. Nicodemus says, "Well, how can
that be true?" And so, Jesus being sympathetic
with him, He said, "Well, for example, you don't understand
that? Do you understand the wind
blowing?" "Why, sure I do." "Can you see it?" "No." "How do you know it's wind? Where's it going? Where did it come from? Nicodemus, there are many
things, humanly speaking, we don't understand. But what I'm talking about is a
personal relationship with God, through His Son, Jesus, through
me," Jesus was saying to him. And so, when people ask you,
"Well, how do you know you're ready to meet the Lord?" There is only one experience
that makes you ready, and that is at a time in your life when
the Holy Spirit has convicted you of your sin, convicted you
that you are separated from God by your sin, and that you need
the Lord Jesus Christ as your Savior. And at some point, you made a
decision to surrender your life to Him, yield your life to Him,
and to walk for Him. God intends for us to live
a holy life, a life of obedience and surrender to Him, a life of
love toward the Lord God for all He does for us. Listen, there needs to be
evidence in our life on the outside that something's
happened. And so, when He said to him,
"Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. You don't understand the wind? You may not fully understand
this." And I can tell you, at twelve
years of age, I don't think I'd ever heard anybody talk about
being born again. In fact, there was a lady
preaching. I don't know what she said. Watch this, this is the evidence
of the awesome love and power of God. Here sits a twelve-year-old kid
on the second row who doesn't know anything theologically. I have a Bible, but I couldn't
quote you a bunch of Scripture. And I'm sitting there, and all
of a sudden, I have this feeling that something's wrong and
I need to get right and the time to do it is right now. And so, I fell at the altar
by myself. And I was scared. And five of my Sunday School
buddies came down the aisle, got around me and began to pray me,
and as they would say, "They prayed me into heaven." Well, I trusted Jesus as
my Savior. It's an experience that you can
have sitting right here or wherever you're seated. It's just the fact that you have
to realize you're not nearly as good as you think you are. And you're not good enough to go
to heaven living in your sin. You may have told God many
times, "I'm sorry." Listen carefully, telling God
that you're sorry does not make you right. Many people are sorry. Jesus didn't say to Nicodemus,
"Except you be sorry." He said, "Except you be born
again." That means a radical change
in your life. Think about this, you can't be
good enough or the cross was a horrible mistake by
Almighty God. The cross of Jesus Christ was
God's expression of love for us. And what He was saying is this:
"Your sin is unacceptable, and there's no work that you can do
that'll take care of that sin. Only by the blood of My Son,
Jesus, only by the life of the Son of God can you be forgiven
of your sin." So, the cross is all about the
price God paid in sending forth His Son, Jesus, into the world. He paid the price. We don't pay the price. We don't work it up. We don't save ourselves. We yield to Jesus Christ as
Savior, Lord, and master. And when we accept Him as our
Savior, that's when the change takes place. Doesn't mean you'll be perfect,
but it means that you have realized that there's something
within you that has to be dealt with. It's that old sinful nature has
to be dealt with. And God is willing to forgive
you, to cleanse you, write your name in the Lamb's Book of Life
and make you a child of God. But it's a decision, it's a
decision that you have to make. And when that happens,
it'll be very evident. So, what are the results, for
example, in a person's life when they say, "Yes, I'm asking You,
Lord, I want to be born again. I'm trusting You as my Savior,
I'm asking You to forgive me of my sin. I want this radical change
in my life"? So first of all, there--that
means there's a change in my relationship. Watch this. Haven't you heard people say,
"Well, God's my friend. He's my buddy." No, He's not. He's not your friend, He's not
your buddy, He's not your anything until you trust His
Son, Jesus, as your Savior. It's one thing to sort of pal
around with--you can't pal around with holiness,
righteousness. You can't pal around with that. We're talking about receiving
the Person of Jesus Christ as your personal Savior as an act
of faith. I'm accepting Christ as
my Savior. So, there's a change in your
relationship to God. Your relationship to God before
you're born again is you're an enemy of the faith, because
you're living a different kind of life. You're not for God, either you
got to be for Him or against Him. If you're living in sin, you're
against the kingdom of God, against God. "Well, I will never be against
God." By your thoughts, maybe, you
think that, but the truth is if you're not on His side,
whose side are you on? There is no neutral road. I'm either walking down His
road, I'm down the road of the world. And we look around today and see
exactly what happens to a nation when so many people have turned
away from Jesus, away from the Church, and what's happening? It's affecting everything
about us. So, it's a definite
