Chapter 3
Verse 6 Born of the Spirit- The modern church has gotten away from this wording. We use "ask Jesus into your heart" "surrender your life to Christ" and "make him Lord" but we never use born of the Spirit. If we emphasize the Spirit at all we bring it up as a moment subsequent to salvation and one that a believer might possible experience if he or she plays his or her cards right. Or one that gradually takes place over the course of a believers life if he or she goes to the correct church. I'm sure more of this will come up as we get into the epistles so I'll leave this here for now.
But the point is that I don't think our head knowledge of Jesus dying on the cross for us is sufficient for salvation, for being born again like Jesus is talking about in John 3. When we receive Christ, make him Lord, ask him into our hearts, we are born again. It's completely possible to go through one of these acts, say a prayer, go to the altar or mentally understand salvation and have never received it. Jesus tells Nicodemus that "you must be born again." The same applies today.
Verse 18 mentions The Name of Jesus. You also find that wording in chapter 1 I think. I find that idea interesting and I know I've written about it before. What's in a name?
Chapter 4
The story of the Samaritan woman is one of the first sermons I preached that I actually remember the content. The fact that Christ took the time to break social norms by talking to an outcast woman; she was naturally an outcast from Jew being a half-breed and then she was an outcast from the outcasts because she had been married more than a few times. But that doesn't hinder Jesus. He speaks with her, gets to the heart of the matter and she not only comes to salvation but many of her people do to. She goes from being used up to be used miraculously by Jesus Christ. Awesome!
Comments