Are you born again?
In His dialogue with Nicodemus (John 3), Jesus reveals afundamental and essential condition for entering the Kingdom of Heaven. In verse 7, He proclaims, "You must be born again"—a declaration that leaves no room for ambiguity. This necessity prompts critical questions: What does it mean to be "born again"? How does one undergo this spiritual rebirth? And how can one be assured it has taken place? For, as Jesus states in verse 3, "unless one is born again, he cannot see the Kingdom of God," let alone enter it. And so, the question you should ask yourself is this: “Am I born again?”
This is perhaps the most important question anyone can ask themselves. Of all the questions in human history, none carries more weight or eternal consequence than this one. No one can see—let alone enter—the Kingdom of God unless they have experienced this new birth. It is therefore essential that you not only understand this truth but answer this question with confidence and clarity; that you have been born again.
This article will seek to explain what it means to be born again, provide biblical evidence for the necessity of the new birth and examine the marks or evidences of a truly regenerated life. My prayer is that through this exploration, Christ will be exalted, and readers will deepen their understanding and appreciation of the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To Him be the glory, both now and to the day of eternity. Amen. (2 Peter 3:18). The Bible uses the word regeneration as a synonym for being born again ( Titus 3:5) and therefore this word will be used interchangeably.
Definition
Jesus Christ secured all the blessings of salvation once and for all through His blood on the cross, those blessings are not experienced by God’s people until the Holy Spirit graciously applies them to each believer’s heart. Regeneration is the very first spiritual blessing that is applied in the believer’s experience of redemption. To understand what being born again/regeneration means, we must first understand the nature of man before being saved. The Bible uses a variety of terms and images to describe non-believers. As to Spiritual Condition, they are; dead in sin (Eph 2:1), blind (2 Cor 4:4), lost (Luke 19:10), slaves to sin (John 8:34. As to their relational status with God, they are; enemies of God (Rom 5:10), children of wrath( Ep 2:3), aliens and strangers (Eph 2:12), fools (Psalm 14:1). As to their moral and ethical character; they are unrighteous (Rom 3:10) they are in darkness (Eph 5:8), lovers of self/ haters of God (2 Tim 3:4).As to their destiny without Christ; they are perishing (1 Cor 1:18) condemned ( John 3:18) and without hope (Eph 2:12).
These graphic and sobering descriptions of non-believers in Scripture means that they do not just need a moral makeover;they need a miracle of regeneration. Dead people cannot reform themselves. Morality does not resurrect the dead. Only the life-giving power of God can. Blindness cannot be fixed with clearer rules, Spiritual blindness is not solved by more information.Slavery to sin cannot be broken by better habits. Condemnation is not lifted by trying harder. Good deeds do not cancel guilt. What non-believers truly need is not self-help, but a new heart (Ezekiel 36:26); Not behavioral change, but rebirth (John 3:3); not external conformity, but internal transformation (Romans 12:2); not reformation, but resurrection (Ephesians 2:5) and this is what being born again is. It is the supernatural work of the Holy Spirit by which God imparts new spiritual life to a sinner.
The Author of Regeneration
Dead men do not decide to stop being dead. They lack both the power and the desire. In fact, Scripture says they love their darkness (John 3:19) and are content in their spiritual death. Their only hope for life comes from outside of themselves. “But God, being rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved” (Ephesians 2:4–5). Only God, in His mercy and love, can breathe life into the spiritually dead. Only grace can make a dead soul live. This is what it means to be born again: Not a self-improvement project, not a moral reset, but a miracle of divine grace—where God, rich in mercy, breathes life into the spiritually dead and unites them to Christ. He imparts new spiritual life. He gives the sinner a new heart—eyes to see, ears to hear. He effectually calls His people “out of darkness and into His marvelous light” (1 Peter 2:9).
