C:sermons/year-a/Lent2-2011-Born From Above
March 20th, 2011
By Rev. Dr. Thomas L. Truby
John 3:1-17
Born From Above
What does it mean to be born from above? Born of this earth means being caught in mimetic rivalry; desiring the desires of each other and all wanting roughly the same things and fighting over them. “Being born from above” pulls us out of the mess by focusing on the One who is beyond us all. Being formed from above lifts us out of our entangling jealousies and secret competitions. This lifting can occur at any age. Nicodemus thinks it’s too late for him but he is wrong.
On this second Sunday of Lent, Nicodemus doubts that new starts are possible. He expresses deep pessimism. Some biblical scholars think the writer of John’s gospel portrays Nicodemus as simply missing the point. I don’t think he does. I think they both are using common words to talk at another level.
Verse five begins with “Very truly” which is Jesus’ way of saying “listen up, get this right.” No one can enter the kingdom of God born of water only—we can’t get there in our ordinary humanness, mimetic rivalry has too much of a hold and inevitably sucks the peace out of us. Jesus isn’t talking about the here-after when he uses the phrase“kingdom of God”. He sayswe can’t live as a God’s people unless we allow something to pull us out of the dog-eat-dog world we have created. No one can pull themselves up by their own bootstraps. We are caught in this, all of us born of women, even those of us who are stellar performers, like Nicodemus, can’t be in Jesus’ kingdom on our own. We have to be born of the Spirit, born from above.
Born of the Spirit involves tuning our life to a different instrument;marching to a different drummer;attendingto a different source of motivation. Then grasped by forgiveness and depending on the Advocate; we receive life and sustenance from this new relationship.
In verse sixJesus tells us that there is a separation. Flesh is one thing; Spirit is another and a gulf lies between them. It reminds me of the story of Lazarus and the rich man where both die and discover an unbridgeable chasm between them.
We are all flesh, born of it; and we are all human, born of women. We have no choice about the flesh part—but we canchooseto be born of the Spirit. Jesus is alerting Nicodemus to his choices. Nicodemus came seeking and Jesus tells him there is something to be found. The flesh is trapped in desire after the human other, or what Paul calls “desires of the flesh.” But there is another source of desire to which we can be hooked and this desire comes from above.
In verse sevenJesus warns Nicodemus not to be put off by this call from above. Don’t be astonished that I am asking you to make a radical shift in thinking and life. Don’t be scandalized that I am calling even a serious religious person like youout of a certain fog, both boring and predictable, into something as astonishing as a new birth. Even when you are old and established with deep habits, you still must be born from above.
Verse eight says theSpirit cannot be controlled. It is outside our jurisdiction. We hear and feel the evidence of its existence but we can’t see it. It surprises us with its movements. It pops up here and disappears there. It moves to and fro in our midst and we cannot direct it.
Think about all the things that are happening in our church; all the surprises. List them. Even that I am preaching with as much vigor and energy as I am, surprises me. I could not have predicted it five years ago. I see evidences of the Spirits movement in your faces and you see it in mine. I see it in your relationships with each other where there is a developing joy and ease. You hang around in the sanctuary after church, “in the very presence of God” and catch each other up on your lives. It is wonderful and it continues into the coffee hour after worship.
This is the way it is when we are born of the Spirit. We can’t see it but we can feel it. We are all just human, every one of us born of women, but there is something more now. There is an added dimension. Jesus called it “being born of the Spirit”. He told Nicodemus he needed this birth as well as the first one to really live. The first one gets us going but the second makes it worthwhile. After the second one, we find ourselves participating in God’s kingdomand it feels right.
Nicodemus, astonished by Jesus’ invitation to be born into something new, asks the question, “How can these things be?” Jesus responds with his own question, “Are you a teacher of Israel, and yet you do not understand these things?”
“Nicodemus, if you are going to teach people about life and God, you need to know these things. People look to you for guidance, they model themselves after you. You need to know that God has called us out of our dog-eat-dog existence and made rebirth into a new existence possible. This new existence isn’t confined to the horizontal; it is from above. It has its origins with God and entails a new way of living.”
Now comes another of Jesus’ “Very truly, I tell you” messages, his way of saying open your ears, this is important! “We speak of what we know and testify to what we have seen; yet you do not receive our testimony.”
Who is the “we” he is referring to? Is he talking about himself and his disciples? I don’t think so. The “we” refers to God. Jesus is saying his father and he speak as one. They are absolutely together. Even with the two of them speaking in perfect harmony and in complete union; still folk aren’t taking in their testimony, they don’t believe.
Jesus is saying, in spite of all the good things you see happening, things that show God and me are working together, you still don’t believe I am from God and show God’s character. If you don’t believe what you see, how are you going to believe who I really am and what role I really play in the cosmos? There is so much more happening than Nicodemus can see that he is like one of those plastic fisher-price record players trying to play a Beethoven Sonata. There is way more information available than his spiritual apparatus can process.
Verse thirteen hints at the hugeness hidden in their conversation. “No one has ascended into heaven except the one who descended from heaven, the Son of Man.” Suddenly Jesus references his future. He is speaking of his coming ascension and his crucifixion that precedes it. Perhaps this is why this passage is given on this second Sunday of Lent. Holy week is still a way off but it is coming.
As Jesus continues, the imagery becomes clearer and we picture Golgotha, “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.” The lifting up is not the ascension; it is the cross. The story Jesus uses to foresee what will happen to him tells about the poisonous snakes that invaded the camp in the time of Moses. The people were being bitten and so Moses crafted a snake made of gold, put it on a pole and had it lifted up. When the people looked upon it, they were saved from the poisonous bite of the snake. What a metaphor for what Jesus did on the cross. The symbolism is gripping. The bite of the snake is reversed.
Why did God to this? Why did God send Jesus to us and why did Jesus agree to go? The Gospel of John gives us this answer:
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.
This is God’s rescue plan. It is designed to infiltrate the dog-eat-dog world we have created and pull us out of its grasp through birth from above. This birth from above excludes no one and any talk of Jesus as condemnation comes from the flesh and has nothing to do with the Spirit.
Yes, we are flesh, but we are made to be born from above and when we are so born, we see, feel and participate in the Kingdom of God. Thanks be to God! Amen.
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