Please read John 3:1-21, then read it out loud and read it a third time, writing it down, if you like, to ensure you remember it.
The good news that Jesus proclaimed was that he came, not only to give forgiveness, but freedom. He came, not only to give you a second chance, but a change. A new nature and a new beginning.
The person that you are now; that which is flesh and blood cannot inherit eternal life, but you can if you receive the life that comes from Jesus Christ.
There are many who deny the change or demand the change before Christ; but the change Jesus spoke of comes by Christ and through the Spirit of God. You and I cannot make the change but, by a change of mind and will, we submit to God and he brings the change about within us and causes it to be lived out of us. He does this by planting his Spirit within us.
For this reason God said, “It shall be in the last days [those that follow the manifestation and sacrificial death of Christ] I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh [meaning from one end of the earth to the other].”
And in another place he says. “I will take away your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh to obey me.”
That is a new nature. You will be a new person and that is a heavenly one. No longer ruled by the disobedience that is in the world because you are now spirit and not flesh.
Yes, you still live in the body. Yes, for the moment you may need to eat and sleep and drink water to survive this world; but now that is not the real you for the real you is born of God and ruled by the Holy Ghost.
No one sees a physical change but they will see a change in your nature. They will notice that you now dance to a different tune. That you are no longer who you were.
This is good news because there are none of us who have everlasting life: the life that God has. We know this because he has existed from eternity to eternity and is without beginning or end. It is hard for us to conceive yet we know this because the testimony of God is with Adam, who was in the beginning, and is with us to this very day.
Now God wanted us to have his life; to share his joy for living; to have a home with him.
What happened by Adam and Eve destroyed this and what began with them continues today because we all, continually, disobey. We are compelled to disobey by the nature we have received by them.
It is not their sin that brings destruction on us but our own; and we have all sinned. No one can truthfully say, I have never sinned.
So, God, because he loves you and I, gave Jesus, his only begotten son, a propitiation for our sins so that we, by believing that we have died in him [as he died on the cross] and are raised up as new creatures in his resurrection, may have everlasting life.
There are essentials in this believing.
Firstly we must believe that Jesus is eternal; that he existed in heaven; that he came to earth and, after living to demonstrate the power and goodness of God toward us who don’t deserve it, died for our sins.
We must also believe that God raised him up on the third day and that he returned to heaven where he now sits at the right hand of the Father where he sat before.
We must believe that we are carnal: sinful flesh and that we cannot have eternal life except by Jesus Christ because he offered himself for us.
We must turn from the unbelief of the world and science that says there is no God.
And yet this believing is impossible except it is given us by the Holy Ghost.
So on the one hand it is a command and on the other it is an empowering. You cannot come without the work of the Holy Spirit so ask God to send his Holy Spirit to you so that you might believe. An effort to believe without the work of the Holy Spirit is likely to fail.
All who believe know that it was God’s work and none of their own doing.
Now this I say by the Holy Ghost that Jesus did not come to judge but to forgive and has given this authority to me [and to all who witness] that, in him, your sins are forgiven and that you should go, in the Spirit and not trusting your own will or determination, and sin no more.
Yes today there is forgiveness of sin and, if you will believe in him and confess your sins you will not only be forgiven but cleansed of all unrighteousness.
Justified does not mean “just as if I had never sinned.” That is an unfortunate misinterpretation of the word that only portrays God’s act of forgiveness.
Know this: when you believe in Jesus and confess your trust in him and your desire to be clean your sins are forgiven. Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord is forgiven of their sin. Will you call? Then you will be forgiven.
Jesus came that you may be born of God. Not naturally, nor through lust, nor in marriage, but in the Spirit.
How will you know you are saved?
You know firstly because God says all who believe in Jesus his son are saved. God cannot lie and you need to make this your confession, “I am saved because God says I am.”
Secondly you will feel what none other can see: the new nature birthing in you. You will desire godly things and will draw back from sin. Many experience the joy of relief knowing they are forgiven every trespass and given a new life.
Can we explain what a baby experiences when it is born, when it breathes its first? We have all been there yet none of us can recall the first minutes of our lives and must depend on the outside witness of others and essentially our mother.
But you will know because a new love enters into you and flows out. It is not a love that the world knows neither can it experience it because it is the love of God. This love, loves God and loves Jesus, loves righteousness and hates all that is evil.
It does not hate people because God loves the world and it has experienced this love, but it is pure love, not tainted with the self of the flesh. There is a new appreciation for all that is godly and a desire for the fulfillment of God’s will for all who believe.
This love grows. It begins in simple childlike faith doting on the nature and promises of our Father in heaven; grows to love good and the truth; lets that love turn outward to all who love God, and finally to all.
