Ye Must Be Born Again | Rev. Ben Rodriguez

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Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:15

Reading verses one through eight. And I feel the Holy Ghost in this place today. I'm thankful for his sweet presence. I'm thankful for his sweet presence. The scripture says the joy of the Lord is my strength. Amen. I'm telling you here today, I feel the joy of the Lord, and it is my strength this morning. Amen. I feel like something good is about to happen. Amen. Amen. I'm telling somebody here today, I can feel the joy of the Lord. Amen. Moving on me. I feel the joy of the Lord falling in this place today. Amen. I believe that God is going to pour it out on somebody today. Does anybody believe that? Say amen. Alright, we'll be reading verses 1 to chapter 3 of the book of John. Ready or not, here we come. It says, There was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. The same came to Jesus by night and said unto him, Rabbi, we know that thou art a teacher come from God. For no man can do these miracles that thou doest except God be with him. And Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee. Does anybody know this verse this morning? Why don't you say it with me today? Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. And Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter the second time into his mother's womb and be born? Say this with me, verse 5. And Jesus answered, Verily, verily I say unto thee, except a man be born of the water and of the spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. Verse 6 says, That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the spirit is spirit. And marvel not, don't be confused, don't put a question mark on it. That I say unto thee, Ye must be born again. Last verse of John, it says, The wind bloweth where it listeth. And thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh and whither it goeth. So he was saying, The wind is gonna blow where it wants to go. And you can hear the sound of the wind as it goes. But you cannot tell when it comes or where it's going, but there is a sound that comes from the wind, and Jesus said, So is everyone that is born of the Spirit. Acts chapter 2 and verse 38. Scripture reads like this today. It says, Then Peter said unto them, Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ, for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost. Hallelujah. I want to tell somebody here today that we are gonna do more than just give a simple Bible lesson, even though we're gonna go through the scriptures a lot today, and if you want scripture, we're gonna have a lot for it. So if you got a pen and paper, it'd be good to take it out. But I want to tell somebody here, we're not just simply going to talk about what was happening in the word of God, but there is something, there's a component to the word of God. The Bible tells us it's alive, and I'm telling you here today, as we begin to preach and speak about the word of God, there's something that just begins to happen. The word of God, and it is like a dynamite power, and as it goes forth into the life of man and woman that hear the sounds of the words of God, God starts to manifest this power in the life of somebody that says, I believe the word of God, and I believe today as the word of God goes forth, that God is going like arrows into the hearts of men, God is going like arrows into the hearts of women, and if you will open up your heart today, your life will never be the same today.

SPEAKER_00 4:29

Because I'm telling you that Jesus gave the command that ye must be born again, and I'm speaking to somebody that brings a brand new start. If you need a new life, there is no life like you can find in Jesus Christ.

SPEAKER_01 4:46

Amen. Hallelujah. Someone give a hand clap to the Lord if you believe that. And why don't we lift up our hands and why don't we pray? I know, I know we've taken some time, but we need the help of the Holy Ghost in this place. Come on, as we lift up our hands, let's pray right now. God, I thank you for this moment. I thank you for the strength of your spirit, God, truly, God, truly, God. I understand, God. I'm standing in your in your strength and in your providence. And I pray, God, that today, God, that you would carry me, God. I pray that your grace and your mercy, God, would be evident all throughout every part of this sermon. God, I pray, Lord, God, that your anointing, God, would empower me, God, to be able, God, to deliver the word today. I pray, God, that the spirit, God, that is inside of me, that same spirit that resurrected Christ Jesus from the grave, God would be able, God, to move into somebody today.

SPEAKER_00 5:38

I pray, God, that somebody would come up out of the grave that they're living in. I pray, God, that somebody would make a decision to change their life. I know it's a Sunday morning, I know it's raining. God, I know that maybe somebody didn't expect it, but God, today is the day that they've been praying and waiting for. And I pray, God, that today you would feel as many of those that are hungry to receive the Holy Ghost.

