OK, you do have to be born again, which is to be baptised with the Holy Spirit. You don't have to be dipped in water to be born again.
That is just unscriptural.
The passage was quite specific. Water and the Holy Spirit.
Joh 3:6 That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.
Getting baptized 'in water' is not being born of the flesh...Our bodies are 90% water...Isn't that what they say??? You can't get around it...
Joh 3:4 Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? can he enter the second time into his mother's womb, and be born?
Nicodemus had no problem understanding the first birth was the natural, human birth...It wasn't baptism (in water)...
Jesus says we must be baptized. Are you arguing with Him?
Matthew 28:18-20
And Jesus came and spake unto them, saying, All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world. Amen.