Four Steps to being Born Again: Repentance and Seeking

In this article I want to explain the first two steps in the process that leads a person to be born again, and in the next, the subsequent steps.

Some people believe that one can go up to a complete stranger who knows virtually nothing about Jesus Christ, sacrifice or atonement, sin, or even why we were created, give them a  10-15 minute lecture, get them to say a little prayer, and then tell them they are born again. This form of car-park evangelism actually dictates to God that He must make this person a partaker of the divine nature whether or not He thinks they are ready to be born again.

I met an American on the main street in Kyiv about 20 years ago who would give teenage kids $1.00 if they would repeat a sinner’s prayer he dictated and then rush off to his Church and tell everyone how many people he saved that week. McDonalds had just opened in Kyiv and a burger cost about $1.00. The teenagers were not interested in salvation, just a hamburger.

So firstly, let me make three important points.

1. When a person is truly born again, they have no need for someone to tell them this for the Spirit of God will tell them. Romans 8:16 tells us that the Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are born again, and Galatians 4:6 states a similar fact. If you need a person to convince you that you’ve had a spiritual experience of new birth, then, you can be about 99% certain it has not happened, indeed your as born again as a hamburger.

2. 1st century people, whether Jews or Gentiles understood concepts such as worship, sacrifice and atonement because these were part of their everyday lives from birth. Romans considered themselves the most religious of people and even accused Christians of being atheists for not worshipping the God’s of Rome. Jews entire lives were centered around obedience and worship of God. Modern day Westerners are absolutely nothing like the people evangelized 2000 years ago.

The people that Peter preached to on the Day of Pentecost, the first sermon from a Christian preacher, were believing Jews. The Bible calls them 'godly/devout/God-fearing' (Acts 2:5). They knew their history, they knew the Old Testament Law, they knew about sacrifice, sin and atonement. 

Actually, the reason they were in Jerusalem was to attend the Passover and make a sacrifice for their sins. Those people took a lamb to the temple, they put their hand on its head while it was slaughtered, they knew that it died in their place. In essence, they were carrying out a form of active faith in obedience to God’s command. When Peter explained that Jesus Christ was the sacrifice that God had provided, they understood as they had all of Jewish history, the prophecies and the law to prepare their hearts.

God spent 1500 years preparing the Jews for the coming of Christ, but modern day evangelists have the insane idea they can teach all of that in 10-15 minutes, and they are basically demanding that God make these people born again whether or not He considers them ready for that commitment. God does not submit to our flawed evangelical techniques or our cultures which demand we have everything in an instant.

Becoming a Christian is about a life-time commitment, about trusting God with your life, and He never expects anyone to do this until they know who it is they are to trust. He makes the first step in calling us, and through general revelation, calling us to stop walking away, and turn around and face Him. 

1. Repentance.

The first step to being born again is repentance, indeed repentance was commanded by Jesus at the very beginning of His ministry and throughout (Mark 1:15). There are two meanings of repentance in Scripture. The first simply means to change your mind and direction, to turn around and face God instead of walking away from Him.

The second happens when we are convicted of sin through the revelation of the Holy Spirit, when we see our sin as God sees it, and this brings about godly sorrow and a desire to be made clean. This form of repentance is far more than an intellectual agreement that we are a sinner, it is a deep conviction of owning our sinful rebellion and an overwhelming desire to be free of it. God demands this form of repentance in passages such as Acts 17:30.

The first form of repentance is a call to turn and seek, and if one obeys that call, the seeking will lead to the second, and new birth. 

2. Seeking.

The second step is to seek God, and again, it is the Holy Spirit who calls and motivates us to seek, but we must obey His command, and this step comes with a condition. We will only find God if we seek with ‘all our heart’ (Hebrews 11:6, Jeremiah 29:13). 

How do we seek? 

We put ourselves in a place where we can learn what salvation is. We go to a Bible study, we go to Church, and we start praying and asking the Lord to lead us to the place and time when we will understand and be ready to receive Him as Lord and Savior. Unfortunately, when seekers start doing this, some people tell them that they are already born again. They are wrong. Let me say it again. Do not let anyone tell you that you are born again. The Lord is perfectly capable of that and when you are born again, you will know it.

