Many people who say they are Christians believe its just a matter of joining the group. They have no desire for Christ, even though they may wish to think of themselves as a good person for attending this "church club."
I heard a woman once said, "I go to church because that's what they do here in the South." She said nothing about God or Christ, only that its the thing to do here. That's where the social connections are, in the church.
If this is someone's understanding of church gatherings then they are not born again.
If attending a church gathering makes you feel safe in case life will bring some trials, then you are not born again.
Someone who becomes born again does so because they have realized they are sinful creatures on their way to hell. They want Christ because they desire to be cleansed of that sin and changed into an entirely different person by Christ when He comes to live in them.
No one will be born again until and unless they believe in Christ as the sacrifice for their sin. They must know first that they are sinners in need of saving.
Far too many people have attended churches to hear music and motivational speakers with big happy smiles and all kinds of lies about how good they are as human beings and how they deserve whatever they want in life. No one will be saved hearing messages like this that just build up pride in the hearer.
John 3:1-21
"3 Now there was a man of the Pharisees, named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews;
2 this man came to Jesus by night and said to Him, “Rabbi, we know that You have come from God as a teacher; for no one can do these signs that You do unless God is with him.”
3 Jesus answered and said to him, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.”
4 Nicodemus *said to Him, “How can a man be born when he is old? He cannot enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born, can he?”
5 Jesus answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.
6 That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.
7 Do not be amazed that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’ 8 The wind blows where it wishes and you hear the sound of it, but do not know where it comes from and where it is going; so is everyone who is born of the Spirit.”
9 Nicodemus said to Him, “How can these things be?”
10 Jesus answered and said to him, “Are you the teacher of Israel and do not understand these things?
11 Truly, truly, I say to you, we speak of what we know and testify of what we have seen, and you do not accept our testimony.
12 If I told you earthly things and you do not believe, how will you believe if I tell you heavenly things?
13 No one has ascended into heaven, but He who descended from heaven: the Son of Man.
14 As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up;
15 so that whoever believes will in Him have eternal life.
16 “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life.
17 For God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through Him.
18 He who believes in Him is not judged; he who does not believe has been judged already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.
19 This is the judgment, that the Light has come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the Light, for their deeds were evil.
20 For everyone who does evil hates the Light, and does not come to the Light for fear that his deeds will be exposed.
21 But he who practices the truth comes to the Light, so that his deeds may be manifested as having been wrought in God.”
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