Transcript
And turn back once again to John
chapter 3. John chapter 3. And to a familiar,
even a favorite passage of so many people. I thought about
that this week. How popular this account of Jesus’
interaction with Nicodemus is. And I tried to think through
even in my own mind why that’s so, why so many people seem to
relate to Nicodemus. In fact, we even tend to project
onto Nicodemus perhaps some of our own weaknesses. We talked
last week about the fact that he came at night and I found
it interesting. So many people ascribed to Nicodemus
cowardice. And I think there’s at least
the possibility that they’re reading into that, that Nicodemus
was cowardly and he came to Christ kind of skulking through the
darkness at night just in order to hide from his fellow Pharisees. One thing that’s true. We don’t
know what was in Nicodemus’ heart, why he came at night. But one
thing is true, we all have been where Nicodemus is. Where we
are pondering Christ, and perhaps even for the very first time.
We are thinking about him, and thinking about some of the things
that he said. We’re weighing those things,
and they are weighing upon us. And we’re thinking about what
is required in coming to faith in Christ. And what are the benefits? And what are the challenges to
doing that? I think that’s where you find
Nicodemus. Nicodemus was likely fascinated with Christ. He was
taken in to a degree. He was maybe amused by Him or
interested in Him on some level. We saw that part of the context
was that Nicodemus had taken in, watched some of the signs
that Jesus had done, and in that sense he was interested, fascinated. But he hadn’t placed his faith
in Christ, not fully, not completely. And I think we can all relate
to that. That moment where we were hedging, that moment where
we were mulling over the things of Christ. We come into that
moment and we find what we found, you and I. How gracious Christ
is. How gracious he is to meet Nicodemus
and not chide him and not rebuke him. He certainly didn’t rebuke
him for coming at night. Not rebuke him for not already
having placed his faith in Christ, but slowly nurturing him, and
teaching him about the way of salvation, and then laying before
him the great call to repentance and faith. If you would, John
chapter 2, which really sets the tone for John chapter 3.
John chapter 2, beginning in verse 23. Now, when he was in Jerusalem
at the Passover, during the feast, many believed in his name, observing
the signs which he was doing. But Jesus, on his part, was not
entrusting himself to them, for he knew all men. And because
he did not need anyone to testify concerning man, for he himself
knew what was in man. Now there was a man of the Pharisees
named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. This man came to Jesus
by night and said to him, Rabbi, we know that you have come from
God as a teacher, for no one can do these signs that you do
unless God is with him. Jesus answered and said to him,
truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot
see the kingdom of God. Nicodemus said to him, how can
a man be born when he’s old? He cannot enter a second time
into his mother’s womb and be born, can he? Jesus answered,
Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the
Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which
is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the
Spirit is spirit. Do not be amazed that I said
to you, you must be born again. The wind blows where it wishes,
and you hear the sound of it. but do not know where it comes
from and where it is going, so is everyone who is born of the
Spirit.” Nicodemus said to him, how can these things be? Jesus
answered and said to him, are you the teacher of Israel and
do not understand these things? Truly, truly I say to you, we
speak of what we know and testify of what we have seen and you
do not accept our testimony. If I told you earthly things
and you do not believe, how will you believe if I tell you heavenly
things? No one has ascended into heaven,
but he who descended from heaven, the son of man, as Moses lifted
up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the son of man be
lifted up so that whoever believes in him will in him have eternal
life. For God so loved the world that
he gave his only begotten son that whoever believes in him
shall not perish, but have eternal life. For God did not send the
Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might
be saved through Him. He who believes in Him is not
judged. He who does not believe has been
judged already, because he has not believed in the name of the
only begotten Son of God. This is the judgment. But the
light has come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather
than the light, for their deeds were evil. For everyone who does
evil hates the light and does not come to the light for fear
that his deeds will be exposed. But he who practices the truth
comes to the light so that his deeds may be manifested as having
been wrought in God. Nicodemus had one of those moments
that you and I know. If we have come to Christ, we
know that we came to those crossroads. We know we came to that crisis
point where we had heard of the things of Christ. We had seen
Him change our friends, perhaps our families’ lives. We had watched
God at work and we knew that there was something to it. And
then we heard about the claims of Christ and we began on this
lengthy task of mulling him over. Nicodemus is right there. And
we saw last week that initial confrontation where Jesus presents
before Nicodemus the necessity of rebirth. It’s an introduction
to those things. It’s not the final word, even
as we’ll see this morning. Jesus gives to him the foundational
elements of salvation. First of all, he told Nicodemus
of an ultimate destiny, the kingdom of God, heaven. And he pointed to that as being
a real and legitimate kingdom. Nicodemus was likely caught up,
as were the Pharisees, so many of them, caught up in this expectation
of an earthly kingdom, and Jesus speaks of a kingdom of a completely
different kind. It is the ultimate destiny for
any man, the kingdom of God, to be a child of God, welcomed
into God’s kingdom where God rules, where righteousness prevails,
It sounds too good to be true, but it is true. Jesus tells Nicodemus
about this kingdom. But he tells him, secondly, that
in order to arrive in this kingdom, one must undergo a complete transformation. This isn’t a matter of reform. This isn’t a matter of cleaning
up one’s act. It isn’t a matter of more obedience
to more law. It is absolute and overwhelming.
