6-21-09 Born
Big Idea: We understand the idea of being born, but born again, that’s more difficult. Jesus says that we must be born again to see the kingdom of God. Jesus is our umbilical cord to new life. Without him there is no way to remove the waste in our lives and provide us with nourishment to help us grow. Without him we die. With him we can be born again and live.
How many of you have ever been born? It’s a good question to find out who’s listening and whose not don’t you think? How many of you have ever been born? Everybody! How many of you have ever been born again? How do you know? Take a look and see if it happened this way for you?
Video Clip – The Matrix – red or green
Unfortunately no one can tell you about the kingdom of God; you have to see it for yourself.
Aren’t you glad that being born again in the kingdom of God doesn’t require us to go through that! The Matrix is one of the best movies to depict the idea that there are two worlds that we live in – the kingdom of earth and the kingdom of heaven. When we are born from our mother’s womb, we understand that we are able to see the kingdom of this earth, but Jesus says that you have to be born again in order to see the kingdom of heaven.
Some of you believe yourselves Christians, but the true test of whether you are a follower of Christ is whether you see the kingdom of heaven; you have physical eyes, but do you have spiritual eyes? You have been born of your mother’s womb, but have you been born of the Spirit of God?
If these statements have raised some questions in your mind, we’re going to be talking about these things over the next month or so in this new series called “Born”.
Let’s jump in.
Beloved, let us love one another, because love is from God; everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love, does not know God, for God is love. God’s love was revealed among us in this way: God sent his only Son into the world so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins. Beloved, since God loved us so much, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God lives in us, and his love is perfected in us. 1 John 4:7-12
Notice the word “know” appears twice in the first two verses. We’ve been taught that in order to grow we have to know. In school we learn that we must know more to become more. The American education system is built on this principle. If you want to become a doctor, you have to know more than a nurse. When we know more, people often times respect us more. You become more in the eyes of other people.
This same understanding has infiltrated the church. There are many rooms in most churches that are used week in and week out to teach people more about God, and . . . certainly to a point this is good. But the problem comes when knowledge about God overcomes our knowledge of God. Let me explain.
Before meeting my wife, Shannon, I saw her across a classroom at KVCC, and ohhhh weeee, that was a good day. That first day in class when my eyes roamed the classroom and locked on Shannon – I knew some stuff about Shannon and it was all good. Now, Shannon had a friend by the name of Jeff Campbell who she talked to quite a lot at KVCC, so if I had wanted to I could have talked to Jeff and found out some more of the facts about Shannon. I could have talked with her family, her other friends, her co?workers, etc to find out a great deal of information about Shannon, and by talking with these people I could develop quite a profile on Shannon – knowing much about who she was. In a sense, I could begin to know Shannon just by asking questions and receiving information about her.
Many of us have grown up in the church, some have gone to Christian schools, some have been taught Christian principles by parents, Sunday School teachers, and various preachers. Some have gone through various adult education classes, attended Bible studies or Bible colleges, and so we may know a great deal about God. It could be said that we, in a sense, “know” God. But
But Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians 8 that
All of us possess knowledge. Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up. Anyone who claims to know something does not yet have the necessary knowledge; but anyone who loves God is known by him. 1 Corinthians 8:1-3
The verb “to know” was used in the Old Testament like this:
Genesis 4:1 “Now the man (Adam) knew his wife Eve, and she conceived and bore Cain”
“Knowing” in the OT context was often associated with deep intimacy. You didn’t know someone if you had casually met them, but had not spend much time with them.
The scriptures say, The two became one flesh
When a man and a woman come together in love, there can be nothing between them. This beautiful act of making love between a man and a woman is the closest that we can get to truly knowing what God wants in his relationship with us.
God does not want any sin to separate us from him. God wants to be close to us – so very, very close – even to the point of being inside of us. Just as a man enters a woman in love, so it is that God enters us though his Spirit. God’s love and his Spirit get inside of us when we deeply and personally get to know him.
Now, throughout the Old Testament God refers to Israel as his bride, and when Israel worshipped other gods, this is what was said of them.
