Jesus' Conversation with Nicodemus Continues

Tom:

As many of our listeners know, in this segment we have been going through the gospel of John with particular emphasis on the gospel and the salvation we have in Christ.  And, as we have been saying, our life in Christ begins with our understanding of the gospel and our acceptance of it by faith.  And, certainly this book, the gospel of John is wonderful teaching about all of these things that are so critically important.  Dave, last week we ended with John right around verse 9.  We keep jumping ahead and falling back and jumping ahead and falling back but hopefully—

Dave:

You didn’t give a chapter, chapter 3 is it?

Tom:

Chapter 3, right.  Let me pick up at verse 9.  “Nicodemus answered and said unto him, How can these things be?”  Now, Jesus had just instructed Nicodemus that he must be born again—MUST be, I think that is where we ended last week.  So, it wasn’t just a suggestion, a good idea for Nicodemus and we talked about that.

Dave:

Right.  Like the “10 Suggestions” on Mount Sinai.

Tom:

Right.  Verse 10, “Jesus answered and said unto him, Art thou a master of Israel, and knowest not these things?”  Dave, I think this is important.  We talked a little bit about it last week but Jesus is taking a religious leader to task here.

Dave:

He is doing it very nicely, I guess, but rather sharply as well.  I guess we could say, How can you be a Rabbi and be so stupid?  You’re supposed to be the teacher and I’m trying to tell you something that you really ought to know.

Tom:

And Dave, I’ve mentioned before we get letters from pastors around, we get wonderful letters but there are some that you wonder why they are actually pastors.  They take us to task for pointing out simple truths that they find offensive, doctrines that they find offensive.

Dave:

Well, I guess the Bible does offend and Jesus, as we mentioned last week, offended a lot of people, not intentionally, but a master of Israel who is supposedly leading the people and teaching the people should know what Jesus is telling him.  He should know that the only way you are going to get into the kingdom of God is you must be born again.  You have to be born of the Spirit of God into the family of God and the whole reason for that—we talked a little bit about it earlier on this program—is because we have broken God’s laws.  We have forfeited the right to live in God’s universe.  Man was thrown out of the Garden of Eden and we see the evidence of that today.  We’re trying desperately to turn this world back into a paradise but we are not going to be successful in that and it wouldn’t be a paradise without the presence and blessing of God anyway.  So, Nicodemus, you ought to know these things.  How do you think this problem can be solved of this breach between God and man and the fact that God had to put man out of the Garden and the penalty of death came upon Him?  Then he goes on and says, “Verily, verily I say unto thee, we speak that we do know and testify that we have seen and ye receive not our witness.”  He’s speaking as God, now and He says that God has given you the facts.  All through the Old Testament, through His prophets, He gave you the facts.  The Israelites, the Jewish people, God’s people, His chosen people, they rejected His Word, they stoned the prophets.  This is not anti-Semitism to say that, it’s a matter of record in the Old Testament.  This is what the prophets themselves said.  This is what Jeremiah and Ezekiel—read what the prophets said.  So, Jesus is simply saying we, that is, my Father and I and the Holy Spirit, we have told you the truth and you have rejected it.  And then in verse 12, He is now referring back to what He told him about the wind.  The wind blows where it will, you hear the sound, and you don’t know where it comes from or where it is going.  I don’t think our modern weather experts could improve upon that statement.  We don’t know where it is coming from or where it’s going.  So, Jesus says look Nicodemus, if I told you about earthly things, physical things and you don’t believe me, you can’t understand it, how will you believe if I tell you of heavenly things?  And now, he is going to launch further into heavenly things.  You know, he is telling Nicodemus, on the one hand, Nicodemus, I can’t explain this to you because I can’t explain what a spirit is.  God is a Spirit.  I can’t explain to you what a soul is, what a spirit is, that man in fact, does have a soul and spirit in his body because—

Tom:

Dave, not that Jesus didn’t have the capacity to do that.

Dave:

No, no, it’s our peanut brains.  We don’t know anything really, as we have gone over that.  We don’t know what gravity is, what an electron is, electricity and so forth and Jesus is saying, man was made in the image of God therefore, he is a spirit being.  But, Nicodemus I can’t explain all these things to you.  You want me to explain it but I am going to tell you something that you really have to know.  And, He makes an amazing statement here in verse 13, “And no man hath ascended up to heaven…”—that’s interesting.  I don’t know where Enoch and Elijah went.

Tom:

Elijah taken up in a whirlwind—Enoch walked with God and was no more.

Dave:

God took him.  But Jesus is saying that no one has, I presume He is saying, has come into the very presence of the Father yet.  Paul said he was caught up to the third heaven and he heard things that were not lawful or were not possible to utter.  But Jesus is saying something that, well, we have to take this in relation to both Enoch and Elijah.  No man has ascended up into heaven but He that came down from heaven, even the Son of man which is in heaven.  Now, while we are on that verse, Tom, maybe there is another interpretation; no man has ascended up to heaven.  Well, they didn’t get up there themselves, they didn’t climb up on a ladder, they didn’t do it on their own, but God brought them up there.  That’s a possible answer.

Tom:

Even though they tried at the Tower of Babel. 

Dave:

It’s a possible interpretation, Tom, and frankly, I don’t know which one it is.  But anyway, Jesus is saying, there is only one who came down from heaven and that’s the Son of man, He calls himself.  He is the Son of God, the Son of man, He is God and man met together in one person through the virgin birth and Jesus, although He calls himself the Son of God, He also called himself the Son of man.  We have to recognize this—that’s beyond my comprehension.  But, man was made in the image of God and God could become a man.  The Spirit of God lived within the spirit of Adam at one time and now the Spirit of God has come to live in a body of the perfect man, Jesus Christ himself, who is God and man in one.  I don’t understand that but this is what the Bible teaches and it must be so, as we mentioned earlier, because the Messiah has to be God in order to save us.  But now, we have this statement Tom, “Even the Son of man which is in heaven.”  So, I turned around and you’re always asking me and saying, what do you think of that?  You’re the man who has been laying this out for us.  Well, you can’t confine God, even when God becomes a man.  See, that’s difficult for us to understand.  You know, when Jesus, for example,—He was a baby—I can’t fathom that—He was a little child growing up in the household of Mary and Joseph.  Joseph fathered other children with Mary, so there were brothers and sisters, as the Bible very clearly tells us, and when Mary says to Jesus, I want you to run down to the well, take this bucket and run down to the village well and come back with some water, Jesus didn’t say, Wait a minute! Who do you think you are ordering around?  I mean, I’m the Creator of this universe.  I don’t fathom that.  He became a man, He became a child and yet, He didn’t cease to be God.  So, He’s in heaven at the same time He’s on this earth—I can’t fathom that.

Tom:

Dave, the scripture that talks about, in Him there is all the fullness of the God, bodily.  I think that relates to this verse.  Again, ask me to explain it and I can’t.  But once again, when we are dealing with the scriptures, yes, there are things that go beyond our comprehension but with regard to what God has revealed to us, we can search the scriptures and come to a reasonable understanding of these things.

Dave:

Well, the things that go beyond our comprehension, we also have enough sense to realize they must be.  I can’t imagine, for example, how God always exists, no beginning, no end, I can’t comprehend that but I know it must be.  I can’t imagine how Jesus Christ is God and man in one—I know it must be and that’s why He is our Savior.