The Clandestine Connection
" Now there was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a member of the Jewish ruling council. He came to Jesus at night and said, “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.” In reply Jesus declared, “I tell you the truth, no one can see the kingdom of God unless he is born again. ” “How can a man be born when he is old?” Nicodemus asked. “Surely he cannot enter a second time into his mother’s womb to be born!” Jesus answered, “I tell you the truth, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless he is born of water and the Spirit. Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit. You should not be surprised at my saying, ‘You must be born again.’ The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit.” “How can this be?” Nicodemus asked. “You are Israel’s teacher,” said Jesus, “and do you not understand these things? I tell you the truth, we speak of what we know, and we testify to what we have seen, but still you people do not accept our testimony. I have spoken to you of earthly things and you do not believe; how then will you believe if I speak of heavenly things? No one has ever gone into heaven except the one who came from heaven—the Son of Man. Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the desert, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, that everyone who believes in him may have eternal life. “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." (John 3:1-17, NIV)
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This is perhaps one of the most remembered and well known biblical encounters that the Christian community has ever shared together. We read the term “born again” for the first time in the pages of scripture. This term has become the most accepted and preferred descriptive adjective that we attach the idea of relationship with God. Over used or not, it says something very meaningful to people who look for authentic Christianity.
It contains the central theme and focus of the gospel in the verse that every person in this room today should be able to recite without hesitation. “For God so loved . . .”
And it gives us an unforgettable character. His name of course was Nicodemus. We are not sure how to feel about him at least I’m not. Let’s look at the encounter in the scriptures.
1. His Approach – (v. 2)
“Now there was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a member of the Jewish ruling council. He came to Jesus at night . . .”
Ø He came to Jesus by night
Perhaps he was unforgettable because there have been times when we all have discovered ourselves to be more like him than we imagine. We have all looked for less conspicuous ways to come to him and less obvious ways of serving him. We have all shuddered at times at the thought of discovery. It shouldn’t be that way but somewhere in the long forgotten past or the all too recent present we have sought the faith concealing shadows because for some reason our faith would have disadvantaged us . . . we have feared. You know the times when we are faced with the awful sense of defeat that overwhelms us when somehow we deny Him by saying less than we should say or saying nothing at all. There are those of us today who find ourselves part of organizations that seem opposed to the premise of biblical faith and within those systems we struggle in our hearts to find a way to please Him and to feed our families and hold our homes together. Nicodemus was a part of a proud, established, puritanical, legalistic, formalized group of men who determined what was acceptable and what was heretical. Jesus was a threat to all that their traditions had established and yet he was impossible to ignore. They could not deny that there was something different about this carpenter’s son, the people’s rabbi from Nazareth of all places. They could never have admitted to each other that there was most likely a deep admiration for his deeds and his demeanor and the effectiveness of his teachings. Some though like Nicodemus were driven to seek him out, to draw closer to this dangerous man. Even though he sought Jesus at night in secrecy, he risked everything that he had accomplished if he were discovered and he came to Christ with partial knowledge and in fear and trembling.
2. His Admission – (v.2)
“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.”
Ø It was partial at best.
He spoke for himself but found it easier to do by representing his group, the San Hedrin. It’s always easier to speak for a group than it is to represent your faith or your position in the first person. He said, “We know . . .”.
When you speak of your faith today do you talk of your own relationship with God or your church. It’s good to speak well of your church and we must if we want to see it grow but it’s powerful when people speak of their own relationship with God and are able to distinguish it from their relationship with a church. It will be nurtured and developed in the context of the fellowship of a local church but faith must be personally possessed if it is to be powerful and impacting.
Nicodemus validates his conclusions by citing the miracles that Christ was performing. He said, “We know that you are a:
q Teacher
q That you come from God
q That God is with you
Nice things to say but not enough when it came to Christ. Jesus responded to his incomplete statements and in verse 3 we see . . . .
3. His Assessment – (v. 3)
“I tell you the truth, no one can see the kingdom of God unless he is born again. ”
Ø Jesus challenged his words.
Nicodemus made his observations about Jesus from what he could see or what he had learned of his ministry. Most likely he was impacted because he had observed first hand the things that Jesus did.
But what can a man say about the dwelling place of God, the kingdom of God unless he can see and understand that kingdom as well. Remember the words that concluded the previous chapter?
"He did not need man’s testimony about man, for he knew what was in a man." (John 2:25, NIV)
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He didn’t need Nicodemus’ endorsement. He didn’t need the stamp of approval of the governing religious body that he represented.
