John 3:5 quotes Jesus as saying except a man be born of water and of the spirit he cannot enter into the kingdom of God what did Jesus mean by the phrase born of water and how can we fulfill his command the answer is coming up next welcome to Apostolic life in the 21st century a podcast dedicated to helping modern-day Believers live out the teachings of the first century Church this podcast is part of the Teaching Ministry of Dr David K Bernard Dr Bernard has dedicated his life to studying the Bible and helping Believers apply its
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for joining us John 3:5 quotes Jesus as saying saying verily verily I say unto thee except a man be born of water and of the spirit he cannot enter into the kingdom of God in your book The New Birth you note that theologians have propagated many theories about the meaning of this phrase born of water and you wrote that some theologians believe that it refers to natural birth which is accompanied by a watery flow of amniotic fluid others say it's identical to the birth of the spirit and still others say that it refers to a
spiritual cleansing performed by the word of God in your book of course you argue that Jesus was referring to water baptism why do you believe that born of water in this verse is a reference to water baptism and what about the other possibilities that you mentioned I do believe that uh this verse refers to water baptism and that is the consensus of the majority of Scholars and historically and even today uh the Catholic Church the Orthodox Church the Lutheran Church Churches of Christ and so the majority of Christian Scholars would still say that among Protestants
even some Protestant Scholars would agree with that others would not because they don't believe baptism as part of the Plan of Salvation so therefore they have to find some way to say it can't be refering to water baptism well of course the majority could be right or wrong I'm just giving you the background but I think the answer is found in the text itself and in the application of the New Testament Church and yes as you mentioned if you want a detailed explanation discussion con considering all the Alternatives it's the discussion is in my book
the new birth but let's just take this passage on its own terms and see what it says I'm going to read from the new King James and I'm going to go to John 33 through 5 Jesus answered and said to him most assuredly I say to you unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God Nicodemus said to him how can a man be born when he's old can he enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born Jesus answered most assuredly I say to you unless one is born of
water and the spirit he cannot enter the kingdom of God so if you look at the parallel verse three and verse 5 verse three unless you're born again you can't see the kingdom of God verse five unless you're born of water and the spirit you can't enter the kingdom of God so I think verse three and verse 5 are equivalent in other words to be born again means to be born of water and in the spirit so the idea that it's natural birth I think is excluded from the context because Jesus is talking about being
born again Nicodemus mistakenly was trying to figure out what is this talking about natural birth and Jesus says no so I think that explanation is expressly excluded and then verse five is an elaboration so Nicodemus didn't understand what Born Again meant so Jesus explained the same thing in other terms well when I said born again I meant being born born of water and spirit so water and spirit are two elements of the new birth I think that's the most natural reading of the text so that would exclude the idea that birth of water is natural
birth that would also exclude the idea that birth of water and birth of spirit of synonymous because Jesus used the umbrella term born again to cover the whole experience but then when Nicodemus wanted further explanation Jesus broke broke it down and say well there are two elements here there's water and spirit so the context wouldn't indicate you must be born of the spirit and you must be born of the spirit he's making a distinction now that illuminates two of the Alternatives the third one is what's washing of Water by the word that's a reference to
Ephesians 5 and while certainly the word of God is a cleansing agent in our spiritual life nowhere in the Bible does it indicate that and nowhere in this context is it comparing the word of of the word in Salvation to water to the contrary the word of God is likened to the seed uh so you see this in First Peter you see that in The Parables of Jesus um the word is not like a river of water the word is like a seed that's planted and if you're going to extend the analogy of being born
again when people hear the word you might say that's conception but as they o believe and obey the word so like a child might be conceived in the womb but the birth is an experience that's distinct from the initial conception so likewise the new birth is distinct from the initial hearing of the word it involves our response of Faith to the word our obedience to the word so to say the word would be the new birth again that's confusing things that's not a scriptural uh illustration and that doesn't fit the analogy of New Birth and
so the word would not be water the word would be the seed resulting or the word would be conception resulting subsequently in the actual birth itself now that leaves I've excluded the other Alternatives that leaves well why do I think it would be baptism well one of the things you always look at is context um what could Nicodemus a religious leader have known so um in in fact um you know Nicodemus didn't understand stand and he goes on later in verse 9 Nicodemus answered said to him how can these things be in verse 10 Jesus
