THE KIRK OF KILDAIRE PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH

CARY, NC

www.kirkofkildaire.org

A sermon preached by Joseph Welker, Jr.

Coming to Faith

John 3: 1-17

February 20, 2005

When I was growing up I learned that Christians had an ongoing debate about how a person comes to faith… to belief in God and in Jesus.

I had a friend, Kim, who belonged to the large, 5000 member FBC of Jacksonville...  she sat behind me in a high school class. Kim was always trying to save me. She was asking if I was “born again.”  She was using the language from our passage today. “Very truly I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God without being born from above (or again).  End of argument for Kim. You either are or you are not. “Which one are you Jody?”

And when I indicated puzzlement about the question, to her the answer was clear. I was out. She had been taught that the way one came to faith was in a moment… some call it their spiritual birthday - they can actually give you a time and date of when they made a profession. I know Kim, being my friend, was trying to do me a favor by saving me, but truth is, she really confused me.

For at Riverside Presbyterian Church we didn’t talk much about being born again. We talked about glorifying God… we talked about growing in faith… but there was never an invitation to make a decision for Christ. I guess we felt like the decision had been made long ago on the cross…

Over the years I’ve thought about that ongoing debate and realized that maybe there is more than one way people come to faith.

One is what I call the road to Damascus - get hit by the 2 by 4 kind of faith. You remember the experience Paul had who - one day is Saul… out to kill Christians… and on another day - thanks to an intervention by Christ - becomes one of them… the kind of spiritually dramatic experience, often born of crisis.

And as I have heard conversion stories over the years - sometimes from drug addicts, alcoholics or everyday people who feel lost… "this is a means of coming to faith that has brought them to God”  These are the people Billy Graham has tried to reach.

As for me, I came to faith more like his wife Ruth. Ruth is a Presbyterian. Child of Presbyterian missionaries.  She grew up in the faith.  She was nurtured into believing over time by her parents and the church. I doubt she could give you a spiritual birthday. Her faith reflects the faith of Timothy.

You remember how he came to faith. Paul, of road to Damascus fame, writes to him and speaks of how he is reminded of his sincere faith, “that lived first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice and now, I am sure lives in you…” 

This is coming to faith I recognize… one passed down to me by  Joe and Martha Welker…… where the seed of faith was planted in the nursery of the church… nurtured and watered through Sunday School, worship and in the relationships I had with people at Riverside Presbyterian Church… that continued to grow through people I met through the Campus ministry at Auburn… and is still growing through the churches I serve… including you.

I used to think those were the two ways people come to faith. But I read the story of Nicodemus and wonder if there is yet another way someone comes to faith.

I don’t know how much you know about Nicodemus… There is not much to know… there are only three references to him in Scripture.

Today we have the first reference. We know he was intelligent, was a person of power and influence as a Pharisee who sat on the Sanhedrin - the ruling council. He knew his scriptures, worshipped faithfully and was a person of integrity.  In today’s story we see he is an admirer of Jesus… but who does so quietly – under cover of darkness.

Let me fast forward you for a minute to where this story today leads…

Later Nicodemus will be a public defender of Jesus as his religious colleagues try to trap Jesus. Jesus is hauled before the Sanhedrin…who is trying to discredit Jesus… and bring charges against him…and convict him… Nicodemus urges them to slow down… give the man a fair trial… “he deserves a hearing.”

After Jesus dies, while  Peter, James, John and the rest have run away to hide for fear their necks might be on the line-- Nicodemus will come out from the cover of night and join Joseph of Arimathaea, another secret disciple of Jesus, in providing for his burial. Joseph will provide the tomb. Nicodemus will provide 100 pounds of myrrh and aloe to essentially embalm the body. An amount normally reserved for a King. 

As you look at the end of the story, you wonder… how did this man come to such faith?

I think it began that night when the two met. I think Nicodemus was born again, but not in the way some of my friends mean it. Birth, it seems to me is more than a moment, it is a process. There is the pregnancy… the development of the fetus… Birth is an image of growth for me.

What happened that night is that Nicodemus - this well seasoned man of God - came to Jesus - open… looking for answers. Not ready to commit, but asking. And Jesus - engaged him in conversation that would lead him over time to let go of old certainties, old truths, in order to be faithful to new possibilities, new truth. Spiritual rebirth is about thinking outside the box spiritually… allowing one to at least consider a spiritual paradigm shift.