a complete transformation and he uses the term, the image,
born again. We looked and took several minutes
to consider that last Lord’s Day. We’ll look at it again,
but essentially he just introduces this idea to Nicodemus and it
must have rocked his world. It must have shocked him to hear
him tell Nicodemus that even he,
a Pharisee, a ruler of the Jews, must be born again. It would
have been understandable for him to understand that certainly
the heathen needed to be reborn. They needed reform. But the Jews, the chosen people
of God, and the elite within it, Jesus told Nicodemus not only
about this ultimate destiny and this complete transformation,
but this absolute prohibition. There are no other ways. Unless
one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of heaven. It was absolute. And so Nicodemus stands before
the Lord. He’s already there. There were
many people that wanted to criticize the fact that Nicodemus came
at night, but he came. We can say a lot about Nicodemus,
but he’s there before the Lord, and he’s wrestling with the Lord’s
calling in his life, much like you and I. And Nicodemus hears these words,
And he recoils. And he utters the only thing
that comes to his mind and his mouth. It’s really a call for
a clarification. It’s a call for details about
this salvation. He wants to know more. And so
he blurts out, look at verse 4. Nicodemus said to him, how
can a man be born when he’s old? He cannot enter a second time
into his mother’s womb and be born, can he? Now, there were
some commentators that almost wanted to treat Nicodemus as
a wise aleck here. That he’s making a wisecrack,
that he’s reducing this thing to an absurdity at really the
Lord’s expense. Mocking him almost. I don’t know
that I get that sense. It certainly is an absurd question
and one of the features of this passage is the possibility, at
least, that Nicodemus was himself already old. And the very idea
of being born again, and he’s trying to compute this whole
thing, trying to think through the logistics of that, And so
he asks the most absurd question he can, because that’s the only
thing that he can even conceive. How can I, when I’m old, are
you suggesting that I go back to my mother’s womb? It’s possible
that Nicodemus just completely misunderstood the Lord. And I
would tell you, it’s quite possible that he was mocking the Lord
here, at least mildly. at least mocking the idea that
he suggested, the imagery that he uses about being reborn. But what Nicodemus longs for
is clarity. He’s doubtful, even from the
very start, even hopeless. Because now he says, if you’re
telling me that I’ve got to go be born again, that seems to
me to be utterly impossible for a man my age. To get a fresh
start on life, who doesn’t long for that, right? We wake up after
a bad week of living our Christian life and we long to have a do-over. We think of our non-Christian
days and we long to have those obliterated and to start fresh. There isn’t a human alive that
wouldn’t try to do it all over and do things better the next
time. The idea sounds appealing to Nicodemus, but the reality
of it is, how? Somehow that I’m going to be
reborn, it’s impossible. And so Nicodemus takes a stab
at asking this question, hoping that if he states it in its absolute,
most literal sense, that Christ will open the door and give him
just a little bit more clarity. And he takes it at the most extreme.
An old man? Are you saying that an old man,
this old man, has to go back into his mother’s womb and be
born? Nicodemus would have been familiar
with the whole idea of a fresh start, even rebirth. The scriptures spoke of it. Isaiah
chapter 1, Come now, let us reason together, says the Lord. Though
your sins are as scarlet, they will be as white as snow. They
are red like crimson, they will be like wool, if you consent
and obey. There were many passages like
that. This is the covenant with which
I make with the house of Israel, Jeremiah 31. I will put my law
within them and on their heart I will write it. I will be their
God and they shall be my people, a fresh start. Ezekiel chapter
11, I will give them one heart, put a new spirit within them.
