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| Nicodemus came to Jesus by night, but when did he leave? |
© Seth Olson 2014, 2020
March 8, 2020—The Second Sunday of Lent
Nicodemus couldn’t sleep again. The all too familiar feeling of anxiety ravaged through his stomach, like monstrous, marauding butterflies. His wife, Rachel, lay beside him in their king-size bed. She could sense his worry; it made her uneasy too. As she drifted off into a troubled sleep, Nicodemus simply starred at the ceiling. The mortgage, the bills, the children’s education, it all added up. These problems alone though did not keep this religious leader from resting peacefully. No, something else was the matter. By morning he would have all the covers wrapped around himself, like some sort of cocoon of fear, yet for Nicodemus that night there was no metamorphosis, no change, no growth. The only butterflies were in his gut.
He left the covers behind before the sun left the cover of the night. Standing in the pre-dawn half-light, he could see the dark circles around his eyes. They grew ever more visible each day in the mirror. Seeing Rachel resting peacefully in the reflection, Nicodemus remembered the pledges he made to her on their wedding night. Promises of trips to the Mediterranean, family vacations, and putting his time in early, so that he could retire at reasonable age, and they could enjoy their golden years together. These hopes vanished, as his focus returned to his rapidly aging face. Looking into his own eyes, he recognized an emptiness.
Following every word of the Law, working harder than every other Pharisee, arriving earlier and leaving later, these were the rules Nicodemus lived by, but still he felt hollow. Like a wineskin with no wine or an inn with no visitors, Nicodemus’ soul felt empty and vacant. Kissing Rachel and his children goodbye, Nicodemus started hurriedly to the Temple to lead morning prayers, as the sun hurried to the horizon. If he felt any peace embracing his family, it vanished, as he stepped out into the street. His thoughts turned to the upcoming Passover festivities, and that morning’s meeting of the Sanhedrin, the religious council.
In a stuffy room with many leather-bound books of the Law and the Prophets, the Sanhedrin members gathered. This council dispatched with old business quickly, then an elder member brought up a touchy, new subject. His calculating words cut through the stale air of conference room B, like a snake darting through withered grass. “What are we to do about this upstart teacher from Galilee?” the man asked. Then continuing without pause enough for a reply, he hissed, “He is gaining followers, you know, disciples even! My sources tell me that he has performed some mighty signs, even turning water into wine at a wedding.”
Another voice emerged, “Where is he now?” The elder Pharisee replied, “Capernaum with his family.” Nicodemus, intrigued by the miraculous deeds and exhausted from his insomnia, forgot himself and excitedly piped up, “Do you think he’ll come to Passover?” Before he could even finish his sentence, Nicodemus knew that the emotions worn on his decorated sleeve had given away his giddiness. In his desperation, Nicodemus secretly hoped he’d meet this itinerant miracle worker.
The elder Pharisee looked down at Nicodemus and snarled. Another leader with long fringes and broad phylacteries questioned, “Why does it matter if this man shows up?” he interrogated, “Nicodemus, why do you care?” A pragmatic voice cut off the questioning to get back to business, “This week, we need extra security at the Temple to prepare for this man… What is his name again?” The elder Pharisee replied disgustedly, “Jesus.”
Although Passover begins at sundown, Nicodemus left long before sunrise on the first day of the festivity. As he made his way to the Temple, he thought, “Maybe, just maybe, God will show me a sign today,” and in this moment of hope, the tension within him released.
Suddenly, right as he entered the Temple gates he heard shouting, then the crack of a whip, sprinting to see what was happening Nicodemus saw a rough looking man. He was driving out the merchants who were selling cattle, sheep, and doves, and the money changers seated at their tables. As the vendors scattered in all directions, the unkempt man flipped over their tables and proclaimed, “Take these things out of here! Stop making my Father’s house a marketplace!” Nicodemus wondered who this man was, was this Jesus, and a verse from Scripture arose, “Zeal for your house will consume me.” Other Pharisees just arriving began to question this man’s motives, but Nicodemus just wanted to know, “When can I meet him?”
