A Sermon preached by Dr. William K. Quick in York Chapel

Duke Divinity School

February 20, 2002

He came to Jesus under the cover of darkness—this ‘Night Visitor’. John tells us Jesus is in Jerusalem for the Passover Festival when this Jewish leader, a Pharisee and a member of one of the stricter sects in Judaism, comes to question the Galilean.

I have walked the dimly lit and narrow streets of the Old City of Jerusalem at night. At the time I marveled how reasonably safe, exceedingly quiet, and virtually empty they are. I can imagine that Nicodemus found ancient Jerusalem much the same.

It was also safe for a respected member of the Sanhedrin to sneak to the place of lodging of this Rabbi from Nazareth unseen by passersby who might ask searching questions.

His friends and associates had surely heard about Jesus and had serious questions concerning this new teacher. Nicodemas had questions, too. The fact that he went at night is usually held against him as though it implied secrecy. Maybe it does. Or maybe it just meant that the cool of the evening was a good time to visit. Whatever the reason, it should be said to his credit that he went at all.

To the Jewish establishment Jesus looked like a potential troublemaker. With whip in hand had he not driven the animals out of the Temple and overturned the tables of the money changers?. He was a Galilean who had come to the Holy City—Jerusalem—and that was roughly the equivalent in our day of being a ‘hillbilly’ in New York or Boston. Jesus had a popular following and the power structure is always threatened by a populist.

Nicodemus was impressed by the ‘miraculous signs’ of Jesus ministry. He sought him out because of the wonderful things it was reported he had done and as "one who has come from God." Jesus talked about a Kingdom— but the people weren’t clear whether he was talking politics or religion. Because he is a controversial prophet from Nazareth, it is not surprising that this pillar of the Establishment was circumspect in seeking him out. Again-it is to his credit that Nicodemus had the courage and open mind to seek him out.

He begins his conversation with a complimentary remark in a gentlemanly fashion but Jesus knew he was not there to pass the time of day. Jesus abruptly interrupts him with a statement guaranteed to start a conversation. He points out to this Pharisee that a person must be "born again" or you cannot enter the Kingdom of God.

A puzzled Nicodemus doesn’t catch the metaphor, takes Jesus’ words literally and asks "how can a grown man enter his mother’s womb a second time?" In his mind birth is a once-in-a-lifetime procedure. Centuries later, Sigmund Freud contended that all of us want to go back to the warmth and security of our mother’s womb. (but I’ve never known anyone who has.)

Jesus tries again—— telling him one has to born physically of human parents and spiritually of the Holy Spirit. He reminds Nicodemus of an Old Testament event, recorded in Numbers 21, to serve as the example of his saving work: "As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up that who believes in him may have eternal life."

But the pace is too fast for Nicodemus. He just didn’t get it and disappears from the conversation as the dialogue turns into a monologue by St. John. The whole scene finally dissolves setting the stage for what Martin Luther called ‘the Gospel in miniature’—John 3:16: "God so loved the world that he gave his only son, that whoever believes in him will not perish but have eternal life."

The story of Nicodemus is a reminder of the call of Jesus to all who would follow him. The Kingdom of God requires a clean break, a fresh start. George Gallop, the pollster and a devout Episcopalian, reports that some 40% of American church members say they have been "born again". Many of our church members still cringe at the term "born again"—a phrase which made its first impact on the public press 25 years ago when Jimmy Carter was running for President and professed he had been "born again".

It may have been strange for Nicodemus and perhaps made him cringe as well. After all he was a Pharisee - a Jewish leader - probably a member of the Sanhedrin which, in most domestic matters, the Romans allowed to operate as both a civil and religious governing body.

Now we know some of the things Jesus had to say about Pharisees: He calls them ‘the blind leaders of the blind’ . . . likens them to ‘white-washed tombs full of the rottenness of dead men’s bones’ . . . and . . . ’that harlots and sinners will enter heaven before you.’

Pharisee has come to have a bad connotation to many Christians, which is unfortunate because it distorts our understanding.

They were the religious people of their day; took the greatest concern for their religion; tithed regularly; kept all the fast days. More than this, they were the responsible, decent, respectable people of their communities. They were as devout and solid a group of people as one could find. To all appearances, they were the type of people whom we refer to often as "the backbone of the church and the community."

