Is Jesus In Your Room? Part 3
John 3:1-21
Imagine, for a moment, that you have completed your undergraduate degree, finished your Masters, and earned four doctorates. You have been teaching at the highest level of academia for many years and are considered the most knowledgeable expert in your field. Now, imagine the ultimate authority comes to you and says, “Everything you have learned up to this point, everything you have dogmatically taught, is wrong!” The authority then tells you that you must go back to kindergarten and start your education anew. You would likely drop dead from the shock, but that is precisely the point. Please edit grammar, spelling, and clarity while preserving the personality and style of the author.
Jesus knew this man’s heart. He knew the question Nicodemus had come to ask, and before Nicodemus could even utter a word, Jesus drops the bombshell!
“Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.”
John 3:3
Have you ever heard of a baby contributing to its own birth? I’ll give you a hint: never! Babies are born into this world, it’s not something they actively participate in. And the same is true for being born into the kingdom of God.
Jesus revealed to this highly religious man that a person contributes nothing to their own salvation. He informed “the Teacher of Israel” that something must happen to them in order to enter the kingdom of God.
Nicodemus said to him, “How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born?”
John 3:4
Nicodemus, “The Teacher of Israel,” was the most well-educated man in town, and potentially quite intelligent. It is safe to assume that he did not think Jesus was speaking literally of crawling back into his mother’s womb. Rather, he was asking how he could unlearn everything he had believed his entire life and go back to square one.
For a man of Nicodemus’s stature, the mere thought of starting over must have been unbearable. Jesus had just told this religiously flawed man that in order to see the kingdom of heaven, he would have to hit the delete button on everything that made him who he was. He would have to walk away from everything he held dear, tear down the walls of the cathedral in which he found security, and become a student again, a babe. He would have to…
put off (his) old self, which belongs to (his) former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires, and be renewed in the spirit of (his) mind, and put on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness.
Ephesians 4:22-24
Jesus said to Nicodemus, “You cannot do it on your own. Something has to happen to you. The wind must blow you through the door you did not open. You must be born of water and the Spirit. Eternal life cannot be earned, it must be granted.” Please note that I have made a small change to “wind must blow you” instead of “wind must blow through you” as the latter seems to be a typo.
7 Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’ 8 The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.
John 3:7-8
This is a supernatural act of the Holy Spirit. You cannot do it on your own, nor would you want to even if given the opportunity to decide. It is a gift of God, and you cannot contribute anything to it.
But once you are born into the kingdom of God, may you open your eyes for the first time and respond through a fountain of tears as you realize how wrong you were. As your walls come crumbling down, you emerge through the clouds of dust and debris and enter through the narrow gate into a new life with Christ by faith!
This is the overwhelming message of Christianity.
for by grace you have been saved through faith and this is not your own doing it is the gift of God. Not a result of works so that no one may boast.
Ephesians 2:8-9
The great chapter of faith, Hebrews chapter 11, uses the phrase “by faith,” 16 times.
Abraham believed God and it was counted to him as righteousness.
Genesis 15:6
The righteous shall live by his faith.
Habakkuk 2:4
Nicodemus was likely familiar with these passages, except for the letter to the Hebrews. After all, he was the teacher of Israel. However, he was a part of an apostate, works-based religious system. He was too blinded by the deceit of self-righteousness to see the promises of Jeremiah chapter 31 and too lost in the darkness of works to navigate the wonderful promises made in Ezekiel chapter 36.
25 I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. 26 And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. 27 And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules.
Ezekiel 36:25-27
I will give them a new heart! I will make with them a new covenant, says God! I will! I will! I will! Says God! And not for your sake, but for the sake of my Holy name! He will! God will! AND HE HAS!!!
Nicodemus….floored to realize the heart currently beating in his chest was not a promised heart of flesh, but a cursed heart of stone.
9 Nicodemus said to him, “How can these things be?” 10 Jesus answered him, “Are you the teacher of Israel and yet you do not understand these things?
John 3:9-10
OUCH!!!
This is the last we hear from Nicodemus for now…
In Him, with love, mike
P.s. This is Part 3, of a five part series. Here are the links to the first two parts: Part 1, Part 2
