Anatoly Yudenko. Born Again

THE DOCTRINE OF BEING BORN AGAIN

We all know the sorrowful story of our forefathers’ fall in Eden. The fallen cherub spoke to them with the tongue of a deceiver, and a great tragedy occurred. Paradise, the Garden of Eden, where man was meant to live forever, was defiled by the sin of disobedience, and the offenders were driven out beyond the bounds of Paradise. And this act of God was not so much a punishment as it was mercy on His part, to prevent the possibility of them eating again — not from the tree of knowledge, but from the tree of life. For if they had once eaten of it, they would have remained forever fallen, forever unreconciled with God.

Having driven the first people from Paradise, God gave them the hope of repentance, that a time and season would come when the Reconciler would arrive, who would take the sin of the world upon Himself, nail it to the cross in His body, and grant people full forgiveness and restoration with God.

So what exactly happened in Eden, that this event echoed throughout all humanity and, transmitted from generation to generation, struck it with sin and death?

And God commanded the man, saying: “Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, you shall not eat of it, for in the day that you eat of it, you shall surely die.” (Genesis 2:16-17) And as we know, this warning of God was violated. Adam and Eve ate of the forbidden fruit, and as a result of this disobedience, death entered them, and life withdrew. A choice was made, and it was a choice for the worse. The first man failed the test of devotion and obedience to God.

But God has pity on Adam; He has pity on all humanity descended from him. And He makes provision for a plan of salvation for people, which the Apostle Paul would later call the mystery hidden from ages and generations.

And further, we read what was written by John in 1 John 1:2: “For the Life was manifested, and we have seen, and bear witness, and declare to you that eternal Life which was with the Father and was manifested to us.” Jesus Christ Himself is Eternal Life for every person who believes and receives Him personally into their heart. But to believe and receive, to agree with Him — this is not yet the final goal. It is, rather, the beginning of the final goal; it is the first, correct, and necessary step toward God. The main thing still remains ahead — that for which this first step was taken. The second step is the decisive moment, of which Christ, proclaiming to His disciples, said: “…it is to your advantage that I go away to My Father; and I will pray the Father, and He will give you another Comforter, the Spirit of Truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him; but you know Him, for He dwells with you and will be in you; I will not leave you orphans; I will come to you; a little while longer and the world will see Me no more, but you will see Me.” Glory to the Lord!

Thus, Christ speaks, comforting His disciples: “I will not leave you orphans” — not because He changed His mind about going to His Father, but because He will send the Comforter, the Spirit of Truth, in His place. And though I go away, you will not remain orphans, just as you were not orphans when I was with you.

In God’s plan of salvation, it was predetermined — from the very moment of Christ’s coming to earth in the flesh — never to leave His people as orphans, up to the very rapture of the Church: “Lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age” (Matt. 28:20).

So, Life was manifested. It was manifested to the people from two components: first, it was manifested in the body of Jesus Christ; second, it settled by the Holy Spirit in the hearts of the redeemed people — those who received it, having believed, been sanctified, and born again of God. Hallelujah!

I would particularly like to emphasize that the goal of God’s salvation is that His temple, which is man, should not remain empty, and that the Lord God should reign within it. Therefore, God chooses a man of faith on earth, Abraham, whose obedient sacrifice pointed to the future: that the time would come when the innocent Son of Man would become the sacrifice for humanity.

Then there would be the twelve patriarchs, then the people of Israel, to whom God would give the law through Moses. And Moses himself would say to this people that the Lord God will raise up a Prophet among you, like me; Him you shall hear — pointing to the Reconciler, that is, Jesus Christ (Deut. 18:15). And likewise, the entire Old Testament, with its sacrifices and ordinances, clearly and definitely points to Jesus Christ. For example, the Passover with the exodus of Israel from Egypt. This is a picture of the exodus from this world into the heavenly abode, just as Abraham himself sought the city whose architect and builder was God Himself. And Christ Himself once said to His disciples, “Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle will by no means pass from the law till all is fulfilled.” And this means that everything that was said about Christ, or expressed through the sacrifices in the ministry of the Old Testament, must be fulfilled down to the smallest details.

Thus you see how the Lord God fulfills everything strictly according to Scripture. And I bring all this forward as an example, that in the Bible there is hidden the entire path of sanctification, growth, and attainment of the fullness of the Church of God in Christ Jesus.

It is sad, of course, that many will reject Christ as the Sacrifice, and instead choose and demand for themselves a murderer.

