Well good morning, and Merry Christmas! I’d ask you to open your Bibles and turn to the gospel of John, chapter 3. This will be a familiar passage to many of you, especially verse 16, which is certainly one of the most well-known passages in the Bible. We’re going to read verses 1 through 17, and then I’d encourage you to keep your Bibles open to the passage and refer to the text as we work our way through it.

Now there was a Pharisee, a man named Nicodemus who was a member of the Jewish ruling council. He came to Jesus at night and said, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God. For no one could perform the signs you are doing if God were not with him.”

Jesus replied, “Very truly I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God unless they are born again.”

“How can someone be born when they are old?” Nicodemus asked. “Surely they cannot enter a second time into their mother’s womb to be born!”

Jesus answered, “Very truly I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless they are born of water and the Spirit. Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit. You should not be surprised at my saying, ‘You must be born again.’ The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit.”

“How can this be?” Nicodemus asked.

“You are Israel’s teacher,” said Jesus, “and do you not understand these things? Very truly I tell you, we speak of what we know, and we testify to what we have seen, but still you people do not accept our testimony. I have spoken to you of earthly things and you do not believe; how then will you believe if I speak of heavenly things? No one has ever gone into heaven except the one who came from heaven—the Son of Man. Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, that everyone who believes may have eternal life in him.”

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.

This passage centers around Jesus’ statement that “You must be born again.” Here are the two questions I would like us to consider this morning:

First, what does that even mean? Even if you are not incredibly familiar with Christianity, the phrase “born again” is probably familiar. If you have been around churches for a while, it may be too familiar. Jesus says, “You must be born again,” and what we hear is, “You must become a Christian.” Which, at the end of the day, is true, but I want us to take a closer look this morning: Why does Jesus use this metaphor about a new birth? What’s he getting at, exactly?

The second question to consider is “Why is this so confusing to Nicodemus?” As you heard in the flow of the passage, there’s this back and forth between Jesus and Nicodemus which reaches a head in verse 10 where Jesus rebukes Nicodemus for his failure to understand. What wrong assumptions might Nicodemus have had that prevented him from properly understanding, and what can we learn from that so we don’t fall into similar errors?

With that outline in mind, let’s start working through the text.

Nicodemus

The dialogue takes place between Jesus and Nicodemus. Here’s what we’re told about Nicodemus:

He is, according to verse 1, a Pharisee. The Pharisees were the religious elite of the nation of Israel. So Nicodemus is educated, he’s intelligent, he’s motivated, and he’s connected to the right people.
Not only that, but in verse 10, we’re told something interesting. Jesus addresses him as “Israel’s teacher”. The original language suggests that this was a title. He’s “the teacher of Israel”. A parallel today might be to say that Nicodemus was the most tenured professor in the seminary, or the senior elder of the Presbytery. He’s in a position recognized for his education and (at least assumed) expertise in the Bible.

Although Nicodemus is a scholar of the Old Testament, his understanding is a bit off, as the dialogue between he and Jesus makes clear.

We don’t really know why Nicodemus sought an audience with Jesus. Perhaps he was expecting affirmation—for Jesus to thank him for his devotion. Perhaps he was spying on behalf of the counsel of the Pharisees. Perhaps he was honestly seeking Jesus’ instruction. We don’t know, because if you notice, Nicodemus doesn‘t really get a chance to set the direction of the conversation.

Jesus, knowing what’s in the heart of all men—including Nicodemus—cuts right to the chase and tells Nicodemus precisely what he needs to hear to have his worldview challenged. The Pharisees placed a huge amount of emphasis on obedience to the Law of the Old Covenant: the Ten Commandments and the rules about sacrifices and tithing and Sabbath observance and other religious festivals. Jesus counters, “Very truly I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God unless they are born again.”

The assumption that the path to a right relationship with God depends on how well one measures up to some standard is very common. Whether it is the Mosaic Law of the Pharisees, the Five Pillars of Islam, the idea of karma in Hinduism, the system of ethics and meditation of Buddhism, or just the generic moralism of secular America, it is a very common assumption that one’s outcome at the end of one’s life is determined by how well one measures up. If I just do enough of the right things (whatever those are), that will make up for all of the wrong things in my past.

So, picture a timeline. I’m at some point along that timeline and can look back and realize I’ve made a mess of things. If I just measure up to some standard, from here on out, then I’ll be good-to-go in the end.

But Jesus says, “No, it doesn’t work that way. You can’t get from where you are now to where you need to be to be right with God. You need to start all over at the beginning. You need to be born again.”

Before moving to Beaver, our family lived in Florida for about four years. The building in which we lived was originally built in 1925 as a hotel. Quite a luxurious hotel (by the standards of 1925). Then during World War II it was used to house naval pilots. In the 60’s it was purchased by a foundation and converted into a private school. Finally, in 1976 it was purchased by a mission organization and converted to apartments and its headquarters. So, the ballroom was converted into a chapel, interior walls rearranged to convert individual hotel rooms into apartments that could house families, etc. Now all of these changes were renovations, improvements to the original structure to get from purpose A to purpose B.

