Matt Sturtevant and Brett DeFries

MS:

Imagine what was going through his head as he scuffled through the streets on the way to see Jesus.  His eyes were continually darting back and forth as he watched for anyone that might see him out this late.  After all, this was Nicodemus, one of the Pharisees, one of the rich, powerful, visible members of the ruling religious council.

It was one thing to move a little closer to Jesus as he preached in the temple or as he performed signs and wonders.  Or even if he asked him questions out in the open.  It could be explained as research – to see whether or not this man was following the law as he appeared in the temple.  After all, that is one of the duties of the Sanhedrin, to which he belonged.  But it was something completely different to be sneaking around in the dark, meeting with this Jesus in secret.  But this was the best time to see him, so he could really ask what he needed to ask, when Jesus was not surrounded by so many followers and onlookers.

Nicodemus had to come.  He had to see this man that intrigued him so much.  The signs that he had performed were amazing.  This man had to be from God.  Maybe it was just an idle curiosity, but the attraction seemed greater than that.  He had to meet the man himself.  So he slipped through the streets in the dark, seeking the place where Jesus stayed.  Until he found what he was looking for…that night and for his whole life.

John 3: 1-21 tells the story of this man, Nicodemus and his conversation with Jesus.  The step that he took might have endangered his reputation, his livelihood, maybe even his life.  Now I bet some of you are testing those memory banks, wondering if you have heard the story of Nicodemus before.  Maybe it would have helped if I started not with verse one, but verse 16…For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever believes in him will not perish, but will have everlasting life.  Words that have changed countless lives since Nicodemus’.  Words that have a greater meaning when set in context of this late night conversation with Nicodemus, as Jesus teaches him about the difference between the law that he and the Pharisees defend and the relationship he calls for.  Stepping back, we see that the whole passage is filled with profound teachings and complex ideas, capped off by the powerful verse 16…

I have stolen the title of my sermon today from my college preaching professor, Greg Earwood, who preached a sermon one Sunday morning about Nicodemus and his night visit to Jesus.  Or, for short, Nic at Nite.

I must confess I do not remember much about the rest of the sermon but there is something about the title that has stuck with me for a decade or so.

Maybe it is because I grew up on Nick at Nite…the prime time lineup of shows that the kid’s network Nickelodeon would always show.  It was my first introduction to shows like Dick Van Dyke and Mary Tyler Moore…Mr. Ed and My Three Sons.  While I am not sure if this is not the connection that Dr. Earwood made, for me, the conversation that Jesus has with Nicodemus in John 3 is a lot like some of these old sitcoms.  Of course John may or may not have had a sense of humor about the way that he narrated the exchange, but for me, the whole conversation is filled with irony and puns, kind of like the old Police Squad sitcom, better known through the Naked Gun movies, or the old movie, Airplane.  In all of these spoofs, there are tons of double meanings and puns.  You know what I mean:

Surely you can’t be serious.

I am serious…and don’t call me Shirley.

Or this exchange from the movie Airplane…

Captain, how soon can you land?

I can’t tell.

You can tell me, I’m a doctor.

No. I mean I’m just not sure.

Well, can’t you take a guess?

Well, not for another two hours.

You can’t take a guess for another two hours?

The comedy of the dialogue comes from the double meanings.  Of course, if you didn’t know the language, the irony wouldn’t make sense.  It is the same with John 3.  The more I find out about the original language that the story of Nicodemus was written in, the more I get the irony.

Take for example the Greek word pnuema.  It means both wind and spirit.  So when Jesus talks to Nicodemus about the spirit acting like the wind, blowing where it will, not under our control, Nic must have caught the double meaning.

And when he talked about the son of man being “raised up”, I wonder if he knew that he meant both exalted and praised, as well as lifted up onto the cross.  As John wrote it, after Jesus’ death, surely he meant both.

But the most complex double meaning – and the one that Nicodemus and translators since had trouble understanding – is the Greek word “anothen”.  It is translated either “again” as in born again or “from above” as in born from above.  Both translations are correct and crucial to what Jesus is trying to say.  Hence the irony.  But why was it difficult for Nic to grasp…surely he understood the language.  What made it so difficult to understand or accept?  Scripture does not tell us his inner thoughts, so we are left to humbly question what went through his mind…

BD:

            With a law for every circumstance, I had the assurance of always knowing exactly what to do.  The Sabbath never saw me tie a knot.  What good Jew would do such work on such a holy day, the day even God grows tired.  But being a good Jew required nothing of my spirit; no particular belief.  It was simply a convenient guarantee that I was doing the will of God, however distant God may be from the law itself. 

            This is the way I liked it.  To follow laws is one thing, but to commit my entire being and reshape my entire conception of religion is quite another story.  I was comfortable as a Jew, I could please God this way without surrendering my inner-life, without exposing my soul like a cracked melon.   

            I had heard Jesus preach, I had seen him heal the scarred, had seen him lift the hopeless brows of men and women.  He told them to love the Lord with all their heart, with all their soul, and with all their mind.  He told them to love their neighbor as themselves.  These were his laws, his commandments.

Different?  Yes, but inconsistent?  I can't see how.

