02 June 2012

To the Extent of Love


Ah, John 3:16.  Most Christians know this Bible verse from a very young age.  Usually, we say it - adults and children alike - in a sort of singsong tone that suggests we quit listening a long time ago.  I’m going to read it again.  Don’t read along this time.

Were there parts of the text for today that grabbed your attention or that made you curious? 

Part of the struggle with the church is that - for a lot of us - we have heard these stories so many times we have quit listening.  We skim the parts of the Bible we don’t like so we can get to the ones we do like.  The problem with slowing down, though, is that we can’t assume we know what the Bible has to say to us.  We actually have to listen and to pay attention, and I’m pretty sure all of us know this is recipe for disaster: when we actually bother to listen, we find that the Bible often makes our lives a bit more complicated than what we would like them to be. 

The text was so nice, so billboard-ready, before Nicodemus showed up and messed it up.  He complicates the text in a way I don’t want it to be complicated.  It bothers me that asks some really good questions, and instead of saying, “So there!” and cheering Jesus on as he bests Nicodemus in the debate, I find myself saying, “But what about…?” with Nicodemus, discovering that Nicodemus actually gets a lot of things right.  Nicodemus confesses: “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God; for no one is able to do these signs apart from God.”[1]  This is a lot for Nicodemus to put together.  At this point, nobody has any idea of all the miracles to come or Jesus’ death and resurrection.  Knowing the rest of the story about Jesus, it seems we assume we know the rest of the story about Nicodemus. 

            We often gloss over Jesus’ response to Nicodemus.  Nevermind that it doesn’t really seem to follow Nicodemus’ quoestion: ‘How can anyone be born after having grown old? Can one enter a second time into the mother’s womb and be born?’ Reading so fast, we automatically assume that Jesus’ words are supposed to make sense.  In many ways, Nicodemus is braver than we are.  Our fears of asking the question or our assumption that we already know all the answers often prevent us from asking.  We do not ask the question because we are afraid we will be judged for not knowing the answer.  We distance ourselves from the text, reading faster and faster and faster so that it doesn’t have a chance to seep into our lives and start messing with how things already are.

So we put up no protest when we hear Jesus say “Very truly, I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God without being born from above.”[2]  We write Nicodemus off because he can’t seem to wrap his mind around rebirth: “How can anyone be born after having grown old?  Can one enter a second time into the mother’s womb and be born?”[3]  Nicodemus’ question seems like a real question.  How are we really reborn?  Does anybody know what actually happens to us in our baptisms?  Sure, we could talk all day about some sort of ontological change or put a bunch of big words in front of it, but I think St. Paul describes the sacraments best when he refers to them as a mysterion.  The truth of the matter is, we have no idea what happens.  We have no idea how the Spirit works.
“The Spirit blows wherever it chooses, and you hear the sound of it, but you have no idea where it comes from or where it’s going.”  We try to pin down the Spirit and these texts, forcing them to fit into our billboard-sized imaginations for how the world ought to work.  We become so focused on the things of this world.  We are obsessed with time; having been given the gift of eternal life, there never seems to be enough time.  We are obsessed with ourselves; having been given the gift of relationship and each other, we hold on to grudges, refusing to forgive others and refusing to forgive ourselves.  We are obsessed with our flesh; having been given the gift of bodies, we neglect to take care of them and then obsess about how we are going to start taking care of them.  The truth is that I don’t understand how to be a person of Spirit when everything around me is flesh.  And, having slowed down just enough for things to get messy, we realize we have a lot in common with Nicodemus.  We understand no better than he how to be born from above, of Spirit and water.  I think this is exactly where God wants us, now that we have slowed down long enough to listen.

It isn’t until we get through reading about Nicodemus and realizing we have no idea how this God works (and that God certainly works differently from how we work!), that we read John 3:16 and 17: “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.”  The extent to which God loved the world is God wanted so desperately for us to understand his love for us that he sent Christ.

So if we slow down and read John 3:16 and 17, what sticks out? 

              If God slowed down long enough to speak to us, it’s probably best that we slow down long enough to listen. 

It’s this overflowing love, God loved the world to the extent that… God would pour Godself out on the cross, taking all of who we are unto himself and giving all of who he is to us.  Christ took the form of a slave so that you might be free.  What is more, you have been given a spirit of adoption that cries, “Abba, Father!” making you co-heirs with Christ.  God loved the world to the extent that Christ would bind himself to you.  Despite all your questions, despite all your protests, despite all your excuses, you are loved with a love that refuses to let you go.  This extravagant overflowing love bursts forth.  The only answers to “How?” or “Why?” my beloved Nicodemuses, is: “It’s a mystery.”      


[1] John 3:2.
[2] John 3:3.
[3] John 3:4.

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