SPEAKER_01 6:04

Hallelujah. Well, don't we give the Lord one more hand clap of praise? Amen. I'm gonna preach to us today about ye must be born again. You may be seated here today. Amen. I'm gonna preach to us and teach to us under this title here today, Ye Must Be Born Again. There was a man that came to Jesus in the middle of the night to have a conversation with the Lord Jesus Christ. And he asked him a question in that conversation, and we are reading of it here in the book of John, that prompted one of the most powerful and profound statements in the whole entire word of God. Jesus uttered these words to Nicodemus, a Pharisee in the middle of the night, and he said, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. He followed up those statements as he looked at Nicodemus, and I believe that Nicodemus looked at Jesus with a question mark on his face, and he said, Marvel not that I say unto thee, ye must be born again. Jesus gave him the requirement for entrance into the kingdom of heaven. It was a new birth of water and of spirit. It was not law, not religion, it was not about heritage, but it was about a regeneration. It was about a new birth. Jesus said unequivocally, You must be born again. Jesus gave him the requirement and told him he must have a new birth if he was ever going to be able to enter or to see the kingdom of heaven. And it was there in the book of John in chapter three, we see that Jesus gave a command. Can somebody say a command? The command that we find that Jesus iterated here in the book of John was this be born again. And he told him that this command, it was, and again, I want us to understand here, he did not give a suggestion, it was not something that he said, if you would like to do it, if you would like to do it, Nicodemus, but it was a command, it was tied to a necessity to do this. And he said that if you will enter into the kingdom of heaven, ye must be born again. It was a command, it wasn't a suggestion, it wasn't simply something that he thought would be a good idea, but he said it must happen, and he told them that the way that this would happen, the necessity for this being brought forth would be by water and by spirit. John chapter 3 is the command, but Acts 238 that we read, it was the place the church was given, the answer of how this was done. Unequivocally, the only way to be able to enter into the kingdom is baptism in water, calling on the name of Jesus Christ, and baptism in the Spirit, which is the Spirit of Christ. But before you understand this morning how you must be born again, and I believe it's important to understand that, you must understand why you must be born again. Because if you do not recognize or realize your necessity for the reason you must be born again, it really doesn't matter. You can sit here and debate all you want and say, Well, we can do it this way or that way. And there's people that spend lots of time wasting and going in circles when they simply do not even come and they fail to recognize the primordial reason why Jesus said you must be born again. He did not simply say it because it was something that maybe you should do because it's a good feeling, but he gave it because it was a necessity, and there is a reason. And today I would like to present to us the reason why somebody would take the opportunity to be born again in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. I would like for us to understand today that we are all separated from God because of sin. And sin, in its most simple definition, is separation from God. When Adam and Eve sinned by disobeying God and eating of that fruit in the Garden of Eden, sin entered into the world and sin entered into our veins. From that moment forward, we were all born into this fallen condition. The scripture says that we are born in sin and shapen in iniquity. And you didn't have to do anything but be born into the family of Adam to carry the curse of sin. And in spite of you thinking you don't look like the person next to you, in spite of you thinking that maybe the person don't look like you, I'm telling you here today that the person next to you, we we all come from the same family tree. We all have the same great-great-great-great granddaddy and the same great-great-great-grandmama, and their name is Adam and Eve. And I'm telling you here today that in spite of the color of somebody's skin, in spite of the cultural background that they have, in spite of the socioeconomic status, in spite of what language they speak, I'm telling you at the end of the day, we all bleed the same. And I'm telling you here today, and I and I would just like to put a little pause here today.

SPEAKER_00 11:32

That in this church, this church is open for every single race, it's open for every culture, it's open for every language, and I'm telling you here today, that's also the reason why you must be born again. Because sin it is a divider, it divides man, it divides woman, it divides culture, it divides language, it divides social groups, it divides financial groups, it divides the educated versus the non-educated. That's what sin does. It doesn't just separate you from God, it separates you from your brother, it separates you from the way God intended you to live, and that's why you all must come to be born again into the family of Christ because it is the great unifier. I'm telling you, it will unify what sin tried to divide. That's what the church is trying to do. That's why you gotta get yourself in the God institution, which is the church of the living God, where God brings together again unity of man and unity of spirit to come together into the likeness of Christ. Someone clap your hands together if you believe it.

