1. “Made us alive”; “Has the life”; “Has eternal life” (Eph. 2:5; 1 John 5:12; John 6:47).
In the past, our spirit was deadened. Now that God has regenerated us, our deadened spirit has been made alive. We have the life of God, which is the eternal life.
2. “Become children of God”; “Partakers of the divine nature” (John 1:12; 2 Pet. 1:4).
Regeneration causes us to obtain the life of God, to have the authority to become children of God, and to partake of the divine nature. Regeneration causes us to obtain the divine life, which is our authority to become children of God. Once we have the life of God, we have the authority to become children of God. Moreover, this life causes us to partake of the divine nature. Regeneration makes us children of God with the same life and nature as God, and it makes us like God, loving what God loves and hating what God hates.
3. “I will also give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you” (Ezek. 36:26).
Regeneration also causes us to obtain a new heart and a new spirit. The new heart gives us new likes and preferences; the new spirit gives us new spiritual abilities and fellowship. In the past, we did not like or prefer the things of God, and we did not fellowship with God or understand and practice the things of God. We had no heart for or interest in the things of God; we even felt strange, disoriented, and weak when we touched them. Now that we have a new heart and a new spirit, we not only love and prefer the things of God, but we can also fellowship with God and understand and practice the things of God. We have a heart for and an interest in these things, we are able to understand them, and we have the strength and ability to practice them. These are the results of our regeneration.
4. “I will put My Spirit within you” (Ezek. 36:27).
When God regenerates us, He not only gives us a new life, a new nature, a new heart, and a new spirit but He also puts His Spirit within us to strengthen the new life within and the function of our new nature, to increase the interest of our heart for matters of God, and to reveal the spiritual things in our new spirit, making it strong, living, able to understand the things of God, and quick to carry out God’s will.
5. “Jesus Christ is in you” (2 Cor. 13:5).
Regeneration also causes us to have Jesus Christ in us. Regeneration gives us the Holy Spirit, who is the realization of the Lord Jesus. The Spirit abides in us. He is the Lord Jesus abiding in us as our life, power, and everything. Therefore, every regenerated person partakes of the Lord Jesus because he partakes of the Holy Spirit.
6. “He is a new creation. The old things have passed away; behold, they have become new” (2 Cor. 5:17).
Regeneration not only gives us a new life, a new nature, a new heart, and a new spirit, but it also makes us a new creation. In the past we were the old creation, stained by sin and corrupted by Satan; now we are the new creation with God’s holy nature and reality. The old things have passed away; behold, they have become new.
7. “Enter into the kingdom of God” (John 3:5).
Because regeneration makes us a new creation with the life and spiritual nature of God, it enables us to enter the kingdom of God and partake of His spiritual kingdom.
8. “Unto a living hope...unto an inheritance, incorruptible and undefiled and unfading, kept in the heavens” (1 Pet. 1:3-4).
Regeneration also gives us a living hope and an inheritance in the heavens. This heavenly inheritance is spiritual, incorruptible, undefiled, and unfading. Anyone who wants to obtain this inheritance must also be heavenly, incorruptible, undefiled, and unfading, having a life with the same nature and condition as the inheritance. Since regeneration gives us a life with a nature that is heavenly, eternally unchanging, and unable to be defiled by sin, the world, or Satan, we can inherit such a spiritual, holy, eternal inheritance. Although we are still in the world and have not yet obtained the heavenly, better inheritance, we already have the heavenly life. This heavenly life causes us to live a heavenly life on earth today, and it will bring us into this heavenly inheritance in the future. This is a beautiful hope! It is given to us by regeneration.