John 2:23 During the Passover feast in Jerusalem, the crowds were watching Jesus closely; and many began to trust (affirm/have confidence) in Him because of the signs He was doing. But Jesus saw through to the heart of humankind, and He did not entrust himself (affirm/have confidence) to them. He didn’t need anyone to testify concerning character of humanity. He understood human nature.
Jesus saw that their admiration of his miracles and signs was not the same as faith. They were impressed, but being impressed is not the same as being a follower who truly sees Jesus for who he is. There is belief about and belief in. Even demons believe true things about God.[1] The crowds believed true things about Jesus. We are about to meet Nicodemus, who apparently falls into the category of someone who is impressed – he believes true things about Jesus - but doesn’t understand truly who Jesus is.
I tend to think that miraculous signs would have been impressive enough to win me over. So why weren’t those miracles overwhelmingly convincing concerning Jesus’ divinity? Miracles were attributed to religious leaders, royalty, and heroes (depending on your culture). Apparently everybody believed in miracle-working; they just weren’t sure where the power came from; some claimed Jesus’ power comes from Satan (see Mark 3:20-30).
It reminds me of my class at Spring Arbor of students who already worked in the medical field. When I gave my presentation on dualism (supernatural and natural worlds exist; there are immaterial realities as well as material ones), they stopped me: “You are preaching to the choir. Anyone who works in a hospital long enough has stories of strange, unexplained things. You don’t have to convince us.”
So miracles were accepted as a thing to those watching Jesus: either God was ‘with’ someone, or evil was empowering people to do astonishing things. But it didn’t necessarily mean more than that. As one pastor said,
“"Seeing signs and wonders, and being amazed at them, and giving the miracle worker credit for them that he is from God, saves nobody. This is one of the great dangers of signs and wonders: You don’t need a new heart to be amazed at them. The old, fallen human nature is all that’s needed to be amazed at signs and wonders.”[2]
My sense, for what it’s worth, is that Jesus miracles were primarily intended to prove to the Jewish community that He was the messiah foreshadowed in the Old Testament.[3] See my footnotes for how Jesus’ miracles hit all the OT hyperlinks for what a Messiah would do.
Nicodemus was one of the Pharisees[4], a man with some clout among his people. He came to Jesus under the cloak of darkness to question Him.[5] He said, “Rabbi, some of us have been talking. It is generally agreed that you are obviously a teacher who has come from God. The signs You are doing are proof that God is with You.[6]”
Once again, Old Testament prophets did signs. Think of Moses turning staffs into snakes, and the plagues, Daniel in the lion’s den, Elijah withheld rain, etc. “God is with you” is respectful to be sure, but it’s not new territory. At this point Jesus totally changes the subject. Remember how “he saw the heart of mankind?” He apparently introduces the true reason Nicodemus is visiting.
Jesus: I tell you the truth: only someone who experiences birth for a second time[7] can hope to see the kingdom of God.
Last week, when I was downstate doing some teaching for a gig involving youth, I had a long conversation after a session with a student. It took 40 minutes until we finally got to the heart of the issue. All the discussion was good, but every 10 minutes or so she would say something that would make me think, “Oh. We aren’t talking about the real issue yet.” But we got there. Jesus didn’t need 40 minutes. That’s one of the perks of being God in the flesh. He just went there.
Nicodemus: “Well, we’ve seen your signs and heard you teach, and we pretty much agree you are a teacher with God’s power behind him.” Jesus: “There’s no way you are going to see the Kingdom of God in the state you are in.” Apparently, Nicodemus really wanted to be a part of the Kingdom of God. Kudos to Nicodemus. This guy is going out of his way to talk with Jesus because this is a big deal to him. So, it’s helpful to know how Nicodemus had been raised to believe one got into the Kingdom of God.
"Nicodemus would have stressed the careful observance of the Law and the traditions of the elders. [but it is] not a devout regard for the Law, not even a revised presentation of Judaism [that] is required, but a radical rebirth. The demand is repeated three times. Nicodemus and all his tribe of lawdoers are left with not the slightest doubt but that what is asked of anyone is not more law, but the power of God within that person to remake him or her completely. In its own way this chapter does away with “works of the law” every bit as thoroughly as anything in Paul."[8]
This had to be a spiritual earthquake. Nicodemus has been dedicating his life to doing all the right things to the best of his ability. Later, when Jesus starts rebuking the Pharisees point by point, we will see they were dedicated to getting even the smallest of things right. Jesus says, “No, the problem is that you aren’t the kind of person who can do this. The solution is so radical that it’s going to be like you started your whole life over and got born again.”
