Look and Live: Four Absolute Truths from John 3

“Jesus answered and said to him, ‘Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.’”

John 3:3

Introduction

This message was on my mind for the gospel meeting, and tonight is that day. Earlier, in our Bible reading session this afternoon, we were thinking about the clarity of Scripture — the absolute truth of Scripture. As I thought about the gospel, my mind went to this story in John 3, concerning Nicodemus and the interaction the Lord had with him.

Tonight I’d like us to think about four absolute truths from this portion we’ve read.

The Absolute Necessity of Being Born Again

The Lord was very, very clear with Nicodemus, this religious man who had come to meet him: in order to be in heaven, you need the new birth. In fact, he repeated it three times over these first few verses. Nicodemus questioned how these things could be — how it would be possible for a man to be born again. But the Lord really emphasized it. In verse 3 he said, “Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” In verse 5: “Except a man be born of water and of the spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.”

In verse 7, it gets very personal: “Marvel not that I say unto thee, ye must be born again.”

A Story of Two Opposites

I began thinking about this passage about a week ago, when a fellow preacher was speaking last Sunday night about a woman who had been in prison in the U.S. She had lived a life of sin, gotten into all sorts of trouble, and finished up charged with murder — her life was going to end by execution in a U.S. prison. And yet God came in and saved that woman.

As I thought about that, it struck me that the man I’m looking at tonight — Nicodemus — was the polar opposite. He was a very religious man, the kind of man people would look up to. But the Lord knew his heart, and he knew that even though this man was very religious, he had never been born again.

The Question for Tonight

And that’s the question we’d ask you at the very outset of our meeting tonight: has there ever been a moment in your life when you accepted the Lord Jesus Christ as your Saviour — when you were born again, born from above? Because, dear friend, the Word of God is very clear. The message the Lord gave to Nicodemus is the same message we have tonight: if you’re not born again, you’re not going to be in heaven.

I wasn’t planning to mention this, but my own father — when he first heard the gospel — that was one of the things that struck him. He heard men preaching about this new birth, about the necessity of being born again, and he thought of himself as a fairly religious man. He went to church as often as he could. And yet, as he heard the gospel preached, he realized something was missing: “I have never been born again. In fact, I don’t even know what it means to be born again.”

Maybe there’s someone in our meeting tonight who’s like Nicodemus. Nicodemus asked what seems like a fairly trivial question: “Can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter the second time into his mother’s womb and be born?” But what he needed to understand is that this is not physical birth — this is birth from above. The moment a soul accepts that they are a sinner in the sight of God, realizes their great need before him, and accepts the Lord Jesus Christ as Saviour — that’s the moment they receive the new birth.

Why Did Nicodemus Come at Night?

Nicodemus was really struggling with this whole concept of the new birth. We’re not told why he came to Jesus at night — maybe he didn’t want to be seen. I remember an old preacher in Ireland who used to say the reason he had no more insight than any of the rest of them was this: Nicodemus came at night because he couldn’t wait until morning. And really, that’s what salvation is about. If you could wait until morning, you wouldn’t need to be saved tonight.

If there’s one thing I could get across tonight, it’s the absolute need for the new birth. That alone would be a great step in your experience. What we cannot do is enlighten you — only the Spirit of God can do that — and we’ve been praying in our prayer meeting tonight that the Spirit of God would enlighten your soul to realize your great need.

I don’t think I have to ask tonight whether everyone intends to be in heaven — I believe everyone under the sound of our voice tonight wants to be there. And if you asked most people on the street, they’d say the same: they want to be in heaven when life is over. But the Creator of the universe, the Saviour of the world, said these words: “Except you be born again, you cannot see the kingdom of God.”

The Absolute Necessity of the Lifting Up

The second absolute truth I’d like to look at is the absolute necessity of the lifting up. We read in verse 14: “As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up.”

What the Lord is getting across here is that he himself must be lifted up on a cross in order for salvation to be possible — in order that Nicodemus, or anyone, might be born again. The Lord had to be lifted up on a cross to bear a penalty that was not his own. He was the spotless, sinless, perfect sacrifice — and yet he was the one who was going to bear the sin of the world. There was none other good enough. As one hymn writer put it, only Christ could pay sin’s price and open heaven’s gate for us.

What the Lord was telling Nicodemus is that this wasn’t some kind of extra — not a fast track to heaven where, sure, being born again gets you there, but there are other ways too. No. There is no salvation in any other, for there is no other name given among men by which we must be saved.

The Weight of the Cross

Think of what it must have been for the Lord to know what was coming. He was going to be beaten until his back was lacerated like a plowed field. He was going to be pierced through the hands and the feet. He was going to be spat upon, and he was going to have cruel, wicked men do all these things to him. And finally, God was going to lay on him the iniquity of us all.

