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  THE ORDER OF SALVATION
  by Richard Owen Roberts
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Summary: This sermon emphasizes the critical nature of understanding
regeneration and the contrast between physical and spiritual birth. It
highlights the importance of being born again by God's work, not by
human efforts, and the need for earnest prayer for the outpouring of the
Holy Spirit to bring life and transformation. The speaker challenges the
common practices in churches and urges a focus on God's will and
purpose, especially in prayer meetings, to align with Scripture and
experience true regeneration.

Topics: "Regeneration", "Spiritual Birth"
Scripture References: John 3:3, Hebrews 12:6, Acts 2:47, Ephesians 2:1, John 2:23, John 3:5

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DESCRIPTION
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This sermon emphasizes the critical nature of understanding regeneration
and the contrast between physical and spiritual birth. It highlights the
importance of being born again by God's work, not by human efforts, and
the need for earnest prayer for the outpouring of the Holy Spirit to
bring life and transformation. The speaker challenges the common
practices in churches and urges a focus on God's will and purpose,
especially in prayer meetings, to align with Scripture and experience
true regeneration.

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CONTENT
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I think some of you are a lot farther back than you need to be. And if
you don't have any pity on yourself, have a little pity on me. And let's
move it down and keep it down here where it ought to be.

Thank you so much for helping. Now, our subject at this time is a
subject that seems ridiculous and unimportant to a great many. But I
honestly am convinced that it is of a very critical nature.

Now, you don't have to be very smart to see that the nation is in moral
and spiritual decline. And I believe it is directly linked to a
viewpoint that seems to exist in the church, that God's not all that
smart. And I'd like to begin with that question.

Is God really that smart? Now, in conversations with various people, I
hear them using terms like salvation, regeneration, or the new birth,
repentance, faith, and numerous other terms as if they were synonyms.
And if you listen to the typical preacher today, the Bible's not worth
very much. So if it gets two or three minutes worth of attention in a
Sunday morning sermon, then the rest of the time is spent talking about
some television program or football game.

So here is a question to consider. Are salvation and regeneration and
other terms like that synonyms? Now, I don't think I need to emphasize
this, but I'm going to anyway. We're not a very big crowd.

And we don't have to be very formal about things. And I believe it would
help a great deal if you have an objection or a question. Let's deal
with it right now, not some other time.

So I'm going to urge you. Now, I'm not speaking for anybody else. That's
up to them to decide.

But for me, you won't bother me if you interrupt. Now, naturally, it
does help a little sometimes if at least a wee bit of politeness is
used. I mean, it is better to let a guy finish a sentence before you
bring another matter to the fore.

So just a little bit of kindness or consideration. But do interrupt at
any point. Maybe if you wave your hand, I'll be capable of seeing it.

If I can't, don't worry. Do whatever it takes to get my attention. But
let's work together to gain some ground this week in our understanding
of the Word of God and in our relationship to its purpose.

Now, here's a phrase that some of you may never have heard, but yet it
was a very prominent part of the Church for a terribly long time. The
order salutis. How many of you have heard that term before? The order
salutis.

Well, apparently not all of you by any means. It's a Latin phrase,
naturally, and it refers to the order of salvation. And honestly, you
won't profit near as much from Scripture if you regard God as dumb, as
you will if you regard every single word in Scripture as having
significance.

And clearly you can't nearly gain as you ought if you lump things
together as if they were synonyms when they are not synonyms. Well,
just, as I said, a little hint as to the way we ought to behave
ourselves when we're together this week. Now, our theme this morning is
regeneration.

And that, for many, is a not very meaningful and not particularly
helpful term, but we'd like to look at it today in a fashion so that at
least our thinking begins to be in tune with God's thinking instead of
in tune with the people around us and in the church who haven't paid
much attention. Now, perhaps I don't need to mention this, but I will,
but the church, by and large, has so messed up the subject of
regeneration, if it indeed thinks at all in that term, so that they have
made regeneration something we do. And you contrast that, then, with the
historic conviction that regeneration is something God does.