He wouldn’t need it today either. He doesn’t need for the most prestigious of colleges or universities to vouch for his credibility. We need it ourselves in varying degrees to tell other people that someone believes us to be capable, reputable, trustworthy, whatever but not Jesus.
He never seemed to seek respectability as a credential. He just did his thing. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we lived in a world where we sought to be effective and we were willing to let our work speak for us.
You know if God can help us to become:
q a church where He works freely and mightily,
q a church where people are transformed and truly delivered from the bondages of life
q a church where the power of God’s presence is experienced more than it is talked about
q a church where people dare to become dispensers of abundant grace in the name of grace incarnate
q a church where a people of prayer inhabit a house of prayer
Then what we are will speak for itself and what we are will become the greatest reason that people come and seek God’s help in their lives. We won’t have to worry about creating an image when we represent the true substance of faith.
Jesus didn’t need anything that Nicodemus offered him. He did not need to know that the religious governing body of the people placed some seal of approval on Him. He knew who He was and that was enough.
I think that he was simply asking Nicodemus what he would possibly know of the kingdom of God because seeing is believing, in the spiritual realm. You can’t see unless you believe. You can’t see the kingdom of God unless you are born again.
There are many unsaved people in the world today who justly criticize people of faith who live low and loose. They are a source of slander to the cause of Christ when rebellion or selfishness causes them to seek their own good ahead of God. But there are others like you and me who sometimes falter and fail. There are those who are torn between two worlds or overcome by temptation and weakness and we fail. The unsaved world may look and see our weakness and criticize but you see, they really cannot speak of the kingdom because a person who is not “born again” cannot understand the kingdom principles of grace and forgiveness. They don’t understand that being a follower of Christ does not require perfection in the execution of our beliefs but short accounts with God and honesty enough to ask forgiveness when we fail rather than looking for someone to blame. This is the hypocrite. The one who will not accept personal responsibility for his/her spiritual state, is the sham artist.
In effect he was saying, “Nicodemus, if you want to tell me where I am from you’d better be able to see where I am from and this is impossible without a new birth.”
Nicodemus objects.
4. His Argument – (v. 4)
“How can a man be born when he is old?” Nicodemus asked. “Surely he cannot enter a second time into his mother’s womb to be born!”
Ø Based on the “natural” man.
It’s amazing to me that we get so hung up on words by times. We can’t see past them. Rather than aids to communication, they become barriers. There are times when we speak in terms that are concrete and times when we speak in terms that are abstract.
When we speak of Christ living in our hearts for instance.
One day on the way home from church a little girl turned to her mother and said, "Mommy, the preacher's sermon this morning confused me."
The mother said, "Oh! Why is that?
The girl replied, "Well, he said that God is bigger than we are. Is that true?"
"Yes, that's true," the mother replied.
"He also said that God lives within us. Is that true too?"
Again the mother replied, "Yes."
"Well," said the girl. "If God is bigger than us and he lives in us, wouldn't He show through?"
He lives in our hearts by the Holy Spirit. The presence of Christ himself in Spirit.
Nicodemus stumbles over the semantics and Jesus answer states what to you and I today is obvious.
5. His Answer – (v. 5-9)
Jesus answered, “I tell you the truth, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless he is born of water and the Spirit. Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit. You should not be surprised at my saying, ‘You must be born again.’ The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit.”
Ø Directed him toward the “supernatural”
Jesus immediately jolted Nicodemus with the announcement that to even catch a glimpse of God’s kingdom, a person must be born again. Nicodemus struggled with this strange idea, and then blurted out: “You can’t mean ‘reenter the womb and be born’! What do You mean by ‘born again’?” (see v. 4 ) Even Jesus’ explanation of the new birth as a work of God the Holy Spirit, and not a physical experience (vv. 5–8 ) brought the same response: “How can this be?” (v. 9 )
Jesus’ answer helps us see that His revelation of grace and truth is not foreign to the Old Testament! Grace and truth are imbedded in the very foundations of the Old: they simply had not been recognized. Thus Jesus exclaimed, “You are Israel’s teacher, and do you not understand these things?”
To what was Jesus referring? Simply this: God’s plan to give men and women a life and a relationship with Him not based on Law is clearly taught in the Old Testament!
For instance, Jeremiah promised a time when “I will make a New Covenant with the house of Israel.” This new way of relating to God is specifically said to be unlike the older, Mosaic way. Under the New Covenant, God promised, “I will put My law in their minds and write it on their hearts” ( Jer. 31:31 , 33 ). When the new heart is created, new life comes; and one who is “born again” comes to know God in a totally different, deeply personal, family relationship. (See also Ezek. 11:19 ; 18:31 ; 36:26 ).
