SERMON PREACHED BY THE REVEREND DR. HAROLD T. LEWIS, RECTOR

CALVARY EPISCOPAL CHURCH, PITTSBURGH, PENNSYLVANIA

ON TRINITY SUNDAY

7 JUNE 2009

“Jesus answered [Nicodemus]: ‘Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born anew, he cannot see the kingdom of God.’” (John 3:3)

       Many a Trinity Sunday sermon has failed miserably because the preacher insists on attempting to do in twenty minutes what theologians haven’t managed to do in two thousand years --- unravel the mystery of the Holy Trinity.  Now this sermon may or may not fail, but it won’t because I get bogged down in Trinitarian doctrines and theories.  This morning, I’d like to zero in on our friend Nicodemus.

       Nicodemus is a fascinating figure. First of all, he is a Pharisee.  The Pharisees were self-appointed canon lawyers, who were principally concerned with keeping the laws and traditions of the Jewish religion intact.  Nicodemus would have been comfortable with what I have called the “seven deadly words of the church”  “We have always done it that way” and the idea that anything that happens three years in a row is an ancient and venerable tradition.  I owe my understanding of Pharisees to a visual image from a musical --- it was either “Godspell” or “Jesus Christ Superstar” --- somehow they both get blurred in the haze of the Sixties.  In the play, the Pharisees are standing on a scaffolding over the stage, kind of like a Greek chorus.  They have five-foot long quills, with which they jot down everything that Jesus does which they deem to have broken the law!

       What is more, Nicodemus is “a ruler of the Jews.”  In fact, he was a member of the Sanhedrin, the Jewish court of appeals --- a group of 70 men who made up the highest tribunal of the Jewish nation.  It is clear, too, that Nicodemus was well educated and had a few shekels in the bank.  Indeed, St John goes to great pains to make it appear that Nicodemus is an elitist. --- a label not unknown to Episcopalians.  I think the old jokes that describe Episcopalians in this way are out-of-date in a church that has become increasingly diverse, but they are still part of our folklore --- like the riddle of why it is that the Episcopal Church never really flourished west of the Mississippi.  The answer is that the Baptists, Methodists and even Roman Catholics jumped into the first covered wagons at the first signs of the Westward Expansion, but that the Episcopalians waited for the tracks to be laid!

       With this knowledge base about Nicodemus, it is understandable that he comes to Jesus by night. He has to exercise extreme caution.  His position as a leader in the community would be threatened if he were seen openly conversing with Jesus, who at this stage in his ministry was seen as an itinerant interloper, fond of espousing rather strange teachings, and known for his flagrant disregard for authority.  Nicodemus has to be careful about whom he is seen with.

       So, this snobbish, wealthy, intellectual and influential man finds his way into Jesus’ presence.  He is intrigued, perhaps, by Jesus’ appeal to the masses.  He wants to find out what makes Jesus tick. His approach is academic, but not without a little flattery.“Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God; for no one can do these signs that you do, unless God is with him.” 

       Now notice the very next line in the Gospel --- Jesus’ “answer,” and then ask, “What is wrong with this picture?”  The problem is that there is no question on the part of Nicodemus.  Jesus reads his mind, cuts to the chase, and addresses the very question that had been troubling his visitor. “No one can see the Kingdom of God unless he is born again (from above)." Of course Nicodemus proves to be obtuse.  He takes Jesus’ words literally and asks if it is possible to enter the womb again.

       What does it mean to be a born-again Christian?  I found this definition on the Internet: “The phrase ‘born again’ is used by people of all religious denominations and all religions, as well as by people who profess no organized religious faith. In general terms, its most frequent meanings are to ‘begin a new life’ and to ‘renew one's commitment to one's previously held values and beliefs.’”  The list of well-known people claiming to have been born-again includes such disparate personages as Jane Fonda the actress and David Berkowitz the serial killer.  We could add to this definition.  Our experience tells us that often, born-again Christians believe that the state of being born again is essential to being a bona fide Christian.  Unless an individual can point to a particular event or moment in time when he or she was born again by making a conscious choice, somehow that person’s faith is suspect.

       But I think this definition gets it all wrong, at least from the point of view of what Jesus is telling us in St John’s Gospel.  Most people claim that being born again is a personal decision, an intentional act on one’s part to change one’s ways.  The imagery that Jesus uses, however, suggests that just as we did not decide to be born in the first place, so in being born again, it is something outside of our control.  It is God who is the primary actor.

       How do we know if we are born from above, born again?  And does it matter?  How do we detect the presence of the Holy Spirit in our own life or in the life of someone else?  It is elusive, Jesus tries to tell Nicodemus.  You can’t see it, but we sense its presence.  The Greek word for spirit --- and breath --- and wind is pneuma from which we get such words as pneumatic tires.  Jesus tells Nicodemus that when you see the trees swaying in the wind, we know that the pneuma is present, but we cannot see it.  And, if I may use the King James Version translation, “The wind bloweth where it listeth.”

       Interestingly enough, we see in Nicodemus’ life some evidence of the spirit moving him.  The next time we see him, in chapter 7, the Temple authorities are trying to arrest Jesus.  But Nicodemus the lawyer speaks up to defend Jesus.   The last time we see Nicodemus we watch as this Pharisee assists Joseph of Arimathea in embalming the body of Jesus to prepare him for burial, for which Nicodemus has lavishly supplied spices. Clearly, something has come over Nicodemus.  He probably left Jesus, after that initial nocturnal visit, dismissing what he said as such much theological gibberish.  But over time as Jesus became a force in his life, he sensed a transformation.

       The key phrase here is “over time.” Beware of the instant fix --- which tries to make you believe that you have to be able to pinpoint your moment of salvation to a particular time of day, in a given month or year.  The salvation process is a gradual one.  The correct answer to “Have you been saved?” is: “I hope I’m being saved; God isn’t finished with me yet.”  The Christian religion is not a sauce that you can smear on your steak; it is a marinade, in which the meat is soaked and can therefore permeate every pore and every sinew. 

       I remember an apt description of the Christian faith that emerged at a Bible study at a parishioner’s home when I was at St. Monica’s, Washington.  Someone raised the question of fairness:  Is it fair that a death-bed penitent, who has been a happy heathen all is life, can be absolved and get all the benefits of heaven, while the faithful Christian, who has read the Bible, attended church and paid his pledge all his life gets no more? Our host, Mrs. Willis, then a spry octogenarian, who died recently at the age of 103, said, “The difference is that the deathbed penitent never knew the joy of being a Christian.”

       Christianity is not some celestial insurance policy, whose reward is everlasting life.  It is a way of living, day by day, a life that Jesus promised we would have, and have in abundance.  We have to decide if we are going to be like the old Nicodemus, Pharisaical, rigid and legalistic, or the new Nicodemus, open to the “sweet, sweet Spirit of the Lord.”

       AMEN.