You can see there's a huge distinction between what I do and what God
does. And how can I possibly relate adequately to the Word of God if I
can't even distinguish between man's work and God's work? Now, just in
case some of you do tend toward the feeble-mindedness, the church, by
and large, today, talks about accepting Christ. I would think a vastly
more consequential issue would be Christ accepting us.

Does Christ need acceptance? Well, if you think he does, you obviously
haven't got a very clear picture of Scripture. But you see, for the bulk
of people in today's so-called evangelical church, the focus is upon
receiving or accepting Christ. And so we have literally millions of
people in this nation who can tell you the day and the hour they
accepted Christ.

And many of them couldn't possibly tell you anything at all about God
accepting them in Christ. Now, think like this. Do you know the word
polity? How many of you know the word polity? All right, that's fine.

My concern is to help one another, and if I'm using terms you don't
know, how am I going to be of any help to you? Now, we have what we call
church polity. Let me ask you, do you see any difference between Roman
Catholic polity and Baptist polity? Well, you know that some religious
organizations, whether you have any opinion or not on any subject, it
doesn't matter, because it's what they tell you from the top that
counts. And you know also that there are denominations where essentially
the people don't vote on anything.

Everything is decided for them by somebody else. Well, now, can you see
that if a religious organization is ruled from the top down, it isn't
nearly as important what the people believe as in a denomination that is
ruled from the bottom up? So, if the people don't really matter in terms
of what they think or believe, then what does it matter whether or not
they understand regeneration? But now, in a typical church like this,
though I have no strong firsthand acquaintance, but I'm making some
presumptions bearing the name of Baptist, that means that the thinking
is that each person who is a member has a voice. Is that accurate? But
as I said, in an Episcopal church, you wouldn't think that way.

Each person doesn't have a voice. In a Lutheran church, they might have
a tiny voice. In a Methodist church, they can squawk when they want to,
but it doesn't have much impact.

But in a Baptist church, what each person thinks and says counts. I
assume this is not an unusual situation where people not only have a
voice, but a vote. And the impression I get is that good pastors get
thrown out on their ear from Baptist churches just because somebody
who's got a lot of clout doesn't like them.

Now, maybe some are put out because they are no good, but surely we
couldn't say that that's always the case. Baptist people, generally
speaking, and of course, not just Baptists, I don't want to offend you,
but it's what we call congregationally governed. Now, I don't want to
shame or embarrass you, and while I wouldn't mind going home tomorrow, I
would prefer to go on my own rather than your pushing me out, but the
simple truth of the matter is I'm not a Baptist.

Never have been. Probably never will be. But I am a Congregationalist,
and whether you like it or not, so are you.

This is a congregationally governed church. That means each person has a
say. And there are many like this.

Many of our so-called Bible churches throughout the nation are
congregationally governed, and of course, many other denominations.
Well, now, this is the thing I want you to understand. If a Roman
Catholic church is observed in its understanding of regeneration, that's
not nearly as dangerous as if a Baptist church doesn't know what they're
doing.

And you see why that's true. So it's terribly important that we
understand the Scriptures because we do give every person a voice and a
vote. Now, with that, as sort of the introduction to the matter, in
other words, by saying that there is great significance in our
understanding regeneration, let me proceed to try and help you.

Let me give you a statement from the book of Acts, chapter 2 and verse
47. I'm just going to read this to you. It's certainly not the text of
the morning, but it's worth thinking of.

Listen now. And the Lord was adding to their numbers day by day those
who were being saved. Did you get that? The Lord was adding to their
numbers day by day those who were being saved.

Now, that's very different from a lot of our churches today. That, of
course, is a description of what was happening in the book of Acts every
day. The Lord was adding to their number.

Now, there's an incredible difference between what the Lord adds to the
number and what we add to the number. And if you're familiar with the
book of Acts, you know that the disciples had been instructed by the
Lord to wait or to tarry in Jerusalem until they were endued with power
from on high. And because they were endued with power from on high, they
weren't anxious to build up their numbers.

