This verse shows very clearly that those who believed on Christ and who received Him did not do so in order to be born of God, but because they already were born of Him.  In scripture, God's act of giving divine life to His people is described as regeneration, a quickening, or a being born again.  Neither flesh and blood, nor man's will, has anything whatsoever to do with it.  In every sense of the word it is "of God".  "You hath He quickened," saith Paul, "who were dead in trespasses and sins" (Eph. 2:1,5); not "You hath He quickened who willed, or desired, to be born again," for those who are dead in sins have no desire to be "born of the Spirit".  Not only do they not desire to be born of the Spirit, but they persecute those who are born of the Spirit (See Gal. 4:29).  "Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be" (Romans 8:7).  If people were born of the Spirit because they wanted to be, then the new birth would be "of the will of man," and "of the will of the flesh."

Both "the things of the Spirit of God" and "the preaching of the cross" are foolishness to them that perish (I Cor. 1:18 & 2:14).  Therefore these things cannot be used as instruments in the Spiritual birth of those who are dead in sins.  "No man knoweth the Son, but the Father; neither knoweth any man the Father, save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal him" (Matt. 11:27).  It is clear, then, whose will is involved in the new birth---and it is not man's.  Not "of the will of man, but of God."    ---Elder Ralph Harris