In The Eyes of a Child

 

In the Eyes of a Child.

“Unless a person is born from above, it’s not possible to see what I’m pointing to – to God’s Kingdom.”

(Photo by bady abbas on Unsplash)

-            “So, when did you get saved?” the woman with earnest eyes and a mouth-bound smile asked me.

-            “That depends on what you mean!” I responded. “The question of time is not very helpful, is it?”

-            “No, but you must know when you got saved,” the lady insisted, slightly frustratedly.

-            “OK, then for the purposes of your question, maybe 2,000 years ago!” said I. “Or, maybe 13.5 billion years ago,” I suggested, enthusiastically.

-            “No, no! When did you repent of your sins and ask Jesus into your life to become your Saviour?” she insisted, indignation distorting her voice.

-            “Well, to the best of my recollection, I was about 11 years old when I had my first real encounter with Jesus and sensed it as a re-birth! …”

The woman looked even less convinced but more irritated and hurried on to her subsequential non-sequiturs!

(I don’t know what level of theological education the woman had had, though I guessed it to be in the Reformist/ Evangelical Fundamentalist/Charismatic mould – with their tendency to be big on assumptions and certainties and rather small in sound, spiritual sense).

Today, we are looking at the next recorded event in Jesus’ early ministry, his encounter with Nicodemus, of the Pharisee sect. In John 3, we read,

 There was a man of the Pharisee sect, Nicodemus, a prominent leader among the Jews. Late one night he visited Jesus and said, "Rabbi, we all know you're a teacher straight from God. No one could do all the God-pointing, God-revealing acts you do if God weren't in on it."

Jesus said, "You're absolutely right. Take it from me: Unless a person is born from above, it's not possible to see what I'm pointing to - to God's kingdom."

While Nicodemus proceeds to debate the gynaecological impossibilities of what Jesus is proposing, he reveals precisely why so many of us – sincere believers, or sympathisers like Nicodemus  though we might be – fail to grasp so much of what Jesus said and did, as well as so many other words and actions we read in our Bibles from the Torah, the Prophets, the Poets, to the Gospels and the pastoral Epistles. Worse, many reject what the Holy Spirit is still saying prophetically today, as She brings to us renewed understanding of the true Gospel of Jesus Christ, along with the interpretations of John, James, Paul and Peter. We are even seeing better, with childlike eyes, the mystery of the metaphors in John’s Revelations!

(Eric Avari as Nicodemus in The Chosen.)

So, to Nicodemus!

Nicodemus was a Pharisee. Who were the Pharisees? Known as the Hasidim - ‘The Separated Ones’ they were a minority group dedicated to the rigorous interpretation of the Law (The Torah). This led to them being hugely unpopular with the Israelites generally, and especially unpopular with King Herod.

In Jesus’ day, their main opposition in the Sanhedrin – the Ecclesiastical Court - came from the Sadducees, a peculiar and highly prejudiced priestly group of mainly well-to do and aristocratic Jews, with an even more severe adherence to the Law – the Torah – than the Pharisees. (We remember them mostly as not believing in the Resurrection and thus being outsmarted by Jesus!) They were also very unpopular, precisely for being highly regarded by the Roman occupiers. They died out after the destruction of the Temple in AD 70, mainly because they were so strict about Temple worship as the central and main purpose of the Law (Churchgoing as more important than Church-being!) whereas the Pharisees stressed individual fulfilment of all sides of the law. We see the same dualism of doctrine to this day where Church is taught and lived as Institution (a human construct) rather than Church as Inspiration (organically God/Spirit-breathed).

No wonder Nicodemus came to see Jesus at night-time (so, “seeing in the dark”, as it were!).

Let’s zero in on some of the main takeaways of this encounter.

3:3a Born from above… Not ‘again’ as mistranslated. So, as Paul tells us later, only from the Spirit can we understand spiritual things and spiritual language. In 1 Corinthians 2:10-16 (MSG) we read:

That's why we have this Scripture text: No one's ever seen or heard anything like this, never so much as imagined anything quite like it - What God has arranged for those who love him. But you've seen and heard it because God by his Spirit has brought it all out into the open before you. Whoever knows what you're thinking and planning except you yourself? The same with God - except that he not only knows what he's thinking, but he lets us in on it. God offers a full report on the gifts of life and salvation that he is giving us.

