Titus 3:3-7; John 3:3-8

We were in sin.  We make no contribution to our remedy for sin.  God has treated us, not as we deserve, but according to His Name.  He has had mercy on us that we might be saved (delivered).  But what, specifically, has been done to deliver us from the miry clay of sin and guilt?

·        He justified us (v7).  Legally, God has declared us righteous.  For God to do this and maintain His righteous character He had to judge His own Son in our place.  Christ paid the price (redemption); He took our punishment (propitiation). That is the subject of Romans.  But what did God have to do in us to justify us?  And remember, it is God’s work; we make no contribution.

·        He regenerated us (v5).  Regeneration refers to the new birth.  The other New Testament writers refer to being born again, born from above or born of the Spirit.  We have become a new creation; the old is gone, the new has come (2 Cor. 5:17).  But what does it mean, the washing of regeneration?  Some refer this to baptism, not that baptism causes regeneration or brings any grace at all, but that it symbolizes rebirth.  I believe a better explanation comes from the fact that washing is not the baptism word but rather refers to cleansing from sin that is the effect of regeneration.  It’s the same term as in Eph. 5:26, the washing by the word.  The cleansing of Christ in the new birth is, in fact, brought about by the gospel (1 Cor. 4:15), the word of truth (James 1:18).  

·        He renews us (v5).  Renewal and regeneration are clearly connected.  But how?  Some think it is the same work of the Spirit.  But the use of this term renewal elsewhere in the NT suggests differently ((cf. Col. 3:10; Rom. 12:2; Heb. 6:6; 2 Cor. 4:16).  These passages speak of being renewed, of renewal of the inner man day by day, and of the ongoing renewal of the mind.  As D. Edmond Hiebert says (Expositors Bible Commentary, p446):

The washing is viewed as producing an instantaneous change that ended the old life and began the new, while the work of renewal by the Spirit beginning with the impartation of the new life, is a lifelong activity in the experience of the believer.

·        He fulfilled His will in us (v7).  God’s purpose for us was that we should be holy and blameless (Eph. 1:4).  Thus He predetermined that we should be His sons by adoption (Eph. 1:5).  And what does this say of the believer?  It says he is the heir of God.  You cannot be an heir and have the inheritance God has determined is yours in Christ unless you have become, by the new birth, His son!  Again, how glorious to know that Christ has made us His special people.  The blessings are unending.

Are you saved?  You are if you have believed the gospel by which you are born again.  Are you being saved?  You are if you are being renewed day by day.