Trinity Sunday, Year B

John 3:1-17

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.

Wombs are comfortable places. Not that any of us really knows or remembers, but in the womb, the developing fetus is warm and well-fed on demand without even needing to swallow. For those of us (all of us, really) who have to worry about mundane things like eating, breathing, keeping our bodies at a livable temperature, keeping healthy, going to work, getting stuck in traffic — to say nothing of the more palpable dangers of modern life — existence in the womb is simple and easy, maybe even enviable compared to our daily slog.

And then, one day, triggered by something medicine still hasn’t identified, labor starts. (I know medicine doesn’t really know what causes labor to start because there were two periods in my life, of about three weeks each time, when I googled that question at least twice a day.) 

Then, the baby is born. Suddenly, the womb is gone and there’s a lot more to worry about. Almost immediately, the baby needs to coordinate their lungs with their diaphragm in order to breathe. There are new senses to absorb a big world — sight, sound, smell. The baby suddenly has to deal with hunger and hoping one of these big humans around them will respond appropriately, and then there is the whole mechanism of suckling and swallowing, something babies sometimes do in the womb but just for funsies, not for need. 

Babies have such a steep learning curve in learning to exist it’s almost comical. Sometimes, if a baby is born with a lot of hair, they’ll reach their hand up to their head and they have this grasp reflex and that hurts because it pulls the hair, but they don’t have the wherewithal to release their grasp so in their despair, the hair pulling only gets worse. 

Newborns are vulnerable. That’s a fact that almost seems cliche, but in fact many biologists have posited that human babies are particularly vulnerable because we need to be born earlier in our development than most other animals.

The idea is that if we gestated to the same stage of development as most other animal species are when they’re born, we’d be in the womb for 12 months rather than nine — but because humans are bipeds, and a mother’s hips can’t open wide enough to allow a 12-month-old head to get through, we come out “early” at nine months and finish that first stage of development outside the womb.

So even compared to other animals, newborn human babies are particularly vulnerable and particularly reliant on others. A newborn baby’s entire universe is their caregiver; in fact, for the first few months of life they can’t see more than a foot or two in front of their face because all they need to focus on is that caregiver. 

I wonder if any of this was in Jesus’ mind when he explained to Nicodemus that he needed to be born from above. That in being born from above, we would be fresh and at the mercy of the spirit. 

Let’s step back and remember who Jesus is talking to here: Nicodemus was a Pharisee, a leader and teacher of the Jewish people, deeply educated and well-versed in theology. He is both curious and cautious about Jesus: Curious because clearly no one can do what Jesus is doing apart from God, but also cautious enough to be aware that Jesus wasn’t exactly in the good graces of the local authorities — this particular dialogue takes place shortly after the whole disturbing-the-peace display in the temple, after all — and so he went to Jesus in the dead of night so he wouldn’t risk his reputation (or a run-in with said authorities) by engaging with Jesus.

So Nicodemus, this intelligent religious scholar, comes to Jesus with questions and leaves… well, with even more questions. Bewilderment. 

I grew up in an area where it wasn’t uncommon to be asked not just if you were a Christian but if you were, specifically, a “born again” Christian. 

Anyone who has spent some time in evangelical circles knows that the phrase “born again” comes with some serious baggage. Oftentimes, if someone asked me if I was born again, it was less of a question and more of an accusation. “Yeah, you’re a lifelong churchgoer, baptized into the faith, but are you really a Christian? Or are you just pretending to be Christian?” This religious rhetoric can be traced back to the Great Awakening of the 1740’s. 

And of course, growing up in the Episcopal Church, I never knew how to answer this question. Wasn’t I born okay the first time? It wasn’t until I was in my 20’s, finally traveling far enough away from home that no one cared if I called myself ‘born again’, where something dramatically shifted. I had new eyes to see how God was working in the world. I was newly astounded that the good news of the gospel was, in fact, good. Very very good. And I had more confidence in a loving creator God

It wasn’t until I came home, reflecting on all I had learned and who I was in that process that it occurred to me, “wait. Was I reborn?” 

I don’t know what triggers us to be born from above. As Jesus tells Nicodemus, “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.”

I can’t give you an invitation to be born from above. What I can do is invite you out of the shadows and to risk the light. I can invite you to let go of all you think you know. I can invite you to trust Jesus in a way that will change so many things about you.