SPEAKER_01 12:48

Oh, yeah, we're living a world that's so divided. You gotta understand. When Adam and Eve, our great-grandmother and great-grandfather, they made the mistake that they uh they messed it up for all of us. We were all born in sin, and you didn't have to do nothing. Just like nobody didn't have to tell you to lie, nobody didn't have to tell you how to cheat, no one didn't have to tell you how to steal, no one had to teach you how to backstab, no one had to teach you how to gossip, it just came naturally. Hallelujah. And someone said, Well, they some others do better than others, amen. But I'm telling you here today, that fallen condition results from the fact that inside of our family lineage, the Adam and Eve, they became separated from God. And when they became separated from God, it distorted their image, it distorted their likeness. We were made in the image of God. But sin, its job is to distort the image in which God has created us. Sin is a terrible thing. Sin is a terrible thing. You know, we live in a world today that glorifies sin. We live in a world that if there's ever been a time where we're calling bad good and good bad, and we're calling evil good and good evil, it's today. I'm telling you here today, somebody you gotta understand that you cannot allow yourself to view your world based off the world in which we're living in. Because if you understand the biblical truth, that something happened to humanity, and the way that God intended for life to come to pass was marred and broken because of what Adam and Eve did in the garden. That lets us know that even everything that came forth that moment was also marred, broken, and not in the perfect alignment that God wanted. And as you look around the world, you're gonna find more broken things. As you look around in people, you're gonna find more broken people. As you look into the systems, at the end of the day, as pretty as they might be, you're gonna find more broken systems. As you look into the politics, you're gonna find more broken ways that humanity tries to remedy the sin issue. But I'm telling you here today, you can't politic the sin issue out, you can't legislate the sin issue out. I'm telling you here today, you can't soothe the sin issue out. There is only one way that a man can be liberated from the sin condition. And my brother is getting out of the family of sin, and it's stepping into the new family of Jesus Christ.

SPEAKER_00 15:14

And I'm telling somebody here today, don't be looking for the answers in the world because all you're gonna find is more problems, more issues, more lying, more cheating, more killing, more stealing, more abusing, uh, more sexual immorality. You're gonna find people taking advantage of man, woman, boy, and girl. That's what sin produces. But I'm telling you, when you find a place where God restores the connection between God and man, you find somebody that understands how life should be lived. I'm telling you, you don't want to know how to live your life, find it where somebody understands. I gotta be close to my creator because he's the one that gave me life. There is no life separated from God. That's a false reality, that's a fantasy. But if you find life with Christ, you find life from the one that gave you life.

SPEAKER_01 16:12

Somebody say amen in this place if you believe that. Amen. You didn't have to do anything to be born into the family of Adam to carry the curse of sin. Romans 3 23 says, We all have sinned. God is such a good God, and you know what? There's somebody here today that said, Well, I don't know about that. I'm a pretty good man. I'm a pretty good woman, amen. I try to do right, I try to pay my taxes on time, I try to I try to contribute to society. Sometimes I even show up to the counter and I round out my change when they ask me to give it at McDonald's. I feel like a good man. Hey, my friend, the scripture says we all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. I'm telling you here today that you are not the answer to your own problems. Because again, the blind can't leave the blind. And a man that don't know how to swim can't help another man that's drowning. And the scripture says that we all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. And that's exactly why the only way we're gonna get help from the sin condition in which we're drowning in is to find the one that walked on this earth and was tempted in all points but knew no sin. I'm telling you here today, man couldn't help man because all man had fallen with sin and was fallen short of the glory of God. And I'm gonna tell you here today that's exactly why uh that our Lord and Savior decided uh to come down in flesh and walk among us because there was no remedy that would be found amongst us.

SPEAKER_00 17:56

He searched all over the earth, he searched high and low, and there was nobody that could pull humanity out of its sinful condition. There was nobody that could halt the freight train that was heading to hell. So the scripture says that God sat in heaven and he made a decision to make bare his holy arm. He chose to get off the throne of heaven himself to come into the Virgin Mary, and it was there that there was a conception, and Jesus was born into this earth. I'm telling you here today, that is why God came to give us an ability to step out of sin because we couldn't do it by ourselves.

SPEAKER_01 18:39

I'm gonna hurry today. This is universal and this includes every person born of a woman. And see, the terrible thing is again, we're talking about why you must be born again. You know what? I'm telling you here today, you gotta understand why you need to be born again. See, you might say, Well, I got sin, everybody's got problems, everybody got issues, but you have to understand that what you have inside of you, it is a terrible thing. Sin not only separates us from God, but condemns us to death. Romans 6 23 says, for the wages or the payment of sin is death. The verse shows us in Romans chapter 5 and verse 12 how Adam sin spread into all man. It says, Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, so death spread to all men because all sin. So, what is this death? Death is separation, this death is separation from life the way that God has intended it. See, the scripture says for we all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. Well, how can I liberate myself from this sin? How can I liberate myself from this death? How can I liberate myself from this condition that I find myself and I want to make it to heaven? I don't want to be condemned to a devil's hell, I don't want to be living in the bottomless pit. I want to be able to live with the Lord Jesus and I want to make it to heaven. I'm telling you here today, the scripture speaks to us the remedy on how, and it tells us the way that somebody comes out out of this condition that comes through the blood of Adam is to be born again into another family.

