7 Steps to Spiritual Growth: Born Again Experience

Repentance is a key part of the born again experience.

The initial stages of Christian life involve more repentance and surrender to God.

The law of God is there to drive you from sin and help you develop a conscience.

True salvation involves a radical change in behavior and a willingness to follow God's commands.

Thank you. So how do you get your sins forgiven? Repent, repent and turn to God and surrender in obedience. You stop being the criminal you were. Well, how does that affect you? Ignorance is not bliss. You can't keep living in rebellion and disobedience to God and say, I didn't know. How do you know right from wrong? How do you know what is sin and how do you know what is righteous? How do you know? Okay. Commandments, that's both right. Commandments come from the Bible. The Word of God tells you what's right and tells you what's wrong. Therefore, at your initial state when you're born again, do you know all the Bible? Absolutely not. Absolutely not. So what happens is, in true salvation is, the part you know, like in Acts 2, They didn't know all the teachings of Christ at that point, but it says 3,000 people hearing Peter's message repented and were baptized and joined the group. Now what's that mean? They didn't know all the teachings of Jesus yet, but they knew enough. They knew that they murdered Messiah. They knew their sin was evil. They surrendered to the man they fought against, and instead of resisting Messiah and continuing to fight against them, He turned and bowed their knee and said, whatever you want, we'll follow. Everything they knew was wrong, they turned from. But that's where being born again is all about. It's the beginnings of thorough and complete and total change. An absolute makeover begins at that point. Because then is when you start to read the Bible. That's why now, I wish somebody told me when I first became a Christian, nobody helped me. That's why my first year of being a Christian was the worst year of my life. I couldn't understand what was going on. I thought things were going to be wonderful when I became a Christian. Instead, I was the most miserable person alive. I felt that all I did every day was repent. Now I know I was supposed to do that every day. That was the whole key of being a believer. Full, thorough repentance. I thought it was misery. I thought I was being punished. And no one taught me that is the way of life when you first become a Christian. You get thorough, complete deliverance from sin. That is the issue. That's the whole point. Well, man, I'm so stupid I had no clue. Therefore, I struggled and found myself doubting and whatever, and it was the right thing. And I wandered through it. I want you to understand, the initial phases of Christian life then is more repentance. More and more. You read and know and understand and you say, man, I haven't been doing that. I had to start throwing away my music. I cleared out every music I used to have. I was a rock and roll freak, man. I listened to all of the Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath, these occultic rock bands that preached all their Satanism and I didn't even know much about what they were talking about. All their immorality, all their garbage. I had stacks and stacks of that music pouring into my soul and I didn't have anybody tell me you should stop listening to music maybe my mom did, I don't remember but I wasn't listening to her at the point I just began to find myself struggling to have to get that out of my life by God talking to me things began to change in my life I started to sense what I thought was wrong what I did was wrong everything, in other words, my conscience came alive and with it, God poked and poked and poked at me That's exactly what this says here. Laying the foundation of abandonment of dead works, of evil activity. Get it out of your life and out of your system. Throw it away. Run from it. Flee from it. Cry about it. Get sad about it. Tear it out of your body. And that was the first year of my life. Well, that's what it's all about. And that's what it's saying here. Do it. Well, how do you get your sins forgiven? You repent. Then what? Well, Matthew 13, remember, he says, The Son of Man will send forth his angels, and they will gather out of his kingdom all cause of offense, in other words, persons by whom others are drawn into error or to sin, and all who do iniquity and act wickedly. What does God want out of his kingdom? People who do evil, who follow iniquity. Remember, iniquity is doing your own thing. It's the same, that's what sometimes they translate it, lawless. Now the thing you hear in a lot of churches is, now that I'm a Christian, I'm free. And I don't have the bondage of the law. Which means they have the freedom to do anything they want. Which is absolutely a lie. Even that's false. You're free from the sin, not free to do the sin. They actually don't get the message of salvation. Salvation, the whole point is to stop doing those things. The law of God is there to drive you from sin. Like a schoolmaster, it says. To get you away from it. I always use this example with my boys. When they were little, they all sat in the back seat. Well, they always poked and fought and hit and did all the