This is what makes a person a Christian: regeneration—the spiritual recreation of one dead in sin, the divine impartation of spiritual life into the soul of the sinner. Unlike conversion (repentance and faith) and sanctification, which involve human participation, regeneration is a process in which man remains entirely passive. God alone acts as the sole agent, sovereignly accomplishing the miracle of the new birth. In the physical realm, a child contributes nothing to his own conception or birth—he does not even exist until conception occurs! His existence hinges entirely on the will of his parents. Likewise, Jesus employs the analogy of new birth to reveal a profound truth: spiritually dead and depraved sinners are utterly incapable of contributing to their rebirth into eternal life. They depend wholly on the sovereign will of God to bring about their regeneration!
In John 1:13, the Apostle John declares that God’s children, birthed through regeneration, are born "not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God." This verse destroys any human claim to the new birth. To say it is "not of blood" means regeneration is not inherited through ancestry. No one is born again by virtue of their bloodline or heritage—physical life may stem from the union of a father and mother, but spiritual life does not. Regeneration is wholly supernatural, beyond the reach of natural descent.
Likewise, to say it is "not of the will of the flesh" underscores that the new birth is not a product of human effort or decision. A sinful person cannot ‘will’ themselves into spiritual life any more than a corpse can will itself to rise! No amount of moral striving or religious exertion can trigger regeneration, for such acts arise from a state of fleshly bondage. As Jesus states in John 3:6, "flesh gives birth to flesh"—only the Spirit can birth spirit. Thus, the will of the flesh is powerless to produce this spiritual transformation.
Finally, John asserts it is "not of the will of man," ruling out any notion that human-made religions or sacramental systems can effect regeneration. No ritual, tradition, or institution can generate the new birth—it owes nothing to human invention and everything to the sovereign act of God alone.
The children of God are born of God alone, and Scripture employs the most dynamic language to affirm His sovereign role in regeneration. Consider these testimonies: In James 1:18, we read, "In the exercise of His will He brought us forth by the word of truth, so that we would be a kind of first fruits among His creatures." Far from relying on human initiative, spiritual life springs from the deliberate act of God’s will. Ephesians 2, as noted earlier, describes humanity as "dead in trespasses," utterly powerless to revive itself. Yet, in that helpless state, "God … made us alive together with Christ." The action is His alone. Likewise, 1 Peter 1:3 proclaims that "according to God’s great mercy," He "has caused us to be born again." The language is unmistakably active—God Himself is the cause of our regeneration. In each case, Scripture leaves no doubt: the new birth is God’s work, initiated and accomplished by His power and mercy.
In Titus 3:5, Paul writes, "He saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit." Here, regeneration is depicted as salvation from sin, marked by both a cleansing ("washing") and a transformation ("renewing"). This echoes John 3:5, where Jesus describes the new birth as being "born of water and the Spirit"—a likely allusion to Ezekiel 36, where God promises to sprinkle clean water on His people and grant them a new heart.
We can discern that regeneration’s nature involves a cleansing from sin and the creation of spiritual life—a purifying renewal. At its core, regeneration is the divine impartation of eternal spiritual life into a sinner who was once spiritually dead.
Regeneration renews humanity as comprehensively as sin once corrupted it. The Holy Spirit transforms the sinner in three profound ways: First, He opens the mind’s blind eyes, replacing a fleshly perspective with a spiritual one (Acts 26:18; Rom. 8:5–9), granting the regenerate the mind of Christ to discern spiritual truths (1 Cor. 2:16). Second, He renews the heart, exchanging a heart of stone for one of flesh (Ezek. 36), so the sinner now mourns sin, hungers for righteousness, and thirsts for God (Ps. 42:1–2), treasuring Christ above all. This is not forced obedience but a genuine shift to love what is genuinely good. Third, regeneration liberates the will from sin’s bondage, aligning it with God’s pleasure (Phil. 2:13), so the newborn soul delights to obey, declaring, “I delight to do Your will, O my God; Your Law is within my heart” (Ps. 40:8). God’s law, once external, now lives within, written on the heart (2 Cor. 3).The regenerated sinner is truly, as Ephesians 4:24 describes, a "new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness."