They were deeply concerned to have God build up their numbers. And so
what God built up was not trash. But you see, we live in a time when
it's not that way at all.

In most instances, it could not be said that the Lord has built up the
number, but that the pastor or the people or a combination of those two
has built up the number. And literally, what was happening in the book
of Acts, which is what is referred to in those words I just read, God
was taking dead people and giving them life and then adding them to the
church. But now, generally speaking, what is happening today is men are
taking dead people and adding them to the church and no life is being
given to them.

So most of our churches today have some with life and some who have no
life. And those who don't have any life don't necessarily like what's
going on. So every little while, they throw the pastor out and try
somebody else.

Now, that's a very sobering thing if you face it squarely. And because
that's part of what's happening and because the vast majority of church
members are as dead after being members as they were before becoming
members, the nation is in the critical situation of going downhill
rapidly, both morally and spiritually. And the only thing that will ever
change that is to go back to the realization that the Holy Spirit is
wiser than us and knows what he's doing.

And we're going to have to dump some of the notions that we've allowed
ourselves to be infiltrated by and get back to the Word of God. So
that's our theme this morning. The theme of regeneration, which I want
to state again, is not something we do, but something God does.

And if you will pardon an old man to reminisce for a moment, when I was
a youth, I was invited to serve a dead church as pastor. Insofar as I
could tell, not a large church, but insofar as I could tell, there might
possibly be one Christian in this entire church. And even at that I was
wrong because the person I thought was a Christian didn't turn out to be
a Christian at all.

But then there was an elderly man whom I had not at that time met who
had been praying for a long time that the Lord send the truth to that
church. And he was fairly ill for a long time and I didn't meet him, but
that didn't keep him from praying. And then on the third Sunday, when I
was there as pastor, I thought I saw some tears on one face.

I was fairly sure of that. I thought maybe I had seen a tear or two on a
second face, and I thought maybe I had seen a single tear on a third
face. And so at the end of the service I said I will be here at the
church at three and anyone who can no longer live without the knowledge
of sins forgiven is welcome to meet me here.

And to my amazement, there were 13 that came. 13, if I may say so, dead
people who were walking. So many that I didn't know how to handle that
is in the way that I had intended the 13, and so after laying out some
of the basic truths of Scripture, I said I would like to have an
opportunity of an interview with each of you for at least a half an hour
over the next six days.

And please do not leave until you have signed up for an interview, but
it would be better if you came and told me how God had made you alive
than if you came to ask me how that might happen. And over the next six
days, 11 out of the 13 came reporting how they had been born again. And
then, using the language of Acts 2 that we just read, the Lord was
adding to the church daily those who were being saved.

It was a genuine work of God, and although most of them who were born
again in those days have gone onward to the glory, there was not a
single one that fell away. Because when the Lord does a job, He does a
wonderful job, but when we do it, it leaves an awful lot to be desired.
So we're talking about regeneration.

The Lord taking someone who is dead, spiritually, and making them alive.
And I hope that it's very, very clear to you that there is a vast
difference between the Lord making a dead person alive and a dead person
praying the sinner's prayer. Because a very high percentage of those
persons who have prayed the sinner's prayer are every bit as dead after
they prayed the prayer as before they prayed the prayer.

Now, a few of you may be aware, and I'm certainly not making anything of
this, but many, many years ago, Billy Graham, the well-known evangelist,
asked me to become his ghostwriter, and that was quite impossible. It
never worked out. But then later, when they started the Graham Center in
Wheaton, Illinois, Maggie and I moved from California and worked for
several years with the Graham Association.

They paid my salary, and although I was said to be on the faculty at
Wheaton College, it was really quite different from that. I was actually
part of the Graham Association. Now, I mention that because I wanted to
tell you that because of that arrangement, many, many, many times, I had
serious conversations with members of the Billy Graham Association, with
various evangelists and so on.

