REGENERATED SPIRIT

I. He who believes and is baptized shall be saved. Mark 16:16

A. God is not a liar, we can be assured of our salvation because His word tells us so.

B. We base our salvation on God’s unchangeable word not on our changeable feelings. Heaven and earth shall pass away but His words shall by no means pass away (Matt. 24:35).

II. The processed Triune God becoming the life-giving Spirit. John 1:1, 14; 1 Cor 15:45b

A. God passed through a process in order to save us and to regenerate us.

B. In the beginning He was the Word and one day He became flesh. God was incarnated that He may have blood for our redemption for the Scripture tells that without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins. He shed His blood on the cross and died for all our sins. On the third day He was resurrected and became the life-giving Spirit. As the life-giving Spirit He is now ready to enter into man to give life and to regenerate man’s spirit.

III. God created a spirit within man. Zech. 12:1

A. Man is different from all other creatures because man has a spirit. The spirit of man is the most noble part of his being because it is especially designed to contact and receive God.

B. Because of man’s fall sin entered into man and deadened the spirit of man. Man cannot contact God anymore and is therefore separated from God.

C. The death of Christ on the cross took away sins that insulated God from man. In resurrection Christ as the Life-giving Spirit entered into us the believers making our dead spirit alive!

IV. God the Spirit seeks man to worship Him in spirit and reality. John 4:24

A. Because only man has a spirit, no other creature have ever had the practice of worship. To worship God, who is Spirit, we must worship with our spirit, which is of the same nature as He is. Only our spirit can touch God who by nature is Spirit.

B. Real worship is not a dead sinner coming to God in hypocrisy but an enlivened believer coming to God in truth and sincerity. Real worship is God the Spirit entering and indwelling in our enlivened spirit and He becoming our reality – our real salvation, life, righteousness, holiness, love, virtues, satisfaction, and everything.

V. To be saved means that the Spirit of God begets our spirit. John 3:6

A. Unless a man is born anew he cannot see the kingdom of God (John 3:3). No flesh can inherit the kingdom of God. Thus, man needs to be born of God’s Spirit in his spirit. When the big Spirit of God enters into our small spirit, our spirit is begotten by the Spirit of God and thereby regenerated.

B. Through regeneration, the Spirit of God begets our spirit and we receive eternal life and are saved. Having received God’s eternal life, we entered into a second birth. God’s eternal life then qualified us to enter into God’s eternal kingdom.

C. Thus, we believers experienced two kinds of birth: The physical birth and the spiritual birth. We experienced our physical birth at the time of our mother gave birth to us. This birth gave us a human life and ushered us into the human kingdom. We experience our spiritual birth at the time God regenerated our human spirit. This new birth from God gave us a divine life and ushered us into the kingdom of God. If man is not regenerated with God’s divine life, man has no way to enter into God’s kingdom for the kingdom is a matter of life.

VI. To be regenerated is to be born of God. John 1:12-13

A. Sonship is a mater of life. By receiving Christ as our life, we have been born of God. By this divine birth we were born children of God; born not of flesh but of Spirit.

VII. From this point on, the two spirits are one spirit. 1 Cor. 6:17

A. Now, having received Christ into our spirit we become one spirit with Him. The Lord’s Spirit and our human spirit like coffee and milk inseparably mingled together will be eternally mingled as one. He in us and we in Him will live forever through eternity. Christian life is a life of abiding in the Lord and the Lord abiding in us.

VIII. From now on, we should always have our being according to the spirit, living in the spirit in the worship of God. Rom. 8:4

A. Sin is in our flesh, while the Spirit of the Lord is in our spirit. Therefore, we should not walk according to the flesh but according to the regenerated spirit. The key to live a sinless life is by living in the spirit.

B. When we walk according to our regenerated spirit, we can fulfill the righteous requirement of the law of God. Real worshippers must walk in the spirit; all the time minding the things of the Spirit. We must live a life that is one spirit with the Lord always. The moment we fail to walk according to the spirit, we spontaneously sin against God.

C. To walk according to the spirit means our mind, heart, and whole being are fully set to the Lord. Anytime, anywhere we are found in Christ and people find us in Him. They see Christ through us, and in us Christ is magnified and glorified.

IX. By calling on the Lord and praying, we enjoy the Lord’s riches and strengthen our spirit. Rom. 10:12; 1 Cor. 12:3; 1 Cor. 1:2; Eph. 6:18

A. Those who want to walk according to the regenerated spirit must all the time contact the Lord. The easiest way is to call on the Lord’s name. To call, "O LORD JESUS" to us is so sweet and enjoyable because we have His life and we love Him, He is so dear to us and like an air He is so near and available to us anytime and anywhere.

B. Praying also helps us to turn to our regenerated spirit. Therefore, anytime and anywhere we must call His name and unceasingly pray. This will strengthen our regenerated spirit, keep us in the Lord’s presence, and drive the Devil away.