Nicodemus John 3 1-21
The day I met Jesus wasn't a day - it was a night.
I'd been aware of his activity for several weeks and had been intrigued by the stories I was hearing of poor people being healed, demoniacs being delivered, strange sermons being preached..... I had also heard about him storming into the temple the week before and turning over the tables, causing a complete riot and injuring several moneylenders in the process. I couldn't work out quite what was going on with this Rabbi, if indeed he was a Rabbi. The people seemed to love him, but my colleagues in the Sanhedrin and the council were deeply suspicious of everything he was doing. There was talk that he might be planning a revolution, a political uprising. Many of the Pharisees were convinced that his teachings were blasphemy and several of my friends had confronted him about healing on the sabbath and not following the correct washing practices before eating. But he apparently always had a clever answer. He had not made any friends among the religious leaders in Jerusalem - but I couldn't help but be fascinated by him. From my reading of the scriptures I understood that there was a promised Messiah coming who would turn the established order on its head. And this Jesus certainly seemed to fit that bill.
Moreover, I could not agree with my colleagues who asserted that the miracles Jesus was apparently doing were being done by Satan. All the stories I had heard were of people being set free, made well, given life, restored to work and purpose. These things didn't sound like the work of the devil. They smacked very much of the hand of God to me. After weeks of wondering who this Jesus was, I finally decided to go and find out for myself. I went to see him
Coward that I am, I decided that it would be too risky for me to be seen with him in public. So I found out where he was staying and one evening, after sunset, I made my way in the dark to the house where he and his friends were sitting on the roof terrace having their evening meal. I apologised for interrupting and he graciously invited me to join them. I sat down at the table and Jesus asked me what he could do for me. I suddenly felt a little foolish. The words I had rehearsed in my head on the way there disappeared and I struggled to string a sentence together.
'Errr, well, ummm, thank you for agreeing to see me ' I stuttered ' Very kind of you. I, um, well, I was just wondering..... I know that you are a teacher who has been sent by God because nobody could do the things you have been doing unless God was with him, but I was wondering if perhaps you are more than a teacher. People are saying you are the prophet Elijah, some are saying you are the Messiah......'
Jesus looked at me with a serious expression on his face. He was a bit younger than me, an ordinary looking man with a friendly face. He spoke with the accent of the common people. His hands were large and work worn. But when he fixed me with that look I felt as though I was about to hear something of cosmic importance. I felt like a young disciple at the feet of an esteemed Rabbi. It made me very uncomfortable indeed.
' Ah Nicodemus,' he said ' you don't get it. You think that you can understand spiritual things when your spirit isn't even alive. In order to understand you need to experience a second birth, a different sort of birth. ' He had lost me. I didn't understand what he was on about. I said ' What? What do you mean a second birth? I can't go back to being a baby and be born a second time. Impossible.'
Jesus sighed. Then he smiled and said ' You call yourself a teacher of the law and you dont even understand the basics! Listen, you are made up of a physical part - that part which was born as a baby from your mothers womb, and a spiritual part - that's the part that God brings to birth by the work of His Holy Spirit. Think of it like this , when a storm blows up you can't see the wind. It is invisible, but you can see the effect of the wind as it uproots trees and blows down fences. Even though you can't see it you can see its power at work. The Holy Spirit is like that. You can't see Him, but you can see where He has been. He leaves evidence wherever He goes. You dont know where the wind comes from or where its going ; only God knows that. It's the same with the Spirit, and if your spirit is brought to birth by God then He is in control of it. If you allow Him to breathe His breath into you you will start to live with His life. '
I was starting to struggle with all of this. It was difficult to understand. It sounded as though it ought to make sense, but in all my years of learning the Torah I had never heard anything like this. I muttered something like ' Im not sure Im grasping this really'
Jesus said ' Im talking about things I know to be true by experience. My disciples and I have witnessed the Spirit of God moving in the way I have described to bring life and healing and the transformation of spiritual birth over and over again. But if you don't believe what Im telling you about what has been happening here and now, in Jerusalem how are you going to believe me when I start talking about what is happening in the heavenly realms? Nobody has been up to heaven to see what is going on there, but I have come down from heaven and have always been there because i am the Son of Man. So I can speak of heavenly things. Do you remember when Moses lifted up the snake on a pole in the desert? When the people looked at the snake they were healed of all their diseases. That was just a pre-cursor, a taster, a hint of what God really wanted to do. He wants to lift me up on a pole so that people can look at me and receive so much more than just physical healing. God loves everyone so much , SO much, that He is prepared to sacrifice His only son so that anyone who looks up at him on that pole and believes in his sacrifice will receive eternal life. You have to believe me, God isn't out to punish people for not following all the rules, His greatest desire is that every single one should be rescued. And all you have to do is believe it! Believe that God has sent His son. If you don't believe then you are condemning yourself because you are refusing to acknowledge that light has come into the world. Who would rather love darkness than light? Sadly there are some who fear that if they come into the light their shortcomings and sins will be made evident. But by hiding in fear of condemnation they are already condemned. People who come out of their darkness and stand in the light, ready to be seen for who they really are, warts and all, they are being truthful. And truthfulness is an attribute of God. '
I was starting to understand. We continued to talk late into the night and I discovered that Jesus was a funny, warm, sharp and brilliant man who talked about God with a passion I had never heard before. By the end of the night I was pretty convinced that He was who He said He was. And I was hungry for some of this spiritual awakening, rebirth, whatever it was that He was talking about. Little did I know that I would only come to a full understanding of all of these things on the Day of Pentecost three years later. In an upper room. Right here in Jerusalem.
