New Birth and the Restoration of Our Relationship With God
- New Birth is necessary because sin disrupted humanity’s relationship with God, beginning with Adam and Eve’s choice to do life their own way.
- God provided a rescue plan through Jesus as the ultimate sacrifice, since no one is without sin and intervention is required.
- Through baptism and the Holy Spirit, believers receive God’s gift of guidance, power to resist sin, and growth in a restored relationship with Him.
Hello, I’m Anessa Westbrook, one of the authors of The New Birth, and you probably have some questions.
For starters, maybe you’re wondering why a new birth is even necessary. Well, this is a very important place to start. We’ve got to answer this question, and to answer this question, we need to go back all the way to the garden to see God’s creation, God’s desire to have relationship with humanity. In fact, God and Adam and Eve walked around in the garden together and talked as you might talk to a friend. Imagine that—being able to have a relationship with God where you can ask him all of the questions you had during the day. Amazing! 
But when Adam and Eve decided to do things their own way, that relationship was disrupted, and there had to be a way to restore relationship with God, a God who is fully holy and fully divine.
“There had to be a way to restore relationship with God, a God who is fully holy and fully divine.”
God created the Law so that there could be a bridge, so people would have a way to attain holiness by his grace, so that we could be in his presence. But it was hard to keep. It was difficult, and in fact, it was imperfect. And so God had to make a plan, and he promised to send his Son so that we could have the ultimate sacrifice, and Jesus could be the ultimate sacrifice for our sins.
We’re not perfect. First John 1:8 says that if any of us says we’re without sin, we’re deceiving ourselves. We know how hard it can be to avoid mistakes, and God is here to help us succeed.
Sin separates us from God, and the decision to trust and follow Jesus is a necessary part of restoring that relationship. Romans 3:23 says we’ve all sinned, and intervention is required to restore that relationship. But God wants us to be able to maintain that. He wants us to succeed.
I’ve heard before that the perfect gift is one that we didn’t know we needed, and then once we had it, we knew we couldn’t live without it. And God gives us just such a gift upon our baptism: the Holy Spirit.
The Holy Spirit is there to guide us, to help us identify sin, to help us get away from sin, and to help us be able to grow in our relationship with God.
