The reading
John 3:1-21
1 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. 18 Those who believe in him are not condemned; but those who
do not believe are condemned already, because they have not believed in the
name of the only Son of God. 19 And this is the judgment, that the light has
come into the world, and people loved darkness rather than light because their
deeds were evil. 20 For all who do evil hate the light and do not come to the
light, so that their deeds may not be exposed. 21 But those who do what is true
come to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that their deeds have been
done in God."
The message
I had always
wanted to see the Northern Lights. They are green flashes and streaks or bands
of light in the night sky. I had heard
a lot about them and I had seen lots of pictures. It fascinated me ever since I first learned
about them. It is a journey to get to
them. They occur mostly above a
particular part of the world, generally around the Arctic Circle and viewable
in winter from several countries not known for mild winters. They are a natural
phenomon influenced by solar flares, clouds, weather, temperature and other
factors beyond our control. This means you could be in the best viewing spot in
the best place on the best possible night and still miss them. Last week, I went
to Iceland with my family so I would have a chance to see them. Our first day there was filled with stories
of people who missed them, who were there on 7 or 8 tours and over a week with
no sightings. On our second night, we took
a tour about an hour outside rekjevevick, the capital city where we were
staying. We stopped in a relatively abandoned area (okay downright desolate
area) and waited to see the Northern lights. There was nothing but cold and
wind. After 2 hours, the tour called it
quits and we all received a free redo. Disappointed and cold, with the
experiences we heard about, we booked for the next night and prepared for
another cold, windy let down. People who
lived there all told us the same thing, keep going, keep looking, you’ll catch
them.
Our next
trip went to a different, equally cold windy and desolate area of Iceland. When
we got off the bus, my brother said, hey isn’t that the northern lights and I
said, nah, it’s just some clouds. We saw
some sort of site a few hundred yards away and wandered over to the area (I
don’t know what we expected to find). It happened to be the remains of a Viking
settlement (also known as a few piles of rock),
Just that afternoon, I was complaining that I didn’t see any old stuff
so it was a nice surprise, As we walked
back to the buses, those clouds were still there, my brother started again, hey
clouds don’t stay around that long, those look sort of green and they are
moving in weird ways.
We asked one
of the tour guides what we were looking at and she was a little surprised,
saying, that’s what the northern lights actually look like. She explained that our eyes do not see colors
like our cameras do, our minds do not join images together in the same way our
cameras do and we cannot photo-shop or edit what our eyes see. Most of
the time the Northern lights are faint and not nearly as bold as people expect,
with occasional flares of brightness. I
stared at the sky for a while and started to notice subtle greens appearing and
some movement. It dawned on me that I
was actually looking at the northern lights all along. After
this we saw the northern lights 2 or 3 more times, over the city, in places we
were told they rarely appear. The truth
is if I had driven out there alone, I would not have stopped, without the help
of a guide and others (and the internet), I would have driven right by without
thinking twice about the clouds. It wasn’t exactly what I expected.
In today’s
bible reading, Nicodemus wanted to see
something. He wanted to see the Messiah, the long promised and expected savior,
the presence of God with us, the restoration of God’s people. The problem was
Nicodemus was not quite sure what he was looking for. He suspected it could be Jesus but dismissed
Jesus as a danger and a fake. Nicodemus was a Pharisee, a group of highly
educated and selective religious authorities, a group who had already made up
their minds that Jesus was not the Messiah.
Nicodemus sneaks out at night and engages in this really sort of cryptic
conversation with Jesus, they seem to be asking and answering different
questions and we have no indication that
Nicodemus believes, accepts or even understands what Jesus is telling him. Nicodemus starts with the big question on his
mind. What am I looking at in you? Jesus was doing great signs and teaching with
authority, Jesus was being very messiah like in every way and Nicodemus needs
to know why. Jesus does not say, well I
am the messiah, instead, he replies, to see the kingdom of God you must be born
from above. Nicodemus takes this
literally and wonders how someone can be physically born again. After a few more misunderstandings, Jesus
just flat out tells Nicodemus the truth.
That they are talking about 2 different things. Nicodemus is out at
night, in darkness, focused on worldly things and cannot see what is happening
around him. He is searching for the Messiah while standing right in front of
him, missing this opportunity to see and believe. On the other side Jesus is
focused on God, forgiveness and the gift of eternal life, sharing one of the
most powerful passages in the bible "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. Nicodemus is limited by his expectations,
busy looking at his checklist to see if Jesus has enough boxes filled in to be
the Messiah, while Jesus is revealing the kingdom of God, sharing the good news
and trying to show him that God is doing something amazing.
We are left
wondering if Nicodemus ever gets over his preconceptions and gets out of his
own way to see the Messiah. He will show up 2 more times in John’s Gospel. He
remains on his journey to see the Messiah that was right in front of him. In John 7, Nicodemus will confront his peers, fellow
religious leaders, mildly but enough to draw a lot of attention to himself: Here’s
what happened: Then the
temple police went back to the chief priests and Pharisees, who asked them, “Why
did you not arrest him?” The police
answered, “Never has anyone spoken like this!” Then the Pharisees replied,
“Surely you have not been deceived too, have you? Has any one of the authorities or of the
Pharisees believed in him? But this
crowd, which does not know the law—they are accursed.” Nicodemus, who had gone to Jesus before, and
who was one of them, asked, “Our law does not judge people without first giving
them a hearing to find out what they are doing, does it?” They replied, “Surely
you are not also from Galilee, are you? Search and you will see that no prophet
is to arise from Galilee.”
Nicodemus
will appear again in John 19, at the burial of Jesus, We are told After these things, Joseph of Arimathea, who
was a disciple of Jesus, though a secret one because of his fear of the Jews,
asked Pilate to let him take away the body of Jesus. Pilate gave him
permission; so he came and removed his body. Nicodemus, who had at first come to Jesus by
night, also came, bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes, weighing about a
hundred pounds. They took the body of Jesus and wrapped it with the spices in
linen cloths, according to the burial custom of the Jews. Now there was a garden in the place where he
was crucified, and in the garden there was a new tomb in which no one had ever
been laid. And so, because it was the
Jewish day of Preparation, and the tomb was nearby, they laid Jesus there. Nicodemus’ journey to find the messiah
takes him to a meeting with Jesus, a conflict with his community and leaves him
with Jesus when almost everyone else was gone.
The moment I
saw this reading, I thought of my experiences with the Northern Lights. They
were not exactly what I expected, not easy to find even in Iceland, not
something I or the tour company or anyone could control and I would have missed
them if I just left because it was only clouds or did not bother going back to
that cold windy field again. I would have missed one of those bucket list
things I wanted to see. It was work for me to see something literally right in
front of my eyes. I needed help, guidance
and information. This reading challenges us to understand God is not limited by
our expectations, to remember God does not always appear where, when and how we
expect, God’s grace is wider that we imagine, covering more people and deeper
sins, God’s power is greater than we can imagine,
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