SPEAKER_00 20:27

The only way to get out of this death sentence is to be born into the family of the one that paid the price of this death sentence because the Bible says that death or that sin requires a payment, and that is death. And I'm telling you here today, nobody can escape the payment that must be made. If you sin, there must be a payment that is given for the sins that you have committed. And I'm telling you here today, that is why Christ came and he walked on this earth and he became a man so he could die the death of a man that we should have lived. There's a reason why he came in 38D and he walked on this earth for three and a half years and he walked among the people that were on this earth and he spoke to them, but he walked up to Calvary, hung himself on a cross, died for you where we should have died for our sins. I'm thankful that he died for me because if he had not died for me, I wouldn't have been able to spend eternity with him. My blood wouldn't have been enough to be able to pay for me to come out of the ransom of sin. But his blood was perfect, his blood was spotless, his blood was knowing no sin, his blood was the perfect remedy for the sin of humanity. Jesus He died for the world, and I'm telling you here today the best thing you can do is live for him. I'm telling you, you got a decision today to live for the Lord Jesus Christ. Hallelujah.

SPEAKER_01 22:08

That's exactly why Romans chapter 5 and verse 10 says, For as by one man's disobedience, speaking of Adam, when he disobeyed God in the garden, that many were made sinners. So by one man's obedience, the man Christ Jesus, many will be made righteous. And this is why the man Christ Jesus went to that cross, hung, and bled, and died. So he could pay the price of death that you and me should have paid. Amen. This is why God came and took on the form of a servant. Became flesh, so he could pay the price only man could pay. Amen. What will save this world from sin and death? What will save this world from sin and death is what I'm preaching to you today. It is the gospel. What is the gospel, you might ask? Well, the gospel is the good news. It is the evangelion. But what is the gospel if you break it down? It is breaking down into three things. You know what the good news is? Christ came. He died for us. When he died for us, he was buried. But after he was buried, he resurrected. That is what the gospel is. That's what the good news is. But the good news is, is because he died, we don't have to stay dead. And because he went to the cross and paid the price and conquered death, we have the ability to be resurrected and to brand new life. This is exactly why in 1 Corinthians and chapter 15 and verses 1, it says, Moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the gospel. How that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures, and that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures. This is the gospel, his death, his burial, and his resurrection. Because he conquered death today, you can live. But I'm telling you here today, there is a simple truth that the most of Christianity does not recognize. Christ died for all, yes. But not all are making it to heaven today. See, because Christ did something on the cross for you and me, but it's your choice to choose to apply that to your life. I'm telling you here today, it's not enough to just know the gospel experience, know the gospel, but you have to apply the gospel experience. This is the only way that a man can make it to heaven. This is how we get out of the family of death into the family of life. And see, the gospel is what we just read his death, his burial, and his resurrection. So the only way that a man, I understand we're going a little slow here today, but I want somebody to understand the power of the gospel, the power of baptism in the name of Jesus Christ. The power of receiving the Spirit. See, we got we got people throughout the day that they think that all they do is they get baptized, they get a free t-shirt. They might get a donut, they might get a pizza party. You got to understand that when you get baptized, there's something that happens. You're taking part of the gospel experience. We can't allow lukewarm Christianity to dumb down what Christ did for us on the work of Calvary.

