Reborn to Love

By: Wendy Duckworth Vance

It would be reasonable to assume that most believers know John 3:16, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have everlasting life”, but how well do we know or fully understand the preceding verses?  In verses 1 - 15 of John 3, Yeshua (Jesus) is having a conversation with a Pharisee named Nicodemus, who had come to see him at night.  During this conversation, Yeshua tells Nicodemus that one must be born again in order to see the Kingdom of God. Further stating that one must be reborn of spirit - specifically the Holy Spirit, for that which is born of flesh is flesh and that which is born of Spirit is Spirit.

So what does this mean for believers? Do we become some sort of non-corporeal being, a disembodied wispy veil of a being?  Of course not, I mean, if so, how easy would it be to distinguish the genuine believer from the wolf in sheep’s clothing social believer? Or why then would believers worry about accidentally taking the mark or losing their lives during the evil reign of the Antichrist or in the mission field in various places? Put simply, if we were transformed into the wispy, ghost-like images that enter our minds when we think of a being that we would describe as a spirit, it would not be possible for our lives to be controlled or taken by these human means.  Instead, what is being discussed here is a change within, a transformation from concerns of this fallen world to the concerns of the throne room of the King of Kings.  It is a rebirth, reincarnation , if you will, that is the result of death as we have followed the instructions of Mathew 16:24 - 26, Luke 9:23-25, and Mark 8:34-37 to pick up our cross and follow Christ.  The old man or woman dies to this world, to selfishness, and is given eternal life within the Kingdom of God.  A life that is radically different, radically changed from a selfish sin nature to a selfless -pour out yourself for others existance.

What did Christ do on the cross?  He died on that cross !  In so doing, he took upon  Himself our sin and our curse. Then three days later, He rose to life, conquering the punishment of spiritual death that hangs over each of our souls. We are invited by this same Yeshua to enter into this death and rebirth - to be transformed into the image bearers of God, which we were originally created to be before sin entered our existence by the disobedience of our first parents.

But this begs the question, what does it mean to be an image bearer of God?  Does this mean we look a certain way, a certain color?  Well, no, if this were so, we  would be transformed into a person who likely “looks” ethnically Jewish/Middle Eastern.  After all, the Word is clear that the Jewish people are His Chosen People forever (no, they were not replaced). The Word is also clear that Yeshua is of Jewish descent through Mary and that He is also fully God. So how we look isn’t the transformation.  Okay, so then perhaps it must be our wealth, our material possessions - after all, according to the prosperity preachers, we are “priests and kings,” and God is just waiting to be our great genie if we just sow that seed money.  No, that isn’t right either.  Some of the most faith-filled, give-the-shirt-off-their-back-to-help-someone-else folks I have had the privilege to know have been among the poor, not those we view as “blessed” from our earthly perspective.  Nor is it gender-based, as most of us could name both men and women whose lives are lived in service to the gospel.   So then what is this image that we bear?  In a word - LOVE!

1 John 4:8 tells us that those who do not love do not know God, and the reason is that “God is love”.  If we are then transformed to be His image bearers, proclaiming His kingdom until He  returns, and God is love, then the image that we bear is love. His love reached out to the sinner, the broken, sick, poor, foreigner (immigrant), people with disabilities, to those no one else wanted, to all nations and tongues.  To all of us, He called us to His Kingdom, to be loved and to rest in His Shalom (peace). This then is the state into which we are reborn -to be love to those forgotten.  

We are not reborn to be political powerhouses, to build “great” countries, to build walls to keep out those that don’t look like us,  to force our beliefs on those who have not accepted the invitation to Marriage Supper of the Lamb, to create the just “right” pure race, to take from those who already have so little.  We were not reborn to be judges and executioners for God - He will take care of the business of separating the sheep from the goats, the tares from the chaff when He comes again. No, we are reborn to love radically, just as He loved during His earthly ministry and when He endured the agony of the cross to pay the redemptive price that gives us access to the throne of Grace.  

If then we are reborn into His image - to be love - then let us love. Let us minister to the sick. Let us fully include those forgotten/the marginalized. Let us stop giving the highest seat and honor to the wealthy and powerful, and instead give them to those who are barely holding together body and soul to scratch out a living in this life.  Let us stop treating our foreign/immigrant neighbor like some disease that has been dropped upon us, to be violently wiped out. Let us minister and care for single mothers and their children. Let us bandage the physical and emotional wounds of the victims of domestic violence, feed the hungry, shelter those without homes, be the light in the darkness that surrounds us. Let us be truly be reborn into His image - let us be reborn to love.