Jesus' Resurrection Ensures our Regeneration

Peter says that "we have been born anew to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead" (1 Peter 1:3).  Here he explicitly connects Jesus' resurrection with our regeneration or new birth.  When Jesus rose from the dead he had a new quality of life, a "resurrection life" in a human body and human spirit that were perfectly suited for fellowship and obedience to God forever.  In his resurrection, Jesus earned for us a new life just like his.  We do not receive all of that new "resurrection life" when we become Christians, for our bodies remain as they were, still subject to weakness, aging, and death.  But in our spirits we are made alive with new resurrection power.  Thus it is through his resurrection that Christ earned for us the new kind of life we receive when we are "born again."  This is why Paul can say that God "made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up with him" (Eph 2:5-6; Col 3:1)

Grudem, Systematic Theology p214