LIKE A THIEF IN THE NIGHT
Text: Isaiah 42; John 3: 17
Shortly before his inauguration to his inauguration as President, Lincoln decided to stop in Baltimore, on his way to Washington from Illinois. After almost two weeks of train travel on a meandering journey, Lincoln was warned by the detective Alan Pinkerton that assassins awaited him there. Because the trains at that time did not connect, Lincoln had to leave the first train and go to a second train for Washington.
Rather than walking openly with his signature stovepipe hat, he put on a wide brim soft hat and along overcoat, and accompanied only by Pinkerton and one bodyguard, he slipped into a waiting carriage and connected to the next train. When the story about this incredible trip surfaced, it became embellished, as do many stories, and Lincoln was accused of slipping into Washington like a “thief in the night” by the New York Herald.
In this morning’s reading Nicodemus comes to visit Jesus at night also out of fear, but of what? The text does not say, but then the writer goes on describe a Jesus who tells Nicodemus that he must be born anew, not as people are physically born but of the spirit. Of course, this is the origin of the oft used phrase of being “born again” to describe new found faith and radical change within ourselves when one discovers God. But then we should ask, what does this phrase really mean?
Many, if not most, of us in the liberal or progressive tradition, eschew such language as belonging only to evangelicals, usually characterized as being less than our civilized selves. However, just as we should not let the Yahoos capture the flag as its symbol we should not let evangelicals or the know nothings capture a phrase such as “born again.” It’s really a lovely and powerful metaphor, if you think about it.
As individuals we are always reinventing ourselves, or, to put it in the language of the evangelical, being born again. There are a myriad of websites suggesting ways for us to reinvent ourselves. But aren’t we happy the way we are? Of course, not! If we were happy in our old lives, we would stay that way.
Think of the many ways we are told we can reinvent ourselves: we can lose weight, we can change our hair color, we can change our jobs, we can change our image of ourselves. The list goes on and on. Sometimes it seems that the term “reinvention” is little more than psychobabble for creating a new you -- or me. The difference is that it doesn’t carry the emotional and religious baggage of the phrase “born again.”
But let’s look at that phrase, “born again” in the context of this morning’s story. John’s Jesus tells Nicodemus that one must be born of water and Spirit. Continuing with the quasi-Gnostic language, John’s Jesus separates flesh and spirit and uses the metaphor of the wind: It blows where it chooses and we do not know from whence it came or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit.
What do we make of this? First, a short lesson in translation is necessary. The word in John 3.8 translated as spirit is pneuma, the Greek word that the Septuagint used for the Hebrew word rauch, such as used in Genesis, translated as the Spirit of God moving across the face of the waters, but which also means the breath of God. This is not the same Greek word sometimes translated as Spirit in the farewell discourse found in John 14-17; that word is parakaleo, the exhorter or comforter.
We are told to be born of the Spirit, and that the pneuma of God -- the Greek word is the same although translated differently sometimes -- blows where it chooses. I think that means we must be open to all the possibilities that God offers us but also the demands that God makes of us. So, we are back to “born again.” Now I don’t know what labor was like for other women, but with my first born I was in labor for almost two days. I thought I was going to give birth, packed that suitcase and called a cab -- my husband Bob had just learned to drive and was terrified he would have an accident with me in the car. There’s little more embarrassing than walking out the following morning still pregnant. But I knew I was still feeling contractions. Later that same day, I drove to the OBGYN and she told me I was 10 cm. dilated and to get to the hospital. At that point, I had to go back home and get the stupid suitcase. Fortunately, this was in New Haven where things were pretty close. It took me another full day and night of labor to finally give birth. This was not an easy or painless process.
It’s the same with being born again. One just doesn’t “believe” and a Christian pops out. It’s a whole process of learning and studying, figuring out what this faith means for your life. It’s a lot easier to have a so-called conversion experience with a Christian emerging like Athena fully formed from the head of Zeus. I was raised in the faith in a mixture of my parent’s inclusive Episcopal church and the exclusive approach of the Southern Baptists, which I left in disgust over what I saw as the church’s refusal to support civil rights, the social issue of my youth, wrestled with a new kind of understanding of faith and faithfulness, and I’m still being born.
We who call ourselves progressive Christians need to reclaim the language that describes our faith. We cannot simply allow others to define it for us and for others. Last week someone asked me if I was a “born again” Christian and I responded that I was still being born because I didn’t have all the so-called answers to life’s persistent questions, as it were. The questioner looked startled. “But aren’t you a pastor?” she asked. “Yes,” I responded, and continuing, “but I hope I’m not so full of myself that I think I have all the answers.”
The process of becoming and being is a difficult one as Jesus’ own life points out. It is clear that even in John’s Gospel that Jesus struggles with who he is and is to be, with the possibilities offered by God and the demands he felt God demanded of him.
John’s commentary on the conversation of Nicodemus and Jesus is also telling. As the writer put it, for God so loved the world.... These are words of the writer, not attributed to Jesus himself as some think. But if we look carefully at those words, they are also words that we need to interpret for ourselves and our generation. Indeed, it is through the life of Jesus that we are offered a new vision of God, a new way to live and thus salvation, which I suggest, is also a process, a process of learning what is most important in our lives and how we can open ourselves to all the possibilities offered by God as well as living faithfully in response to the demands made on our lives by God.
As we go through this season of Lent, I suggest that we reclaim the language of faith that rightfully belongs to us as emerging Christians, followers of the One who gave us this new vision of God, a God who opens the world to us and embraces us on our journey.
Let us pray: Holy One who has given us the breath of life, breathe your pneuma, your rauch into us so we may reflect your Spirit in all that we do and with all whom we meet. Amen.