John 3.1-17
Now there was a Pharisee named Nicodemus, a leader of the Jews. 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.’ Jesus answered him, ‘Very truly, I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God without being born from above.’ 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?’ Jesus answered, ‘Very truly, I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God without being born of water and Spirit. What is born of the flesh is flesh, and what is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not be astonished that I said to you, “You must be born from above.” 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.’ Nicodemus said to him, ‘How can these things be?’ Jesus answered him, ‘Are you a teacher of Israel, and yet you do not understand these things?
‘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. If I have told you about earthly things and you do not believe, how can you believe if I tell you about heavenly things? No one has ascended into heaven except the one who descended from heaven, the Son of Man. And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.
‘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.
‘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.
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One must be born again or born from above as it is translated in our passage today (it basically means the same thing). This is a common phrase in certain Christian circles, are you born again?’ Do you have Christ living in your heart? Are you a ‘New Creation.’
I confess that I have always avoided this saying about myself, and the reason is probably a selfish one, have always found myself jealous of those Christians who have had a really powerful sense of God and of the Spirit moving in their lives. I am not sure why this is, but it may be some deep sense that I may be ‘missing something’ from this Christian walk that I am on, that we are all on.
I know Christian brothers and sisters who came to faith in a single moment; their lives were going one way, then they have had an encounter with Jesus Christ and been changed. A bit like Zaccheus, a tax collector who meets, and Jesus goes into his home. And something changes in him; from being a hated and self-interested tax collector, to a generous person, renewed and restored to the person he was made to be by Jesus. This is from Luke 19 verses 8 and 9:
But Zacchaeus stood up and said to the Lord, “Look, Lord! Here and now, I give half of my possessions to the poor, and if I have cheated anybody out of anything, I will pay back four times the amount.”
Jesus said to him, “Today salvation has come to this house, because this man, too, is a son of Abraham. For the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost.”
I remember stories of people who were drug dealers, criminals, all kinds of people who have done all kinds of terrible things have been changed, just like that, by the Spirit of Jesus Christ. Their lives were heading in one direction, but then there was an almost literal ‘about face’.
I don’t think I have ever really had such an experience; but there was a time in 2006 when I think I really ‘felt’ the wind of the Spirit for the first time, and I said a prayer and went to a bible study and went to a meeting where I was asked by somebody ‘and are you a believer,’ and I didn’t answer straight away. And this person said ‘you hesitated.’ And I don’t know why but it really annoyed me, I felt as though I was being judged and ‘not quite there yet.’ It wasn’t helpful. Life went on for me, and it took me over four years before I went back to church.
The change in me has taken many years, and as I have reflected during my preparation for this sermon, I can say that I am ‘born again’ or ‘born from above’ because the Spirit of God lives within. I know the presence of the Spirit of God in my life. If we are Christians, the Spirit of God has rebirthed us into a new life and a new way of being. Whether done in an instant, or over a period of years, God’s Spirit is at work.
Jesus says, “Very truly, I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God without being born of water and Spirit. What is born of the flesh is flesh, and what is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not be astonished that I said to you, “You must be born from above.” 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.’”
The life of the flesh is our natural state, prone to sinfulness and our own selfish desires. The life in the spirit is what Jesus offers us; salvation, resurrection life, eternal life, life that is full of hope and joy no matter the circumstances. Some balk at this, especially in modern times; the idea that there is anything wrong inside of us.
The scriptures say that human beings are both good, and evil, look back to the beginning of everything in Genesis chapter one, were God made all things, including human beings, and it was ‘very good.’ But it doesn’t stay that way; Genesis 3 records the first disobedience of human beings. We disobey, we harm others, that old word ‘sin’ so unpopular these days is real and it pervades our lives, and needs to be dealt with.
We can deny this if we want, but it is self-deceiving denial. One of the things that I always found difficult about Christianity was that I always felt ‘I was trying my best.’ The gospel that I experienced was one where I had been brought up a Christian, and yet all God did was judge me and find me wanting.
In one of the apostle John’s Letters later on in the New Testament he says this;
‘If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.
And he is right, he is absolutely right. No matter how hard we try, sin crouches at our door and all too often, finds his way in.
God’s response to sin, is those famous verses from John 3:16:
‘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.’
This means that God, seeing our situation, knows that our sin needs dealing with. He can’t just ‘let us off,’ as that would make a mockery of his Justice; in fact, it would make a mockery of all people who strive for justice. All those who say ‘why doesn’t God just let me off?’ would we want the person who has caused serious harm to others to be let off? No, we would want justice for the victim, and that’s what God wants; justice for all. and to bring justice to all, the sin of all needs dealing with all together, all at once.
By sending Jesus, to pay the penalty for sin, by dying the death of the cross, by which we can be free if we turn to him and ask for forgiveness.
This is not a concept or an idea, this is not some ‘idealised’ or ‘impersonal’ form of love. This is the love of a passionate God, who wants to bring his people out of slavery to their sinful ways, and know the freedom of what it means to live a life with the Spirit of the living God within us; no longer bound by guilt and death, but truly, truly free.
This is what God offers to us in his son Jesus. The Father, Son and Spirit are on a mission, to bring to salvation all those who seek it; he wants passionately to know us, to have a relationship with us, to be with us, to share his eternity with us.
Come to Jesus Christ today, know his love for you, and receive his salvation. It’s a gift he offers to us freely, because he loves us, receive it today.
Amen
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