The New Birth
John 3:3

The story begins with a man named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews, that is to say, a member of the Sanhedrin. The Sanhedrin was a court of seventy members and was the supreme court of the Jews. It had religious jurisdiction over every Jew in the world. One of its duties was to examine and deal with anyone suspected of being a false prophet. It is amazing that Nicodemus should come to see Jesus at all.
Moreover, he is described as a Pharisee. In many ways the Pharisees were the best people in the whole country. There were never more than 6000 of them; they were a brotherhood. One entered the brotherhood by taking a pledge in front of three witnesses that they would spend all their lives observering every detail of the scribal law.

What does this mean? To the Jew the Old Testament Law was the most sacred thing in all the world. The law was the first five books of the OT. They believed it to be the perfect word of God. To add one word or take one word away from it would be a deadly sin. Now if the Law is the perfect and complete word of God, that would mean it contained everything a person need know for the living of a good and godly life, if not explicitly then implicitly. If it were not there in so many words, it must be possible to deduce it. The law as it stood consisted of great, wide, noble principles which a person had to work out for oneself.

But for the later Jews that was not enough. They said: “The law is complete; it contains a everything necessary for the living of a good life; therefore in the Law there must be a regulation to govern every possible incident in every possible moment for every possible man.” So they set out to extract from the great principles an infinite number of rules and regulations to govern every conceivable situation in life. In other words they changed trhe law of the great principles into the legalism of by-laws and regulations.

As an example, the Commandment about the Sabbath, one should not work on the Sabbath. The Talmud summaries these applications in 156 double folio pages. An example concerns knots–rope tying. Camel drivers and sailors could not tie knots on the Sabbath. A one handed knot was ok, but not two hands. However, a woman could tie a knot in her girdle.
Now suppose a man wished to let down a bucket into a well to draw water on the Sabbath. He could not tie a rope to it for a knot in a rope was illegal on the Sabbath. But he could tie it to a woman’s girdle and let it down.. These kind of things were life and death to the scribes and Pharisees. One other example, you could not take a laxative on the Sabbath as a medicine, but you could take it for pleasure.

There are people who think that keeping rules and rituals make one a Christian. Attending church is often confused with being a Christian. People sometimes say to themselves, I don’t drank, I don’t commit adultery, I don’t curse, I don’t do this, or that, and they want you to conclude they are Christians. Comments like this would be greeted by Jesus with the words, you must be born anew to see the Kingdom of Heaven.

There was at least one Pharisee who searched for something better and he came to Jesus by night for a conversation.

I. The Need for Rebirth

.When Nicodemus came to Jesus he admitted that no one could do what Jesus had been doing unless God was involved in it. Jesus by passed his comment with the words, “Unless one is born anew he cannot see the Kingdom of God.” The real issue concerns something that takes place in our lives, being born anew.

When gave Nicodemus this answer, Nicodemus did not understand. The reason Nicodemus did not understand relates to how the word can be translated. The word translated “anew” has three different meanings. (1) it can mean from the beginning, completely radically, (2) it can mean again, in the sense of the second time, and (3) it can mean from above, and therefore from God. It is not possible to get all these meanings into any English word; and yet all three of them are in the phrase born anew. To be born anew is to undergo such a radical change that it is like a new birth; it is to have something heppen to the soul which can only be described as being born all over again; and the whole process is not a human achievement, because it comes from the grace and power of God.

When we read the story, it looks at sight as if Nicodemus took the word anew in the second sense only, and with a crude literalism. How can anyone, he asked, enter again into his mother’s womb and be born a second time when he is already an old man? But there is more to Nicodemus’s answer that that. In his heart there was a great unsatisfied longing. It is as if he had said with infinite, wistful yearning: you talk about being born anew, you talk about this radical, fundamental change which is to necessary. I know that it is necessary, but in my experience it is impossible... It is not the desirability of this change that Nicodemnus questioned;, that he knew only too well, it is the impossibility. Nicodemus confronted the great problem–the problem of the person who wants to be changed and who cannot change himself.

