Monday, March 12, 2018
There was a
man named Nicodemus, a Jewish religious leader who was a Pharisee. After dark one evening, he came to speak with
Jesus. “Rabbi,” he said, “we all know
that God has sent you to teach us. Your
miraculous signs are evidence that God is with you.” Jesus replied, “I tell you the truth,
unless you are born again, you cannot see the Kingdom of God.” “What do you mean?” exclaimed Nicodemus. “How can an old man go back into his mother’s
womb and be born again?” Jesus replied, “I
assure you, no one can enter the Kingdom of God without being born of water and
the Spirit. Humans can reproduce only
human life, but the Holy Spirit gives birth to spiritual life. So don’t be surprised when I say, ‘You must
be born again.’ The wind blows wherever
it wants. Just as you can hear the wind
but can’t tell where it comes from or where it is going, so you can’t explain
how people are born of the Spirit.” “How
are these things possible?” Nicodemus asked.
Jesus replied, “You are a respected Jewish teacher, and yet you
don’t understand these things? I assure
you, we tell you what we know and have seen, and yet you won’t believe our
testimony. But if you don’t believe me
when I tell you about earthly things, how can you possibly believe if I tell
you about heavenly things? No one has
ever gone to heaven and returned. But
the Son of Man has come down from heaven.
John 3:1-13(NLT)
For a smart man,
Nicodemus had trouble comprehending spiritual issues. That is quite problematic for someone charged
with guiding a nation’s spiritual and moral conscience. Nicodemus was a Pharisee, one of the rulers,
meaning he probably sat on the Sanhedrin, Israel’s ruling council. As such, this important man who came to Jesus
under cover of night (perhaps afraid his colleagues would find out he was
consulting with a simple carpenter) should have recognized what the carpenter
was saying.
The simple
question here is: What was Nicodemus’ disconnect? To be a Pharisee at all Nicodemus would have
had to be highly educated, particularly in the Scriptures. The Pharisees had the strictest moral code,
held the Scriptures in highest priority as God’s Word to be obeyed, and, this
night he opened the conversation with Jesus as an honest, willing-to-learn, open-minded
scholar…or was he?
The ruler seemed
to have a right attitude, except for the fact that he didn’t. He framed his question in the form of
teaching Jesus, rather than presenting himself as one who needed to be taught. He said: we all know you’re from God. He said: you’ve come to teach us. He said (essentially): the evidence – the miracles you do – support
our theis; so, Jesus, I’m here; teach me if you will…I’m waiting.
Now, I’m willing
to admit I’ve made the cardinal sin of reading that last bit into the
text. Considering Nicodemus came to
Jesus at all indicates he probably wasn’t defiant, daring Jesus to teach him –
a learned Pharisee. But attitude
notwithstanding, Nicodemus still got it wrong; Jesus had not come primarily to
be a teacher…rather
he came to be a preacher. He
didn’t come to have a conversation; he came to announce the Kingdom’s arrival
and that salvation was at hand. Notice
Jesus’ first sermon in the synagogue of his home town:
When he came to the village of Nazareth, his boyhood home, he went as
usual to the synagogue on the Sabbath and stood up to read the Scriptures. The scroll of Isaiah the prophet was handed
to him. He unrolled the scroll and found
the place where this was written: “The
Spirit of the Lord is upon me, for he has anointed me to bring Good
News to the poor. He has sent me to
proclaim that captives will be released, that the blind will see, that the
oppressed will be set free, and
that the time of the Lord’s favor has come.” He rolled up the scroll, handed it back to
the attendant, and sat down. All eyes in
the synagogue looked at him intently. Then
he began to speak to them. “The Scripture you’ve just heard has been
fulfilled this very day!” Luke 4:16-21(NLT)
It’s no wonder a
man, deeply trained in Scripture, Theology, Reason, and the Experience of being
immersed in the religious life of God’s people didn’t get it at all when Jesus
said that he had to be born again. Nicodemus was expecting a thesis from the
teacher, along with appropriately detailed discussion; Jesus laid out an
ultimatum.
For You Today
Our Lenten Walk is a season of preparation to be dead-honest with Jesus in
all we do and say. Don’t repeat the
Nicodemus blunder of trying to control the conversation; let God determine
everything about your agenda today.
You chew on that as you hit the
Rocky Road; have a blessed day.
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