John 3:1-17
March 1, 2026
If I were asked to recite a Bible
verse when I was a kid, I would quickly and confidently say, “For God so loved
the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes him may not
perish but may have eternal life.” Only, I said, “believeth” and “shall not” and
“shall” because back then I only knew the King James version of the Good Book.
I knew John 3:16 like the back of my
hand. I could repeat it all day and night. It was the one verse of the Bible
that I really knew and thought I understood. But it wasn’t until many years
later that I paid as much attention to the story around this beloved verse as I
did to the verse itself. It wasn’t until many years later that I read more
thoroughly the story that verse 16 is centered in. It is about a pharisee named
Nicodemus, a leader of the Jews, coming to Jesus by night. These verses include
Jesus’ word to Nicodemus that “ no one can see the kingdom of God without being
born from above.” Born from above is also translated as “born again.” The
concept of being born again has become a cultural and theological lightning
rod, and that lightning rod is also why I feel a tremor of dread whenever this
story rolls around in the lectionary.
Being “born again” is not just a
reference to this story from John’s gospel. It is an identity marker for groups
of believers under the larger umbrella of Christianity. People identify
themselves as “Born Again Christians.” For the people I know who identify this
way, that means that they can name a date and a time and a place when they
accepted Jesus into their hearts, when they were saved. For many people, not
all, this means that to be a true Christian, to be a true believer, you must be
able to do that, to name a date and time and place. For some folks, if you want
to be a card carrying Christian, then you must be born again. That is not my
belief. That is not me. I do not identify as born again. I cannot name one date
or time or place when I have recognized God’s presence and pull in my life. I
can name several. Being born again is not my litmus test for faith.
Please do not misunderstand me. I am
not critiquing born again Christians for this. That is their expression of
faith and I respect them for it. It’s just not mine. But that doesn’t mean that
I, and others who are not born again, don’t have our own litmus tests for our
faith. I believe it was Martin Luther who called John 3:16, “the heart of the
Bible, the Gospel in miniature.” Essayist and theologian, Debie Thomas,
referred to this verse as “Christianity in a nutshell.”
And I would agree with her
statement. This verse is the condensed gospel, and if we just assent to it,
agree with it, accept it, then we get what it means to be followers of Christ.
If you want to be a card carrying Christian, then all you need to do is state
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.”
But I am beginning to wonder if
trying to narrow the gospel to one verse or one idea is correct. Let’s look at
the larger story surrounding verse 16. Nicodemus comes to Jesus by night. He
comes in darkness. Light and dark as metaphors is a predominant theme in John’s
gospel. Darkness is not just the physical darkness we experience when the sun
goes down. We live lives of darkness, we live in darkness, when we cannot or
will not accept the Light that God offers through Jesus. To live in the light
of God through Jesus is to live abundant lives. So, when Nicodemus comes to
Jesus by night, he is coming to Jesus from that metaphorical darkness as well
as physical darkness.
Nicodemus recognizes something of
God in Jesus. He calls him, “Rabbi.” He tells him that they know he is a teacher
who has come from God. No one can do the signs and things that Jesus is doing
without being from God, without the presence of God. But what was Nicodemus
after? What did he want to know? Did he want Jesus to tell him plainly that,
yes, Nicodemus was spot on when he recognized Jesus was from God? Jesus was
absolutely from God. Did Nicodemus desire simple reassurance, a statement of
fact, that he could then take back to the others?
If that’s what Nicodemus wanted, he
didn’t get it because Jesus answers him not with plain speech as we might
understand it, but with mystery.
“Very truly, I tell you, no one can
see the kingdom of God without being born from above.”
Born from above or born anew or born
again. You can hear the incredulity in Nicodemus’ response back to Jesus.
“How can anyone be born after
growing old? Can one enter a second time into the mother’s womb and be born?”
Nicodemus is speaking literally,
because he is taking Jesus literally. If we were to put this into more
contemporary language, I could hear Nicodemus saying, “What are you talking
about, Jesus? What are you talking about being born from above or born anew?
