If you the reader have been following my articles on being “Born Again”, you are probably starting to understand why Yahshua said in v. 7 “do not marvel that I said to you, you must be born again.”
To the religious mind, a believer is one who is connected to the Father through a certain system of theological truths, being premillenial, pretribulation, and dispensational. These doctrines have become a set of defining rules which force believers into a man made religious mold. This is exactly opposite of what being “Born Again” means.
In John 3:5, it is commonly preached that the Holy Spirit is like the “wind”, it “blows where it wishes.” The wind cannot be controlled; it can not be put into a mold, nor held captive by the chains of religious doctrine. The Holy Spirit to which we are to be born into transcends every religious system, every demon from hell, every sickness, and every world government.
When one is “born of the Spirit” he takes on the character of the Spirit. Not only is the Holy Spirit free flowing, sovereign, and unstoppable; but so also is the believer. Read again carefully what John 3:8 says: “The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear the sound of it, but cannot tell where it comes from and where it goes. So is EVERYONE who is born of the Spirit”.
The prophets in the Bible were men like the “wind”. They were moved by the Holy Spirit and because of that they were stoned; not by the pagan, but by religious fundamentalism of the day. Religious systems hold to intolerant tenants of belief which leaves no room for sovereign acts of the Spirit much less a “born of the Spirit” believer who dares act out of his new nature as a son of Yahweh’s kingdom.
The prophets of old were both peculiar and admired. These men were Spirit led and thus hated by the religious system because they obeyed the Spirit’s voice. Stephen spoke, on the day he was stoned in Acts 7:51-53: “… you always resist the Holy Spirit; as your fathers did, so do you. Which of the prophets did your fathers not persecute? And they killed those who foretold the coming of the Just One.”
Being “Born Again” introduces one to spiritual sight to see Yahweh’s Kingdom. From there we have a choice, will I step into a Spirit filled life or remain at the kingdoms threshold and criticize those who have entered in.
“But woe to you Scribes, Pharisees, hypocrites! For you shut up the Kingdom of Heaven against men; for you neither go in yourselves, nor do you allow those who are entering in to go in.” Matthew 23:13