I will take the heart of stone out of their flesh and give them
a heart of flesh, a fresh start. But Nicodemus, even with that
backdrop of his Jewish upbringing and the Old Testament scriptures,
even with all of that, he knew that Christ was speaking about
something entirely different. And so he presses the issue. And he takes this most extreme
case. And he says, Christ, are you telling me that I must be
reborn out of my mother’s womb? It’s a foolish, silly question,
and Nicodemus probably knew it. This idea was so radical that
it wasn’t just a little reform, it wasn’t just a change of some
of his habits. It was a complete renewal, a
making over, a recreation, if you will, if Nicodemus was to
see the kingdom of God at all. And so Jesus does consent, mercifully
and graciously. He consents to give Nicodemus
what he desires, clarity. Nicodemus was so utterly bewildered
by this ultimate destiny, the kingdom of God, by this complete
transformation to which Christ was calling him to be born again,
to this absolute prohibition that there was no other way.
Unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God
and he needed clarity and Jesus so graciously provides it. First
of all, Jesus tells him, as he begins to clarify the details
of salvation, that first of all the second birth is a spiritual
birth. Jesus wasn’t suggesting for a
moment that somehow Nicodemus was going to have to go back
into his mom’s tummy and that’s the, the word is very general.
It isn’t as technical as our word womb. Jesus isn’t saying for a moment,
Nicodemus, you have to go back to your mom’s tummy. And he answers
him so delicately and so graciously in verse 5. Jesus answered, truly,
truly I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit,
he cannot enter the kingdom of God. You know what Jesus does here?
He basically says the same thing that he already said in verse
3. Let’s glance at verse 3. Unless one is born again, he
cannot see the kingdom of God. He says the same thing here.
But in the interest of clarity, clarifying for Nicodemus his
intent, he inserts a few new thoughts here, doesn’t he? Unless
one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter into
the kingdom of God. Jesus clarifies the nature of
this birth immediately. It’s a spiritual birth. It’s not natural or physical
at all. It’s a birth, a new birth, effected
by the Holy Spirit, and its result is spiritual. But before we even
get to that, we have to determine what Jesus is talking about here
by water. This has stumped the church,
stumped those studying this passage for centuries. I’m not going
to simplify it by suggesting that we can put away all discussion
for all time, but I have landed on a spot, and I’ll tell you
what it is in a moment. I will tell you that out of all
the many, many different views that I considered, I narrowed
it down to five. First of all, there was the suggestion
that when Jesus said, unless one is born of water and the
Spirit, that by water here, Jesus was urging upon Nicodemus, John’s
baptism. Which the Pharisees had already
spurned. Remember they even sent a delegation
to check John the Baptist out and they wondered what he was
doing and why. Here’s how one described it,
water points definitely to the right of baptism. Naturally,
to the baptism of John, which was then awakening such profound
and general interest, the symbolic purification of the Jews, the
Old Testament use of washing as the figure of purifying from
sin, Jesus’ words opened to Nicodemus a new and more spiritual significance. John’s rite of baptism had a
real and legitimate relation to the kingdom of God. I’ll tell you, those are painful
words to read. From a respected, otherwise respected
source, to think that Jesus Christ here,
with this seeking soul standing before
Him, is now going to urge upon Him as a prerequisite The baptism
of John. They had already dealt with John. Back in chapter 1 verse 26, articulated
it, I baptized in water, but among you stands one whom you
do not know. He was already pointing to Christ. That was his job as the herald. In chapter 1 verse 33, John says
again, I did not recognize him, but he who sent me to baptize
in water, said to me, upon whom you see the Holy Spirit descending
and remaining upon him, this is the one who baptizes in the
Holy Spirit. And so, in a sense, I can understand
how somebody might stumble in to that position, but I do not
understand how somebody can’t work their way out of that works
righteousness. The prerequisite for salvation
would be John’s baptism, There’s no doubt that repentance and
faith, two sides of the same coin, there’s no doubt repentance
is part of our salvation. But to say that the necessity
of John’s baptism is there before one can be saved and absolutely
there before one can enter into the kingdom of heaven, that is
very near blasphemy. Another one said it simply, we
are to understand Christ as Christ expected Nicodemus to understand
him. This is a reference to the rite
of baptism, very generally. I agree with the rule. That the
first thing that we should do as we come to this passage is
put ourselves in Nicodemus’ shoes, listen to Christ’s words and
say, what did Nicodemus understand Christ to be saying? I agree with that rule. I disagree
