Analyzing Birth

Jesus answered and said to him, "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God." (John 3:3)

I have felt for many years as one unqualified to make too many kinds of emphatic declarations about the real meaning of this phrase born again. I am very aware that it is used quite widely in Christian circles and is even bantered about in politics sometimes, but this has only led to widespread skepticism on the part of many about the authenticity of people's claims to having experienced this phenomenon.

So, how do I try to unpack something that I still feel unsure that I even yet really understand it well? To avoid thinking about it is certainly the wrong direction to turn, for according to Jesus this experience in a person's life lies at the very root of everything else if one desires to really be a part of God's kingdom. There is no shortage of demonstrations of people giving false meanings to this idea in the context of pervasive counterfeit systems of religion that all of us are familiar with. But what I desire to know is exactly how to enter into the genuine experience of being authentically born again.

I really am weary of the worn-out usage of this terminology to justify or promote all sorts of gimmicks and religious assertions in various churches. I am just as skeptical as most others about the claims of many people having experienced this event in their lives, though I do find their claims interesting. I am not saying that all of these claims are false, but it seems to me that the very nature of rebirth and what I have been learning about the Spirit of Jesus over the past few years would imply that people who are genuinely born again will not likely be going around trumpeting that fact to gain advantages for themselves. That sounds much more like the spirit of the Pharisee's than the spirit of Jesus.

I was very recently listening to one of my favorite teachers talk about a topic along this line and need to go back and listen to it again very carefully. He was explaining that all throughout the Bible this point of transition is referred to, but from different perspectives. This can be cause for great confusion if we are not aware of the nature of how different this appears depending on what angle you approach it.

He uses the analogy of a door that can be viewed from two sides. When we view this door from the side of the flesh, our human natural perspective that we have grown up with, our normal view of reality, this door is always going to look like a threat to us. It represents death and all the fear and pain that goes with that.

But after a person has voluntarily chosen in this context to pass through that doorway and emerges out the other side of this death experience, when they look back at the very same door, instead of seeing death and pain and fear all they see is the beginning of new life, a life so rich and abundant and satisfying that they nearly completely forget about the pain and death that intimidated them so much from the other side of that door. From this new perspective this door was the new birth experience that Jesus is talking about here; it was their initial entrance into the kingdom of God, the initiation into the family of God where they find fulfillment, joy, meaningful and enriching relationships and perfect peace. That is not to say they have no more problems but that they now have new meaning and purpose for their lives in the midst of everything else going on.

But when we read various passages in the Bible we can often become very confused by sometimes hearing it referred to as death and other times being viewed as the initiation into life and joy and peace. To our normal way of reasoning these two simply are not naturally compatible with each other. It makes little sense at all to believe that one can enter into greater life by giving up life.

Yes, I am aware that we teach this formula all the time in religion. But I am talking about our gut-level beliefs and feelings here, not our professions and intellectual assertions that we throw around with religious jargon. True and effective religion is only that which is rooted in what our heart really believes, not just in what our minds accept as true from what we are taught or have been convinced. In fact, much of the time our religious assertions get in the way of being able to identify what we really believe at the gut-level and it often takes a severe crisis to expose the real beliefs that control the direction and reveal the real motivations of our life.

I have been committed for some time to searching for and examining my own inner self to discover as much as possible what is really going on deep inside. This can be very unnerving at times and quite frightening when deep feelings and false assumptions are unmasked in the right side of my brain that shock and dismay the left side of my brain. Typically my left brain reacts in ways that want to mask or repress these incriminating feelings and beliefs, but I have been learning over the past few years that this is not the right way to move into real life and honesty and freedom. I need to push back against the natural tendencies to hide from my own faults and mistaken ideas about reality and to push into the pain produced by the lies buried in my past memories so that I can expose myself more intentionally to the healing presence of Jesus in each one of these pockets of darkness.

One of the reasons I struggle with this idea of being born again is because of the popular belief and assumption by most Christians that this is something that happens in a specific moment of time and generally only happens once to a person. Again, these are assumptions that I challenge and believe are fundamentally not sound. It is not always true that a person must experience a dramatic rebirth experience all in one moment of time. It is also not true that experiencing this only once is enough to secure a person into a permanent saving relationship with Jesus. I know this may sound like blatant heresy to the minds of many people, but I have observed too many examples that challenge these assumptions about a single birth, once-saved-always-saved mentality to be able to give it any credence.

I believe that it may be that some people experience a new birth transition over quite a prolonged period of time. Now, maybe I am not correctly identifying just what is meant by this birth experience – that is certainly possible since I don't consider myself a strong authority on this subject and am somewhat skeptical about those who claim to be such. But I have just seen too many people including myself that experience a slow growing transition from the old way of thinking to a completely different perspective of reality that takes a long time.

This has sometimes led me to seriously question whether I have indeed ever really experienced the new birth at all or whether I am just pretending or fooling myself. I am sure there are people around who might like to reinforce that opinion about me, but I believe there is room for wide differences in how people come into the kingdom of God. I am not saying that there are other doors through which they may enter, but I am saying that some people's personalities and experience appears very different and causes them to come into relationship with God through very externally different-looking means than others.

Probably the most popular example of a dramatic and apparently quick new-birth experience is that of Saul on the road to Damascus. But even when I look at that story closely it becomes evident that this was simply the external revelation and climax of a long process of conversion that well may have been developing over many years in Saul's heart. And just because the story does not go into detail about all that was transpiring inside of Saul over those previous years does not mean that it was not taking place over time. Most of the events in the Bible are quite condensed which leaves many details to be discovered by implication. And in everyone's life, I believe that the Spirit of God works over long periods of time to prepare a person for certain points of climax which we often label a new-birth encounter with God. And it may also be true that there are quite a number of these climax points as a person is exposed to more and more truths about what God is really like that they never believed before.

