The story of Nicodemus is one of the best known stories of the Bible, and it comes to a close with one of the most often quoted passages in the Bible, John 3:16: “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16). It is so popular that people often wave posters with “John 3:16” written on them at major sporting events.
What we have in this story is a major religious leader of Israel coming to Jesus under cover of darkness. He cannot afford to have his colleagues know that he is making contact with Jesus or he will lose his place as a religious leader of Israel. We know that many other religious leaders secretly believed in Jesus as well, for John tells us: “Yet at the same time many even among the leaders believed in him. But because of the Pharisees they would not confess their faith for fear they would be put out of the synagogue; for they loved praise from men more than praise from God” (John 12:42). They did not have the freedom to speak their minds about what they really believed for fear of being condemned by their self-righteous cohorts who thought they knew exactly what everyone should believe.
Nicodemus begins by saying to Jesus, “Rabbi, we know you are a teacher who has come from God. For no one could perform the miraculous signs you are doing if God were not with him” (John 3:2). You have the feeling that he is about to ask Jesus a question, or several questions. But Jesus cuts to the chase and gives him a central truth that he seems to have missed, by saying, “I tell you the truth, no one can see the kingdom of God unless he is born again” (John 3:3). We know from the conversation that this thought has never entered Nicodemus’ mind. “How can this be?” he wants to know. He asks how you can go back in your mother’s womb. He interpreted Jesus’ words the way he interpreted Scripture: literally. Literalism usually turns Scripture into nonsense. The statement makes no sense to him. Nicodemus, like so many of the other religious leaders, had a template that he placed on the Scriptures, and anything that did not fit that template was disregarded. Thus, they missed much of what the Old Testament was really saying, in spite of all their study. And here I could go into great detail about the many ways that Jesus unpacked the Old Testament in ways that confounded the Pharisees and contradicted their many traditions — but that would take much more time than we have.
Nicodemus came to Jesus confused. Jesus did not fit the mold. He was not your typical rabbi. And he certainly was not what they thought the Messiah would be like, but for Nicodemus, the miracles that Jesus performed were undeniable. Pharisees like Nicodemus thought of the faith as a list doctrines to be believed and rules that must be meticulously followed. These rules were exhaustively studied, added to and redefined so that no one could actually keep them all. In order to pretend to keep them, there was an elaborate system of bypassing the laws that the Pharisees had developed. This is always the problem with legalism. It always results in hypocrisy which applies the biblical laws with special strictness to others and excuses oneself. It strains at a gnat and swallows a camel. It is critical, judgmental and narrow-minded. It picks at the speck in other’s eyes, and misses the timber in its own. It condemns breaking the Sabbath while it plots murder. It has a twisted way of missing the real point while feeling quite superior. At the same time, it elevates oneself while condemning others.
Jesus goes right to the real point so that Nicodemus cannot avoid it. Nicodemus thought he had everything figured out, so when Jesus introduced a new idea at him, it threw him. Jesus talked of being born again — a spiritual rebirth which results in a radical redirection of a person’s life and perspective. This rebirth results in a reorientation of a person’s life that produces a new relationship with God. Someone has called it “The explosive power of a new affection.” It places the center piece of religion on how one relates to God and presents a righteousness that comes from God, rather than the result of one’s personal effort and achievement. It is a righteousness that comes by faith, not legalistic obedience.
When another religious leader came to Jesus, he asked Jesus what the most important law in Scripture was. Quoting the Old Testament, Jesus replied, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself’” (Matthew 22:37-39; Deuteronomy 6:5). Jesus was trying to explain to him that faith was not about believing the right things or obeying religious rules, as much as it was about a right relationship with God and others. He was explaining that genuine faith is about living a life of love for God and people. And this can only happen when a spiritual birth takes place that redirects our love and commitment away from ourselves and toward God and others. This is true holiness.
I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately. I asked myself a few questions. How do we become a part of the Kingdom of God? How can we know that we belong to God and are going to heaven? Do we get to heaven because of good moral behavior? We know that this is not possible, for the Bible says, “There is no one righteous, not even one” (Romans 3:10). It says, “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23). How then do we become right with God? Is it through believing the right things and having all the right doctrine? No, for the Bible says, “there is no one who understands” (Romans 3:11). No one will go to heaven because they have done all the right things or believed all the right things. None of us will go into heaven with perfect behavior or perfect theology.
