"Very Truly, I Tell You"⁽¹⁾
Polk City UMC
February 28, 1999
Mark Haverland


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 by saved through him."






"Very truly, I tell you," Jesus says three times to Nicodemus, who has a hard time grasping the gist of what Jesus is saying. 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?" In other words, of course it's nonsense, just trust me, it's true.


My wife and I have one of our tensest moments when I say such things to her. "Trust me," is my last resort when she won't believe me that the car will run another few miles on empty, that the campsite is just around the next bend, that I know how to fix the lawnmower, patch drywall, lay floor tile, fix the leaky roof, get the car down the driveway in spite of a recent snowfall. And it never works. In fact, this expression seems to set her off to exactly the opposite reaction to the one I hope for. I don't know why this expression seems such a threatening put down for her, but it is. She refuses to believe and feels attacked when I try to sidetrack her reasonable and reasoned, and usually correct, objections with my trump, "well, just trust me on this one."


Jesus had slightly more luck with Nicodemus. To each stumbling objection that Nicodemus raises, Jesus reassures him, "Very truly, I tell you." In other words, Jesus says to Nicodemus and us, "I know this doesn't make sense, it's not supposed to make sense, just trust me on this one. These wild and crazy notions I preach are all true!"


Nicodemus was an establishment type. He was educated. He was a part of the governing council of his community. He was a person of some affluence. He was part of the establishment, just like us, I suppose. Educated, reasonably affluent, part of the social milieu from which the community leaders come. It is not very often that we in this congregation have real rebels in the pews. For good or ill, we are the establishment. We are the people who do the work and tend the professions and other endeavors that make the community function. We are not here to upset the world or turn things upside down. We are establishment types just like Nicodemus.


Also like Nicodemus, we are people who are curious about Jesus. You would not be here today if you did not have a certain pull, a certain curiosity, a certain desire to know and understand Jesus Christ. Nicodemus came to visit Jesus in the night, and that probably was much more than a matter of the time of day. Nicodemus came to visit Jesus while Nicodemus was in the dark. He was in the dark; he did not understand, but he was curious and interested. He had some sense that this rabbi was someone of great importance, and he came to visit and to try to understand. In so
doing, he is like us. You are here because you felt that tug on your heart. You care about Jesus. You want to understand. You are at least open to the possibility of following him. We are like Nicodemus, and he is like us.


Nicodemus was also a person who was very confused by Jesus. He applied his intellect, his learning, and the values of his culture, and still he could not understand what in the world Jesus was talking about. Though we may not like to admit it, the same is true for us. When Nicodemus and Jesus talked, they talked past each other. Jesus and Nicodemus never really connected, Nicodemus comes to Jesus in his curiosity and his interest, and he says, "You must be someone from God." Jesus replied that if Nicodemus wanted to know the kingdom of God, he had to be born again or new or from above. Already the conversation was flying in different directions.


Nicodemus must have felt like a person who gets up in the morning and says to someone in their household, "What are we having for breakfast?" and the other person answers something about Christmas. The conversation just does not connect. Nicodemus may have been one of the first people confused by Jesus and what he said, but he was not the last. We, too, think that the application of our intellect, our education and the values of our culture will get us to an understanding of Jesus, but we are kidding ourselves. Tell me what there is in our intellect, training, education or culture that helps us understand Jesus' statement, "if someone strikes you on the right cheek, turn and offer the left." Is that advice that makes sense? Is that advice that fits the way in which we are trained and educated and the direction of our society? It is indeed a mysterious teaching that often goes right past us, doesn't it? What about when Jesus said, "If you would follow me, you must take up your cross"? We have so much made the cross an art piece or jewelry that it is so easy to forget that Jesus said, "Take up the instrument of capital punishment and follow me. " That is not something we easily comprehend, understand, assimilate just through our intellect. Our education does not give us the tools necessary to deal with such a teaching.


Or what about when Jesus said, "If you would save your life, you must lose it"? There is not a single self-help book on the shelves of the bookstores that advises that life can become great by giving it away. That does not fit. The papers are full of self help seminars and advice columns advising us how to live life to the fullest, and how to marshall our resources to see that we can continue to spend forever. Saving for our retirement, establishing our IRA accounts, especially the new Roth IRA is spawning a whole new industry in financial advice. Save, save, save, advise one segment of the economy. Spend, spend, spend, or course scream the TV, radio and newspaper advertisements - more convincingly from all appearances. Seldom does anyone tell us that in order to save our money, we should give it away. I believe money is like children. We just have our children on loan from God for a few years while they grow up. Our real job in life to turn our kids lose equipped to be Christian disciples. Money is like that. It finds its greatest value when we give it away. Talk about being counter culture, however. If we treated money as Jesus would have us treat life, and in many ways our money is our life, our economy, not to mention the entire banking and investment economy would crumble. In regard to our money and our lives, Jesus said, "Throw it away and then you will find it." That is not something we can understand by running it through our intellect.


