The new birth - A new way of seeing the world
Dr. Roberto Miranda(Audio: Spanish)
SUMMARY:
In this sermon, the speaker focuses on the concept of being born again, which is often associated with Christianity. He uses the encounters of Nicodemus and the Samaritan woman with Jesus to illustrate how both were removed from a true relationship with Christ. The speaker emphasizes the need for a new experience with Christ, which involves receiving a new nature and becoming a son or daughter of God. He explains that when a person is born again, a constitutional change takes place within them, and the divine nature becomes a part of their being. The speaker also highlights that being born again is a process of becoming a new creature, which involves developing and growing in one's relationship with Christ.
When we are born again, we receive a new spiritual nature and a new way of thinking. The life of God is engendered within us, and we become a new creature. We are given the ability to understand the world and the things of God in a different way, and we are able to process them spiritually. The new birth also allows us to move towards the adoption of a child's mind - an innocent mind that is capable of coming into contact with God's mysteries and promises that require childlike faith. We must fight against false sophistication and cultivate the gift of believing like a child.
The new birth in Christ is a spiritual transformation that involves a change of nature, mindset, identity, and a total rejection of the past. It requires a willingness to sacrifice everything, including bad habits, cultural values, and even relationships if necessary. This transformation is only possible through a personal relationship with Jesus Christ and fixing our gaze on him in faith. The new birth is a new creature, a variant that gradually develops its personality, something new, and it is a world to explore. We must be in perpetual transformation, renewal, and change so that the new creature that God has declared becomes a reality in our lives.I invite you to go back to the Gospel according to Saint John. You know what happens, that many times when one works on the word of the Lord, that word kind of opens up in front of oneself and one sometimes enters thinking, wow, will there be enough material here for a complete sermon, a text of scripture? And one jumps on faith and then when one begins to expose the word that word magically opens up in front of one and one discovers wonderful levels and layers of complexity. And that happens to me many times when I enter into the word of the Lord.
Last Sunday I know we talked about Nicodemus and his encounter with Jesus and before that we had talked about the Samaritan woman. And also about their encounter, their dialogue with Jesus, and how the Lord was leading these two characters, who in fact are very similar to each other, although they would seem totally different, but they are very similar in their internal spiritual makeup.