1.First God created (birthed) man in His own image, so man was created (born) originally pure and good like God. Man was in the beginning clear from every sinful blot.
2.But, although man was made in the image of God, he was not made (created/birthed) immutable. He was created able to stand, and yet liable to fall.
3.He fell from his high estate. He "ate of the tree which the Lord had commanded him, Thou shalt not eat thereof."
4.By this willful act of disobedience to his Creator, this flat rebellion against his Sovereign, he openly declared that he would no longer have God to rule over him.
5.He would now be governed by his own will, and not the will of God that created him.
6.He would now not seek his happiness in God, but in the world and in the works of his hands.
7.God had told him before, "In the day that thou eats..." of that fruit, "…thou shalt surely die."
8.Accordingly, in that day he did die: He died to God, -- the most dreadful of all deaths.
9. He lost the life of God: He was separated from Him of whom, his spiritual life consisted.
10.The love of /for God was extinguished in his soul, which was now "alienated from the life of God."
11.He fled from the presence of the Lord. He endeavored to "hide himself from God among the trees of the garden:" (Gen. 3:8)
12.He lost both the knowledge and the love of God, without which the image of God could not subsist
13.He was deprived of this, and became unholy as well as unhappy.
14.He had sunk into pride and self-will, the very image of the devil; and into sensual appetites and desires, the image of the beasts that perish.
15.And in Adam all died, all human kind, all the children of men who were then in Adam's loins.
16.The natural consequence of this is, that every one descended from him comes into the world spiritually dead, dead to God, wholly dead in sin; entirely void of the life of God; void of the image of God and of all that righteousness and holiness in which Adam was originally created.
17.Every man born into the world now bears the image of the devil in pride and self-will; the image of the beast, in sensual appetites and desires.
18.Hence it is, that, being born in sin, we must be "born again." Hence every one that is born of a woman must be born of the Spirit of God.
How must a man be born again? What is the nature of the new birth?
1.The precise manner, how it is done, how the Holy Spirit works this in the soul, no one even the wisest of the children of men is able to explain. Even though,
you may be as absolutely assured of the fact, as of the blowing of the wind.
2.When an adult Heathen was convinced that the Jewish religion was of God, and desired to join therein, it was the custom to baptize him first, before he
was admitted to circumcision. And when he was baptized, he was said to be born again; by which they meant, that he who was before a child of the devil was
now adopted into the family of God, and accounted one of his children.
3.A man cannot "enter a second time into his mother's womb, and be born:" -- But they may spiritually.
4.A man may be born from above, born of God, born of the Spirit, in a manner which bears a very near analogy to the natural birth.
5.Before a child is born into the world he has eyes, but sees not; he has ears, but does not hear.
6.He has no knowledge of any of the things of the world.
7.We do not even give the name of life. It is only when a man is born, that we say he begins to live.
8.As soon as he is born, be begins to see the light, and the various objects with which he is encompassed. His ears are then opened, and he hears the sounds.
9.He likewise breathes, and lives in a manner wholly different from what he did before.
10.While a man is in a mere natural state, before he is born of God, he has, in a spiritual sense, eyes and sees not.
11.A thick impenetrable veil lies upon them.
12.He has ears, but hears not; he is utterly deaf to what he is most of all concerned to hear.
13.His other spiritual senses are all locked up.
14.He is in the same condition as if he had them not.
15.He has no knowledge of God; no intercourse with him; he is not at all acquainted with him.
16.He has no true knowledge of the things of God, either of spiritual or eternal things.
17.Though he is a living man, he is a dead Christian.
18.As soon as he is born again of God, there is a total change in all these particulars
19.The "eyes of his understanding are opened''.
20. He sees the light of the glory of God," his glorious love, "in the face of Jesus Christ."
21.His ears being opened, he is now capable of hearing the inward voice of God, saying, "Be of good cheer; thy sins are forgiven thee;" "go and sin no more."
22.He is now ready to hear whatsoever "He that teaches man knowledge" is pleased, from time to time, to reveal to him.
23.He "feels in his heart, the mighty working of the Spirit of God;"
24.Not in a gross, carnal sense as the men of the world stupidly and willfully misunderstand the expression; though they have been told again and again.
25.He feels inwardly sensible of the graces which the Spirit of God works in his heart.
26.He feels, he is conscious of, a "peace which passes all understanding."
27.He many times feels such a joy in God as is "unspeakable, and full of glory."
28.He feels "the love of God shed abroad in his heart by the Holy Spirit which is given unto him;"
29.All his spiritual senses are then exercised to discern spiritual good and evil.
30.By the use of these, he is daily increasing in the knowledge of God,
31.Of Jesus Christ whom God hath sent, and to all the things pertaining to his inward kingdom.
32.And now, he may be properly said to live: God having quickened him by his Spirit,
33.He is alive to God through Jesus Christ.
34.He lives a life which the world knows not of.
35.A "life which is hidden with Christ in God." God is continually breathing, as it were, upon the soul; and his soul is breathing unto God.
36.Grace is descending into his heart; and prayer and praise ascending to heaven:
37.By this intercourse between God and man, this fellowship with the Father and the Son, as by a kind of spiritual respiration, the life of God in the soul is sustained;
38.And the child of God grows up, till he comes to the "full measure of the stature of Christ."
Researched, compiled and written by Rev. Bola A. (27Nov2009)
HOLY SPIRIT SERVICES - Int
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