"Faith Reconfigured" San Williams, UPC
John 3:1-17
Did you notice that we’ve changed the front of the bulletin for Lent? Our bulletin cover during Lent offers us a visual reminder that we are disciples, followers of Jesus Christ. Since Lent is a season for reassessing, renewing and deepening our discipleship, each Sunday in Lent we’re striving to do just that. This Sunday we find ourselves in the company of Nicodemus. Nicodemus has faith—he believes that Jesus has come from God—but when he comes face to face with Jesus, Nicodemus finds his faith challenged and reconfigured. Be warned: What happened to Nicodemus can happen to us.
Start with a question: What’s amiss in the way Nicodemus approaches Jesus? He’s a ruler of the Pharisees, a scholar, a member of the Sanhedrin, wealthy, widely respected--whatever could be lacking in Nicodemus’ faith? Nicodemus, you recall, begins his conversation with Jesus by saying, “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.” On the surface, this sounds like authentic faith. Yet in the verse immediately preceding today’s reading, John mentions that many believed in Jesus because they saw the miracles he was performing. Then John adds, “But Jesus on his part would not entrust himself to them…” Throughout John’s Gospel, we read of people who believed in Jesus because of the signs, the miracles, he performs. Jesus’ signs are a significant part of his ministry, yet again and again, Jesus expresses concern about those who come to him because they are impressed by his miracles. In fact, near the end of the Gospel, Jesus complained about people who want to see miracles before they believe. Then he goes on to give a special blessing to those who “believe in him even though they haven’t seen any signs.”
And still today some people may look for signs and wonders as a way of validating belief. Maybe this is especially true in the more charismatic inclined congregations, those that emphasize extraordinary happenings—speaking in tongues, emotional highs, dramatic healings and Damascus Road-style conversions. But even those of us with a more subdued style of faith may point to some extraordinary moment in our lives as evidence of the validity of our faith—some mountaintop experience when God’s presence seemed overpowering, or a time when we felt we had received a clear answer to prayer. Such signs and wonders are not to be disparaged or denied, but neither are they a reliable basis for belief in Jesus. So Nicodemus comes to Jesus representing those who believe in him because of the signs he performs. For this reason, Jesus regards the faith of Nicodemus as inadequate.
But there’s yet another way in which Nicodemus’ faith is lacking. His approach to Jesus is totally cerebral. Nicodemus is a teacher, a man of intellect, a scholar steeped in theological tradition. Not surprisingly, he approaches Jesus carefully and cautiously. He plans to scrutinize Christ's teachings before jumping in and embracing them. If Nicodemus were alive today, he would make a good Presbyterian. Years ago, when I was coming before the Presbytery as a candidate for ministry, I had to get the approval of David Stitt, former President of Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary and an active member of this church when he lived in Austin. Dr. Stitt had a formidable intellect and he was a forceful personality. When he found out that I was coming from a Methodist background, he leaned forward and said, “You know there was a significant difference between Methodists and Presbyterians. Methodists say if your heart be as my heart, take my hand and we’ll walk together. But we Presbyterians believe that even if your heart be as my heart, let’s sit down and discuss matters further.”
Actually, one reason I’m a Presbyterian is because of our denomination's historic emphasis on the life of the mind. Our willingness to think the faith, to subject faith claims to theological scrutiny is, I believe, a good thing, especially in a time when religious faith can so easily be hijacked into something perverse and even dangerous. Examining faith matters critically, as Nicodemus did, is not wrong; it’s just not all that’s required for the kind of relationship to God that Jesus offers.
A week ago last Saturday, I attended a men’s gathering at a Baptist church on the north side of town. A deacon at our sister church, Corinth Missionary Baptist Church, invited me to be a group leader at this conference sponsored by several Baptist fellowships around town. The theme of the conference was "Show Yourself a Man.” I chose for my topic the relationship of manliness and meekness. I wanted to discuss how Jesus’ words “blessed are the meek” challenge and correct how we understand manliness. When I pulled into the church parking lot the first thing I noticed was a line of Harley Davidson motorcycles. At the registration table, I found myself among a group of Christians whose heads were shaved and who wore leather vests and t-shirts reading “Bikers for Jesus.” It came to me to wonder, suddenly, whether my decision to focus on meekness was all that brilliant. Gazing at the widely diverse participants that morning, I saw clearly that my experience and approach to faith were different from most of theirs. Not better, just different. The kind of caution and scrutiny with which Nicodemus approached Jesus is not to be disparaged or abandoned. But in and of itself, a faith that is only in our respective heads will always be lacking. Nicodemus was as intelligent as they come, but he couldn’t think his way into the Kingdom of God.
Preacher and writer Barbara Brown Taylor contends that part of Jesus’ problem with Nicodemus was the difference between what Jesus meant when he said "believe” and what Nicodemus meant by the same word. Taylor writes, “On one level, to believe someone means simply to accept what that person says as true, usually on the basis of some evidence. Someone shows you a picture of himself climbing the rock face of a mountain, tells you it can be done, and you say, “I believe you.” You accept the proposition. You give your intellectual assent, but it does not interfere with the way you live your life, because it is all in your head. But,” Taylor continues, “there is another level of belief that is much more visceral. Instead of showing you the pictures, someone invites you to go rock climbing with him. As he checks the knots on your harness and runs your safety line through the carabiner around his own waist, he assures you that everything will be all right. The proper response at that point is not, “I believe you” but “I believe in you,” because you are 'way past anything like intellectual assent. You have set yourself in relationship with this person, and you are trusting him with your life.”
Now, something like that was happening between Nicodemus and Jesus. Jesus didn’t want to have a Socratic conversation with Nicodemus. He wanted to bring Nicodemus with him into a new relationship with God. Jesus sought to reconfigure Nicodemus’ faith from something based on signs, or contained by the intellect, into a relationship with God based on love. Such a relationship isn’t ours to create. Rather, it comes as a gift. God, you see, has a soft spot for this loused-up planet. God loves it! God loves it so much that he sent the Son to reveal God’s saving love for the world. To be “born from above” is to accept God’s action on our behalf, an action that sweeps us into the love that the Father has for the Son and the Son has for his disciples. The Spirit joins us to the love nexus that we sometimes name Father, Son and Holy Spirit. It is a love that flows in all directions at once. Flows by the Spirit’s breath around the sanctuary in worship, draws us in ministry to the Fellowship Hall on Tuesday mornings, to offer assistance and food, sends us out to love our neighbors, joins us with sisters and brothers in places like Mexico and the Congo. Apart from drawing us into the love God has for the world, all the signs and miracles of Jesus are meaningless, and all our propensity for theological scrutiny misses the point.
Nicodemus’ last words to Jesus were “how can these things be?” But there’s a suggestion in John’s Gospel that Nicodemus got beyond this question, and friends so can we. Maybe a first step is, as the literary analysts would have it, to “suspend disbelief.” Disbelief comes from the intellect. Belief, well, it comes from somewhere entirely.
May the Spirit that blows where it will, blow on us today. May the love of God revealed in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ empower us to believe, and in believing have eternal life.