Giving Birth
“Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit.” (John 3:6)
I love the New Testament metaphor of rebirth as a way of describing how we begin the process of entering into God’s kingdom. The image of rebirth points to new life and new beginnings.
The context of this verse from John’s gospel is a deeply spiritual conversation between Jesus and a member of the powerful Jewish ruling council, the Sanhedrin; a man by the name of Nicodemus. Jesus’s deeply spiritual words are lost on this religious teacher. The entire idea of being born again baffles him.
The reason for Nicodemas’ lack of understanding is summed up in the words of I Corinthians 2:13, which tell us that spiritual things are spiritually discerned.
As the conversation between Jesus and Nicodemus progresses, our Lord gently rebukes this spiritually sightless man (who later became one of his disciples), saying, “I have spoken to you of earthly things and you do not believe; how then will you believe if I speak of heavenly things?” (John 3:12)
It is impossible to truly understand God and His ways apart from a radical reorientation of our lives and minds that allow us to see the invisible things of God’s kingdom all around us.
This reorientation process begins as we acknowledge our dependence on the mysterious and life-giving ways of God’s Spirit. “The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit. (John 3:8)
There is so much to say about this verse but what stands out most to me is how those people who learn to receive the things of God’s Spirit and walk in the ways of God’s Spirit rely not on the flesh (human effort) but on the Spirit (divine revelation)
We can learn a great deal about God and His ways as we study scripture. There is a lot of knowledge to be gained; knowledge that helps us as we live out our lives. But to really begin to understand the deep things of God, we must allow the Holy Spirit to open the eyes of our heart to receive clear vision into His invisible kingdom which is all around us.
Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit.
In Christ,
Dan