with the conclusion. And I think Jesus will go on
to clarify his point in verse 6, that flesh begets flesh and
spirit begets spirit. He’s not in any way pointing
Nicodemus back to John’s baptism and saying that this, this is
something you must go do. It’s frightening. It’s frightening
and the history of the church shows that this has resonated
within the church and, and I’m talking about the church of the
big C in quotes. Because I think to succumb to
this is to take yourself out of salvation by grace alone and
faith alone. Are we to understand that baptism
precedes regeneration? No, absolutely not. Some people said they cleaned
it up a little bit. They said to point people back
to John’s baptism is clearly untenable. What it’s referring
to here is the grace of Christian baptism. See, John’s baptism
is quite different than the baptism that we practice in the church. And so they say that the reference
to water here points to Christian baptism, to that rite that was
instituted after Christ came. After John’s baptism had seen
its completeness, now those are baptized as a testimony after
they have placed their faith in Christ. That makes a little
bit more sense. The only problem is, Nicodemus
wouldn’t have had any clue. He wouldn’t have had any clue
what Christ was talking about in that moment, because Christian
baptism hadn’t even been instituted yet. But as things develop, as the
gospel is preached, as Christianity is introduced and grows, as the
church begins to flourish in the world, As the New Testament
is written and disseminated, as Christian baptism is instituted,
the idea of baptism as necessary for salvation is never advanced. Never. Not only could Nicodemus
not have perceived, even if Nicodemus were standing here today and
had only the New Testament to look into, Nicodemus would not
draw the same conclusion. that some of these otherwise
careful commentators did, and the history of the church says
that the church has adopted that in many circles, here’s the problem. If water
here refers to baptism of any kind, John’s baptism, Christian
baptism, if it refers to baptism here of any kind, then we have to conclude that
baptism is necessary for salvation because Christ says it’s by water
and the Spirit. The passage itself doesn’t point
clearly and definitively to that conclusion, but if that conclusion
were true, watch how it unravels. Watch how the gospel itself unravels. If baptism is necessary for salvation,
then all who came before John the Baptist cannot possibly be
saved. Abraham, Isaac, Moses, David,
and all the rest of the saints in the Old Testament, who Hebrews
tells us were living by faith. If baptism is necessary for salvation,
then no thief on the cross, no deathbed, no foxhole conversion
would ever be adequate if that individual did not present to
the waters of baptism. If baptism is necessary for salvation,
the whole idea of baptismal regeneration becomes a possibility. that someone
is saved just by being baptized. And we hold that position to
be not only unbiblical, but heretical. If baptism is necessary for salvation,
why doesn’t the rest of Scripture mandate that practice? Why doesn’t
Jesus himself ever take it up on another occasion and say,
you must be baptized if you are going to be saved? He doesn’t
say it. In fact, we would have to disregard the mountain of
testimony to the contrary, that salvation is by grace through
faith in Christ alone. It’s not baptism. What is it? And I would present to you, and
what I’m trying to do here is start with the most absurd and
work my way up to what I think is the most plausible explanation.
Third option. then most would deem this to
be utterly bizarre. And that’s why I put it third,
because this is a more plausible explanation to me than forcing
someone to undergo baptism in order to be saved. Here’s how one said it. He referred
to the order of creation. That’s what’s being explained
here. He said it this way, to a well-instructed Christian,
I think there’s a few in this room, I would like to say that
after 25 years of walking with Christ, serving Christ in the
ministry, I’m a relatively well-instructed Christian. To a well-instructed
Christian, there was no need to explain what was meant by
being born of water in the spirit. And I should have stopped reading,
but I didn’t. The words, therefore, had a threefold
meaning, past, present, and future. Oh, here we go. In the past,
they look back to the time when the spirit moved on the water,
causing the new birth from above the order and beauty out of chaos.
He takes us back to Genesis 1. Like I said, this is almost so
utterly disturbing that you want to have a book burning at the
end of it. Here’s how another one described it. The order which
is followed by God in the new creation is the same he observed
in the restoring of the old creation. The unregenerate sinner is in
darkness, spiritual death. The Holy Spirit moves upon, broods
over the conscience and the heart. The Word of God goes forth. The
result is light. The sinner is brought out of
darkness into God’s marvelous light. That is just utterly bizarre. To take and do that to scripture? To say that’s what water meant? The fourth. We’re getting there.
