Today’s sermon has been prepared by Pastor Richard Schwedes of the St Paul's Lutheran Church Sydney for us.
It is based on the Gospel reading of John 3:14-21.
If you ever thought you were confident that you know everything that you need to know about God, then I have a story for you.
My name is Niccodemus.
I thought I really knew God.
I had diligently studied the writings of what many of you know as the Old Testament. In fact, I can recite not just a verse or two, but many chapters. I was pretty sure I knew what God expected and how he operated. You see, I was part of a special group of people called a Pharissee. Now we are special people, set apart to know and help others know about what God expects. We had the nick name, ‘experts in the law’ because if anyone needed to know about God and His law they would come to us. And even if they didn’t come to us, we would go to them and let them clearly know what God expected of them.
But on one dark night all this changed.
I had heard about this character Jesus. Jesus had come along out of nowhere, but His reputation was growing. He had been at a wedding that had run out of wine, and He turned the water that was supposed to be used for some ceremonial washing into wine. Who wouldn’t want to know this man?
But He had also upset the local traders at the temple, and at the same time had made some outlandish claims that he was going to destroy the temple, which by the way had been under construction for 46 years, then he had the audacity to say He would rebuild it in 3 days. Then there were the many signs and wonders He performed around the country. No wonder there was a small group of people following him.
But what really intrigued me was how much He knew about God, yet he wasn’t part of any Pharisee team. In fact. He wasn’t part of any respectable group we knew about. Some of my colleagues were very suspicious of Him, they felt He could be a threat to the way we go about life, how we understand God and how much people held us in high regard, even though many of them didn’t really like us. But I was intrigued, because not only did he do all these things, every time he opened his mouth, His understanding and teaching of God was unbelievable, it was like He been sitting with God for centuries.
So, I decided I had to meet him, but I was also worried what my fellow Pharisees would think. So late one night I went looking for him. Fortunately, I found him and the conversation we had changed how I saw God and my view of all people including those questionable foreigners.
This meeting with Jesus altered my life.
I haven’t got time to tell you everything but let me tell you about some of the important things you need to know.
For a start I knew Jesus knew his stuff, he could easily recall many of the old stories of God at work. For instance, He reminded me of an old story of when our ancestors were bitten by deadly snakes in the desert and were dieing, God instructed Moses to make a figure of a poisonous snake and place it on a pole. And God said to Moses anyone who looks at this snake will not die. And the story goes all who followed this instruction lived.
But Jesus wasn’t all about the past, because then He used this story to give me an insight into the future, He talked about our eternal life. He made this unbelievable claim that just like the snake was lifted up and all who followed God’s instructions to look at it would live, He said that the Son of Man, would be lifted up and all who believed in Him would have eternal life.
Now back then, I didn’t fully understand that he was referring to himself, but I was pretty sure He was referring to the Messiah, the one God had already promised us. And when that terrible day happened, when Jesus was lifted on the cross, this conversation came back to me. I looked at Jesus and thought you are being lifted up, I pray that what is happening to you saves me.
This statement that all who believed in the Son of Man who was lifted up would be save, also rocked how I understood God and how I could obtain life forever with Him.
You see I was a very knowledgeable Pharisee. We had no problems in believing that God was giving us life after death, but we were pretty sure that the only way this was possible, was to perfectly do everything God had said. And because we wanted a lot of our fellow Jews with us, it was our duty to tell everyone what was the right thing to do and remind them if they didn’t do the right thing then they had no possibility of having a good life after death.
However when Jesus said all who believe in the Son of Man who has been lifted up will be saved, my eyes were opened to see that God actually operates differently.
God wasn’t offering us eternal life because we did everything perfectly or we could be great performers, rather He was offering us eternal life if we believed in the One he sent.
This was not the only radical thing Jesus said. Listen to what he said next,
“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. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because they have not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son.”
Until I had this conversation with Jesus, I thought like many other Pharisees, that God only loved Israelites, and perfect Israelites at that.
And not only that, to be truthful I was a little scared of God, thinking that if I ever came face to face with him, then he would more than likely point out all my faults and tell me in a loud condescending voice, I wasn’t good enough for him. However what Jesus had just said reminded me that God was extremely loving. I don’t know why I had forgotten this, in Psalm 107 we are reminded that God’s love endures forever.
And there was something even more remarkable about what Jesus told me that night, that God’s love was for everyone in the world.
It is still ringing in my ears, For God so loved the world. God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world.
This was mind blowing for me at the time. You see I had been used to thinking that God was only interested in helping and saving a small group of people in the world, us Israelites. But now Jesus was saying He not only loved everyone, He would dearly like everyone to be saved….on one hand this makes sense, especially when you consider that God created the entire world, not just apart of it. So why wouldn’t He want to be reconnected with everyone He has been involved in creating. But for my little brain this is going to be a logistical nightmare. Can you imagine heaven? All these different people, with their different food, different tastes in music, different languages, different customs, different personalities. But fortunately, as Jesus highlights, for us to gain eternal life none of this stuff is to be our focus, our focus is to be the Son of Man, which I later discovered was Him.
Now this changed not only how i saw my relationship with God. No longer did I think that God was going to inspect me with a fine tooth comb, looking to reject or punish me, due to any of my flaws or inadequacies. Rather I now see God as someone who is looking to show me love constantly, and to use His love to help me connect and reconnect with Him, especially when I am struggling to do so. It also changed how I related to other people and what I needed them to know. As a Pharisee I was convinced that it was my job to tell people what they were doing wrong and how bad this is, but now after my conversation with Jesus this is no longer my focus. My focus is now to tell people that no matter what, no matter what they have done or failed to do, that God is always loving them. And that all their faults, that would otherwise separate them from God, can be dealt with simply by believing that Jesus’ death on the cross and the empty tomb is enough.
Can I encourage you to do the same?
Can you help people know they are always loved by God?
Now unfortunately not everyone liked Jesus or what He revealed about God. Initially for me I was in that boat, I was so sure of myself and believed I was better than most people, and definitely was convinced that us Israelite Pharisees were the ones God truly loved above everyone else….but after spending some time with Jesus my life and understanding of God changed dramatically. I was no longer burdened by having to perform or even worse by trying to cover up anything I had done wrong because I was worried about being judged, but rather I saw that God really really really loved me.
And that through Jesus I got to experience His unjudging, all embracing love. And I believe everyone needs to know this truth about God, that God is everyone’s loving powerful king who uses His power to love and save…
May you know how much God loves you….
everyday spend a little time with Jesus and your understanding of God will deepen and you will gain a greater appreciation of His love for you.
May you also use your understanding of God and His love to help others see the true God, a God of love, who was prepared to send His only Son Jesus into this world so they could know and benefit from His love. Amen
