John 3:1–8, 13–18

Bible Studies for Life
Professor of Philosophy, Howard College of Arts and Sciences, Samford University

Something You Must Do
John 3:1–8, 13–18
This lesson includes a verse that may be the best summary of the news that Jesus Christ brings God’s salvation to the world. John 3:16 distills the essence of divine love and forgiveness and may be understood as the Bible in a nutshell, for the Bible’s consistent themes include God’s love for the world, God’s gift of grace in Christ and God’s desire for all to place their faith in Jesus as God’s only Son.

New Birth is Necessary (1–3)
One of the primary issues in the Gospel of John concerns Jesus’ origin, specifically the attempt to identify from where Christ comes (6:38; 8:14, 42; 12:46–47). Nicodemus, the Jewish leader who comes to Jesus by night, acknowledges that Christ has surely come from God as a teacher, or rabbi, who performs marvelous signs on the basis of God’s presence with Him. Jesus uses Nicodemus’ affirmation as the context for addressing the reality of the kingdom of God. Jesus only mentions the Kingdom five times in John, the first two times here in this passage. He informs Nicodemus that only those who have been “born again,” or “born from above,” or perhaps “born again from above,” may recognize and comprehend the reality of God’s Kingdom. Because God’s Kingdom is a new reality, all who hope to participate in it must become new creations and open themselves to a new understanding and a new existence.

New Birth is a Work of the Spirit (4–8)
Nicodemus’ response to Jesus’ insistence on the necessity of the new birth discloses one of the primary reasons in the Gospel of John why people misunderstand Jesus’ teaching: they fail to interpret his statements symbolically. (For other examples of this, see John 2:19–20; 4:10–11; 18:33–36.) Nicodemus begins to ask Jesus a medical question about how to reverse the birth process and physically return to his mother’s womb. Yet Jesus is speaking figuratively, using the birth language as an image for communicating the Spirit’s work of redemption. Being born of the flesh is one thing; being born of the Spirit is another. And that spiritual birth maintains a certain uncertainty, for Jesus claims that no one may know conclusively either the source of the Spirit’s life-giving power or the direction toward which the Spirit directs that power (8). No one may domesticate or dominate the Spirit of new birth because no one redeems himself or herself through his or her intellectual or moral acts.

New Birth Involves Believing in Jesus (13–15)
Our first week’s lesson (Feb. 4) ended with the introduction of a significant theme in the Gospel of John, the distinction between Jesus and Moses. In this week’s passage, the author repeats that theme through Jesus’ own analogy between the glory of His crucifixion and the healing serpent erected by Moses in the wilderness (Num. 21:9). Jesus tells Nicodemus that when He is “lifted up,” all who look upon Him and believe will be given eternal life. “Lifted up” carries the double meaning of Jesus’ being literally “lifted up” on the cross and symbolically “lifted up” through exaltation or glorification. Later, Jesus will tell His disciples that if He is lifted up, He will attract all people to Himself (John 12:32). The crucifixion becomes the revelation of the glory of God that lures all people to salvation.

God Wants You to Experience New Birth (16–18)
Jesus claims in John 12:47 that He does not judge the one who rejects His teaching because He did not come into the world to judge it but to save it. It will be His word itself that judges those who refuse to believe. This later statement coheres perfectly with Jesus’ earlier claim in the final passage of today’s lesson. God loved the world in such a manner that the unique Son of God was sent to be the object of faith and the source of eternal life. Those who believe receive the gift of life immediately; however, those who disbelieve immediately fall under the judgment of the Word of Life. It is the love of darkness that ultimately condemns those who will not receive the gift of the Light of the World.