I'd been aware of his activity for several weeks and had been intrigued by the stories I was hearing of poor people being healed, demoniacs being delivered, strange sermons being preached..... I had also heard about him storming into the temple the week before and turning over the tables, causing a complete riot and injuring several moneylenders in the process. I couldn't work out quite what was going on with this Rabbi, if indeed he was a Rabbi. The people seemed to love him, but my colleagues in the Sanhedrin and the council were deeply suspicious of everything he was doing. There was talk that he might be planning a revolution, a political uprising. Many of the Pharisees were convinced that his teachings were blasphemy and several of my friends had confronted him about healing on the sabbath and not following the correct washing practices before eating. But he apparently always had a clever answer. He had not made any friends among the religious leaders in Jerusalem - but I couldn't help but be fascinated by him. From my reading of the scriptures I understood that there was a promised Messiah coming who would turn the established order on its head. And this Jesus certainly seemed to fit that bill.
Moreover, I could not agree with my colleagues who asserted that the miracles Jesus was apparently doing were being done by Satan. All the stories I had heard were of people being set free, made well, given life, restored to work and purpose. These things didn't sound like the work of the devil. They smacked very much of the hand of God to me. After weeks of wondering who this Jesus was, I finally decided to go and find out for myself. I went to see him
Coward that I am, I decided that it would be too risky for me to be seen with him in public. So I found out where he was staying and one evening, after sunset, I made my way in the dark to the house where he and his friends were sitting on the roof terrace having their evening meal. I apologised for interrupting and he graciously invited me to join them. I sat down at the table and Jesus asked me what he could do for me. I suddenly felt a little foolish. The words I had rehearsed in my head on the way there disappeared and I struggled to string a sentence together.
'Errr, well, ummm, thank you for agreeing to see me ' I stuttered ' Very kind of you. I, um, well, I was just wondering..... I know that you are a teacher who has been sent by God because nobody could do the things you have been doing unless God was with him, but I was wondering if perhaps you are more than a teacher. People are saying you are the prophet Elijah, some are saying you are the Messiah......'
Jesus looked at me with a serious expression on his face. He was a bit younger than me, an ordinary looking man with a friendly face. He spoke with the accent of the common people. His hands were large and work worn. But when he fixed me with that look I felt as though I was about to hear something of cosmic importance. I felt like a young disciple at the feet of an esteemed Rabbi. It made me very uncomfortable indeed.
' Ah Nicodemus,' he said ' you don't get it. You think that you can understand spiritual things when your spirit isn't even alive. In order to understand you need to experience a second birth, a different sort of birth. ' He had lost me. I didn't understand what he was on about. I said ' What? What do you mean a second birth? I can't go back to being a baby and be born a second time. Impossible.'
Jesus sighed. Then he smiled and said ' You call yourself a teacher of the law and you dont even understand the basics! Listen, you are made up of a physical part - that part which was born as a baby from your mothers womb, and a spiritual part - that's the part that God brings to birth by the work of His Holy Spirit. Think of it like this , when a storm blows up you can't see the wind. It is invisible, but you can see the effect of the wind as it uproots trees and blows down fences. Even though you can't see it you can see its power at work. The Holy Spirit is like that. You can't see Him, but you can see where He has been. He leaves evidence wherever He goes. You dont know where the wind comes from or where its going ; only God knows that. It's the same with the Spirit, and if your spirit is brought to birth by God then He is in control of it. If you allow Him to breathe His breath into you you will start to live with His life. '
I was starting to struggle with all of this. It was difficult to understand. It sounded as though it ought to make sense, but in all my years of learning the Torah I had never heard anything like this. I muttered something like ' Im not sure Im grasping this really'
Jesus said ' Im talking about things I know to be true by experience. My disciples and I have witnessed the Spirit of God moving in the way I have described to bring life and healing and the transformation of spiritual birth over and over again. But if you don't believe what Im telling you about what has been happening here and now, in Jerusalem how are you going to believe me when I start talking about what is happening in the heavenly realms? Nobody has been up to heaven to see what is going on there, but I have come down from heaven and have always been there because i am the Son of Man. So I can speak of heavenly things. Do you remember when Moses lifted up the snake on a pole in the desert? When the people looked at the snake they were healed of all their diseases. That was just a pre-cursor, a taster, a hint of what God really wanted to do. He wants to lift me up on a pole so that people can look at me and receive so much more than just physical healing. God loves everyone so much , SO much, that He is prepared to sacrifice His only son so that anyone who looks up at him on that pole and believes in his sacrifice will receive eternal life. You have to believe me, God isn't out to punish people for not following all the rules, His greatest desire is that every single one should be rescued. And all you have to do is believe it! Believe that God has sent His son. If you don't believe then you are condemning yourself because you are refusing to acknowledge that light has come into the world. Who would rather love darkness than light? Sadly there are some who fear that if they come into the light their shortcomings and sins will be made evident. But by hiding in fear of condemnation they are already condemned. People who come out of their darkness and stand in the light, ready to be seen for who they really are, warts and all, they are being truthful. And truthfulness is an attribute of God. '
I was starting to understand. We continued to talk late into the night and I discovered that Jesus was a funny, warm, sharp and brilliant man who talked about God with a passion I had never heard before. By the end of the night I was pretty convinced that He was who He said He was. And I was hungry for some of this spiritual awakening, rebirth, whatever it was that He was talking about. Little did I know that I would only come to a full understanding of all of these things on the Day of Pentecost three years later. In an upper room. Right here in Jerusalem.
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