answer said to him are you the teacher of Israel and do not know these things so when Jesus said born of water in the spirit he expected that Nicodemus as a Jewish religious leader and biblical scholar could have understood exactly what he was talking about well what could Nicodemus have understood in the life of Jesus so these other Alternatives that I mentioned are subsequent Christian theological constructs Nicodemus wouldn't have had anything to know about that but what could he have known well as a Jew he would have known that when people converted from another religion
to Judaism part of that was what they call proelite baptism proelite meaning converts they would immerse them in a ceremonial bath so on the temple grounds and you can even go there today in in Jerusalem there are scores of deep uh pools or baths where people would go down for ceremonial cleansing and they would fully immerse themselves the the Hebrew term is the Mikvah so the Old Testament had examples of ceremonial cleansings and Washings at the time of Jesus there was proelite baptism where converts from other religions were immersed so as part of becoming Jews
and more specifically right here in the gospel of joh in the preceding chapter you have John the Baptist preaching the message of repentance believe on the Messiah wait for the coming of the Holy Spirit the Messiah will give you the spirit and so to do that I'm going to baptize you un repentance so most obviously when Jesus said you must be born of the water and the spirit he could have expected ni Nicodemus to know well the the Old Testament uh part of becoming a priest um you had a ceremonial immersion uh in their day
part of becoming a Jew being a convert you would be immersed and John the Baptist preaching going on right there you want to show your repentance and you want to show your waiting for the coming of the spirit be baptized by immersed in water and and we don't have to guess that but actually we see here in John uh the same chapter um you have John 3:23 now John was also was baptizing in Enon near Salem because there was much water there and they came and were baptized and then John CH 4 verse 1 and
verse uh two therefore when the Lord knew that the Pharisees had heard that Jesus made and baptize more disciples than John though Jesus himself did not baptize but his disciples so in the immediate context you've got John the Baptist baptizing and Jesus disciples baptizing well the most obvious reference would be water baptism now what about the application to the New Testament Church when you actually study the historical records the book of Acts is the history book of the early church it shows how people actually were converted and came into the church after the death burial
and resurrection of Jesus so what happened acts 238 repent be baptized everyone of you in the name of Jesus Christ you shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost um and so you can go through throughout the records in the book of Acts uh acts 8 the story of the Samaritans that were baptized in the name of Jesus filled with the spirit acts n Paul he was baptized by calling on the name of Jesus he was filled with the spirit acts 10 Cornelius and his household the Gentiles they were bapt they they received the spirit
first and they were commanded to be baptized Acts 19 the Disciples of John and Ephesus they were baptized in the name of Jesus Christ they were filled with the spirit so here Jesus says in John 3 the new birth is going to be a baptism of are you going to be born of water and spirit when you see the Fulfillment of Jesus words consistently throughout the Book of Acts you find baptism of water in Jesus name baptism the spirit so it's very easy to see that the birth of water and spirit is equated in the
rest of the New Testament with the baptism of water in the spirit and I'll give you one more verse that just makes it Crystal Clear um because you find this exact usage of the word uh in in the story of Cornelius Acts 10 uh verse 47 and 48 uh so um after the the Gentiles received the Holy Spirit they spoke in tongues then Peter asked this question acts 10:47 can anyone forbid water that the should not be baptized who have received the Holy Spirit just as we have and he commanded them to be baptized in
the name of the Lord then they asked him to t a few days so he he uses this very phrase hey can we forbid water in the obvious implication no we can't what does that mean be baptized in water in the name of Jesus Christ so Jesus said you need the birth of water and spirit the Apostle Peter the Apostle who was given the Keys of the Kingdom to proclaim the message says we need to give them water and you could even put in kind of like parenthesis just like Jesus said and what was that
water water baptism so I think it's very strongly established both from the immediate context and from the application throughout the New Testament that when Jesus said you must be born of the water and of the spirit he meant you must be baptized in water and you must be baptized in the Holy Spirit and that's the new birth experience thank you for listening to this episode of apostolic life in the 21st centur if you enjoy this podcast please take a moment to give us a review on Apple podcasts Spotify or your favorite podcast app we also
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