_THE NEW BIRTH_
JOHN iii. 1-21.
Here is the Life in contact with the icy legalism of the day. Nicodemus
was a Pharisee, and his piety was cold and mechanical. Religion had become
a bloodless obedience to lifeless rules. Men cared more about being proper
than about being holy. Modes were emphasized more than moods. An external
pose was esteemed more highly than an internal disposition. The popular
Saint lived on "the outsides of things."
Then came the Life. And what will He say to the externalist? "Ye must be
born again." Nothing else could He have said. If the mechanical is to
become the vital there is nothing for it but a new birth. To get from the
outside into the inside of things, from the letter into the spirit, we
need the miracle of renewal, the recreating ministry of grace.
And so it is to-day. The ritualistic is vitalized by the evangelistic. If
the mechanical is to become the spontaneous, there is need of the "well of
living water, springing up unto eternal life." When we are born again,
ritual becomes helpful trellis for the spiritual flowers; the outward form
becomes the helpmeet of redeeming grace.