During the seeking period the Lord teaches us to begin trusting Him and start getting to know Him. He is preparing the ground for the seed. You can’t give your life to someone you don’t know or trust, and salvation is not just about a change of mind, but rather, a change of ownership. We must ‘belong to Christ’ (Romans 8:9) and become ‘God’s own possession’ (Ephesians 1:14).

For 40 years I have brought seekers to my home and taken them through the history of the Jews, showing them how God prepared the world for the coming of Christ. 

I use my own book, Time for Truth: The Story of Salvation, but there are now seekers' studies very similar to my own such as the Alpha Program. You can download a free digital copy of this book from my website, stevecopland.com.

During these weeks the seeking person's eyes are opened, they begin to understand God's holiness, our sinfulness, the need of a sacrifice, the offer of grace, the work of Jesus on the cross. This person is being prepared to make an informed decision.

The Lord is calling this seeker into an eternal relationship with Him. Most people spend months dating someone when considering a lifetime relationship. They want to get to know the person they will become one with until death. You would be unwise to marry someone you don't know, but becoming a disciple is also a kind of marriage. Indeed, Jesus refers to the Church as His bride. Give people time to get to know the one that will command them to trust Him with their lives. 

The Lord never commanded the Jews to trust Him without first learning about Him. Read the story of the Exodus. God sent Moses to Egypt where the Jews were slaves. They saw incredible miracles for months; they experienced the Passover and saw the Egyptian’s firstborn die. 

They walked through the Red Sea on dry ground; God fed them in the desert with manna from heaven. He gave them water and fresh meat. He brought them to Mount Sinai and gave them the Ten Commandments, He gave them angels to guard them, and then He brought them to the land He had promised them- the Promised Land, their inheritance.

There were over one million adult Jews who saw all of that, but only two men, Joshua and Caleb, were willing to trust Him. All the others refused. When they saw the fierce inhabitants in the land of Canaan they were afraid and refused to trust the Lord for their future.  'Few there are that find it', Jesus said. The Lord was son angry with them that He was going to destroy everyone of them under twenty years old. Moses changed His mind, but God swore than none of those who were unwilling to trust Him would ever enter the Promised Land.

The Lord promises that those who seek with all their hearts will be rewarded. It is His promise to the diligent seeker. But there will be a time of counting the cost which is the subject of the next video.

The seeking may be difficult. God makes it so, and for a very good reason. Consider this. Jesus spoke of a treasure hidden in a field and a pearl of great price (Matthew 13:44-45). Jesus is both the hidden treasure and the pearl, for Jesus Christ is the reward. In both parables the seeker must give everything in order to receive.

Mediocre seeking never finds Christ, for God is the all and everything God. The reward is not a two week vacation on a tropical island, but eternal life in Paradise with Him. Mediocrity, being neither hot nor cold, makes the Lord want to vomit (Revelation 3:16). The reward is not a field or a pearl, it is eternal life with Him, an eternal life which begins now and is guaranteed to those who belong to Him.

In conclusion: If you are involved in evangelism then give God time to prepare a person’s heart. Your role is to motivate people to seek Him, indeed when Paul was speaking to the Athenian philosophers on Mars Hill, he told them the following words concerning God’s purpose in creating us.

‘God did this so that they would seek him, and perhaps reach out for him and find him, although he is not far from any one of us’ (Acts 17:27).

Be a part of that plan, but don’t get in God’s way and don’t tell a person they are born again because they went through some 4 spiritual laws tract you used. We are called to make disciples, not powerless converts, we are called to introduce people to Christ. 

Being born again is about a change of ownership and it will require an individual to trust Christ for their future. That may mean ending an immoral relationship, it may mean being ostracized by family, it may mean persecution or even death. Christ calls individuals to understand His call, to deny self, and take our cross. This command is both for regeneration and sanctification, for we must be crucified with Christ. But more of that in the next article.

I hope that some of you may decide to start a seekers group in your home. Invite seekers, give them a meal, and then work through the book over a period of 6-8 weeks. I have done this for about 40 years and seen the Lord do amazing things in the lives of seekers.

Final word…let God be God…only He knows when an individual is ready to surrender their life to Him as Lord and Savior. God bless.

Steve Copland