Multitudes of kind, honest, sincere religious church members, when they come to the end of life’s journey, will awaken to the fact that they have missed Heaven because they had never been born again. They substituted church membership, conformation, baptism, and communion for the new birth.
Nicodemus was a ruler and teacher in Israel, but Jesus said to him, “… Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God” (John 3:3); “Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again” (John 3:7).
There are many preachers, deacons, church officials, and members of churches who have never experienced the new birth, who think they can enter Heaven because of their profession. But faithful attendance at all the church services, wearing a religious garb, trying to keep the commandments, giving money for the Lord’s cause, being kind
to loved ones and neighbors, and helping the poor and needy will not give us a passage to Heaven. Jesus said, “Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works? And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity” (Matthew 7:22-23).
There is only one way by which we can enter Heaven and that is by the way of the new birth. “Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that entereth not by the door into the sheepfold, but climbeth up some other way, the same is a thief and a robber” (John 10:1).
The Scriptures declare that we are born in sin, “… I was shapen in iniquity; and in sin did my mother conceive me” (Psalm 51:5); that by nature we are “… dead in trespasses and sins” (Ephesians 2:1); that “… There is none righteous, no, not one” (Romans 3:10), “For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23) and that without the new birth, we are “… without Christ… having no hope, and without God… “ (Ephesians 2:12). The old nature that we have inherited through the fall of our first parents cannot be changed by reformation or by being religious.
Jesus said, “That which is born of the flesh is flesh…Ye must be born again” (John 3:6-7). Only God can work this miracle in our hearts by the power of the Holy Spirit, for it is His mission to convict of sin and to cause us to repent and take Christ as our Saviour. As we do this, we do not only receive the assurance of forgiveness and cleansing, but an impartation of a new divine nature, and we can say with Paul, “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new” (2 Corinthians 5:17).
This is the new birth. This is the crisis experience. We do not grow into salvation; but we pass from death unto life. There is a definite time when we are born again. It is just as real as when a man is rescued from a watery grave or from a burning building. We cannot save ourselves, nor can anyone impart eternal life, save our Lord Jesus Christ. There is nothing that we can substitute for the new birth.
Dr. James M. Gray, who became an outstanding preacher of the Gospel, said that before he was saved he knew the Lord’s prayer and the ten commandments, and he was confirmed and had joined the church; but it was not until years afterward that he was converted. God used a traveling salesman and the preaching of the Gospel, which he did not hear in his own church, to awaken in him the need of being saved.
Charles Wesley preached the Gospel with much diligence, yet he did not know what it was to have peace with God. When he was thirty years of age, he took seriously ill. A young Christian man visited him and, realizing that Wesley was not saved, led him to see that through the Lord’s finished work we are justified.
Religion and good works without a definite experience of salvation will not give us an entrance into the kingdom of God, “For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast” (Ephesians 2:8-9). “Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost” (Titus 3:5).
Heaven’s door will open only to such who have been regenerated and washed from their sins through the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. All others, no matter how religious or sincere, or how many good works they have done, will not find favour with God, for “…all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags…” (Isaiah 64:6) in His sight.