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EVIDENCES OF THE NEW BIRTH
You Can
and Ought to Know Whether You Have Been Born Again – Here are 10 Signs
“Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born
again. The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof,
but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that
is born of the Spirit” (John 3:7, 8).
We know when the wind bows because we can hear the
sound of it and we can see the effect of it when dust and smoke and chaff are
blown away and grass and trees move and bond with the wind. We have learned
that these things are the effects of the wind, and we accept them as evidences
that the wind is blowing. Even so, the Bible tells us that certain things are
effects and evidences of the new birth, and if we recognize these evidences in
our lives we may be sure we have been born again.
The person who is born again …..
Hears God's Words
1.
“He that is of God heareth God’s words: ye
therefore hear them not, because ye are not of God” (John 8:47). The persons to
whom Jesus spoke these words were mentally acquainted with the Scriptures and
they did hear God’s words through Jesus with their outer ears, but they refused
to hear them with the inner man. They turned a deaf ear and hardened their
hearts against the truth. The child of God not only hears God’s words with the
outer ear and receives them into his natural mind, but he hears in a real
spiritual sense: that is, he consents and agrees to God’s words in his heart, so
that he is willing to be governed by the truth conveyed in these words of God.
He recognizes the authority of God to speak and his own duty to listen to what
God says. He believes that God has spoken through the Apostles and other
inspired writers of the Bible, and he listens to their message as unto God. “We
are of God: he that knoweth God heareth us; he that is not of God heareth not
us. Hereby know we the spirit of truth, and the spirit of error” (I John 4:6).
Believes
In God's Son
2. “Whosever believeth that Jesus is the Christ
is born of God” (I John 5:1). The Bible does not say that we are born again
because we believed, but that we believe because we have been born again. John
did not write, “Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ will be born of
God,” but, Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ is {or, better
translated has been} born of God”; that is, his faith is evidence of his
regeneration. Many LOST SINNERS SAY THAT THEY BELIEVE IN Christ, but they
don’t. They have no true inner conviction or faith that Christ died for their
sins, that He is the Son of God, that He arose from the dead, that “He must
reign, till he hath put all enemies under his feet,” or that God has ordained
Him to “judge the world in righteousness.” Lost sinners may believe in some
false or imperfect imaginary Christ, of man’s
teaching, but they do not believe in the Christ of the Bible. They do not
believe that Jesus is the Christ described in the Bible. “Whosever believeth
that Jesus is the Christ is born of God.”
Loves
Jesus Christ
3.
“Jesus said unto them, If God were your
Father, ye would love me” (John 8:42). The lost sinner does not love the Lord.
The person who is born again loves Jesus, and will do anything he can for Him.
“If a man love me, he will keep my words” (John 14:23). “For this is the love
of God, that we keep His commandments” (I John 5:3).
Loves
The Brethren
4.
“Beloved, let us love one another; for love
is of God; and every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God.” “Every
one that loveth him that begot loveth him also that is begotten of him.” “By
this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to
another.” (I John 4:7; 5:1; John 13:35)
Makes Peace For Sinners
5. “Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall
be called the children of God” (Matt. 5:9). Lost sinners are enemies of God.
“There is no peace, saith my God, to the wicked” (Isa. 57:21). Even the saints
in this life war against God in their fleshly natures. “For the flesh lusteth
against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the
one to the other; so that ye cannot do the things that ye would” (Gal. 5:17).
The children of God delight in making peace between God and sinful men by
bringing them to Christ. “Now then we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God
did beseech you by us; we pray you in Christ’s stead, be ye reconciled to God”
(II Cor. 5:20).
Keeps
Himself
6.
“He that is begotten of God keepeth himself,
and that wicked one toucheth him not” (I John 5:18). The person who is born
again has within him a desire to persevere in the faith, and God gives him the
power to keep himself as he is “Who are kept by the power of God through faith
unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last time” (I Peter 1:5).
Does Righteousness
7. “If ye know that he is
righteous, ye know that every one that doeth righteousness is born of Him.”
(I John 2:29). “For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the
flesh, God sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin,
condemned sin in the flesh: that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled
in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit” (Rom. 8: 3, 4).
Cannot
Sin
8.
“Whosoever is born of God doth not commit
sin; for his seed remaineth in him; and he cannot sin, because he is born of
God.” “That which is born of the Spirit is spirit.” “Now if I do that I would
not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.” (I John 3:9;
John 3:6; Rom. 7:20).
Is Chastised
9. “My son, despise not thou the chastening of
the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuked of Him; for whom the Lord loveth He
chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom He receiveth … But if ye be without
chastisement, whereof all are partakers, then are ye bastards, and not sons”
(Heb. 12:5-8).
Overcomes
The World
10.
“Whatsoever is born of God overcometh the
world; and this is the victory that overcometh the world, even four faith” (I
John 5:4). The person who is overcome by the world and goes back into sin may
have some kind of religion, but he doesn’t have Christ. The children of God
overcome the world instead of being overcome by it.
Have you been born again? Examine yourself in the
light of God’s Word. “Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of
God” (John 3:3).
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