Born Again? I Get It
"You have been born again, not from a seed that can be destroyed, but through God's everlasting word that can't be destroyed." 1 Peter 1:3
Jesus said "heaven (the sky) and (the) earth will pass away, but My words will never pass away".
Born Again Series
Jesus is the Word -- read this message if you wish to understand more about this.
[This is the third part of this series, if you missed the first two parts, read them first to better understand where we are at on this message].
Born Again
How to know if you have been reborn (in the spirit)?
1. You no longer merely 'believe' in Jesus of Nazareth. (Believe it or not even demons know and acknowledge who Jesus is).
2. You also need to have Him 'live' within you. ('Be living' in you).
How? By His Spirit -- the Holy Spirit (the Spirit of God, the Living Word, the Way, the Truth, the Life) will take residence inside of you.
How so? Through the same way, everything else in creation was created, by His spoken words -- so you speak it into existence. (You are made in God's image). And not with empty words but by speaking out words that you do "believe".
The signs? You will realize you are no longer your 'old' self. And something inside you is stirring. When you say or do something unpleasant, you are silently convicted, you feel bad about it and want to do better next time.
You have that urge to learn more about Jesus.
You have that desire to share with others your experience.
What else? Well there are the gifts of the Spirit (fruits actually) -- the more important ones being love, joy, peace, hope... hard to fake these.
Love
God is love and this will manifest in your life unexpectedly, even unexplainably as you are now able to love even the unlovable and love even yourself. If not, at least forgive yourself and forgive those who hate you. And more importantly you are now able to move past and move on -- free of guilt, anger, pain and unforgiveness.
Joy
Joy from within -- the joy of the Lord does not come from "happenings", thus it is not just the fleeting feeling of being happy. It is much more than that. It is unexplainable and not easily supressed or dampened. Pain, suffering and mourning may come in the night but joy comes in the morning (like the rising of the sun, like clockwork, like take it to the bank).
Peace
Inner peace, like joy, inner peace is not dependent on what is happening on the outside. If your peace, joy, love and even hope are not snuffed out by circumstances around you, then you know God's spirit is living in you and you have been born again.
It is By Grace
Apostle Paul said it best "Now God has us where he wants us, with all the time in this world and the next, to shower grace and kindness upon us in Christ Jesus.
Saving is all his idea, and all his work. All we do is trust him enough to let him do it. It’s God’s gift from start to finish!
We don’t play the major role. If we did, we’d probably go around bragging that we’d done the whole thing! No, we neither make nor save ourselves. God does both the making and saving.
He creates each of us by Christ Jesus to join him in the work he does, the good work he has gotten ready for us to do, work we had better be doing." (the Message paraphrase)
Gift of God
So this is not about us, this is not from ourselves, or from our own works, it is the gift of God.
We ask for it and we receive it by faith. We have covered this previously, not blind faith but childlike faith. And no, not childish faith. There is no room to be childish and foolish or being cocky with this message.
We believe this by our own testimony (our own personal story) on how it has changed us. And we want to share it with others not because we are forced to but because it is a natural overflow of God in our life.
Do you want to be born again?
Jesus is the Word -- read this message if you wish to understand more about this.
[This is the third part of this series, if you missed the first two parts, read them first to better understand where we are at on this message].
Born Again
How to know if you have been reborn (in the spirit)?
1. You no longer merely 'believe' in Jesus of Nazareth. (Believe it or not even demons know and acknowledge who Jesus is).
2. You also need to have Him 'live' within you. ('Be living' in you).
How? By His Spirit -- the Holy Spirit (the Spirit of God, the Living Word, the Way, the Truth, the Life) will take residence inside of you.
How so? Through the same way, everything else in creation was created, by His spoken words -- so you speak it into existence. (You are made in God's image). And not with empty words but by speaking out words that you do "believe".
The signs? You will realize you are no longer your 'old' self. And something inside you is stirring. When you say or do something unpleasant, you are silently convicted, you feel bad about it and want to do better next time.
You have that urge to learn more about Jesus.
You have that desire to share with others your experience.
What else? Well there are the gifts of the Spirit (fruits actually) -- the more important ones being love, joy, peace, hope... hard to fake these.
Love
God is love and this will manifest in your life unexpectedly, even unexplainably as you are now able to love even the unlovable and love even yourself. If not, at least forgive yourself and forgive those who hate you. And more importantly you are now able to move past and move on -- free of guilt, anger, pain and unforgiveness.
Joy
Joy from within -- the joy of the Lord does not come from "happenings", thus it is not just the fleeting feeling of being happy. It is much more than that. It is unexplainable and not easily supressed or dampened. Pain, suffering and mourning may come in the night but joy comes in the morning (like the rising of the sun, like clockwork, like take it to the bank).
Peace
Inner peace, like joy, inner peace is not dependent on what is happening on the outside. If your peace, joy, love and even hope are not snuffed out by circumstances around you, then you know God's spirit is living in you and you have been born again.
It is By Grace
Apostle Paul said it best "Now God has us where he wants us, with all the time in this world and the next, to shower grace and kindness upon us in Christ Jesus.
Saving is all his idea, and all his work. All we do is trust him enough to let him do it. It’s God’s gift from start to finish!
We don’t play the major role. If we did, we’d probably go around bragging that we’d done the whole thing! No, we neither make nor save ourselves. God does both the making and saving.
He creates each of us by Christ Jesus to join him in the work he does, the good work he has gotten ready for us to do, work we had better be doing." (the Message paraphrase)
Gift of God
So this is not about us, this is not from ourselves, or from our own works, it is the gift of God.
We ask for it and we receive it by faith. We have covered this previously, not blind faith but childlike faith. And no, not childish faith. There is no room to be childish and foolish or being cocky with this message.
We believe this by our own testimony (our own personal story) on how it has changed us. And we want to share it with others not because we are forced to but because it is a natural overflow of God in our life.
Do you want to be born again?
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