We don't have to rely on the world's guesses and opinions. We didn't learn this by reading books or going to school; we learned it from God, who taught us person-to-person through Jesus, and we're passing it on to you in the same first-hand, personal way.

The unspiritual self, just as it is by nature, can't receive the gifts of God's Spirit. There's no capacity for them. They seem like so much silliness. Spirit can be known only by spirit - God's Spirit and our spirits in open communion. Spiritually alive, we have access to everything God's Spirit is doing and can't be judged by unspiritual critics.

Isaiah's question, "Is there anyone around who knows God's Spirit, anyone who knows what he is doing?" has been answered: Christ knows, and we have Christ's Spirit (“mind”).

 

3.3b “…cannot see the Kingdom of God.” “See” here has the idea of perception rather than sight in the physical and biological sense. It also carries the idea of experiencing and understanding. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus says “Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God…” Not in the merely physical sense (and certainly not later “in heaven”) but the evidence of God working in and around us. It is in Christ that we have a pure (perfect, clean, whole) heart. He is the Light, and as in Psalm 36:9, where we read “For with you is the fountain of life; in your light we see light.” This is a very profound observation!

3:5 “…enter into…” The ‘kingdom of God’ - God’s realm of authority - is the union of heaven and earth fulfilled in and by Jesus Christ - Son of God and Son of Man. The imagery and metaphors of the Book of Revelation, for example, reveal the coming down from heaven of the New Jerusalem, God’s dwelling with humanity on earth (in the “New Heaven and New Earth” long promised). To “enter into” is not so much admission (though that, too) but rather being an active participant in, rather like ‘entering into the spirit of something’.

3:8 “…born of the wind…!” As people born from ‘above’ – from a higher realm – we are incarnate beings – spirit-in/as-flesh! So that “as He is in the world, so also are we”! “Those who are led by the Spirit of God, these are the children of God” (Romans 8:14).

3:15 “whoever believes, in Him will have eternal life.” We usually think of “eternal life” as about time when really it is “life of the Age of Ages” a dimension or quality of life rather than quantity. “I came that you might have life and have it more abundantly [fully, wholly, completely],” Jesus said...

3:16 For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.

If we don't believe in Jesus and what he says, how can we experience 'new' life, or transformation he promises? To believe him (as the Word of God) and to 'receive' him has the sense in today's language of downloading an app, or any other piece of software: it only becomes functionally useful for us when we "activate [our] subscription". To be 'born from above' essentially and metaphorically equates to a "factory reset!"

At about the same time, the disciples came to Jesus asking, "Who gets the highest rank in God's kingdom?" 2 For an answer Jesus called over a child, whom he stood in the middle of the room, 3 and said, "I'm telling you, once and for all, that unless you return to square one and start over like children, you're not even going to get a look at [see] the kingdom, let alone get in [enter in]. 4 Whoever becomes simple and elemental again, like this child, will rank high in God's kingdom. 5 What's more, when you receive the childlike on my account, it's the same as receiving me. (Matthew 18)

In so many ways, it is necessary for us to lose our sophistication and regain our simplicity. This was the essence of Jesus’ kingdom message (Gospel, evangelion, “good news”). It was also the preaching and practice of St Francis, making him one of the most demonstrative disciple-children of Christ in the Church – even to this day.

Spring Cleaning in the Church?

 

In our first post, we made some observations about Jesus's first "miracle," or "sign" - as the Gospel of John prefers to call these interventions.

    Following on then, we see Jesus heading to Jerusalem to participate in the Passover of the Jews. Maybe it was from a hangover after all that wedding wine; maybe a touch of the old in vino veritas, too, but Jesus took umbrage at what he saw going on in the Temple - in both word and deed. (John 2:13-22). He seemingly lost his rag, because he suddenly grabbed some bits of string, or rope, or leather, and twisted them together to make "a scourge" - a rudimentary whip of chastisement - and started driving out the sheep and cattle being sold for ritual sacrifice. He also ordered the stall-keepers to take the birds away.

