The new birth is a divine act wrought on earth by the Holy Spirit of God. "Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again" (John 3:7). These were our Saviour's words to Israel's ideal man—one of the finest specimens of humanity they could find to be a ruler. Mentally, morally, and religiously he had few equals and no rivals. Aspiring to heaven, but utterly unfit, he must be born again by the Holy Spirit of God, and so must reader and writer, and every human creature.

How we become children of God is so clearly defined that only the wilfully ignorant could misunderstand: "Ye are all the children of God by faith in

Christ Jesus" (Galatians 3:26); or again, "Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ is born of God" (1 John 5:1). The Holy Spirit, using the Word of God to reveal our ruin by sin, and God's remedy for sin through Christ's atoning blood, leads to the decisive act recorded in these Scriptures. Thus believers in Christ are born again "by the Word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever" (1 Peter 1:23).

All would agree that prior to their birth they had no part in the affairs of this life; and that their present position dates from the day they were born. They did not grow into the world, but were born into it. In like manner unless one has been born again he is not in the kingdom of God at all. You cannot grow into it. You must be born into it. "That which is born of the flesh is flesh" (by this act we are placed on earth); "That which is born of the Spirit is spirit" (by this act we are placed in God's kingdom). "Marvel not that I said unto thee, ye must be born again" (John 3:6,7).

—James M'Kendrick