Nick at Nite
A sermon by
John 3:1-17
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SERMON: Nick at Nite
I'll never forget the Sunday in Odessa I preached from this text. I started off by saying that Nicodemus was a Pharisee who came to Jesus under the cloak of darkness. No sooner than I paused to take a breath, one of the men in the choir quipped to another, "So, Nick at Nite, huh?" Ever since then, I've thought of this passage in a new way; hence, the title of the sermon.
I don't mean to trivialize the text. To the contrary, Nicodemus was a man of God, a devout student of the Torah, a teacher of the Law, an esteemed Jewish leader, a respected elder and member of the Sandedrin.
He was a paragon of virtue, but he had a problem – he was spiritually blind. And so, I'd like to take a closer look at Nicodemus in the sermon this morning. My question is, "What kept him from seeing the kingdom of God?" You can think of him as Nick at Nite, if you like, but just be careful not to put him down; for, if you look carefully, he bears a close resemblance to you and me. The text begins,
"Now there was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus,
a ruler of the Jews.
The same came to him by night…"(John 3:1-2a)
It's easy to see why Nicodemus came to Jesus at night – he had a reputation to consider. Jesus was an enigma to the Jewish leaders. He had no credentials. As far as we know, he had no formal education. As far as they were concerned, he was merely an itinerant preacher and faith healer, of which there were many in his day. It wouldn't have been prudent for Nicodemus to have been seen in Jesus' company, so he came to Jesus at night under the cloak of darkness.
But get this: In John's gospel, words like darkness and light are used both literally and figuratively, and it's at this deeper, symbolic meaning of darkness that we find the significance of the Nicodemus story: As well-versed as he was in the Torah, he was in the dark. He didn't have a clue who Jesus was. He'd heard that Jesus performed miracles; that's all. So he came to Jesus and said,
"Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God,
for no one can do these signs that you do,
unless God is with him." (John 3:2)
Nicodemus had obviously heard about Jesus' turning the water into wine, feeding the multitude and healing the sick. He was baffled. It didn't fit his understanding of the Jewish faith or his preconceived notions about the Promised Messiah. And this is the irony: He could explain every aspect of the Law and the Prophets, but he couldn't recognize Jesus as the Christ.
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A friend of mind once toyed with the idea of writing a novel about the Second Coming of Christ. His idea was to portray Jesus as a Puerto Rican janitor in a large, affluent church. As the drama unfolds, various committees meet at the church to discuss the church's ministry. They come to plan ways to reach others with the Good News of Jesus Christ.
They pass the custodian coming and going. Sometimes he even comes into the room where they're meeting, say, to empty the trash. But they never say a word to him, except to patronize him. They certainly never ask for his input. After all, they have important work to do – God's work – and what would he know about that?
It's not such a far-flung idea. In Jesus' day, the scribes and Pharisees were known for spending hours on end discussing and debating the finer points of the law; yet, they were unable to recognize the Promised Messiah when he came. It makes you wonder: If Jesus were sitting here today, would you recognize him? In the prologue to John's gospel, we read,
"The true light that enlightens everyone was coming into the world.
He was in the world, and the world was made through him,
and the world didn't recognize him.
He came to his own,
and those who were his own didn't receive him.
But as many as received him,
to them he gave the right to become God's children,
to those who believe in his name:
who were born not of blood,
nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man,
but of God." (John 1:9-13)
Jesus told Nicodemus, "Most certainly, I tell you, unless one is born anew, he can't see the Kingdom of God." (3:3) This went right over his head. Nicodemus said, "How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother's womb, and be born?" To which Jesus responded, "Most certainly, I tell you, unless one is born anew, he can't see the Kingdom of God." (John 3:3-5)
All this must have sounded cryptic and confusing to Nicodemus, for he threw up his hands and exclaimed, "How can these things be?" (John 3:9) Nicodemus didn't get it, and I suspect he's not the only one.
What does it mean to be born again … to be born from above?
The place to start is with the language. In the Greek language there are two different ways to express the verb, to be born. Richard Donovan explains:
Birth can be considered either from the father's side, in which the verb is 'beget,' or from the mother's side, in which the verb is to 'bear.' The Johannine metaphor uses the former verb, with the meaning 'beget'" (Howard, 505; see also Brown, 138), so Jesus is saying that we need to be sired a second time, this time by the Heavenly Father. (SermonWriter, Feb. 20, 2005, Volume 9, Number 9, ISSN 1071-9962)
This is brought out in the verse that follows. Jesus said,
"That which is born of the flesh is flesh.
