John 3:1

1. There was a man] Better, Now there was a man. The conjunction shows the connexion with what precedes: Nicodemus was one of the ‘many’ who ‘believed in His name,’ when they beheld His signs (Joh_2:23).

Nicodemus] He is mentioned only by S. John. It is impossible to say whether he is identical with the Nicodemus of the Talmud, also called Bunai, who survived the destruction of Jerusalem. The name was common both among Greeks and Jews. Love of truth and fear of man, candour and hesitation, seem to be combined in his character. Comp. Joh_7:50, Joh_19:39. In Joh_19:39 his timidity is again noted and illustrated.

a ruler of the Jews] A member of the Sanhedrin, Joh_7:50. Comp. Joh_12:42; Luk_23:13; Luk_24:20. His coming by night is to avoid the hostility of his colleagues: the Sanhedrin was opposed to Jesus. Whether or no S. John was present at the interview we cannot be certain: probably he was. Nicodemus would not fear the presence of the disciples.

Chap. Joh_3:1-21. The discourse with Nicodemus

This is the first of the eleven discourses of our Lord which form the main portion, and are among the great characteristics, of this Gospel. They have been used as a powerful argument against its authenticity; (1) because they are unlike the discourses in the Synoptic Gospels, (2) because they are suspiciously like the First Epistle of S. John, which all admit was written by the author of the Fourth Gospel, (3) because this likeness to the First Epistle pervades not only the discourses of our Lord, but those of the Baptist also, as well as the writer’s own reflections throughout the Gospel. The inference is that they are, as much as the speeches in Thucydides, if not as much as those in Livy, the ideal compositions of the writer himself.

On the question as a whole we may say at once with Matthew Arnold (Literature and Dogma, p. 170), “the doctrine and discourses of Jesus cannot in the main be the writer’s, because in the main they are clearly out of his reach.” ‘Never man spake like this man’ (Joh_7:46); not even S. John, and still less any one else, could invent such words.

But the objections urged above are serious and ought to be answered. (1) The discourses in S. John are unlike those in the Synoptists, but we must beware of exaggerating the unlikeness. They are longer, more reflective, less popular. But they are for the most part addressed to the educated and learned, to Elders, Pharisees, and Rabbis: even the discourse on the Bread of Life, which is spoken before a mixed multitude at Capernaum, is largely addressed to the educated portion of it (Joh_6:41; Joh_6:52), the hierarchial party opposed to Him. The discourses in the first three Gospels are mostly spoken among the rude and simple-minded peasants of Galilee. Contrast the University Sermons with the Parish Sermons of an eminent modern preacher, and we should notice similar differences. This fact will account for a good deal. But (2) the discourses both in S. John and in the Synoptists are translations from an Aramaic dialect. Two translations may differ very widely, and yet both be faithful; they may each bear the impress of the translator’s own style, and yet accurately represent the original. This will to a large extent answer objections (2) and (3). And we must remember that it is possible, and perhaps probable, that the peculiar tone of S. John, so unmistakeable, yet so difficult to analyse satisfactorily, may be a reproduction, more or less conscious, of that of his Divine Master.

But on the other hand we must remember that an eventful life of half a century separates the time when S. John heard these discourses from the time when he committed them to writing. Christ had promised (Joh_14:26) that the Holy Spirit should ‘bring all things to the remembrance’ of the Apostles; but we have no right to assume that in so doing He would override the ordinary laws of psychology. Material stored up so long in the breast of the Apostle could not fail to be moulded by the working of his own mind. And therefore we may admit that in his report of the sayings of Christ and of the Baptist there is an element, impossible to separate now, which comes from himself. His report is sometimes a literal translation of the very words used, sometimes the substance of what was said put into his own words: but he gives us no means of distinguishing where the one shades off into the other.

Cardinal Newman has kindly allowed the following to be quoted from a private letter written by him, July 15th, 1878. “Every one writes in his own style. S. John gives our Lord’s meaning in his own way. At that time the third person was not so commonly used in history as now. When a reporter gives one of Gladstone’s speeches in the newspaper, if he uses the first person, I understand not only the matter, but the style, the words, to be Gladstone’s: when the third, I consider the style, &c. to be the reporter’s own. But in ancient times this distinction was not made. Thucydides uses the dramatic method, yet Spartan and Athenian speak in Thucydidean Greek. And so every clause of our Lord’s speeches in S. John may be in S. John’s Greek, yet every clause may contain the matter which our Lord spoke in Aramaic. Again, S. John might and did select or condense (as being inspired for that purpose) the matter of our Lord’s discourses, as that with Nicodemus, and thereby the wording might be S. John’s, though the matter might still be our Lord’s.”

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Joh_3:1-2

There was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus

Nicodemus

I.

NICODEMUS THE INQUIRER. He was a Pharisee, and therefore all manner of religious obstacles, formalism, etc., stood in his way. He was a ruler, and therefore all manner of social impediments beset him. But his conscience had been awakened. He came in the dark so as not to be noticed. He admits Christs Divine teacher-ship. Men now hold miracles in light esteem, but this narrative shows us that they should make a sober man think. Our Lords reply shows that Nicodemus admission was not enough. It is a great thing to reverence Christ, but this will not save without a spiritual change. About this Nicodemus was as ignorant as a babel and as Jesus opened it and related matters he might well marvel. He had inquired, and now heard much more than he anticipated. He is a sample of most inquirers. Through chinks and crannies the heavenly light steals silently and gradually. As the light goes in, prejudices are overcome and notions surrendered, until it becomes day as it did with Nicodemus.

II. NICODEMUS THE CONFESSOR (chap. 7.). The impression made on the public mind by Christs teaching and miracles was great (Joh_7:27). The rulers, filled with wrath, sent officers to arrest Him. These officers were so struck with what they heard that they returned without their prisoner. The Pharisees rebuked them, and heaped insults on all who acknowledged Him. Then Nicodemus arose in His defence, standing on Exo_23:1-33, and Deu_1:16. It requires some courage to defend one whom rulers have condemned. Nicodemus did this, and bore the reproach of discipleship. He who was once timid now dares to stand up for Christ alone. The explanation is that in the meantime he had been born again,

III. NICODEMUS FAITHFUL IN HIS MASTERS HUMILIATION (chap. 19.). Jesus has been tried, condemned, and executed. All His disciples had fled, but Nicodemus stands firm, and with Joseph of Arimathea secures for our Lord an honourable burial Lessons

1. If God begins a work in the soul, He will carry on that work to completion.

2. Ministers must not be discouraged at unpromising beginnings.

3. A man may be at first, but he cannot continue, a secret disciple. (C. D.Marston, M. A.)

Nicodemus

Every effect is to be traced up to some adequate cause, and the effect is in exact proportion to the cause. This is true

1. In nature.

2. In providence.

3. In grace. Witness the case of Nicodemus here and in chaps, 7. and 19.

I. GRACE IN ITS FIRST COMMENCEMENT MAY BE VERY FEEBLE. Nicodemus was a timid man, and ignorant, and somewhat hard; yet he welcomed and employed the light, although not to the fullest extent. In his and in all other cases the beginnings of grace are feeble. Young believers are likened in Isa_40:11 to lambs; in Isa_42:3 to a bruised reed and smoking flax; in Mat_13:31 to a mustard seed; in Mar_4:1-41. as a blade. Just as Christ in His natural body grew up from nothing as it were, so is Christ born in the heart.

II. ALTHOUGH GRACE IS THUS FEEBLE IN ITS COMMENCEMENT IT IS A REALITY. Though Nicodemus came as a coward, yet he came; though he was ignorant, yet he asked; though he was a ruler, yet he renounced his knowledge and inquired with all the simplicity of a child. If we had rescued some poor creature from the waves, not a breath stirring, apparently dead, we should use every means and go on in hope. At last we hear a feeble sigh, and the conclusion we draw is that he lives. His life is as real as if he walked. Look at the sinner dead in trespasses and sins. Nothing moves him; not the terrors of the law, nor the invitations of the gospel. But God sends forth His Spirit, the heart is touched, the conscience enlightened, and the effect is that He feels his sin and cries, God be merciful, etc. We now find him pleading the atonement and finding mercy. He receives a new principle. This is a reality, and is so described in the terms new creation, new birth, resurrection. That it is real is proved by three things.

1. It abideth (Gal_5:17).

2. It over cometh (1Jn_3:9).

3. It still tendeth towards God (Joh_4:14).

It came from God, it ascends to God. It longs to love Christ and holiness more, and is not satisfied till it reaches the bosom of its Father (Psa_17:15).

III. WHEN GRACE IS REAL, HOWEVER WEAK, CHRIST DOES NOT DESPISE IT. He did not upbraid Nicodemus with coming by night, nor does He any one now.

