Well, it’s getting late here, and we lose an hour on top of that. So this will be my last.
Peter was a chief spokesman for the Apostles (not a Pope). And it was he whom God entrusted to set things right. Which he surely did at the very beginning of Christianity, on the day of Pentecost. No one can improve on Peter’s sermon on that day. It had far reaching consequences.
And what did he preach? He preached the gospel, Christ’s death, burial, and resurrection. His hearers were pricked in their heart, the text says (Acts 2). However, Peter didn’t leave them with just pricked heart religion (common among Protestants). Having a pricked heart is good, believing the gospel is good, but Peter’s next words are the obedience of the gospel, which Paul would later refer to as “the obedience of faith.”
In answer to their inquiry, “men and brethren what shall we do,” Peter said...
Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.
He was sounding the keynote for all Christianity, Protestant or RCC. Here are the real keys of the kingdom.
I forgot to tie Peter’s “keys” with the subject of this thread, regeneration or being born again. Only when one becomes one with Christ’s death, burial, and resurrection, is he born again, born of the water and Spirit, or regenerated.
Peter was telling them how to be born again. Mental assent, or a pricked heart, was not enough, regeneration starts in the heart, and is completed in obedience to the gospel.
It should not be that hard to see the birth of water and Spirit Christ spoke of in John 3:5, identification with Christ’s death, burial, and resurrection, being preached at Pentecost, in Peter’s words, Acts 2:38.