And in general, the Lord God, from the very beginning — that is, from the beginning of man’s fall — builds a line of salvation through a chain of specific events, starting with Abraham and ending with the redemptive sacrifice of Jesus Christ, followed by the glory of the ascension into heaven and the final completion of salvation — the descent of the Holy Spirit upon the Apostles.

It is also sad that in almost all Christian denominations, this profoundly important moment — the descent of the Holy Spirit — is ignored.

With the reception of the Holy Spirit, the restoration of the Temple of God begins — the temple, that is, fallen man — after which the severed connection with God is restored anew, by means of speaking in other tongues, glorifying and magnifying the wonderful works of God.

Man is the Temple of God, resurrected for God. The Holy Spirit dwells in him again. The goal is achieved. The true Temple is man, no longer empty or desolate, but God dwells in him, as He said, “I will dwell in them, walk among them, and be their God, and they shall be My people.” He foretold this beforehand about the New Covenant, the crown of which will be the glorious enthronement of God – the Holy Spirit – in the true temple not made with hands, the temple-man, lost and found again. And all this will be, if we hold fast the life begun, firm to the end.

Perhaps all of us speak of this and understand that the entire New Testament is concealed in the Old Testament. And this is correct. So it is. Because the ministry of the Old Testament is a shadow of good things to come, and not the very image of the things. And all the good things, or heavenly realities, that cast this shadow, were in heaven. And only through Jesus Christ, who came down from heaven, and together with Himself brought these heavenly blessings to earth. Glory to our God.

As it is written, “In Him, in Christ, dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily.” That is, Christ revealed His Father to us in all His fullness and glory, and this Godhead of the Father dwelt in Christ bodily. And all that was in times past partially revealed in the Old Testament was revealed in all fullness and glory through Jesus Christ in the New Testament.

But we, dear friends, are often not sufficiently attentive to the Word of God and not diligent enough to grasp this. And as a result of all this, we get misunderstanding and disagreement, which is undesirable. And in order to come to agreement on any question found in the Word of God, it is necessary, first of all, to find the key to the unfolding of a particular theme, based strictly on Holy Scripture. For example, almost all Christian denominations very vaguely, or even distortedly, understand, or do not understand at all the question of being born from Above. And this is one of the most important questions in Christian teaching.

I do not intend today to go deeply into all the details and perspectives of distorted understanding in one or another stream of Christianity, but I want to say that in the Word of God the principles of the spiritual regeneration of a Christian are set forth very concretely and rather clearly, and we only need to deeply examine what is written and receive revelation from above.

Such was the will of God, glory to Him!, that I was spiritually born in a church that from the beginning understood the question of being born from Above correctly: that being born from Above is indeed from Above, i.e., from God, and speaks for itself, and the moment of this birth for each person is the baptism with the Holy Spirit, where the union of the Holy Spirit with our spirit takes place. For the first time in the history of Christianity this happened on the Day of Pentecost, where the Church of Christ was born and has existed to this day. Glory to God!

For almost fifty years, at least as I know it, in our church it was not questioned that being born from Above is exactly the baptism with the Holy Spirit. Among us, as in all churches, we held services of examining the Word of God, and repeatedly, including on the question of being born from Above, but no one ever thought of interpreting this question differently. True, as often happens, during the study of Scripture some people prefer to keep silent, so you don’t always know what is on their mind. And perhaps some of these people had a different opinion, but they kept silent, and now, when they have found themselves in America, with American freedom, these seeds, lying for decades in dry ground, began to sprout, and so vigorously! that within a decade or so they have overgrown almost all the fields of Christianity. And we, at this turn of events, were not entirely prepared. And now, perhaps, someone has hastily begun to seek methods of influencing them, but the time has been lost.

Of course, like probably many other Christians, this state of the churches troubled and worried me, and I said, addressing the Lord, “Lord, it cannot be that nowhere in Scripture will we find a worthy answer to those who pervert Your Word.” We must somehow admonish those who have strayed from the Truth. And God gave an answer.

The key or basis for unfolding this theme – the answer – was the text from Holy Scripture, 1 Peter, chapter 2, verse 9, where it is said, “But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for His own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light.” Most beautiful words! The strongest promise of God that we can have on this earth, from which we will proceed in the further conversation concerning the question of being born from Above.
Peter, addressing the church, says, “You are a chosen generation.” And even more importantly, a royal priesthood—a people taken for His own possession. And since this is so, the uncovering of this theme must be sought not just anywhere, but primarily among the priests of the Old Testament period, where the entire path of sanctification and preparation of the church, in the person of the priests of that time, is very clearly and distinctly shown, where an example is given of the conditions under which a priest could enter the holy place, that is, into heaven itself, in our understanding of the New Testament church.