We often talk about absolute truth. Absolute truth exists, but it exists only in the mind of God. The prophet Isaiah speaks for God saying, “‘For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,’ declares the Lord. ‘As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts’” (Isaiah 55:8-9). Instead of absolute truth, maybe we should use the biblical term “revelation,” or “revealed” truth. God has revealed some of his truth in the Scriptures, but because of our fallen nature, none of us can have a perfect grasp on it all.
It is interesting that it took the church nearly 400 years to come to some understanding of who Jesus was and to develop the doctrine of the Trinity. There were also questions about who the Holy Spirit was and what role he played. It was not until the church met at the Council of Nicea in 325 that all this was hammered out in the statement that we now have as the Nicene Creed. Even then, considerable debate and controversy continued, and another Council at Constantinople had to be called to reaffirm the Nicene Creed in 381. The question is, “What about all those Christians in between the time of Christ and the Council of Nicea?” There was a lot of confusion and misunderstanding about the true nature of Christ and how he fit into the Godhead. Many sincere Christians who tried to understand the nature of Christ and the Holy Spirit would be seen as heretics by some, but they were genuinely trying to understand, even though they understood imperfectly. They still loved God with all their hearts. Were they outside of the Kingdom because they did not have their thinking exactly right at every point?
So how do we come into the Kingdom of God, if it is not through perfect moral obedience or correct belief? It is through humility. It is through throwing ourselves at the mercy of God. It is through loving God and others, while realizing we do not have it all together and we don’t have all the answers. We are trying our best, but in our fallen state even our best is far from perfect. Paul wrote: “So we, too, have put our faith in Christ Jesus that we may be justified by faith in Christ and not by observing the law, because by observing the law no one will be justified” (Galatians 2:16). We are made fit for the kingdom by asking for God’s forgiveness and seeking his grace. It is by living humbly before God and others. This is what the Bible teaches, for it says, “He has showed you, O man, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God” (Micah 6:8). It is in living in this humility that we find God’s forgiveness and experience spiritual rebirth.
Robin Meyers, in his book Morning Sun on a White Piano, quotes theologian Ernest Campbell who summarizes the ministry of Jesus with these words: “A reforming Jew, convinced that the people had turned love into legalism, [Jesus] went about asking those people who thought they were ‘in’ (Pharisees, Sadducees, and other officially religious people), ‘Are you sure you’re in? . . .I know you think you re in, but are you sure you re in?’ And to those who thought they were ‘out’ (widows, tax collectors, prostitutes, the sick and dispossessed, and other officially irreligious people), he asked, ‘Are you sure you re out? . . .I know you think you’re out, but are you sure you re out?’” Meyers goes on to say, “His ministry was one of constant and unbridled compassion, and his parables made the point again and again: our thoughts are not God s thoughts, even on our best days.”
Nicodemus knew the Scripture, in fact, as a Pharisee, he most likely had the entire Old Testament memorized. He knew the Scriptures and was a very moral person. As far as moral goodness and biblical beliefs, he was, by all counts, “in.” But there was something more important that he needed. He did not need a more correct belief system, nor did he need to observe new moral truths. He needed an inner transformation. He needed to give up his self righteousness and receive the righteousness that comes from God.
The apostle Paul wrote: “For in the gospel a righteousness from God is revealed, a righteousness that is by faith from first to last, just as it is written: ‘The righteous will live by faith’” (Romans 1:17). Paul outlined the problem of the Pharisees, a group that he was once a part of, by saying, “Since they did not know the righteousness that comes from God and sought to establish their own, they did not submit to God’s righteousness” (Romans 10:3). Paul had tried to be perfect in legalistic righteousness and correct beliefs, but he knew better than anyone that it did not work. He was always aware that he did not measure up. In the book of Philippians he lists all the things that he could have pointed to, as far as what could be credited to him as personal righteousness, and then he wrote about his achievements saying, “I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ — the righteousness that comes from God and is by faith. I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection from the dead” (Philippians 3:8-10). Paul had passed from formal religion to a relationship with God.
