Crossing the River: Born Again?

6/17/2019

Perhaps in further memory of my father, I awoke this morning with the old song “I Won’t Have To Cross Jordan Alone” in my head. (He sang a few bars of that quite often.) It’s not a totally Scriptural song, but has some great lines in it which do depict “when (we) come to the river at the ending of day, When the last winds of sorrow have blown, There’ll be somebody waiting to show me the way, I won’t have to cross Jordan alone.” —If you take out the reference to Jordan you have a pretty clear picture of what happens when saved people leave this life. Also, in the chorus, the middle 3 lines are “Jesus died all my sins to atone, When the darkness I see, He’ll be waiting for me…” very sound doctrine. 

I’ve noticed for many years in any people the “quick to judge” attitude which I first saw in myself after learning that the Apostle Paul was our apostle for today. The quick to judge action is generally caused by seeing some-thing or -things which make one have questions to ask which the general public of church-goers will not be able to answer. So, it’s like I know something and I bet you don’t, and if you don’t I can label you with one of my labels. When I could plainly see why, according to Scripture, there should not be any denominations of churches, I set out to show why I (me and the Bible) was right and “they” were wrong. This was in 1974. I still think that is correct, for if the Bible had shown me differently, I would have changed again—I changed once. But, relating that to people has changed considerably. Betterment by further study is always in our instructions.

If, then, it is so clear that there should be no divisions among us, why do I not charge ahead just like I did in 1974? Because the very same Scripture has shown me I cannot change anyone else’s mind: “Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind,” I reckon. Time and circumstance, good and bad experiences, helpful and harmful things have all taught me to take all of the Apostle Paul’s teachings all the time. Sometimes, some teaching is cancelled out by later teaching which shows how the revealed mysteries unfolded before Paul so that as he taught the “mystery of Christ” he learned and taught not to offend the “Jews, Gentiles and the church of God.” Later, and harkening back to some former things, he said, “Let no man judge you in ….” whatever.  

Look: People sometimes ask me if I’m “born again.” The answer cannot be a yes or no—and that alone makes some people offended. And yet, the common Christian application is to make born againand savedbe one and the same thing. Born again, only used once by the Lord in the book of John, is a reference to actually being born a second time, or resurrection. It is not a reference to being saved by trusting the finished work of Christ at Calvary: “how that Christ died for our sins…was buried…and he was raised again for our justification.” Christ is born again, “first-born from the dead..” (That really sends the normal Christian off the beam when you tell them Christ is born again.)

Generally, the christian life is such that believing one gets born again is about the conversion experience. Scripture bears out that born again (“except a man…”) is resurrection. Hence, Peter preached to the Jews in Jerusalem concerning this for them how  it occurs when Christ comes back, also in his first epistle. Our Apostle Paul did the same thing: he taught the Corinthians “as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bare the image of the heavenly.” Well, we don’t yet, do we? But we shall, right? Our “vile bodies ,…like unto his glorious body.” Paul goes on to say that the Lord Jesus Christ is the only one who now “hath immortality.” I hope this two paragraph explanation adds to your knowledge of the Word. If it brings questions, do not hesitate to talk with me about it. I won’t be angry or arrogant, we should be able to discuss Scripture, right?

Thanks for reading, the Elder