And time after time, we would come to the discussion that we're having
here this morning. And I would tell them very plainly that what God does
and what man does can be radically different. And that of the millions
of converts that they were reporting around the world, most of them were
just converted to Billy Graham and not to Jesus Christ.

And using their own statistics, I would remind them that at least 92% of
all those that they claimed as converts were so fallen away within two
years that they had absolutely no contact with Christ or the church. And
do you know how they would respond to me? They would say, Mr. Roberts,
your problem is you're so negative. You should get excited about the 8%
that follow through instead of being so worried about the 92% that fell
away.

And how do you suppose I responded to that? Well, that was a question.
That meant I'm trying to draw you into this situation. Well, okay, but
I've already said that, so that would be repetitious.

How do you suppose they responded? And, well, I don't mean to embarrass
you or to make it difficult. They would say to me, rejoice over the 8%,
and I would say to them, do you realize that the 92% that fell away are
as if they received an immunization shot and no longer could be aroused
or interested? And many times they say, oh, I tried all that. That's a
lot of monkey business.

A false convert is much more dangerous than no convert at all. And,
again, I want you to see how that relates to our nation, where a
terribly high percentage of the nation that lives as if the devil was
the only one they ever knew claim Jesus as their Lord. And then a huge
number beyond that are unwilling to listen to any Christian witness
because they've been immunized against that by having been told that
they were already a Christian having received Jesus Christ.

Now, with that, just as preliminary, we just now started, you see. I've
just been making some friendly statements, too, up until now. But now
I'm about to start what might be called the lesson of the morning.

And I'd like to ask you to turn to the book of Ephesians. And I would
like you to have a careful look with me at what is said in Chapter 2. So
Ephesians, please, at Chapter 2. And as has been the case yesterday and
is still the case today, I fish out my glasses that aren't very good,
but maybe I can read accurately here. Have you got Ephesians 2? And you
were dead in trespasses and sins in which you formerly walked according
to the course of this world, according to the prints of the power of the
air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience.

Among them we, too, all formerly lived in the lust of the flesh,
indulging the desire of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature
children of wrath, even as others. Now, let's pause for a moment and
ask, about whom are those words written? Well, yes, of course. Someone
did this, and rightly so.

And someone said all, and rightly so. So that is the condition of all
mankind. They are dead in trespasses and in sins.

And even after they have prayed the sinner's prayer, they are, unless
God himself has done something, still dead in trespasses and sins. Man
does not give life to others. Only God gives life.

Now, I know that that's obvious, but yet it's so significant. We ought
to be greatly affected by that. Verse 4, But God, being rich in mercy
because of his great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead
in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ.

By grace. Now, notice the wording here. By grace you have been saved,
and indeed are being saved.

Well, we needn't pursue this further, I suppose, but surely we must get
that fixed. Every person is dead in trespasses and sins. So there are
obviously two issues that we need to consider.

The natural man is dead. When we are born physically, we are born dead
spiritually. And we remain dead all through our life unless we are born
again, or born a second time, or regenerated.

Now, perhaps you've heard the statement, those that are born once must
die twice. And those who are born twice die only once. Now, from the
nodding of heads, I can see that at least some of you have heard that,
but let's give it consideration.

Those who are born once die twice. Now, what does that mean? Well, if
you're born dead, so what are the two deaths? Well, perhaps I'm a little
closer to one of these than most of you. I mean, I recognize that just
about everybody my age has already gone, and for reasons God only knows,
I'm still here.

But we do know about physical deaths. Some of you have been within the
last few months at the funeral of someone, perhaps someone you loved.
But when a person dies in this life, is that the end? No, no, there's
still another death, the eternal death.

And have you ever seriously weighed the question, what is death? Is
death cessation of existence? No, not really. When a person dies in this
life, they don't cease to exist. The body that they occupied may rot
away, but they still are facing the second death.