We’re close. We’re so very close with this
one. And this is a good one. And if you meet me at the door
and tell me that’s your position, I’m fine. We’ll hug. This is the cleansing aspect
of water. The purifying aspect. The spiritual
renewal and cleansing as another called it. One described it in
these terms. New birth involves the cleansing
action of God’s word and shows man his sin and announces salvation
in Christ. I know, but I’m being gracious.
They cited that No doubt Nicodemus as a faithful Jew would have
known his Bible. He would have known Ezekiel 36. Then I will sprinkle clean water
on you and you will be clean. I will cleanse you from all your
filthiness, from all your idols. Moreover, I will give you a new
heart and put a new spirit within you and I will remove the heart
of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. And
so the water here is considered as that which cleanses from sin. And that’s one of the big discussions
that we have with young people. And they come to us and they
say, Pastor, I want to be baptized. I say, great, that’s great. When
we get baptized, is that going to make you more saved? No, that’s
the answer we’re looking for. When you get baptized, is that
water baptism, like some of the old hymns, going to wash away
your sin? No. Good answer. There’s no water,
no matter how pure, washes away the sin of our soul. But all
this is a mountain of conjecture and would have been far too much
to expect Nicodemus to grasp and imbibe and appropriate all
of that data. Water in the Spirit, because
Jesus touches on it, He says it, and He moves on immediately.
He’s going to illustrate what he means in a moment, but what
he’s really calling Nicodemus to is an understanding not of
this other element, water, but really of the elements of the
understanding of being born of the Spirit. And so to me, the
most natural way to understand this verse. Truly, truly, I say
to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, is to speak
of it as natural birth. This is the birth process, the
first birth. Now one pastor challenged this,
and I’m up for the challenge, because he’s not here to argue
with me. It was hardly necessary for Jesus to tell Nicodemus that
in order to be born again, he first needed to be born physically.
That’s precisely the point. Jesus is standing there with
Nicodemus. They can presume the fact that
Nicodemus was born once. What Jesus is impressing upon
him is that he must be reborn. And just as physical birth is
the first life-producing event resulting in physical life, so
the second, or spiritual birth, is the second life-producing
event resulting in spiritual life. We need both. Without the
first, without being first born of water without our first birth,
the second birth is both unnecessary and impossible. One pastor said here, it is the
perennial heresy of the natural man to think that if he can fit
himself by his own efforts for the kingdom of God, Jesus makes
it clear that no man can ever fit himself for the kingdom.
Rather, he must be completely renewed, born anew by the power
of the Spirit. These words forever exclude the
possibility of salvation by human merit. And that’s Jesus’ point.
Look, unless you’re born, not only of the water, but of the
Spirit. It’s a work of God. And Jesus drives this point home.
Look at verse 6. That which is born of flesh is
flesh. You have that birth, Nicodemus. That part of it is done. And
the one or that which is born of the spirit is spirit. It literally
says this in the Greek, the one having been born from flesh is
flesh. And the one having been born
from the spirit is spirit. And so he takes this analogy
a step further and drives the point home. that what we inherited
from our parents is this life that we’ve been given, this physical
life, the appetites, the desires, our looks, our behaviors. But what we received from God
in this spiritual rebirth is God’s righteousness being worked
in and through our being. It is an entirely different kind
of birth. It is a birth of the Holy Spirit. There are two births. There’s
the natural birth and the spiritual birth. And when he mentions flesh
here, I think it’s a fascinating thing that he does. Flesh can
be used in a number of different ways in scripture, and so can
spirit, quite frankly. I think that what it’s clear
to me that John does here in capturing Christ’s
words, that which is born of flesh is flesh, that which is
born of spirit is spirit, is he takes those words and uses
them in two different senses. In the first sense, he takes
that word flesh, those that are born of the natural world and
the natural sense, you get all that comes with it. You get the
pain, you get the weakness, you get the sinful tendencies, you
get all of it. Flesh in a general sense and
flesh in a very specific sense. But I think he does the same
thing. I think he does the same thing when he says, that which
is born of the Spirit is spirit. That which is born of the Holy
Spirit is spiritual. It is deep. It is of God. Jesus so mercifully looked at
Nicodemus. He had a degree of yearning to
know and understand. He was bewildered at what Christ
had told him about this kingdom and the means to enter it. And
he cried out for more information. Granted, it was an absurd way
to get there. But Jesus is so merciful and
he tells him, you must be born of water and the Spirit. There
must be a spiritual rebirth, Nicodemus. The second birth is
a spiritual birth. Secondly, the second birth is
by sovereign appointment. And this had to just utterly
stun Nicodemus. Because Nicodemus, like most
Jews, like certainly the Pharisees, and absolutely those of the Sanhedrin,
felt like they were God’s gift. After all, they were God’s people.