things they were doing to each other. So we could tell they didn't love each other. They spent too much time hurting each other. So we set up laws. The invisible wall right here, this crack in the seat, you don't put your arm past there, you don't stick your nose past there, it's out of your territory. And you do the same thing. And you had to set up laws to force them to do what they didn't do naturally. The law forces you to do right. Correct? That's exactly what it is. The law begins this as an initial part of being a believer because you don't know love of God yet, So the law forces you to do things because God tells you and He puts guilt into you and your conscience is weary. And you're forced to do what's right until you come to a place naturally where you have so much love. I don't have to put rules until... Now, my boys, they probably haven't changed. If I put them back in the seat, they probably still slug each other. No, I don't know. I'm kidding. But what I'm saying is there's a point where they love each other. They won intentionally hurt each other right That comes as a natural maturity The same is true when we talk about this in the spiritual There a point where you mature past that you naturally love and you don have to have those laws tell you because you're to do with the law. In fact, you probably do more than the law says at that point. But the initial stages, the repentance always has to do with the law of God. Does that make sense? You hear what I'm saying? Now, this is what he's saying here. God says at judgment time, he has to get those people up. That means throughout the church age time within Del Rio and other churches in our town, in our country, in our world, there's a mixture of people that still do evil stuff. They claim they're Christians, but they don't do what God tells them to do. They don't honestly listen. They may say they listen, but they don't listen to the point where they do anything about it, right? They'll hear a sermon, they'll sing a song, they'll go home and do what they did before. No change. what we're saying is it has to be such a radical change when you begin to choose by your will to say I don't want to do what God tells me not to do and I'm going to fight this I'm going to resist it I'm going to get help from somebody to help me but I'm going to get this out of my life I'm going to get it out and I'm going to start doing what God tells me to do if it kills me and that's kind of the attitude that comes and you think of that when kids learn to walk They basically say, I'm going to learn to walk if it kills me, because you watch them and they kill themselves. They fall, bust their noses, and fall over and trip, and they cry, and they get boo-boos, and they keep trying. Even though they're getting beat to death sometimes, some of the poor kids have a hard time learning, but they don't quit. There's a hunger inside them that says, I'm going to learn. I'm going to get up and do this. That's what a new baby Christian has to have. It's a thing inside that says, I'm going to get past these sins if it kills me. I'm not going to make excuses anymore. I'm not going to try to weasel out of it. I'm not going to say, well, everybody sins. It's no big deal. It is a big deal. God says it's a big deal. He says, repent, repent, repent, doesn't He? Therefore, it's a big deal to Him. I don't care what your friends have told you. I don't care what your grandmother told you. If it's not what Jesus said, it's wrong. And you need to take that in stride. When Jesus said He wants you to repent, then you need to do it. And so that's what we see here is a true clarity. And again, I remind you then from Matthew 7. This is where people are really having a rough time. Because Jesus, and we have to repeat this so many times in our culture, not everyone who says to me, Lord, Lord, shall enter the kingdom of heaven. Not everybody who said, Jesus, forgive me of my sins, will go to heaven. Not everybody who said, I believe in Jesus, will go to heaven. Not everybody who became a preacher will go to heaven. Not everybody who became a deacon will go to heaven. There's a distinct difference between what you believe and what you are or what you do. Jesus said, and here we go again, Lord, Lord, shall not enter the King of heaven, but He who does the will of My Father in heaven. Who goes to heaven? Those who do the will of My Father. He said it, I didn't. Right? Do you do the will of the Father? Or do you just think it? See, that's the key. If you just keep talking and you keep believing and thinking, but you're not doing, you're a hypocrite. You're not real. Only those who do the will of the Father go to heaven. That's what He said. Many will say, and notice the word many, that means more will say this than the ones who will be the obeyers. The small minority of the people in the church are going to be the true believers. The majority are going to be right here. Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in your name? Haven't we cast out demons in your name? That means we prove that we're of you because we even have the power to do in your name what you want us to do. and have we not done even miracles in your name? This is why we can include the charismatic movement in our culture today because they are the ones that are obsessive over miracles and all these kind of things. We're not known as the Baptists that walk around and do miracles. The ones that are known for it are known as charismatics in the church. They're the ones that do the miracles. And see, this is where we're going to find the issue. Outwardly, they claim we are the highest Christians. over the lowly Baptists who don't do anything. They only sing songs, but they don't have the power we have. They can't do the things we do. So it's looked on as they're the more influential Christians, right? In a culture. And it says, but that's the group that's going to say, Lord. And it says, then I will declare to them, I never knew you. Depart from me because you who practice lawlessness. Only Charismatics who practice obedience go to heaven. Only Baptists who practice obedience go to heaven. Only Methodists, you know what I'm saying, who practice obedience go to heaven. That's the only ones. It doesn't matter what you think and believe and what you label, you've chosen. If you're not obeying, you're not going. Am I clear? This is rough. But this you must have established in your mind because I want you in heaven. Then with that first step down, Repent, repent, repent, repent, repent. That's our key word. After that then, how do you know when you're born again? How do you know when you've been forgiven of sin? How do you know? That's the next key, isn't it? How do you know you've got what you hope for? Well, remember what Jesus said. That which is born of the flesh is flesh. That which is born of the Spirit is spirit. We're talking about spirit, right? Not physical. So what is a person's spirit? Conscience is definitely one of the aspects of your spirit. It definitely is. If you go through the Scripture, actually there's about nine things that the Bible clearly states are aspects of who your spirit is. But one of the first keys that I found, because it talks about the Holy Spirit will come in John, Jesus says the Spirit will come, and He'll convict the world of sin is one of the first keys. So I know the first thing of your conscience is one of your first issues of your spirit. So one of the ways you can know whether you're being born again is the fact that your conscience comes alive. Now remember, that's going to say the same thing like if you took a toaster and plugged it in the wall. I mean, you could put bread in there all day long. If it's not plugged in, nothing happens. You get good old soft bread when you're done. The key is when you plug it in and then hit that button, bam, it glows. Something is energized within there that's all different from before, right? And you will know when you have truly been born again because you'll be invaded by the Spirit of God. You'll be born again because your conscience comes alive like never before. Again, I wish people told me this when I first became a Christian at 19. I had no clue. I thought I was in misery because I did something wrong not knowing that my conscience came alive like a gangbusters. man I first got away with a lot of sin when I went to church secretly you know what I'm saying my mother didn't know no one knew my sin I could sweep it under the rug come to church smile everybody thought I was a good Christian boy on Sunday And then I go home and live in my sin the rest of the week again But man, when I got converted at 19, it was like getting plugged into the wall with your finger. Wham! Suddenly, I came alive like I had never known before. I felt my conscience come alive, and it was killing me. My thoughts were only evil continually, but I didn't know that before. It didn't bother me, you know what I'm saying? Suddenly, now I wasn't even waiting to go to church. In fact, within a couple months, I couldn't even think evil without feeling so guilty. I had to scream and beg God to forgive me because it was burning my heart out. The conscience came alive so powerfully that I struggled. And that's why I hated myself. I felt all I did every day was sin all day long. I thought, how can you be a Christian and sin all day long. Well, I was sinning all day long before my conscience woke up and didn't feel it or realize it. I didn't have any guilt over my sin. Now the guilt factor was a major issue of my life. And you know what it did? It drove me to repent more. That's a good thing. I spent more tears and cried out to God more and asked for more forgiveness and strength and help and to get it out of my life than ever before. I was getting desperate. It just didn't. It seemed like there was no end to this thing. I thought, is this what Christianity is all day long? All I'm going to do is hate myself, hate what I do, and don't have any power to change? Well, I went on for a year, and then God in the midst of that called me to be a preacher. What a crazy thing. I'm still in misery. He calls me and talks to me and tells me He wants me to serve Him. So I contact my grandmother in Florida here, and there was a Christian, and there still is, Palm Beach Atlantic College here in West Palm Beach. And I ended up getting a connection there and started going there. Well, it didn't help. Here I'm going now to college being trained to be a preacher and I'm still in misery. I would go, in fact, I don't know if you've ever been down