And in the second death, is there no feeling, no understanding, no
anything? Well, if there were, then our Lord Jesus Christ wouldn't have
been so explicit in things that he said about hell. And I wonder how
many of you have ever faced this reality. There are six words that are
never spoken in hell.

Now think of that. Six words that are never spoken in hell. Do you know
what those six words are? Anybody have an idea? Were you about to say
something? All right.

As I said, we're not here to embarrass one another, but to help one
another. Six words. Sooner or later, he will come.

Think of that. Six words never spoken in hell. Sooner or later, he will
come.

Because just as heaven is a place where the unbroken presence of Christ
reigns, so hell is a place where the presence of Christ never comes. And
just think now. A person in hell for 1,000 years can't say to himself,
sooner or later, he will come.

After he's been there a million years, he can't say, sooner or later, he
will come. After seven trillion years of endless burning, he can't say,
sooner or later, he will come. Because Christ never, ever comes.

But hell goes on and on and on. And suffering is unceasing. And as I
said already, the reverse.

Imagine now heaven, where Christ is never gone, where he's always
present, where he's always in control. Well, my point is simply to help
you to get a sense, not only intellectually, but experientially, of the
difference between being dead and being alive. And the main thing I've
tried to focus upon is to help you to feel deeply that there's nothing
we can do to bring life to ourselves.

Now, we'll take just a moment or two, maybe a little longer, to ask and
to think about this question. What are the marks of spiritual death? Do
you hear that clearly? What are the marks of spiritual death? I've got
the list that I brought along. Not that I want to bore you to tears, but
I just want to get you thinking about this.

Listen carefully. And these have no order. They're just some random
things that I wanted you to think about.

We can say concerning the dead person that he is and always will be
unaffected by God's rights in this world. Now, just think of that. The
dead person is unaffected by God's rights in this world.

Do I need to mention to you that God does have rights? Is it not obvious
that the one who made everything out of nothing has rights that
accompany that creation of all things, including us? But the person
who's dead, never, never, ever, ever, never, he can come to church every
Sunday for 35 years in a row, never miss once, and be totally unaffected
by God's rights. He's dead. Or think of this one.

To be careless concerning your own soul. And again, let me repeat what I
just said. A person can come every Sunday for 35 years in a row.

The preacher can say everything he knows. He can weep all the tears that
his body is capable of producing. And you'll never succeed in getting a
person, even for a jiffy, to weigh the state of their own soul.

Because that person is dead. And you may come along and say, oh, I've
got the solution. Will you pray the sinner's prayer with me? And maybe
if you twist their arm hard enough and they get rid of you, as is often
the case, they may go along and pray the prayer, and it won't do a
spectacle.

It won't make a particle of difference. I have a friend in the far west.
I had actually been enabled to start a church in his part of Idaho.

And perhaps it will help you to get what I'm saying if I share a bit of
this with you. You see, at one time when I was a student in college, I
served as a student minister of a Methodist church. And these folks, now
that was in the state of Washington, right on the border, Newport,
Washington.

And this fellow that I'm going to speak to about was brought many times
by a Christian family in Idaho to the Methodist church. And so he heard
me speak often. He was the kind of a person that was loaded with
questions.

And I quickly realized, and some of you had yet to resolve this matter,
there are people who, when they ask questions, are not listening to the
answer. While you're giving the answer, they're busy preparing the next
question. So you're really wasting your time when you answer their
questions.

He was like that. Then one week, this Christian couple got this guy to
agree to go to a service in Spokane, Washington. Now most of you perhaps
haven't been in that area.

Maybe you don't know the topography like I do. But you could go over the
mountain and be in Spokane in very short miles. But in bad weather, you
couldn't get over the mountain.

That is Mount Spokane. You'd have to go around. It would take at least
40 minutes to go around.

Anyway, this man agreed to go to what was then the Fourth Presbyterian
Church. The elders were warned that he was coming, and so they were
there to meet him. And after the service, to drag him into the prayer
room.

