Nicodemus

Today’s Gospel passage is mainly known for verse 16, perhaps the most famous verse in the whole Bible, and one that has taken on a life quite apart from its original context within the story of Nicodemus.

Nicodemus is widely considered the patron saint of curious Christians, sceptics, and those with a restless faith. He’s also one of the few people other than the disciples who appears several times in John’s Gospel. Today we heard about his first appearance. Then he appears again in Chapter 7 standing up for due process when it comes to judging Jesus, and finally he helps Joseph of Arimathea to collect, anoint and bury the body of Jesus.

Only a few appearances but they seem to tell the story of someone moving from bafflement to public commitment. His faith takes time, most of John’s Gospel in fact, and that is a reassurance.

There are many stories in the Bible and beyond of people responding immediately to Jesus, dropping everything to follow him at once and finding their lives changed overnight. And that is a wonderful thing for which we give thanks.

But for others, maybe even most of us, faith is more a question of fits and starts, two steps forward and one step back. Sometimes things might seem clear and at other times confusing. And sometimes faith might feel like an endless series of questions. For those of us who fall into that category the story of Nicodemus might be especially meaningful.

Nicodemus is sure that Jesus has something to do with God but for now he’s unable to understand beyond that. He’s someone who’s devoted his life to learning, to asking questions, to solving tricky problems of interpretation and understanding using his intellect. He’s not so different to many people in Cambridge and in this congregation. And he’s curious about Jesus, so he goes to the original source to find out more.

Curiosity, we’re sometimes told, killed the cat. This is generally said to stop us asking questions, especially when we’re children and asking about everything. (In fact, a study found that children between 14 months and 5 years old ask an average of 107 questions per hour, which sounds exhausting!) But there’s a second line to the saying “curiosity killed the cat”, which is “but satisfaction brought it back”.

The first line reads like a warning against asking too many questions, but the second line is permission.

Curiosity can feel dangerous and plenty of people want to shut it down when it threatens their position, their dearly held opinions or their way of life. It’s no coincidence that dictators tend to keep a tight grip on education and are suspicious of the highly educated.

But if curiosity leads to truth, knowledge and clarity it’s life-giving, not deadly. And in Nicodemus’s case curiosity eventually led to all these things.

Not right now, in this meeting, but over the course of John’s Gospel we see Nicodemus getting bolder in his commitment. He comes to Jesus this time, though, because signs and wonders have convinced him that something is going on here that has to do with God. He hasn’t grasped the whole truth yet, but he comes to find out more, and Jesus leads him closer to the reality of what’s going on.

It’s a difficult process, with much frustration, and at times Nicodemus seems almost wilfully stupid, especially when he talks about not being able to go back into the womb. But how likely is it, really, that a man like Nicodemus, experienced in detecting subtle nuances, finding loopholes and articulating intricacies, couldn’t recognise a metaphor when he saw it?

Perhaps his objection was more to do with the impossibility of changing what’s already happened and the difficulty of changing who we are.

We can change, sure, if we work at it, but we can never go back to the purity and innocence of a newborn baby, however much we might want to.

The poet John Clare is believed to have said, “If life had a second edition, how I would correct the proof”, and that’s a sentiment we can all share.

So, Nicodemus and Jesus talk, Nicodemus asking his questions, not wanting to settle for easy answers or only half-understood truths and determined to work through his confusion and frustration.

Jesus tries to explain that he’s talking about a birth and a new life that comes from above, from God, that it doesn’t depend on any human actions but only on the love of God.

It’s a life that doesn’t wipe out the past but works to redeem it and give us a new beginning from which we can grow, learn, love and be loved.

And it’s in this context that we get the famous verse: “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but have eternal life.”

Jesus tells Nicodemus and us that new life is a gift freely given to everyone who wants it. He tells us that our lives can be made different because we’re loved beyond measure.

The story of Nicodemus reveals that we can be restless, sceptical and confused and bring those things to God confident that he will help us. It encourages us that curiosity is not a sin to be shut down with accusations of lack of faith but the beginning of a deeper faith. It shows us that questions are a chance to start a conversation about what really matters and about what troubles people, not a threat to the established order.

And it’s a reassurance that the journey of faith can and does include wrestling with God as Jacob did, demanding he listen as the Psalmist did, among many others, and learning, bit by bit, how very much we are loved, with our questions, confusion, misunderstandings and all.

“For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son…”