And now these are the spiritual elite, and they felt like they
could waltz into heaven at any moment, just based on their own
merits. And Jesus says, not so fast. Look at verse 7. Do not be amazed
that I said to you, you must be born again. Remember, this
is Jesus providing him, out of His abundant mercy, clarity. And Jesus hasn’t said it this
way yet. He’s expressed it in the negative
twice. Unless you are born again, you
cannot. Unless you are born of water
and the Spirit, you cannot. But now He goes straight to the
heart. with a positive statement. You
must be born again. Absolutely clear. But note this. He uses the plural. You plural. And the application of that is
universal. In other words, all have sinned
and fell short of the glory of God. And here, Jesus mercifully
reminds Nicodemus that he came as a representative of others,
the Pharisees. He reminds Nicodemus of that.
And they too need to know that they need to be born again. And
there’s an interesting twist here. Nicodemus seems to marvel
at the very inconceivable idea that he should need to be reborn. But what Jesus corrects is not
that Nicodemus alone needed to be reborn, or even that any needed to be
reborn, but that all needed to be reborn. Not only all heathens,
that would have been entirely understandable to Nicodemus and
any Jew, not only to Nicodemus and all his Pharisee friends,
not only to all Jewish people, but all mankind. Everyone, all
people, on the face of the earth. Every person ever born needs
to be reborn, spiritually speaking. And then Jesus says this enigmatic,
powerful statement. Look at verse 8. The wind blows
where it wishes, and you hear the sound of it, but do not know
where it comes from and where it is going. So is everyone born
of the Spirit. And you say, well, let’s end
10 minutes early, because that clarifies everything. Not so
fast. There’s a possibility here that
the word for spirit, and you’ll hear it, is from where we get our word
pneumatic, pneuma. And we have to note from the
very start that this word, translated by most Bible versions as wind,
I think there were two that I considered, one a Roman Catholic version
and then I think Young’s literal translation translated it as
spirit, which is a legitimate way to translate that word. Whether you use a small s or
a large s, that word pneuma, from which we get our English
word pneumatic and others, air driven, it could be either wind
or spirit, justly so. And so one translation then would
be, it would sound like this. The spirit blows where it desires. And there were a lot of people
that really liked that. After all, the word is translated
as spirit throughout the New Testament over 350 times. That’s a lot of data. I thought
about going through each one. In fact, it never stands for
wind. elsewhere in the New Testament.
No one ever translates it as wind. And others added that it really
makes more sense to the passage to say that the Spirit has a
mind that can exercise desires rather than wind having some
kind of a mind. The Spirit blows wherever it,
the Spirit, desires. And that’s good data. But there
is another possible translation, reasonably so. The other possible
translation is that the wind blows where it desires. Most
of our translations have exactly that. And this translation allows
the word blows to function more naturally because it’s equated
with, it’s more to be equated with wind than the spirit. The
verb translated here, blows, is translated the same way everywhere.
Matthew 7.25. We will look at all of these.
There’s only four. Matthew 7.25. The rain fell,
the floods came, and the winds blew. Same thing in Matthew 7.27. See, we’re halfway through it
already. Luke 12.55. When you see a south
wind blowing, John 6.18, the sea began to be stirred up because
a strong wind was blowing. That’s the nature of that word
translated here as to blow. This argument that it’s better
to think of the spirit having a will or a desire, it’s an image
that’s being projected onto the wind. The wind really doesn’t
have a mind per se. But there’s an interesting and
even a beautiful twist here that Jesus is using. He gives the wind, as it were,
a will, a desire. One commentator said here, the
sovereign character of regeneration is clarified by an illustration
taken from that active word, so. What Jesus is doing is issuing
forth a comparison, a contrast here. That just as the wind blows
according to its desire, we don’t even sense where it’s going or
how or why. It’s a comparison. He goes on
to say, it acts with complete independence. It cannot even
be seen. Its source, its ultimate goal, its destination, no one
knows. The relation of wind to your
body resembles that of the spirit to your soul. The wind does as
it pleases, so does the spirit. Its operation is sovereign, incomprehensible,
and mysterious. And to the Jewish mind, they
understood that. They understood this image. He would have understood
what Christ was appealing to here. But the wind is mysterious. The wind is beyond explaining. We can study it, but we can’t
predict it. We can’t forecast the exact direction. We don’t know when it starts
or when it actually stops. When it becomes imperceptible
and when it just begins to be that gentle breeze on our cheek.