I like the way John Buchanan, pastor of the Fourth Church Chicago… recalls that night when Nicodemus sneaks away to see Jesus - not wanting to be seen.“They talk, and it’s a difficult, almost tortured conversation. “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God,” he says, And Jesus replies, “You must be born again.” Nicodemus, settled, stable, past the age when you can change your mind or think new thoughts or seek new truth, says, “Can one enter a second time the mother’s womb?” He’s a fundamentalist. He can’t recognize a good metaphor when he stumbles on it. This is about newness, Nicodemus. This is about letting go of old truths, old definitions, old traditions, old theological certainties, and allowing God to lead you into a new and open-ended, hope-filled future. And then, says Buchanan, perhaps the most important religious statement anybody ever made. The most incredible and critical theological affirmation:

            “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not  perish (which means “be lost’) but may have eternal life.”

God so loves the world. This is about a God radically redefined - not in terms of power or judgment, or punishment, but in terms of love. This is about a God who does not wait in holy splendor for men and women to prostrate themselves, to beg for mercy, or devote their lives to being pure enough to earn God’s approval. This is about a God who loves so much a son is given.

And this is about Nicodemus - you and me - who are the ones now loved, the ones invited to love the world as much as God loves it, to love one another as we are loved.

It is about a wondrous love, from the heart of God, given without condition; a love so wondrous, it lays down life itself; a love that asks only that we accept it, receive it, allow it to re-create us, rebirth us; a love that asks us only to trust the one who gives it - with our lives, our future.”

This is the kind of love that changes lives. His story reminds me of a story told by Mike Yaconelli. Some of you may know his name. Mike is a minister who has written volumes of books for youth ministry and is the owner of Youth Specialties - an organization that has helped many of us with our youth ministries. Mike tells the story of a young girl who graduated from high school somewhat unsure of her future. She took a year off… then went to college… but then quit college about a year and a half later. She wasn’t happy, she told her parents. She decided to drop out of school and live in Hawaii for a year…She went to Hawaii and loved every minute of her experience and when she returned to the mainland, she postponed her education even longer to live in Lake Tahoe, where the snowboarding was good. “Uh… Hawaii and Tahoe are wonderful resorts and fun places to live, but don’t forget your education. You are 22 and you are not getting any younger.” What the parents and grandparents didn’t understand was that while this young girl was “wasting her time in resorts,” she was traipsing around in her soul, searching for God. Although her father was a minister, she had never fully embraced Christianity. It wasn’t that she didn’t BELIEVE in God, it was more a matter of knowing. She didn’t KNOW God, and she certainly didn’t understand the love of God. Of course, her parents knew nothing of her inner journey. She kept telling them she was going to return to school the next year.

Then they received a phone call. “I’m not going back to school next year. I’m going to Africa!” “Africa? Why on earth would you be going to Africa?” Her parents were more than a little concerned.“I want to find God. I’m going to spend five months on the Mercy ship which is now in South Africa.” The parents were shocked and asked the typical questions: “How much will it cost? How will you find the money?” “No problem,” she said confidently. “I have been saving money and I will write a few people to see if they will help me.” In two months she raised the money and was in South Africa on the Mercy Ship. It was a five month adventure. She and a group of others were the first white people to live in a black shantytown just outside of Durban. In her newsletter explaining her trip to the people who supported her, she wrote, “It was around midnight and my friend Carolyn and I were sitting on top of a jungle gym talking about how quickly our time in S. Africa had gone. The moon was shining through a thin slice of clouds, and the stars were shining almost as brightly as they do in my hometown. The wind was blowing some Eucalyptus trees, and Carolyn and I were bundled up in sweatshirts and dirt covered skirts. “I’ve fallen in love,” I told Carolyn. “I’ve fallen in love and I am never falling out.” I will never forget that night, the trees, the wind, the smells. I had broken out of my eggshell, emerged from my cocoon, and I was ready to tell the world I had fallen in love. I had found what I was looking for, and when I found God He hadn’t moved. He wasn’t lost. He just embraced me and said, “Thank you, thank you. I have loved you all along, Jill. All this time, I loved you first.” What an amazing love.”

Mike says that the girl who wrote the letter was his daughter Jill. Child of the church. Daughter of the guru of youth ministry. She wasn’t going to college… she wasn’t pursuing a career. She was risking her future on her search for God…And she found him.” [1]

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his son”, Jesus told Nicodemus.

Maybe the important thing is not how you get there… perhaps there is more than one road for the journey of faith… the main thing, is that at the end, we discover what Jesus came to offer: the passionate love God has for us and for the world. Amen.