Sermon notes

What Is New Life?

Gospel Basics Sermon Series #6

Joh 3:1-15

Introduction:

The dangerous course of modern Christianity

I am deeply concerned about a breed of Christianity that knows much about how to help you improve your marriage, or succeed at work, or propel you to greater fulfillment in life but knows little or nothing of damning effects of our sin nature, the blackness of our fallen hearts, or our utter helplessness and inability to do anything truly good without Jesus!

I am distressed by a Christianity that will give you 7 secrets to a good love life, 10 keys to financial success, and 12 steps to freedom from addiction but fails to really give you the one and only person who alone has walked all the steps, has all the keys, and keeps no secrets!  

I am troubled by how many churches have quietly slipped into a mode of ministry that pursues the look and feel of Christianity without the heart change of Christianity, ministries that focus on doing the right thing, singing the right songs, keeping the right traditions, helping the right people, but fails to confront sinful people with a holy and righteousness God!

New life as a foundational gospel truth

And so today I want to remind you of a foundational truth of the Gospel that when understood correctly and kept in focus in our lives, in our ministries and in our church, will help us avoid the emptiness of “How to” Christianity, will ignite true life from within, and will fuel our passion for the gospel.

I want to talk to you today about the Biblical concept of “new life,” being “born again,” or “regeneration”. This foundational truth is found in both Old and New Testaments and it is vital for a proper understanding of the Gospel. Understood and believed correctly it changes the way we view the Christian life and it changes the way we share the Gospel.

To put it succinctly, The Bible teaches us that man’s heart and soul, his entire being is so tainted by the indwelling presence of evil, that there is nothing we can do to remedy or fix the situation. There is no meeting, no method, no modification of behavior, no meditation, no medication, no magic and, no mere flexing our will power, that can fix our broken lives.

Our lives must be discarded, put aside, left in the past and we must exchange them for new lives, we must have a new birth, we must be regenerated by Author of all life.

New life as seen in John 3

The concept of new life rings out from many pages of Scripture but nowhere is it more prevalent than in the Gospel of John and nowhere do we see such an explanation of it than in John chapter 3.

The Gospel of John in particular focuses on new life.

Jesus is said to be the author of all life! John 1:4

Jesus gives the water of life John 4:14

Jesus is the giver of life John 5:21

Jesus is the bread of life John 6:35

Jesus is the light of life John 8:12

Jesus is the resurrection and the life John 11:25

Jesus is simply “the life” John 14:6

This is a story that only occurs in the Gospel of John. It was of particular importance to John and his readers because:

John wanted his readers to understand that the Gospel of Jesus Christ was about far more than living according to some set standard, it began with new life and without that new life, no amount of religion, knowledge, or morality would do you any good.

It emphasized that this new life come through belief, not through heritage

John was writing to a second generation of Christians who may have thought that if there parents were Christian, then that meant they were automatically Christians.

I.