SPEAKER_00 25:24

I'm telling you here today, it's a lying spirit that will tell you that baptism is not necessary for salvation. It says it in Mark 16:16 He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved, but he that believeth not shall be damned. Why? Because when you understand why we're baptized, we're not just baptized to make a public declaration to say, Hey, I think I'm serious about living for God, but it's the understanding that I'm living in a family that's filled with sin, and this family is gonna take me to death. So I'm gonna choose to die, which is repentance. That's coming to an altar and saying, God, I died of my sin, I died of my life, I died in my old ways, and baptism is burial, burying that old man, putting him in the grave, and receiving the spirit of God is the spirit of resurrection. It brings you up out of the grave, and that one day that you have the spirit of Christ, that same spirit that glorified the body of Christ, one day will come to glorify your body. We will come from mortality and we will put on immortality. I'm telling you, don't be distracted by this life that's got limitations, don't be distracted by this flesh. We've got a promise. I know we live in a day where the apostle Paul says, The good I want to do, I don't do it. The things I want to say, I don't say it. What I want to do, I end up not doing. And he speaks about the struggle of the flesh, the struggle of this world. And I'm telling you, that's why we gotta kill this flesh daily. We gotta come to an altar daily, we gotta pray daily, and I know it's bothersome, I know it's a fight. I you know what I fear, I fear the flesh more than I fear the devil, because I'm telling you, my flesh will give me more problems than the devil will. The devil can't make me do nothing, but my flesh will put things in need to do things that I know I don't want to do, and you gotta mortify, kill that old man, because that man will try to come and kill you, but there is a promise to all those that take on the gospel, to all those that repent in this life, to all those that are baptized in the name of Jesus Christ, and receive the gift of the Holy Ghost. I'm telling you, yes, you need it, because the best life you can live is receiving this experience now. But we need a promise as we receive the gift of the Holy Ghost. You gotta understand this, my brother. The Holy Ghost, yes, it's power now, but it's gonna be power in another life. There's gonna be a day, hallelujah, in the sound of a trump. There's gonna be a day that this immortality will put on immortality, this flesh will be glorified, and I'm gonna be able to be with Christ Jesus in the air. I'm telling you, yes, we live the life we live for now, but make no mistake, I'm living for heaven, I'm living for the day that this fleshly body will no longer hold me down, this fleshly mind will no longer find me, and I'm telling you that if you receive the gift of the Holy Ghost, you've got to promise that when that drum sounds, that same spirit that resurrected Christ Jesus will resurrect you, and we will be caught up with our Lord and Savior in the air. Come on, someone give a hand clap to the Lord, and can we thank him for that? Apostolics, we can't forget about the power of the Holy Ghost. Yes, it's a power now, but make no mistake, it's a power for a tomorrow, it's a power for another day.

SPEAKER_01 29:26

You know what I fear like I fear that you know what the Christianity, I'm telling you, hey, what I'm trying to do today for somebody is show you the biblical view of Christianity, of being of new birth, and I'm telling you, yes, this experience will change your life today, but I'm telling you it's also for tomorrow. Hallelujah. Glory to the Lord, amen. So, how how how do you get that promise? How do I know that on that day, on that glorious day will be when I when I see my Christ Jesus? How do you know that you'll be in that number? So you just can't hear it today. You gotta apply it. Gotta apply it. So we must obey the gospel. It's good news, it's good news to those that want to be saved. It ain't good news to those that don't want to be saved. But I'm telling you here today to those that want it. It's good news to the soul, to those that are tired of sin and tired of this flesh, and tired of the way life is and tired of this sinful condition. It's good news because telling me here today that I can kill this old man, I can kill these fleshly desires, I can be baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus, and I can be resurrected into new life today. That's good news to me.

SPEAKER_00 30:56

I'm telling you here today, there is a way that you can experience it, and it is through application and obeying the gospel, which is repentance, which is baptism, and it is receiving the Spirit.

SPEAKER_01 31:09

Amen. I'm almost done here today. Death applied because we got to obey the gospel. This happens only through the gospel. This doesn't happen in preaching, this doesn't happen in good singing, this doesn't happen. No, this happens in hearing the gospel. Amen. Death applied, what is the gospel? He said it's his death, his burial, and his resurrection. So how do we apply it? Death applied is repentance. Repentance is dying to sin, it's an old life. And see, I'm gonna tell you something. You know, repentance, I think sometimes we have a faulty understanding. And for some of us, also too, there's wanting the Holy Ghost. There's people here today that I know seeking the Holy Ghost, you've been seeking for a minute. And I hope this will help somebody here today. Sometimes we believe that repentance is simply feeling sorry for what we've done. But repentance is not feeling sorry for what we've done. Repentance is coming to the point that we don't want to do anymore what we did. And so repentance isn't just, hey, you caught me, I'm ashamed. Or you feeling condemnation for what you did or feeling bad about what you did. That's not repentance. Repentance is making a decision, I will never do it again. I'm making decisions in my life to turn away from this sin. I'm making changes in my life so I don't be put in this position again. That is what rep that is the fruit of repentance. That's what repentance looks like. And see, if someone's not repentant, you can't you can't receive the gift of the Holy Ghost. Because if all you do is I'm sorry for what I did, but you don't in your heart you don't want to make a change, and you can't receive the spirit that brings change. And so I've said this before, but I'm gonna say it again. Repentance comes from a military term. And it's I know this is a military town, but as they would begin to walk in one line, they would say repent, and they would turn around and do an about face, and they would walk the other direction. It's an about face. That's what repentance is. So if you want to experience this wonderful experience, you must repent of your sins. You must repent of your ways. You must repent of your life. I want someone to really think about it today. You know, we can have a way of just glossing over this. We can have a way of just kind of not putting a lot of attention into this. There's some things in your life that you know is not what you want in your life. There's there's things in your life that are not of God. And although they brought you joy for a season, you're starting to reap the consequences of God. But if you repent of your sins today, God is faithful to forgive you. You know how sad it is. It was in the church house. In the church, we can talk about repentance and it gets uncomfortable. God forbid that we ever reach a place in the church that we want to hear about blessing, and we want to hear about dominion and we want to hear about authority, but but we don't want to hear about repentance. Repentance is what is the doorway for you to walk into the experience of blessing. Without a repentant life, you can't have a blessed life, and without a repentant life, you can't have authority, and without repentant life, you can't have dominion in your personal life. But all those that recognize there is no good thing in me, and I come to repent. I'm telling you, there is grace for you.

