“Born of water
and Spirit”(Jn 3:5). When Jesus
talked about regeneration to Nicodemus, he
clearly referred to Ezekiel 36:24-27, indicating that regeneration is resulted
from water (a
metaphor for the written Word of God, the Bible)
and Holy Spirit. His teaching clearly indicates how the remnants in OT were
saved. The good example is how Ezekiel was saved. According to Jesus’
teaching, anyone who has the Spirit of
Christ can see the kingdom of God (Jn 3:3) and can enter the kingdom of God (Jn
3:5). We can see “the word of the LORD came to Ezekiel the priest, the son of Buzi, in
the land of the Chaldeans by the Chebar canal, and the hand (also translated as Spirit) of the LORD was upon him there.”(Ezek 1:3). The Lord spoke to Ezekiel (Ezek 1:28;2:1-8; 3:1-11,16-21)
and the Spirit dwelled in him and lifted him up (Ezek 3:12-14; 22-24). Then he was able to see the Kingdom (Ezek
1:28; 3:23) and enter the kingdom (Ezek 1:28; 3:1-3, 15,23). He is the one
who has been delivered from one realm, the realm of sin and death, and has been
transferred to the realm of Christ’s Spirit, which is life. When he saw the
kingdom, he fell on his face and started eat the
scroll, he was humbled and ready to serve as a suffering prophet. He saw the
King, son of God, would leave his heavenly throne, which is mobile, moving with
lightning speed across the sky, and come down to the earth as son of man
dwelling in his captured people, give up his freedom for the freedom of the
chosen people who are bonded with sin, serve them as a suffering prophet
(Jn1:14, Phl2:6-11). Since the Spirit of Christ dwelled in him and lifted him
up, he was able to be imitator of Christ. He was a new creature in Christ’s
image. He stood in the gap between an angry God
and a sinful people as Christ did. He spoke prophecies to
the dry bones (preaching God’s words to spiritual dead people) and the wind (prayer
to Holy Spirit) (Ezek 37:3-14). That’s how the dry bones were resurrected.
People in NT are saved in the same way. The elders in OT had to devoted
themselves “to prayer and to the ministry of the word”(Acts 6:4). Because
that’s the way how God save his elected ones through his servants. Peter said that we are “born again, not
of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the living and enduring word
of God” (1 Peter 1:23). He is using the facts of sex as an image, saying that
the Word of God operates on our heart as the male sperm does on the ova in the
uterus of a woman. The uterus is our heart; the ova is faith. The sperm of
God’s Word penetrates our hearts to bring forth the life of eternity. Paul says
“let the elders who rule well be considered worthy of
double honor, especially those who labor in preaching and teaching”(1Tim 5:17). Luke mentions 3 times in Acts “word of God continued to increase and the number of
the disciples multiplied greatly” (Acts 6:7;12:24;19:20). Very often,
our Christian forgot an essential truth, i.e. Christ is the Word who became flesh(John
1:1,14) . People who exalt Christ devote
themselves to the ministry of the word as Apostles and those elders did (Acts
6:4; 1Tim 5:17). A water-down or twisted
gospel would result in no growth of the church, just like low sperm count or
abnormal sperm would result in infertility. God’ servants have no right to be silence on
biblical truth (Ezek 3:16-21; 1Cor 9:16-17; 1Tim 4:16). The way that God saves
his people in both OT and NT is the same.
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