Through such passages as these, which Nicodemus as a recognized Bible authority should have known and understood, the “new birth” had long been taught. But Nicodemus did not know. And he did not understand. His concept of God was faulty. He knew about the Law, but he missed the promise of grace, which tells us that God loves us in spite of our failures and our sins.
Quietly Jesus went on to explain the grace of God and reveal underlying principles by which grace operates.
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Jesus throws his words back to him.
“Surely he cannot enter a second time into his mother’s womb . . . “
The spiritual birth is not a chance to start over and try to avoid the mistakes of the past. It is not reincarnation.
In a thousand tries we could not succeed at coming closer to God than we can when we come by Christ, by the new birth.
Amazing how blind we can become to spiritual truth - we live with something that we fail to utilize. Simple enough for a child to understand on one hand and yet beyond the grasp of a religious leader. Why?
Ever wonder how much of our spiritual development is the process of unlearning? I have occasionally had students who come to TKD who want to show me what they know - very difficult to teach these people.
Many of us are forever blinded by our misconceptions or our false assumptions, the things that we just automatically accept without question – these things stunt our spiritual growth and development.
We don't need another chance to do it right - this is not salvation. Larry King - what was your question m'aam? - on interview with Neil Diamond.
The spiritual birth is not a re-entry but about a first time foray into the kingdom of God.
“I tell you the truth, no one can enter the kingdom of God . . .”
The new birth is about spiritual life and existence in the here and now and the ever after.
It makes a new man and a new woman. It means the passing of old things and the regeneration or renewal of all things.
New Birth: John 3
Entering into a new spiritual life is like being born again. The analogy has many implications. Each is closely associated with growth. A newborn child has the potential for maturity; yet the fulfillment of that promise comes only after a long process of growth and learning. The Christian too is urged to keep on growing in Christ, and is reminded that we “are being built together” to become a dwelling in which God lives by His Spirit ( Eph. 2:22 ).
There is another implication that is sometimes overlooked. Birth catapults the newborn into a different world, in which a totally different lifestyle must be learned. Understandings, attitudes, values, and behaviors must be developed.
Spiritual birth may come after understandings, attitudes, values, and behaviors that contradict the Christian lifestyle have become deeply ingrained. Colossians says that God has “rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son He loves” ( 1:13 ). A citizen of God’s kingdom has to reject the old ways of darkness while learning how to live a new life.
This kind of learning involves far more than gaining new information: a personality is being rebuilt. To understand how spiritual growth takes place, we need only to look at the process of an infant growing. How does a maturing child learn to function in society? Essentially, lifestyle is learned and personality shaped in the family. In the context of intimate and loving relationships provided by the family, a way of life is both taught and caught, explained and modeled. The family relationship provides the essential context for the growth of an infant. In the same way, every born-again Christian needs a family in which to grow.
The exciting announcement of the New Testament is that God has provided just such a family for us, in one another.[4]
It’s about understanding the difference between what is human and what is Divine. There are certain things that only God can accomplish.
People wear themselves out trying to do God’s work and they beat themselves up for their perceived failures.
q Only God can draw someone to himself. We can be instrumental in the process as we love them in Jesus name but condemning them will never produce repentance in their hearts.
" You, therefore, have no excuse, you who pass judgment on someone else, for at whatever point you judge the other, you are condemning yourself, because you who pass judgment do the same things. Now we know that God’s judgment against those who do such things is based on truth. So when you, a mere man, pass judgment on them and yet do the same things, do you think you will escape God’s judgment? Or do you show contempt for the riches of his kindness, tolerance and patience, not realizing that God’s kindness leads you toward repentance?" (Romans 2:1-4, NIV)
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q I believe that it’s only God who truly grows a church. We can gather groups of people. There are marketers and public relations experts who could be far more effective at growing churches today than most pastors and in some way we have placed an expectation on them to do this. But you know there is something sweet when we bring our best to God and he blesses it and makes it ultimately significant. Only God can truly build a church
Come on Nicodemus, learn to tell the difference between what is natural and what is supernatural, what is human and what is Divine.
I so want to be a part of a supernatural and blessed fellowship – I REALLY believe that I am. I believe that WE are allowing God to create a spiritual building and a wonderful fellowship and I rejoice in it today.
6. His Amazement – (v.9)
“How can this be?” Nicodemus asked.”
Ø Showed his ignorance of spiritual reality.
You know, it doesn’t matter how educated we are in the ways of God, we can miss it at times. Sometimes our familiarity can bring with it certain “blind spots”. There are people raised in the church who cannot see the reality of an intimate relationship with Christ. When they read greatest commandment, it is vague and detached from their experience. They have little awareness of what it means to love God intimately and intensely.