there, but they have right along the waterway intercoastal there, they have an outdoor worship center and whatever. I used to go there at nights and cry out to God over the water, begging Him for deliverance from my sin. Because I couldn't get it. It's like, how can I be a preacher? I'm still a hypocrite. And I suffered severely for months and months of repentance, repentance, repentance. And through this process, God led me to go to a place up in Titusville, Florida, to a church run by a guy named Peter Lord. Everybody heard of him? He was a well-known preacher of the Southern Baptists. I went to school with his son. and we went up there for spring break and there while they set up a little seminar, they called it, a ministerial students conference, they called it. In other words, he brought about 10 of his friends from school. We went up with them and they just spent a week with us of time. While I was there, I found myself struggling to no end. I had cried and begged God to deliver me from sin and we were sitting there and one of the pastors, and I never said a word. I mean, this is all inside. I didn't show anything to them. I showed my false face. Everything was cool. I'm studying to be a preacher. Yoo-hoo. And this guy turns to me out of the blue and just blew me away. He said, you know, God can deliver you. Like, I felt electricity. My hair stood up. I was like, how do you know what I think? And I never met you before. And suddenly within an hour you're telling me these things. And now you're freaking me out now. It's like God has got something after me. Well, before that week was over, I was free. God did the final work in my life. And all that struggling and all that wrestling and all that crying and praying got to a conclusion at that point. And when I went home from there, I was clean. And the power of God had brought me, the grace of God had brought me to a place where finally after all that period of my infancy, shifted gears. My conscience was clear. There was no more thing going on giving me guilt. I had peace of mind. I had joy that began to pump out of me like a freight train, you know what I'm talking about? And God was mighty in my heart. Within a couple weeks of being home, the conclusion of that was there and I was changed. Again, no one taught me these things. I had to learn it by trial and error and ignorance and I just stumbled through it all. It took me forever. I want you to understand the principles here. It's easier if you know what's going on. Don't you think? I am sure that a woman would be, you know, like you ever hear of these ladies who can't figure out, they go to the hospital and they have a baby and they claim they didn't know they were pregnant? You ever heard of that? Every once in a while you hear that on the news. It's usually a bigger lady, so she doesn't show anything physically, so she doesn't show any difference. She doesn't even know she's pregnant. It would have been a lot easier for that lady if she had known she was pregnant for nine months to wonder why all these things were going on. You would think after your belly is kicking and things are moving, you'd get a hint that there's a baby, but they still, a lot of them you hear, they didn't know they were pregnant. They claim they didn't know until they gave birth. That's the kind of thing I want you to see. it would be easier if you know what's going on, wouldn't it? To cooperate with God if you knew what's going on. And that's why I want you to understand it. It's important to understand these principles. So understand what I'm saying here. If you're born of the Spirit, it says you hear the sound of it. You hear that God's at work. But you don't really see the wind, but so is everyone born of the Spirit. Changes happen inside you that you can't explain. A newness. Your conscience comes awake. Things begin to rattle within you. And that's why, number one, the invisible Spirit of God, I'd like to win, changes a person from inside. Have you got that? Have you got an unexplainable thing going on inside you that changes you and shows you that you're thinking differently? Your conscience is screaming at you. Things are being different. When you are born again, you are a new spiritual life. You are a new creation inside. Not outside, inside. That change that happens is incredible. That's what we're talking about. Just because you claim you're Christian doesn't mean you are one. You must show the evidence, and it starts with repentance, right? And then shows the signs of change. Number two, being born again is not a mental religious opinion. It's a life-altering change of being. You know if you're invaded by God. You must know if Christ is truly inside you. And this is harder for people who claim they've been Christian since they were a little child. Right? Because it's kind of there and you don know what you doing But it got to be the same There no difference whether you a child or not There got to be a change Thirdly the Holy Spirit enters into a person causing a spiritual eruption Look at the verse John 7. He who believes in me, who cleaves to and trust in or relies on me, as the Scripture has said, from his innermost being shall flow continuously springs and rivers of living water. But he was speaking here of the Spirit whom