            I wanted to know more.  What I heard was compelling, but also difficult and unclear.  Listening to him from a distance was safe but insufficient.  I had seen and heard enough to convince me that he was somehow from God, but what was the meaning of all that he said?  I had to speak with this teacher myself.  I found him one night after he had left the crowds and the other Pharisees were asleep or studying.  What he said was alarming.  I said that I was sure he must be from God and he told me I had to be born from above. 

            Don't get me wrong.  I understood the metaphor.  The notion of rebirth is not foreign to Jewish doctrine.  All Jewish converts are said to be born again, I even know of one man who converted and later married his sister with the blessing of Jewish leaders. He was born again, a child of the church, not of his mother, and therefore was no longer the brother of his new wife.  I understood what Jesus said, I just couldn't accept how it could happen.  He said we had to believe in him, in God's son, who was sent to save people from their sins. 

            Jesus left after saying these things, and I was left more uncertain than when I arrived.  I still was still concerned about Jesus' new commandments.  I found them to be true, but there was no law, no compass to determine how to love our neighbors as ourselves, or how to love God with all our heart soul and mind.  What is to be my guide?  What do I mean if I say I believe in him?  These were my questions, and I know of many who had the similar ones.  I heard people say that they didn't need naive and sentimental appeals to love and kindness; they needed answers.  One man would say, don't tell me to love, tell me how to love.  I need the answer for each circumstance.  If two of my friends are quarrelling, and they both have good reasons for feeling betrayed and are both looking to me for solace, whatever I choose I will be loving one neighbor and betraying the other.  If I say nothing, am I not betraying both? 

            Suddenly, though, this question began to provide its own answer.  Would not the law also fail me in one way or another?  No human ethic can help me here.  No circumstantial law can provide an answer in a moral situation so stacked with variables, with feelings, with insecurities.  What law can maintain a fidelity to such complex dilemmas?   What is to be my guide?

            As Jesus was being tried, if one can call a hearing of such focused and fearful hate a trial, I told the Pharisees that we should at least hear Jesus' defense, but I did nothing.  I read the Jewish law, again and again.  The law had been a balm, a consistent answer, but it was failing me, and it could not answer this question of why a Man of such divine likeness could be killed for nothing more than a radical ethic of love. 

            Maybe I should have done something; Perhaps I would have believed by now, if he still was alive,  but I'm thinking this on the way to his tomb, to give him a Jewish burial; a burial which may end my career, for I am burying a heretic; a Teacher; A man who may have been my God.

MS:

What does it mean to believe?

What then is to be my guide?

We hear in Nicodemus’ words the frustration.  He had for so long been able to rely on certain things, be secure in certain realities.  The Torah.  The law.  The commandments.  That is how God spoke to us.  But now this Jesus is throwing those realities into question.

And in the end, we are not that different from Nicodemus, are we?  As individuals and as a church, we are used to a certain way of doing things.  And it is not as if those ways, those realities, are wrong in and of themselves.  But Jesus warns us, as he warned Nicodemus, that we are not to rely upon our habits and traditions, but to rely on the relationship.

That is what he must have meant when he talked about the Spirit and the wind.  Neither are predicable, controllable, habitual.  And so in our lives, following the lead of the Spirit is not a mechanical, static process, but a dynamic one.  And so we ask, like Nicodemus might have wondered, “when our traditions and our understanding about the way the world works is gone, what will be my guide?”

Just talk to those young adults who are maturing in their faith, who are realizing that the old Sunday school answers don’t always fit like they used to.  Just talk to those who are grieving today the loss of a loved one, and are wondering if the world will ever make sense again.  Just talk to many of us here today who for the first time in 25 years are worshipping without Jane and Bill Anderson as worship guides and leaders here at First Baptist.  Like Nicodemus, we ask, “when our assumptions are challenged, when our reality has changed, when our paradigm has shifted without asking us, what will be my guide?”

That is what he must have meant in vs. 16 when he talked about God giving us his son, in whom to believe.  He could have given us a 10 Commandments, 2.0…and update.  But instead of another set of laws, he gave us himself in human form.  That is how we respond when the anchor that holds us is gone.  We remind ourselves that it is our relationship with Christ that is our true anchor.  He will be our guide.

That is what he must have meant when he used that word “anothen”.  Born again and born from above.  For us to really understand, we must use both English translations.

For to be born anothen is to be born from above – to see the world as God sees the world, to see people as God sees them.  To see with what Robert Lupton calls “kingdom eyes”.  No longer is it our priorities, our assumptions, our understandings, but we ask God to replace them with his persepective…from above.

But to be born anothen is also to be born again.  To have a changed and new life.  But that is not always a one-time affair.  Actually, I am disappointed when it is.  I shudder when I hear people talk about being born again as a one time event...like they are saying, “jump in the pool; the water’s great”.  The problem is when that’s all there is, and everyone is just bobbing around in the pool.  For me, to be born again is a repeatable event.  More like a mountain climber than a swimming pool: always stretching, always moving, always seeking.  So then, to be born again is something that happens again and again, as our relationship with Christ grows and stretches.  There are major benchmarks along the way (BOM…their benchmark moments).  But being born “anothen” is something that God calls us to yearly, weekly, daily.

So today we sit in the dimness with Jesus and Nicodemus.  There are parts of our lives that are unraveling and we think we must redouble our efforts to regain control.  But Jesus tells us to let the Spirit blow.  So let us release our grip on what we feel must take place and allow ourselves to be born again, with eyes from above.