The New Birth Is for Sinners, Not the Self-Righteous

The will of God for the church in the world is to proclaim the Gospel. That is our calling. Jesus said, “I have not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance,” and that is the remarkable reality of the Gospel: that God saves sinners, and that those who are self-righteous and religious are—by their own self-righteousness—cut off from the hope of salvation.

There were about 6,000 Pharisees at the time of our Lord in the land of Israel, but there is only one conversion of a Pharisee mentioned in any of the four Gospels. His story is told in John 3, and his name is Nicodemus.

“Now there was a man of the Pharisees, named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews; this man came to Jesus by night and said to Him, ‘Rabbi, we know that You have come from God as a teacher; for no one can do these signs that You do unless God is with him.’ Jesus answered and said to him, ‘Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God’” (John 3:1-3).

The Gospel is articulated here by Jesus as sinners needing to be born again. Proclaiming the new birth, proclaiming the need to be born again, is the most critical responsibility the church has.

Born again is a very familiar term. The notion of being born again is so commonly expressed that it’s part of evangelical pop culture. But almost no one seems to understand what our Lord is saying.

It’s a simple idea, being born again. Like any parable or any illustration our Lord used, He picked something very common and simple. And you must understand the heavenly reality of the new birth because it is the foundational truth of salvation: You must be born again, or perhaps it is more accurately translated born from above.

Let me show you how simple the analogy is: What role did you play in your physical birth? You played no role. And that is exactly the idea in our Lord’s use of this analogy.

The message of our Lord here is that the new birth is totally a work of God, which immediately obliterates all “works righteousness,” all religion, all ceremony, all ritual, all sacraments, as making any contribution to new life. You’re not going to enter the Kingdom of God because you try harder to be a better person or because you’re more religious or more moral or more philanthropic or more virtuous.

This stops a legalist dead in his tracks. All his life, the legalist—in this case the Pharisee Nicodemus—was trying to achieve Heaven by his self-righteousness. Here our Lord says it is all for nothing. It’s meaningless.

This is a dramatic moment in the Word of God, a crucial revelation that is introduced to us in the story of Nicodemus, and it’s important that you get this because this is how you need to explain the Gospel to people.

In all the four Gospels, it is crystal clear that salvation is not for those who are good; it’s not for those who try harder; it’s not for those who live better; it’s not for those who are more moral or more religious or forsake certain vices or pray certain prayers. It’s a work of God.

Jesus knew people’s thoughts, and He knew Nicodemus feared that even with all his religion and his ritual and his external righteous acts, he was not related to God—he was not in the Kingdom.

What Nicodemus wanted in his heart was to be in the Kingdom, to be accepted by God, to have the hope of eternal life. He wanted to be in the realm of the redeemed, those who are saved from judgment, those whose sins are covered and forgiven. He wanted to be in relationship with God forever and bound for Heaven. That was the question in his heart.

Jesus’ answer is stunning: “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born from above, he cannot see the kingdom of God.”

Jesus is saying, “No contribution you have made or will make puts you in the Kingdom. Oh, you’re high up in the religious stratosphere, but with God you’re at zero, and you need to be born from above.”

So how does the story end? Go to John 19, the burial of Jesus after His crucifixion: Nicodemus shows up with a volume of spices fit for the noblest of people. He is bold. He’s not afraid anymore. Somewhere between John 3 and John 19, Heaven has come down on Nicodemus.

I have good news for you. Heaven comes down, and God makes sinners new. We contribute nothing; all we can do is believe and cry out to God, “Lord, give me faith; give me life.” You cry out to Heaven that God would grant you life and repentance and faith.

God saves sinners not on the basis of anything that they have done but rather when they have recognized they are utterly undone; when they come to the point of spiritual emptiness and cry out, “God, be merciful to me, a sinner.”

Scripture quotations are taken from the New American Standard Bible 1995.

John MacArthur is the pastor-teacher of Grace Community Church in Sun Valley, California. This article is adapted from a sermon preached Oct. 4, 2020.

Photo: Grace to You