5 March 2023 Lent 2

For God so loved the world….  We hear it quoted often.  We hear it in many different circumstances, and unfortunately, we also hear it used by people to justify their exclusion of some they don’t think have made it to the grade of belief and therefore are not included in ‘those to be saved’.  And this attitude is one of the things which often puts people off talking about their faith, because they fear being judged as ‘not good enough’, or ‘from the wrong stream of faith’.  And the problem is, while most of us could probably quote John 3:16 without giving it a second thought, not many of us give much thought to the next verse which would tell those who are judging that they have ‘missed the point’.  “God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.”  We cannot use 3:16 as proof that we have it right and the others are ‘doomed’, because this next verse tells us that Jesus came not to condemn but to save, so everyone is loved, everyone is able to be saved, no matter what.

Nicodemus was a Pharisee, a member of the Sanhedrin, and more than likely a very scholarly man, yet following his conversation with Jesus, he was confused and struggling to understand what Jesus was telling him.  And while Jesus spoke of birth, flesh, water, spirit, using obscure and metaphorical language, he was in no hurry to alleviate Nicodemus’ confusion.  Jesus tells him the Spirit cannot be caged or contained, it ‘blows where it chooses’.  Our journey of faith and the workings of salvation also cannot be caged or contained.  When we speak of God’s kingdom, we enter a realm of deep mystery where surprise, or fright, or confusion, are not just possible, they are usually the norm.

In his conversation with Nicodemus, Jesus was not just giving him a few ‘handy hints’, or ‘minor adjustments’ to achieve a near perfect life; he was giving him a brand new life.  A new birth.  And as any who have witnessed the birth of a child or animal knows, no birth occurs without significant shock, disorientation and pain.  So, if we are not finding Christianity confusing, then maybe we are not really practicing Christianity.

All three of today’s readings have a similar theme.  Faith means being prepared to take risks to change.  Abraham dares to follow voices he believed to be the call of God which asked him to leave all he had, all those he knew, all he held dear and familiar, and go to an unknown place, for reasons unknown, other than God had commanded him. And this call is repeated in our lives today.  It is a call to move beyond three very human, powerful, and deep-seated fears – fear of the unknown that we cannot control (ignorance); fear of those who are different from us (inclusion); and fear of powerlessness in the face of impossibilities (impotence).  Abraham journeyed from what he had to what he did not have; from the known to the unknown; and from all that was familiar to things that were strange and unfamiliar.

Paul calls Abraham the “father of many nations”; and he asks ‘is God the God of Jews only?’; or is he also the God of the Gentiles?  And he says that in Abraham God loves all peoples equally.  God so loved the world….  When God called Abraham, he subverted conventional wisdom and moved him beyond normal and understandable human fear – beyond ignorance, inclusion, and impotence.

Nicodemus takes a risk by coming to Jesus.  He is a respected member of the religious elite; he knows Scripture inside out and backwards.  But his opening statement to Jesus is a puzzling one.  “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.”  Is he using the ‘royal we’ and speaking only for himself or is he implying that at least some of his fellow Pharisees also see Jesus as ‘coming from God’.  But regardless of this, Jesus implies ‘you don’t know the half of it’; and he challenges him to open himself to new horizons, to accept the unexpected and to see the world from a different perspective.  When he tells Nicodemus he needs to be ‘born from above’, Nicodemus mishears or misinterprets the meaning of Jesus word (it can mean both born again, and born from above) and he gets trapped in his own spiral loop.  But when John wrote about this encounter, his meaning to the early Christian community was both.  They needed to be ‘born again’ like the first time and born from a different source.  Being born of water and the Spirit – invoking the image of baptism to this early community.

Jesus tells Nicodemus that if he wants to ‘enter the kingdom of God’, he needs to walk away from his religiosity.  This consummate religious insider needs to leave the ‘known’ and enter the ‘unknown’.  He must be born twice, once by his earthly mother by water, and again by his heavenly Father through the Spirit.  And only the free gift of God’s love, not religious effort, can do this.

As we continue on our Lenten journey, we need to be prepared to walk away from our own ‘known’ and enter the ‘unknown’.  To enter the desert, the wilderness; where wandering, thirsting, yearning, waiting, and listening go with the territory.  The way of faith that John 3:16 points to is vast and mysterious.  We can trust it because its challenge corresponds to reality.  God’s love for us is rich, demanding, costly, and most importantly, free.