At this time of year Christendom turns naturally and gratefully to commemoration of the birth of Jesus of Nazareth. However, at these recurring anniversaries it may be well thoughtfully to consider that remarkable declaration of the mature Jesus, when he said to Nicodemus, who had come by night to talk with him about the things of God, "Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God."
It will be recalled by students of John's Gospel that in reply to the question of the astonished Nicodemus, "How can a man be born when he is old?" the Master said, "Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God." These words of Christ Jesus show plainly that heaven, harmony, is attained only through spiritual regeneration, and that this experience, which involves purification of thought, must come to everyone as an individual experience.
The understanding of God, Spirit, which constitutes heaven, comes to each one when and where he is ready for it. Without this dawning in human consciousness of the spiritual light of divine intelligence which reveals the truth about God and man in His likeness, one cannot know what Life really is; for as John, the beloved disciple of Jesus, said, "He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life." Obviously, then, unless one has the Son—the Christ, or spiritual idea of God—one cannot know Life as God, Mind, Spirit, the animating, divine cause of all that exists by way of creation—the spiritual universe, including individual man.
