John 3:1-17 New Revised Standard Version (NRSV)
Nicodemus Visits Jesus
3 Now there was a Pharisee named Nicodemus, a leader of the Jews. 2 He came to Jesus by night and said to him, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God; for no one can do these signs that you do apart from the presence of God.” 3 Jesus answered him, “Very truly, I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God without being born from above.” 4 Nicodemus said to him, “How can anyone be born after having grown old? Can one enter a second time into the mother’s womb and be born?” 5 Jesus answered, “Very truly, I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God without being born of water and Spirit. 6 What is born of the flesh is flesh, and what is born of the Spirit is spirit. 7 Do not be astonished that I said to you, ‘You must be born from above.’ 8 The wind blows where it chooses, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.” 9 Nicodemus said to him, “How can these things be?” 10 Jesus answered him, “Are you a teacher of Israel, and yet you do not understand these things?
11 “Very truly, I tell you, we speak of what we know and testify to what we have seen; yet you do not receive our testimony. 12 If I have told you about earthly things and you do not believe, how can you believe if I tell you about heavenly things? 13 No one has ascended into heaven except the one who descended from heaven, the Son of Man. 14 And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, 15 that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.
16 “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.
17 “Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.
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The following sermon was preached by me, Rev. Sarah Locke, on March 8, 2020 at Redeemer Episcopal Church for a specific context and time. You can read the sermon below or listen to the sermon (with infusions from the Spirit)
at this link.
Gracious God, be with us as we sit in the uncomfortable space between our old life and the new one you have promised to us in Christ Jesus. Amen.
When I did my internship in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, I had a lot of questions. And I had a lot to learn. It seemed like every aspect of the ministry I had understood to be true and “normal” had been uprooted as soon as my feet hit the soil of this country.
My supervisor, who was a Lutheran Chinese Malay pastor, was kind of famous for never answering questions and just telling stories instead. Or, to my dismay, when I went to him with sincere, vulnerable questions, he would often wave his hands and insist: “that’s not important.” It was incredibly frustrating.
That is what I think about when I read this exchange between Jesus and Nicodemus.
Traditionally told, this story is about how Nicodemus can’t understand what Jesus lays out for him so plainly. Nicodemus comes to Jesus with sincere, vulnerable questions, Jesus answers, and Nicodemus is so dense that he doesn’t understand and has to keep asking questions until finally he leaves.
Many of our campus ministry students are seniors right now, so they’ve been getting questions from friends, relatives, and professors about what they are going to do with their lives once they have their degree in their hands. Perhaps you remember getting those questions yourself when you were younger. Or perhaps you get the same question any time you are approaching a transition. What are you going to do in retirement? What are you going to do since you quit your job? Once you’ve moved to a new city?
Oftentimes, we don’t have very good answers to these questions. Perhaps we don’t know. And many times that causes great anxiety. But the questions keep coming.
Graduation is just around the corner for my senior campus ministry students, so when anxiety runs high, I use wise words from Pastor Barbara Brown Taylor: “Your old life is over, it’s okay if you know nothing about the new life.”
We’re told that Nicodemus came to speak to Jesus at night. We probably think that he couldn’t come by day because he didn’t want people to know. I’m sure that was part of it. But sometimes darkness is the best cover for important conversations. For some reason, it is easier to be vulnerable by candlelight at night than in the bright sunlight of daytime.
But Jesus does not seem willing to be gentle with Nicodemus. Instead of slowly igniting Nicodemus’ candle of knowledge, he snuffs it out and shines a huge spotlight on Nicodemus’ unknowing.
A few weeks into my internship in Malaysia, I was tasked with leading a Bible study with a very faithful family in their home. I came ready with all of my big questions about God and probing questions about biblical passages. I remember asking the first question and no one answered. After several minutes of trying to reframe the question, I asked, “No one has an opinion? No one knows what this passage might mean?” They said, “That’s why we’re here. YOU tell us.” “Well, there’s no right answer,” I said with surprise, “only different interpretations.” They were… unsatisfied with that answer. Questions, they said, have correct and incorrect answers. This is how we learn.
This is what we are used to in most of school, right? When a teacher asks a question, you should know the right answer. That’s how it works.
So when Nicodemus asks his questions, he expects Jesus to give him the correct answers. Nicodemus goes to Jesus to be enlightened— he wants answers to his questions— but it seems that he leaves even more confused. Perhaps that’s the point.
Perhaps Jesus is trying to help Nicodemus understand that no one really understands God. We think of this exchange as Jesus being snarky or perhaps even mean to this ignorant Nicodemus, but he assures him that no one knows. God. “The wind blows where it chooses, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit. No one knows where it comes or where is goes. No one. Nicodemus is not special in his ignorance of these things. No one knows, Jesus says. The only thing that sets Nicodemus apart is that he is so uncomfortable in his unknowing, and he thinks he ought to know.
This makes things uncomfortable for those of us who rely on knowing how things work. If I’m honest with myself, I have a lot of questions, just like Nicodemus: who has access to the Spirit and how, what does it mean to be born again, how does God decide who gets the Spirit and who doesn’t? How can we even be sure we have been born again?
We don’t know. Because we are not God. And oh what blessed news that is! We aren’t going anything wrong. We are human. And sometimes there is a limit to human knowing. We are simply dust.
Sometimes when we go to Jesus in the dark and ask, “why, what, how, and when?” We are simply reassured that God is present, Jesus is speaking, and the Spirit is moving. Even when we don’t understand it. This is the reassurance we get when we come to the font in baptism: Your old life is over, it’s okay if you know nothing about the new life.
It is uncomfortable to sit in this unknowing— the transition between the old life and new, the time between Ash Wednesday and Easter morning— but it is in this discomfort that we feel the wind moving, that we hear Jesus speaking, that we look with wonder toward the rising sun.
Nicodemus approached Jesus wanting to know more, to bring his own knowledge to help him understand God, but ultimately he went away with more questions. And we won’t see Nicodemus again until he pays for the tomb where Jesus’ body will be laid, waiting and hoping— just like us— for the promise of a new life that he knows nothing about. Amen.
