The story of Nicodemus is one of my favorite Bible stories, and. Nicodemus is one of my favorite Biblical characters. Why?

Transcription

1 Sermon for Trinity Sunday Sunday, May 31, 2015 B Sisters and brothers in Christ, grace and peace be unto you in the Triune name of God: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen. The story of Nicodemus is one of my favorite Bible stories, and Nicodemus is one of my favorite Biblical characters. Why? you ask, thinking, What we heard this morning was a nice story, but favorite? You re right, but what we heard this morning is not the whole story of Nicodemus. We must move on to, as radio personality, the late Paul Harvey, would say, the rest of the story. For in the rest of the story or, more aptly the whole story, we can see where and how the story of Nicodemus becomes one of my favorites. Nicodemus comes on scene for the first time this morning in the drama that is the Gospel of John as a type character we all know the type, and have run into them all over in our lives: He is the kind who knows. Nicodemus is not a curious person. He comes to Jesus to confirm what he already knows about him, not to learn who Jesus is or what he s about. After all, Nicodemus knows what more is there to learn? He is a know-it-all when he comes to Jesus in the dark. Of course, John is playing with this image of darkness. The

2 invitation in John s gospel is to come and see 1 and we know that, even with our modern lights, it is much more difficult to see in the dark; we might be able to see generally, but we miss many details. Nicodemus doesn t see Jesus yes, yes, he may physically be in Jesus presence in our story, but he doesn t really see Jesus. We see this in the way that they are talking past each other on totally different levels: Jesus speaks of being born from above by the Spirit; Nicodemus is talking about re-entering the womb and being born again. They don t get each other, and we leave Nicodemus, for this first time, with him muttering something about how can these things be? This does not sound like a promising start to one of my favorite Bible stories or Bible characters. Today we celebrate Holy Trinity Sunday. Though this is the only Sunday of the year celebrating a doctrine of the church, I m not going to get into the technicalities of the Doctrine itself; rather I want to spend a little time dealing with one way that doctrine applies to us and to Nicodemus: the progressive work of faith formation. Very early in our life, we experience creation. As a very young child, our concept of creation is that which is in our immediate surroundings. But, I don t think it takes us that long to realize that there is creation outside of our immediate surroundings, and soon this understanding 1 See, for instance, John 1:39.

3 starts to view the enormity of creation; we look around us and see amazing wanders we see the vastness and the intimacy of creation, the similarities and differences within, among, and between the many parts of creation. We begin to know God the Creating Father. As Paul would say to the Romans, [e]ver since the creation of the world [God s] eternal power and divine nature, invisible though they are, have been understood and seen through the things he has made. 2 Yet, Paul speaks this in the midst of a condemnation. Why? Because the ones about whom Paul is speaking, while they were claiming to be wise, they became fools; and they exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling [things of the earth]. 3 Idolatry is not Nicodemus issue, yet as we encountered him today at night we see that he, like those in Paul s condemnation, only knows God partially. He does not recognize Jesus as the Son, and probably doesn t even recognize the work of the Spirit in the world. But Nicodemus limited, partial knowledge of God is why we need to continue the story. Nicodemus appears a second time in John s gospel, 4 causing us to question his earlier type-character of know-it-all: Jesus teaching has caught the attention of the Jewish leadership they don t 2 Romans 1:20. 3 Romans 1: John 7:50ff. The following parts come from the story leading up to and during Nicodemus actual appearance.

4 like it; they don t like the talk of Jesus as Messiah; they are seeking to kill him, so the chief priests and Pharisees send out temple police to arrest Jesus. Despite this order, the temple police are unable to arrest him. Their report back to the chief priests and Pharisees does not go well, ending in the leadership calling the crowd supporting Jesus ignorant and accursed. Here we again encounter Nicodemus, questioning the leadership s decision to condemn Jesus: Our law does not judge people without first giving them a hearing to find out what they are doing, does it? he asks them. As is, unfortunately, often the case with ones who come to the defense of another, they reply to Nicodemus with a near condemnation, Surely you are not also from Galilee, are you? Compared to the encounter of Jesus and Nicodemus we heard this morning, this second appearance is comparatively brief. It is hard to get what s really happening with Nicodemus here but this: His knowing has turned into questioning; he has become curious. I like to think of this as the Spirit beginning to work on him. We don t know where it will go, but this is the way of the Spirit, for the Spirit blows where it chooses. 5 We don t know how the Spirit will work on us or on any who receives the Spirit. The Spirt works in mysterious ways and even in unexpecting individuals like Nicodemus. Is the 5 John 3:8. I m interpreting to be Spirit, contrary to the NRSV s wind.

5 mysterious work of the Spirit finished in any of us? I don t think so. Is the work of the Spirit finished in Nicodemus? No, she has opened a little gap in Nicodemus knowledge to leave room for more to come later. Nicodemus is experiencing what, in today s church language, we would call Faith formation. We first encountered an ignorant Nicodemus. Now, Nicodemus wisdom has expanded; it is now, in this time before his fellow chief priests and Pharisees that I think he s opening himself up to understanding who Jesus is. As Paul says, No one can say Jesus is Lord except by the Holy Spirit. 6 Indeed, I think that no one can contemplate the Lordship or Messiahship of Jesus (which I think Nicodemus is doing) except by the Spirit. So, this gets to the reason why this story of Nicodemus is one of my favorite scriptural arcs. Like Nicodemus, we all begin ignorant; we all begin in the dark. But yet, through our adoption in baptism, God promises the sending of the Spirit upon us. In the waters of baptism, we fully arrive in God s grace; but our life and our faith have hardly arrived at their completion. Our faith is a progression and we are beginning to see this also in the faith of Nicodemus. 6 1 Corinthians 12:3.

6 So, now, for the rest of the story : Nicodemus appears for a third and final time in the gospel of John, 7 blowing apart the type-character of know-itall. It was the day of Preparation, the day before the Sabbath of Passover, and dead on a cross outside Jerusalem is Jesus. In the light, before the setting of the sun and the beginning of the Sabbath, Jesus body is removed from the cross by Joseph of Arimathea. Nicodemus, who had first come to Jesus by night, also came, bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes weighing about a hundred pounds. They took the body of Jesus and wrapped it with the spices in linen cloth And they laid Jesus [in the new tomb in the garden]. Now this amount of burial spices was extreme; it was costly; it was what would have been used to anoint a king for burial. Here, on this day of Jesus death, Nicodemus again grew in his faith formation. By his presence in the light and by his act of love in anointing Jesus, he shows himself to be one who has come to believe that Jesus is indeed the anointed one the Messiah the one sent from God for the sake of the world, which God loves supremely. This is the rest of the story of Nicodemus, his move, his faith formation which I feel so parallels our own from being in the darkness of ignorance though he claims to know to being in the light of the presence of the crucified Christ. It is this faith 7 In John 19:39. The following sets the scene and describes/quotes what happens when Nicodemus again appears.

7 formation journey of Nicodemus, empowered by the Triune God, which makes it one of my favorite Biblical arcs. May the peace of the Triune God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, keep us always forming in our faith, always moving toward a more Godly wisdom, until that day when we will be known fully, and fully know. Amen.