A Pharisee and religious leader Nicodemus sought Jesus under the cover of night. With this
encounter in John 3, we see more of Jesus’ famous words, the red letters.
In John 3:2 Nicodemus said,”Rabbi, we all know that God has sent you to teach us. Your
miraculous signs are evidence that God is with you.” (NLT) Nicodemus had seen the signs
of Jesus and acknowledged them, but he was also a leader who enjoyed his position.
Nicodemus wanted to know more about our LORD, but he wanted to keep his status. Thus, he spoke to Jesus in private. What you say really matters and how you live really matters. Jesus knew and lived that fact. His words and actions were consistent. “Action reinforces the
validity of what’s spoken.”
The conversation continued between Jesus Christ and Nicodemus as Jesus told him,”I tell you the truth, unless you are born again, you cannot see the Kingdom of God.” John 3:3 (NLT) Here Jesus, a craftsman, told a religious leader about the requirements to the Kingdom of God, but Nicodemus did not understand. Jesus explained,”No one can enter the Kingdom of God without being born of water and the Spirit.” John 3:5 (NLT)
Two interpretations concern the phrase “born of water.” One relates to physical childbirth, and the other refers to water baptism. Pastor Josiah stated,”I believe we’re baptized because of salvation not for salvation.” Water baptism is important but is not essential for salvation. However, we do want to follow the full directives of the LORD, and He told His disciples in Matthew 28:19; “Go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.” (NIV)
The phrase “to be born of the Spirit” stumped Nicodemus the religious scholar. To believe Jesus is the Son of God and to believe that He is our personal Savior are acts of the Spirit. Jesus explained it through the wind.
“The wind blows wherever it wants. Just as you can
hear the wind but can’t tell where it comes from or
where it is going, so you can’t explain how people
are born of the Spirit.” John 3:8 (NLT)
“Wind” in Greek is “pneuma,” and it means “of the wind or breath of nostrils or Spirit.” Jesus in John 20:22 “He breathed on them and said to them,’Receive the Holy Spirit.’” (NASB) This incident was the first time that the Holy Spirit took residence in mankind. Man’s body became the temple of the Holy Spirit. He transferred His Spirit to them, and we have the Holy Spirit living in us, interceding for us, directing, guiding and convicting us. How blessed we are.
The Paramount Point is “We’re people of the wind-People of the Spirit.” We can relinquish
the need to know every little detail in our faith walk. Though we live in a time when we can
research on our phones many unknown topics, we may not know how everything works in the
spirit world, but our heavenly Father does. Just as you cannot explain every detail of the wind, you cannot know every little detail about faith.“Sometimes a lack of knowledge is an
incubator of faith.” Jesus told His disciples to have child like faith. Faith is “being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.” Hebrews 11:1 Paul wrote in 2 Corinthians 5:7 “For we walk by faith not by sight.” (NKJV) We get to lean into the LORD
more, our Abba Father.
In our In Christ’s Image Training, we learned about being more Christ like. We want to have
more of Him and less of us and our demanding wills dominating our lives. When we surrender our lives to Him and we focus on being one with Him, we can be light in this troubled world. “It’s beautiful when it’s a challenge to differentiate where we end and He begins.” Sometimes God takes over, and He ministers in and through us. “There’s a healthy degree of mystery amidst people of the Spirit.”
John 3 contains the famous words of our LORD.
“For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten
Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have
everlasting life. For God did not send His Son into the world
to condemn the world, but that the world though Him might
be saved.” John 3:16-17 (NKJV)
Jesus explained His reason for coming to earth to Nicodemus the Pharisee How ironic! But the LORD wants that none should perish. That is love which is a “choice and act of the will.”
As I sat here reading these words, I began to sing
“Oh, How He loves You And Me,
Oh, How He loves You And Me.
He Gave His life What More Could He Give;
Oh, How He Loves You,
Oh, How He Love Me,
Oh, How He Loves You And Me.”
Kurt Kaiser
May we be salt and light in this troubled world because He wants that none should perish.
Written by
Larry & Annette Linthicum
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