Remembering the Past...
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    Park Christian Church
                                                                    (Disciples of Christ)

June 7, 2009

Scripture:         John 3:1-17

Sermon:           “Nic at Night”

            Turn with me in your Bible to the Gospel of John for our scripture reading this morning.  We will be hearing from the 3^rd chapter, verses 1 through 17.  And that is on page 126 of the New Testament in the pew Bible if you’d like to read it there.

            And, yes, this passage includes that one verse that you are probably so familiar with.  You see it every now and then hanging on a banner at a football game.  John 3:16.  “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.”

            This is also the place in the Bible where we find the notion of being “born again.”  You’ve heard that.  Born again.  Are you a born again Christian?  That’s the way folks say it.  The problem is that the word translated from Greek here means both “again” and “from above.”  The word is anothen.  So, Jesus might be saying born again and he might be saying born from above.  And you’ll hear me say “born from above” while the version in the pew Bible says “born again.”

            Now, the writer of John’s Gospel is a smart guy, it turns out.  And he wants there to be some uncertainty about how to understand that word.  Is it born again or is it born from above?  You see, all of this is taking place in a conversation with a Pharisee named Nicodemus.  And he’s got a very religious background that makes him want to interpret everything very literally.

            “Born again?” he asks.  “How is somebody supposed to get back inside the mother’s womb and be born again?”  That’s the trouble with the way he understands life and the way he understands God.  There’s no room for the imagination.  Very strict stuff.

            I’m actually very interested in this Nicodemus.  Let’s listen for the word of the Lord…

            Now there was a Pharisee named Nicodemus, a leader of the Jews.  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.”  Jesus answered him, “Very truly I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God without being born from above.”  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?”  Jesus answered, “Very truly, I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God without being born of water and Spirit.  What is born of the flesh is flesh, and what is born of the Spirit is spirit.  Do not be astonished that I said to you, ‘You must be born from above.’  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.”  Nicodemus said to him, “How can these things be?”  Jesus answered him, “Are you a teacher of Israel, and yet you do not understand these things?

            “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.  If I have told you about earthly things and you do not believe, how can you believe if I tell you about heavenly things?  No one has ascended into heaven except the one who descended from heaven, the Son of Man.  And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.

            “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.”

            “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.”

            Sneaking around at night.  Must be that Nicodemus doesn’t want anyone to know what he’s up to.  Good Pharisee, leader of Israel that he is, going to visit this Jesus must be dangerous business that he doesn’t want anyone to see.

            I’ve heard it said that nothing good happens at 2 am.  What do you think that means?  Folks who are up and about at that hour are usually up to no good is what it means.  I have no personal experience in this area.  So, I’ll just tell you a story about somebody else.

            There was once a church in a town called Midway, Kentucky.  And it is true that I once served as the pastor of this church.  But, I was not alive when this occurred.  Back in 1860 the man who was serving as pastor, L. L. Pinkerton, brought in a foot-pump melodeon to use for the worship services.  This was something of a primitive kind of organ.  Not many churches used musical instruments in those days, mostly because they were very expensive.  But, Pinkerton said that the singing in the church was so bad that it would “scare even the rats from worship”.

            Now, it just so happened that if you were the sort of person who would attend church on Sunday and venture your way into the local saloon on Friday or Saturday night, you’d probably find a foot-pump melodeon in the corner of that place where people would gather around and sing drinking songs.  Raucous, riotous songs, you know.  And there were all kinds of things that happened down in the local saloon that you don’t want to know about.  Or, maybe you do.

            So, not everyone in the church there in Midway thought this was a good idea.  You can’t mix the things of this world with the things of God, you see.  What would people say if they knew your church had one of those bar room organs in it?  This one member of the church, Adam Hibler, decided that he’d do something about it.  He said it was “the instrument of the devil”.  Indeed.  So, he waited until the sun went down.  And then he took his slave, Reuben, to the church where they stole it through a window in the sanctuary.  By the cover of night, Adam Hibler chopped that poor little melodeon to pieces in the front lawn of the church.

            Night time is when things happen that no one would dare to do otherwise.

            When do you think that all of that graffiti on the bridge gets spray painted?  You know, some local boy gets all romantic and proclaims his love for so and so in big red letters on the overpass.  “R L + J M” inside a big heart shape.  We hope that J M is impressed.  But, R L did that when the sun was down, you can be sure of that.

            What does it mean that Nicodemus went to visit Jesus by night?  This guy didn’t want to be seen, or get caught.  And while this usually means that something nefarious is afoot, in this case it actually says something important about Nicodemus.

            You read back a few verses in John’s gospel and discover that Jesus had marched into Jerusalem and cause quite a stir.  He went right into the temple court and started overturning the tables where folks were selling animals for sacrifices.  Made a whip out of cords and started yelling at folks.  “Stop making my Father’s house a marketplace!”

            What do you think that folks like the Pharisees, and leaders of Israel made of all of that?  Were they just terribly excited that someone had finally tried to clean the place up a little bit?  It would be nice to get to the worship service without all of that wheeling and dealing going on outside with some folks who were a little less than scrupulous.  It was probably like going to a concert or a ball game when you have to walk through a whole sea of ticket scalpers.  Do you think that the religious authorities were happy about this little demonstration?  It turns out that they weren’t.