We can’t tell. And a lot of times, all we can
see, this is why the weather people, they have to go out and
stand in the storm while they’re filming, right? So that we can
see the effects of the wind, because if they just stood in
the newsroom and said, you know, it’s really windy outside, that’s
not enough for us. We got to see, you know, the
person fighting and tipping over and the umbrella collapsing in
the wind. We know it because of its effects. And so just as in nature, we
stand back and the honest truth is Nicodemus had to stand back
just as you and I had to stand back and acknowledge the gentle breeze that was beginning
to blow. Acknowledge the wind of God’s
sovereignty blowing in his direction. Nicodemus had to acknowledge
that. And that’s what Christ was appealing to him to do. Is that Nicodemus hadn’t come
just out of curiosity. Nicodemus hadn’t come according to his own whims. Nicodemus
had come and only by the sovereign drawing of God Almighty, coming
to hear the Lord Jesus Christ. It’s the sovereignty of God.
That’s what Jesus is pointing to. One pastor said, the sovereignty
of God in scripture is absolute, irresistible, and infinite. When
we say that God is sovereign, we affirm his right to govern
the universe which he has made for his own glory. In other words,
what Jesus wanted Nicodemus to understand is how utterly in
control God was. how utterly sovereign God was. That Nicodemus and no one else
is going to march into God’s kingdom on His terms, but only
on God’s. Only by God’s sovereign invitation,
only by God’s sovereign grace. Well, we don’t know, not yet, how that
immediately hit Nicodemus. We know how it hits most people.
to think that God is in control, to think that God lays down the
rules, to think that God is this bully, this sovereign killjoy
that seems to just work us around like so many puppets. One faithful shepherd nailed
it when he said, there is no attribute more comforting to
his children than that of God’s sovereignty. Under the most adverse
circumstances and the severe trials, they believe that sovereignty
has ordered their afflictions, that sovereignty overrules them,
and that sovereignty will sanctify them all. And what a weak to
understand those words. God is sovereign. But he goes
on to say, on the other hand, there is no doctrine more hated
by worldlings, no truth of which they have made such a football
as the great, stupendous, and most certain doctrine of the
sovereignty of the infinite Jehovah. Men will allow God to be everywhere
except on his throne. They will allow Him to be in
His workshop to fashion worlds and make stars. They will allow
Him to dispense alms and bestow His bounties. They will allow
Him to sustain the earth and bear the pillars thereof, or
light the lamps of heaven, or rule the waves of the ever-moving
ocean. But when God ascends His throne,
His creatures then gnash their teeth.” What Jesus was doing out of His abundant mercy, was
calling Nicodemus to acknowledge the sovereign goodness of God,
and to humble himself in God’s presence, to cast himself at
His mercy. Let’s us do likewise. O merciful God, we know that
like many, many in this room, had a moment like Nicodemus. We had no interest in Christ
or Christianity or the Bible, and yet one day we found ourselves
caught up in these things and pondering them. Your sovereign
wind was blowing in our direction. Oh Lord God, We pondered and
we questioned and we wrestled with these things until we realized
that this birth to which you call us is a spiritual birth.
And the work of your Spirit was active within us, a sovereign
wind was blowing. O merciful God, if there are
any in this room who walked in here casually today, thinking
that they were just fulfilling their duty and coming to church. A sovereign wind is blowing. The Lord Jesus Christ has paid
the penalty for sinners. That truth stands before you.
And the only way of salvation is through repentance and faith,
faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and in Him alone. We thank you and we praise you
in Jesus’ name. Amen. You take your, excuse me,
hymnals as we close. Turn to 75, O Father, you are
sovereign. We’ll stand together and sing
verses 1, 3, and 4.