This idea of renovation, in the spiritual realm, is the assumption of Nicodemus and many others, up to our very day. How can I adjust my life, make changes, improve personally, etc. so that I can get from where I am now (which is pretty messed up) to where I am pleasing to God? How can I renovate my life to get where I want to be?

In contrast to renovation is demolition. Not too long after we left Florida, that same building was sold again. And there was some uncertainly as to what would become of it. One plan was for a healthcare-related facility, perhaps a long-term care facility. If that were to happen, the entire building would need to be demolished and rebuilt from the ground up. That change would simply be too radical to just convert the existing building.

And this is what Jesus is saying to Nicodemus. “You can’t get to where you want to be, Nicodemus, by renovating your life. You need to demolish and start over. You need to start from scratch. You need to be born again.”

Now, what objection immediately arises when you hear that you have to start all over? “You can’t do that!” Which is precisely Nicodemus’s response. “How can a man be born when he is old?” Some think here that Nicodemus is being really dense, as if he thinks Jesus is literally proposing that one can somehow go back through the birth canal. I really don’t think that’s the case. Remember what we saw earlier about Nicodemus. This is the teacher of Israel; this is the dean of the seminary. I think he understands precisely what Jesus is saying and is just answering him in kind, in keeping with the metaphor. “I hear what you’re saying, Jesus … you have to start all over again. But you can’t do that!”

So, what does Jesus mean here? He presses on in verse 5. “No one can enter the kingdom of God unless they are born of water and the Spirit. Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit.” This birth that Jesus is talking about is of a totally different kind. Flesh gives birth to flesh. Human effort isn’t enough. You need to start over by the Holy Spirit.

What Jesus is communicating here to Nicodemus is the good news of the Gospel—that our salvation doesn’t depend on human effect but is based on what God has accomplished in Christ. It is couched here in metaphor, to be sure, but if we jump ahead to verse 16 it is explained plainly. (We’ll come back to verses 10–15 in a minute.) Jesus states:

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.

How does one start over, spiritually-speaking, so that one can have eternal life? The answer is that, fundamentally, it’s not about you. It’s about what God has done through Jesus, and we just need to believe. That’s how you start afresh. That’s as far as this passage takes us, but we know from the rest of this gospel how this comes about. We know that Jesus lives a life of perfect obedience to God the father, what we could never do, and then takes the wrath of God—the wrath that we deserve—upon himself on the cross, so that for those who believe in Jesus, their sins are atoned for, they are satisfied through the sacrifice of Jesus. You can’t get from where you are right now to where you need to be by measuring up to a standard. You need a completely new start, a new identity, one that comes from the Holy Spirit.

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here! (2 Corinthians 5:17)

Nicodemus doesn’t get it … do we?

Now if you’ve been paying attention, this isn’t the first time you’ve heard this message in this church. We never want to get to a place in this church where we assume the Gospel. It needs to me made explicit over and over again. Part of that is because it forms the foundation for everything else. But another reason, relevant to our passage this morning, is because people often need to hear the Gospel many times before it “clicks”.

I grew up in this church, went to Sunday morning worship, Sunday school, Treasure Club (pre-runner to Quest), in a home with Christian parents. The first time I heard the Gospel was when I was in ninth grade. Now does this mean that the Gospel was not announced in this church, or in my home, for 14 years? No, of course not. But I didn’t have—as the Bible would put it—ears that could hear.

Our brains have this remarkable ability—this frustrating ability—to misprocess information. It is happening right now. The sound waves are being transmitted, vibrating the bones in the ear, all that stuff, and yet truth gets lost because we have these filters in place, filters of distractions and invalid assumptions that make us unable to hear truth.

So now let’s go back to verses 10 through 15 and consider our second question, “Why is this so confusing to Nicodemus?” Jesus has stated this truth a couple of times, and Nicodemus doesn’t get it. Jesus responds with a bit of an edge starting in verse 10. His rebuke is, “You are supposed to be an expert in the Scriptures; how can you not understand these things?” Because the necessity of regeneration from above, of salvation being found by faith, is there in the Old Testament. This isn’t something that Jesus invented in the New Testament. A couple of examples:

I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. (Ezekiel 36:26)

Behold, his soul is puffed up; it is not upright within him, but the righteous shall live by his faith. (Habakkuk 2:4)

Abram believed the Lord, and he credited it to him as righteousness. (Genesis 15:6)

And these are just some of the verses that we can cherry-pick and display conveniently on a PowerPoint slide. Far more persuasive is the larger narrative, the promises of a deliverer given in Genesis, the covenant with Abraham, the symbolism of the sacrifices and festivals in the Law, etc.

When the whole of Scripture is considered, what Jesus is saying here makes perfect sense. So why couldn’t Nicodemus, a scholar of the Old Testament, see this? And I believe the answer is because he had an errant filter through which he interpreted his study of the Scripture.

Here’s what we know about the Pharisees. They were devoted to properly understanding God’s Law, but they also heavily relied on tradition and the inherited expert opinion on the Law. So, they had not only the Old Testament, but also lots of commentary on the Old Testament. And, as it happened, over time—see if any of this sounds familiar—those traditions, and those expert opinions came to have logical priority over the text of Scripture itself.