It is interesting how he changed. Before Paul met Christ he was beating people who did not think like he did and throwing them into prison. But that all changed. I think of the time that Paul went to Athens to the Areopagus which was surrounded with the statues of all the Greek gods. As he went there, it says, “While Paul was waiting for them in Athens, he was greatly distressed to see that the city was full of idols” (Acts 17:16). But he did not wade in condemning those who believed in all these idols. He did not tell them how wrong and stupid they were. He did not talk down to them. Instead, he found an idol which had the inscription: “To an unknown god.” He began by complimenting them. He said, “Men of Athens! I see that in every way you are very religious. For as I walked around and looked carefully at your objects of worship, I even found an altar with this inscription: TO AN UNKNOWN GOD. Now what you worship as something unknown I am going to proclaim to you” (Acts 17:22-23). How gracious of Paul. He looked for something in their culture that he could use as common ground. He did not condemn them for worshiping the unknown god, he said that what they had been worshiping the whole time was actually the true God of the universe without knowing it. God had planted, in their hearts, a desire to know the true God, as he does with all people in all places — even people worshiping other gods and practicing other religions. Were they misguided? To be sure. But if Paul had gone in with guns blazing there would have been no one who would have come to a saving knowledge of Christ. He spoke the truth, but he spoke the truth in humility, love and compassion. He never compromised, but he spoke with intelligence and understanding of where they were. He did not convince everyone, but the Bible says, “A few men became followers of Paul and believed. Among them was Dionysius, a member of the Areopagus, also a woman named Damaris, and a number of others” (Acts 17:34). If he had only come with words of judgment, no one would have believed.
Shouldn’t this be how we approach other people? Shouldn’t this be how we live with each other? Shouldn’t mercy and grace make us more tolerant, not less? Do we all have to think exactly alike before we can love and accept each other? Shouldn’t there be freedom to think, even if it isn’t the way we are used to everyone thinking? Do we have to fix everybody, or can we trust that God is working in ways that we may not be aware? Let’s let the Holy Spirit do what only the Holy Spirit can do: convict people of sin and convince them of the truth. We can present moral and biblical truth, but we cannot convince anyone. It was a great relief to me when I realized that as a pastor. What benefit is there to rejecting people who are different from us? I think the devil loves it when we attack certain groups of sinners. Should we be making them think there is no hope for them, or should we be holding out the hope of the Gospel? Why are their sins worse than our sins? I think the devil loves it when we attack other religions as though no one in that religious group could possibly be seeking the true God and father of our Lord Jesus Christ. I think the devil loves it when we waste our time attacking Harry Potter, the Teletubbies and Sponge Bob Square Pants, as some of our religious leaders have done. Shouldn’t we instead be concentrating on holding out the hope of the Gospel for people who are desperately in need of real life and a relationship with God? When Jesus talked with Nicodemus, he did not berate him for being a coward. Nicodemus knew that he was loved, and Christ held out to him the possibility of something he had never dreamed of. He moved him beyond the letter of the law to the possibility of a relationship with God that had to that point eluded him.
The late Henri Nouwen, a great theologian and priest, retells an old story in his famous book, The Wounded Healer: “One day a young fugitive, trying to hide himself from the enemy, entered a small village. The people were kind to him and offered him a place to stay. But when the soldiers who sought the fugitive came and asked where he was hiding, everyone became very fearful. The soldiers threatened to burn the village and kill every man in it unless the fugitive was handed over to them before dawn. The people went to the pastor and asked him what to do. The pastor, torn between handing the young man over to the enemy or having the people killed, withdrew to his room and read his Bible, hoping to find an answer before dawn. After many hours, in the early morning, his eyes fell on these words: ‘It is better that one man dies than the whole people be lost.’ Then the pastor closed the Bible, called the soldiers and told them where the young fugitive was hidden. And after the soldiers led the prisoner away to be killed, there was a great feast in the village because the pastor had saved the lives of the people. But the pastor did not celebrate. Overcome with a deep sadness he remained in his room. That night an angel came to him and asked, ‘What have you done?’ The pastor said, ‘I handed over the fugitive to the enemy.’ Then the angel said, ‘But don’t you know that you have handed over the Messiah?’ ‘How could I know?’ the pastor replied anxiously. Then the angel said, ‘If instead of reading your Bible, you had visited this young man just once and looked into his eyes, you would have known.’”
“For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him” (John 3:17).
Rodney J. Buchanan
June 10, 2007
Mulberry St. UMC
Mount Vernon, OH
www.MulberryUMC.org
Rod.Buchanan@MulberryUMC.org