1. His covenant engagements forbid it.

2. His love forbids it.

3. Beware, then, how you despise feeble grace

(1) in others;

(2) in yourself.

Conclusion-- Jam_4:6. Pro_13:4. (J. H. Evans, M. A.)

Nicodemus

I. THE DESCRIPTION HERE GIVEN OF THE MAN.

1. His religious profession, a man of the Pharisees.

2. His official position, a ruler of the Jews.

II. THE CIRCUMSTANCE RECORDED CONCERNING HIM.

1. Why he came.

(1) Negatively.

(a) It was not to ensnare or oppose Jesus, as was the case with his co-religionists generally.

(b) Not out of curiosity like Zacchaeus.

(2) Positively, to know the truth.

2. When he came, by night.

(1) It might have been from a feeling of shame or timidity; but what we know of him does not favour this supposition. Our Lord does not blame him, why should we?

(2) From necessity, his duties forbidding during the day.

(3) From choice as well as convenience. He wanted a private interview, such as Christs busy life could not afford during the day.

III. THE ACKNOWLEDGMENT MADE BY HIM.

1. To what it refers--to the character of Jesus as a teacher come from God.

2. The ground on which it rests. Nothing can be more reasonable than the inference. It will be seen

(1) That the miracles of Christ are here spoken of as things of general notoriety. They certainly were not done in a corner.

(2) Their reality is represented as being above all suspicion. They are spoken of as these miracles, and no doubt was, or could be, entertained concerning them.

(3) Their wonderful nature was such as clearly indicated that they were wrought through a Divine interposition. The feeling of all who were not blinded by their prejudices, on witnessing each mighty act in succession, was, This is the finger of God.

(4) Their express design is recognized as confirmatory of our Lords character and claims. What He says should therefore be attended to, and the important truths He uttered on this occasion are especially worthy of the most serious consideration. (Miracles of Our Lord.)

The character of Nicodemus

I. AN INQUIRER. Reports had reached the teachers and rulers concerning Christ which startled them. A man not educated in their schools, nor sent forth with their authority, an obscure man of peasant origin, was preaching doctrines not included in their systems, and doing works to which they were not equal. Nicodemus, one of them, came to inquire of Christ personally as to these things.

II. A CAUTIOUS MAN. There are some who are carried about with every wind of doctrine. Nothing astonishes us more than the ease with which men take up a new religion except the ease with which they lay it down. Not so with Nicodemus. He knew that Judaism was of God, and that Judaism prophesied a Messiah with which Christ did not seem to correspond. Yet Christs miracles appeared to authenticate His mission. But before accepting Him he would inquire further.

III. AN INTELLIGENT MAN. Education does not always enlarge the mind. Religious education sometimes tends to bigotry. But this man was an independent thinker, and claimed the right of private judgment. His large mental capacity had been cultured to appreciate evidence and to weigh words. Consequently Christ reveals to him more advanced truths.

IV. AN EARNEST MAN. He had been occupied with his official duties during the day, and now he treads the lone dark streets uncertain whether Christ would receive him.

V. BEING FAITHFUL TO THE LIGHT HE HAD, THE LIGHT WAS TO DEEPEN AND BRIGHTEN. (H. J. Bevis.)

Brave Nicodemus

We see in him

I. THE COURAGE OF THE EARNEST INVESTIGATOR INTO THE CLAIMS OF CHRIST. He was earnest enough to come by night so that he might have a long, calm, and uninterrupted interview. Had he been afraid, Christ would probably have rebuked him. He boldly acknowledges Christs Divine mission, and pursues his inquiries into the meaning of Christs words. Christ rewards this courage by unreserved communications of spiritual truth. This courage must be imitated by every truth seeker.

II. THE COURAGE OF WISE-WORDED SPEECH FOR CHRIST. The next time we see him (Joh_7:50) his courage has grown, and in the midst of Christs implacable enemies he speaks a wise word for Him. For such a man with his constitutional reserve to act as he did, and to incur what he did, required no ordinary courage. This courage is the power of Christian testimony now: in the presence of enemies, in the midst of temptations, at home.

III. THE COURAGE OF LIBERAL-HANDED SACRIFICE FOR CHRIST. When our Lords hour was darkest, Nicodemus courage is at the brightest. He takes His stand by the Crucified, whose disciples were scattered, whose cause was discredited, and whose name was a mockery. He ran some risk, knew little of Him compared with what we know, took His body reverently from the cross, embalmed and buried Him. Christ is not in the grave now. To be on His side still requires courage and sacrifice. Count the cost; maintain the struggle; win the crown. (G. T. Coster.)

Nicodemus and Christ

I. THIS MANS APPROACH TO CHRIST.

1. Who was he?

(1) A Pharisee; a member of the richest, proudest, most numerous, influential, and sanctimonious class in cur Saviours time. Not only so, but a man of them--a full-blown representative whom the community and the sect acknowledged as a leader and light of the party.

(2) A ruler of the Jews, not a mere master of a synagogue, but (Joh_7:50) a member of the Sanhedrim--the supreme ecclesiastical and civil tribunal, the final court for the interpretation and enforcement of the law. No one could be a member of it without being well advanced in life, perfect in all his faculties, tall and impressive in appearance, wealthy, learned, and trained in judicial administration. Perhaps the sublimest visitor the Saviour ever had.

2. Why did he come? The Messiahs coming was generally expected. Christ had done some apparently Messianic deeds, and had been acknowledged. The Sanhedrim could not avoid dealing with Him. Nicodemus was therefore probably deputed to wait upon Him. This was not a worthy method of procedure. Instead of inviting Christ openly to hear what He had to say, or going as frank and faithful men to Him, they concluded to keep their impressions secret while one of their chiefs under cover of night stole away to catechise the Saviour.

3. How did he act?

(1) Very inconsistently. If he knew that Jesus was a Divine teacher it was not his business to raise up objections.

(2) He was crippled by his prejudices and pride of character. His very first word betrayed him. He must needs bring forward the official we, as if the individual Nicodemus had nothing specially personal at stake. Then his difficulty about the new birth arose out of his prepossessions in favour of his own goodness and the non-necessity for him of a spiritual change.

II. CHRISTS TREATMENT OF THIS DISTINGUISHED VISITOR

1. He met him with calmness and civility. He came to save great men as well as small. (Joh_6:37.)

2. He spoke at once to the point, and undeceived him in regard to the basis on which he and his fraternity were building their hopes. Jesus, who knew what is in man, knew the unspoken thought of Nicodemus. He knows what is in our hearts, and is able to suit His favours to our wants before we express them. Nicodemus wanted some decisive manifestation that Christ was the King of Israel. Christ responds that no one would ever be able to discern or enter the kingdom without a new birth. Thus, at a single stroke, Christ laid prostrate this renowned councillors greatness, and dashed out for ever the loudest hopes of his race.

3. The Saviour expounded the unalterable condition of admission. That condition was

(1) A birth: mysterious, but

(2) real (Jam_1:18; 1Jn_5:1; 1Pe_1:23).

(3) A re-birth (2Co_5:17), a renovation in the springs of life, in the impulses and activities of the man, and in all the aims and endeavours of his being.

(4) A birth from or out of the Spirit.

(5) A birth conjoined with baptism (Mat_28:19-20; Mar_16:16).

4. In order to this renewal, Christ explained the true nature of the Messianic work. Hot to fight the Romans, confront Caesar with Caesars weapons, subdue the nations to Jewish vassalage--but to die for sinners that they might live.

5. As underlying all, Jesus taught the right doctrine concerning God. Nicodemus believed in God, but had a very limited and inadequate conception of the higher mysteries of the Godhead. He needed to be taught that God was Three-One, and that in this same young Galilean the expressed Godhead dwelt, being come from heaven for mans redemption. (J. A.Seiss, D. D.)

Who was Nicodemus?

Of this particular Nicodemus, we know with certainty nothing more than is told us in this Gospel (Joh_7:50; Joh_19:39). The Talmud mentions a Nakedimon, so called from a miracle performed by him, who was the son of Gorion, and whose real name was Bonai. It also gives the name Bonai as one of the disciples of Jesus. He was one of the three richest Jews when Titus besieged Jerusalem, but his family were reduced to the most abject poverty. So far the Talmud. The inference is that this change of fortune is connected with his becoming a Christian and with the persecution which followed, and he is himself identified with the Nicodemus of the gospel. We can only say this may be so. (H. W.Watkins, D. D.)

