Two men standing in a garden to talk; so much alike and yet so different. Two men, with much on their minds, with eternal issues at stake, and yet with very human concerns too. Two men, very different and yet brothers, much the same.
Two men standing in a garden to take one another’s measure. The one a ruler of the people, a Pharisee, well placed, privileged, to the manor born, now maybe a little uptight because something could challenge that privilege. The other a man of the people, not their ruler, but a peasant, a villager, a stranger to the council chambers. Yet relaxed, confident, ready to respond to the occasion. Two men of different backgrounds, yet so much alike.
Two men groping to glimpse one another’s faces. The one having insisted on a night-time meeting, afraid that his presence might be misinterpreted, fearful that his colleagues might think he had gone over to the rabble, uptight about his reputation. The other speaking of himself as a child of the light, not of darkness, speaking gravely of those who loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.
Two men with differing angles on the human heart, yet both with the knowledge that that heart can be deceitful above all things.
Two men with roots in authority and with a history of power. The one elected by his peers to a seat on the Sanhedrin, considered able to judge and to decide what was best for the masses, but now growing apprehensive, uptight that something was afoot that could change the balance of power. The other of whom it was said that all things were made through him, and without him was not anything made that was made. Two men looking at the trappings of authority in quite contrasting ways, yet both with a knowledge of its meaning.
Two men named as teachers, rabbis, interpreters of God’s word. The one now anxious, uptight that what he has learned in books is being called into question by one who has apparently read few if any of the prescribed books. The other described by his biographer as that very Word made flesh, dwelling among us, pitching his tent on our front yards. Two teachers, differing in the ways they derived their truths, but alike in their reverence for the truth that comes from God.
Two men born as all men are, gestating in a mother’ s womb, nestling beneath her heart, coming into the world as squalling, tiny, fragile things. The one, however, now puzzled, curious, and maybe a little uptight that he should be told that he must go through it all again and be born anew. "How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born?" Curious, cryptic, threatening words. But the other, born of woman but not of man, born of the spirit but not of human will, born into history but coming from beyond history. Two men of different parentage and different origin, but nevertheless alike, flesh and blood, human.
Two men thinking out loud about the things of God, pitting against one another their discernment of the ways of the Eternal one. The one counting on the dependability of God, the predictability of the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; believing that what the fathers had seen was all there was to see, and frightened, offended, certainly uptight at the suggestion that there might be a breakthrough beyond that.
Ah, but the other … the other … the other man speaking of the breadth and length and height and depth of the Spirit of God, how that Spirit may blow wherever it will and may blow some fresh breeze into the stony cold heart of a man.
Two believers with sharply divided perspectives on the ways of God, yet sharing a common reverence for the God who acts in human history and who made known His ways unto Moses, His deeds unto the children of Israel.
Two men. How different, and yet how much the same. The one uptight because the other threatened the neat workability of his world. The other launching out into a journey that would climax in rejection and suffering, agony and death, yet wonderfully and strangely collected. Two men. How different, and yet how much the same.
How much Nicodemus needed Jesus he did not know at the time, though we are led to believe that the day came when he became a more open follower of his late night companion. But Nicodemus needed Jesus because Jesus showed him what it is to be authentically human, what it is to get past the uptightness and the insecurity of ordinary life. Nicodemus needed Jesus the Son of Man.
The New Testament uses the title "Son of Man" in several different ways when it applies it to Jesus. But one of the key things this title says to us is that this Jesus is authentically human, that He is as much like us as He is unlike us. As this morning we celebrated His strength as Son of God, providing power and lifting up crystal clear standards and directions, now this evening we celebrate His apparent weakness as Son of Man.
I say His apparent weakness: here He lies in yonder stall; in a manger is the Lord of all. Wonder of wonders, that He who was before all worlds, whom the heavens cannot contain and whom time cannot measure … wonder of wonders, that He should take on mortal flesh, infant flesh, packaged in six or seven soft pounds.
But what all this means is what challenged Nicodemus so much and what challenges us so much. He is Son of Man. He is truly human. He is authentically human. He is God’s demonstration package, wrapped up in swaddling clothes, set to grow and develop and learn and become, so that we could find in Him something to measure ourselves by.
When we are uptight, sometimes it is because we, like Nicodemus, think our status is threatened. We think the world is out to get us. We suspect somebody wants to put us down.
But when we sit in the garden and speak with the Son of Man, real humanity, life as it was intended to be, we find out that in Him we are accepted, in Him we are affirmed, and we do not have to fear. God accepts us. God loves us. And what does it matter if somebody else has a problem with us?
The Son of Man shows us how to accept ourselves.
Or if we are uptight and anxious, sometimes it is because we, like Nicodemus, imagine that everything we have known, all the skills we have accumulated, all the powers we have honed … that it will all become obsolete and useless. If you want to see some anxious, scared, uptight people, just go to the Rust Belt and the manufacturing plants where computers and robots have been prepared to perform things human beings used to do. It’s natural to be uptight if you think that you are an antique, a museum piece, about to gather dust on the shelf.
But the Son of Man, that real human being named Jesus of Nazareth, lives to speak to us in the dark night of the soul and to assure us that there is new truth, there is new knowledge, that we are still going to be useful, that we are cared for by a loving Father. As an authentic human, as Son of Man, He shows us how to live on the edge of a new world and to wait for it, to wait in trust of what the Father will bring.
On this silent night, we, like Nicodemus may bring Christ a host of questions along with our answers. We may bring a whole lot of doubt along with our faith. But because He is Son of Man, because His life is lived alongside our lives and His breath breathed into our nostrils, because, though divine, He is also bone of our bone and flesh of our flesh … we can take heart.
We can take heart because He shows us that life can be lived without insecurity and uptightness.
We can take heart because the Son of Man demonstrates that fellowship with the Living God gives us power and provides us hope and peace.
We can and do take heart because as Son of Man He takes our frailness and our imperfection and says, "Yes" to us. He says "Yes" and tells us it’s all right to be incomplete: just keep on growing, keep on becoming.
We take heart because the Son of Man is lifted up, so that whoever believes in him may have eternal life. We take heart because God so loved the world … and us … that He gave His only Son, Son of God and Son of Man, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have, right here, right now, eternal life.
We take heart as brothers and sisters of the Son of Man.
