11 June 2006
Mansfield M. Kaseman
Genesis 12:1-4
John 3:1-17

Never in the history of the human race - despite periodic and frantic attempts to find some Shangri-La or fountain of eternal youth - has any one been given the chance to relive any part of his or her life. For some it's all too painfully true:

The Moving Finger writes and having writ
Moves on: nor all your piety and wit
Shall lure it back to cancel half a line
Nor all your tears wash out a word of it.

But the good news for today is that if we cannot be young again, we can be born again; and precisely because it is impossible to be young again, it is all the more important to be born again.

Yes, I know the problems most of us have with the term "born again." It may be associated with those Christians who tend to have all the answers because they never allow important questions. "Born again" might remind us of the Bremen Boston lady who said, "If you're born in Boston, you don't have to be born again."
On-the-other-hand, I would love to have a banner out front reading: "The United Church of Christ of Seneca Valley welcomes you regardless of race, creed, gender and the number of times you've been born."

While the term "born again" may be misused and confusing to many - including Nicodemus - I suggest this should not negate right use. And the right use is what we find with reference to Jesus in his encounter with this highly accomplished Pharisee, a ruler, a member of the highest governing body of the Jewish people, the Sanhedrin.

If anyone should have a self-satisfied view of life it should be this man with all his learning, discipline, accomplishments and assumed economic as well as social status. Yet, here he is risking his reputation under the cover of nightfall to associate himself with Jesus. Why? Some think he is like others who want to entrap Jesus through tricky questions. "Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God."

That can sound like a setup. But I prefer to think he is a seeker much like you and I. He is not satisfied with the faith of his childhood or early adulthood. He's perhaps grateful for his theological education, but wanting more than what comes with a degree, status, achievement, and possessions. I suggest he's done enough soul work and is sufficiently in touch with his inner-self to know that what brings peace and an abiding sense of wholeness is a personal relationship with God. It is more than being religious in a formal and public fashion. Rather it is being spiritual in an informal and very private way.

He also has sufficient wisdom and courage to be coming to Jesus who has exactly what he needs and desires. The problem Nicodemus has with the counsel of Jesus - I suggest - is not that it was off target or all that confusing, but the opposite. Jesus hits the nail on the head and drives it through the board with the first blow of the hammer. There is neither small talk nor therapeutic questions preparing Nicodemus for the advice that could transform his life.

I too would have been playing some word games with Jesus. While all too true - the idea that I must be born again or from above or of the Spirit - and so, by implication to get with it - would leave me scrambling for words and needing time to digest the meaning of it all.

The silly exchange related to being born after growing old and being put back into the mother's womb is simply stalling to catch his breath and regain some composure. It might have helped him to tune in on Oprah's program that dealt with 44 ways to take age off your life including own a dog, floss your teeth and laugh a lot. Many people are interested in growing young instead of old, but we all know this is not the issue at hand. Very simply put, Jesus is cutting to the chase, and Nicodemus seems stunned, which is not unlike the father who struggled day and night to get his family where he thought they'd all be happy, healthy and secure. Here they are in the suburbs, and what does he overhear from his daughter talking with a friend in D.C. but, "You have to grow up in Potomac to know how bad it is."

St. Augustine has a word for both the father and Nicodemus: "You run well, but off the track." Under such circumstance it takes time to recover, to absorb the shock and decide just what to say and do.

Who has not been in such a position? We sometimes find ourselves in distress and/or longing for something to fill the void. We know something important is missing, and we may discuss it with loved ones and friends. We are convinced that we really want to know the truth. But when we are confronted point black with our predicament and what to do about it - it can threaten and intimidate us. Much of the time in psychological terms we prefer to be more effective neurotics than persons who are born again.

Somehow the security of the known misery can be preferable to the misery of the unfamiliar insecurity. After we have done all the work, gotten the degrees, made it professionally, become a respected leader, and feel proud of all we can offer our family - it can be very scary to consider letting it go for something radically different. In our hearts we may know something is missing and we may want to be born again. We may in fact want to gain fresh perspective and relying less on our accomplishments and more on the Spirit and the promise of an open future. But being born again means living with the unfamiliar insecurity. It means living with questions rather than presuming to have the answers. It means listening from the heart to one's daughter or son or spouse or friend or colleague telling us that in spite of our success and good intentions - something is missing, something is off track.

This hurts. And it's natural to become defensive - especially if we are men, which is why there are typically more women committed to communities of faith than men. I think Nicodemus deserves credit for being a good Pharisee and especially for pushing the envelope of his faith. But still he is a credientialed ruler and a male. In his day, as in ours, masculinity was not just a matter of biology. It was and is something that has to be proved over and over again in a ceaseless quest that is consumed with being secure, confident, right and tough.

Some twenty-five years ago a modern ruler, like Nicodemus went from Washington to New Haven to discuss the Vietnam with an audience at Yale. As the questions became pointed and relentless regarding policies the students thought to be wrong - off track - the very bright, competent and committed Daniel Patrick Monahan lost it. He shouted with a clinched fist in the air that he was tougher than they were long before they were born and he was tougher now. If they wanted to press their point any further he would meet them out back.
What made the scene so poignant and unforgettable was that the students were not questioning his toughness. Quite the opposite: they were questioning his sensitivity and compassion; they were questioning not his intelligence but his wisdom, his morality, his humanity.

In the act of being born again, machismo is stillborn. Only humanity lives, and it is laced with fear and trembling. In being born of the Spirit, boundaries widen and sometimes without obvious direction. For "the wind blows where it chooses, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit."

We have no evidence that Nicodemus accepted such radical transformation, although he must have remained a troubled person and a sensitive seeker because at the end he was present with ointment to embalm the crucified body of Jesus.

Abraham and Sara, on-the-other-hand, were willing to become uprooted, to leave their kith and kin, and in faith to move out on a new path. It could have been of them that Browning wrote:

Grow old along with me,
The best is yet to be,
The last of life
For which the first was made.
Our times are in His hand
Who saith, "A whole I planned."
Trust God, see all, nor be afraid.

You and I cannot be young again, but we can be born again - born of the water, a symbol of forgiveness, and of the Spirit, a symbol of wisdom, peace and power. We don't need to move like Abraham and Sara to a new country but we do need to move, as Nicodemus evidently could not, which is from the ranks of Jesus' admirers to the ranks of his followers.

To accomplish this we need to be willing to move from the security of the known and of proven success - to the vulnerability, the adventure of not being sure, and the pleasure of simply being available. After all, "the wind blows were it wills, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from nor where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit."

The choice is ours individually and collectively. Next Sunday we have Ed White coming to preach and initiate a birthing process for our congregation. In anticipation I ask you, do you want to be a Nicodemus or an Abraham or a Sarah? Are you satisfied with the status quo and being an admirer of Jesus in a comfortable pew or are you ready to become a follower along a journey in which we too may be born of the Spirit?