This life of God is yours if you will believe in Jesus Christ and I encourage you to receive it today.
The good news that Jesus proclaimed was that he came, not only to give forgiveness, but freedom. He came, not only to give you a second chance, but a change. A new nature and a new beginning.
The person that you are now; that which is flesh and blood cannot inherit eternal life, but you can if you receive the life that comes from Jesus Christ.
There are many who deny the change or demand the change before Christ; but the change Jesus spoke of comes by Christ and through the Spirit of God. You and I cannot make the change but, by a change of mind and will, we submit to God and he brings the change about within us and causes it to be lived out of us. He does this by planting his Spirit within us.
For this reason God said, “It shall be in the last days [those that follow the manifestation and sacrificial death of Christ] I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh [meaning from one end of the earth to the other].”
And in another place he says. “I will take away your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh to obey me.”
That is a new nature. You will be a new person and that is a heavenly one. No longer ruled by the disobedience that is in the world because you are now spirit and not flesh.
Yes, you still live in the body. Yes, for the moment you may need to eat and sleep and drink water to survive this world; but now that is not the real you for the real you is born of God and ruled by the Holy Ghost.
No one sees a physical change but they will see a change in your nature. They will notice that you now dance to a different tune. That you are no longer who you were.
This is good news because there are none of us who have everlasting life: the life that God has. We know this because he has existed from eternity to eternity and is without beginning or end. It is hard for us to conceive yet we know this because the testimony of God is with Adam, who was in the beginning, and is with us to this very day.
Now God wanted us to have his life; to share his joy for living; to have a home with him.
What happened by Adam and Eve destroyed this and what began with them continues today because we all, continually, disobey. We are compelled to disobey by the nature we have received by them.
It is not their sin that brings destruction on us but our own; and we have all sinned. No one can truthfully say, I have never sinned.
So, God, because he loves you and I, gave Jesus, his only begotten son, a propitiation for our sins so that we, by believing that we have died in him [as he died on the cross] and are raised up as new creatures in his resurrection, may have everlasting life.
There are essentials in this believing.
Firstly we must believe that Jesus is eternal; that he existed in heaven; that he came to earth and, after living to demonstrate the power and goodness of God toward us who don’t deserve it, died for our sins.
We must also believe that God raised him up on the third day and that he returned to heaven where he now sits at the right hand of the Father where he sat before.
We must believe that we are carnal: sinful flesh and that we cannot have eternal life except by Jesus Christ because he offered himself for us.
We must turn from the unbelief of the world and science that says there is no God.
And yet this believing is impossible except it is given us by the Holy Ghost.
So on the one hand it is a command and on the other it is an empowering. You cannot come without the work of the Holy Spirit so ask God to send his Holy Spirit to you so that you might believe. An effort to believe without the work of the Holy Spirit is likely to fail.
All who believe know that it was God’s work and none of their own doing.
Now this I say by the Holy Ghost that Jesus did not come to judge but to forgive and has given this authority to me [and to all who witness] that, in him, your sins are forgiven and that you should go, in the Spirit and not trusting your own will or determination, and sin no more.
Yes today there is forgiveness of sin and, if you will believe in him and confess your sins you will not only be forgiven but cleansed of all unrighteousness.
Justified does not mean “just as if I had never sinned.” That is an unfortunate misinterpretation of the word that only portrays God’s act of forgiveness.
Know this: when you believe in Jesus and confess your trust in him and your desire to be clean your sins are forgiven. Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord is forgiven of their sin. Will you call? Then you will be forgiven.
Jesus came that you may be born of God. Not naturally, nor through lust, nor in marriage, but in the Spirit.
How will you know you are saved?
You know firstly because God says all who believe in Jesus his son are saved. God cannot lie and you need to make this your confession, “I am saved because God says I am.”
Secondly you will feel what none other can see: the new nature birthing in you. You will desire godly things and will draw back from sin. Many experience the joy of relief knowing they are forgiven every trespass and given a new life.
Can we explain what a baby experiences when it is born, when it breathes its first? We have all been there yet none of us can recall the first minutes of our lives and must depend on the outside witness of others and essentially our mother.
But you will know because a new love enters into you and flows out. It is not a love that the world knows neither can it experience it because it is the love of God. This love, loves God and loves Jesus, loves righteousness and hates all that is evil.
It does not hate people because God loves the world and it has experienced this love, but it is pure love, not tainted with the self of the flesh. There is a new appreciation for all that is godly and a desire for the fulfillment of God’s will for all who believe.
This love grows. It begins in simple childlike faith doting on the nature and promises of our Father in heaven; grows to love good and the truth; lets that love turn outward to all who love God, and finally to all.
This life of God is yours if you will believe in Jesus Christ and I encourage you to receive it today.
