A Sermon from the First Church….       

A sermon offered by the Rev. Ian F. “Jack” Steeves in the public worship of the First Congregational Church of Scarborough, Maine on Sunday, February 17, 2008 (Second Sunday in Lent).  The principal readings were Genesis 12:1-9; Psalm 121; and John 3:1-17. 
 

“I tell you’re the truth, no one can see the kingdom of God

unless he is born again” (John. 3:3) 

“Preposterous!” 

“Now there was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a member of the Jewish ruling council (Sanhedrin).”  These familiar words open one of the most memorable stories in the New Testament.  The story moves only two verses when Jesus tells his nocturnal guest, “You must be born again.”  

Nicodemus could not understand (and I am certain I can not) how time could run back, the mistakes of youth be cancelled out, the bonds of old age and habit lose their grip, and life starts over again.  “How can a man be born when he is old?”  Jesus is not talking of physical re-birth, but spiritual re-birth. 

Along with all who have wrestled with the problems of faith,” Jesus understood and said that in spite of all that Nicodemus represented (and we claim to represent ourselves) of learning, culture, social and religious status, human nature cannot, unaided, rise about its own spiritual level.  We are men and woman, loved of God, but we are who we are.   

Nicodemus must have been a bit surprised at himself, paying a nocturnal call on Jesus.  He did not have a question for him, or, if he did, he did not speak it.  He did not call to make a complaint or to quibble about a point of law as was the custom.  He did not ask to be healed.  He was seized with an inner impulse that propelled him to Jesus’ side with a simple declaration: “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher, come from God.”  What did Nicodemus expect to happen?  I do not think he knew.  If he did know, he does not tell us. 

A curious dialogue ensues.  “You cannot see the kingdom of God, unless you are born anew,” says Jesus. 

“But adults are closer to death than to birth.  You cannot shrink and re-enter the womb of your mother for another chance at life,” counters Nicodemus.  This was not what Nicodemus expects to talk about. 

“Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit….The wind blows wherever it pleases” says Jesus. 

The soft, cool evening breezes sweep over Nicodemus’ bearded face.  He thinks for a while.  Religious men and women do that.  A God who demands a second birth; a Spirit who works like the unseen wind. 

Shaking his covered head, Nicodemus says only,” How can this be?” 

Jesus goes on at length, but seems to be a little cross with his guest.  This matter of new birth, an inward spiritual invigoration seems – to Nicodemus – to be demanding, too impossible. 

There is something very important that Jesus leaves unsaid.  It is present by implication.  When we take the name of “Christian,” when we are baptized, be it as uncomprehending infants or as adult believers, we take a momentous step.  It is a new life!  From that moment, God is always beside us: calling, waiting for us to follow. 

And follow, most of us do, generally, without even knowing so – like Nicodemus, drawn to Jesus’ side.  God calls, we follow.  We are new creatures in Christ, like newborns trusting our mother’s care, trusting our father’s provision and protection. Like Abram and Sarai, we know not where we are going, but we resolved to go wherever God calls us. 

“Preposterous,” says the world, and, perhaps, a family member or friend echoes the consensus.  “What’s gotten into your heads?’’ You have got to be stopped for your own protection.” 

The Gospel text does not tell us what conclusion Nicodemus draws from Jesus’ interpretation of the meaning of re-birth.  Rather, the story draws us in and we become the nocturnal audience whom Jesus addresses, in the remaining verses of the reading.  He makes it crystal clear that our capacity for discernment is influenced by our willingness to have a new relationship with God through Jesus.  God is more than a concept to explore, or an idea to be debated or the originator of a set of principles to be learned and applied to one’s daily life.  God is all of these and more. 

We celebrate the coming of Christ and the manifestation of God in Christ during the Advent, Christmas and Epiphany seasons.  Lent is a time when we seek to be closer to this God.  One of the times we are closer is when we open ourselves to being renewed by God’s spirit.  We cannot control when God’s present and Spirit will be felt in our lives, but we can prepare ourselves to receive it. 

A little time spent in daily study and prayer will help us to discern and express our love of God.  The attention we give to God during Lent can put us more in control over what distracts us from preparing to receive God in a new and personal way. 

Some use the term “re-birth” or “renewal,” still others prefer the older term, “born again.” 

A complete baptism is physical and spiritual.  You are baptized in water and by the Spirit.  Most of us are physically baptized only once, but all of us must seek to be graced by God’s spirit throughout our lives.  Spiritual growth is what Lent is all about.  Growth may be painful and require that we make sacrifices and changes in our lives, but it is always empowering. 

We would feel again the hand of God.  The necessary condition of belief is the desire to believe.  Lent is not a time for arguing about God.  It is a time for the kind of reflection that may cause us to wrestle with ourselves in an effort to become clearer about what it is we desire. 

In the midst of this Lenten journey is a reassuring word that most of us first heard and perhaps memorized in Sunday school.  “For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in him should not perish, but have everlasting life” (John 3:16).  God’s love gives new life to those who believe.  It is also an invitation to discover God’s spirit and the power and joy of loving God.   

Our love of God can expand our capacity to receive and give love to others.  It can help us establish fellowship with other people.  Our living as faithful people is done in the context of sharing life with others. 

Spiritual growth is a continual process.  What God asks is that we begin the journey.  Whether our beginning seems to be a “reasoned” approach or a wild, ridiculous “leap of faith,” it requires that we believe that God’s love for us will see us to the end. 

The One with whom the journey begins is the One in whom the journey ends. 

“How can this be?”  Those are Nicodemus’s last words in this passage, which makes him the patron saint for all of us who get stuck at the first step, without the faintest idea of how to begin.  Here is now, Jesus says.  Watch me.  Don’t think about it too, too hard.  Watch me.  Just do as I do.  Believe me.  Believe in me, and when we get to the end of journey, we will be at the end and we will be together for ever.  I promise. 

We cannot win this by our self-sufficient acts; we can only accept it as God’s precious gift.  It is offered to us all.  Some of us could find a new release, a new joy in living, a new direction, a new freedom for and from ourselves, in accepting this now.