SPEAKER_00 34:49

God's grace is sufficient for you, and that's exactly why the scripture says that in my weakness, strength is made perfect. That means you've come to recognize and admonish your own self and say, I'm not a good man, I need help, and I repent, and that is exactly where God's spirit can come down and help you, my brother. That's exactly where God's spirit can help you. You might be a single mother, but I'm telling you here today, God can help you where you feel weak. You might feel like you're all alone. But if you will open up your mouth and tell God where you're weak, God will come and bring strength to you. God will come and help you. Repentance is just opening up a doorway for God's spirit to come. And where there is no repentance, there is no doorway for the spirit. Where there is no room that we make for God, God will not come. But when we repent, we're preparing our heart for the spirit of God to land. When we repent, we're preparing a room for God to live. And if you want a new life today, my friend, you must repent, you must repent of your sins, you must repent of your evil ways, you must repent of your perverse thoughts, you must repent of the evil, because repentance is what's gonna create an opportunity for God to come and change you. I know we don't want to hear about repentance, but if we don't have repentance, we can't have change, we can't have regeneration, we can't have a new life, but if you repent of your sins, God will prepare you for a new life.

SPEAKER_01 36:38

Someone clap your hands if you believe that today. Romans 6, 6 says, knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed. That's where repentance is. So that's how you repent. You obey the gospel. Does anybody here want to obey the gospel? Raise your hands and meet it if you want to obey the gospel. I want to obey the gospel. I'm telling you here today, it does no good for me that I gained the whole world and lose my own soul. I'm telling you here that at the end of the day, I love every single one of you and I want everybody to be saved, but at the end of the day, I need Ben Rodriguez to be saved. I'm telling you here today, it does no good for me to fly around and do whatever I do and try to get people to come to Christ. And at the end of the day, I am not living a life of repentance. I'm telling you, I'm not interested in living a life where I could lose my own soul. And my brother, you gotta get as ate up about that as well. That I gotta live my life for the Lord.

SPEAKER_00 37:37

I'm telling I want my wife to be saved, I want my children to be saved, and I'm gonna do what I can, but at the end of the day, you are the one that's gonna make a decision for you. You can't make your husband do anything that they don't wanna do, you can't make your children do anything they don't want to do. But my brother, you gotta make a decision for yourself, you gotta make a decision for you, you gotta make a decision and say, I will serve the Lord whether nobody wants to serve the Lord. Do you hear me today? I gotta make a decision, I gotta make a decision. I'm telling you, God is not gonna look at you on the day of judgment and say, I didn't wanna do it, because my husband didn't wanna do it, my wife didn't wanna do it, my boyfriend wasn't a cool about it, my girlfriend was looking at me crazy because I was crying in the church service. No, no, no, no, brother. You gotta get it for yourself because the only person that's gonna make it to heaven and stand in front of God on judgment day is yourself, and you gotta get yourself right, you gotta get your mind right, you gotta get your heart right, you gotta make a decision today. It's gotta be your decision.

