Second Sunday in Lent, rcl yr a, 2023
GENESIS 12:1-4a; PSALM 121; ROMANS 4:1-5, 13-17; JOHN 3:1-17
and yet you do not understand these things
There’s a lot to like about Nicodemus. It’s easy to imagine Nicodemus as a searcher, it’s like he knows there’s something in his life that doesn’t sit quite right; and so he’s on a quest. And then he hears about this man Jesus, a wonderworker, he hears people beginning to say some extraordinary things about this Jesus. And so Nicodemus searches Jesus out, and Nicodemus finds him.
There is some question though about Nicodemus, in particular about the quality of his faith in Jesus. Is Nicodemus a faithful believer in Jesus? Is he a disciple? Or is he someone who is more an example of a failure to believe, and failure to understand just what Jesus is all about?
He does seem to start off well. He does seek out, and find, Jesus.
But … he comes by night. This is not so good. In John’s Gospel, you stumble at night; Judas leaves Jesus, and betrays him, at night. Night is when you hide what you are doing—out of shame, or because you just don’t want to be found out. So Nicodemus coming to Jesus at night? Maybe he isn’t quite a disciple of Jesus—or if he is, he certainly doesn’t want anyone else to know that he is.
But when Nicodemus starts speaking, we begin to think, yeah, dude gets it. As readers of John’s Gospel, we know already many things: that the Word of God was with, and is, God; this Word of God is so close to God, that we can say that this Word of God is just as God as God is God. So when Nicodemus says “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.” We can see how Nicodemus gets it: Jesus is deeply connected to God. Jesus has come from God, according to Nicodemus; Jesus can’t do signs apart from the presence of God, says Nicodemus. This is surely the faith of a disciple!
But then, when Nicodemus next opens his mouth, it’s just to put his foot in it, completely misunderstanding what Jesus means when he speaks about being born again. Jesus is speaking in rich terms about the kingdom of God, the kingdom where the Spirit reigns, and surprises us. And all Nicodemus can think about is his mother. And then Nicodemus opens his mouth for the last time, saying, “How can these things be.” To which Jesus says, and you think you are a teacher? And yet you do not understand these things. Nick, you know nothing, really. At least, nothing rightly or well.
So the jury is out on Nicodemus. He’s a searcher, but he’s not quite sure if he really wants everyone to know that he’s really into this Jesus guy. He does get that Jesus comes from God. But then he doesn’t quite clue into some really basic things about the way Jesus speaks about God’s kingdom and the freedom of the Spirit of God.
There are two reasons I think we are allowed to at least imagine that Nicodemus is some variety of follower of Jesus though. Sure, he isn’t called a disciple, he doesn’t get a story about dropping all his gear and following Jesus.
But the first reason we can at least imagine that Nicodemus could be a follower of Jesus: Nicodemus doesn’t appear to go away or leave Jesus. All we hear after the Nicodemus story is that “Jesus and his disciples went into the Judean countryside.” No news about Nick’s travel plans.
Nicodemus does appear two more times in John’s Gospel. Once to defend Jesus before the Sanhedrin, and another time to take Jesus down from the cross with Joseph of Arimathea, bringing a king’s ransom’s worth of precious oil and perfume for Jesus’s embalming.
But for now, we are left with the question: could Nick now be hanging out with Jesus and the other disciples? This “hanging out with Jesus” thing is important in John’s Gospel. So much so in fact that we usually know, when someone encounters Jesus, where they go afterwards.
The disciples clearly follow Jesus; the Samaritan Woman leaves the presence of Jesus to tell others about him; the official whose son was ill goes on his way, believing; the paralyzed man at the pool picks up his mat and walks away; Jesus’ brothers leave him and go up to the Feast of Tabernacles; Jesus tells the woman caught in adultery to go on her way; and the man born blind goes off to wash in the pool of Siloam.
But Nicodemus? We aren’t told, one way or another.
It’s a clever device of John’s, isn’t it? The ambiguity of Nicodemus asks questions of us. What do we think about those who know there’s something about this Jesus guy, but might not be ready to openly crack open their Bible at work on a lunch break? What do we think about those who keep asking all the wrong questions? Or those of us who just keep getting it wrong?
This thing about getting it wrong brings me to the second reason we can at least imagine that Nicodemus could be a follower of Jesus. It’s Nicodemus who prompts Jesus to say some things we desperately need to hear, things we may never have heard otherwise. Things about love; things about life; about God’s way, which is not a way of condemnation, but is rather a way of mercy, of compassion, a way of forgiveness.
So I think we can imagine Nicodemus showing up on a regular basis. That sometimes with the disciples on the road with Jesus, everyone sitting around the fire in the dark, sipping on hot chocolate and mulled wine, that Nicodemus would just wander out of the bushes and into the light. And that maybe the disciples rolled their eyes a bit, and maybe Jesus did too.
But what the disciples really know is that when Nicodemus comes in out of the dark, and asks his questions, and says some crazy stuff that hardly makes sense—that this is when they should listen in. Because when Nick is around, they know that Jesus says the sorts of things they know they long to hear.
Like what we hear this time, when Nicodemus first seeks out Jesus, when Nicodemus says, “How can these things be?”, and when Jesus first says oh Nick, “and yet you do not understand these things,” but then says the sort of thing our hearts long to hear: that God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him would not perish but have eternal life. Indeed, that God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.