Hope of Glory said:
You are saved by "believe". Unless you are born from above, you cannot see the Kingdom. (John 3:3) But, if you want to enter the Kingdom, you have to follow through with doing stuff. (John 3:5)
Don't say that I am misquoting you, becausing I am not.
You have just stated again that salvation is by works; it is
doing stuff.
To be born again is to be saved. It is the message of salvation and has nothing to do with the literal kingdom. You have taken this verse out of context so many times it is sickening. Examine the book of John for a minute and then re-consider.
First look at the key verse which gives us the theme of the book:
John 20:31 But these are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing ye might have life through his name.
What is written in this book is written that you might believe that Jesus is the Christ, and that believing you might have eternal life. There is the theme of this book. It is a message that is written to the world. It is universal in its scope. It is not a kingdom message.
Only five times in these 21 chapters is the word "kingdom" found.
Twice it is found when Jesus is talking to Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews.
Then three times it is found here:
John 18:36 Jesus answered,
My kingdom is not of this world: if
my kingdom were of this world, then would my servants fight, that I should not be delivered to the Jews: but now is
my kingdom not from hence.
It is evident that Jesus was not speaking of his kingdom, not throughout the book, and not even to Nicodemus. He said so. His teaching was not based on the kingdom. Will you take him at his word. This one verse should be enough to shoot down your interpretation of John 3.
What does it mean then in John 3:3,5?
He only used the word "kingdom" because he was talking to a Jew, to relate to Nicodemus (a Jew) what one should do to be saved. The Jews related to the word "kingdom" better than the word heaven or other "heavenly terminology." Yet you are allowing this term to become a stumbling block in your own religion.
The very question that Nicodemus asks at the beginning intimates that he wants to know more about spiritual things, especially in the light of eternal life, salvation; not necessarily the kingdom. Nicodemus, by profuse study of the OT knew all about the kingdom. But he didn't know beans about how to be born again--a NT concept. Thus the rebuke from Jesus:
John 3:10 Jesus answered and said unto him, Art thou a master of Israel, and knowest not these things?
--Nicodemus would not have received that rebuke if Jesus was talking about the MK, which Nicodemus knew all about.
Three times Jesus said: You must be born again. The emphasis is on being born again--not the kingdom.
"That which is born of the flesh is flesh; that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.
There are two types of birth, Jesus says: a fleshly (or physical birth, and a spiritual birth). We are all born physically into this world. But not every one is born spiritually. Nicodemus: you must be born again.
John 3:5 Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.
--There are only two agents mentioned here by which a man is born again: water and the Spirit. We all know what the Spirit is--the Holy Spirit. Every man must be born again of the Holy Spirit. But the question is what does the "water" represent.
The Catholics say it is baptism, making it mean baptismal regeneration. But that is heresy and salvation by works. It does not mean baptism.
Some say it means the water (physically) as in the amniotic fluid of a mother. That would be a straight literal interpretation, and it is a plausible explanation.
But I believe there is yet a better explanation.
I beleive the water is represenetative of the Word of God.
What is water normally used for? Its normal use is for washing.
John 15:3 Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you.
--Jesus washes us through His word.
There are two agents by which a man is born again--water and the Spirit.
James 1:18 Of his own will begat he us with the word of truth, that we should be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures.
--James says that a man is "begotten" with the "word of truth" i.e., the Word of God. We are born again through the Word of God: Two agents--water and the Spirit--the Word of God and the Spirit.
1 Peter 1:23
Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible,
by the word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever.
--Here it is very clear. We are born again of the Word of God. One cannot argue with this Scripture. Water is representative of the Word of God.
Salvation comes by hearing the Word of God, and by conviction of the Holy Spirit. It is by those two agents that a man must be saved. He cannot be saved without either one. He cannot be saved without the message of the gospel (the Word of God); neither can he be saved without the Spirit of God.
Thus the water and the Spirit are representative of the Word of God and the Spirit of God.
They have nothing to do with entrance into the literal kingdom of God as in the MK. Jesus only used that term to relate to a Jew.