This article, as it is with limited space for explanation, is difficult to know where to begin. There being such a vast misunderstanding of this most vital doctrine also makes it very tedious to write. A hundred years or so ago the evangelical church had to deal only with those limited cults and sects of religion that had brought into religion that doctrine labeled “Baptismal Regeneration,” introduced by the “Campbellites” (modern day “Church of Christ”). Today we have another “two-headed beast” even more subtle and deceptive than the one introduced by William and Alexander Campbell. Namely “decisional regeneration” brought in by Billy Graham and the “easy-believism” of modern evangelism. The new birth, my friends, is not brought about by someone’s proposition of four easy steps to salvation. The “Roman Road” proposition, that many use, leads nowhere but to deception and hell if the Sovereign Spirit has not been pleased to breathe life into the soul of the spiritually dead sinner. Many people in our day believe that it is just as easy to let the flesh-withering Spirit of God into the soul as it is to raise a window shade and let the bright rays of the morning sun into our homes. In John 3:1-14 our Lord presents this doctrine of the new birth to us in a detailed way as He talks with a very religiously-learned man by the name of Nicodemus. If you note carefully the discourse reveals to us a man who was religiously enlightened, but spiritually darkened; a man religiously active, but spiritually invalid. Christ told him he could not see, nor enter the kingdom of God until he was born from above. The mistake that men make today is presentation. They present the sinner with this proposition,” you must repent and believe and be (or in order to be) born again.” The cart is before the horse. A man cannot repent and believe until he is regenerated by the Spirit, who sovereignty breaths life upon whom He wills. This Christ clearly teaches when He says to Nichodemus in verse 8 of John 3, “The wind (or Spirit, for that is of whom He speaks) blows where it wills and you hear the sound of it, but cannot tell where it comes from and where it goes. SO IS EVERYONE WHO IS BORN OF THE SPIRIT.” It is just as impossible for men to control the work of the Holy Spirit in the salvation of souls as it is for them to control the wind. Do not be deceived my friend, you must ne born again, not propositioned! ~~Terry Worthan, 1938-2022
Ye children of men, attend to the word so solemnly uttered by Jesus the Lord And let not this message to you be in vain, ‘Ye must be born again” “Ye must be born again”; “Ye must be born again” I verily, verily say unto you “Ye must be born again.”
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