And he had a long ways to go back home. And 15 minutes, 30 minutes, 45
minutes, they're still trying to get him down on his knees to pray the
sinner's prayer. And finally, because he wanted to get home, he got down
on his knees and prayed the sinner's prayer.

And they were elated, praising God for this wonderful conversion. And
then he got in his pickup and headed for home. And he kept saying to
himself, you've always been a rotten sinner, but now you've added to it.

By the first time in your life being a hypocrite, and all the way home
he was saying to himself, you hypocrite, you didn't mean a word of that.
And he most certainly didn't. And when he finally got home, his wife
who'd gone to bed already, he woke her up and he said, now look, I've
never minded being a sinner, but I can't stand the thought of being a
hypocrite.

I'm going to get down on the floor and say, Lord Jesus, if you can do
anything with me, help yourself. I'd like you, he said to his wife, to
join me. And there, God came and brought life.

Well, I've told you already, I was a student at the time. And a very few
days ago, this dear man, still alive, after some 60 years, called to
tell me how God was moving in their church. Do you get the picture, the
difference between what we do and what God does? That's what we're
concerned about.

That's what the Bible calls regeneration. I'll not go further with this
list of marks of death, but I am going to ask you, will you do some
thinking about this? Will you face the reality of what the dead look
like? And will you honestly acknowledge that you can't change them? Only
God can. Now, with that as a background again, let's turn to one of the
most well-known passages on this subject of regeneration and get a very
clear look at what God has to say.

This is in the Gospel of John, and I'm asking you to turn to Chapter 2,
the Gospel of John, at Chapter 2, and I'm urging your very careful
attention at verses 23, 24, and 25. A few of you who do have minds at
work can remember that on Sunday morning we were looking at Chapter 2,
verses 1 to 11. But now we're looking at the last three verses of the
chapter, and before we actually consult them, I would like to remind you
of the content of Chapter 2. The episode of the wine that was made from
water verses 1 to 11, that's the first incident.

The second incident is the first cleansing of the temple. And just by
way of summary, what happened after Christ threw the money changers out
of the temple? Well, they found another door and came back in. And then
we have three verses that are most certainly not connected with the
miracle in Cana of Galilee and not connected with the cleansing of the
temple.

Now, I don't want to harm any of you who may be loaded with
superstitious notions, for all I know. While we know that the Word of
God is inspired, we're not so silly as to think that the division into
chapters and verses is inspired. Now, that's a rather mundane statement,
but important, because look at these three verses now at the end of 2.
When he was in Jerusalem at the Passover, during the feast, many
believed in his name, beholding his signs, which he was doing.

But Jesus, on his part, was not entrusting himself to them, for he knew
all men, and because he did not need anyone to bear witness concerning
man, for he himself knew what was in man. Now, maybe you've never
carefully looked at these words, and so maybe nothing great strikes you,
but do understand, here is a group. We're not told what size, but we're
led to think it may be quite a number.

And they come saying to Jesus, we believe as a result of seeing the
miracle. And I want to ask you, is anybody ever saved as a result of
seeing? Well, maybe you've heard, as I have, observed people saying, if
somehow it would be possible to go to Mount Ararat and chip the Ark of
Noah out of the ice and then put it on a cart of some sort and wheel it
through all the streets of the city, everybody who saw would be saved. I
hope you don't embrace nonsense like that.

The Bible is ever so clear. Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the
Word of God. There's not a hint anywhere that we're saved by sight.

So here's a crowd. We know not the number, as I said, that comes to
Jesus, and they say we believe because of what we've seen. And on his
part, we read, Jesus did not commit himself to them.

And then there is given a reason that everyone here without exception
would do very well to lay hold of. He did not pay any serious attention
to what they said because he knew what was in man. And he didn't need
anybody to testify of him.

Now, this is off the subject of regeneration, but it's too sweet an
opportunity to pass up. Every true Christian needs to be fully liberated
from the need of praise. Jesus was so liberated from the need of praise
that when a group came claiming to believe, he was unmoved.