We have much in common with the Pharisee. If there’s a sermon we preachers must preach to ourselves, as well as the church, it is a sermon on the Pharisee. Being clergy, one is put among the Pharisees who take religion seriously.

Confronted with the teachings of Jesus, do they not seem strange? Jesus, it seems, has turned things upside down. The people he condemns the most are the people we praise most highly: the religious, the good, the wise, the wealthy.

What’s behind all this? What can he mean? Why are we uncomfortable when told each of us is a sinner and has come short of God?

When Henry David Thoreau was getting along in years, his aunt asked him if he had made his peace with God. Thoreau answered, as most of us probably would, "I was not aware, Auntie, that God and I had quarreled!"

And therein lies our problem: refusal to see we have done anything which falls short of God’s will . . . that we need to make peace with God. We cannot come to God . . . to the table of Holy Communion . . . congratulating ourselves upon better than someone else. We can only come saying, "Just as I am, without one plea." Realizing how much God has given us, who deserve so little, we come unworthy, asking only what we may do to show forth our gratitude . . . to seek once again to place Jesus Christ at the center of life . . . believing that "if one is in Christ, one is a new creature. It is no longer I who live but Christ who lives in me..."

It was the same message Jesus had for the rich young ruler: "..sell all that you have.." Completely change your outlook on and orientation toward life. That was more of a clean break that the rich young ruler wanted to make because he had great possessions. On the other hand, Zaccheus, the tax collector from Jericho, made that clean break!

One of the most fascinating stories of a clean break in the 20th century is the autobiography of Elizabeth Burns. THE LATE LIZ is the story of a woman who was rudely awakened by the Holy Spirit and became one of God’s most effective witnesses. She was a product of America’s upper class and suffered through three broken marriages. Finally, so riddled with hurt and bitterness, one night she took 13 high-dosage sleeping pills in an attempt to commit suicide. Her son found her unconscious and rushed his mother to the hospital where she hung between life and death. She slowly awakened . . . but it was an awakening which was to be a total personal awakening in her soul as well as her body. Her remembrance of that moment brought a sense of freedom "as though the windows of my life had been washed, a part of me left behind, a part old, hard and heavy. My mind was clear; it too had been washed and unencumbered. I understood for the first time what it means to be forgiven by God."

It is unfortunate that the phrase "Born Again" has been so largely identified with, and reduced to, experiencing a single type of emotional religious experience because it clearly involves different things for different people. Elizabeth Burns made a clean break with her past. Some need to make a clean break with their guilt and failure. Some, perhaps Nicodemus was one, need to make a clean break with their religious ideas. Some need to make a clean break with their goals. Some need to make a clean break with their companions. Being "born again" means making a clean break with anything and everything which interferes with our obedience to God!

Let us also be reminded that the love of God has a way of redeeming lives long after they seem to have been lost. A person cannot go back to the mother’s womb but one can receive new life from above—a fresh start, a new direction.

I close with the testimony of an old Army guy who for more than 35 years had been a heavy drinker with a temperament of a top sergeant, long after he had become a Colonel. He spoke before a group of doctors and said he’d had a personality change. Now temperate as once he had been intemperate; as considerate as he had once been severe, as concerned for others as he had once been selfish. In the audience was a psychiatrist of the school which says personalities are set very early and doubted he had experienced a personality change at his age. "Well," replied this member of Alcoholics Anonymous, "at least I know I am under new management."

That is the answer of Jesus to those who say that an alcoholic can’t become sober, that the self-centered must always be that way, that the cruel cannot become kind. It is possible for anyone to come under new management . . . to be born anew . . . and discover that when Christ reigns, life has a quality it never had before!

What Jesus was saying to Nicodemus is something like this: "If you are really interested in what I’m doing, the first thing to realize is that you have to start all over again. You can’t inch your way into the Kingdom of God by tinkering a little bit here or a little bit there with yourself. It isn’t just a matter of being a little more disciplined, or giving a little more to the church, or praying a little more often. It is a whole different way of life. It’s like kicking a drug habit, you’ve got to do it cold turkey—all the way—and the withdrawal symptoms are like the trauma of being born again."

Dr. William K. Quick is a 1958 graduate of Duke Divinity School. He is in his fourth year as a visiting faculty member. Pastor Emeritus of Metropolitan United Methodist Church in Detroit, he is the Associate General Secretary of the World Methodist Council.