As I have said before, the entire New Testament is hidden in the Old Testament, which, in turn, was revealed to Israel through the material images of the priestly service in the Temple. And therefore only here, and precisely here, as nowhere better, can we learn our role of sanctification, as priests of the New Testament, which consists of three levels:

ELECTION
WASHING
ANOINTING WITH OIL

And only when all of us strictly adhere to this order, will we fear no attacks, whether from within or without, because this statement is based not on bare words, but on the Word, both of the New and Old Testament. In this example of the priestly service it is shown how dangerous it is to stop somewhere in the middle, without going the whole path of sanctification, to enter the holy place, say, bypassing the anointing with oil, and to appear before God.

I, of course, do not call for a return to temple service as such, but we must agree that in order to appear before God Himself, we must strictly observe holiness and blamelessness today, because nothing unclean and devoted to abomination will enter there, into heaven, before God.

The teaching of Jesus Christ must be accepted only as a whole; one cannot be content with just a part. Later, I will remind you of this.

The process of restoration with God is built in a strict sequence and a certain order; just as to a person born according to the flesh God does not immediately reveal the depths of His purposes, but as he grows, He initiates him into the mysteries (if, of course, he thirsts to know them), so that these revelations may not cause harm instead of benefit.

Christ said to Nicodemus, “That which is born of the flesh is flesh,” which in the end is nothing but soil into which the spiritual Beginning from the Spirit of God must be sown, and it itself does not inherit incorruption, but only he who is born of the Spirit of God inherits eternity in heaven with God. And therefore you, Nicodemus, everyone, must be born from Above. This is the essence of all life. Nicodemus, of course, did not understand everything Christ was saying, nor do we understand everything when it comes to spiritual, heavenly things.

The flesh, ultimately, is the straw on which the ear grows, gains strength, and ripens, and the final outcome is this: Gather the wheat into the barn, but burn the straw with unquenchable fire. Corruption does not inherit incorruption; such is God’s law. Everything is kept in its order. We have been sown into this world by God’s appointment, in order to inherit eternity, having come to ourselves, to return to the Father, to regain what was lost. Therefore, it was necessary for us to be born according to the flesh, so that later, having come to our senses and made the right choice, we might also be born according to the Spirit.

Straw, in essence, is nothing other than our earthly life, which was created, or intended, only so that by managing it correctly, man might achieve the main thing — to be restored in God. Therefore, the very birth according to the flesh is one of the links in the overall chain of returning to God, and it occupies one of the lower steps of mankind’s restoration — the return of the creature to its Creator. But this can by no means yet be called being born from Above.

The second step of the ascent for a person already born according to the flesh is the acceptance of God’s Word, and this includes — separation from the world, deep repentance, contrition, inner washing and cleansing, acceptance of Christ’s atoning Sacrifice — in a word, to be washed in the washing of regeneration by water. But even this is not yet being born from Above, because, as we see from the actions themselves, these are only prerequisites, deep preparation for the regeneration from Above.

This state can most likely be called the state of the one who came to himself, from the parable of the prodigal son, who experienced deep despair and inner renewal, and firmly decided to return to his Father. That decision prompted him to change his way of thinking, led to repentance and deep inner cleansing.

And only the third step of the ascent to God, the anointing with oil, is the concluding one, after which the priest, or in our case, we ourselves, can boldly enter into God’s presence, into the holy place, enter into heaven itself, where at the right hand of the Father is our Savior Jesus Christ.

We all know that Christ fulfilled the whole law of Moses and revealed to us what the essence of the temple service of the Old Testament letter and its actions consisted of.

He, Christ, also, when beginning His ministry, started by separating His chosen disciples from the world and preaching to them that the Kingdom of Heaven was at hand, etc., and thus prepared them for the anointing with oil, that is, for baptism with the Holy Spirit. Having informed them of all this, He told them, “Therefore, wait for the Promise.”

And on the day of Pentecost, when they were all with one accord in one place, the promise, the promise of the third Person of the Godhead, came upon them from heaven. The Lord God Himself by the Holy Spirit settled in the hearts of each of them. Glory to our Lord!

