We are prone to reduce the new birth to what happens at the end of a “salvation formula”. I have heard many testimonies of conversions that did not conform to any formula. We should not be surprised, Jesus said that the new birth would have the element of mystery in it; this mystery He illustrated with wind. The true wind that He speaks of is the wind of the Spirit, the blowing on our soul of God Himself. He, who knows our heart, soul and mind, touches it all, the entirety of what makes us who we are with the Wind of Himself, transforming the whole. We must stop putting this grand mystery in a box as a pass key for us to control who gets in; instead let the Spirit do His mysterious, but real, transforming work. We are born of the Spirit and not of a formula.
Jesus answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’ The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.” (John 3:5–8 ESV).
