Fearlessly Courageous
Desk of Dennis Piller
5 13 2026
What Does the Bible Teach About Being Born Again?
Another word for born again is regeneration. I hope you have added that word to your personal vocabulary. It matters. It means God regenerates people. Only regenerate people are saved.
Regenerate people and born-again people are the same.
Recently, I spoke about the Barna Group and how the term “born again” has been diluted and desecrated in modern culture. Today, people use it for almost anything that gets revived or refreshed. If you search the internet, you will find phrases like: Cisco Systems has been born again, the Green Movement has been born again, Kosher foods have been born again, and countless others. But isn’t that what they do with much of the wisdom of God? It gets twisted to be whatever serves their purpose.
So it is not surprising that nearly half of Americans claim to be “born again.” But according to Scripture, this title is precious, holy, and eternally significant.
So what really happened to us?
And what must happen for someone to truly be born again?
There are millions of people who do not yet follow Christ. They are not born again. Sadly, some of them sit in churches every week. Some are church members. Some are even leaders. They are cultural Christians. Religion has become an external form, a tradition, or a social identity. But there has never been a true inward awakening from spiritual death to spiritual life.
The new birth is not the work of man.
No human being can bring about the new birth. No preacher can produce it. No writer can manufacture it. You contributed nothing to your physical birth, and in the same way, none of us contributed anything to our spiritual rebirth.
God makes it happen. It happens to us, not by us.
Peter says in 1 Peter 1:23–25: “Since you have been born again, not of perishable seed but of imperishable, through the living and abiding word of God… And this word is the good news that was preached to you.”
In essence, the new birth is a supernatural miracle.
When you are truly born again and grow in the grace and knowledge of what the Lord has done for you, your fellowship with God becomes sweet, and your assurance that He is your Father becomes deep.
When you begin to understand what truly happened in your new birth, you treasure God differently. You treasure His Spirit, His Son, and His Word more deeply than ever before. Christ becomes more glorious because you realize He did what you could never do for yourself.
And as believers begin to understand the supernatural nature of conversion, something else happens: authenticity begins to rise inside the church. Religious hypocrisy begins to diminish. The world begins to see real love, real sacrifice, real courage, and real devotion to Christ.
In the new birth, something comes alive that was not there before.
2 Corinthians 5:17 says: “If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation.”
John 6:44 says: “No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him.”
Ephesians 2:5 says: “Even when we were dead in our trespasses, God made us alive together with Christ.”
Are you seeing this?... .Natural cannot create supernatural… Dead men cannot bring themselves to life.
Only God draws us.
Only God awakens us.
Only God holds us.
Only God preserves us.
And that means salvation is not something to casually wear as a label. It is a miracle to stand in awe of. I pray you make that your intentional purpose every day.
Just a note on May 19th, I continue to host a Discovering Jesus ONLINE 6-week course to dive deeper into our faith and empower you with true tenets of our faith to stand on. Tuesday nights, 7pm to 8:30. It is open to you, your spouse, your family, or your neighbors. Let me know if you have an interest, and I will send you a link and the necessary materials. It is FREE of charge.
To join the video meeting, click this link: https://meet.google.com/zkb-dxcq-iau
Song Reflection:
CeCe Winans – Alabaster Box
Excerpts and quotes inspired by Finally Alive by John Piper.
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