Nicodemus: I am a grown man. How can someone be born again when he is old like me? Am I to crawl back into my mother’s womb for a second birth? That’s impossible!
The Jewish people believed in people being regenerated when people converted to Judaism; they even referred to it having a new birth. I suspect the idea wasn’t the problem so much as the fact that Nicodemus had already been ‘born again’ into Judaism. That ground had been covered. This really limited his options as he considered that he would have to be born again, again.
Jesus: I tell you the truth, if people not experience water and Spirit birth,[9] there’s no chance they will make it into God’s kingdom.
This likely refers to Old Testament passages in which “water” and “Spirit” describe the pouring out of God’s Spirit in the end times (Is. 32:15; 44:3; Ezek. 36:25–27). It’s a hyperlink to a “cleansing and transformation” that involves becoming a new kind of person, not just a cleaned up one. (See my footnotes for more details.)
When my computer gets old enough, it can’t do what it’s supposed to do because the programs are becoming obsolete. I can add patches; I can load all kinds of upgrades; I can get it refurbished. But eventually, it’s not going to run the programs it was intended to run and that I need to run. Shoot, I can’t find chargers that match, and it can’t interact with other computers because none of the connectors work. I need a new computer.
Nicodemus was patching and upgrading relentlessly. He wanted to function as Yahweh intended: There is no reason to doubt that he wanted to love God and love his neighbors as God intended. But He needed to be new. So Jesus explains what he needs in order to be new.
Like comes from like. Whatever is born from flesh is flesh; whatever is born from Spirit is spirit. Don’t be shocked by My words, but I tell you the truth. Even you, an educated and respected man among your people, must be reborn by the Spirit to enter the kingdom of God.[10]
“Like comes from like” just means that things give birth to other things that are like themselves. If you are fleshy, you give birth to fleshy things, and they will be like you. The line continues. Obviously Nicodemus knows this. But Jesus introduces a different line of succession for those who will enter His kingdom: It’s not the fleshy descendants of Abraham; it’s the spiritual children of God. God’s people need to be new: they need a new spirit, and that has to be birthed from a spiritual place, not a physical place.
The wind blows all around us as if it has a will of its own; we feel and hear it; we do not understand where it has come from or where it will end up, [yet we see its impact, so we know it is real.]
So far, so good. Earthly analogy. The wind is less mysterious to us than it was to them #science, but try to imagine life before Doppler radar and satellites. Wind is crazy, and that area was known for really crazy winds. Sudden storms on the Sea of Galilee were a frightening thing. If you sail on the Great Lakes, you know how it is. The weather turns on a dime. I was fishing in my kayak a couple weeks on just a small lake, and a wind came up that sent me and couple others scurrying to shore. I don't understand how wind works, but, yeah, it’s real.
Life in the Spirit is as if it were the wind of God.[11] [It moves on a will of its own; we hear it, but don’t understand how it all works; we don’t know where it will end up, but we feel it. We see its impact, and we know that it is real.]
So, this is what Nicodemus is going to need. Something out of his power to earn or control or even understand. I was talking with Gary Hambleton this week about his heart procedure. He was trying to explain it, but how exactly they are going to make him feel like new is mysterious to us non-heart doctors. Gary and I can talk about diet, exercise, other things in the control of us heart patients. But the Surgeon knows stuff we don’t, and from our perspective, moves in mysterious ways, his medical wonders to perform.
Nicodemus’ righteousness – his fitness for the Kingdom of God – had been earned, controlled and understood up to that point. Now, Nicodemus was going to have to be reborn as a man who surrendered himself to a Holy Spirit that has a will of its own. He won’t know how it works; he won’t know where it will end, but he will feel its power and presence. AND IT WILL MAKE HIM NEW.
Nicodemus: I still do not understand how this can be.