For all his training and exposure to the religious elite, he was perplexed and confused. It was all just too simple.
George Barna makes the observation that there are a whole generation of unsaved people within the church who are as regular as clockwork in their attendance and even their support of the church in other ways, - but they are disconnected personally from God.
How complicated can it be really?
Do you see it that way? There are dear folks today who fear the implications of coming to Christ. You are sure that he will take something away from you that you don’t want to surrender. He won’t wrestle things from you brother and sister but He will reveal himself to you to the point that those shiny things and those lofty dreams will lose their luster and one day you will pass them off to Him with no sorrow.
The true Christian never has to give up anything (of course I am not speaking of sins), but there are a lot of things that will give him up. They will go one by one. There will be no grief. It will be the way childish occupations are abandoned. I never had to give up playing with tops and marbles. I never had to come to the place where I said, "Oh I am a big boy now, and big boys shouldn't play marbles. So I will make a great effort to give up playing marbles." It did not happen that way. One day I was playing marbles with a group of small boys and some older boys came by. They looked at me and said, "Hey, kid, can you field a ball?" "Sure I can," I replied with more vigor than accuracy. "Well," they said, "we are short a fielder. Get out there and see what you can do." I went out and was ready to play my head off to keep up with the older fellows. When it was my turn to bat I was ready to swing till I burst, and to run till I dropped, and do all that I could to keep up with the bigger company I was in. And when the game was over and we older boys, as I then classed myself, walked down the street past the little fellows who were playing marbles, I did not go back to marbles. I had graduated. I did not give up marbles, marbles gave me up.
-- The Epistle to the Romans, Donald Grey Barnhouse
7. His Acceptance – (v. 10, 11)
Ø Christ’s personal testimony of his identity and ministry.
You are Israel’s teacher,” said Jesus, “and do you not understand these things? I tell you the truth, we speak of what we know, and we testify to what we have seen, but still you people do not accept our testimony. I have spoken to you of earthly things and you do not believe; how then will you believe if I speak of heavenly things? No one has ever gone into heaven except the one who came from heaven—the Son of Man. Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the desert, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, that everyone who believes in him may have eternal life. “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."
It’s strange that Nicodemus was able to accept that Christ was a teacher come from God but seemed to struggle with what he had to say about the new birth and about himself.
I believe that we can conclude from later accounts of his involvement in the burial of Christ that he believed and he accepted but he could never seem to find his way to clear and open profession of faith. If he had, doubtless it would have separated him from his peers and still he found his identification in the death of Christ ultimately. He was most likely an ineffective influence in the group that ultimately facilitated his death.
Can you imagine hearing the words of John 3:16 spoken for the first time from the lips of Christ? What an incredible experience and what a wonderful promise for us today.
Application:
q What may be keeping you today from coming openly and clearly to Christ? Do you fear that it will somehow jeopardize your position or your job or diminish you in the eyes of others? Is the force that stands in your way worth the pandering? Is it time to take your chances and identify yourself?
q Has religion blinded you to personal intimate relationship with Christ? Have you misplaced spiritual vitality for religious respectability?
q Are you trying in your flesh to take the place and responsibility of God for someone else? Can you trust your most loved family, friends to God with confidence that He will take care of them? Are you able to distinguish the things that flesh can give birth to from the things that have their life breathed into them bby the Spirit?
Concluding his book, Born Again, Charles Colson writes:
It was that night in the quiet of my room that I made the total surrender. "Lord, if this is what it is all about," I said, "then I thank You. I praise You for leaving me in prison, for letting them take away my license to practice law, yes -- even for my son being arrested. I praise You for giving me your love through these men, for being God, for just letting me walk with Jesus."
With those words came the greatest joy of all -- the final release, turning it all over to God.
Colson knew that although salvation was a free gift, there was a cost to following Jesus.
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[1] The Holy Bible : New International Version. 1996, c1984 (electronic ed.). Grand Rapids: Zondervan.
[2] The Holy Bible : New International Version. 1996, c1984 (electronic ed.). Grand Rapids: Zondervan.
[3]Richards, L. O. (1987; Published in electronic form by Logos Research Systems, 1996). The teacher's commentary (electronic ed.) (Jn 4:43). Wheaton: Victor Books.
[4]Richards, L. O. (1987; Published in electronic form by Logos Research Systems, 1996). The teacher's commentary (electronic ed.). Wheaton: Victor Books.
[5] The Holy Bible : New International Version. 1996, c1984 (electronic ed.). Grand Rapids: Zondervan.