Perhaps most mysterious of all is Jesus' statement to Nicodemus and to us that we must be born anew. Too often, I think, evangelical Protestants have used this text in sermons and implied somehow that you can be born anew by a decision or by an act of the will. I do not know about you, but I was not born originally by a decision or an act of will on my part, were you? I did not use some sort of prenatal judgment to come to a decision or an intention to be born. It was a gift that was unwanted, unasked for, and unmerited. A gloriously wonderful gift! When Jesus says we must be born anew, he is talking about just that sort of thing. He says it is like the wind. The wind blows, and we really don't know where it comes from or where it is gone, but we experience it. If we are to know the Gospel, we must know it--not so much as Nicodemus tried to know it, by understanding it through his education, understanding it through the values of his culture, but rather we must come to know the Gospel of Jesus Christ by being open to the mysterious and surprising ways of God. The wind blows where it will and often we find that our sails are set for a different direction, the wrong direction, the direction we have been led to expect, the direction the world anticipates and tells us to prepare for.


When the pilgrims landed in Plymouth, Massachusetts in 1623 their minister John Robinson gave them a stirring sermon about the new life and new world they were about to encounter. "There is yet more light and truth to break forth from God's holy word," Robinson told the faithful few as they embarked on the new land. God has many things yet to tell us which our past, our culture, our experiences, our education, our intellect, our economy, even our church have not prepared us for.


There is a great hymn no longer in the United Methodist Hymnal call "Once to Every Man and Nation." Perhaps the PC police were too strong to include such sexist language in the newest editions. But is includes one of the greatest expression of the notion that surprised poor old Nicodemus. New occasions teach new duties, Time makes ancient goods uncouth; They must upward still and onward, who would keep abreast of truth. Time makes ancient goods uncouth. Apparently "uncouth" means both unpleasant and rude, and also unkind. Couth comes from an ancient word which means kind. Imagine what it means to our faith journey that what once was good and true can in time become unkind.


Certainly, we belong to a tradition that has held many truths which over time became blatantly "unkind." Christians have burned heretics, killed infidels in Muslim countries, supported slavery, encouraged the inhuman extermination of American Indians, banned blacks and women to inferior positions in the church. All these ancient "truths" have since become "unkind" as God's word continues to unfold in mysterious and surprising ways. Those who think God's spirit will not blow from yet another new direction tomorrow are not listening to the words of Jesus as he speaks to Nicodemus.


Several of us are reading the Lenten study book by Peter Gomes. This book will surprise us and challenge us with a vision of ancient truths made uncouth by the spirit of God blowing in new directions, catching our sails set incorrectly. Even the author is a surprising voice. Peter Gomes is an African American from Plymouth Massachusets, son of a Baptist mother, trained by African Methodist Episcopal Sunday School, ordained a Episcopal priest, self-professed homosexual professor of Christian Morals at Harvard College, and for 25 years the minister of Harvard's Memorial Church, who exposes the errors of generations of Christians as they try to read and understand the Bible. Talk about being born again from a fresh breath of the spirit. This man would drive poor Nicodemus nuts. I can just see him and all of us modern Nicodemuses, shaking our heads and saying, "How can this be?" And Jesus answers us as he has answered people throughout history: "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."


But it does blow! One of these days, in one of these places--for you--the wind of the love of God in Jesus Christ will sweep over you in such a way that it literally blows you away and you will experience what Jesus was talking about in these nonsensical teachings: Turn the other cheek. Take up the cross. Find life by losing it. Be born anew as the wind blows, as the grace and love and mystery of God sweep you in directions you never imagined possible.


"The wind blows where it will. So it is with all who are born of water and the spirit." One of these days, the wind of the love of God in Jesus Christ will sweep over you with a new turth made uncouth by the passing of time as God's word continues to shed new light and truth on a world unprepared for mystery and wonder. When we close ourselves off from the surprising wind of God and hide behind our ancient and firmly held beliefs and the teachings of our culture, we are not allowing for the mystery of our faith to challenge, energize, and ignite us. Chesterton has said, "The world does not lack for wonders, only for a sense of wonder." The mystery of a God's unfolding spirit provides clarity for our journey rather than certainty of destination. Trust me, Jesus tells Nicodemus and us, imagination, freedom, and wonder belong at the center of our faith, rather than certainty, dogma, and ironclad truths.












1. This sermon is heavily influenced by a Carl L. Schenck's sermon entitle One of Us, published in the February issue of Lectionary Homilectics and by a sermon by Patricia de Jong, Mission and Misunderstanding, preached March 3, 1996 at the Berkely UCC.