And would it be wrong for me to ask, have you been liberated from the
need of human praise? You see, an awful lot of Christian work is
ridiculous because it's done because a person hoped to get the acclaim
or the praise of someone. Did you ever wonder why so many millions have
been led to pray the sinner's prayer? I've tried to make it clear. It's
not because it saves anybody.

But if you consider yourself a soul winner and you can get a lot of
people to pray the prayer, then you can get all puffed up with pride and
think you're doing well. So I do want to urge, before we go back to the
subject of regeneration, that you seek earnestly to be totally liberated
from any need of human praise. But now, with what we've seen in verses
23 and 24, let us then turn to chapter 3. There was a man of the
Pharisees named Nicodemus, ruler of the Jews.

This man came to him by night and said to him, Rabbi, we know that
you've come from God as a teacher, for no one can do these signs that
you do unless God is with him. Now, the wording is obviously different,
but isn't that exactly what the crowd said? We believe as a result of
what we see? Now, look, if you had the opportunity to choose between two
teachers, Jesus and me, who would you choose? Well, if you have any
brains, you'd choose Christ any day. Some of us do the best we can, but
it's not all that good.

But Jesus was one stupendous teacher, and you can be certain he didn't
teach nonsense, and he didn't practice nonsense. And because Nicodemus
was prestigious, probably even wealthy, Jesus did not treat Nicodemus
differently than he treated the crowd. Having rejected the claim of the
crowd of necessity, being who he is, Jesus had to reject the claim of
Nicodemus.

Now, that's terribly important. We do not have here a wonderful story of
someone becoming a Christian. We have here the tragic example of
somebody who doesn't know what Christianity's all about.

And just the way Christ responded to this man makes this very clear.
Look at verse 3. Jesus answered and said to him, Truly, I say to you,
unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Now, those
are wonderfully urgent words, and words that we need to be certain we've
got right.

Now, some of you who have been born again don't need to be told by me
that there are two kingdoms, right here and right now. You know that.
You weren't taught that by a pastor.

You were taught that by God. God can take a dead person, give them life,
and enable them to see what cannot be seen by everybody around them. And
because we can see that there is a kingdom of God and that the kingdom
of this world is vying against the kingdom of God, we are unable to make
wise choices.

We're unable to choose on the basis of that which brings glory to Christ
and that which has everlasting worth over against simply choosing what
feels good or smells good or looks good. And all around us are people,
some of whom do mean well, it seems, but they're blind to the reality
that there is a kingdom of God. So here's this prominent religious
teacher being told very plainly that he can't even see the kingdom, the
kingdom of God.

Now, dear friends, let's see the practical application of that. When the
pastor of this church stands to preach Sunday after Sunday, he's got
some blind people and some who can see. He can paint the kingdom of God
in the most beautiful picture possible.

And there are some who don't have the slightest notion what he's talking
about. And there are some who are thrilled at what he's saying. And
because all of us who love Christ are burdened for those around us who
don't know Christ and can't see the kingdom.

What is the biggest single thing that any person can do to help their
pastor? Would it be to get a hold of your neighbor and twist his arm and
get him to agree to come? The one thing that we can do seems to be the
one thing the church won't do. I shared with some friends, maybe a few
of you heard me say this, a while back when I was at Westminster Chapel
in London, the then pastor said to me, do you realize that when Martyn
Lloyd-Jones was pastor, of the thousands of people coming, a high
percentage of them were perfectly ordinary means. They couldn't afford
to take the tube or the subway from their suburb into downtown London,
then go back again after morning service, then come back again for
evening service.

Couldn't afford it. So what did they do? Brought their lunch. And after
they had eaten their lunch, what did they do? They gathered together in
prayer.

And they prayed for the outpouring of the Holy Spirit on the preaching
that night and, of course, on every occasion. Now just apply that.
Suppose that you were the force behind the increasingly significant
prayer life in your church and knowing perfectly well that no matter how
much you love your pastor, it isn't going to make that much difference.