SPEAKER_01 38:51

The Holy Ghost is here today. Man, I'm so thankful the Holy Ghost showed up on a Sunday morning today. Woo! I know the Holy Ghost is working today. Hallelujah. Hey, you gotta make a decision today. See, that's that's what the gospel does. Man, the gospel, it's so confrontational. Oh, I love the gospel. I'm a confrontational person, so I love it. You may not think I'm confrontational because I try not to be confrontational with things that don't matter, but I I I really just can't leave things alone. Ask my wife. Let's talk about it. I don't want to talk about it. We need to talk about it right now. Well, I there's there was something something wasn't right at the we need to talk about it right now. Hey, give me some time. No, we need to talk about it right now. We're gonna confront this thing right now, right here. Hallelujah. And you know, I don't know if that's a good thing or not. So I mean, I don't know. We got our we have our marriage counselors here, they can help us. That's what's good about this revival. We're getting free marriage counseling. Amen. It may not be good with me, but I'm telling you what, it's great with the Holy Ghost, it's great with the Word of God. We come to the Lord and we say, I don't want to talk about it. Brother Junior, I don't I don't want to I don't want to talk about that right now, God. I got I got Sunday brunch on my mind. Thinking about those lemon ricotta pancakes, think about those maple sausage. Praise God. I don't want I don't want it, but the Holy Ghost will come to you and it will come and it'll get in your face. It'll confront you. Burial applied, it's baptism. If you have never been baptized today, this church here has water in that tank 24-7. Anyone that wants to be baptized, why would you want to be baptized? I want to obey the gospel. Romans 6 3 4 says, Know ye not that so many of us that were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death. Therefore, we are buried with him by baptism into death. Baptism is more than a ritual ceremony, it is the start of a new life in Christ. It is burying that old man of sin so you can walk in the newness of life. So if you want to repent today, if you feel the Lord calling you to repent, the logical thing to do is what we do with dead things. We bury them in the grave. You want to put that old man down. Put him under the grave. It is resurrection life, it is spirit birth and new life power. Romans 8 11 says, But if the spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, shall also quicken your mortal bodies. So John 3 is the scripture that we read in our text, it declared the necessity of new birth. Acts 2.38 shows us the way into new birth. What is the gospel? It is death, it is burial, and it is resurrection. And in Acts 2.38, the reason you hear people speak about it so much is because in here it speaks to the three keys that a person needs to do to be able to obey the command of Jesus Christ. Peter said unto them, Repent. What is death apply? Repentance. And be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ, for the remission of sins. What is burial apply? Baptism. What is resurrection apply? It's receiving the Spirit of God. Acts 2 38 is the gospel applied. Repentance. Baptism in the name of Jesus Christ. And spirit baptism. And if you are going to be baptized today, you must do it in the way that they did it in the Bible. There is only one biblical way to be baptized, and it must be done in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. When you go down in water, they must call on the name of Jesus. This is not a suggestion to be baptized. In Jesus' name. It is not an opinion to be baptized in Jesus' name, it is a command. That's exactly why Acts 10 48 says, And he commanded them to be baptized in the name of the Lord. Acts 2 21 says, Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. And I'm telling you here today, you might have you might not know how you were baptized. You might have done it in another way. And see, I want to help somebody here today. I'm not here to make anybody feel bad, but I'm here to help clarify something here today. We have two prominent different formulas that people use within baptism. And there's people here today that will vehemently use Acts 2.38, as we see here in the Word of God, and there's others that behemothly use Matthew 28, 19. When Jesus said, Go you therefore into all the world, baptizing the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. But then we see here in Acts 2.38, Peter gets up on the day of Pentecost after Jesus has ascended into the clouds, and he stands on the day of Pentecost with the keys of the kingdom, and he says, Be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ. And then I had somebody ask me many years ago and say, Well, who do I listen to? Jesus or Peter? You felt pretty tough with that one. And I said, Man, the scripture says line upon line and precept upon precept, the word of God does not contradict itself. And so I gotta ask you a question here today. I want you to think about it. And I'm not here to make enemies with nobody. We're here logically to think about this. As Jesus gave the command on Matthew 28, 19, as he was standing there before his ascension, he was giving this command to the apostles that were standing before him. And then Peter got up on the day of Pentecost after Jesus, after he was leaving, he said, Go and baptize them. And also wait for the promise of the Father, which is the Holy Ghost. As they went in the Pentecost, they were away praying at all 120 with the apostles. And as the Spirit of God poured out in the book of Acts, as the Holy Ghost filled that place, and they all began to speak in other tongues, they did not know what was going on. Peter stands up and he starts to preach the gospel. And he says, Ye must be born again. Repent and be baptized, every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of your sins. If Peter was giving a contrary formula to what Jesus gave in Matthew 28, 19. Number one, Peter was present, but number two, the rest of the apostles were also present when Jesus gave that command. But the scripture says that the rest of the apostles, when Peter began to preach this, they stood up to their feet and they amened him. Because they knew it wasn't a contradiction, they knew it was the fulfillment of what Jesus was saying. Because again, I want you to think about it here today. He said, Baptize them in the name of the Father, in the name of the Son, in the name of the Holy Ghost. Well, Father, at the end of the day, it's not a name, it is a title. Son, it's not a name, it's a title. Holy Spirit, it's not a name, it's a title. But we just read here within the word of God that it says that He commanded them to be baptized in the name of the Lord. And you would ask someone, What is the name of the Lord? What is the name? Oh, I even heard someone whispering right now. They said, Why? It's just there's something about that name when you say the name of Jesus. I'm telling you, he said he commanded them to be baptized in the name of the Lord. Acts 19 5 says they baptized them in the name of the Lord Jesus. And whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.

