Clean Water, a New Heart, and the Spirit Within

The restoration promise moves from regathering to inward transformation: God will cleanse his people, remove the heart of stone, give a heart of flesh, put his Spirit within them, and cause them to walk in his ways. This is a major new-covenant trajectory behind New Testament regeneration language, including the probable Ezekiel background to John 3’s water-and-Spirit saying and the cleansing-and-renewal language of Titus 3.