those who believed in Him were afterward to receive. For the Holy Spirit had not yet been given because Jesus had not yet been glorified. In other words, raised from the dead, which happened after His death, burial, and resurrection. Notice what He's teaching ahead to them, but looking back now is this. True entrance of the Spirit in your life causes a flow, a rattling, an explosion, an eruption of change comes on in your life. That's being born again. If you have not experienced that, I don't care what you believe, you better doubt whether you're truly saved. Because when the Holy Ghost comes in, He rattles your cage. And if you can't think of ever being rattled, then you need to go back to phase one. Repent. I don't care what it takes, you need to repent until you see absolute massive change because that is the road in. Right? That's the road in. That's what he said. Now, remember then, with that initial change of repentance, what you know is your sins are forgiven. And the way you know that is you get that influx of God's presence in you. He rattles and shakes and erupts inside you. And remember what Peter said, everything that goes into life of pleasing God has been miraculously given to you at your conversion. You have no lack of power, of grace or anything to obey God. You have no excuse for not walking with God from the time you're born again. God gives you absolutely everything you need in the presence of the Holy Spirit who invades your soul. If He's there, there's no need for anything else. You have all the power you need, right? Are you changing? Do you see a rattling going on within you? Do you hear that voice of God that shakes you and pulls you away from sin? Do you have a hunger like a baby to do what's right? See, that's the idea. It's not just the conscience. It's the hunger. There was a hunger that began at me when I was 19 years old that I couldn't put out. I had a hunger to do what God wanted. It just would not leave me. It drove me the hunger to please God. More than myself, more than my parents, more than anything, I hungered and hungered to make God happy. I couldn't explain it. It wasn't there before I was converted. I was raised in church and didn't have the hunger. Then the hunger forced me and shoved me and just pulled within me to do what God wanted. So that made me want to look and see what the Bible said He wanted because I can understand it. Do you have that hunger? Do you have that hunger? Do you have that hunger? that shakes you. Two things then. How do you know your sins are forgiven? How do you know? Feel free? Feel free? What do you start with? The burden off you. Okay. Do you know it because you asked Jesus to forgive you? No. You repent. Exactly. You don't do it because you ask. You know because you've repented. You know it because you get enlivened charge within you. You know because your conscience comes alive. You know it means to be born again. That's phase one. There's a change that you can't stop. I found that I couldn't stop what started. It was pushing and shoving me. Just like you can't stop getting old. You can't stop getting old. You're going to get old and die. You can't stop it. This is what I'm saying. It's a process you cannot stop. If you're truly born again, it doesn't go away. It continues to surge from within. In the same way, you can't stop getting old. Your body processes. You keep going on. You don't think about it. In fact, that's what the scientists keep spending a lot of money trying to stop it. They can't stop it. They keep trying to figure ways to go in the DNA and turn it off. Anything they can do because they want to stop it. but you can't stop it. If you're born again, you can't stop it. It comes and it comes and it comes and it comes because the love of God, the grace of God is almighty, powerful, and it will change your life like a flood that flows from you like a waterfall. You cannot stop it. If you don't sense it, if you don't have it, go to the beginning and say, am I really born again? what makes me different than the devil? Just because I believe, what makes me different than the devil? The devil does what he wants. Do you do what you want? Or have you changed to do and desire to obey the living God? It's key. Let's pray. Father, I pray that it's been clear enough, the message has been powerful enough by your Spirit and your grace to, first of all, raise questions in any of them that need doubt. We can convince ourselves of a lot of things, Lord, but I pray that You will convince my friends here today of their true situation. If they're born again, Lord, give them the clear teaching of Your Word so they have joy. They can jump up and say, I see in me repentance. I see change. I see my conscience screaming at me when I do evil. I see inward reality knowing that I am born again. Lord, I pray for that. And if they don't see that, I pray that they'd give them fear that judgment day will bring them destruction and that will drive them to their knees. And I pray now, Lord, that you'll convince any that need to truly repent to start it here right now in the heart. convince them of their great need to be saved from their sin. I pray now in Jesus' name. Amen. Stand up and shout it if you love my Lord

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