What does Tribe teach about born again?
Drawn from the messages where it was actually addressed: the words said from the front, the passages taught, and where to hear the whole thing.
At Tribe, the teaching on being born again starts with a straightforward claim: a person is a spirit, living in a body, and being born again is a spiritual transaction, not a physical one. Brian has taught from John 3 that what is born of flesh is flesh and what is born of the spirit is spirit, and that without Jesus a person may have a pulse but is spiritually dead. The new birth is the moment that changes. He used 1 John 5:12 to put it plainly: he who has the Son has life, and he who does not have the Son does not have life, regardless of what else that person has going for them. As Brian put it, "He who has the son has life. It don't matter how hard you can ski, how high you can climb, what's in your bank account."
The teaching has also pressed hard on what this new birth costs and what it requires. Brian has been careful to note that the flesh does not get born again, it needs to be crucified. The spirit is renewed at salvation, but the mind has to be renewed daily. Second Corinthians 5:17 framed it this way: the old life is gone and a new life has begun. That is the exchange. And the story of Nicodemus in John 3 has come up repeatedly at Tribe as a picture of someone standing in front of something genuinely new, signs he could not explain from within his existing framework, with Jesus patiently but firmly pointing him not toward an adjustment but toward something new entirely. Jesus never offered to pour a little new wine into an old wineskin.
That image of the wineskin has shaped how Brian talks about receiving the new birth. The wineskin represents a person's capacity to receive and adapt to a new work of the Holy Spirit, and a dead spirit simply cannot hold what the Holy Spirit is offering. The new birth is what changes the container. One thing Brian has returned to more than once is that this new life is not meant to be hoarded. A new wineskin filled with new wine is meant to be poured out.
Taught from John 3:3-6 · 1 John 5:12 · 2 Corinthians 5:17 · John 3:1-21 · Romans 12:1-2
“If this is a place where a culture is created that we wear masks and that we can't be real and vulnerable, heaven forbid that this place be a museum of exhibits for saints.”
From New Wineskin, New Capacity
The passage taught · 2 Corinthians 5:17
17 Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old things have passed away. Behold, all things have become new.
World English Bible
Messages that go deeper
- November 18, 2024 New Wineskin, New Capacity Brian Hunter walks through John 3 and the story of Nicodemus to ask one pointed question: what is the condition of your wineskin, and is there room for what God is pouring out?
- November 17, 2024 New Wine Deeper Explained A Tribe Church sermon on Jesus's teaching about new wine and wineskins, exploring what it means to stay open to the Holy Spirit's work in your life.
- October 24, 2022 Resurrection Series Week 1： New Life Brian Hunter walks through John 3 and John 11 to explore what resurrection really means, starting with the exchange that has to happen before new life can begin.