Two historic night scenes

One of the most memorable and important interviews which ever took place between two individuals in this world was held on a raft in the middle of the river Niemen, at the little town of Tilsit, in Prussia. At one oclock precisely, on the 25th of June, 1807, boats put off from opposite sides of the stream and rowed rapidly toward the raft. Out of each boat stepped a single individual, and the two met in a small wooden apartment in the middle of the raft, while cannon thundered from either shore, and the shouts of great armies drawn up upon both banks drowned the roar of artillery. The two persons were the Emperors Napoleon and Alexander, and the history of the time tells us that they met to arrange the destinies of mankind. And the hastily-constructed raft, on which the interview took place, will be remembered as long as the story of great conquests and mighty revolutions can interest the mind of man. The conference lasted but two hours; it was entirely private between the two emperors, and yet it was fraught with momentous consequences to millions. It was one of the great crises in human history when the currents of power that govern the nations take new directions, and break over the bounds and barriers of ages. Go back eighteen hundred years beyond the treaty of Tilsit, and we can find a private conference between two indivisuals of far more momentous and lasting importance than that between Napoleon and Alexander. This more ancient interview was not watched with eager expectancy by great armies; it was not hailed by the thunder of cannon and the shout of applauding thousands; it was not arranged beforehand by keen and watchful agents guarding the interest and safety of the two who were to meet. It was in a private house, at a late hour of the night, and it was brought about by the mingled curiosity and anxiety of an old man to know something more of a young teacher who had recently appeared in his native city. And yet from that humble night-conference of Jesus with Nicodemus there have gone forth beams of light and words of power to the ends of the earth. The plans formed by Napoleon and Alexander at Tilsit were reversed and defeated long ago, and it is impossible to trace their influence in the condition of European nations today. The words spoken by Jesus to His wondering and solitary listener that night have already changed and glorified the destiny of immortal millions; they have more influence in the world now than in any previous age; and they are destined to go on increasing in power, until they shall be received as the message of life and love by every nation under heaven. (D. March, D. D.)

The influence of night on the student

There is a reason why students prefer the night to the day for their labours. Through the day their thoughts are diverted into a thousand streams; but at night they settle into pools, which, deep and undisturbed, reflect the stars, But night labour, in time, will destroy the student; for it is marrow from his own bones with which he fills his lamp. (H. W. Beecher.)

Christ the greatest Teacher

In

I. The extent of His knowledge,

II. The perfection of His character.

III. The excellence of His methods.

IV. The kindness of His disposition.

V. The greatness of His rewards. (R. Brewin.)

The relation of miracles to teaching

When God had some new tidings to tell to the world, He gave to the men whom He sent with the message the power of working miracles. The miracles were a sort of bell, which they rang in the ears of their generation, that people might listen to what they had to say, and believe that it came from Heaven. (Dean Goulburn.)

An interview with a night visitor

The hours were too few for the work each day brought to Jesus. His labours were often prolonged into the night. An exciting day was over, and one of Jerusalems noblest sons sought the Saviour. The visit was not prearranged, but spontaneous. Nicodemus could not sleep till he had seen Christ. Others were within the same influences, yet slept. Here was the first-fruit of Christs direct ministry. The visit did not surprise the Saviour. Let the incident suggest

I. USING THE DARKNESS FOR SEEKING THE SAVIOUR. Night is friendly to retirement and secrecy. The guilty abuse it; but the holiest have ever found its tranquilizing calm, helpful. Attention is needed to it. The struggle which compelled Nicodemus to journey to Jesus. Naturally he must have felt reluctant to quit his home. Why not wait till morning? But thoughts had been arrested, anxiety stirred by the works of Jesus. Conviction had grown. He could not therefore be inactive. The visit involved risk. Caution would counsel hesitation, but eagerness made him resolute, and, determined to lose no opportunity, he came to Jesus by night.

2. The motive which led to the use of the night. Fear, prudence, unwillingness to court attention, are motives with many. Vanity, sense of shame, reluctance to compromise ones dignity, are motives with others. Were these Nicodemus motives, or the fact of convenience, the night ensuring quiet and leisure? Or was it restless eagerness? The narrative marks that no earlier hour was available (Joh_2:24). Yet the thricereiterated by night seems to denote excessive prudence.

3. The spirit His visit betokened. He craved satisfaction. If He is the promised One, I must know Him.

4. The knock at the door of Jesus home.

II. YIELDING UP SLEEP FOR A SOULS ADVANTAGE.

1. No hour finds Jesus unwilling to attend to our need.

2. Christs eagerness to meet a seeker. At once Nicodemus was led into themes of which his heart was full.

III. SPENDING THE NIGHT TALKING OF WONDROUS THEMES. Jesus uses time well. The themes may be thus classified

1. Concerning the Divine Trinity. The Spirit (Joh_3:5-6), the only begotten Son (Joh_3:13-18). God the Father, who sent the Spirit and gave the Son.

2. Concerning the action of the threefold Godhead in mans salvation. The Spirit regenerates; the Son atones; the Fathers love provides the sacrifice and gathers in the world.

3. Concerning mans responsibility in reference to salvation. He has no part in saving himself. Jesus accomplishes that (Joh_3:17). He must be enlightened (Joh_3:3) and renewed (Joh_3:7). On him is cast the solemn duty of personal belief in Christ.

4. Concerning the great issues set before the soul. Not to believe incurs condemnation. But the world through Christ may be saved (Joh_3:17). There remains for each the vast alternatives of everlasting life or the abiding wrath of God (Joh_3:36).

IV. HEAVENLY LIGHT GAINED IN THE NIGHT INTERVIEW WITH JESUS.

1. Nicodemus became a humble listener at the feet of Jesus. It was his intention to interrogate the Teacher, but he soon became silenced.

2. He retired with new and sacred life within him. (W. H. Jellie.)

The anxious inquirer--coming, disputing, listening

I. NICODEMUS COMING TO CHRIST. Amongst those mentioned in the closing verses of the last chapter was the Rabbi Nicodemus. To him the young man Jesus was an object of profound interest. He retired from the crowd to the Sanhedrim. There his fellow princes were in indignation at the assumption of the youthful Nazarene, and amazed at the audacity of His holiness. He leaves the Sanhedrim, and retires to his own home. He becomes anxious about this Teacher sent from God. He takes down the ancient laws and prophecies. He sees the resemblance between that young Rabbi and some of those shadowy words which lighten over the ancient parchments. A new interest gathers over the pages. While he reads the sun has set, the crowds have dispersed, Jesus has gone home. Nicodemus resolves to go to Him. The night season is all the more favourable. Nicodemus approaches the retreat of Jesus, timidly and holding back. But the door is open, and there is Jesus waiting for him.

1. Nicodemus was an anxious but haughty inquirer. The proud, moral disposition of the Jew starts into light at the first word--We know. The things of eternity will not allow him to sleep; but the opening remark of this emissary of the Sanhedrim implied that he and they had little to learn.

2. Still he made a concession. He calls Jesus Rabbi. He could call his brethren in the great council chamber no more.

3. He maintains a reserve. Something clutched at the rope and plucked you back just as you were about to tell Christ all. Christ came to him at once, and replied not to what he said, but to what he thought. You cannot see till you are born.

II. NICODEMUS DISPUTING WITH CHRIST. He came expecting to discuss with Christ the things of the Jewish Church; Christ pressed home all his thoughts to internal questions. Many came to Christ to dispute rather than to listen. The overcoming of the disputatious element in us is one of the most important preliminaries to the reception of the truth. In disputing we defend our own views rather than open our minds to the truth. Nicodemus disputing reveals to us

1. How the carnal mind is ignorant of the things of the Spirit of God.

2. Wherein lies our difficulty of belief. It is in the How and the Why we find the great obstacles to our faith.

3. How far we may be immersed in spiritual ignorance when we seem to be most advanced in knowledge.

4. How possible it is to belong to the outward and visible church, and yet to know nothing of the great and saving change of heart and life.

III. NICODEMUS LISTENING TO CHRIST. He gives up disputation, and Christ unfolds the plan and science of salvation.

1. He asserts the inability of the man and the inutility of human knowledge.

2. The plan of Divine ability beginning with the work of the Holy Spirit and ending with that of the Divine Father.

3. The exhibition of the mediatorial sign.

4. The unfolding of the essential law of the Divine kingdom--do the truth and you will know the truth. (Paxton Hood.)

The Teacher and the taught

I. THE DISCIPLE.

1. His relation to the ruling powers and his position as a man of culture.

2. His want of moral courage.

3. His reverent acknowledgment of Christs authority, in which he manifests elementary faith.

4. His willingness to be taught.

II. THE TEACHER.

1. His willingness to teach. Christ ever meets the eager and reverent inquirer in this spirit.

2. His willingness to accept imperfect faith.

3. The truths be taught.

(1) The need of regeneration.

(2) The mystery of His own person.

