Born again – a son of God

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A. By default we are not born children of God

  • Sonship is defined from whom we have come. (In this case ‘sonship’ is not referring to gender but origin.) As human beings, we have both a physical and spiritual dimension to our being(1). Each dimension has its own origin: in the physical we originate from our earthly dad; in the spirit, unfortunately, our spirit is sinful because our spiritual father is in fact the devil(2-4).
  1. It is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. If there is a natural body, there is also a spiritual body. [1Co 15:44 ESV]
  2. Jesus said to them, “If God were your Father, you would love me, for I came from God and I am here. I came not of my own accord, but he sent me. … You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks out of his own character, for he is a liar and the father of lies. [Jhn 8:42, 44 ESV]
  3. And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience— among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. [Eph 2:1-3 ESV]
  4. Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned– … For as by the one man’s disobedience the many were made sinners, … [Rom 5:12, 19 ESV

B. You can change your spiritual birth certificate and father

  • God gives us the opportunity to be born in the spirit a second time(1), giving us a new spirit – His spirit – and we are a new creature or creation(2).
  • In the same way that sperm is the seed of physical birth, what God has said – His word – is the seed of our spiritual birth(3).
  • A human son receives the DNA from his earthly father, so too do we receive the spiritual DNA of our spiritual Father – this is called the “Spirit of God”(4).
  • Because we are born from God, we are therefore sons of God(5-6). We have a right in the legal system of heaven to be children of God; He is our Father.
  1. Jesus answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’ [Jhn 3:5-7 ESV]
  2. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation or creature. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. [2Co 5:17 ESV]
  3. having been born again, not of corruptible seed but incorruptible, through the word of God which lives and abides forever, [1Pe 1:23-25 NKJV]
  4. He anointed us, set his seal of ownership on us, and put his Spirit in our hearts as a deposit, guaranteeing what is to come. [2Co 1:21b-22 NIV]
  5. But as many as received Him [Jesus], to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name: who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. [Jhn 1:12-13 NKJV]
  6. See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are. [1Jo 3:1a ESV]

C. God wants to father us and us to be His sons

  • God came to the world as a son with the purpose of revealing himself to us as a Father.
  • A father-son relationship (taking the gender part out of it) is a unique relationship. It is made of two separate beings, but a part of the father is in the son. In that aspect, there is a union between the two.
  • The natural father-son relationship gives us insight into the characteristics of the same relationship in the spirit(1):
    • The father has a responsibility to the child to offer security and provision;
    • The child has a dependency on the father with the purpose of growing up to be like the father in maturity and values, but not necessarily in personality.
  • When we are born of the spirit of God, we are born of the same spirit as Jesus (the firstborn son), which unites us to the Father(2). We are able to relate to God as Father in exactly the same way as Jesus was able to relate to his father(2). In the same way that a young child would call out to his father: “daddy!”; that same dependent and expectant connection is in our spirit as we say: “our Father …”(3).
  1. Or which one of you, if his son asks him for bread, will give him a stone? … If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him! [Mat 7:9, 11 ESV]
  2. And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, “Abba! Father!” [Gal 4:6 ESV]
  3. your Father knows what you need before you ask him. Pray then like this: “Our Father in heaven, [Mat 6:8-9 ESV]

What do you believe?

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Is the Gospel bigger than your belief system, or is your belief system bigger than the Gospel?  We are living in days where it matters what we believe.  Most would agree that the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ changed the playing fields for humankind, the earth, the universe, and the heavens forever. However, few believe the fullness of the Gospel’s teaching and still fewer live it out. The power and truth of the Gospel of Jesus Christ triumphs over every religion formed by the good intentions of men. It is bigger than any ethnic culture, revolution, reformation, movement, or system of government. The Gospel is more than salvation and friendship with Jesus. If so, then what exactly changed between heaven and earth and between God and mankind?  

It is important to acknowledge that each generation moves and lives at the level of revelation received. Our generation is no different. Proverbs 25:2 says, “It’s the glory of God to conceal a matter but the honour of Kings is to search out a matter.” Are you willing to move out of your comfort zone and your neat tidy boxed theology and engage with the Trinity and all creation? It takes courage but the reward is worth it. Holy Spirit has been challenging our perspective with the questions like: Who are you? What do you believe?  The answer requires us to mine the depths of the scriptures. Once the foundations are addressed, I believe the Ecclesia (The Church) will operate in the order of Melchizedek. This will be marked by governing with greater authority, resulting in the ‘Restoration of All Things.’ First, let us focus on what being ‘born from above’ opens for the believer.

The teachings of Jesus started with him declaring in John 3: ‘…if any one may not be born from above, he is not able to see the reign of God.’ (YLT).  Jesus hands us a key to enter his Father’s kingdom. This is the key to new sight and new perspective to being able to perceive and understand heavenly things. Without this transaction we remain blind to the kingdom of God. 2 Corinthians 3:14-18 says: ‘their minds were blind‘ and ‘a veil lay over their heart’. They could not see the truth even when the scriptures were read to them. ‘But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord.’ This veil is lifted when we believed into Christ. Being born from above is a spiritual transaction and a reconciliation to our true Father in heaven. Now we can see as Christ sees and this changes everything. The word, transformed in the Greek means to transfigure, to change into another form. This is for us, here on the earth.