Hosea 9:1
Do not rejoice, O Israel!
Do not exult as other nations do;
for you have played the whore, departing from your God.
You have loved a prostitute’s pay
on all threshing floors.
What God is saying is that Israel had made a vow to love God and follow all his ways. They had made a vow or a covenant with God much like we make vows when a man and a woman are married.
The church in the New Testament is called the bride of Christ. There is this idea that the people of God are married to God. You and I are called by God to make a pledge, a vow, a covenant with God. We were created for a relationship with God, just as Adam and Eve had a relationship with God in the garden where they walked and talked with him in the cool of the day. When we love something or someone more than God, he considers us adulterers and prostitutes (repeat).
The greatest call for you and I is to love God with all that we are. The greatest commandments are about love – love God with all that we are and to love those around us as much as we love ourselves. It’s a deep kind of knowing.
Listen again to what John writes:
Beloved, let us love one another, (Why) because love is from God; everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, for God is love.
This passage is like a great piece of treasure that you have to hunt for, because there is all kinds of greater meaning in the words that the author is using. Look at the term that John uses “everyone who loves is born of God and knows God” What does this mean to be born of God? Jesus explained it this way:
Now there was a man of the Pharisees (a Pharisee is a highly respected religious teacher) named Nicodemus, a member of the Jewish ruling council. He came to Jesus at night and said, “Rabbi, we know you are a teacher who has come from God. For no one could perform the miraculous signs you are doing if God were not with him.” Nicodemus identifies Jesus as a teacher from God, so Jesus just steps right in and begins teaching. In reply Jesus declared, “I tell you the truth, no one can see the kingdom of God unless he is born again.” ”
I laugh because this is what Jesus does all the time. He just makes a statement that he knows that the other person, in this case, another teacher, doesn’t have a clue what he is talking about, and when this happens it always raises a question from those who he’s talking to. Nicodemus jumps right in.
How can a man be born when he is old?” Nicodemus asked. “Surely he cannot enter a second time into his mother’s womb to be born!” Jesus answered, “I tell you the truth, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless he is born of water and the Spirit. Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit. You should not be surprised at my saying, ‘You must be born again.’ John 3:1-7 (NIV)
Last month we did a series called hungry and together we learned that our stomach is hungry for food, but our soul is hungry for God. The stomach is hungry for physical things. Our soul is hungry for spiritual things.
Here Jesus is telling Nicodemus that there is a physical birth, but also a spiritual birth. Over the last weeks, we said that we had two voids that hunger; one is our stomach and the other is our soul. Here Jesus says that being born once isn’t enough. There is another birthing process that needs to take place in order to be fully who God created us to be.
You were once born physically, but the question is, “have you ever been born spiritually? Jesus says that you cannot see the kingdom of God until you’ve been born again. How does that happen is the question?
When a man and a woman make love there is seed from the man that is planted in the soil of the woman. My choice of words here is for a reason. God is always known as a gardener throughout scripture. His first garden was the garden of Eden. A seed is planted inside the woman and it begins to grow. A child is born as fruit of their love. Do you see this?
When you and I seek to love God with all of our heart, soul, mind, and strength, all the time – not just on Sunday morning – the first step is baptism.
I tell you the truth, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless he is born of water and the Spirit.
A child comes out it’s mother’s womb when her water breaks. A child of God is born when we admit that we have sin – that we are not perfect, and that we need and want God’s help in becoming the person that he created you and I to be. Sin and selfishness separates us from God and each other, and when we come to the point were we understand that and want God and his love to enter our lives on a full-time basis, then we get baptized. We get dunked in the water.
Baptism is the beginning of the birthing process. Love has already conceived something great inside of you. Baptism is the acknowledgement of what God’s love and his Spirit is doing inside of you, and baptism is the beginning of a new life in Christ and his kingdom. Baptism is the acknowledgement of what God is doing inside of you.