That which is born of the Spirit is spirit." (John 3:5-6)
To be born of water is to come out of the mother's womb and grow as a physical being; to be born of the Spirit is to be brought to life by the Spirit of God and grow as a spiritual being. Until that happens – until you're born of the Spirit – you're not going to be able to recognize God at work within you and around you. You're going to be spiritually blind, and to be spiritually blind is to live in a black and white, two-dimensional world.
To be spiritually alive is to experience the world in 3-D, living Technicolor and Surround Sound. It's to find meaning in the facts and figures of everyday life. It's to go beyond the who, what, where, why and when of everyday events to the wonder and beauty of life in all its fullness.
Think of the love song from The Music Man:
There were bells on the hill
But I never heard them ringing,
No, I never heard them at all
Till there was you.
There were birds in the sky
But I never saw them winging
No, I never saw them at all
Till there was you.
And there was music,
And there were wonderful roses,
They tell me,
In sweet fragrant meadows of dawn and dew.
There was love all around
But I never heard it singing
No, I never heard it at all
Till there was you!
Now, translate that back to the story of Nicodemus: When the Spirit of God comes into your life it awakens your spirit:
• Your ears are opened to music you've never heard before;
• Your eyes are opened to sights you've never seen before;
• And your heart is opened to a love you could've never, ever imagined before.
John Newton experienced this first hand and described it this way:
Amazing grace, how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me!
I once was lost, but now am found; was blind but now I see.
What's the secret of being born of the Spirit?
First, it's not up to you. It's up to God. Paul made this clear in his Letter to the Ephesians, where he said:
"For by grace you have been saved through faith,
and that not of yourselves;
it is the gift of God, not of works,
that no one would boast." (Ephesians 2:8-9)
As for your physical birth, you didn't get to choose the day on which you were born, or where, or who your parents would be, or whether you'd be male or female, or any of the other circumstances affecting your life. So it is with your spiritual birth. It's God who does the choosing.
But there's an important second point that goes along with this: While you don't get to choose the particulars of your physical birth; it's up to you to respond to what you're given – to play the hand you're dealt – to do the best you can with what you've got.
Remember the Parable of the Talents? The landlord commended the five-talent man because he put his talents to work; he condemned the one-talent man because he took what he had and buried it in the ground.
Listen: Even though it's God who chooses to give you your spiritual birth, it's up to you to affirm the faith you've been given and build on it and put it to work.
Just as your physical birth is but the beginning of a lifetime of new growth and discovery, so is your spiritual birth but the beginning of a life of faith. The Good News is every time you take even a little baby step on faith, your faith gets stronger. You're able to see signs of God at work and know the plan God has in store for your life.
You don't grow up physically all at once. You grow up little by little.
In the same way, you're not likely to experience the fullness of God's glory all at once. But once you profess Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior; once you turn to God and trust the Spirit to guide you, the easier it is to live by faith and know yourself as a disciple of Jesus Christ.
My son, Christopher, learned to fly when he was sixteen. He had a great instructor. He started him off flying straight and level. That's it. The instructor did the rest. Then he had him make shallow turns to the left and to the right. As Chris gained confidence, he added another technique, another skill, another maneuver. In time Chris was taking off and landing on his own and ready to make his first solo flight.
To walk by faith is to confess Jesus as Lord and Savior, then take one step at a time. God will do the rest, and with each step you take, you'll grow more and more into his likeness.
Jesus goes on in the passage to talk about how he'd be lifted up like the serpent Moses lifted up in the wilderness – as a sign of salvation. And then he says the most cherished words of the New Testament:
"For God so loved the world, that he gave his one and only Son,
that whoever believes in him should not perish,
but have eternal life." (John 3:16)
Let's stop here and ask: Whatever happened to Nicodemus? Did he stay with Jesus or go home? Was he born again, or did he stay in the dark? Was he ever able to recognize Jesus as the Christ?
John doesn't say outright, but he gives us a clue. When the temple leaders first rose up in opposition to Jesus, Nicodemus went to bat for him. He reminded them of the Torah, which stipulated that you shouldn't judge another person without first giving him a proper hearing. (John. 7:50-53) On that, they backed down.
That's not all. In the end, the day Jesus died on the Cross, there were two men there to receive his lifeless body. One was Joseph of Arimathea. He provided the tomb in which Jesus was buried. The other was Nicodemus. He brought a hundred pounds of costly myrrh and aloes to prepare Jesus' body for burial. (John 19:38-40)
Regardless of whether Nicodemus was a baby Christian or a full-blown disciple, he was there for Jesus when it counted … no longer hiding under a cloak of darkness … with a love and devotion for all to see. May the same be said of us today.
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Copyright 2010, Philip McLarty. Used by permission.
SCRIPTURE QUOTATIONS are from the World English Bible (WEB), a public domain (no copyright) modern English translation of the Holy Bible.
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