Sayings Of Jesus: “Born Again”
This will be the first of an occasional series of blogs on things that Jesus said, starting with one of the most famous. “Very truly I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God unless they are born again. No one can enter the kingdom of God unless they are born of water and the Spirit.” John 3:3; 5 (for the longer passage, see John 3:1-21).
These verses form part of a conversation between Jesus and a leading Pharisee named Nicodemus. The longer passage in which they sit is well-known and oft-quoted—not just because it’s the source of the phrase “born again” but because it also features John 3:16: “God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”
The passage tells us that Nicodemus comes to Jesus at night, but not why. It’s possibly because he doesn’t want his peers to see him associating with Jesus—perhaps especially because in John’s chronology Jesus has just drawn unfavorable attention to himself by overturning the money changers’ tables in the temple courts (John 2:14-17)—but that’s just speculation; not too much should be made of it. It may simply be that John is alluding to a contrast between darkness and light: Nicodemus arrives in theological “darkness,” as it were. Does he leave enlightened, through his encounter with the light of the world? Sadly, it’s an unanswered question, though if we look at the two subsequent occasions when John mentions Nicodemus (John 7:40-52 and 19:38-40) there’s at least the hint of a progression toward him becoming a Jesus-follower.
Things start well enough: the first thing Nicodemus says to Jesus is a respectful acknowledgement that God is clearly with him in his ministry; which is, presumably, the reason Nicodemus was keen to meet and talk. Frequently in Jesus’ conversations with religious leaders, their motive is questionable (trying to catch Jesus out, or to get him to incriminate himself by saying something they can use against him) but that’s not the sense here. It’s likely that their conversation would have lasted some while, rather than just the couple of minutes suggested by the limited dialogue that John gives us.
Verse 5 has perhaps the most famous phrase in all Scripture, certainly for evangelicals: to enter the kingdom of God we must be “born again.” This is usually taken to mean being born not just physically, as a baby (“born of water”), as everyone is, but also being “born again” spiritually (“born of the Spirit”), as not everyone is, but needs to, in order to receive eternal life. Without suggesting that this standard way of reading is wrong, a few thoughts can be added to the mix.
Firstly, there’s no equivalent reference to being “born again” in the Synoptic Gospels, so the popularity of the phrase for contemporary gospel presentation (to a point where it sometimes gets mocked for its cheesiness—inside and outside of Christian circles) is perhaps a little surprising. Maybe we would do well to be a little more thoughtful and creative in choosing gospel language, not least because the New Testament offers us so much other material to work with. That said, we do see some comparable phraseology in 1 Peter 1:23 (“You have been born again, not of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the living and enduring word of God”); in 1 John chapters 2 thru 5 (“born of God” appears six times); and, in “adoption as God’s children” language in Romans 8:15; 23, Galatians 4:5, and Ephesians 1:5—which is imagery that avoids “born again” cheesiness.
Secondly, John is typically enigmatic in using a Greek word that many versions translate as born again (ESV, NIV), but which equally means born from above. Hence, some versions translate it as that (NRSV, NET). A few aim for the best of both worlds; such as, the Jubilee Bible: “born again from above.” There is no “right” choice. No doubt readers’ familiarity with “born again” (which brings with it the expectation of seeing the phrase) underlies at least some translators’ decisions—not least because John clearly has “from above” in view in 3:31, 19:11, and 19:23. Either way, the point is the need for spiritual re-birth, through a divine as well as earthly fathering, but precisely what that means is still enigmatic—there’s no scriptural basis for defining it as pari passu with the modern idea of praying “The Sinner’s Prayer.”
Thirdly, although modern evangelistic emphasis tends to focus on verse 5 (that absent being born again no one “can enter the kingdom”—interpreted in a “going to heaven” sense), the phrase in verse 3 preceding is that no one “can see the kingdom.” Both can be true of course, but the Greek word translated “see” carries not just the obvious sense of “with one’s eyes” but also of grasping it, perceiving it, and understanding it. In other words, without being “born from above,” we won’t “get it.” The kingdom needs to be perceived through spiritual eyes. Interestingly, despite the kingdom of God being the most frequent theme in Jesus’ teachings in the Synoptic Gospels, chapter 3 is the only place that it appears in John’s Gospel (though cf. John 18:36, where Jesus speaks of “my kingdom not being of this realm”).
Christians tend to assume that the famous phrase in John 3:16—“God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life”—is Jesus speaking (along with verses 17 through 21 following). Not least because many Bible versions punctuate it that way. But the NIV closes the speech marks at the end of verse 15 preceding. In one sense it’s immaterial, insofar as the verses are still canonical Scripture, but the NIV takes the view that this is John’s commentary rather than Jesus’ words. Who’s right? Either! There were no speech marks in New Testament Greek, so it’s a judgment call either way. Interestingly, “gave” is past tense. This could indicate that (i) John is speaking in hindsight of the Father having given the Son in relation to the entirety of his mission—incarnation, life, death, and resurrection—or (ii) Jesus is speaking of the Father having given the Son in the incarnation. In any event, nothing in the phrase singles out Jesus’ death, so we should not think of it as speaking only of the cross (in other words, “gave him to die”).
Were it not for our familiarity with John 3:16, it might seem surprising that God would “love the world,” when elsewhere we are told, “Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.” (1 John 2:15). The Greek word is the same (kosmos), but it has a wide range of meaning, from the entirety of the created order (per our English word cosmos) through to its 1 John 2:15 sense, speaking of godless values, systems and behaviors that are antithetical to God’s nature and character.
We also see in John 3:16 a contrast of eternal life with “perishing”—rather than, as is often supposed in gospel presentations, a contrast with “eternal suffering” (in hell). This aligns it with Paul’s Romans 6:23 contrasting of “the gift of eternal life” with death (as “the wages of sin”). The Greek word for perishing also has the meaning of suffering loss, or of being lost; it’s used in that sense in the Parable of the Lost Sheep. I am not suggesting that “perishing” implies avoiding being accountable before God for how we have lived this life; simply that it’s pointing to death as the ultimate outcome, rather than to eternal conscious torment in the fiery flames of hell.
When John speaks of eternal life (the Greek word zōē) he does not simply have in mind its quantity (as everlasting) but also its quality. The nature of eternal life is the life of the Age to Come, but starting now. John later tells us that the heart of eternal life is relationship: knowing the Father and the Son (John 17:3; cf. John 6:58). We can know God now, in the present, albeit in a limited sense compared to the fulness of how we will know him in the future. It therefore has that same sense of “already, but also not yet” that presently characterizes the presence of the kingdom of God in this world. The idea of eternal life being everlasting is not absent, of course, but the point is that it’s not simply talking about a future event of “going to heaven when you die.” Its everlasting nature derives from an Age to Come in which death as the ultimate enemy of human life is no more (Revelation 21:4; cf. Isaiah 25:8).
Once death is defeated and removed from creation, in the way that Revelation 21:4 pictures it, then what is left? Unending life!