2. While this lesson does not treat of the resurrection of Christ, it
has reference to its fruits: faith, the very essence of Christianity,
here expressed as being born of God; and the evidence of the Holy
Spirit, received through baptism, which assures us we are children of
God and have, through Christ, eternal life and all blessings.
3. Though John's language is, as usual, plain and simple, yet, in the
ears of men generally, it is unusual and unintelligible. The world
estimates it as similar to the prattle of children or fools. What,
according to the world's construction, is implied by the statement,
"Whatsoever is begotten [born] of God overcometh the world?"
Overcoming the world, the unconverted would understand to mean
bringing into subjection to oneself every earthly thing and assuming
the position of sovereign of the world. Yet more absurd in the ears of
this class is the saying that we must be born of God. "Did one ever
hear of such a thing," they might exclaim, "as children born of God?
It would be less ridiculous to say we must be born of stones, after
the idea of the heathen poets." To the world there is no birth but
physical birth. Hence such doctrine as our lesson sets forth will ever
be strange, unintelligible, incomprehensible, to all but Christians.
But the latter speak with new tongues, as Christ in the last chapter
of Mark (verse 17) says they shall, for they are taught and
enlightened by the Holy Spirit.
4. Clearly, then, when the Scriptures speak of being born of God, it
is not in a human sense; the reference is not to the conditions of our
temporal lives, but to those exalted ones of a future existence. To
say we must be born of God is equivalent to saying that if man is to
be redeemed from sin and eternal death, to enter into the kingdom of
God and into happiness, his physical birth will not suffice; all which
nature, reason, free-will and human endeavor may afford is inadequate.
Physical birth, it is true, answers for everything in the way of
temporal possession and achievement, everything great, powerful,
noble, rich, wise, learned; in short, every exalted and desirable
thing of earth. But all such possession and achievement serves only
the physical existence; it is swept away by death, to which event it
is ever subject.
Hence becomes necessary a new and different birth, a birth more
significant than that of the natural man even in the case of emperors,
kings, or the wisest and most influential of earth. For as Isaiah says
(ch. 40, 6): "All flesh is grass, and all the goodliness thereof is as
the flower of the field. The grass withereth, the flower fadeth." The
demand is for a divine birth, a birth in which parentage is wholly of
God; a birth signifying the operation of God's divine power in man, a
power achieving something beyond the attainment of his natural
capacities and effecting in him new understanding and a new heart.
5. The process is this: When the individual hears the Gospel message
of Christ--a message revealed and proclaimed not by the wisdom and
will of man, but through the Holy Spirit--and sincerely believes it,
he is justly recognized as conceived and born of God. John in his
gospel (ch. 1, 12) says: "As many as received him, to them gave he the
right to become children of God, even to them that believe on his
name." And in the first verse of the chapter including our text, he
tells us: "Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ is begotten of
God." Through that faith, for the sake of his Son, God accepts us as
his children, pleasing to him and heirs of eternal life; and the Holy
Spirit will be sent into our hearts, as is explained later.
6. This doctrine condemns those arrogant teachers who presumptuously
expect to be justified before God by their own merits and works. They
imagine that their wisdom, learning, good judgment, intelligence, fair
reputation and morality entitle them, because of the good they are
thus enabled to do, to the favor of God and to reception up into
heaven. But the Scriptures clearly teach the very reverse, that all
these things are nothing in the eyes of God. It is sheer human effort;
it is not being born of God. However wise and powerful you might be,
if even the noblest, most beautiful, fruit human nature can produce,
you could not see the kingdom of God unless you became a wholly
different person, unless you were born anew, according to Christ's
words in John 3, 3. And this is something impossible to your natural
powers. You certainly cannot make yourself of other parentage than you
are. God must begin the work in you, communicating his seed--his
Word--by virtue of which the Holy Spirit operates in you, enabling
you, by faith, to cling to the promise, as said before.
7. Now, he who is thus born of God, John declares, overcomes the
world. Verily, this is a significant and forcible assertion the Holy
Spirit makes; it represents a tremendous power, a great work. The
child of God must, indeed, attempt and accomplish great things. The
birth effected through the Word and faith makes men true sovereigns,
above all earthly rulers; it gives them power even to overcome the
world, something impossible to any Roman or Turkish potentate. They
effect not their victory by physical force or temporal power, but by
the spiritual birth, through faith. As John says immediately after the
clause we are discussing, "This is the victory that hath overcome the
world, even our faith." Here is his own explanation of what he means
by being born of God.