When we think of this lifting up, it reminds us how seriously God takes sin. It’s a serious thing in the sight of God. So we ask you tonight: how serious is sin for you? Are you content just to live along, day by day, in your sins? We want to tell you, dear friend, that the wages of sin is death. There will be consequences. All sin must be paid for, and your sins must be paid for if you ever intend to be in heaven.

The Gospel in Miniature

As I looked back at Numbers 21 — the story referenced here in John 3 — I don’t think I’ve ever seen a more condensed picture of the gospel. In verse 5, the people had sinned. In verse 6, sin had brought death — that’s the truth of the gospel: the wages of sin is death. In verse 7, the people acknowledged their sin and repented, crying out to Moses, “We have sinned.” We would long for that to be the cry of someone in our gospel meeting tonight — that you would realize how serious your sin is in the sight of God.

Then in verse 8, the Lord provided salvation. What a God of mercy, to provide salvation. And in verse 9, we have the people’s responsibility: to look. We were singing earlier — look and live.

The message the Lord had for Nicodemus wasn’t that he needed more knowledge or more education in the scriptures — though that has its place. He was taken back to the scene of the children of Israel, bitten by those fiery serpents, facing certain death. The remedy was simple: look and live.

All we can really do tonight is point you to the Lord Jesus Christ — to the one who laid down his life at Calvary, who satisfied his Father, who paid the price for your sin and for mine. We can’t tell you that you need to do something more, because that wouldn’t be scriptural. We simply have to tell you to look — to look and live, just like those people of old. There’s nothing complex about it. They were just told to look, and live.

We trust that someone in our meeting tonight might look and live. Isaiah 45:22 says, “Look unto me, and be saved, all the ends of the earth; for I am God, and there is none other.”

The Absolute Certainty of Wrath or Judgment

The third truth I’d like to look at, just for a couple of minutes, is the absolute certainty of wrath or judgment.

There’s No Escaping the Verdict

Sin will be judged. Sometimes, whether it’s speeding on the highway or something else, we like to think we can get away with it. Maybe you glance in your mirror, there’s no police car in sight, and you push the speed limit a little further. That’s probably how a lot of us go through life, consciously or unconsciously, when it comes to sin.

But we read in verse 18 of John 3: “He that believeth not is condemned already.” If you’re not saved in our gospel meeting tonight, and if you were to leave this life in that condition — unsaved — you are condemned already. Your fate is already known. You don’t have to wait for it.

Many would teach, maybe even online, that you have to wait until the end and see whether your good deeds outweigh your bad deeds, and that somehow you’ll sneak your way into heaven. That’s not going to happen, because God is a holy God, and he demands that sin be dealt with. In verse 36 we read: “He that believeth not the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abideth on him.”

The Wrath Christ Already Bore

As I thought about that wrath of God abiding on him, my mind went to Isaiah 53 — a well-known portion — and a couple of short verses from it. Verse 5: “He was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities.” Verse 6: “The Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.” You could also read 1 Peter 2:24 — that he bore our sins in his own body on the tree.

That wrath of God is hovering over every man, woman, boy, or girl who is not saved. But it need not fall on you, because the Lord Jesus Christ has already borne that wrath — that judgment of God has already been borne. If you were to accept him as your Saviour tonight, you could be saved. There’s no need for you to bear that wrath of God yourself. Why would you? We trust that someone might come to Christ tonight and accept him as their Saviour.

The Absolute Security in Christ

As I close, I’d like to spend a couple of minutes thinking about the absolute security in Christ. If there’s that absolute certainty of judgment for those who aren’t saved, I want to remind you tonight that there is absolute security in Christ for those who accept the Lord Jesus Christ as their Saviour.

What God’s Word Actually Promises

In verse 15 we read: “Whosoever believeth … shall not perish, but have everlasting life.” These are not my words. These are not the words of people who come to the Gospel Hall, or any other church. These are the words of God — the God of eternity, the God who provided a way of salvation.

Verse 16, that very well-known verse: “… should not perish, but have everlasting life.” You could have everlasting life tonight, if you were to accept the Lord Jesus Christ as your Saviour. Verse 18: “He that believeth is not condemned” — there’s no condemnation to those who believe. And verse 36: “He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life.” Notice — this is present tense. If you were to accept Christ tonight, you would have eternal life.

We trust that someone under the sound of our voice tonight might accept the Lord Jesus Christ as their Saviour, turn and repent of their sins, and come to Christ. As the Lord said elsewhere: “I give unto my sheep eternal life, and they shall never perish” (John 10:28).

Look and Live Tonight

Dear friend, in our meeting tonight, if you want to be secure for eternity, we trust that you will look to Christ. Look to that one upon the cross, the one who laid down his life for you, the one who shed his precious blood. If you accept that blood, the Lord can save. Without the shedding of blood, there is no remission for sins (Hebrews 9:22) — and that blood has already been shed. The price has already been paid. All that’s left for you to do tonight is to accept that finished work of the Lord Jesus Christ.