This Sunday is the 2nd Sunday in Lent, and the Gospel leads us to question what it means to follow Jesus. I will be preaching at Culm Davy Chapel at 9am and St Mary’s Church, Hemyock at 11am. You will be very welcome to join me.

As I was driving back from Andover this weekend (I am currently splitting my week between the parishes I serve and my family who have remained behind for schooling purposes), the radio played a tune from back in the day: Nicodemus and Pliers, or at least that’s who I thought I was listening to. All these years I had misunderstood, it isn’t Nicodemus, but Chaka Demus!

Nicodemus of the Bible, was a Pharisee, one of the good ones. He was faithful, prayerful, and observant, and when he saw what Jesus was doing and glimpsed something in him holier than anything he had ever seen before, he didn’t feel threatened. Most of the Pharisees we come across are antagonistic towards Jesus, or worse; it is as if their belief system is being challenged and their authority rocked. Not for Nicodemus. Nicodemus is inquisitive.

So here he is in the middle of the night, seeking out a private conversation with Jesus. Nicodemus begins by acknowledging that Jesus is a ‘teacher who has come from God’ and by honouring him as a ‘Rabbi’. Nicodemus has recognised Jesus’ miracles for what they are, he has hit the nail on the head. We might think that Jesus would praise him, instead, he starts talking in riddles about being ‘born of the Spirit.’

This is often interpreted as being ‘born again’. It is a phrase that my mother (and I am sure many other Anglicans of her generation) hate. It has been banded around as a status symbol, a ‘Born Again Christian being superior to a ‘Cradle Christian’. We might put Nicodemus in the second category (except of course that he is Jewish). My mother as you would expect is also of the second category. She was Christened at an age before memory can recall, taken to Sunday School and prepared for Confirmation. She joined the Young Wives when she married (in church of course) and Mothers’ Union when I was born, and naturally I was Christened at an age I can’t remember. My mother led Sunday School, baked apple pies for the Harvest Supper, served on the PCC, and managed the Church Hall. When she was 50 she started asking questions: did she really believe, or did she just belong because that’s where all her friendships were based?

I had my turning point when I was a bit younger: as I prepared to leave primary school (a Church School, of course) I began to ask questions. I saw the suffering in the world and didn’t really know if I could believe in a God that enabled suffering to happen. So I prayed to God to reveal himself to me.

Nicodemus comes to Jesus in the middle of the night. He is asking if Jesus is the one, and is told that he needs to be born again. It doesn’t make sense. How is it possible?

Jesus is in effect saying, that Nicodemus has to be awakened, birthed in, the Holy Spirit. We might say ‘baptised in the Holy Spirit’. What Jesus doesn’t do his lay hands upon Nicodemus right there and then and command the Holy Spirit to fill his heart. There is no praying the Jesus prayer, no confession, no act of repentence. There is teaching. And space.

The reading ends with nothing having happened. We can assume that Nicodemus and Jesus parted ways, that Nicodemus is a lost cause. If we read on, we can see Jesus challenge Nicodemus before he leaves,

For all who do evil hate the light and do not come to the light, so that their deeds may not be exposed. But those who do what is true come to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that their deeds have been done in God.

John 3: 20, 21

Nicodemus is so close to ‘getting it’ to being born again in the Spirit, but he has only dared to approach Jesus under the shadow of night. He has carefully chosen a time when he will not be discovered by his fellow Pharisees. Jesus is questioning Nicodemus truly believes that he is from God.

Nicodemus walks away, it is the end of the story. Or is it.

Fast forward a few chapters and Nicodemus is with his fellow Pharisees when reports come in that Jesus has not only been declaring that he is the Messiah, but that people are believing him. This cannot be allowed, so the Temple Police are sent to arrest him, but come back empty handed. The Chief Priests and Pharisees are unimpressed, but the police, their own officers reply

Never has anyone spoken like this.

John 7:46

When the Pharisees accuse the Temple Police of being deceived, pointing out that none of them, the educated officials and religious leaders, believed him, Nicodemus begins to speak up. He doesn’t yet have the courage to say ‘Well actually I believe’, but he does question their motices and actions

Our law does not judge people without first giving them a hearing to find out what they are doing, does it?

John 7:51

Nicodemus, is getting braver, he is beginning to step out in faith.

The final time we see Nicodemus is at Jesus’ death. He along with Joseph of Arimathea, a member of the Council and a secret disciple, approach Pilate requesting Jesus’ body be released. It is in Joseph’s tomb that he is buried, but it is with valuable spices brought by Nicodemus that he is anointed.

Nicodemus may not have had a dramatic conversion moment with Jesus. He might not have experienced the Holy Spirit coming upon him with the force and power that the disciples did, but he grows in his faith, in a confidence that can only come from God.

If these three moments with Nicodemus are symbolic of our own faith journeys, I wonder where you are?

Are you tentatively approaching Jesus in the dark? Knowing but not wanting to commit? Or are you just finding your feet and beginning to question the things which you have simply accepted as right? Perhaps you are ready to fully embody your faith, to be prepared to stand up for what is right, to follow Jesus without holding back?

Read Nicodemus’ encounter with Jesus here.