Trinity Sunday & Nicodemus

John 3: 1-17

If you had some time alone with Jesus, I wonder what you would ask him?

The amazing healer, teacher and miracle-worker is usually surrounded by his followers and by people wanting to see him and hear him – but here in the cool of the evening it is just the two of you. What would you ask?

 

Would you ask about the miracles of healing – how does it work? Is there a way to see someone we love healed?; or get healing for ourselves..

Would you ask about heaven – is Jesus really from there? What is it like?

Would you ask about your life – is there something you should be doing that you haven’t discovered yet? Or is there a way of putting right something that went horribly wrong in the past?

Would you ask about Jesus, about himself -  how does he find the energy to keep going out there to do good and preach good news? What does he want his followers to do? Is he really the Son of God? What does that even mean?

 

Nicodemus comes to Jesus. He comes at night – perhaps because he didn’t want to be seen – or perhaps because he wanted some quiet time alone with Jesus to find out what he really wanted to know.

 

The interaction between Jesus and Nicodemus is more than Nicodemus asking one question and Jesus answering it – it’s a conversation.

 

It begins with Nicodemus making a statement 

“We know you are a teacher sent by God, no one could perform these signs of yours unless God were with him.”.

 

The thing that has been called a “sign” performed by Jesus, so far in John’s gospel, is the turning of water into wine; but he has also called disciples to follow him and has overturned the tables of the money changers in the temple. He will go on to heal people, feed the 5000, walk on water, even raise Lazarus from death.

Nicodemus is right – only someone sent by God and empowered by God could do those things. But Nicodemus poses it as a sort of question: we (and presumably he’s speaking for others among the Pharisees) we think you are from God – are you??

 

Jesus answers with a statement

“no-one can see the kingdom of God unless he is born again”. 

The kingdom of God is the place where these remarkable things done by Jesus – miracles, healings, challenges will all be commonplace. To see the world changed like that a person must be changed too, to become new, again, says Jesus.

 

Nicodemus takes what Jesus says about being born again literally “how can a person be born when he is old – he can’t enter his mother’s womb a second time!”.

 

Jesus replies, in effect ‘No-one can see the kingdom unless they are born again - not in a flesh way, but by water and the spirit. The Spirit, the power of God, can change a person and help them see the things of God in this world’.

 

When Nicodemus still doesn’t get it and asks 

“How is this possible?”, Jesus starts to talk about himself 

“No one has gone up to heaven except the one who came down from heaven, the Son of Man who is in heaven.” 

 

Jesus is pointing to himself not just as someone sent from God and empowered by God, but part of the very presence of God – a bridge between heaven and earth.

 

Then Jesus talks about how he will show the love of God to the whole world – when he is ‘lifted up’, and then come those two most amazing verses of scripture 

“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 be saved through him”.

 

We are not told what, if anything, Nicodemus says to Jesus is response to all this. But John’s gospel does show us the impact of this conversation on Nicodemus.

 

Nicodemus comes into John’s gospel twice more – firstly in chapter 7 v 50 – when the council of leaders are considering having Jesus arrested. The council have finally decided that what Jesus is saying and doing is contrary to the law of God, and they are wanting the temple police to arrest Jesus. 

But Nicodemus speaks up “Does our law permit us to pass judgement without first learning the facts?”. 

It seems that this buys Jesus a little more time before the authorities finally move against him. 

Meanwhile, perhaps Nicodemus himself is still considering the facts about Jesus.

 

Secondly, in ch 19 v 39 Nicodemus once again enters the story of Jesus. Jesus has just been crucified and has died on the cross, and Joseph of Arimathea has asked Pilate for permission to remove the body of Jesus. Nicodemus joins Joseph to carry the body to the borrowed tomb. 

It seems that Nicodemus has finally decided what he thinks of Jesus – he risks a lot to carry the body of a condemned criminal, and he brings with him a huge quantity of spices for the burial.

 

Nicodemus finally comes out from the darkness into the light – it seems the truth of Jesus’ identity has dawned on him. 

Did he later hear the good news of the resurrection? It’s not silly to think he would have done – presumably somebody reported to Joseph of Arimathea and to Nicodemus that the body they had carefully laid in the tomb was risen and Jesus was alive.

Finally Nicodemus would learn that Jesus is the Son sent from God the Father and raised by him from death to live forever and to send the promised Holy Spirit.

 

Today is Trinity Sunday – and as we look at this reading from John’s gospel, we find Jesus talking easily about his work, his relationship to God the Father and the work of the Holy Spirit.

We find the answers to the questions we might ask Jesus about salvation and heaven and purpose in life, all wrapped up in the question to Jesus himself - who is he? The one who can not only teach about heaven but who shows us heaven here on earth. The one who shows God’s love in action and who declares God’s love for the world. The one who asks people to follow, to see life in a new way, to be loved and show love in return. 

Nicodemus shows us that talking to Jesus is not just getting answers but is about developing a relationship of faith in Jesus, which leads to a relationship of love with God the Father and the Holy Spirit too. For us, God in Trinity is not just an idea we have to grasp, but is about understanding how we relate to God, serve God, follow in right paths, are filled with love and purpose.

 

And if all this talk of the Trinity is starting to make your head hurt, take heart in this story of St. Augustine.

 

It is said that he was walking along the beach one day, taking a break from writing his treatise on the Trinity. The great scholar just couldn’t get his mind around this great mystery.  

He was taking what I call a “think break”.

As he walked along the beach he saw a little boy digging a hole in the sand, and then running to the ocean, filling up his hands with the seawater, running back to the hole and emptying the water into the hole.  Augustine watched as the child went back and forth several times. 

Finally he said to the boy, “What are you doing?”  The boy said, “Trying to fill that hole with the ocean.” And Augustine said, “You’ll never fit the ocean in that hole.”  And the boy said, “Neither will you be able to fit the Trinity into your mind.”

 

We, too, might struggle to grasp the truth of the Trinity in our minds, but I pray that we will find that there is room for the love of God in our hearts and our lives. And so like Nicodemus we might learn to have faith Jesus and through him learn to live in the love of God – Father, Son & Holy Spirit. Amen.