            Some folks who study the life of Jesus think that this little episode in the courtyard of the temple was the very reason he was crucified.  Maybe so, too.  He even went so far as to suggest that the temple would be destroyed.  And that’s kind of like making a threat against the President in those days.  People heard that as treason.

            Nicodemus was one of these people.  A Pharisee, which mean that he was a well-educated and very serious person about his faith.  Tried his best to please God according to the laws that we read about in the first few books of the bible.  He was a leader, too.  I don’t know this, but he may have been a member of the Sanhedrin.  And that’s no small potatoes.  Nicodemus was just knee-deep in the religious life of his people.

            So, he didn’t want to be seen.  What would people say?  Maybe they’d start thinking that he was one of these new radicals like Jesus.  For heaven’s sake that could be costly.  Maybe they’d start thinking that Jesus wasn’t so dangerous.  And, well, Nicodemus wasn’t quite ready to say that.

            But, there he was.  Under the cover of night, there he was.  And that may not be all that impressive, considering he wasn’t all that upfront about it.  But, there he was.  Despite everything that he was and everything that he knew, something about this Jesus was just too exciting and too real to not want to know more.  And I think that Jesus recognized this and really wanted to help Nicodemus understand.

            Now, this story usually reads like an argument.  Jesus is going toe to toe with a Pharisee and they’re arguing the finer points of theology.  He says, “Brother, you’ve got to get born again from above.”  And Nicodemus says, “You’ve lost mind!  Nobody can be born a second time.  It’s a one-shot deal.  Your mother gives birth to you and that’s that.  Are you saying somebody’s got to somehow get back inside the mother’s womb?  Crazy talk.”

            That’s how we usually hear this story.  Jesus vs. Pharisee.  And we watch and we cheer Jesus on for being our champion against all that is wrong and unjust in the world.

            What if Jesus actually sees this Nicodemus, who by the cover of night dares to come and learn something more, and tries to teach him out of deep love?  What if this story is actually about how a person can start to break away from all of the wrong ways that they’ve learned to live in the world and view the God who created it all?  What if?  What if that’s what’s really going on.

            Maybe Nicodemus is a very sincere seeker who is just dying to know that God is a living presence in the world.  And maybe Jesus truly loves the idea that Nicodemus could come so alive if only he could break out of the shell he’s been trapped inside.

            How does the story sound then?  It sounds to me like Jesus is saying, “Nicodemus, can’t you see it?  God is a living, and unpredictably loving God that moves freely throughout our lives in order to free us from everything that controls us and keeps us from being all that we were ever meant to be!  Can’t you see it?  Just connect to it.”

            Like, maybe, Jesus is trying to reframe Nicodemus’ idea about faith.  Faith is a spirituality, not a set of beliefs and rules and guidelines.  And it certainly is not a way to gain control over the world and decide who is a better person than somebody else.  Faith is a spirituality.  It is a connection to God that is humbling and sacrificing.  And so, Jesus winds up showing Nicodemus that his own life gives witness to it.  He says, “I’m going to give away my whole life.  I’ll be lifted up.  And in that way, others will be lifted up, too.”  It’s a spirituality.

            It probably takes a lot of courage, and a lot of time to break away from everything you’ve ever known in order to be born again from the Spirit.  And I imagine that’s especially true for anyone who’s grown up with the idea that God’s got a long list of expectations that you better follow in order to be right.  Do this.  Don’t you dare do that.  God’s watching.  And you don’t even want to know what’s going to happen if you don’t pay attention.

            And here you’ve got a man saying, “God loves the world so much!  Don’t you see it?  God loves the world and you so very much that this thing isn’t about condemnation.  It’s about God’s love.”  How are you going to respond?

            It probably takes a lot of courage.  And it probably takes a lot of time.  But, when Jesus found himself in more trouble with the leaders in Jerusalem, do you know what happened.  It’s there in chapter 7 of John’s gospel.  The Pharisees were upset that the temple police had not arrested Jesus for making claims about being living water.  They wanted somebody to arrest him then and there.  But, one of these Pharisees intervened.  He said, “Come on, fellas.  There is no law that allows us just up and arrest somebody without a fair trial.”  Do you know which Pharisee that was?  Yep.  Nicodemus.

            They said, “Oh, no, Nicodemus.  Not you.  What are you, from Galilee, too?  Have you been deceived.”

            That took a lot of courage.

            But, when they finally did put Jesus to death, there is something else that happened.  A man named Joseph of Arimathea was allowed to take away the dead body in order to bury him.  Joseph probably came from money, you know, and could do that.  But, he was a disciple in secret out of his fear for his own life.

            When the time came to prepare the body of Jesus for burial, there was another man who came and joined Joseph of Arimathea.  Yep.  Nicodemus.  So moved by this Jesus was he that he brought expensive oils and lotions to cover the body.

            Now, you read into this what you want.  I’ll tell you what I see.  I see a person who has made a terribly long and difficult journey into a new, life-giving faith where the love of God completely and utterly changes everything.

Rev. David James Brown

Park Christian Church (Disciples of Christ)