Jesus: Your responsibility is to instruct Israel in matters of faith, but you do not comprehend the necessity of life in the Spirit? I tell you the truth: we speak about the things we know (zing!), and we give evidence about the things we have seen, and you choose to reject the truth of our witness. If you do not believe when I talk to you about ordinary, earthly realities [which we have both experienced], then heavenly realities will certainly elude you.[12] [To speak of heavenly realities with authority, one needs to have been there.] But no one has ever journeyed to heaven above except the One who has come down from heaven—the Son of Man, who is of heaven.[13]
Consider this: to be perfectly acquainted with a place, it is necessary for a person to have been at that place. A lived experience beats a theoretical experience every time. I’ve watched a show called Somebody Feed Phil, and I’ve spent an hour watching him eat and talk in cities around the world. That doesn’t mean I know the city. Phil spent days there. He knows the city better than I do, but he doesn’t know the city. It’s the people who live there who know the city. Jesus knows Heaven. It’s worth listening to the only One who has lived there tell us about it.
Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness. In the same way, the Son of Man must be lifted up; then all those who believe in Him will experience everlasting life.[14]
Through the ‘lifted up’ serpent, the dying were restored by fixing their eyes on it. When Jesus would be lifted up #crucifixion, those looking to Him, though dying in sin, would be healed and saved.
For God expressed His love for the world[15] in this way: He gave His only Son so that whoever believes in Him will not face everlasting destruction, but will have everlasting life. God didn’t send His Son into the world to judge it;[16] instead, He is here to rescue a world headed toward certain destruction,[17] so that through Him it might be saved.[18]
A summary of the gospel (“good news”) paraphrased from Adam Clarke:
The world was in a ruinous, condemned state; people were without power to rescue themselves or the world from destruction.
God, motivated by His eternal love, provided for its rescue and salvation, by giving Himself (through his Son) to pay the penalty He set for those who contribute to the ruination of the world, themselves and others.
Sin must be a serious evil, when it required no less a sacrifice, to make atonement for it, than God manifested in the flesh to die on behalf of those who brought sinful ruin.
One is saved through this sacrifice when one believes that the atoning sacrifice of Jesus indeed accomplished this purpose (affirms, has confidence in, trusts and obeys so that it transforms our lives).
Those who believe are exempted from the judgment of eternal death (that they may not perish) and enter into a new life that begins now and ends in eternal glory (that they may have everlasting life).
No one who entrusts themselves to Him has to fear being brought to judgment (a trial the separates the grain from the chaff), yet that judgment has already happened for everyone who refuses to trust because they reject the name (the person) of the only Son of God. What is this judgment? The Light sent from God, Jesus, pierced through the world’s blinding darkness of sinful, pain-filled deeds. Still some people loved the darkness over the light because their intentions and actions were evil. Those who do evil things hate the light and will not come to the light, because they do not want their evil deeds to be seen for what they are. Those who abandon deceit and act on what is true, they will enter into the light where it will be clear that all their deeds come from God.[19]
People loved (agapao) the darkness rather than the light. They give themselves sacrificially for the sake of the sin. The immediate judgment seems to be living in darkness: living in the corrosiveness of evil deeds, not just giving in to but embracing the self-destruction that follows sin.
Then, this story bookends nicely.
Nicodemus started with, “By your deeds, it’s obvious you come from God,“ and ends with Jesus saying, “When you are in the light, it will be clear that your deeds come from God.”
Nicodemus started with, “I am doing the works of the Kingdom to be a member of the Kingdom”; Jesus flips it: “Enter the Kingdom so that you can do the works of the Kingdom.”
And it begins with entrusting ourselves to Jesus. It begins with believing, leaning on, following in the footsteps of, and giving our lives sacrificially to the love of God and others, made possible through the work of Jesus and the renewal of the Holy Spirit.
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[1] James 2:19
[2] “It’s precarious to be a sign-seeker, to crave the spectacular and follow the latest sign worker, until he leaves his wife or buys a new jet with everybody’s money.” #trueevents https://www.desiringgod.org/messages/he-knew-what-was-in-man
[3] The previous several paragraphs were informed by this article: “Making Disciples by Performing Miracles: A Study in Mark, ”Jonathan Rivett Robinson.
https://hail.to/laidlaw-college/article/k1J3D96. This long quote is worthwhile: “It is the Jewish scriptures rather than Greco-Roman literature which provide the strongest parallels for Jesus’ miracles. In Jesus’ public miracles he is revealed as God’s agent; the healer and deliverer of Israel. Like Elijah and Elisha, he heals the sick and restores dead children to their parents (Mark 5:21-43; cf. 1 Kgs 17:17-24; 2 Kgs 4:8-37). Like David, he delivers from evil spirits and defeats demonic legions (Mark 5:1-20; cf. 1 Sam 16-18). Like Moses, the hungry people of God are fed in the wilderness (Mark 6:30-44; cf. Num 11). However, those miracles witnessed only by his disciples expand these scriptural Christological insights further. Only the disciples see how the wind and waves obey him and how he walks upon the water as if it were the dry land (Mark 4:35-41; 6:45-52). These two sea miracles serve to identify Jesus with YHWH who calms the storm in Jonah 1 and who walks on the sea in Job 9:8 (LXX).”