The Means of Regeneration
The scripture is clear on the means which God uses to impart this new spiritual life. It is the word of God and particularly the gospel that God uses to regenerate sinners. James 1:18 states, "In the exercise of His will, He brought us forth by the word of truth." Here, "by" denotes the means—God’s sovereign act of regeneration flows through the word of truth. Similarly Peter writes, "You have been born again, not of perishable seed but of imperishable, through the living and enduring word of God," 1 Peter 1:23. This enduring word that Peter talks about is later identified as the gospel in verse 25 that this word "is the good news that was preached to you." The Gospel is the imperishable seed of new birth. Paul notes that the Thessalonians were called “through our Gospel” (2 Thess 2:14).
Thus, the Holy Spirit wields the proclaimed Gospel to pierce the heart, opening blind eyes to Christ’s glory. The external call of preaching serves as the vehicle for the internal call of regeneration. This is why Paul declares in Romans 10:17, "Faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ"—the Gospel message. In short, the means of regeneration is the Word, the powerful proclamation of the good news.
The Evidence or marks of Regeneration
There is so much confusion on what being born again is out there and what the evidence of being born again is. Some claim(contrary to scriptures) that you must speak in tongues if you have been born again. But the Bible is clear on the evidences of being born again.
Faith is the first and foremost result of regeneration. As the light of the Gospel shines into sinners heart, their spiritual eyes are opened, and they see sin for what it is; disgusting and horrible in the sight of God. Their eyes are also opened to the loveliness of Christ (2 Cor 4:6). The newborn soul therefore turns away from sin (repents) and believes (faith) in the Gospel. This new life is then marked by progressive holiness. First John 2:29 states that the regenerated believer practices righteousness “everyone also who does righteousness has been born of Him.” John also states that “Everyone who has been born of God does not sin, because His seed abides in him; and he cannot sin, because he has been born of God.” (1 John 3:9). This is the dominating tenor of the believers life; it is marked by increasing holiness (Rom 6:4; Eph 2:10; 4:24). This is not perfection but direction. The believers life is characterized by gracious habits of putting away patterns of sin and putting on pattern of righteousness (Eph 4:22-24). Those who profess to be saved but do not progress in cultivating patterns of life in obedience to Christ’s commands can make no legitimate claim to be true children of God. Whatever they may say with their lips, their lives betray a heart that is still unregenerate.
Secondly, the regenerate life is marked by overcoming the evil influences of this world system for “For everything that has been born of God overcomes the world” (1 John 5:4). The world lies in the power of the devil (1 John 5:19). The devil tempts professing believers with the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes and the pride of life (1 John 5:4) to shipwreck their faith. Praise be to God for John says that the regenerate child of God withstands the pressure and the temptations of this “present evil age.”1 John 5:18 states that, “ no one who has been born of God sins; but He who was begotten of God keeps him, and the evil one does not touch him.”
Another evidence that you have been born again is that you will willingly and delightfully obey God’s command. God’s commands are not burdensome (1 John 5:3). Those who are born again exclaim with the Psalmist, “O how I love your law!” Psalm 119:97. They delight to do the will of God from their hearts (Psalm 40:8) . They delight in obedience because their hearts have been liberated to love the law that God has commanded.
Another mark of a regenerated soul is not only the love for God but the love for other believers. John writes, “Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God; and everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God.” 1 John 4:7. God is Love (1 John 4:8) and therefore His children will share in the same nature ( 2 Peter 1:4) Those who are born again therefore manifest an evident love for the church, for the child of God loves the children of God (1 John 5:1) and is devoted to meeting the needs of his brothers and sisters in Christ.
Conclusion
I finish this article by asking you this vital and important question. Have you been born again? Because you cannot see the kingdom of God if you have not been born again. If you are not born again, you will one day wish that you were never born.Cry out to God, the Giver of life! May He have mercy on you before that great and final Day.