|
by
Doug Ward |
OXFORD, OHIO-The term "born-again Christian" is heard frequently in
our culture. However, what it means to be "born again" is less
familiar. The term comes from a challenging New Testament passage that includes
some puzzling phrases.
On
March 4, 2018, New Testament scholar Ben Witherington III examined this
passage, the third chapter of the Gospel of John, in a helpful sermon at Oxford
Bible Fellowship. Witherington, the Amos Professor of New Testament for
Doctoral Studies at Asbury Theological Seminary in Wilmore, Kentucky, has
written commentaries on every book of the New Testament, and his expertise in
both exegesis (biblical interpretation) and homiletics (preaching) was clearly
evident in his sermon.
Witherington
began by relating a story told by one of his colleagues at Asbury, Dr. Charles
Killian. Killian recalled that as a teenager, he repeatedly responded to altar calls at revival meetings, coming forward to
surrender his life to Jesus. He said that he was born again, and again, and
again, and again, until he had stretch marks on his soul.
Killian's
experience raises questions about the meaning of John 3. When Jesus said that
"unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom
of God" (John 3:5), was he talking about a certain experience one must
have in order to be a Christian? Was he talking about what happens when a
person accepts Christ and is baptized?
|
Nic at Night |
John 3 describes a visit paid to Jesus by Nicodemus, a pious Jewish leader.
Nicodemus came to Jesus at night (v. 2), presumably because he wanted to keep
secret his interest in the controversial teacher.1
Witherington likes to refer to this episode as "Nic
at Night."
Jesus
emphasized to Nicodemus the necessity of being born again if one wanted to be
part of the Kingdom of God (v. 3). Witherington asserted that at this point,
when Jesus spoke of being "born of water," he was not referring to
Christian baptism, a ritual practice that did not yet exist. He explained that
the word "water" was used at that time to refer to things involved in
creating a human life. For example, both semen and amniotic fluid were called
water, and of course we still speak of a woman's "waters breaking"
shortly before she gives birth. So to be "born of water" was to have
a physical birth, to be "born of the flesh" (v. 6).
Jesus
contrasted being "born of the flesh" with being "born
again" or "born of the spirit." Witherington noted, as do
English Bible translations, that the Greek word for "again", anothen, can mean either "again" or
"from above." He believes that both meanings are in view in John 3.
To be born again is to experience a sort of second birth, a spiritual rebirth,
one not subject to human causation or manipulation. This second birth is a
birth from God, carried out through the agency of the Holy Spirit.
Dr.
Witherington stressed that there is nothing in John 3 about what kind of
subjective experience the reborn person has as a result of this new birth.
Jesus was not talking about our feelings or reaction to the experience.
Instead, he was talking about the work of God in the life of the individual. It
is God who does the "rebirthing," not us.
|
Change
is Possible--And Necessary |
Nicodemus expressed bewilderment at Jesus' words (v. 4). He knew that Jesus was
not asking him to reenter his mother's womb and call for "womb
service," so what was Jesus talking about?
Witherington
observed that then, as now, most people are skeptical about the possibility of
radical spiritual transformation in a person's life. "Can a leopard change
his spots?" was an ancient saying (Jer 13:23).
We might say, "You can't teach an old dog new tricks." He mentioned
that a psychologist once told him that psychology does not believe in dramatic
personality change, but only in amelioration of our worst tendencies through
therapy.
The
Bible, on the other hand, does teach that spiritual transformation is possible,
so skepticism about such a change would not have been Nicodemus's problem.
Indeed, the imagery of new birth was used to describe the conversion of a
Gentile to Judaism.2 What would
have puzzled Nicodemus, though, was the idea that faithful Israelites like him
would be required to undergo such a transformation. Both Jesus and John the
Baptist elsewhere received similar reactions to their calls for repentance
(Luke 3:8; John 8:33). Witherington related that a Jewish friend had told him
there was no need for faithful Jews, who do not believe in original sin, to
have this type of spiritual rebirth.