    That's got to be provocative on several levels. At a purely practical level, though, many of the pilgrims to Jerusalem to celebrate Passover, some from far away, would not have been able to bring their own animals with them. Nor would they have had the wherewithal to bring enough pigeons and doves, either.  So, it seems reasonable to think that having animals and birds available for sale, in situ, was uncontroversial enough.

    Nevertheless, for Jesus the animals and birds had to go, and go they did, with great squawking, bleating and bellowing to boot. The sight, the sound, and the smell of it all made this dramatic event quite the piece of Performance Art, I'm sure! Despite some theological sceptics and pessimists tut-tutting at Jesus's seeming anger-management issues, there is no indication that any animals were hurt in the making of this dramatic production.     And no harm was done to the human elements either.

Turning on the moneychangers, who were there legitimately as far as anyone was concerned, he literally turned the tables on them, scattering the neat columns of coins across the stone floor in all directions. (One can just see the scramble to grab a few handfuls that this sparked!) The Temple Tax could only be paid in a dedicated currency, so all Roman and other 'foreign' coins needed to be exchanged. (You can't have the heads of Emperors and emblems of Empire in God's House, after all! As Jesus famously said at a later date, "Render to Caesar what is Caesar's; render to God what is God's!").That the exchange rate would certainly have been extortionate is largely a given in this case, too. 

Plus ca change! 

What's all this about? What has so got Jesus' goat [and sheep, and cattle, and birds], so to speak? His tirade against the pigeon sellers seems to give a clue,

- "Get out of here!" he yelled, "Stop making my Parent's house a marketplace!"

    It is worth noting, in passing, that Jesus drove out the sheep and cattle; this shows his care that none of them would be completely lost; they could be retrieved later. But the money? Pah! Let the poor (and even the not-so-poor) jostle and jab for what they could grab!

So, God's House as a Commercial Exchange Centre? This really touches a raw nerve here. Since this whole system of "trade" was essential to maintaining the cultic rituals of sacrifice and tithes of the Jewish Temple - not to mention financing the Project, as the sale of indulgences would be for towards the building of St Peter's Basilica in Rome!) Jesus is actually challenging the legitimacy and authority of such rituals and, indeed, worship.

    (I know of a church whose recently installed incumbent closed down the in-house shop, and moth-balled the Cafe, almost certainly in solidarity with, and as a modern metaphor for, the apparent implications of Jesus' righteous indignation. That incumbent was soon un-installed!)

    Anyway, Jesus will come to the point, very soon afterwards. The Religious Authorities (read "Ministers"!) challenge him in turn and demand some evidence, some credentials that authorise Him to carry out such wanton violence against their system. To which, he responds, "I'll knock this temple down, and rebuild it in three days!" Considering the Temple had then been under construction for forty-six years, that Jesus' claim was met with derision, astonishment and scepticism comes as no surprise.

    But, as John points out, Jesus was talking about his body as a temple. The disciples will remember this later, after his return to life. The recollection will instil a renewed awe and respect for the old Scriptures. 

It's funny how the wisdom of old can suddenly look not so out-of-date! The outcome of all this turmoil was that a lot of people figured out that he, and his message, were to be trusted. But not the people themselves, of course. 

    Jesus knew then, and knows, concerning us today, how fickle we humans can be. Ask any politician! Jesus didn't need others to tell him what people are like. After all, he could read their thoughts. And ours, too!

So, while we ponder the implications of this moment in Eternal Time - and our history - let us consider: How many vggchurch messages, notices, even sermons focus on you giving more money to the cause, the project, the "ministry", the "mission". How much of the riches accumulated are, in fact, for the profit of the [mostly false] "prophets" (and preachers)? Ask Joel Osteen!

Don't let the so-called "shepherds" fleece you a day longer!