Lectionary Readings for Sunday, February 17, 2008

Lectionary Readings for Sunday, February 17, 2008
Second Sunday in Lent

Genesis 12:1-4a with Psalm 121 and
Romans 4:1-5,13-17 and
John 3:1-17 or Matthew 17:1-9

Life has a language.
And Scripture has a word for us.

The story of our lives and the story of our congregations can be meaningfully framed as story of connections both made and lost; of meaning that brings order into our lives and times when chaos seemed to reign supreme. Or we can look through the lens of activities, sometimes prompted by our own endeavors, and sometimes born of a response to an ever-changing world. We would soon find, however, that our stories cannot be told without giving the ebb and flow of hope its proper attention. Towards the end of the tale we will undoubtedly take time to count our blessings and give thanks for their power to augment our lives.

Scripture gives us a well-focused lens through which we deepen our insights into the abiding mystery of life, just as John Calvin said it would be. It is not, however, a predictable journey. Time and again it turns our attention to improbable places. If we are to understand liberation we must first hear the cry of the Hebrew people as they endured slavery. If we are celebrate what God can do, we are likely to be drawn not to paragons of health and financial success, but to a group of lepers, a paralytic who has yet to walk, and women who know the meaning of “shun.” The Lenten trek begins not with a celebration, but with the “imposition” of ashes that reminds us of our mortality.

So it is with this week's reading from the Gospel of John. The conversation between Nicodemus and Jesus takes place not in broad daylight but in the depth of night in which daytime boundaries have lost their power to frame simple arguments. What happens at night is complex, somewhat confusing, and mysterious as life itself. We enter the discussion with verses that are chock full of territorial expectations that one would expect might point the way. But instead of solving a problem they simply reframe it.

“There was a Pharisee,” the text reads. The Pharisees knew that worship is not a one day affair, but a daily observance. One of their goals was to extend the sense of the holy so deeply felt on the Sabbath throughout the week. In a bible study last week one man who was not persuaded that Lent's would make an actual difference in the lives of those who observed it said, “From what I've seen everybody just goes back to what they were doing after Easter.” The Pharisees organized to help prevent just such a scenario. There are things you do when God is given primacy in your life; and there are things you do not do. A wise person learns and observes the difference and then shares that knowledge with others. It is essential to recognize that Nicodemus is part of a group. Birds of a feather do flock together when given an opportunity to do so. And when we get together we talk.

This morning I visited an Altzheimer's unit and noticed two chairs at the end of a long hallway. Both were occupied; and three people had drifted that way as well to share gentle conversation blessed by one-word sentences, nods of the head and occasional smiles. At the other end of the hallway a brightly lit dayroom also provided a gathering space. It is our nature to get together, and the patients had created a dayroom annex at the end of the long hallway. When Nicodemus speaks he will note not that he has noticed Jesus' healings, but that 'we” know the healings must be from God. In like manner Jesus notes that “we speak of what we know.” The world of coherence always seeks its adherents. It is in the boundary between coherence and connection that we find life full of wonderful, and inevitable, tension.

There are many layers of meaning in the landscape of coherence that introduces the text.

First we are introduced to a Pharisee.

Then the Pharisee is given a name. He isn't anybody; and he isn't somebody.

Next we learn he is a leader.

Next the leader meets Jesus, whose name reveals his saving mission that an esteemed leader might, or might not, need.

Next Jesus is referred to as “Rabbi.” Clearly the passage will be about learning and teaching. But learning and teaching about what? Coherence invariably asks, “What are you learning? And what are you teaching?”

Finally two men who raised in the same faith make it clear that God is the true focus of their conversation. Whereas Nicodemus pins his words to the world of experience, “No one can do these signs that you do apart from the presence of God,” Jesus pins his words to an understanding of God that transcends events. Nicodemus is impressed with and curious about signs; Jesus is otherwise inclined. The signs are what they are, but there is more, he seems to say. “Tell me about this,” Nicodemus seems to say and suddenly the teacher named Jesus becomes a teacher. And so it is that two worlds of meaning gently collide. It is not surprising that this happens in the dead of night where we must search carefully to get our true bearings.

Listen carefully to the text. I have highlighted those words that designate boundaries that are such an essential part of coherence.

John 3:1-17

Now there was a Pharisee named Nicodemus, a leader of the Jews. He came to Jesus by night and said to him, "Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God; for no one can do these signs that you do apart from the presence of God." Jesus answered him, "Very truly, I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God without being born from above." Nicodemus said to him, "How can anyone be born after having grown old? Can one enter a second time into the mother's womb and be born?" Jesus answered, "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." Nicodemus said to him, "How can these things be?" Jesus answered him, "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 and testify to what we have seen; yet you 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.

"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."

The text comes full circle in its understandings of life. What began as one man's question ends with a sermon addressed to everyone. What began with Jesus gently dismissing the power of signs ends with a reference to a serpent in the wilderness, a sign that once saved a snake-bitten people. What begins with reference to Israel ends with an embrace of the world. Although the world “believe” dominates the last two verses, it is clear that essential though belief may be, birth is not something we do. Instead we are born and then find our lives to be an extended conversation about the nature life to which we are called.

As we prepare to preach this text, it will inevitably spark memories of those times you thought something was “real” and then found it to be something else entirely. I have been to many committee meetings in my life as a pastor in which there were also many agendas present at the table and when we left the meeting and headed into the night only sometimes did we find daylight after the meeting. Most of the time these agendas were somewhat hidden, making the encounter between Nicodemus and Jesus remarkable for its candor, its naming of boundaries, and its willingness to engage in a conversation about life.

Or, it may be that you recall a place of apparent confusion that revealed stunning clarity. Such an incident happened to me this week. I was working with a group of dementia/ patients. As we began worship it was clear the congregation was on the move. Some needed to travel, and did. Some clapped to the rhythm of the hymn I played on my banjo, others seemed to drift away as the window framed a tableau of beautifully falling snow. Every once in a while one would speak, his or her words seeking to lay claim to some hidden world of meaning. There could not be, or would not be, an explanation as to why those words were spoken. Suffice it to say the short sentences, or counting over and over again, marked a boundary just as surely as your sermon will this Sunday.

Several days before I underwent yet another round of surgery on my left eye. The hospital asked me to wear a green wristband until a nitrogen bubble is absorbed into whatever cells will receive it. The wristband caught the attention of one woman whose only speech up to that point had been somewhat outside the realm of “normal” conversation. She pointed to the band, wanting to know what happened.

“It's for my eye,” I said. “There's a bubble in it. When the bubble goes away I can take this off.” She smiled.

“Your eye is going to be okay,” she said.

“Thank you,” I said. “You have given me a blessing, and I thank you.”

As so often happen, if we are to look for life we are wise to not avoid conversations born of an Alzheimer's night or an encounter between a wise leader named Nicodemus and a teacher named Jesus.

Larry

I welcome your response to these columns. I may be reached at:
larry@leadingcausesoflife.org
Or
larrypray@gmail.com