That main purpose set by God, for which all the previous ordinances and acts of consecration were, most likely, means to achieve this chief goal, came to completion — the goal which the Apostle Paul expressed thus: “Christ in you, the hope of glory” (Col. 1:27).

So, we see that this teaching on regeneration is not just an ordinary sermon, such as we often hear in our meetings (though that too is very important), but it is a revelation of God, recorded on the pages of Holy Scripture, which the Lord desires to reveal to everyone, so that everyone may come to know the fullness of God’s salvation and not remain deceived — and such, today in this last time, are very, very many.

And if, before receiving this revelation, we often took a position before our opponents as if we were almost guilty, and humbly tried to prove that baptism with the Holy Spirit is necessary for every believer, necessary not even because without the Holy Spirit we would be weak preachers (and that too), but mainly because without baptism with the Holy Spirit — which means without being born from Above — just like a priest without the anointing with oil, we have no right at all to enter into the holy place, into God’s presence.

In connection with this, someone might ask, does it follow that we have followed the Lord for so long, and all in vain? Yes, we followed, and for no small amount of time, and not only followed, but were witnesses and eyewitnesses when Jesus Christ walked through the streets of Jerusalem and taught the people, we saw how He performed great miracles and signs. And others, or many, will say, “We ate and drank in Your presence.” Yes, truly the people of Israel experienced the most wonderful time. They were participants in the greatest event and eyewitnesses of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ Himself coming down to earth for the redemption of the human race, and they heard the words of His all-forgiving teaching. But Christ, answering them, said, “Many will say to Me in that day…” — do you hear: many. Why many? Because many walked, walked and then stopped — some at the very beginning of the way, some in the middle, and some just before the very end. For example, the seventy disciples walked with Christ not a little, and did very much: they healed the sick, cast out demons, performed many miracles — but they stopped, stopped at the most inappropriate time. A very sad picture, is it not? To walk with Christ almost the whole way, to hear words that have the verbs of eternal life, and at the end to say about all this: “What strange words; who can listen to this?”

And as for Jesus Christ, did He fail to tell them something or fail to teach them fully? Certainly not, but He not only revealed His teaching to them, but even gave them from His fullness the same authority that He Himself had, and despite all this they turned away from Him and no longer walked with Him.

They could not contain the words in which the meaning of Spirit and Life were contained. And are there not many people today who, having heard about the birth from Above in the full sense of the word, stop and do not go further because of that same inability to accept what is heard, not mingled with faith?

Christ said to His opponents, “Search the Scriptures, for you think that in them you have eternal life; and these are they which testify of Me” (John 5:29). It should be noted that at the time when Christ spoke these words to them, the New Testament had not yet been written, and even the disciples did not yet have epistles; there was only the Old Testament, and it was to this that Christ pointed, saying, “Search it; it speaks of Me.” The disciples later did exactly that. It is written, “…they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily, whether those things were so” (Acts 17:11). Following the example of the early apostolic church, you and I also need to pay attention to the Old Testament priests in order to understand our role in the path of sanctification, for they testify about you and me and show the only way by which we can appear before the face of God, into His presence, having received no longer the Old Testament symbols, but the teaching of our Lord Jesus Christ and His Holy Spirit, as a particle of His Divinity.

Thus, in order to be born from Above, to be born of God, it is essential to go through the process of sanctification, and it consists, as we already know, of three levels, and in Israel it was shown through the example of the Temple. Why do you think God commanded Israel — first in the tabernacle and then in Solomon’s temple — that the priests should undergo this process of sanctification before they could begin their priestly service? This was done in order to show the course of restoration of the true temple, the human temple, in the future. And if we lay claim to the role of kings and priests, then we also need to follow God’s prescriptions exactly. And this priestly service pointed to you and me, that is, in brief it showed our path of complete sanctification. And if this was a shadow of things to come, then that future was and is the true human temple to which this shadow pointed.

Thus,

SEPARATION FROM THE WORLD (Exodus 28:1).
CLEANSING, WASHING WITH WATER (Exodus 29:4).
ANOINTING WITH OIL (Exodus 40:13-15).

And also, concerning sanctification (about us), see (Leviticus chapters 8–9).

Separation from the world, in our context, is when we have heard about Christ and have firmly decided to follow Him, leaving this perverse and sinful world.

But this is not yet the birth from Above. It is only our first, correct choice of returning to God. It is the first level.

The next, second level, is cleansing, that is, washing. This is what we call being born of water (by the washing of water), and this, of course, also cannot be called the birth from Above. It consists of intensive study of the Word of God, repentance, and deliverance from sins.