Thus, when Jesus speaks truth (that does line up with Scripture), the Pharisees can’t understand. It doesn’t fit into their grid. In verse 11 Jesus says he’s testifying to the truth, but they just don’t want to believe what he’s saying. In verses 12 and 13 the implication seems to be that it was just too simple. They wanted something complicated, some “deep” or “heavenly truth” that was beyond the comprehension of the common folk. No, Jesus says, no one needs to go up to heaven to get the secret decoder ring. Jesus descended to us to testify about the father and salvation. And this message isn’t just for the spiritual elite—it is meant to be understood by everyone.

Now here’s the kicker. We can be guilty—I can be guilty—of the exact same thing. While claiming to believe in the supremacy of Scripture, it is easy to fall into the trap of relying on tradition and expert opinion. To study a lot about the Bible, without actually studying the Bible.

There are many ways this happens. We are awash in a sea of excellent spiritual resources with Bible study guides, podcasts, books by gifted writers on relevant life themes. We should be grateful for these resources, and should avail ourselves of their use, but if we’re not careful we can end up giving them priority of time and thought. Compounding that problem, we can find ourselves in an echo chamber, where we are only hearing from sources that confirm what we already assume to be true, or what we assume to be the most urgent issues.

This happens when we only listen to our favorite authors or speakers, or we interpret Scripture solely in light of our denominational creeds, or through the filter of social justice issues, or based on insights from modern psychology. Again, solid resources have a place, and we should be thankful for and take advantage of them. So don’t hear me saying this morning that those things are bad. If you are in a small group right now and going through a Tim Keller book, that’s great. All I’m saying is that, look, here we are at the end of a calendar year, a good time to reflect. If you look back and can see that you’ve read a dozen books by influential Christian thinkers, have listened faithfully to a Christian podcast all year, but you never really got a daily Bible reading plan off the ground, or actually studied a specific book of the Bible in-depth, maybe that balance could be adjusted.

The danger is we become like the Pharisees, where there is a lot of genuine, sincere study, but the actual voice of Scripture gets drowned out amidst the pursuit of those other voices.

But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have become convinced of, because you know those from whom you learned it, and how from infancy you have known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work. (2 Timothy 3:14–17)

The snake in the wilderness

We‘ll close with the illustration that Jesus gives in verses 14 and 15.

Jesus makes an analogy from a story in Israel’s history. The event occurs in the book of Numbers. If you recall the story, the Israelites were slaves in Egypt, they have now escaped, and are wandering around the wilderness. And—as they are prone to do—they start complaining against God. In response, God sends venomous snakes among them, and many of the people are getting sick and dying. They cry out to Moses, and God responds by providing a means for them to be healed.

It’s kind of a bizarre thing, though. God could have just taken the snakes away and healed everyone. That’s not outside of his power, and would be consistent with his dealings in other places. Instead, he instructs Moses to craft a bronze snake and place it amid the camp. If someone wanted to be healed, they had to look at the snake. That’s it. All they had to do was believe God’s word about healing coming through looking at the snake, and they would be healed.

And then the narrative in the Old Testament moves on. And it kind of leaves you scratching your head and asking, “What was that whole snake thing about?” And I’m sure that people who study the Bible far more than I have some great insights into that passage, but I honestly think that the main reason that happened back then was so that it pointed ahead to what Jesus would do later and be used as an illustration in this very conversation with Nicodemus.

In the same way that the snake was lifted up, so also Jesus would be lifted up on a cross. And in the same way that those who believed in God’s provision in the snake would be saved, so also those who believe in God’s provision in Jesus will be saved. And although we’re not told this explicitly, I’m sure there were Israelites back in the snake-infested camp who refused to believe Moses that looking at a bronze snake would heal them. Because it doesn’t make sense: “That’s ridiculous. Everybody knows that looking at bronze statues doesn’t heal sickness.” Or it goes against our sense of responsibility: “We got ourselves into this mess by complaining. We have to get ourselves out of it by being more religious in the future. Everybody knows that’s how it works. Looking at a bronze snake is the easy way out.”

I hope that no one in this room finds yourself in that same situation of unbelief. The gospel really is that simple. You can’t measure up to God’s perfect standard, you can’t atone for the mistakes of your past, so Jesus paid the penalty for you and God requires that we believe. That we have faith. Period.

Here’s what’s neat about this passage. Although Nicodemus comes across as kind of a doofus in this passage, he comes around. There are only two other instances in the Bible where we hear of Nicodemus. The next comes during a meeting of the Pharisees, where they are accusing Jesus, and Nicodemus stands up for Jesus, asserting that it’s not right to condemn a person without giving that person a chance to defend themselves. That would have come at great personal cost. The only other time we read of Nicodemus is after Jesus had died, when he came with Joseph of Arimathea to bury the body of Jesus. By all accounts, Nicodemus was able to get past his wrong filter, past his blind spots and wrong assumptions, to hear the words of life from Christ. And he believed. And may that be true of all of us as we move into a new year.