The Holy Spirit enabled virgin Mary to beget Jesus bodily even before she came together with Joseph; The Holy Spirit came upon her and the power of the Highest overshadowed her; thus, she was found with Child of the Holy Ghost (Matt 1:18; Luke 1:35); Likewise, the Holy Spirit comes upon our hearts to give us a new birth spiritually (Jn 3:5). Both, the placement of the ‘Seed of the woman’ in Mary’s womb and the placement of the ‘word of God’ in the heart of man are supernatural events (Luke 1:37; 1 Pet 1:23. The former is biological while the latter is spiritual and mentioned by Jesus Christ as ‘being born again’. (Jn3:3, 5).

Mary should have been born again spiritually too; she should have been among the one twenty at the upper room in Jerusalem on Pentecost receiving the fullness of the Holy Spirit as well, as the context tells us in Acts 1:14. She herself expressed her need for a Saviour! (Luke 1:47). (Mary is not the ‘mother of God’; she was the mother of Jesus, ‘God in the likeness of sinful flesh’, not divine. She did not ascend to heaven – no Bible reference for this; she must have died in her body, now waiting for the rapture!)

(Faith comes by hearing and the ability to hear comes by the word of God (Rom 10:17). The Holy Spirit brings life to the spirit of the hearer of the word. The Spirit of God produces godly sorrow that works repentance to salvation. (2 Cor 7:9-11). And, because God foreknows everything, He knows who will believe; it is to them that He imparts faith to believe this word. God’s foreknowledge precedes His election of believers (1 Pet 1:2). Then, He calls the elect / chosen, justifies them and glorifies them. (Rom 8:29, 30).

(The hearer might resist the Holy Ghost when He speaks, convicting the sinner of sin, righteousness and the impending (inevitable) judgement; such stiff-necked people, uncircumcised in heart and ears, forfeit the blessedness that comes when submitting to His prompting – forgiveness of sins, salvation of the soul and the redemption of the whole being. (Acts 7:51))

The Holy Spirit of life quickens / brings alive the dead spirit in man giving it life to live (John 6:63).(Originally, the life in the spirit was lost when the very first man became an unbeliever, disobeyed God and died spiritually; sin and death passed on from Adam to all mankind). (Rom 5:12-21). The person is born in the Spirit – born-again (Jn 3:3) and is born of God (1 Jn 5:1). We receive His Spirit. (1Jn 4:13). He renews our mind at our salvation experience. These are signified by the washing of regeneration / baptism (baptisma is immersion) in water which comes after the ‘born-again’ experience. (Tit 3:5). That is why, this ministry of the Spirit that gives life is more glorious than the ministry of Moses that led to death (through the law). (2 Cor 2:7,8).

There are three that bear witness in earth – the spirit, and the water, and the blood and these three agree in one (1Jn 5:8). This is He that came by water and blood, even Jesus Christ; not by water only, but by water and blood. And it is the Spirit that bears witness because the Spirit is truth.(1John 5:6). Adam came by water only. Blood must have come later when Adam sinned. (The life of the flesh is in the blood (Lev 17:11). That is why God ruled that this blood must be shed for the remission of sins (Heb 9:22)). Being born-again is being born in water and in spirit minus the blood. The blood still remains in the body of the believer as this is a matter of faith and it indicates a spiritual birth, not physical.

During Old Testament times, (until the death, burial and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God), the blood of bulls and goats were shed on behalf of the sinner; the sin of the people were symbolically placed on the animal and the life of the innocent animal was shed – poured out completely, marking the shedding of the blood of the sinner. Even the Muslim world offers a lamb (or another innocent animal) on the day of Bakri-id to show that the blood has been shed on behalf of the family, kith, and kin. People of eastern religions, especially Hinduism, break gourds, coconuts and lemon applied with vermillion to signify the shedding of blood for their sins. Wearing of the thilak / Kumkum on the forehead indicates the shed blood. Sin is bloody indeed!

When one is born again, the blood of the individual is believed to be shed off. (This, Jesus did on behalf of every human being – OT times or NT times). So, being born of water and of the spirit (Jn 3:3, 5) is not baptism in water and baptism in the Holy Spirit. Water baptism follows the ‘born again’ experience of the believer as an external witness of being united together in the likeness of the death and the likeness of the resurrection of Christ; Spirit baptism follows as evidence of the lordship of Christ functional in the born-again believer, a life union with Him. Baptism in water does not save a person; being born again does.

Through this born-again experience, the Holy Spirit qualifies a person to enter into the kingdom of God. (Jn 3:5). Flesh and blood cannot enter the kingdom of God.(1 Cor 15:50). None can say Jesus is the Lord but by the Holy Spirit. (1 Cor 12:3). The Spirit of God enables the spirit of man to acknowledge and confess that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh (1 Jn 4:22) i.e., the Person who has always existed as the Son of God came in the likeness of sinful flesh (Rom 8:3). The Holy Ghost sanctifies the gentiles too (not just the Jewish believers) so that we become an acceptable sacrifice when we are offered up. (Rom 15:16; 12:1).

The Holy Spirit makes man’s body His temple to dwell inside us. (1 Cor 6:19;). The Most High dwelleth not in temples made with hands. (Acts 7:48). The Son of God is Immanuel, ‘God with man’ (on my side!); the Holy Spirit is God in me. (God must be worshipped, not man; our body is an earthen vessel, and we dwell in a tent / tabernacle / clothing; my worth comes from Him). (Mat 23:16-19; 2 Cor 4:7; 5:1, 4). Anyone in whom the Spirit of God dwells, is in the Spirit (not in the flesh). (Rom 8:9).

While God is in me, I am in God Who is Love. (1 Jn 4:15; 2 Thes 1:1). My life is hid with Christ in God. (Col 3:3).

Collectively, all believers in the church are built as a building, a holy temple, and an habitation of God through this Spirit. (Eph 2:22; 1 Cor 3:16). A place of worship is not the Church. Worshippers are the Church! Without ‘u’, ch_rch is meaningless.