A Lord's Day Message for March 20, 2011

(©Rev. Larry A. Langer, First Presbyterian Church, Jasper, IN, March 13, 2011)

“Seven Who Encountered Jesus (2) Nicodemus”

John 2:23-3:21 and Psalm 121

“Now there was a Pharisee named Nicodemus, a leader of the Jews. He came to Jesus by night…..” (John 3:1-2a)

(Sermon preached by Rev. Larry A. Langer, First Presbyterian Church, Jasper, IN, March 20, 2011)

Perhaps you have had some of these experiences.

You got a personally addressed letter in the mail inviting you to a “free dinner” at the Schnitzelbank, and all you have to do is listen to a schpiel about a financial opportunity. “There’s nothing to buy, no pressure, no commitment, except to come, enjoy a meal and listen to a presentation,” reads the invitation. Do you go? Does the prospect of a free meal at the Schnitz entice you to go?

Or, you got another personally addressed letter in the mail, inviting you to a steak dinner at the Mill House, and all you have to do is taste the well-prepared angus prime steak dinner, and listen to a schpiel about how “you can have steaks like this every month in your own home. All you have to do is sign up, and the steaks will be delivered right to your door. And, if you sign up this very night, we will throw in some ground beef, to boot!” Do you go for the free steak dinner? Does the prospect of a free meal at the Mill House entice you to check out the steaks?

Or, perhaps, you are watching television and one of those “19.95 plus shipping and handling” advertisements comes on. Or, the advertisement for Nationwide Insurance and their “Vanishing Deductibles” comes on. Or, the advertisement for relatively inexpensive home loans appears. Or, for E-trade, or for any number of products and services. Do you call, write or go on-line and check it out? Why or why not? It’s a quandary!

Nicodemus was a man in such a quandary; such a quandary that “he went to Jesus by night.” The verbiage here doesn’t mean that “he went to Jesus in the evening after work.” No, the language here means that Nicodemus “went to Jesus in secret, under the cover of darkness, hoping that no one else would see him.”

Jesus was probably in Jerusalem during the day; the verses before the ones we read give indication that he was in Jerusalem for the Passover festival. Other places in scripture seem to indicate that Jesus would be in town during the days, but outside of town at night. It doesn’t matter here where Jesus was; Nicodemus came to Jesus under the cover of darkness.

Nicodemus had thought of a way to try to get his questions answered without involving his peers. Nicodemus had thought of a plan to speak with Jesus one-on-one to try to get the answers to the questions that had been niggling in his mind. So, he gets to Jesus at night.

As I was writing this, I thought of how could he catch Jesus alone? If, in fact, this was when Jesus was in town for the Passover, within the context of the Gospel we read, Jesus had just “cleansed the temple.” He had just had the discussion of saying of himself, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” The people thought he meant the stone-and-mortar temple; Jesus meant, of course, his body. On top of all of this, Jesus had been doing miracles and healing people, and “many believed in his name because they saw the signs he was doing.”

But with Nicodemus, the man who came by night, it was like that old commercial for some insurance company, “When the company speaks, people listen,” and everything stops except for the two central characters. That night in the darkness, everything stopped except for Nicodemus and Jesus. There was no crowd; there were no disciples. There were only Nicodemus and Jesus.

You know, our Lord always has been and always is that way. Jesus is always ready to be one-on-one with someone needing healing or to talk or to question or to examine their faith and what they believe in. Jesus has the over-all ability to speak to very large crowds and to the individual person.

Just think of all the other folks Jesus met one-on-one in the scripture stories. We will be looking at a couple of these – the man born blind, the woman at the well. We will also look at a trio – Lazarus, Mary, and Martha. But there also were the Rich Young Ruler, the woman with the hemorrhage, the centurion’s servant, Jesus’ own mother at the crucifixion, and John the disciple at the crucifixion. All of these had Jesus’ attention one-on-one to experience what they needed of Jesus’ ministry.

Haven’t we each experienced Jesus one-on-one at some time or another? Perhaps we have met Jesus while flat on our back on our bed at night. The darkness was all around. The silence was deafening. The trouble was real. We did what we are instructed to do at those times – We prayed and met Jesus.

Perhaps we met Jesus while we were sitting by the bedside of someone we loved. That person was dozing or in a coma, and we were left to our thoughts. The lights may have been on and the sun may have been shining, but our sadness was causing our soul to be dark. We did what we are supposed to do at those times – We turned our hearts to Jesus in prayer, and he met us there.

Perhaps we met Jesus while we were trying to deal with a crisis with a family member or our closest friend. You know the things that might happen: The discovery of an affair, the arrest of someone, the sudden death of a loved one, a devastating fire, a runaway child, you name any crisis, and some one of us has experienced it.

And in the darkness and gloom that surrounded the crisis, we did the only thing left to do to find peace – We turned our hearts to Jesus and he met us where we were and how we were.

Jesus met Nicodemus where he was and how he was. Nicodemus was having a crisis in his religion. It wasn’t so much a crisis of faith – yet – but it was a crisis in his religious beliefs and his religious practices.