4. The great purpose of His mission with the method of its accomplishment. (Family Churchman.)

The two Rabbis

I. THE TEACHER COME FROM GOD.

1. Accessible to men (Joh_3:1-2; Mat_8:34; Mat_9:28; Mat_11:28; Mat_15:1; Mar_3:8; Joh_4:40).

2. Commissioned of God (Joh_3:2; Deu_18:18; Joh_8:28; Joh_12:49; Joh_14:10; Joh_17:8; Heb_1:1-2).

3. Confirmed by miracles (Joh_3:2; Luk_23:47; Joh_2:11; Joh_9:33; Joh_10:38; Joh_14:11; Act_2:22).

II. A TEACHER ABLE TO TEACH.

1. Of the new birth (Joh_3:3; Joh_1:13; 2Co_5:17; Ga Jam_1:18; 1Pe_1:23; 1Jn_3:9).

2. Of the Spirits power (Joh_3:6; Joh_14:26; Joh_16:18; Rom_8:14; 1Co_2:10; 1Co_1:22; Tit_3:5).

3. Of the Heavenly things (Joh_3:12; Joh_6:33; Joh_6:51; Joh_14:3; Joh_16:28; 1Co_15:47; 1Th_4:16).

III. A TEACHER ABLE TO SAVE.

1. Lifted up to save (Joh_3:14; Num_21:9; Joh_8:28; Joh_12:32; 1Co_2:2; Gal_6:14; 1Jn_1:7)

2. Given of God to save (Joh_3:17; Mat_1:21; Joh_4:42; Joh_5:34;Act_4:12; Rom_5:9; 1Jn_4:9).

3. Believed on to save (Joh_3:18; Mar_16:16; Joh_3:36, vl, 47; Act_16:31; Rom_3:26; 1Jn_5:1). (Sunday School Times.)

Christ as a teacher

I. THE EVIDENCES WHICH CHRIST GAVE OF BEING A TEACHER COME FROM GOD.

1. His qualifications to be this teacher.

(1) In His nature: God and man. Hence He spake with authority and worked miracles.

(2) In His commission. The Father sent Him.

(3) In His endowments. He was filled with the Spirit (Isa_65:1).

2. The peculiarity of His instructions

(1) What was their character? What sublime views He gave of God; what Divine revelations of grace; what Divine consolations; what holy precepts; what openings of the invisible world.

(2) Observe their manner. Never man spake as this man--with such authority, power, simplicity, consistency. He taught by events, anecdotes, parables.

(3) Mark their effects--conviction and conversion--Zacchaeus, Mary, Martha, dying thief, etc.

II. IN WHAT RESPECTS THIS GREAT TEACHER SHOULD BE IMITATED BY OTHER TEACHERS.

1. In His imitable qualifications

(1) His knowledge, particularly of Gods Book. Every teacher should have a concordance, a commentary, and a companion to the Bible. (2)His various methods.

(3) His possession of the Spirit.

2. In His Spirit

(1) The spirit of prayer;

(2) of compassion;

(3) of faithfulness.

3. In His conduit.

(1) His self-denial.

(2) His unwearied perseverance.

4. In His aim--to save souls.

Conclusion.

1. Rejoice that you have such a teacher. Learn of Him if you would be successful teachers.

2. There is no cause for discouragement if you see not the success of your teaching. Christs own received Him not.

3. Let Scripture motives urge you to undertake and pursue this great work. Gratitude, the brevity of time, the present benefit, the future reward.

4. What a blessed day when teachers and taught will meet in heaven. (James Sherman.)

Christ as a teacher

Jesus was emphatically a teacher. Not one who was confined to a professors chair, but one who taught everywhere. As a teacher He was eminently successful, and exceedingly popular. What was the secret of His success and popularity?

I. HIS DOCTRINES were of such a character as to command the most profound respect, and make the deepest impressions.

1. There was in them a peculiar fitness to the people. His teachings awakened the conscience, enlightened the understanding, and stirred the heart.

2. They were free from sectarian bigotry and prejudice. His principles were broad and generous, having universal application to the physical, social, and spiritual wants of men.

II. HIS STYLE. There was nothing stiff or stilted about it, no extravagance of speech, no affectation of manner. His very presence was a charm. Gentleness and simplicity marked all He said and did.

III. HIS ILLUSTRATIVENESS. One of the elements in His great strength lay in the aptness of His figures and comparisons from common life. Wherever He turned His eye He found central truth, and brought out of it something that the people could apply home. He ignored bewildering terminology, and showed that religion had something to say in the home as well as in the temple.

IV. HIS IMPARTIALITY. Teachers often make distinctions among their pupils. But Christ looked at man as man, and turned no one way either on account of rank or of poverty.

V. HIS AUTHORITY. It was the consciousness of His Divine authority which made Him so independent as a teacher. He did not pander to the corrupt tastes of the people nor accommodate Himself to their errors and prejudices.

VI. HIS NATURALNESS. There was nothing strained, artificial, or formal about His methods. It was in the most incidental and easy way that He taught some of His grandest lessons and did His greatest works. The smallest occasion was improved. There never was a teacher so little dependent on times and places. Why this spontaneity in all the teachings of Jesus? Because religion is natural, and religion is natural because it is real.

VII. HIS ABILITY TO INSPIRE MEN, to kindle in their hearts a holy enthusiasm. Xenophon tells us that men were more inspired by the example and spirit of Socrates than by his words. So with Jesus. There was something in His manner, address, and personal presence that at once won the hearts of His hearers. When He wanted men to become His disciples He had but to say to them Follow Me, and they at once forsook all and followed Him. And He exerts that influence to-day. (J. L. Harris.)

Our Lord a model for Sunday-school teachers

I. THE CHARACTER OF JESUS CHRIST AND HIS QUALIFICATIONS FOR A TEACHER. His qualifications are more apparent in their subjects than in their modes. What was Christ? is a better question than How did He teach? Many put too much faith in systems, method, etc., and too little in men of God.

1. Christ had a very high estimate of His work. He made mens minds, and was the light that lighted, etc. He had a full perception of the powers and value and destiny of the human spirit. You must have this same high estimate. No man will do heartily what he does not think worth doing. Nothing can be greater than to teach truth to an immortal mind.

2. Christs mind was fully possessed with the truth He taught. He always spoke as though the truth were His own. You never perceive any effort or sense of novelty. He bore truth about Him as a daily dress. He spoke of God as if He were in His bosom. He left an impression that He spoke that which He knew, etc. It was this that made the people astonished, and that made the officers say, Never man spake like this man. Be like Christ in this respect. There is but one way of attaining it, and that is by being real. It is not attainable by art. You must be a Christian, living and walking in the Spirit of Christ.

3. Christ was entirely self-consecrated to His work. He was not forced or persuaded into it. He came to it because He loved it and those He taught. Kindness, the key to the human heart, therefore, was the temper in which

He taught. Nothing is done without this. He who is set on keeping up His dignity may end in losing His charge. Children are eminently susceptible to kindness.

4. Christ lived His lessons. It was this that silenced His enemies and won His friends. If you would be effective you must teach by what you do as well as by what you say. Children have consciences, and no appeal will be so powerful as that of holiness of character. Besides, imitation is the law of their minds.

II. THE TEACHING OF JESUS CHRIST.

1. The free and familiar manner of it. There is no set system. His course was prompted by circumstances. He spoke to the time. Truth came out of Him on particular occasions, like virtue when He was touched. Dont fill the minds of the children with formal propositions. Speak always the present truth. Be simple, but not coarse. Christ had not hard words or technicalities; He trusted to the inherent dignity of the truth. The sublimest thoughts can be put into words of one syllable, God is light, God is love.

2. If you would imitate Jesus Christ, dont teach more than one thing at a time. He uttered a great doctrine and then dwelt upon it. The minds of adults may be injured by trying to put too much into them. He who seeks to do too much ends by doing nothing.

3. Christ adapted Himself to those whom He addressed. He had many things to say, but waited till they could hear them. This has been His method from the beginning. Revelation was progressive. So you must lead the childrens minds from one degree of knowledge to another. Begin with first principles, and go on to perfection.

4. Christ taught pictorially. Parables are pictures. The Bible is history, and what is history but a picture? What are baptism and the Lords Supper but pictures. Dry didactic statements have few charms for children, but they may be won by anecdotes.

Conclusion.

1. Jesus Christ as a teacher had very little success, but He did not faint. The husbandman has faith in the operation of nature; so must you in the growth of the good seed.

2. Christ believed that His seed would grow again. Many a doctrine the apostles remembered after He had risen. Future events must be allowed to quicken your teaching, perhaps your death. But no truth is ever lost.

3. Even Christ prayed while He was labouring. Without prayer you might as well not teach at all. (A. J. Morris.)

Open and secret Christians

There are always in a congregation some who accept Christ but do not confess Him openly. The Church has its hypocrites, but so has the world: for there are men who seem to lead a worldly life whose inner life is turned toward Christ; but they make three mistakes in their position.

2. THEY OVERESTIMATE THE VALUE OF WORLDLY FRIENDSHIPS. How much will your friends among the men of the world sacrifice for you? They will desert you when your purse fails.