Baptism is a vow, made in love, to God. We are called to make a vow to God, just as a husband and wife make a vow to one another in marriage, and when we come together with God in love something great is conceived inside of us. Fruit of God’s Spirit is conceived inside of us.
Before an infant is born, it is attached to an umbilical cord, and that umbilical cord provides all the nourishment – food and drink – that the child needs. If the umbilical cord didn’t provide nourishment to the child, the child would quickly die. The umbilical cord amazingly does something else; it also removes all the urine and waste that comes from the child. Without the removal of this waste, the child would also die. The umbilical cord supplies good to the child and removes that which would otherwise kill the child. Apart from the umbilical cord connection to it’s mother, the child cannot live. The umbilical cord is a life line. Listen to this:
God’s love was revealed among us in this way: God sent his only Son into the world so that we might live through him.
Jesus acts for us as an umbilical cord acts for a fetus. Jesus removes our sin, and he provides all the goodness that we need in order to be blessed in his kingdom. We cannot be born again; we cannot be born of the Spirit; we cannot see the kingdom of God and enter it without Jesus who is our umbilical cord of life.
This is love, not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins.
Jesus removes all of our sin – all the impurities, all the evil, all the things that corrupt and taint the goodness that God created us for. Jesus redeems us; he takes that which is dirty, corrupted, evil and refines it, transforms is, and removes it from us and makes us good and blessed. He fills us full of love, joy, and peace – all the fruit and goodness of his kingdom. Jesus is our umbilical cord. He removes the bad and brings us good. He is our lifeline. so that we might live through him.
Love is used is used 15 times in these 5 verses in 1 John 4. What do you think John’s point is? In the Greek language, there were five different words used to describe love. In English we only have one. The Greek word that John uses 15 times is Agape. Agape mean to love selflessly. To love without an agenda – to love without expecting anything in return.
Agape love is the love of God. This passage says, God is love. Agape love is the kind of love that is at the heart of every healthy relationship – between a husband and a wife, between a parent and a child, between friends. When people experience that kind of love it changes them. Great love is transformational.
I’ve watched men and women who were deeply depressed, come alive when they fall in love. I’ve seen men and women lose 20,30, even 50 pounds when they find true love. People overcome amazing obstacles when love is at the center of their relationships. When we embrace the love offered by God it is transformational. It changes us from the inside out. Something new and good is born inside of us.
The Bible calls us to publicly confess our love for God. We get baptized because we’ve decided to begin the process of trying to love God with all that we are and we’ve decided to begin trying to love those around us as much as we love ourselves – we’ve decided that we want to join our will and our future and our mission to God’s, so that we can join him in bringing more of up there down here – more of heaven to earth.
Baptism is acknowledging that something new is being born inside of you – something good, something of God.
On July 19th we will be having a baptism gathering at Gravel Lake, and we’d like you, if you’ve never been baptized to consider being baptized then. If you’ve been baptized, but so much has changed and been born in your heart since then, we’d like you to consider affirming your baptism on that day – think of it as renewing your vows.
If you have children that have never been baptized or dedicated, will be talking more about that in a couple of weeks,
July 19th is going to be a grand day in which we see so many things that God has been doing in our midst. We’re going to have a big celebration party afterward to celebrate all that God has been doing. Plan on spending the day with us, as we’ll be boating, swimming and having fun.
Life Link:
Leader: Focus on God by utilizing prayer, God sightings, song, etc
If you’ve ever witnessed a birth, would you consider it a miraculous thing? Why or why not? Is the birth of a child a special time for you? Why or why not?
Review the message or have someone review it
The Question: Was there anything about the message that you disagreed with, that struck you, or that confused you?
Does baptism have to do more with knowledge or love? Which do you want more of? Why? How do you get more love/knowledge? Are you doing that?
How does God’s Spirit living inside of you relate to being born again?
How does being born again have to do with seeing the kingdom of God?
What does love have to do with birth and baptism?
Have you ever been baptized?
- If so, should you see your life changing for the better on a regular basis? Why or why not?
- If not, is there something that is keeping you from making that commitment of seeking to Love God with all that you are?
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