The New Birth, A Mystery

John 3:10 Jesus answered and said unto him, “Are you a master of Israel, and don’t know these things?

Jesus indicates that it is inexcusable that Nicodemus does not understand regeneration and the new birth.

Nick, A Religious Authority, Missed It

Doubtless, he himself had for years taught others the conditions of entrance to the kingdom of God. These  conditions were cast in terms of obedience to God’s commands, devotion to God, happy submission to His will. However, here he is facing a condition he has never heard expressed, the absolute requirement of birth from above.

The New Birth In The Old Testament The Water Symbolism

For the Jews in the Old Testament, water was used for purification. If a person was defiled and unclean, that
person had to go through ceremonial washing of water.

As a master of the Law, he would have remembered Ezekiel 36:24-27,”I’ll put My Spirit within you. I’ll sprinkle water upon you and you shall be clean.” In Ezekiel, water and spirit come together forcefully, first to signify cleansing from impurity, and second to depict the transformation of heart that will enable people to follow God wholly.

When water is used figuratively in the Old Testament, it habitually refers to renewal or cleansing, especially when it is found in conjunction with ‘spirit’.

In Ezekiel 37:3 The language is reminiscent of the ‘new heart’ an expression that revolves around the promise of
the new Covenant Jeremiah 31:29.

Water Does Not Equal Baptism

John 3:5 unless a man be born of water and of the Spirit..

When John wrote this, Christian baptism had been practiced for several decades.

The need for a radical transformation is what is emphasized, the fulfillment of Old Testament promises anticipating the outpouring of the Spirit, and not a particular rite. If baptism is associated in John’s readers’ minds with entrance into the Christian faith, and therefore with new birth, then they are being told in the strongest terms that it is the new birth itself that is essential, not the rite.

The Water Of The Word

The Holy Spirit takes the Word of God and purifies the soul of a man, we are cleansed by the Word as the Spirit of God administers it to us.

Ephesians 5:26 That he might sanctify her by cleansing her with the washing of water by the word.

The Work Of The Spirit

John 3:8 The wind blows where it pleases, and you hear its sound, but you don’t know where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit.

Jesus says the wind cannot be controlled or understood by human beings, but we can detect the wind’s effects.
As with the Spirit, we can neither control nor understand Him, but what He does in the life of the individual
is undeniable and unmistakable.

Both the mysterious and the undeniable power of the Spirit of God are displayed in the Scriptures to which Nicodemus had devoted so many years of study. Ezekiel 11:19

The Water of the Word & Spirit Work Together

Ephesians 4:5 one Lord, one faith, one baptism;

We are regenerated, baptized, indwelt and sealed, all at the same point. Paul told the Ephesians that there is one Lord, one faith, and one baptism, not 25. At the time of salvation is the only time you’re ever baptized with the Holy Spirit. Nowhere in the Bible does it have anything to do with tongues or anything else. It is only at the point
of salvation that involves the baptism of the Spirit.

When a person is cleansed by the washing of the Wordand the Spirit of God recreates him/her, then they can enter the Kingdom of God. That’s exactly what Jesus is saying. The Holy Spirit must recreate them. He must regenerate them, and this cleansing happens only by the power of the Word of God, not an external ritual.

At the point of faith when you receive Christ, the Spirit of God recreates you. He regenerates you by the washing of the power of the Word and brings life where there was death.

Jesus is saying to Nicodemus and to us, without trying to split it all up, “it’s all an inside job done by the Spirit.”

Now that Jesus the Messiah has come, all mans’ laws, rituals, rules and all that other baloney is worthless.

Salvation happens by the Spirit of God inside, washing you clean and recreating you in union with Christ. That is the only way one enters into the Kingdom of Heaven.