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Born Again: Going Deeper Than The Cliché

Are you “born again?”

In the language of Christianese, it is often answered with a stock answer that goes like this. “Being born again means that you have accepted Jesus Christ as your Savior and Lord.” But I would like to delve deeper than this cliché in answering this question.

Nicodemus, a Pharisee and teacher of the Jews, came to Jesus at night. He came as a seeker, knowing that Jesus had performed miracles--works that could not be performed “apart from the presence of God” (John 3:2). Jesus tells this influential and observant Jew that “no one can see the kingdom of God without being born from above” or born again (John 3:3).

Nicodemus, puzzled by this answer, despite his considerable knowledge, asks Jesus, “How can anyone be born after having grown old? Can one enter a second time into the mother’s womb and be born?” Clearly, Nicodemus does not understand what Jesus has told him.

Likewise, many of us are also confused when we hear that oft used phrase, “born again.” Many Christians describe themselves as “Born-again Christians,” but what do they mean by that? Peter Gomes writes that it sounds “like a statement of spiritual achievement, a destination at which one has already arrived, and when it is uttered with the spiritual pride with which so many American Christians utter it, as a badge of spiritual and moral superiority, we can understand why people are confused and mightily put off.”

To me, being born again means an opportunity for those that are dead in sin to wipe the slate clean and be given a second chance in life. It is the gift, freely given to us by Jesus Christ, our Savior, to be buried with Christ in his death, to share in his resurrection, and be reborn by the Holy Spirit into new life.

Taking up Christ’s offer to start life over again opens us to forgiveness, redemption, renewal, and God’s unconditional love.

The Apostle John offers us these mighty assurances: “For God so loved the world that he gave his only son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but have eternal life. Indeed, God did not send the son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him” (John 3:16-17).

The Apostle Paul says, “therefore, if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold all things become new” (2 Corinthians 5:17).

We are “born again,” writes the Apostle Peter, “not of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the living and enduring Word of God” (1 Peter 1:23).

“I tell you the truth, no one can see the kingdom of God unless he is born again,” Jesus tells Nicodemus (John 3:3).

"He [Christ] saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy. He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit"
(Titus 3:5).

This new birth is not based on our own good deeds or emotions (Romans 4).
It is a gift of God (Ephesians 2).

The fullness of being “born again” can be understood in Ephesians 4:7, 11-16.

7 But each of us was given grace according to the measure of Christ's gift.

11 The gifts he gave were that some would be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers, 12 to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, 13 until all of us come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to maturity, to the measure of the full stature of Christ. 14 We must no longer be children, tossed to and fro and blown about by every wind of doctrine, by people's trickery, by their craftiness in deceitful scheming.
15 But speaking the truth in love, we must grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, 16 from whom the whole body, joined and knitted together by every ligament with which it is equipped, as each part is working properly, promotes the body's growth in building itself up in love.

Born Again: Going Deeper Than The Cliché

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