How can you be born when you’ve already been born? How can somebody be born
again after they’re grown up and old? Nobody can return to the womb. Nobody can
go through the process of birth a second time.”
But Jesus is not speaking of literal
birth. Jesus is speaking of the Spirit. “Listen to me, no one can enter the
kingdom of God without being born of water and the Spirit. When someone or
something is born of flesh, they are flesh. But when someone is born of Spirit,
they are Spirit. Don’t be surprised by this. You don’t know where the wind
blows or where it comes from, but you don’t question it. It just is. That’s the
way of the Spirit.”
If I had been Nicodemus, I probably
would not have had such a literate response as Nicodemus did. Nicodemus asks
Jesus how all this can be? I would have just said, “What?” That is my response
whenever I read this story “What?”
Jesus tells Nicodemus that the folks
who don’t believe him when he speaks of earthly things, things of flesh, then
how can they believe or get it when he speaks of heavenly things. Jesus is
speaking of mystery here, the mystery of God, the mystery of the Spirit. It
seems to me that he is speaking to Nicodemus in this way not to confuse or
misdirect him, but because there is so much more to heaven and earth, of God,
than any of us can possibly understand or grasp or get our heads around. But
what it comes down to is that God loves the world. And because God loves the
world, God’s Son came into the world not to condemn it but to save it. Moses
lifted up the serpent on a stick to heal the people in the wilderness. And the
Son will be lifted up so that the people who believe in him can be saved as
well.
See! There it is! There is Martin
Luther’s gospel in miniature! There is Thomas’s Christianity in a nutshell! For
God so loved the world. Jesus came for the world. Just believe this and we will
all be fine. Ha!
Except … here’s the thing, Thomas
writes that when we reduce our faith down, even with the best of intentions, we
also reduce the mystery. God cannot be contained in one verse or one idea.
Being born again is of great importance to the believers who adhere to that
concept. But God is not contained in that. For God so loved the world that he
sent his only Son to save it not condemn it is a source of the greatest comfort
and hope to me, but God is not limited to John 3:16.
Nicodemus wanted plain speech, but
Jesus responded with mystery. Jesus responded with the knowledge that God is
bigger and wider and deeper and just more than one idea or one understanding
can hold. God is more. God is more than what we can imagine. God is more than
the images we place upon him. Let’s be honest, to some degree, in some form or
fashion, we all try to create God in our own image. But God is more. And trying
to grasp the idea that God is more than we can comprehend or understand or hold
onto might be why we reduce God and the gospel down to one verse or one
understanding or one way of being. We try to reduce God down to a date or time
or place because we need a God that we can hang onto, and yet as Jesus tells
Nicodemus, God is more.
Maybe that’s what it really means to
be born from above, to be born anew and again. Living into the mystery of God,
the Son, and the Spirit, is allowing ourselves to be vulnerable. And what is
more vulnerable than a newborn? A baby is helpless and completely dependent on
those around her for her care and protection. A newborn is utterly dependent.
To be born again is to be vulnerable, to be completely dependent on God, to put
one’s whole trust in God and God’s care.
And what about the word believe in
verse 16. In Thomas’s essay, she refers to Diana Butler Bass. Butler Bass
pointed out that our word believe comes from the German word belieben,
which is translated as “to love.” When we believe in God, we don’t just
intellectually assent, we love. We love. We trust. We believe. For God so loved
the world, the whole world, God so loved the people we understand and the
people we don’t, the people who look like us and think like us and act like us
and the people who don’t. For God so loved the whole world, and we are called
to believe, to love in response.
In this season of Lent, maybe one of
the things we need to let go of us is our need to narrow God down to one way of
being, to one way of thinking and understanding. Maybe in this season, we need
to let the mystery of God wash over us and envelop us and lead us. Maybe we
need to be like Abram and go, not because we understand but because we trust,
because we believe, because we love.
Let all of God’s children, in fact
the whole world that God loves, say, “Amen.”
Amen.
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