He'll appreciate it and benefit, but it's not going to win the lost. But
suppose that you intensely, whether this is your church or somewhere
else, you intentionally meet together every week to pray for the
outpouring of the Holy Spirit that God will take away the blind eyes and
the dead hearts and make a person alive so that they can hear the truth
and be gloriously saved. And that's not silly talk.

That's reality. If you read through the book of Acts, that's what you've
got, of praying people, fortifying the labor of preaching the gospel.
And notice as well, verse 4, instead of saying, you have spoken a word I
desperately need to hear, Nicodemus said, how can a man be born when
he's old? How can he enter the second time into his mother's womb and be
born? So then in verse 5, Jesus brings another pointed issue.

Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot enter
the kingdom of God. But I hope that you see clearly that the lovely
privilege of every believer is to earnestly pray for the outpouring of
the Holy Spirit through the preaching of the word. But what does a
typical church do if it has a prayer meeting? Well, they pray against
God's will and purpose.

That's what most churches that still have a prayer meeting do. God
brings sickness to a person because he loves that person and wants to
transform that person's living, and the church gathers and prays that
that person will be healed. That God's purpose in bringing the sickness
is immediately thwarted, and without any benefit or gain, that person is
healed.

What if every time you prayed for the physical well-being of someone,
you prefaced it by saying, don't heal this person until your purpose is
fulfilled? Don't give this out-of-work man a job until he has discovered
your plan and purpose. What if you took seriously Hebrews chapter 12
that makes it clear whom the Lord loves, he disciplines? How about
stopping this nonsense of blaming the devil for everything negative and
praising the Lord for sufficient love to bring us into difficulty that
we may be turned and transformed into Christ's likeness? But now I know
our time is up and I need to finish, maybe quite a while ago for that
matter, for all I know, but I do want you to see clearly one major issue
that you could conceivably have missed. This whole passage, we've only
just read the beginning, but this whole passage on regeneration is a
contrast between the physical and the spiritual.

Now I want you to really hold to that. It's a contrast between the
physical and the spiritual. And this man, though he didn't know it, is
about to help.

He's kind of preventing me from having a good look at you. So I'll look
you over. I want to ask a question to you personally.

At what point did you tell your parents-to-be that you wanted a sturdy
body? Did you hear what he said? He's of the notion that it was probably
never. Now look, how can you make a contrast between physical and
spiritual when no contrast exists? Was Christ such a dumb teacher that
he compared apples and oranges, physical birth and spiritual birth, when
they had absolutely nothing in common? If you can have some input into
your spiritual birth, then it has no contrast. Because in our physical
birth we had absolutely nothing to do with it.

Now that may not seem like very much, but that is a very powerful truth.
And I don't hesitate to go back to what I said a moment ago. In one
great church there were people who understood that Jesus is the Savior,
that Jesus gives sight to the blind, that Jesus brings the dead to life.

And so the biggest concern those people had was to pray for the
quickening, enlightening work of the Holy Spirit. Why waste your time
trying to get people to agree to something when if you succeed it's not
going to make a particular difference anyway? Why not give ourselves to
that which really counts? Now I don't know the pastor here real well,
but some of you know he journeyed all the way to Wheaton to talk with
me. And some of you know he has attended these meetings and did plan
them for the good of all who would come.

And you do know, I expect, that if the Holy Spirit was poured out on
this place he'd be very glad. So why don't we concern ourselves with the
real work of God instead of fussing around with nothingness? The
greatest opportunity any of us could have is to plead that the Holy
Spirit will be poured out and that as a result believers will get
excited and have the most wonderful time of their lives as Christians
and unbelievers will be awakened to their need and find that Jesus is
the answer. That's regeneration.

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Video: https://sermonindex2.b-cdn.net/1vR9Bg562OI.mp4
Source: https://sermonindex.net/speakers/richard-owen-roberts/the-order-of-salvation/
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