After man was made by God, God saw what He had made and used the words very good to describe it (Gen. 1:31). But this very good man became fallen. Most people think that if Adam had not fallen, he and we would not have needed to be regenerated, but this is absolutely wrong. Even if man had never fallen, he would still have needed to be reborn. The God-created man needed to be reborn of God, not just to have God's breath of life, but to have God's life itself. Man needed regeneration even if man had never fallen. God in His economy planned it this way.

The Old Testament tells us that Saul was anointed by God and got another heart (1 Sam. 10:9). A new heart is obviously something new, but another heart may still be the old heart. Saul did not have something new. God created an old man, and this old man should have a transformation, a change from the old to the new. The old man was human; the new man is divine. We all have to see this. Today we are wonderful persons because we have been regenerated with God's divine life. We are now both divine and human. When God was incarnated, He could say, "I am a God-man." Now that we have been regenerated, we can say, "I am a man-God." The only difference is this: He had the divine life first. Then He received the human life. We had the human life first. Then we received the divine life. Eventually, God has two lives with two natures, and we are the same.

Christ was born to give us a second birth, that is, to make us God in His life and nature, but not in His Godhead. God was made a man, and we men are being made God, but without the Godhead. There is a two-way traffic. He comes with divinity to enter into humanity, and we go with humanity to enter into divinity. This is the significance of regeneration according to the blueprint, the plan, of God. By His mercy God has really shown us His plan, His economy. The main line we have seen in God's plan is that God intended to be a man. This is His hobby, His heart's desire. What does God want? God wants to get a man for Him to be one with man. This is the reason why He loves man. So first, He created a man, and this creation of man can be considered as a begetting of man. Four thousand years later, He came to be a man. He was not separate from man, but He became a man in union with man. He entered into man.

God came to be a man to give us a second birth. God can do everything, but if He had not become a man, He could not regenerate man. He must have the qualification of being God and man. He became a man in His incarnation to put on humanity, and this part of Him, the human part, was not divine. While He was on this earth for thirty-three and a half years, He was part divine and part human. In His incarnation He put on man. Then He took the second step to die and resurrect. In resurrection He "sonized" His human part, making this human part divine.

Obviously, we were born human. Then God as the prototype came into us as the divine One. Now it will take our whole life for Him to transform our humanity into something divine. This transformation is the process of "sonizing" us. In one sense, we are now the sons of God because we have been begotten of God with His life. But in our attitude, actions, and behavior we may appear as the sons of beggars. This shows that in another sense, we do not appear to be the sons of God. We should say, "I am a son of God in life and nature, but not yet fully in constitution and appearance. I am being transformed day by day." Now we are under God's transformation. To transform us is to sonize us. This is God's work in us every day.