relationship. Secondly, there's a change
in our position. Before, we're separated from
God, separated from Christ. But when you are born again,
that separation's over. That is, you're a part of the
kingdom of God. Your name is written in the
Lamb's Book of Life, you're a child of God, not for a season
of time, but forever. You don't lose your salvation. You may cloud it up with sin,
but one thing for certain: you sin against God after you're
saved, the Holy Spirit living inside of you to convict us of
sin, show us the truth, make us miserable in order to get us
back, God. So, there's a change in your
position with Christ. Now you're in Christ. Somebody says, "What does that
mean?" It means I've been saved,
I've been born again, I've surrendered my life to Christ. Now Christ is living His life
in and through me, through the Holy Spirit, and I am living
each day for Him. I'm in Christ, the change
of relationship, change of my position. Then, there's a change
in attitude. You can't be saved and then
have no change in attitude. Something happens when you are
born again. Here's what happens, watch this:
the Holy Spirit of God who convicted you of your sin, who
showed you where you were, who showed you what needed to
be done, and who gave you the wisdom to know how to pray
and ask Him to save you. The Holy Spirit of God working
in your life is doing what? Changing your attitude. Now, watch this: when you're
saved, the person of the Godhead, the Holy Spirit, He's
on the inside of you living out the life of Christ, convicting
you of sin, assuring you, encouraging you, helping you in
every way possible. He--the Bible says He sealed
you. Once you trusted Christ as your
Savior, He says the Holy Spirit sealed you. So, what's the difference in all
of us sitting here? The real, ultimate difference
is, some of us are indwelt by Holy Spirit, sealed by the
Spirit of God, name is written in the Lamb's Book of Life. We may not always live it like
we ought to, but we're a child of God. There are those seated here,
never trusted Christ as your Savior. Been to church maybe all your
life, you've been poured upon, you've been anointed, you've
been baptized, but you've never yielded yourself to Christ, been
born again, confessed your sin, surrendered your life to God,
and so what happens? You're not saved, you're not
born again, there's a definite attitude when you are born
again. Then one other thing I think is
necessary, there's a change in your destination. Listen, the closer you get to
your destination, the more sure you better be. Because listen to what He says
in the fifth chapter and the twenty-fourth verse of John. He says, for example, "Truly,
truly, I say to you, he who hears My word," like you're
hearing this morning, "believes Him who sent Me," that is,
believes God, "has eternal life, and does not come into judgment,
that has passed from death unto life." Think about this: when you know
that you're born again, one thing you don't have to
worry about, you don't have to worry about getting lost. And people can tell you, "Well,
if you this, or if you do that, you're going to be lost." No, remember this. If this is why it's so important
for you to mark verses, mark verses. "You've been sealed by the Holy
Spirit, the Spirit of promise." Sealed as a child of God. That is, think about how
wonderful God is. Not only has He saved you, not
only have you been born again, but God says, "Now I want
you to be sure all the rest of your life. I'm a going to seal you with the
third Person of the Trinity." God has sealed you with His
presence within you so that you don't ever have to wonder about
if you can be saved and be lost. If you're living in sin and no
conviction, more than likely you've never been saved. I'll tell you why. The Holy Spirit is--He's the
Holy Spirit, He is indwelling you, he sealed you as a child of
God, therefore when you sin against God, He, the Holy Spirit
living within you, is going to convict you. You may live a long time with
sin in your life and keep hearing this voice, this little
quietness, but what about this, what about that? What about this in your life? And after a while, you may dull
it down to a point, but you'll never dull Him down out, because
He sealed you as a child of God, you're forever a child of God,
and the one thing you don't want to happen is to live your life
and sin against Him, sin against Him, sin against Him, and feel
less and less and less conviction about it because
you're becoming hardened in your heart. The Spirit of God was placed in
your heart to seal you, to assure you, and to give you
wisdom and guidance and direction how to live the
Christian life. That's what it's all about. So, think about it for a moment,
has there ever been a time in your life when you know at that
particular point you asked the Lord Jesus Christ to forgive
you of your sin. You may have used the word
repentance or not, but you were asking Him to forgive you, and
you were surrendering your life to Him. Watch this, there are lot
of people that say, "Well, I've asked God to forgive me." Well, just asking for
forgiveness, first of all, doesn't amount to anything
if you're not saved. You can say, "Forgive me,
forgive me, forgive me." Confessing your sin without