If we were to analyze Nicodemus’ personality type, he would probably test out as an introvert rather than an extrovert, a person who has to see it to believe it rather than just intuitively knowing something, a person who was a deep thinker who sought answers, and a person who wanted to be precise and have answers so he could make a decision about this Jesus.

Nicodemus was in the perfect job for his personality. He was a very prominent Jewish religious official. He is identified as a “ruler of the Jews.” This made him “upper class.” He was conservative in his Jewish beliefs, but also very curios, which made him definitely interested in Jesus’ teachings. He was a Pharisee and as such belonged to the strict religious sect of Judaism, rather than the Sadducees, who were less rigid in their Jewish beliefs and more politically minded. As a member of the Sanhedrin or ruling council, Nicodemus would have been up on the doctrinal trends of the time, which by now was probably including discussions about this guy Jesus.

According to the scripture, Nicodemus’ interest in Jesus had been prompted by the miracles he had witnessed, and he came for more information, trying to put two and two together, for his own faith and the faith of the people. But, he came at night, which causes us to think that he came really trying to figure it out for himself.

We all have to do this. We all have to figure out who Jesus is for ourselves. Oh, we can go to church and hear the messages, sing the hymns and say the prayers and responses. But deep within us is our soul, which longs for us to answer in our head “who is this Jesus for me?”

So, don’t we say pretty much what Nicodemus said? We know that Jesus came from God. All of us come from God. We know that Jesus possessed some gifts of faith to share and some powers of healing. We know this is possible; we have seen people and know people like this. We also know Jesus as a very good teacher of matters of faith and practice. We wouldn’t call him “rabbi,” but we might call him “professor” or “pastor” or an “expert of things religious.”

Shucks, almost every other religion in the world has all of these things to say about Jesus! Almost no religion denies that Jesus existed, that he taught with authority, that he performed some miraculous healings, that he had quite a following, and that he more than likely suffered death by crucifixion. Most religions of the world believe this.

But what only the Christian faith believes is that Jesus is the Son of God, even God himself. This is what Nicodemus was trying to figure out. This is what all of us have tried or are trying to figure out. Who is Jesus, really, and what does he mean for me?

So, Jesus gives Nicodemus the foundation of faith in Jesus: “Very truly, I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God without being born from above…Very truly, I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God without being born of water and the Spirit.”

Nicodemus says, “I just don’t know. How in the world can this be?” His thinking mind couldn’t make the “leap of faith” to being “born again” or being “born from above.” He had heard of John’s baptizing in the River Jordan, which was also a new thing, but really okay as an extension of faith. But Nicodemus had not really heard of being baptized in the Spirit, also. Nicodemus’ own religious beliefs were based on being born into the Jewish faith, being the best Jew he could be personally, and doing the best job he could do as a Jewish leader of the people.

What Jesus was saying is that the entrance into the kingdom of God that Nicodemus desired could not be achieved by legalism or outward conformity. It requires an inner change. It is given only by the direct act of God. Our text for today says that even as the origin and the destination of the wind are unknown to the one who feels it and acknowledges its reality, so also the new life of a person born of the Spirit is unexplainable by ordinary, every day reasoning. It is a matter of faith. It is a matter of thinking and saying “yes” to just about the craziest thing in the world: Saying “yes” to being “born from above,” being “born again,” being born into God’s realm.

Nicodemus was searching for the direction to go to do this. The Spirit had drawn him to Jesus, gotten him to ask questions of Jesus, and gotten him to wonder how this experience could become his. Nothing in Judaism nor his experiences so far in life had offered anything like this.

So, Jesus gives Nicodemus the verse of scripture that all of us know and believe: “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but have eternal life.”

The question is did Nicodemus believe then? We don’t know directly, because the dialogue with him stopped some verses back. We do encounter Nicodemus twice more in the scriptures, though, and this gives us clues that he did respond.

The first time is recorded in John 7:50 and following, when Nicodemus is meeting with the Sanhedrin and recommends that they not judge Jesus for blasphemy until they let Jesus testify on his own behalf. The rest of the Sanhedrin replied, “Surely you are not also from Galilee, are you? Search and you will see that no prophet is to arise from Galilee.”

I am convinced that Nicodemus had come to faith, but he couldn’t overcome the peer pressure without tipping his hand, losing his job, and being accused, also.

The last we hear of Nicodemus is in John 19:39 and following where it says, “Nicodemus, who had first come to Jesus by night, also came, bringing a mixture of myrrh and allows, weighing about a hundred pounds. They took the body of Jesus and wrapped it with the spices in the cloth, according to the burial custom of the Jews.”

Nicodemus brought about 100 pounds of spices and aloes for Jesus. Only a wealthy man could afford such; only a man who loved the deceased would spend it on a dead person. Only a man of faith would spend it on Jesus Christ.

Nicodemus had been born from above. Nicodemus loved Jesus. Nicodemus had come to faith in Jesus, most likely to the detriment of his Jewish status.

The question is what is our status with the Lord Jesus Christ? What have we given up or what do we need to give up for Jesus? Do we need to say “yes” to Jesus today?

“God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him will not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through him might be saved.” Amen.