“I DO not believe in sudden conversion,” said one the other day. “Beware,” said another, addressing a congregation, “of that sect of people, who profess to be able to tell the exact day and hour of their conversion.”
Now the great question is, not the manner of conversion, nor the knowledge of the exact time at which it took place, but is there such a, thing taught in the Bible? Can we know when we have undergone the change it indicates? In John 3, the Lord Jesus Himself speaking to Nicodemus, says emphatically, “Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” This was to a good man, a religious ruler of the Jews. “Art thou a master of Israel, and knowest not these things?” Speaking of those who have received Him, Christ says, in chapters 1 of the same gospel, “which were born... of God.” To be born again is to have life imparted to the spiritually dead. “You hath He quickened who were dead in trespasses and sins.” Christ is our Life. Having Him as the object of faith, having Him in the heart, is to have life; not to have Him so is to be dead.
Reader, which are you — spiritually alive in Christ, or dead in trespasses and sins. To have Christ is to be light. “Ye were sometimes darkness, but now are ye light in the Lord.” (Ephesians 5:88For ye were sometimes darkness, but now are ye light in the Lord: walk as children of light: (Ephesians 5:8).) This is not a matter of doubtful opinion, but a plain statement of the word of God. “The Scripture cannot be broken.” In John 5:25,25Verily, verily, I say unto you, The hour is coming, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God: and they that hear shall live. (John 5:25) our Lord again says, “Verily, verily, I say unto you, The hour is coming, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God: and they that hear shall live.” Have you heard that life-giving voice? If not, you are still dead. You may be reveling in the sense of youthful and vigorous natural life, but He who is “the truth” says you are dead. Speaking to the Jews, to whom had been “committed the oracles of God,” Christ said, “Ye will not come to me, that ye might have life.” And yet once more, in 1 John 5:12,12He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life. (1 John 5:12) it is written, “He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life.”
Oh, reader, what is your opinion worth when God has spoken? Whether you believe it or not, the truth remains the same. It is because you are dead that you do not see your terrible need of life. “I am the Way, the Truth, and the LIFE.”
It is necessary to be born again, because we were all “born in sin, and shapen in iniquity;” because we are by nature dead; because we are by nature corrupt, and corruption cannot inherit incorruption; because we are by nature unclean, and “there shall in no wise enter into it anything that defileth;” because we are by nature dark, and “God is light;” because we are born blind, for “the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.” “I am come, that they which see not might see... But now ye say, We see; therefore your sin remaineth.”
It is needful to be born again, because we are born deaf. “Why do ye not understand my speech? because ye cannot hear my word.” (John 8:4343Why do ye not understand my speech? even because ye cannot hear my word. (John 8:43).)
He that is of God heareth God’s word. “Ye therefore hear them not, because ye are not of God.” “My sheep hear my voice.” Have you heard the life-giving voice of the Son of God? Whether rich or poor, learned or unlettered, old or young, man or woman, whosoever thou art, may God make this word of His resound through the depths of thine inmost soul — “Ye MUST be born again!”
“How can a man know when he is born again!” Did Lazarus know when summoned from the silent darkness of the sepulcher by the voice of “the Resurrection and the Life”? He felt the throbbings of life in the heart that had ceased to beat. Did he know he was alive when his grateful and adoring gaze fell upon the Restorer of his life? Did he know he was alive when lie came forth from the icy chamber of death into the warmth of the natural sunshine?
Does the blind man know when his eyes have been opened? the dumb, when his tongue has been unloosed? So will you if your eyes of faith have seen “the King, the Lord of hosts;” so will you if your once-silent tongue now speaks His praise. Does the lame man know it when he receives power, through the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, to leap, and stand, and walk? So will you, when you can enter into His holy presence “walking, and leaping, and praising God.”
Oh, come now, just as you are, to the Fountain of life, and “take the water of life freely!” But make haste, delay not; for it will not flow forever. “Everything shall live whither the river cometh.” BUT the marshes shall not be healed; they shall be given, to salt. “After death the judgment.”
E. H.