The need expressed by Nicodemus is something that we can all sympathize with. As I reflect on life there are things I have done that I regret very much. I have made mistakes as a parent, as a husband, as a teacher, as a pastor, as a person, and I look back in regard to all of these and wish that I could start over, which is another way of saying what Nicodemus did, be born again, to avoid the mistakes. But that is not possible, but what is possible is this: that in experiencing God’s forgiveness, and the forgiveness of those around me, I can start anew now. I can seek to live that new life ahead of me. That is the greatness of God’s forgiveness. That is what the Spirit of God can do in our lives. The past is forgiven and forgotten.

II. The New Birth is not baptism v.3:5

This verse is one of the frequently misused verses in the NT. There are those who point to this passage and regard the mention of water as being baptism. So,. one must be baptized to enter the Kingdom of God. This is why some Christian groups stress the need of infant baptism.

As we look at the passage we need ask the question: could Nicodemus have known that this was Christian baptism? It does not appear that he understood this to be baptism. There is the use of the word baptism in the Gospel, and John the Baptist did baptize, but Jesus does not pick up on this and refer to baptism, for which there is a Greek word. If John’s baptism were meant here, then it could mean only that John baptized for repentance and it was an outward declaration of repentance, and Jesus is indicating that something beyond that is important. The extra ingredient had no relation to John’s baptism, and it was an inner rebirth that was needed, not baptism.

There are groups that have made baptism a magical rite This has a long history attached to it. Augustine, who had some profound thoughts in many ways, declared that unbaptized children were excluded from Heaven. Clement of Alexandria, a second/ third century Christian assumed that Old Testament saints were baptized in a state of death–this is how necessary baptism was regarded. There have been many parents who have been terror stricken over the death of their unbaptized children. I talked with a woman who was a Jehovah Witness. She left the Lutheran church because they said her unbaptized baby who died would not be in heaven. What cruel theology.

If this passage requires baptism as necessary for the kingdom of God, then the thief on the cross–was assured by Jesus that he would be with him in paradise–cannot be there because he was not baptized. If this be baptism, then all Quakers or Society of Friends, will not be in heaven because they do not practice baptism of any kind.

Baptism does not do for the heart what Jesus talks about. We could do away with baptism, but we cannot do away with conversion, a new birth. The New birth is lacking in the hearts of so many people. The churches of Europe are virtually dead churches because they have adopted infant baptism where everyone is baptized as a citizen of the state. They have presumed some magic rite transforms people. It is not so. One may have a parish of 25,000 people but only have 15-20 people show up on Sunday. We have a situation where everyone is supposedly a Christian, and no one is a Christian.

III. The need for a night conference.

The fact that Nicodemus came to Jesus by night raises questions. It may have been a sign of caution. He may not have wanted people to see him being friendly with Jesus. He may not have wanted his status as a Pharisee to be jeopardized. He may have wanted a more private meeting without a lot of people around to interrupt them. Whatever may have been the reason for coming at night, we must applaud him for coming.

There may be another reason. The rabbis declared that the best time to study the law was at night when a man was undisturbed. Throughout the day Jesus was surrounded by crowds of people all the time. Whatever, Nicodemus was a puzzled man, a man with honors and yet was looking for something better in his life. He came to Jesus for a talk so that somehow in the darkness of the night he might find light.

There is something about the night for opening up and being frank. I have had some great conversations at night traveling through the countryside, or a home. A few years ago we went to a family reunion in Tennessee. We picked up our son in Ft. Worth and left about 1 p.m. Much of the driving in the afternoon was interesting, we talked at times, we looked at the country side, and our son read some along the way. But the evening came, and it was not possible to read, and it was too early to be sleepy. Hence, we talked. We talked about the things he wanted to talk about. We talked about friendship, about his work, his ambitions, what he wanted to do in life, about theology, about problems we all encounter, and these topics were discussed openly and candidly. We finally stopped about 11 p./m. in Mississippi, and slept for the night, but we didn’t want that conversation to stop.
Long before this experience, we found that conversations with children, while they are in bed are great times for talking about things that are on their minds, and great times for parents to deal with questions and problem of the day.

.There is something to be said for being alone before one’s Master, Maker, at night. Nicodemus was there and it was transforming. For us, there are times when I am in bed reflecting on the day, on relationships, on life, and on mistakes, errors, and sins. It is during this time that we can often bring ourselves to honesty and confession. It is during this time that we can admit to God and ourselves that we have sinned and need the forgiveness and restoration of God.

Conclusion
The new birth means a new beginning. It means a new relationship with God which we have not had. It means a new hope for life in the presence of God forever.