Request your free, three-month trial to Tabletalk magazine. You’ll receive the print issue monthly and gain immediate digital access to decades of archives. This trial is risk-free. No credit card required.
Try Tabletalk NowAlready receive Tabletalk magazine every month?
Verify your email address to gain unlimited access.
John 3:1–8
“Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God” (v. 5).
Since no sinner can in himself make the God-pleasing choice to repent and believe the gospel, the Lord must graciously intervene to grant spiritual life, the ability to trust in Jesus (Eph. 2:1–7). This happens through the Lord’s work of effectual calling and regeneration, two aspects of the ordo salutis—the order of salvation—that are closely related and often used interchangeably. Classical Reformed theology, however, distinguishes them. Dr. R.C. Sproul writes: “Effectual calling is the Holy Spirit’s work of bringing about a change in someone. The change that is brought about in and through the effectual call is regeneration.”
A person whom God has regenerated no longer has a heart of stone but has received a new heart of flesh that is able and willing to trust in God’s promises through the Lord Jesus Christ. The Lord promised to effect this regeneration in His people after the Babylonian exile, as promised in Ezekiel 36:22–38. This does not mean that God failed to regenerate people before then; because all sinners are dead in sin and unable to believe God’s promises until they receive new hearts, regeneration has been necessary for anyone to believe no matter what era of history the person has lived in. Ezekiel’s promise pointed to a day when regeneration would be more widespread, when God’s salvation would be more fully realized. This is our new covenant age.
When someone has been regenerated, we also say that he has been “born again.” Today’s passage records Jesus’ key teaching on the subject. Our Savior almost certainly had texts such as Ezekiel 36:22–38 in mind when He expected Nicodemus to understand the necessity of being born again. Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews, should have understood his own need of regeneration, for the Jewish Scriptures teach as much. Jesus was not giving a new teaching but was merely applying the Scriptures to Nicodemus himself (John 3:1–8).
Our Lord’s dialogue with Nicodemus gives us two important facts about regeneration. First, the work is mysterious. We do not know where the Holy Spirit comes from or where He is going, so we do not know exactly when a person’s regeneration occurs (v. 8). All we can see is the fruit of regeneration, which is faith. That brings up the second fact about regeneration—namely, that it precedes faith. One cannot see the kingdom of God until he is first born again, and if you cannot see the kingdom of God until you are born again, you certainly cannot enter it until you are born again.
Coram Deo Living before the face of God
We often say that regeneration is monergistic, meaning that it is the work of only the Holy Spirit. It is not synergistic, which would make it the action of both the Spirit and us. When we recognize that the Spirit is the only actor in regeneration, we are encouraged to pray specifically that God would grant new hearts to those with whom we share the gospel.
For further study
- Psalm 80:18
- Ezekiel 37:1–14
- 1 Corinthians 15:22
- Titus 3:4–5
The bible in a year
- Isaiah 1–3
- Galatians 3