II. THEY OVERESTIMATE THE EFFECT OF CONFESSION ON FRIENDSHIP. It will not drive away a true friend. What hurts us most is ridicule. Learn to live above it. Christ suffered the meanest insult. His followers have often sealed their faith with their blood.

III. THEY UNDERESTIMATE THEIR OWN STRENGTH. They are afraid of falling after they have made a public confession, and of giving opportunity to scoffers to blaspheme. They put too low a value on the strength Christ gives for every crisis. At the moment of danger Nicodemus came forward. Is there a danger now that calls these silent Christians to come forth? There is, though this age is no worse than many others. Our literature is full of a lofty scorn, a condescending pity for Christianity. Many of our scientists are materialists. It is time to be brave and outspoken. Christ is polarizing the world; there are but two classes of men. (W. M. Taylor, D. D.)

An audience of one

Permenides upon reading a philosophical discourse before a public assembly at Athens, and observing that, except Plato, the whole company had left him, continued notwithstanding, saying that Plato alone was sufficient audience for him. (W. Baxendale.)

No man can do these miracles except God be with him

The miraculous in Christs history

At the very threshold of the discussion there meets us the assertion that miracles are impossible. Now I hold that we cannot believe in a personal God and doubt the possibility of miracles.

1. We have a great deal of learned talk about the inviolability of the laws of nature, which really makes a strait-waistcoat for God of His own laws. But the question is set at rest by facts which science attests. What is the beginning of life but a miracle? Scientific men know that this world was once a molten mass, and that there could not then, by any possibility, be on it any germ of vegetable or animal life. But life by and by appeared and multiplied; and in its appearance we have a distinct and special act of God creating life; and that is a miracle.

2. But there are those who admit all this and yet deny any other miracles. They say that they are not reasonable, that they are a reflection on the wisdom of God. But while Gods being makes miracles possible, Gods mercy and mans needs make miracles reasonable. If there is a defect in the mechanism of the world, it is not due to God, but to us; the disorder in the universe is not His, but ours. And a special interposition by Him to right what we have put wrong is the reverse of a reflection on His wisdom. A revelation of mercy to a sinful world is a miraculous thing in itself; and if other miracles accompany it, it is just what might be anticipated.

3. But there are those who say that whether wrought or not, miracles cannot be proved. This is Humes position, which is modified by Huxley, who insists that the proof, if proof can be adduced, must be very strong. Mill further modifies it by admitting that if a supernatural event really occurs, it is impossible to maintain that the proof cannot be accessible to the human faculties. My contention is that miracles can be proved like other facts, and I proceed to prove that the account of Christs miracles by the evangelists is true.

I. THEIR NARRATIVE HAS THE AIR OF TRUTHFULNESS. When we are examining witnesses, we must assume that they are truthful until we have found them false; and there are various ways in which they may impress us. They may give their evidence in such an unsatisfactory manner as to arouse the suspicion that it is false; or it may be given with such artless simplicity as to convince us that it is true. On turning to the Gospels, we find the miracles of Christ recorded with as much calmness as if they had been only ordinary events. Their time and place, their nature, their witnesses, and sometimes their moral effects, are minutely recorded. The writers have all the appearance of men who are not making fiction but recording fact.

II. THE DISCIPLES HAD AMPLE MEANS OF KNOWING WHETHER THE ALLEGED MIRACLES WERE REALLY WROUGHT. Witnesses may be truthful and yet give a testimony we cannot accept, because of their having been deceived. But there are considerations which show that it could not have been thus with the disciples. The assertion that Christ tried to impose upon them charges Him with conduct so much at variance with His character as they present it, that we cannot entertain it for a moment, and the miracles were of such a kind that they could not be deceived in regard to them. They were numerous, varied, and striking.

III. THE DISCIPLES HAD NO CONCEIVABLE MOTIVE FOR CONSPIRING TO PALM ON THE WORLD A FALSE HISTORY OF JESUS. It could net exalt their Master to attribute to Him miracles He never wrought; it could not exalt themselves in their own estimation to sit down and carefully construct an elaborate fiction; and they could not expect to gain over the people to Christ by alleging that He had wrought many miracles among them both in Judea and Galilee when they knew that the people had not seen one of them. Just credit them with common sense, and then say if you can conceive of their trying to palm falsehoods on the world. If they had been knaves they would net have taken this course, for there was nothing to gain by it; and if they had been fools they would not have acted as they did.

IV. THEY HAD NOT ONLY NO MOTIVE TO GIVE A FALSE ACCOUNT, BUT THEY HAD THE STRONGEST REASONS FOR NOT DOING SO. There was no worldly honour or wealth to be got by their testimony; it was certain to entail the loss of all things. Is it conceivable, then, with the knowledge of all this that they would publish false accounts.

V. THEY COULD NOT HAVE GAINED ACCEPTANCE FOR THE GOSPELS IF THEY HAD NOT BEEN TRUE. It is Christs miracles which were appealed to when the apostles urged men to believe in Him. Consider what believing involved. It meant not only accepting His history in the Gospels as true, but taking Him to be the Saviour from sin, and leading, in obedience to His command and after His example, a holy life; and this in the face of the scorn and contempt of the world, with the prospect of temporal ruin, and the risk of a violent death. Now, how could men be persuaded to face the sacrifices all this involved by appeals to miracles which had never been wrought? Corroborative proof I find in the Jews. They did not deny that He wrought miracles, but only tried to explain them away. In their Talmud, which dates back to the third century, it is acknowledged that mighty works were wrought by Him, but it is said that these were the results of magical arts which he had learned in Egypt. And the heathen bear similar testimony. Celsus admits Christs miracles. Ye think Jesus to be the son of God, he says, because He healed the lame and the blind, and as ye say raised the dead. And when he tries to deprive His miracles of their value as evidence of a Divine authority, it is by ascribing them, like the Jews, to His having learned magical arts in Egypt. (A. Oliver, B. A.)

The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Joh 3:1-2. There was a man of the Pharisees — Belonging to the sect so called. What is here related, doubtless, occurred while our Lord was attending at Jerusalem to keep the passover, as is mentioned in the latter part of the preceding chapter: a ruler of the Jews — A member of the great council, termed the sanhedrim, Joh 7:50. The same came to Jesus — With desire of receiving instruction from him in divine things, but came privately, and by night — Through shame, and fear of his brethren of the council, who from the very beginning of Christ’s ministry were his enemies. And said unto him, Rabbi — Giving him the title of respect with which it was usual to address the Jewish doctors; we know that thou art a teacher come from God — Namely, with an extraordinary commission. It is probable that the expression, we know, signifies no more here than it is known, for, as Dr. Whitby justly observes, Nicodemus could not say with truth, that his brethren, the Pharisees and rulers, knew Christ to be a teacher come from God; for it appears from chap. Joh 7:48, that none of them believed on him. For no man can do these miracles that thou doest — Miracles so beneficial and divine; except God be with him — In an extraordinary manner, investing him with power from on high. Here, 1st, We are assured of the truth of Christ’s miracles, and that they were not counterfeit and fictitious. For Nicodemus, a judicious, sensible, inquisitive man, one that had all the reason and opportunity imaginable to examine them, was so fully satisfied they were miracles, that he was induced by them to go contrary to his interest, and the stream of those of his own rank, who were prejudiced against Christ. 2d, We are directed what inference to draw from Christ’s miracles; we are, therefore, to receive him as a teacher come from God. His miracles were his credentials. The course of nature could not have been altered, but by the power of the God of nature, who, we are sure, is the God of truth and goodness, and would never set his seal to a lie or a cheat. Nicodemus’s acknowledgment, that Jesus was a teacher come from God, and his applying to him under that character, implied that he came with a desire to receive from Christ’s own mouth a particular account, both of the doctrine which he taught, and of the kingdom which he declared God was about to erect. Our Lord’s answer intimates, that he either expressly made, or secretly intended, such an inquiry; and it is impossible to enter into the beauty of the following discourse without considering the matter in this light.

Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

EXPLANATORY AND CRITICAL NOTES

Joh_3:1. In Joh_2:23-24, we read of many who believed in Jesus because of the miracles He wrought. But their belief was so imperfect that Jesus had “no faith” in it. Here, however, we have a man of a different stamp. He was, it is true, influenced to some extent by Jesus’ miracles, but he came to the Lord as a genuine inquirer and seeker after truth. Nicodemus.—A Greek name, but known among the Jews. “The Talmud mentions again and again a person of this name (Nakedimon), called also Bounaï, reckoned to the number of Jesus’ disciples” (Godet). The word a man (ἄνθρωπος) connects this with Joh_2:25. He was one of those whom Jesus knew; but he was an exception to the general crowd. The Pharisees.—That sect which, although losing themselves in the quicksands of minute legal observance, yet perhaps included many men possessing a high moral standard. But they did not fully realise the nature of sin and the holiness of God. Therefore, as Hengstenberg remarks, “they knew of no new birth, but of a holiness attained to piece by piece, in which man has the primas partes; God, however, principally the part of spectator and rewarder.” Nicodemus was a ruler of the Jews (ἄρχων), i.e. probably a member of the Sanhedrin (Joh_7:50).

