Jan 21 2025 8 mins
Daily Dose of Hope
January 21, 2025
Day 3 of Week 43
Scripture: Ezekiel 7-9; John 3
Welcome, everyone, to the devotional and podcast called the Daily Dose of Hope. This complements the Bible reading plan for New Hope Church in Brandon, Florida.
For our Old Testament reading, we are in Ezekiel, this time looking at chapters 7-9. First, Ezekiel is again experiencing visions from God. At first, he is taken to see the abominations occurring in Judah. There is an Asherah pole at one of the Temple entrances. For those who aren’t familiar with Asherah, she was a Canaanite fertility goddess and the Asherah cult became very popular in Israel. When you read about temple prostitutes in the Bible, they were often part of Asherah worship. You can see why God was disgusted by this.
Then, Ezekiel was brought to a place inside the Temple in which the elders were worshiping many other gods and burning incense to them. Next, there was a visit to another Temple gate where woman were worshiping Tammuz, a Babylonian fertility god. And finally, outside the Temple, were Jewish men worshiping the sun god. What a mess. How did it get to this?
So, God is enraged and he wants Ezekiel to communicate this. Chapter 9 is a vision of an executioner who will kill most of the people in Judah for their idolatry and disobedience. Only those marked with an X will survive. It is a bit disconcerting that God tells Ezekiel not to feel sorry for them, as they have earned this punishment. Wow. I struggle with this. It makes me so grateful for the cross of Jesus.
Our New Testament text is John 3. In this chapter, we meet Nicodemus, who is Pharisee and a member of the ruling council. He is someone who is well-trained in Jewish law and tradition and most likely held in high esteem in his community. And he comes to see Jesus at night. To me, it’s interesting that the Scripture points this out. Obviously, Nicodemus is intrigued by Jesus. He has seen the miracles and listened to Jesus’ teaching. He knows that Jesus knows God in some way, Nicodemus acknowledges that, but he is probably a bit leary of being connected with Jesus. After all, what will the others think?
We don’t know if there is some pleasant chit chat between Jesus and Nicodemus, there may have been, but in the Scripture it seems that Jesus wastes no time --- he gets right to the point. He says to Nicodemus, “no one can enter the Kingdom of God unless they are born again.” Then, there is that interesting back and forth dialogue in which Nicodemus says, “well, how in the world can someone enter into their mother’s womb a second time?” And Jesus doesn’t even respond to that, he says it again “Dude, you can’t get into the Kingdom of God without being born of water and the Spirit. You must be born again!”
Now, Nicodemus would have probably thought that salvation was his because he was born a Jew. He was one of the “chosen people.” Or, he would have thought salvation was his because he knew a whole lot about the law, he had accumulated a lot of information about God, and he was trying hard to apply it.
Jesus is pushing back against that. He says you must be born again. Yes, Nicodemus, you were born a Jew in your first birth but that isn’t enough for you to be saved and to enter God’s Kingdom. Yes, Nicodemus, you have lots of information about God, you may even be a really good person and attend synagogue, but that isn’t enough either. Jesus is saying to Nicodemus that you have to be spiritually reborn. Jesus knew that Nicodemus needed a change of his heart—a spiritual transformation that could only come from above. The phrase “born again” can be translated “born from above.”
This is what Jesus was saying to Nicodemus: Just as your mother gave physical birth to you, if you want to receive salvation and have eternal life, you need the Holy Spirit to give you a spiritual birth. Jesus says, flesh gives birth to flesh but only the Spirit can give birth to spirit. This rebirth is when we go from being spiritually dead to spiritually alive in Jesus Christ. And there is a certain mystery to it. Just as the wind exists in the earthly, physical realm but there is mystery to where it is going and coming from; so there is the same mystery with the Holy Spirit and how he moves and works. How can this be? That was the question Nicodemus asked. Yeah, how can this be?
Let’s unpack this a bit more. When we were born the first time, we were born inclined to sin, inclined to make bad choices. Think about a toddler. Why do we have to put safety plugs in all our electrical outlets? Because no matter how many times we say no, our little ones defy us and they go straight for that outlet. Because they don’t know what’s best for them. Our natural inclination is to do what we want to do. From the time of the fall in Genesis to right now, this very second, we as human beings are sinful, broken people. Look at our world. We miss the mark of God’s full intention for our lives. Even when we are generally good people, we are far from perfect.
And our sin, our brokenness, creates a barrier between us and God. God is holy, totally without sin, and we are a hot mess. We all are. And we can’t jump that barrier between us and God. Nothing we can do will close that gap. No striving to be good. No racking up spiritual merit badges. Not being born into a Christian family or having a really strong Christian mama.
God made a way for us to be right with him, to eliminate that barrier. God himself made a way for us to walk closely with him. You know God’s solution to our sin ---- Jesus. (If we were to continue with today’s Scripture, then we would read the best known Scripture verse in the world. John 3:16 ---- For God so loved the world, that he…)
Jesus was God with flesh on. He came voluntarily to demonstrate a different way of doing life AND then he went to the cross. He died on that Roman cross, serving as the final, ultimate sacrifice for sin. You see, when Jesus died on the cross, his blood atoned for our sins. For all of our sins. So, if we believe in him, turn away from our old way of doing life, then we receive salvation. We are spiritually reborn. Born again by the Spirit. Jesus did the work and the Holy Spirit applies the blood.
You see, when we believe in Jesus Christ, God no longer sees our sin and our mess, he only sees the blood of Jesus. Not only does this ensure that we get to spend eternity with Jesus, we receive new life right now, today. We become new people, new creations (2 cor. 5:17). The Holy Spirit, the Spirit of God himself, comes and dwells within us, changing us from the inside out. Being born again means:
1- Acknowledging your sin, turning away from your old life and turning toward God (repentance)
2- Saying yes to Jesus!
3- Being filled with the Holy Spirit.
Have you been born again? That’s a question we all have to answer.
Blessings,
Pastor Vicki