Several Pharisees, seething at Jesus’ irreligious behavior and his disrespect for their Tradition, watched him carefully for a mistake. Nicodemus, on the other hand, looked on with eager anticipation, hoping for another sign. Secretly following Jesus around, he watched from a distance as Jesus healed a man blind since birth. It was then, that Nicodemus made up his mind, he would risk his status within the Sanhedrin, so that he could meet with Jesus.
The night Passover was finishing, Nicodemus told his wife he was going to seek out a mighty healer, in hopes of a sign that might fill the emptiness within him. Rachel urged her husband to find healing. Then, Nicodemus pulled his cloak over his head and hurried through the streets to the outskirts of Jerusalem.
He had used the Sanhedrin’s intelligence network to discover where Jesus was staying. After mistakenly waking a few neighbors in search of Jesus’ exact location, Nicodemus eventually found the right house. When he knocked on the door quietly, two of Jesus’ disciples, Simon-Peter and Andrew, came to the door. Nicodemus asked if he could speak to their teacher. Welcoming the guest inside, Simon-Peter went back to sleep. Andrew went to wake their teacher. Soon, Jesus emerged silently from his sleeping quarters, lit a candle, poured some wine for his guest, and offered Nicodemus some of the remaining Passover feast.
Speechless, Nicodemus could not initially reply to the hospitality. Only long ago when, as a child he had traveled to Temple for high holy days with his family had Nicodemus felt such a rush of spiritual energy. Jesus’ eyes beamed in the candlelight and Nicodemus could tell that when Jesus looked at him he was looking deep within his soul.
Anxiously, Nicodemus tried to cue up the questions that he had prepared, but he blabbered out instead, “Teacher, uh… we know that you are a… uh teacher who has come from God; for no one can do these… eh, signs that you do apart from the presence of… um God.” Before he could continue, Jesus swiftly replied, “Very truly, I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God without being born from above.”
Confused and wearied by his many sleepless nights, Nicodemus’ legal and literal mind churned out a logical question, “How can anyone be born after having grown old? Can one enter a second time into the mother’s womb and be born?”
Wiping some sleep from his eyes, Jesus attempted to broaden Nicodemus’ horizons, “Very truly, I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God without being born of water and Spirit. What is born of the flesh is flesh, and what is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not be astonished that I said to you, ‘You must be born from above.’ The wind blows where it chooses, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.”
Perplexed even more now, Nicodemus’ head was swimming in a vast ocean of questions, helplessly grasping for something to keep him afloat, he wondered, “How can these things be?”
With a smirk, Jesus replied, “Are you a teacher of Israel, and yet you do not understand these things? Very truly, I tell you, we speak of what we know, we testify to what we’ve seen; yet you Pharisees do not receive our testimony. If I have told you about earthly things and you do not believe, how can you believe if I tell you about heavenly things? No one has ascended into heaven except the one who descended from heaven, the Son of Man. And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.”
Nicodemus still reeling from how one can be born of the Spirit, could barely keep up with Jesus now. His mind was sprinting just to keep up with Jesus’ strolling pace. Nicodemus thought, “I am just here to understand the signs.” But amid this swirling sea of wonder, confusion, and mystery, Nicodemus realized that his heart felt alive and his spirit felt awake for the first time in years. Cutting through the questions, the literalism, and the legalism, Jesus spoke words that would be forever ringing in Nicodemus’ soul:
“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.”
Jesus continued talking shifting his focus now more pointedly toward those whose hearts and minds and souls remained closed—closed to this radical truth that God’s Son had indeed come into the world. “This is the judgment, that the light has come into the world, and people loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil. For all who do evil hate the light and do not come to the light, so that their deeds may not be exposed.” Nicodemus wondered if Jesus was talking about his sneaking around to find Jesus that night. As Jesus caught his attention, starring Nicodemus right in the eye, the upstart teacher said, “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.”
Upon hearing this challenge, Nicodemus finished the cup before him, his soul felt full for the first time in years. Thanking his hosts, he silently departed. As he left Jesus, the sun was rising.
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