Joh_3:2. He came to Jesus.—This suggests a division in the Pharisaic camp. Some were chafing in their bonds and desired spiritual freedom. Nicodemus recognised in Jesus a more than ordinary appearance. The report of the deputation sent to John the Baptist no doubt also raised his interest in Jesus higher; and all this probably coincided with the longing after Messiah and His kingdom which filled the hearts of the best of the race at that time. By night.—Not because he feared, but rather because both Jesus and himself were occupied during the daytime (but see p. 89). He called Jesus Master (ῥαββί), although it seems as if Jesus had not gone through the educational course required ere a Jew could assume this title (Joh_7:15). But Nicodemus recognised Jesus as a teacher sent from God. The miracles of Christ led him dimly to realise this. We know, etc., shows that a number of the Jewish rulers shared the opinion of Nicodemus.

Joh_3:3. Verily, verily, etc., expresses the truth and unchanging validity of what was about to be spoken: “Except a man be born again,” etc. (ἄνωθεν means “from above,” “from the beginning”: born again, anew, or reborn is evidently the sense in which Nicodemus understood the phrase). Nicodemus came with a dim perception that these miracles, etc., of Jesus might be evidences of Messiah’s presence. But Jesus showed him that Messiah’s kingdom is inward and spiritual. Cannot see the kingdom of God.—I.e. cannot arrive at an individual participation in God’s kingdom, nor at the attainment of its blessedness. The kingdom of God is that kingdom which the Messiah was expected to establish; and its nature is clearly set forth, e.g., in Luk_17:20-21.

Joh_3:4. Nicodemus did not misunderstand our Lord. He knew that Christ referred to a spiritual, inward change. But he did not see that such a change was needed in his own case. He was already in the kingdom; and to ask that he should begin anew his moral and religious life, like proselytes who must become as children ere they could become subjects in God’s kingdom—as well expect one who had grown old to be reborn naturally.

Joh_3:5. Vide separate note, p. 98.

Joh_3:6. That which is born of the flesh is flesh.—Flesh (σάρξ), means our human nature considered in itself and apart from controlling spiritual power. It is our fallen humanity as it exists with its passions, feelings, etc., not governed by the divine law, and uncontrolled even by our own higher reason and conscience. It lies in sin; and it is thus transmitted from generation to generation. Our Lord when He became incarnate, therefore, was not born by “ordinary generation.” The substantive flesh as a predicate (is flesh) has a much more forcible meaning than the adjective carnal. “The state has in a manner become a nature” (Godet). Hence the need of a new nature. That which is born of the Spirit, etc.—This answers the question, “How can a man be born?” etc., of Joh_3:4. Spirit contains some reference to that higher spiritual part of us by which we are related to God, and which in our fallen nature is stifled and repressed. Through the quickening power of God’s Spirit that which is dead through sin is quickened and raised up again, and reinstalled in its true position (Eph_2:1). And it is the whole man that is thus born of the Spirit. All his nature is affected by this radical change. And only on this condition can he become a subject in the spiritual kingdom.

Joh_3:7-8. Marvel not, etc.—No doubt Nicodemus did marvel as this wonderful discourse proceeded. Who does not marvel at this exhibition of the manifold wisdom of God? (Rom_11:33-36.) Nicodemus rested on his privileges (birth, etc.) as fitting him for entrance into Messiah’s kingdom, and is naturally confounded at the new ideas presented to him, especially when they are pressed home personally: Ye must be born again, etc.

Joh_3:8. Wind, etc.—The Greek πνεῦμα and the Hebrew דרּחַ mean both wind and spirit; and some translators and expositors have urged that here the true rendering is “spirit” in both cases. “The Spirit breathes where it listeth.” But the evident sense of the passage is that of the Authorised Version; and it is that accepted by the majority of scholars. Indeed the use of the word φωνή, the “sound” of the wind, etc., shows that here our Lord was using one of His parabolic figures. οὔτως (so) also suggests that we have here an analogy. So is every one, etc.—The origin and rise of the new birth are unseen, and known only to those who experience it; and even they cannot trace the movements and activity of the spirit. By the way of experience alone can men realise it.

Joh_3:9-10. How can, etc.—Nicodemus confesses his ignorance of all this; and no wonder, for Pharisaism in its devotion to petty ritual-details had become spiritually short-sighted and oblivious of those higher spiritual realities. There is on the part of Nicodemus, however, a hopeful trait—he is willing to be taught. Art thou the teacher of Israel?—The article is not to be taken in an emphatic sense, as specifying Nicodemus as the most widely noted teacher of the time. It rather gives the noun an abstract meaning, as representing a class like ὁ σπείρων (the sower): Matthew 13; 2Co_12:12. See Wordsworth’s Greek Testament.

Joh_3:11. We speak what we do know, etc.—Is the “we” merely an example of the pluralis majestaticus? It appears hardly likely when we remember that “I” is used in the foregoing verses. The clearest explanation is that given by Hengstenberg and others, viz. that our Lord here refers to some who already represented the new doctrine (John the Baptist and the disciples already called), and sets them over against the rabbinical school represented by Nicodemus (1Jn_1:1-4). Ye receive not, etc. (Joh_1:5; Joh_1:19; Joh_2:19-25).

Joh_3:12. Earthly things (τὰ ἐπίγεια).—These earthly things refer indeed to the spiritual life, but to those facts in it which take place on earth, e.g. what Jesus had said to Nicodemus regarding the condition of men, the necessity of the new birth, etc., and “His general teaching up to the present time” (Godet). Heavenly things (τὰ ἐπουράνια) have reference to the higher mysteries of redemption, such as the relation of Christ to the Godhead, the counsel of God in reference to the salvation of man, the manner in which the world’s redemption was to be effected, etc. Such great facts are not arrived at by human experience and investigation; they must be divinely revealed.

Joh_3:13. And no man hath ascended, etc.—καὶ = and yet, and may be connected with Joh_3:12, i.e. “My testimony is not received, and yet I alone can testify of those heavenly things so indispensable to humanity.” No one from among men has ascended into heaven, and thus is in a position to declare to men those heavenly truths: He alone can do so who, living in unity with the Father, has seen and known them—the Son of man who came down, etc., who now stood before Nicodemus “in the form of a servant.” Son of man.—“He that came down from heaven, even He who being incarnate is the Son of man without ceasing to be what He was before” (Westcott). Which is in heaven.—Omitted by א, B, L, etc. The evidence of A, in which the words occur, is doubtful, as they are written over an erasure. But it is contended that the surface difficulty of the words may have led copyists to omit them. How could Christ while on earth be yet in heaven? But if it be remembered that heaven is a state more than a place, such difficulties vanish, and the words are seen to describe fitly Christ’s close and intimate fellowship with the Father (vide Watkins, etc.).

Joh_3:14-15. And, etc. (καί).—Jesus not only revealed the way of salvation, He made it. Such is the force of the copula. Lifted up (Joh_8:28; Joh_12:32-34).—In reference to the Passion, but also (Act_2:33) in reference to the Ascension. It was necessary for man’s salvation (δεῖ) that Christ should rise through the cross to the “right hand of power.” That whosoever believeth in Him might have eternal life.—The words should not perish but are omitted in several of the most important MSS.—א, B, L—although found in A.

MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.—Joh_3:1-15

Our Lord’s interview with Nicodemus.—This conversation is undoubtedly one of the most important ever recorded. It is one of the most detailed expositions that we have of our Lord’s teaching on one of the most indispensable concerns of the kingdom of God. As we learn from Joh_2:23, Jesus was at the passover at Jerusalem, and “many believed on His name, beholding the miracles which He did.” One of the number evidently was Nicodemus. He had seen the miracles, had witnessed the cleansing of the temple, when without official power, etc., but simply by the calmness and earnestness of His demeanour and the righteousness of His cause, Jesus had for the time remedied what was to all pious Israelites a crying abuse. Nicodemus was a “man of the Pharisees,” therefore one of those who thought themselves the élite of Israel, who being as they imagined perfect in legal righteousness, were quite prepared to be members of Messiah’s kingdom when He appeared. He was also a member of the Sanhedrin, and thus occupied a conspicuous position among his countrymen. Probably, however, like many good and honest men of his party, he was not only longing for the advent of Messiah’s kingdom, but unsatisfied with his own position spiritually. Therefore the advent of this new, wonderful teacher excited within him those feelings of dissatisfaction and hope; hence—

I. He became an inquirer.—

1. That he was a personal inquirer seems to be evident. In no sense was he like the members of the deputation sent to the Baptist. They were sent officially, in order to furnish an official report. Nicodemus came to Jesus for his own personal satisfaction—to seek for light on some of the questions clamouring for solution in his own mind.