And the third level, the final stage of sanctification, is the anointing with oil, the concluding stage that includes the two preceding stages. It is called the birth from Above, which allows entry into the holy place, that is, into the body of Christ’s Church, whose head is Jesus Christ Himself.

So then, the question is, could a priest enter the holy place in the Temple having completed only the first level — merely having separated himself from the world, or from the main body of the people of Israel? No, of course not. He would expose himself to mortal danger. And could one who had passed the second level (having undergone cleansing) enter the holy place? No, certainly not. Only the one who had passed the third level — the level of anointing with oil, baptized with the Holy Spirit in our context — has the right to enter the holy place, because he has a particle of Divinity within himself and becomes a partaker of the divine nature and of the Church of Christ.

So let us examine ourselves: at what level have we stopped in our sanctification, and what do we represent before God? At the first? At the second? Or at the completed third?

I want to say that many denominations do not fully take seriously the significance of the baptism with the Holy Spirit. They do not know that this is the power that will resurrect us and lift us up to meet God on the day when Christ appears for His Bride — the Church — in which He has beforehand left the guarantee of the Holy Spirit, as it is written, “But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you” (Rom. 8:11). And in the ninth verse it says, “But if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Him.” Do you hear what the Word of God says to us? Not His.

One might ask, why so categorical? And the reason is that God undertook a very great work for the restoration of fallen man and paid a very high price. He Himself came, suffered, cleansed, washed, received, and then ascended in glory to heaven with His blood sacrifice, to bear witness before the saints and to send the Holy Spirit upon those who accept Him as their personal Savior and confess Him as their Lord and God. And to those who have ignored and neglected all this, He will say categorically, ‘I do not know you.’

For Christ, when He came to earth for the redemption of the human race, also presented three levels of humanity’s restoration.

Separation from the world: By His preaching He separated people from this world for His Kingdom.
Cleansing: which includes preaching and the atoning sacrifice, washing in the blood, and forgiveness.
Anointing: which means the baptism with the Holy Spirit. This is the anointing with oil.

Now you see how unwise it is to stop somewhere in the middle, comforting oneself with deception, and condemning oneself to be found among the foolish virgins on the day of Christ’s appearing.

The most important and ultimate goal of God the Father is to enter the temple of man by the Holy Spirit, for the sake of which everything that came before was accomplished.

Look closely: even Christ’s sacrifice itself was so that God the Holy Spirit might freely enter the human heart and make it a temple not made with hands. With God everything was and is accomplished in an orderly way, and all according to Scripture.

Therefore, the baptism with the Holy Spirit is the crowning glory of all God’s work in restoring fallen mankind, and to ignore it seems, quite simply, unwise.

Birth of Water and the Holy Spirit

Although these two states of birth have one common origin and final goal—the goal of regeneration, the restoration of fallen man—in their essence, both in character and in their purpose, they differ substantially from one another.
Birth of water is birth from the Word of God, and is obligatory and necessary, but nothing more than the first step of being Born Again, and represents a far from complete New Birth as such.

And here is why. I will give the example of Jesus Christ from the parable of the hidden treasure in the field (Matt. 13:44).

Suppose that nobody living in that country knows about that treasure—which was indeed the case. The people there, in terms of material provision, were of various classes, and naturally among them were the poor, for whom the found treasure, oh, how timely it would have been! But alas!—nobody knows about it. And so people live their own lives, and the treasure lies there by itself, bringing no benefit to anyone.

But here Christ, through this parable, spoke to the people not about the riches of this world, but about a wealth far higher in significance, the wealth of heaven, of eternal life in the blessedness of paradise in heaven.

And so, in order to make use of this treasure, it is necessary first of all to know for certain that it really exists, having obtained full information and coordinates: in which field it is, and at what depth buried, etc., and only then, based on that, it is necessary to act, that is, to take some active measures to possess it.

In this parable, the man who found out about it quickly sold all he had in order to buy that field. He knew for certain that by buying it and thus becoming the full owner of it, he would extract that treasure for his own use, and it would prove to be thousands of times more valuable than the costs invested, making its owner the richest man on earth.

Figuratively, Jesus Christ pointed with this parable to the kingdom of heaven, a treasure whose price is immeasurably greater than all the wealth of the world.

So then, in order to become the possessor of this treasure, at least two necessary conditions must be met: first — to learn that it truly exists and what must be done to obtain it. This is the first thing that must be done. Let us call this section – THE INFORMATION PART.