Jesus,
however, said otherwise, and he expected Nicodemus as a teacher of scripture to
understand what he was talking about. In particular, the prophets had spoken of
a future spiritual transformation of Israel on a number of occasions (Ezek 11:19-20; 36:24-27; 37:13-24; Jer
31:31-34).
How
is this transformation carried out? Jesus told Nicodemus that the work of the
Holy Spirit in a person is invisible, like the wind (v. 7). Witherington
explained that Jesus employed a play on words in this verse. Both the Hebrew
and Greek words for spirit (ruach and pneuma) have three meanings: breath, wind, and
spirit. He commented that this kind of imagery reminds us of the Genesis
account of the creation of Adam, where God "formed the man of dust from
the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life" (Gen 2:7).
Witherington
stated that we can know the work of the Spirit by its effects, seeing the way
the Spirit changes a person. Israel's King Saul was "turned into another
man" through the influence of the Spirit (1 Sam 10:6).
The
most famous biblical transformation example is that of a later Saul, Saul of
Tarsus. His story is told three times, in Acts 9, 22, and 26. Even in the case
of Saul's dramatic confrontation with the risen Jesus on the road to Damascus,
the change in Saul was a process rather than a single event. Saul was initially
struck with a blindness that lasted for three days (Acts 9:9). Later he
regained his sight, was baptized, and was filled with the Holy Spirit (vv.
17-18).
Dr.
Witherington asserted that in John 3, Jesus was not talking about a certain
kind of experience. Instead, he was talking about the action of God, which
produces an outcome. The process can take differing amounts of time, and it may
or may not be dramatic. In some cases, like that of scholar C.S. Lewis,
conversion was a kind of surrender after a long struggle. Witherington noted
that Lewis called himself "the most reluctant convert in all of
Christendom."
Witherington
said that the new birth process, like physical childbirth, can take differing
amounts of time and can be easy or difficult. He related that once when he was
traveling in Egypt, his train was stopped for a while. Looking out the window,
he could see people picking bananas. One woman, who was clearly in the final
stages of pregnancy, had to stop when her waters broke. But thereafter she
quickly gave birth, and ten minutes later she was back picking bananas.
Witherington had never heard of such a birth.
However
the process occurs, all of us must change because we have all sinned (Rom 3:23;
6:23). Witherington added that no one can affirm Jesus is the risen Lord
without the internal prompting of the Holy Spirit (1 Cor
12:3).
|
The
Meaning of John 3:16 |
One of the most-repeated verses in the Bible, John 3:16, occurs in the context
of Jesus' conversation with Nicodemus. The preceding verses state that Jesus
would be resurrected so that "whoever believes in him may have eternal
life." Witherington commented that he prefers the translation
"everlasting" to "eternal" in John 3:15-16 because a
believer's life only stretches eternally into the future, rather than into both
past and future as Jesus' life does.
Witherington
then explained that when John 3:16 says, "For God so loved the
world," it means, "For God loved the world in this manner", or
"God loved the world as follows," rather than "God loved the
world so much that". The statement is not about the depth of God's love,
but about what he did to fix the human malaise.
He
also observed that "the world" in John 3:16 means "the world of
humanity organized against God." It is this fallen world that John 3:16
says God loved. John 3 implies that all of us, even the best of us, are lost.
We have fallen and can't get up. Hearing this can hurt our pride, but it is
true, for Nicodemus and all of us.
Witherington
concluded by adding that John 3 does not describe a human self-help program. We
cannot earn, worm, or learn our way into the Kingdom of God, he said.
Transformation is produced by God alone, and we do not inherit it. God does not
have grandchildren, only children, as Jesus explained to Nicodemus.
1Nicodemus would later
speak in Jesus' defense (John 7:50) and help to give the crucified Jesus a
proper burial (John 19:39-42).
2According
to a famous rabbinic saying, a person who has become a proselyte is "like
one newly born."
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