being a child of God doesn't go anywhere. Because if you're not praying as
a child of God whose name is written in the Lamb's Book of
Life, who has repented of your sin, if you're not praying to
Him, talking to Him from that basis, just confession won't
cut it. That's not it. You can confess anything. There have been lots and lots of
people who've confessed and confessed and confessed, but
have never surrendered themselves to Him. Can you point to a time in your
life when you genuinely yielded your life to Him? I've talked to a lot of people
over the years who've said, "Not now." Now is always the time to get
right with God. Not tomorrow, not next week, not
next month, because you don't know what that prolonged time of
your disobedience, you don't know where that's going
to lead you. I'll tell you where it's going
to lead you. Lead you to make decisions
you're going to regret; make decisions you can't get out of;
make decisions that bring heartache, trouble, trial,
disappointment in your life. When you refuse to do what is so
clearly a command of the Lord God, there is a penalty, and
penalty after penalty after penalty. So, I want to challenge you this
morning, because I care about you, because I love you, I don't
even know some of you, but I care about what you understand
about the Word of God. And I'm going to pray with you
in just a few moments, and I pray that you'll be honest. Can't fool God. It doesn't make any difference
what anybody else thinks. What matters is that you know
that you are ready to die today and meet the Lord. You may get home today,
you may not. Say, "Don't try to scare me." If I could scare you into the
kingdom of God, I would do it. That's not my purpose. The issue is, are you ready
to meet Him? Because, watch this, there's not
a single one of us who can say, "I'll live a long time and I'll
do that later." None of us can say that, so I'm
going to have a prayer, and I want you to pray part of this
prayer with me. If you, listen, if you know that
you've never been born again, if you just think you have and not
sure, whatever it might be, settle that issue today,
right now. It's nobody else's business,
it's you and God. Nobody else matters at this
moment. You and your eternal
relationship with God is the only thing that matters, and
you're the only one who can determine what that'll be. You've heard the truth. It's a matter of praying. "I yield myself to You in a new,
fresh way, Lord, today." And you want to be sure. Because watch this, if you don't
have the assurance that you've been born again, you have no
assurance about anything in life, nothing. So let's pray. Father, we love Your Word, thank
You for making it simple and plain to us. Now we ask that Your
Holy Spirit, who always works in times of confession and
repentance and being born again, I pray right now that the
Holy Spirit would convict every single person here who has never
been born again. Convict them, not of a bunch of
sins, but of that most important decision, to ask You to not only
forgive them of their sin, but to change their eternal destiny. To give them the gift of
eternal life. I pray that the prayer would be
simple, and that it would be sincere. So sincere and so simple that it
would never be forgotten. And Lord, I pray for somebody
here who's not sure, as well as those who know for certain
they've never been born again. But as they pray to believe in
their heart, that You will do exactly what You promised to do,
and that they can walk out of here with absolute certainty. Not because of what they've
done, but because of what they believe, that You have brought
about a new life. So I pray, Father, give them the
grace to pray this prayer in whatever way they choose
to do so. Heavenly Father, today I want to
be sure about my relationship to You. Some of you may pray, "I know
that I have never been born again." Today, I'm asking You in the
confession of my sin, in my repentant heart, I'm asking You
to bring about that new birth in my life. To save me, to give me the
gift of a new birth. I'm receiving the work of the
Holy Spirit right now in my life. Sealing me as a child of God and
enabling me to live the life that You've called me to live. And I will trust You, Lord,
daily to give me the strength to walk the path of
righteousness, to live a godly life. And I know that when I falter
and fail, You'll forgive me, but You'll never cast me aside,
never throw me out, for I'm eternally secure in You. And I pray this prayer
in Jesus's name. Now, for somebody, you know in
your heart that you have been born again, but you've really
blown it, you've messed it up, you've sinned against God. You keep on confessing the same
old sin. Would you be willing to pray
this prayer? Father, forgive me for my
slothfulness, spiritually. Forgive me for lying to You,
trying to impress You that I'm doing good, and I know
in my heart that I'm living a sinful life. Today, I want to make a change
in my life. I'm asking the same Holy Spirit
that saved me to enable me, and I want to make a full surrender
of my life afresh and anew today that I can live a godly life,
a holy life, one that's pleasing and honorable to You. And one that'll bring You joy,
and one that'll enable me to share this awesome message
with others. And I pray this
in Jesus's name, amen.