Therefore, if someone possesses this, even completely full information, can we reliably assert, on the basis of that alone, that from that moment he has become the rightful owner of this treasure (in our case, a person born again, that is, having reached his main goal)? No, of course not; he has come much closer to it thanks to this information, but the goal still lies ahead, the treasure is not yet in his hands, and who knows how events will unfold from now on? Where is the guarantee that he will reach the goal?

So the conclusion is: information is nothing more than a means to reach the goal, and the goal is the inner state of a person who has become a bearer of the kingdom of God within himself in the Holy Spirit.

The second part of this section consists in putting the acquired wealth into practice, and we will call this part – TAKING POSSESSION, which in turn points to the need to do something, to sacrifice something, to take on certain obligations, and so forth.

And now let us return to our theme: the birth of water and the Spirit, which Jesus Christ strongly recommended to the teacher of Israel, Nicodemus. Let us recall their dialogue. John chap. 3:3, 5, 6. Jesus said to him, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God,” and in the fifth verse He repeated this to him again more broadly and deeply, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.” He told him that being born again consists of two parts: it consists of the birth of water and the birth of the Holy Spirit.

Thus let us remember: being born again, that is, being born of God (otherwise it would not be called born from Above), consists of being born of water and born of the Spirit. He, Christ, repeated all this to Nicodemus a second time so that he would understand what being born again means—that for the new birth it is essential and necessary for everyone to receive both the birth of water and the birth of the Spirit. Without this birth, a person not only will not inherit the Kingdom of God, but will not even see it. This is so important to know, so necessary to carefully investigate and earnestly desire to obtain, because our future depends on it—our heavenly future—and therefore we simply have no right to treat this matter carelessly, hastily, or in a slipshod way.

Now, drawing closer to the question we are considering, it is necessary to grasp or define the term birth of water, and then also the term birth of the Spirit.

So, let us begin with the birth of water. What did Christ have in mind by the birth of water when He recommended it to Nicodemus? Here is what: we read in James 1:18, “Of His own will He brought us forth by the word of truth, that we might be a kind of firstfruits of His creatures.”

Do you see where the beginning (the firstfruit) comes from? From regeneration by the Word of Truth!

A person begins his sanctification in no other way than by hearing the word of truth (the good news) and receiving it into his heart. Having heard it, he seems to awaken from sleep, he comes to himself. He hears conviction; his conscience immediately reminds him of a multitude of errors, of sins both small and great. Deep repentance takes place. A longing to hear God’s Word grows. The person intensely seeks a way out of the situation he finds himself in, and the first question that arises is: “Men and brethren, what shall we do?” Acts 2:37–38 — … “Repent, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit” — the apostle Peter answered. And the apostle Paul, speaking directly about the church, said that Christ sanctified her, that is, the church, and cleansed her with the washing of water by the Word (Eph. 5:25–26). In this way, by the washing of water, God brought about the cleansing and sanctification of people’s hearts. This is what can be confidently called the birth of water, or the birth by the Word, which in essence means one and the same thing, because it says: with the washing of water, and it adds by the Word. The Word of God, like water, like a washing of water, washed away all impurity and cleansed the human heart.

It should be noted that here we are speaking so far only about the Word (by the Word). The Word performs this initial role of the sinner’s turning to God, because through It faith is born; although with the assistance of the Holy Spirit, the leading role here is nevertheless fulfilled by the Word. If you do not hear and do not learn, then you will not receive and will understand nothing. It will be like foreigners speaking different languages, neither one knowing the other’s tongue, so that they do not understand each other. That is why I have called this section the informational part. A person who knows nothing yet initially receives information about heaven, about his fallen state, about the saving sacrifice of Jesus Christ, and so on. And he comes to himself, awakens from the sleep of sin, repents, weeps, is broken in heart, and receives from God a certain joy, even physical lightness in the body, because he has received forgiveness, cleansing, and peace from God.

Did you notice how the apostle Peter answered the new converts to their question? “Repent, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.” He did not stop only at repentance, nor even at baptism in the name of Jesus. All of that is good and wonderful. To go through repentance, to receive baptism, to obtain forgiveness of sins—is that not enough? Of course, it is not enough.

The apostle Peter firmly knew that this is far from enough, and therefore, in concluding his answer, he added and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit—receive what took place today, on the day of Pentecost.

