Men Whose Eyes Have Seen the King # 28

Born of God

"The power of the Most High shall overshadow thee: wherefore also that which is to be born shall be called holy, the Son of God" (Luke 1:35)

"As many as received Him, to them gave He the right to become children of God, even to them that believe on His name: which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor the will of man, but of God" (John 1:12, 13)

"That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit" (John 3:6)

"These things have I spoken unto you, that in Me ye may have peace. In the world ye have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world" (John 16:33)

"Behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called children of God: and such we are. For this cause the world knoweth us not, because it knew Him not. Beloved, now are we children of God, and it is not yet made manifest what we shall be. We know that, if He shall manifested, we shall be like Him; for we shall see Him even as He is" (1 John 3:1, 2)

"For whatsoever is begotten of God overcometh the world" (1 John 5:4)

In bringing these Scriptures together, those about the birth of the Lord Jesus and those about the birth of believers, I am not failing to recognize a great difference. One has always to safeguard this matter o the Person of the Lord Jesus. He was Very God of Very God; "God manifest in the flesh"; "Emmanuel, God with us." In that He stands alone, unique; there is not another like Him. His birth was different, even, from the new birth of every child of God: it was different in kind; it was different in degree.

The Correspondence Between Christ's Birth and Ours

Nevertheless, there are factors in His own birth which constitute the nature of the birth of every believer. Deity apart - Godhead left with Him - there is yet something in these passages about the believer's new birth that corresponds to His birth. It is to some of these features that we are now to give attention. You will not confuse the two, I trust, at any point, on that matter of His uniqueness. At the same time, and on the other side, I do trust that you will be able to recognize what John said, that that which is true in Him is, in its own realm, and after its own kind, also true in us (1 John 2:8). And, in this matter of the birth and the new life of the children of God, we shall be able to understand better if we recognize some of these features in the birth of the Lord Jesus. For His birth does, as I have said, hold all the factors which go to make up a true child of God.

~T. Austin-Sparks~

(continued with # 29 - "The New Birth A Divine Intervention")