2. Too much, perhaps, is made of the fact that Nicodemus came to Jesus by night as a proof of his timidity and fear of compromising himself with his fellows. No doubt there might be a feeling in his mind that he must not too rashly compromise his position by openly seeking an interview with this Galilean teacher. But the reason for his choosing the evening hours for his visit may be found also, in part, in the fact that both he and our Lord were occupied during the day. No doubt a man in the position of Nicodemus was busily occupied at this busy time in Jerusalem. What hope would there be therefore of uninterrupted converse on the most momentous of all themes in the press and hurry of the day? And indeed, with the full moon of the passover week shining in all its brightness on the crowded streets, the night would be almost as public as the day.

II. The spirit in which Nicodemus began his inquiry.—

1. Jesus did not refuse to receive this man in those hours devoted to rest and refreshment. It was ever His meat to do His Father’s will. And the Saviour received him willingly. Besides, as we are told at the end of chap. 2 (Joh_3:24-25), Jesus “knew all men, and needed not that any should testify of man,” etc. He saw behind the wrappings of Pharisaic formalism and prejudice of birth and training into the inner being of Nicodemus (as of Nathanael), and recognised there good soil where the good seed might bring forth manifold increase.

2. The opening words of Nicodemus, however, showed that the prejudices of class and training were still strong. He came confident in his own position. He was a leader in the Church of God, and from that very fact, he and all his compeers inferred, a subject of God’s spiritual kingdom. He came to find out indeed the standing of Jesus. Jesus, he felt assured, was “a teacher come from God.” But on what special mission, for what divine purpose, was He sent? It never occurred to Nicodemus that there could be any inquiry or doubt as to his own position.

III. The unexpected answer of Jesus to his inquiry.—In His answer our Lord shook to its foundations the self-confidence of Nicodemus: “Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God” (Joh_3:3).

1. Our Lord at once reverses the current Jewish ideas concerning Messiah and His kingdom; He here lays the foundation of His teaching as to His kingdom—its spiritual nature and heavenly origin are plainly asserted. Not of human origin, no merely external rule or law, no earthly pomp, were to characterise it and its advent among men. Men do not become subjects of it by right of birth, office, position. They must be new born into it, with a new spirit not subject to evil, but inspired to overcome it.

2. Those who are “born again” (or from above) are those who become what they were not before, in whom an entirely new spiritual life has been implanted, and in whom this change has been brought about, not by the fulfilment of certain ritual or devotional duties, not even by repentance alone, but by the impartation of spiritual power from above. They alone shall “see the kingdom of God”; they alone can know this kingdom and understand it truly. As the eye is fitted for seeing the natural world, so must the inner eye of the soul, the moral being, be fitted by regeneration to see spiritual things. Nicodemus might have found teaching in this direction in the Old Testament revelation (Eze_36:26; Eze_18:31; Eze_11:19; Deu_30:6; Jer_32:39; Jer_4:4).

3. Thus the ideas expressed in our Lord’s words would not be altogether strange to Nicodemus. Indeed, he felt their truth; but he could not imagine they could be applicable to himself. Was he not already in the kingdom of God? A descendant of Abraham, and from that very circumstance, as a faithful Israelite, the inheritor of the promises, what need for him to go through any new process to fit himself for that kingdom? Would it not be as possible for one grown to manhood to be born again as a little child? Any spiritual renewing for one like him would require to be preceded by a rebirth of the physical being as well.

4. Our Lord in His reply to this question, which reveals the astonishment and perplexity of the inquirer, explains more nearly the meaning of His answer, which Nicodemus had rightly appropriated personally. “Verily, verily, … except a man be born of water,” etc. There cannot here be any reference to Christian baptism, which was not then instituted. The reference was to John’s baptism, which at that time was creating much stir among the people, and which the Pharisees had rejected. Now our Lord here insists on that preparation of the heart of which baptism is the symbol, and which John preached, as an indispensable necessity for entrance into His kingdom (Luk_1:16-17). Repentance and pardon, of which baptism is the sign and seal, must go before, are the first steps in that new birth, which is effected by the Spirit of all grace. “The pardon which is symbolised by water-baptism is only the negative condition, the sine quâ non of the new birth. The positive principle of this inner fact is the Spirit, whom God gives to the soul which has been washed from its sin. As really then as salvation comprehends the two facts, pardon and regeneration, so really did Jesus sum up in the two words water and Spirit the whole of salvation, and consequently man’s entrance into the kingdom of God” (Godet). The baptism of the Spirit is what is essential (Mat_3:11); but it must be preceded by that repentance and that faith which looks to Christ as the source of pardon, of which baptism is the sign and seal. This last will not be omitted by those who are loyal to Christ’s commands (Mat_28:19-20) and apostolic usage.

5. “That which is born of the flesh,” etc. (Joh_3:6). In this truth is seen the possibility of the new birth. Where the Spirit comes with regenerating power, “old things pass away; behold, they are become new.” It is the true answer to “Can a man,” etc., of Nicodemus.

IV. The new birth is mysterious, yet comprehensible.—

1. Perhaps there was here a pause in the conversation, during which the evening breeze of the Syrian spring made its presence felt, as it gently whispered at ‘the chamber window, and entered with refreshing coolness. And then on the ear of Nicodemus fell the words, “Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again. The wind,” etc. (Joh_3:7-8). The presence and power of the wind are evident. Even in these days, when meteorologists predict the direction, etc., of storm winds, still it is true we cannot tell at what spot it actually rises, etc. Especially is this so with the gentle spring and summer breezes.

2. So is it with the Spirit in the new birth. “Who can trace the weaving of the new life from its first threads which have been woven together by grace divine?” Who can tell when the earliest promptings of divine love began, trace the earliest workings of the Spirit, unfold in all its grandeur the process of the new birth in the soul? But the broad results and facts we can see and know. Just as the ordinary results of the working of the wind are evident, so is it with the working of the Spirit.

3. The time is coming when its full effects will be revealed (Col_3:3-4; 1Jn_3:2). “It doth not yet appear what we shall be.” Yet even here and now proofs of the Spirit’s presence and activity abound. The fruits of the Spirit are manifest in the lives of God’s people (Gal_5:22-26). There is a visible growth in grace—a visible change. The spiritually lame walk, dumb speak, etc.

V. The possibility and necessity of the new birth.—

1. “How can such things be?” (Joh_3:9). It was difficult for the Jew, who relied on his relation to Abraham, his being one of the chosen people of God, and his conformity to the law, to realise the necessity for spiritual regeneration. It was easier for the Gentile to understand this. Yet even among the Jews the necessity for some such change was seen (Psa_51:12; Isa_44:3, etc.). But the scribes and Pharisees darkened the light of such truth by tradition. Thus even the “masters of Israel” (Joh_3:10) were often ignorant of those truths.

2. “Verily, verily, I say unto thee, We speak what we do know,” etc. (Joh_3:11). The Saviour in regard to such great truths placed Himself high above all earthly teachers, who often have to guess at truth. He spake what He knew, etc. It is fashionable in some quarters to speak of the nescience of Christ, of His having limited the sphere of His knowledge at His incarnation. Here Christ claims full knowledge of the highest truth. “If I have told you earthly things,” etc. (Joh_3:12), i.e. things already revealed to the Church on earth, such as this very truth of the new birth, “how shall ye believe if I tell you of heavenly things?” i.e. of the deeper truths of the Spirit’s working—the whence and whither of spiritual life in the soul—the mysteries of Redemption, the Atonement, and the Incarnation?

3. Christ is the revealer, through His Spirit, of these deep truths. He alone is competent to reveal them. “No man hath ascended,” etc. (Joh_3:13). This is no mere rhetorical expression, but the expression of a deep truth. “He came down from heaven”—as the angel of the covenant—to prepare the way by His Spirit in Revelation, and last in His incarnation. And He is “in heaven”—in His spiritual intimate communion with the Father, and in the sinlessness of His humanity. “I and My Father are one.” Heaven is a state, not a place.

4. The new birth cannot be brought about by our own power. Those dead in trespasses and sins must be quickened; their guilt must be cancelled, they must be reconciled. The atoning work of Christ is the only foundation for the new life. Faith within and His finished work are the means of union with Him; and in that union the new life is assured.

Joh_3:1-15. The new birth of men.—We assert:—

I. Its necessity on account of the divine Father’s righteousness.—

1. Man by nature is unregenerate. That which is born of the flesh is flesh.

2. The righteousness of the Father cannot, however, receive the unregenerate and unholy into its fellowship, because it requires men to be holy, and holiness is not characteristic of the natural man. If men desire, therefore, to enter into the heavenly kingdom, they must be born anew.

