They seem to think that when Jesus said, "Ye must be born again," he meant some one else that must be born again—didn't mean them at all. You see John the Beloved, when walking through the streets, and you say to him, I met your Master last night—I went around to see Him." John would say, "How did you like Him?" His friend would reply, "I never met such a person in my life; never heard a man talk as He did. been ringing in my ears ever since.

What He told me has

He told me that God

so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believed on Him should not perish but have everlasting life." "John, does your Master talk that way all the time?" "Yes, He always talks in that way." That man will never forget that interview. He was found in the dark by Christ; he was directed into the right way; in that way he will ever continue, and there is not a thing he would not do for Jesus. See Nicodemus. He, with Joseph of Arimathea, took down the body of Jesus and brought it away, and stayed by Jesus to the last.. I never knew a man that had a personal interview with Jesus, that did not stay by him. Oh, make up your mind that you will seek Him and follow Him until you have an interview with Him, for never man spake as that man spake. is just the man that every one wants.

He

But I can imagine some one says, "If that is to have a new birth, what am I to do? I can't create life. I certainly can't save myself." You certainly can't, and we don't preach that you can. We tell you it is utterly impossible to make a man better without Christ, and that is what men are trying to do. They are trying to patch up this old Adam's nature. There must be a new creation. Regeneration is a new creation, and if it is a new creation it must be the work of God. In the first chapter of Genesis man There is no one there but God. Man is

don't appear.
not there to help or take part.

When God created the

earth He was alone.

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When God redeemed the world

He was alone. "That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the spirit is spirit." The Ethiopian cannot change his skin and the leopard cannot change his spots. When I was in England my little girl said, Papa, why don't those colored people wash themselves white?" You might as well try to make yourselves pure and holy without the help of God. It would be just as easy for you. to do that as for that black man to wash himself white. The Ethiopian cannot change his skin, neither can the leopard change his spots. A man might just as well try to leap over the moon as to serve God in the flesh. Therefore that which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the spirit is spirit. Now God tells us in this chapter how we are to get into His Kingdom. We are not to work our way in, not but that salvation is worth working for. We admit all that. If there were rivers and mountains in the way, it would be worth swimming those rivers and climbing those mountains. There is no doubt that salvation is worth all that, but we don't get it by our works. It is to him that worketh not, but believeth. We work because we are saved; we don't work to be saved. We work from the Cross but not towards it. Now it is written, "Work out your salvation with fear and trembling." Why you must have your salvation before you can work it out. Suppose I say to my little boy, “Go and work out that garden," I must furnish him the garden before he can work it out. Suppose I say to him, "I want Well," he you to spend that $100 carefully." me have the $100 and I will be careful how I spend it." I remember when I first left home and went to Boston, I had spent all my money, and I went to the post-office three times a day. I knew there was only one mail a day from home, but I thought by some possibility there might be a letter for me. At last I got a letter from my little sister,

says,

"let

and I was awful glad to get it. She had heard that there were a great many pickpockets in Boston, and a large part of that letter was to have me be very careful not to let anybody pick my pocket. Now I had got to have something in my pocket in order to have it picked. So you have got to have salvation before you can work it out.

"It is to him that worketh not but believeth." When Christ shouted on Calvary, "It is finished," He meant what he said. All that men have to do now is just to accept of the work of Jesus Christ. There is no hope for a man or a woman as long as they are trying to work out their salvation. I can imagine there are some people here who will say, as Nicodemus did, "this is a very mysterious thing." I see the scowl on that Pharisee's brow as he says, "How can these things be?" It sounds very strange to his ear. "Born again; born of the spirit? How can these things be?" A great many people say, "You must reason it out, but if you don't reason it out, don't ask us to believe it." Now, I can imagine a great many people in this hall saying that. When you ask me to reason it out, I tell you frankly I can do it. "The wind bloweth where it listeth, and you hear the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh and whither it goeth; so is every one that is born of the spirit." I can't understand all about the wind. You ask me to reason it out. I can't. It may blow due north here, and up to Boston it may blow due south. I may go up a few hundred feet and find it blowing in an entirely opposite direction from what it is down here. You ask me to explain these currents of wind, but because I can't explain it, and because I don't understand it, suppose I stand here and assert, “ O humph! there is no such thing as wind." I can imagine that little girl down there saying, "I know more about it than that man does, often have I heard the wind and felt the wind blowing against my face,” and she says," Didn't the wind blow my umbrella out of my hands

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the other day, and didn't I see it blow a man's hat off in the street? Haven't I seen it blow the trees in the forests and the grain in the country." My friends you might just as well tell me to-night that there is no wind as to tell me there is no such thing as a man born of the spirit. I have felt the spirit of God working in my heart just as much as I have felt the wind blowing in my face. I can't reason it out. There are a great many things I can't reason out that I believe. I never could reason out the Creation. I can see the world, but I can't tell how God made it out of nothing. But even these men will admit there is a creating power. There is a great many things that I can't explain and that I can't reason out, that I believe. I heard a commercial traveller say that he had heard that the ministry and religion of Jesus Christ was a matter of revelation and not investigation. "When it pleases God to reveal His Son to me," says Paul. There were a party of young men together, and these men went back to the country, and on their journey they made up their minds not to believe anything they could not reason out. An old man heard them, and presently he said, "I heard you say you would not believe anything you could not reason out." "Yes," they said, "that was so." "Well," he said, coming down on the train to-day, I noticed some geese, some sheep, some swine, and some cattle, all eating grass. Can you tell me by what process that same grass was turned into hair, feathers, bristles and wool? Do you believe it is a fact?" "Oh yes," they said, "we can't help believing that, though we fail to see it." "Well said the old man, "I can't help believing in Jesus Christ." I can't help believing in the regeneration of man when I see men that have been reclaimed. I see men that have been reformed. Haven't some of the very worst men in the city been regenerated-picked up out of the pit and their feet put upon the rock and a new song put in their

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mouth. It was

is praising God.

cursing and blaspheming, and now it Old things have passed away and all things have become new ; not reformed only, but regenerated-a new man in Christ Jesus.

Look you, down there in the dark alleys of New York is a poor drunkard. I think if you want to get near hell, go to a poor drunkard's home. Go to the house of that poor miserable drunkard. Is there anything nearer like hell on earth? See the want and distress that reigns there. But hark! A footstep is heard at the door, and the children run and hide themselves. The patient wife waits to meet him. The man has been her torment. Many a time she has borne about for weeks the marks of blows. Many a time that strong right hand has been brought down on her defenceless head. And now she waits expecting to hear his oaths and suffer his brutal treatment. He comes in and says to her: "I have been to the meeting, and I heard there that if I will I can be converted. I believe that God is able to save me." Go down to that house again in a few weeks and what a change! As you approach you hear some one singing. It is not the song of a reveller, but they are singing the "Rock of Ages." The children are no longer afraid of him, but cluster around his knee. His wife is near him, her face lit up with a happy glow. Is not that a picture of regeneration? I can take you to thousands of such homes, made happy by the regenerating power of the religion of Christ. What men want is the power to overcome temptation, the power to lead a right life.

The only way to get into the Kingdom of God is to be born into it. If the Archangel Gabriel was to wing his way here to-night, and we could have a chance to tell him all our wishes, we couldn't ask him for a better way of getting into the Kingdom of God. Christ has made salvation ready for us, and all we must do is just to take it. Oh,