Now, when the Holy Spirit has descended upon the apostles and other disciples, it is unthinkable to remain without the Holy Spirit, for this is the promise of Christ Himself. To reject the Holy Spirit is tantamount to rejecting Christ Himself, because the Holy Spirit was sent in Christ’s place so that we would not remain orphans. To receive the Holy Spirit must be done personally by everyone, just exactly as repenting and being baptized in the name of Jesus Christ is to be done by everyone. From the day of the coming of the Holy Spirit to earth, the period, or the era, of the Holy Spirit began, and the human temple must not remain empty. This is the time when God, according to His promise, is restoring what the devil destroyed. The interrupted connection with God is being restored. The dead person is raised. The living God, by the Holy Spirit, settles in the hearts of believers and dwells there as the full-rightful Master, as He did before. Hallelujah! Glory to our Lord Jesus Christ! Who defeated the devil and freed us from captivity, having forgiven us and cleansed our hearts, so that the Holy Spirit might freely settle in them and restore the destroyed temple for God.

In our church, where I was brought up, there was a definite rule and sequence in the work of sanctification and regeneration for every person coming from the world to God. And therefore, for every new convert, after giving him instructional words and seeing the fruits of conversion, they did not delay in teaching him the doctrine of the baptism of the Holy Spirit. And they would say: while the vessel is cleansed and emptied of the old contents, it is necessary to fill it with new contents—to invite Jesus Christ into that heart. This will then be the chief purpose of all the work done in a person in terms of his sanctification. For everything done beforehand was more likely the prerequisites for the purpose, but not the purpose itself; and the purpose itself is “Christ in you, the hope of glory.” This will then be the second part of the birth from Above, as the birth of the Holy Spirit.

Rightly are these two births, of water and of the Spirit, called and considered the birth from Above, of which Christ spoke to Nicodemus. Without knowledge, without information about this—that is, without the birth of water—a person cannot receive these heavenly values, this hidden treasure in the field. But even after learning all of this, if a person becomes complacent and stops at this level, he becomes the most miserable of all men, because he was so close to blessedness, and in that direction he expended so much labor, possessed all the information, and yet did not reach the goal. A terrible picture.

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. What profit is it for a man to remain born only of the flesh? God offers far more than this—to be born from Above, to receive adoption, and to become a child of God forever. Glory to our Lord!

Unfortunately, very, very many among those who have believed in Jesus Christ and confess Him as their Lord are born only of water and simply cannot understand that this is very, very little, and that the most important part is the second part, the concluding part of the birth, which is union with the Lord Himself, through the baptism of the Holy Spirit.

In other words, the first part of the birth, the birth of water or of the Word of God, is nothing more than the informational part, that is, the sowing.

God sowed His saving seed into the fields of human hearts, both personally and through His apostles. And therefore, the apostle Peter, addressing those who had believed, insists in his first epistle: “like newborn babes, long for the pure spiritual milk, that by it you may grow up to salvation.”

He calls the converts newborn, and this is absolutely so. But these newborns, it turns out, need—among all other things—to also have salvation. It turns out that although they have been born of the word, they are far from perfection, they still do not know very much; they may, for example, not know that besides the birth of water, there is also the birth of the Spirit. Even the disciples themselves did not yet fully understand this, but on the other hand, they were in strict obedience to Christ and waited in Jerusalem for what was promised. And Christ fulfilled His promise and did not leave them as orphans, sending them the Holy Spirit. He spoke to them thus: John 16:7 “Nevertheless I tell you the truth: it is to your advantage that I go away; for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you; but if I depart, I will send Him to you.”

Being in obedience to Jesus Christ and receiving His promises by faith, the disciples, longing for the pure spiritual milk, grew up to salvation and passed this on to others.

From all the foregoing, it is necessary to conclude: that a person born from Above is one who is necessarily born of water, that is, of the Word of God, and of the Holy Spirit. They cannot be separated one from the other, because the Word and God, or the Holy Spirit, are essentially One.

Without hearing about God, a person will not know God, just as one who has known God cannot do without the Word of God, which is heavenly Bread for him. But each fulfilling its role, together they lead the repentant sinner to perfection. Glory to God!

These two kinds of birth constitute one whole, and since both the one and the other come from God, this phenomenon is called being born of God, that is, the birth from Above.

Just as in the human body the feet cannot do what belongs to the hands, and likewise ears cannot fulfill the role of eyes to see, yet performing both functions in the body, they are necessary to each other. Therefore, the question, “Is it possible to do without the Word of God?” or “Is it possible to do without the Holy Spirit?” would sound, to say the least, absurd or even unreasonable. The Word of God, delivered once by Christ, accomplished and still accomplishes to this day its part of the work, while the Holy Spirit, dwelling in the heart of man as a personality, a personality from God—does His part.