[4] “At this time, Israel’s Roman occupiers have given a small group of Sadducees and Pharisees limited powers to rule, and Nicodemus is one of the Pharisees. He holds a seat on the ruling council known as the Sanhedrin.” (commentary from The Voice translation)
[5] Adam Clarke believes this was because Jesus was alone at night.
[6] Jesus’ signs are the conversation starter but not a trigger for faith (v. 2). (NIV Biblical Theology Study Bible)
[7] The translation “born from above” accords well with the discussion of “earthly” and “heavenly” things in v. 12, and the discussion of ascending and descending in v. 13. This is the meaning of the Greek adverb in other places in this Gospel (19:11, 23). Nicodemus apparently understood it to mean “a second time.” It is possible that both meanings are intended—a new birth that is a birth from above. (ESV Reformation Study Bible)
[8] Leon Morris, at Precept Austin
[9] Probably the statement refers to Old Testament passages in which the terms “water” and “Spirit” are linked to express the pouring out of God’s Spirit in the end times (Is. 32:15; 44:3; Ezek. 36:25–27). The presence of such rich Old Testament imagery accounts for Jesus’ reproof of Nicodemus (v. 10): as a “teacher of Israel,” he should have understood. (ESV Reformation Study Bible) “The most plausible interpretation of “born of water and the Spirit” is the purifying and transforming new birth. Since Jesus expects Nicodemus to understand what he means (vv. 7, 10), the background to the concept is previous Scripture. Water in the OT often refers to renewal or cleansing, and the most significant OT connection bringing together water and spirit is Ezek 36:25–27, where water cleanses from impurity and the Spirit transforms hearts. So “born of water and the Spirit” signals a new birth that cleanses and transforms.” (NIV Biblical Theology Study Bible)
[10] “By water and the Spirit (in this place)…is probably an elliptical form of speech, for the Holy Spirit under the similitude of water; as, in Matthew 3:3, the Holy Ghost and fire, do not mean two things, but one, viz. the Holy Ghost under the similitude of fire-pervading every part, refining and purifying the whole. (Adam Clarke)
[11] Both in Hebrew and in Greek, the “sound” of the “wind” can also mean the “voice” of the “Spirit.” (NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible)
[12] Nicodemus should be able to recognize Jesus’ point, which draws on a familiar principle. Some Jewish people already recognized that humans, with limited knowledge even of earthly things, could not understand the heavens (noted in the widely circulated Wisdom of Solomon 9:16) — at least not without the Spirit sent from above (Wisdom of Solomon 9:17). In John, “earthly” analogies for “heavenly things” here might refer to “above” (see NIV text note on v. 3), “water” (v. 5) and “wind” (v. 8). (NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible)
[13] “But our Lord probably spoke to correct a false notion among the Jews, viz. that Moses had ascended to heaven, in order to get the law. It is not Moses who is to be heard now, but Jesus: Moses did not ascend to heaven; but the Son of man is come down from heaven to reveal the Divine will.” (Adam Clarke)
[14] Just as the image of a serpent was the weapon that destroyed the power of the serpents, so the instrument of Christ's death becomes the weapon that overthrows death. (Orthodox Study Bible)
[15] “The whole human race: This would be a revelation to the exclusive Pharisee, brought up to believe that God loved only the chosen people.” (Cambridge Bible For Schools And Colleges)
[16] “Since there are sinners in the world Christ’s coming involves a separation of them from the good, a judgment, a sentence: but this is not the purpose of His coming; the purpose is salvation.” (Cambridge Bible For Schools And Colleges)
[17] The world was under threat of judgment before He came; with His coming salvation became a reality offered to a hostile world (Matt. 23:37; Rom. 5:8). (ESV Reformation Study Bible)
[18] Note the change from ‘to save the world,’ to ‘that the world might be saved through Him.’ The world can reject Him if it pleases. (Cambridge Bible For Schools And Colleges)
[19] Jesus speaks of “doing” the truth. This indicates that “truth” is a matter of both thought and practice.