The Lengthening of Surprizing Grace

We read a series of wonderful stories this Lent, stories which emphasize the wideness of God's mercy, the expansiveness of grace, the profligacy of love. These are stories of Jesus having improbable conversations with all sorts of people: the establishment leader Nicodemus, the Samaritan woman at the margins of society, the blind beggar by the side of the pool, and finally the dead Lazarus whom Jesus calls to come out of the tomb. This is not the vision of Lent we expect -- not the repent from your sins, nose to the floor kind of Lent. This is a Lent of repentance, meaning of turning around: turning around from the prisons that bind us, prisons of our own making or the prisons in which social expectations place us. It is a Lent of turning from death to life. Not an easy journey, but easier than you may think ...

Lent 2A Feb. 17, 2008 St. Paul’s

Genesis 12:1-4a; Psalm 121; Romans 4:1-5, 13-17; John 3:1-17

"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."

I’ve told this story before, about camping in a motor home, when our three older children were small. We were awakened around 5 or 6 in morning by a sound like that of an oncoming train. The towering pine trees among us were bending and breaking; the wind shook the vehicle. We heard cracking and whooshing, the sound of a powerful wind through the branches and needles, and then, quiet. No trees hit our heads, but the door was blocked by a fallen tree and another crushed the top of our car. A child we knew down the road had his foot broken by a tree that fell on his tent. A few miles away, a father died, sleeping next to his family, as their tent was crushed by a tree.

We certainly experienced that wind – the meteorologists called it a “micro-burst” – not a tornado but a wall of wind – but we could not even imagine controlling it. We didn’t know where it came from, or where it went, although in some places in the woods you can still see the uprooted trees. And try as we might to understand why this happened, we could not even begin.

You can tell I often think about this experience. It comes to mind when I am facing something I do not understand, or when something powerful happens to me that I cannot predict or control. When I need to imagine something not in human terms, but on the scale of how God works.

When Nicodemus came to Jesus, under the cover of darkness – was that so no one else would see him? Or is that just a symbolic device to illustrate to us just how little Nicodemus understands? –when Nicodemus came to Jesus, it was as a representative of the establishment, of the old guard – “old school” as young people say now. Nicodemus, as a friendly voice from the old guard came to Jesus and said, Just what are you doing, and don’t you think you could damp it down a bit?

Not a chance, Jesus said. If you are interested in what God is doing, the only way is to be born from above.

Born again? Nicodemus asks, misunderstanding Jesus’ word – missing the point entirely. Nicodemus thinks Jesus is talking in human, experiential, existential terms – “the kitchen table exists because I scrub it” kind of terms. To think so humanly, so literally, well, of course it does not make sense to be born again. How can that be? Nicodemus has a stake in the way things are for the religious establishment; he benefits – he sees no reason to change, to see anything in any new way.

No, Jesus says, you must be born from above. It’s like that wind that blew out of Canada that morning years ago. The Spirit blows where it will, and those who live in the realm of God experience that same powerful, uncontrollable, life-changing Spirit. Once you feel that Spirit, you cannot go back to old, predictable ways. It is those old ways that lead to death – if we live merely human, merely predictable lives, of course we will perish. We will have nothing else. But if we allow ourselves to be swept up in God’s uncontrollable and unpredictable Spirit, if we live the way God would have us live, it will lead us to eternal life.

I think Jesus is astounded that Nicodemus doesn’t get it – doesn’t get it that life in God’s Spirit is a great adventure in which we give up control of where the Spirit will take us. I think Jesus is astounded that such a teacher of Israel would forget a lesson so basic to the formative stories of the Jewish people. We read that story today: the story of Abram and Sarai leaving home to follow God’s promises of blessing and abundance. God was telling them to leave everything familiar behind – everything humanly possible – everything beloved and old and time-worn and traditional. To stay behind meant no future – no children, no descendents, no nation, no blessing. It was only when they left it all, when they followed the Spirit of God blowing like that uncontrollable windstorm – then and only then, God says, will this come to pass that in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.

Remember that story of Abram and Sarai when you think God is asking you to do something impossible. Remember that blessing that blew their way on that powerful wind. Remember that Nicodemus stayed in darkness when he could have had eternal life. Remember that, when you take your next big risk, when you feel on the edge of the precipice, that God is the ground on which you take your next step.