SPEAKER_00 47:51

That is why you need to be baptized in Jesus' name. Because Acts 4 12 says, Neither is there salvation in any other, for there is no other name under heaven given among men of God. Whereby we must be saved. Every baptism of a thousand we have recorded in the Bible after what's not in Acts 2 and 39. In the name of Jesus, that's not the fact that we're given the name of the Lord Jesus. In the name of the Lord Jesus, Acts 22 16. Holding on the name of the Lord. And for those that have been baptized in any other way, I want to tell you that we have biblical examples of people being baptized again.

SPEAKER_01 48:44

I'm almost done here today. I want to help somebody. I don't want you to feel attacked. If you didn't know you stepped into an apostolic church or not, now you did. Well, these are the people they've been talking about on Instagram. Oh my god, I'm in a church of heretics. No, you're not, my friend. Amen. Unless you don't like the word of God. Amen. Praise God. No. I'm giving you the Bible today. Acts 19, 3 and 5, it says, He said unto them, Unto what then were ye baptized? And they said unto John's baptism. And see, Paul walks up to these people and he recognizes that they are they are forms of believers. He walks up to them and says, Hey, hey, hey, my brother. Hey, my brother in Christ, how were you baptized? And I want to ask you this if it if it didn't matter, I've probably people say, Well, you know what? You baptize this way and we baptize this way, at the end of the day, it all matters. Why would the apostle Paul say, How are you baptized? If it didn't matter, why would you ask the question? It's like the reality, what are we having for dinner? If you don't care, you probably do care. Amen. Praise God. And they said unto John's baptism. Then said Paul, John verily baptized with the baptism of repentance, saying unto the people that they should believe on him which should come after him that is on Christ Jesus. And when they heard this, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. And if you have to ask today, I don't know how I was baptized, I don't remember. Get baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. Make it a confidence that you did it the way that Paul did it, and you did it the way that Jesus commanded the apostles, and you did it the way that Peter preached on the day of Pentecost. So today, if you want to be baptized, we've got it ready, we got towels, we got robes. You ain't got to get your clothes wet. I want us to stand here today. And today you can receive the gift of the Holy Ghost. And when you get the Holy Ghost, because that's resurrection applied, you will speak in tongues, like they did in the Bible. And this is exactly why that when Jesus was telling Nicodemus in the book of John, he said, Hey, he gave a little caveat. It's funny to me, it's because like Jesus knew that nobody was really gonna fight as much. Being born of the water was baptism, but they would fight a lot. The method of how some would be born in the spirit. And Jesus said, The wind blows where it goes. But you know where it goes, even though you can't see it, because you hear the sound thereof. And Jesus said to Nicodemus, so is everyone that is born of the spirit, so is everyone that is born of the spirit, everyone that is born of the spirit. The wind of Pentecost hit them as they were there in the upper room, and there was a sound of the spirit that was made when the Holy Ghost made contact with their soul. That's exactly why in Romans chapter 8 and verse 15 it says, For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear, but you have received the spirit of adoption. And this is powerful because we just talked about the reason why we do this is because we are stuck in the family of sin. So when you take on the name of Jesus Christ and you are receiving his spirit, you are getting adopted into the family of Christ, and it is that by that same spirit that we cry, Abba Father. You know what happens when people receive the Holy Ghost and they speak in tongues? It is their spirit testifying, it is their soul testifying that there is life, resurrection life, and it is their soul crying out to their father. I'm telling you, the very same way that when a baby is born, they'll spank that baby to make sure there's a sound of life. I'm telling you here today that when you receive the Holy Ghost, you're gonna make a sound of life, and it's gonna be done like it was done on the day of Pentecost. And they're all filled with the Holy Ghost, and they began to speak with other tongues.