So is a one-time new-birth experience enough to initiate a person permanently into the kingdom of God? Or is there more that needs to take place to keep them there?

This is where things can get very touchy with theologians and religious people of all stripes. This can be a source of very explosive arguments and debate that I have little interest in getting caught up in. But I do believe that though our salvation itself is secure, that security is not based on our own new birth encounter with God but on the unconditional forgiveness that has already been a reality in the heart of God from eternity.

Now that I begin to see it more clearly from that perspective it begins to make even more sense to me how this new birth experience may fit into the puzzle. I have never really thought about it this way before. Again, possibly yet another false assumption about God is emerging into my consciousness here. That is the idea that by my conversion or new birth or whatever term might be used, that I can somehow contribute in some way to my own salvation. This gets to the core issues of what place my willpower and choice has in relationship to my being saved in the end. And what I believe in this regard will strongly influence or determine the surrounding assumptions and beliefs about many other related issues.

I am praying for insight, wisdom and guidance to understand this more clearly. I want to have a clearer understanding of what Jesus was trying to explain to Nicodemus and get past all the preconceived ideas and assumptions and teachings from my past. And not only that, I also want to experience the assurance more fully at the heart level that comes from passing through this doorway into life. If that needs to happen on a daily basis then I want to be willing to do that daily.

Does this imply that each day when I wake up I am outside of God's family of life again? No, I don't think that is necessary to assume. But on the other hand, the false beliefs and teachings of many churches about assurance of salvation causes many people to neglect securing their own salvation because they assume that some experience they had with God years ago is all that is necessary for them to be saved in heaven. But this false kind of assurance leads many to neglect their salvation and fail to have their characters prepared to enjoy the very heaven that they believe they are destined to inherit.

It is very clear from the Bible that there is more to salvation than simply having an encounter or experience of conversion and new birth. Just as a baby must experience much more than a birth experience to continue to be viable in this world, so too must Christians experience much more than initiation into God's family if they want to remain alive and thrive the way they were intended to by God. Does that mean that they must pass through the birth canal spiritually over and over to stay a Christian? Not necessarily. But if they fail to daily have their spiritual connection with God nurtured, then they may die and find themselves back on the other side of that door once again and in need of being born all over again.

By what I have read in the Bible, this may or may not be able to happen very often. If a person dies spiritually after they have genuinely experienced the incredible goodness and sweetness of God, something inside of them is destroyed, some part of them that enables them to be drawn to God's goodness and love in the first place. And while it is not impossible for them to be born yet again it becomes much more difficult the second time because of their reduced capacity to respond to God's love and grace. This is referred to in Hebrews 6 where it says that it is impossible to return to a relationship with God under certain conditions.

But after looking carefully at this passage, I believe that when a person has not really experienced the truth about God and turns away from Him because of misunderstandings or misrepresentations about Him by religion, that God can still bring them back and reintroduce them to Himself using fresh revelations of His goodness and character to appeal to their hearts.

But it is also true that those who really have entered into a rich and deep experience with God and have been filled with His Spirit and have lived in His presence; when these people chose to turn their back on His love for them and embrace lies about Him through lust, greed, pride or any other choice – they will find themselves incapacitated to return into an intimate relationship with God. They have destroyed their own heart's ability to respond to the very attractions that God uses to draw people to Himself. They have so damaged their own respect and desire for goodness and truth about God that it is impossible for them to be attracted to Him effectively again. They lose their ability to feel the right kind of desire that is needed to experience a saving relationship with Jesus.

So, if this new birth that Jesus was talking about is referring to entering into a full, intimate relationship with God at a deep level, then it could be seen as a one-time experience possibly. But if it is referring to a change of mind about God, a turning from lies about God to embracing fresh revelations of His heart to them, then I can see this being a repeated experience that needs to happen on a regular basis. This view of the birthing process is more of a progressive thing, a building on previous decisions to embrace truths about God, not a repeating of previous decisions over and over.

It is very normal for a person to encounter truth about God and accept it in one area of their thinking but still be very steeped in lies about God in many other areas of their thinking and feelings. It is from this perspective that I believe a person needs to be born again and again as they are confronted with more and more lies in their heart and mind about the truth of God and about reality. As each new revelation of truth about God is encountered, they again have to make sometimes painful or difficult choices to let go of their previous ideas and feelings and to pass through an experience of death into life in this area of their gut-level belief system. They have to repeatedly die to self and their own opinions each time they meet selfish and sinful perspectives about God. If this kind of new birth is what describes the other side of the same door as dying to self, then Paul might affirm that it must be passed through on a daily basis.

I affirm, brethren, by the boasting in you which I have in Christ Jesus our Lord, I die daily. (1 Corinthians 15:31)

While this statement is lifted out of the middle of a dissertation on the resurrection, it still affirms that Paul saw himself dying to his own desires and feelings on a regular basis. In several other places he refers to this issue of dying to self.

I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me. (Galatians 2:20)

If dying to self, being crucified with Christ is a description of the back side of the door of new birth, then it can be seen that death and new birth need to happen on a regular basis. And while it is not necessary for a person to be initiated repeatedly into the family of God to come to see themselves as an accepted part of that family, I believe we will find times in our lives where our doubts about our security or place in that family so overshadow us that we may need to reaffirm our choices that initiated our previous new birth experiences over again. This is all part of the settling process whereby our hearts become more and more secure in the rest that God invites us into and where our lives can feel safe to thrive and mature in Christ.