In this, there is a definite sequence. The Word of God invites, cleanses, and prepares a person so that the Holy Spirit, in turn, can enter the heart of man without hindrance and freely dwell within it, making it a temple for our Lord Jesus Christ and God our Father.

Christ, instructing His disciples, once told them a very important truth: “You are already clean because of the word which I have spoken to you.” John 15:3-4. And further verse 4: “Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in Me.”

He spoke these words to the disciples shortly, on the eve of His suffering and His removal from the earth to His Father, beginning from chapter 14 and ending with chapter 16. In these chapters, He spoke to them mainly about the Holy Spirit and about His approaching sufferings before His ascension to His Father.

Thus, before sending the Holy Spirit upon His disciples, He again reminded them: you are already clean through the word, you are already prepared to receive the Holy Spirit, and therefore, “abide in Me,” He pleaded, “and I in you. I will pray the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may abide with you forever—the Spirit of truth.” John 14:16. And in chapter 15, verse 26, He affirms: “But when the Helper comes, whom I shall send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, He will testify of Me.” You see what clear and strict sequence there is in all of this, from sanctification by the word to preparation for receiving the Holy Spirit. First cleansing by the word, and then receiving the Helper—the Spirit of truth.

In this connection, it would be worthwhile to glance at the history of the people of Israel, where we can also clearly see that the Word from God already occupied the central role in the formation of Israel as a special people, as a people chosen directly by God for a unique purpose. And God’s contact or connection with Israel was also directly through the Word of God, through the Law (the Decalogue), and through specially chosen men of faith—the prophets. Yet it was a dialogue as if from afar. Between God and Israel there was a certain distance. But the moment came when this Word—the Word from God—became incarnate and took on human flesh: “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth,” says the Apostle Paul. And God undertook this in order to shorten as much as possible the distance separating man from God. The Word of God became the God-man, our Lord Jesus Christ, who dwelt among people as a man, yet in His inner nature was God. He taught the people, revealing and showing lost humanity the way to heaven.

Thus, God in Christ Jesus once again went to meet fallen humanity. And what was the people’s reaction, and what do we see?

Just as the first time the Word, as the law, was not received by them, so the Word, Christ, was also rejected and despised by many of them, especially by the scribes and Pharisees. For indeed the good news was preached to us as well as to them; but the word they heard did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in those who heard it (Heb. 4:2). And because of this, when Christ appeared, they did not recognize Him and did not receive Him.

Does not the same thing happen today, when many, though they have received the word as the word from God, yet do not receive God as the Holy Spirit and even reject Him? Yet Christ Himself affirmed and even reminded the Samaritan woman that the hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such to worship Him. God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth (John 4:23, 24).

Such worship is in its essence the most faithful and the one that best corresponds to His love, and even more, it is the closest communion of man with God.

Worship on the level of spirit and truth is the only standard that defines the right relationship between man and God.

Having read all this and reflected deeply, we inevitably must heed the words of the prophet Isaiah, who appealed to the people of Israel saying, “Seek the Lord while He may be found, call upon Him while He is near” (Isaiah 55:6).

Today, as we ought to acknowledge justly, our God has drawn nearer to us than ever before and has become incomparably closer than He was in Israel, and far closer than when He, as the incarnate Word, moved among the people. And, of course, without question, He has become closer to us when He, by the Holy Spirit, entered our hearts. For all this, endless glory be to our Lord.

I would like to end here, but a severe warning from the Apostle Paul to the Hebrews—and today to all of us—keeps coming to mind: “Anyone who has rejected Moses’ law dies without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses. Of how much worse punishment, do you suppose, will he be thought worthy who has trampled the Son of God underfoot, counted the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified a common thing, and insulted the Spirit of grace?” Heb. 10:28-29.

And if one not only insults but also slanders, reviles, blasphemes, and mocks, including with other tongues—what then?

The Holy Spirit is the completing hypostasis of our God in our salvation, the One who has taken up residence in the hearts of the redeemed people of God as in His temple not made with hands.

Therefore: Christ’s aim is that He Himself personally dwell in us and we in Him—this is in its fullness the birth from above, which Christ once presented to Nicodemus, to the apostles, and which they in turn presented to the whole church of Christ. Glory for everything to our Lord Jesus Christ and to God our Father forever and ever!

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