Current Events Monday: You Must Be Born Again–A Response to “Cancel Culture”
“Jesus answered and said to him, ‘Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God’” (John 3:3).
Jesus’ stark statement concerning a spiritual re-birth must have shocked Nicodemus, the original hearer of what we read in John 3. Indications are that Nicodemus could not quite grasp Jesus’ meaning at first, thinking that one had to accomplish some sort of physical feat in order to experience new life in God’s kingdom. Through patient and powerful argument, Jesus unwrapped the meaning of his bewildering teaching. He put to Nicodemus (and us!) that a person must be born all over again “from above,” through the work of the Spirit—which is nothing short of miraculous since no human effort is involved.
What we are talking about here is the great old doctrine of “regeneration,” the truth that one becomes a participating citizen of the Kingdom of God through a rebirth of the soul. But what does that mean exactly? While words somewhat fail to get at the totality of regeneration, the term essentially refers to a change in the moral and spiritual nature of one who puts their faith in Jesus Christ. It’s a change in the very heart and character of someone to the degree that love for God and neighbor, as well as rejection of sin, becomes the central, ultimate concern of life. The Holy Spirit thus indwells one’s regenerated soul and steers us towards walking as Jesus walked.
Regeneration is accomplished not by human effort but by the Spirit of God, since only the power of God can exact such a change in one’s life. It occurs when God draws people to Christ, the Spirit convicts of sin, and the gospel becomes the power of God unto our salvation, or rescue from sin. We affirm this salvation is by God’s grace through faith, meaning that a person—by conscious choice—surrenders all allegiance of his/her life to Christ. Our sin is thus cancelled since Christ atoned for our sin on the cross through his sacrificial blood.
And why is regeneration relevant still today? Well, it has much to do with the tremendous cultural firestorm created recently around two seemingly unrelated news stories. One story involves the increased calls for Spotify to place limitations on Joe Rogan’s podcast content. The second involves a school board in Tennessee which decided recently to ban a book about the Holocaust called Maus. The term “cancel culture” has been used of late as a popular pejorative label for those who desire to limit disagreeable information, no matter their political affiliation. Also, the term “misinformation” seems to be a code word for any topic or person who is subject to the chopping block.
“Cancel culture” is probably not the best, most accurate term to describe what is really going on in our culture today. A cursory reading of history will reveal that people of different persuasions have attempted to limit the speech of their enemies since the Garden of Eden: Adam wanted to cancel Eve. Eve wanted to cancel the serpent. In fact, cancel culture should be called what it truly is: sinful human nature. This nature asserts that if we can just get rid of those who are obviously not measuring up to our ideals, then we can have peace, harmony, and nirvana. The fatal flaw in this line of thinking comes down to pride and pretense—the cloaking of our own limitations in order to highlight the limitations of others. To participate in cancel culture is the epitome of hypocrisy. While attributing evil to others, we miss the inherent evil in ourselves.
And thus, we circle back to regeneration. Christ’s plan for us is reconciliation, not cancellation. We are not meant to be at the center of the universe, dictating terms to others like demagogues. We resonate then with Paul’s outcry: “What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death?” Thanks be to God that we can be born all over again, not through our works, but through the power of the Spirit. Once we experience salvation through Jesus Christ, ours is not to participate in the so-called cancel culture. Rather, our call is to the ministry of reconciliation (2 Corinthians 5:11-21).
Consider the ministry of Jesus. His was not a crusade against social prognosticators, podcasters, publishers, and politicians. I can’t think of an episode in his earthly ministry where he viciously went after someone who disagreed with him. Nor did Jesus voice particular concern about those who were after him. He seemed to accept persecution as an inevitability and was able to speak truth in such a convicting way that those who were out to cancel him did not have any more weapons to use against him except the cross.
So, where do we go from here? Our message must be the same as that of Jesus: “You must be born again.” What Christians have to offer the world is not another cancellation but the prospect of regeneration. Why then would we sit on this message while our neighbors devour one another?