Jesus goes on to say in John 10:7-9 NKJV that He is the ‘door of the sheep’ and ‘they will hear My voice.’ By going through the door, which is Jesus’ body, we will hear his voice and we will be fed from his pastures. Armed with this promise of seeing and hearing, let us go through the door and not camp at the doorway or the foot of the cross as so many Christians have done. It was Jesus’ body broken on the cross that tore the veil in the temple which rendered the old covenant of sacrifices and separation from God obsolete. Now as we enter through Jesus the door, we have ears to hear and sight to see, grasp, perceive, understand God’s Kingdom, and if we can see it, we can walk in it and if we can walk in it, we can live in it.  Jesus said of himself in John 14:6 “I am the way, the truth and the light.” We need to walk through the Way into the Light to encounter Truth so we can see and hear correctly. Remember practice makes perfect. It took faith to believe you were saved and even that faith was given to you by God. It also is by faith you believe that you can see and hear. Prophesy this truth to yourself. Romans 10:17 ‘So then faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.’  This is not wishful thinking this is how you believe!

Religion teaches us that the aim of being born again is to go to heaven when we die. This teaching makes physical death our hero and keeps the believer separated from heaven, constantly begging God to come down to earth to meet their needs. He has opened the way for us to go up to heaven and be taught from his perspective. For in Him we live and move and have our being. Acts 17:28

Romans 6:3-12 teaches us that we were baptized into Jesus’ death. We put to death our old nature and the slavery to our old master Satan, and our corrupt nature/DNA, 2 Peter 1:4. Our sin was swallowed up and dissolved in Christ. In his death he took on sin. Our old self was buried with him and that is where it stays. When we were baptized into Jesus’ resurrection. Our flesh being corrupted in Adam is being made perfect through believing into the Word that is Jesus Christ himself. We have the mind of Christ so let us use it and not our carnal mind. 1 Corinthians 2:14-16

We need to get acquainted with our new self, as encouraged by Paul in Colossians 3:1-3 ‘Therefore if you have been raised with Christ [to a new life, sharing in His resurrection from the dead], keep seeking the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. 2 Set your mind and keep focused habitually on the things above [the heavenly things], not on things that are on the earth [which have only temporal value]. 3 For you died [to this world], and your [new, real] life is hidden with Christ in God. (AMP) This is true reformation, to come into agreement with the truth of our new nature. We are now multi-dimensional beings born in the spirit of God through Jesus. We are on the earth and in heaven at the same time.

We must realise we are aliens on this planet and enemies of this world or age. We must break up with the systems of this age in our thinking and in our character. We must disentangle ourselves completely from this age and be transformed/transfigured by the renewing of our mind, Romans 12:1-2. We must come out of the world and separate from its systems, 2 Corinthians 6:17. Through Adam we were baptised into this world’s systematic thinking and reasoning and behavior. Being born from above requires a total repentance/reformation, which enables us to reset our mainframe, so we can think like our Father thinks.

The outworking comes through the divine entanglement of our spirit with God’s spirit as we become one with him. 1 Corinthians 6:17 ‘But he who is joined to the Lord is one spirit with Him.’  We have been born from above from God the Father and being one with him we now carry his nature, his DNA. 1 Peter 1:23 says, we are born of incorruptible seed by the word of God.  2 Corinthians says, ‘Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.’ The word new in the Greek means of a new kind, unprecedented, unheard of.  We are new spiritual beings, life giving spirits and it is our spirit that must come into the primordial position and rule over our soul and body.

One day Jesus said to me: you need to believe into me. Note he did not say believe me but believe “into”. We need to believe who he is and what he has done which the scriptures teach us, and we need to believe him experientially as saviour, as lord, as friend, as brother, as king, as lover. He told me believing into him is letting myself become completely absorbed into him. Believe as he believes. I looked up the Greek of John 3:16 and found that the preposition ‘in’ can be rendered ‘into’ therefore reading ‘whoever believes into him’.  When we receive Christ, we must believe into all that He did. Just as death was swallowed up through the victory of the cross, so are we swallowed up in Christ. The scriptures say we are hidden in him. What do you believe? Do you believe?

Can you see that God is busy opening the eyes of our understanding and that it is important to go and study the Word for yourself and ask Holy Spirit to show you what happened when we got born again and who you really are now? It is the best adventure. Ask, seek, knock. Pray Paul’s prayer over yourself from Ephesians 1 – that ‘the eyes of our hearts would be enlightened, that is to receive the Spirit of revelation, wisdom and understanding regarding the hope to which we have been called.’ You can start by taking one of the scriptures below and read through it and meditate and ask Holy Spirit to fill your sanctified imagination or the eyes of your heart with his light and understanding.

As believers into Jesus meditate on these scriptures:
We have been reconciled back to God through Jesus – Romans 5:10
We have been co-buried and co-resurrected with him – Romans 6:5, Col 3:1
We have been born from above – John 3:3 (Again – G509 Anothen means from above, from a higher place. From heaven or God. From the beginning, from the very first)
We carry the divine nature/DNA of God – 2 Peter 1:3-4
We have been re-created into a new being – 2 Corinthians 5:17 (New – G2537 Kainos means of a new kind, unprecedented, novel, unheard of) 
We are not of this world’s systems anymore – Romans 12:2
We have been invited into oneness with God – John 17, Ephesians 2:5, Ephesians 1:4
We have been seated in heavenly places in Christ – Ephesians 2:6
We been given rest from our own works.  – Psalm 46:10, Hebrew 4:9-11

Activation: This simple activation may help you to see and hear in the heavenly realms. See in your mind’s eye, the torn veil that separated us from God in the temple. Jesus tore the veil from top to bottom, so you do not have to be separated anymore. Now take a physical step forward through the veil, step into heaven. Step into oneness in Christ Jesus. What do you see?  What do you smell? Who is there with you? Where are you?  Look at your surroundings? Explore… In the same way you received salvation by faith, by faith move in the heavenly realms.  Use your sanctified imagination, which is in subjection to the Holy Spirit, who will lead you into all truth.