II. It is possible through the “lifting up” of the Son.—

1. Men have sinned, and therefore must some representative of humanity make satisfaction to the divine righteousness, and bear the punishment of sin. This Christ did in that He permitted Himself to be “lifted up” on the cross; in that He, being without sin, died upon the cross.

2. Those who look to the Crucified in faith are made partakers of the fruits of Christ’s death, are reconciled to the Father, and received by Him as children and heirs. For Christ is not lifted up on the cross only, but is also raised to the right hand of the Father, where He intercedes for His own with blessed results, and whence He works among His people through “water and the Spirit.”

III. It is efficacious through the working of the Holy Spirit.—

1. The Holy Ghost fills us with the power of a new life (of which baptism is the symbol), so that we can thereby attain to the renewal of our whole existence.

2. And whilst sin still retains some hold over us, and we may often fall into sin, the Holy Spirit ever aids us to rise again; and when we repent and turn to Christ in faith He imputes to us the work of Christ, assures us of forgiveness and sonship, maintains us in the faith, strengthens us to walk in righteousness and holiness, and finally intercedes for us “with groanings which cannot be uttered.”—From J. L. Sommer.

Joh_3:3-5. Spiritual regeneration, or the new birth.—The manifestations and operations of the Holy Spirit are manifold, from the time when He “brooded over” the chaotic elements and creation issued in harmony and order. So He works in the disordered moral nature of man. All along the course of history He has been striving “with men.” Through prophets and holy men He inspired God’s people with the hope of deliverance. But especially since, in accordance with Christ’s promise, He descended on the Church at Pentecost, has His working been manifest. We live in the dispensation of the Spirit—the teacher, counsellor, and Paraclete of Christ’s true followers. He dissipates their darkness, strengthens them in weakness, sanctifies their nature. No aspect of His work is more important than that set forth here—the mighty work of regeneration. Day by day is this miracle wrought. He comes into the human spirit in gentle visitings, so that what was before spiritual darkness and disorder becomes filled with light and attuned to order. We do not now intend to state minutely the great doctrine here implied; rather we shall see how the fact appeals to all, the fact of regeneration or conversion—regeneration from the divine, and conversion from the human, point of view.

I. The necessity for the new birth.—“Except ye be born again,” etc. No more important or momentous words could sound in men’s ears or tremble on their lips. If the Bible is God-given, if Jesus is the eternal Word, then there can be nothing passing this in importance. It is the point of junction of two roads,—one leading through many a lowly vale of humiliation, over many a hill of difficulty, but ending in everlasting glory; the other beginning in self-will and ending in despair. Without this vital change there can be for men no true spiritual heavenly life, or constraining love, etc. But what is the attitude of many, even subjects of the outward and visible divine kingdom, here? Do not many look on the subject with ill-disguised contempt? Do not many, when the change passes on others, consider them deluded—almost mad? Are not those under the influence of this change sometimes recommended to throw themselves into the gaieties of the world to drive away the cloud of spiritual care? Fatal folly! How terrible, how irrevocable sometimes are the results! Such men are blind leaders of the blind who regard the workings of the Spirit as signs of fanaticism, requiring to be corrected by their worldly wisdom. But this is the result of either unbelief or ignorance. Nothing is more plainly taught in God’s word than the necessity for this change. And it is not necessary in the case of the grossly wicked merely. They, of course, must be changed, regenerated, ere they can see the kingdom of God. But even men of good repute among their fellows may at heart be destitute of true love to God and man. This they must have if they would be God’s children. And no man can effect it of himself. The Spirit alone can do so, with His quickening and sanctifying power. And it is not a mere outward reformation that He effects. The inner alienation of the heart from God must be removed, and replaced by a totally different feeling. And that no man can do this of himself is simply a fact. The holiest will confess that it is so. True, much latent criminality may be kept in check by what might be called “artificial” means—the laws of social order, etc. But such restraint from sin has no affinity with regeneration. Even the most rigid restraints and the most strenuous self-endeavour cannot attain to it. A man may be benevolent, may give of his goods to feed the poor, may give his body to be burned, yet regeneration might still be afar. And men feel they need this vital change, and that no effort of theirs can effect it (Mic_6:6-7). This true and right state of heart can be attained to only by regeneration, not by any study of the divine character or the example of Jesus. The natural man cannot understand the things of God. It would be as easy to produce a flower by willing it. An artificial flower may be made by laborious work to look very beautiful, and almost to vie with a real flower. But a closer inspection and a test under the microscope will show how wide asunder the two are. God reads our hearts and knows our needs. And the Spirit of God alone can make us new creatures, filling our hearts with love divine. “Every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God” (1Jn_4:7).

II. The manner in which the Spirit accomplishes this great work.—It is a mysterious process, as might have been expected. We cannot say when and how the Spirit may work. We can see the effects, as with the wind. The reason is that the spiritual working is conjoined with our human activity (Php_2:12), and we cannot always know where the one begins and the other ends in any particular case. [Is there not a tendency to take perhaps too “mechanical” views of the Spirit’s working sometimes in evangelistic work?] The change is not first external, but internal. It does not alter the nature or banish the natural feelings, emotions, etc., of the heart. It does consist, however, of a change in the dispositions that regulate these. In regeneration by the Spirit the will is regulated; the attitude of rebellion is changed; it becomes a will to do good. This change is not altogether disconnected from human agency and the use of means, e.g. the presentation of the Word, etc. But these are not sufficient of themselves; either men will not listen to them, or will not see their force when they do. He who is not born again cannot see the kingdom, etc. As well discourse to the blind of beauty, or to the deaf of harmony, etc. But open the eyes, unstop the ears, and then both will share in the same joy. So is it in the spiritual life; those from whose spiritual vision, etc., the film, etc., has been removed see and hear wondrous things in God’s law. And notice also how human activity is conjoined with the divine working. When the man’s eyes are opened he is to look, etc.

III. The manifestations of this change.—They vary as men vary. Sometimes it is almost imperceptible, when, e.g., the subject of it has been reared in a Christian home, and is of amiable, gentle character, like a Timothy. Yet an imperceptible something will show to those nearest that there is a difference—greater earnestness, more prayerfulness, etc. And it will certainly be known to the man himself, and that most surely by one supreme test—the love of the brethren (1Jn_3:14). Yet again, as the wind not only comes in gentle breezes, rippling the lake, sighing through the forest, whispering at the chamber window, but sometimes rushes with hurricane fury, lashing the waters into storm, etc., so with some of strong nature or former great wickedness when they are born of the Spirit. But in every case the change will be evident—as the waving grain on harvest field is evidence that the seed sown germinated, etc. Has this change taken place in us? Nothing can be more important to us. Eternal issues depend upon it. Give no sleep to your eyes, nor slumber to your eyelids, until, if you have not yet experienced it, you pray with earnest desire that you may be “born again.”

A holy hour with Jesus in the silent night.—Let us seek to realise for ourselves this hour—

I. With its great inquiry (Joh_3:1-4);

II. With its wonderful instruction (Joh_3:5-12);

III. With its special reference to the Son of man, our Saviour (Joh_3:13-15).—M. Herold.

Joh_3:8. Spiritual life a divine inspiration.—Christian men have lost the belief of the apostles that God is speaking in us, witnessing in us; that we have an anointing of the Holy One. They speak instead of impressions and motives and influences, as if God were not to come into close contact with us, but were acting through these. Religious life has become a matter of self-searching into experiences, as things to be produced by exciting impressions. We no longer act as from the inspiration of the Holy Ghost; we no longer live as looking into the spiritual world. The Christian life has therefore lost much of its ancient might. But God’s Spirit is equally close, His voice equally near, though in a different way. Regeneration is impossible, apart from the direct touch and actual inspiration of God.

I. Spiritual life is a direct inspiration from God.—It is difficult to realise the fact. It is a truth out of the common range of everyday thought. This is so because we occupy ourselves so much with the outward aspects of life, and seldom enter the secret chambers of the Spirit. We feel ourselves so cold, etc., that we scarcely dare say, “I am actually touched, moved, inspired by the Almighty.” We think, too, of God as in the heavens. We forget that His presence in the heart alone begets that faith through which He reveals His glory. These words suggest two thoughts:—

1. Spiritual life is impossible apart from this inspiration.—To be born of the Spirit is to have a divine love created within, overthrowing the tyranny of the present, the sensual, the sinful, filling with heavenly hopes and aspirations, raising life above the downward, natural tendency to a life whose whole world is God and God’s heaven. Spiritual life is an elevation above the natural will, the natural inclination and tendency. And this can be produced only by the direct inspiration of the Spirit of God. For man cannot, by mere effort of his own, raise himself above the natural life. Look at Jacob, Saul of Tarsus, John the son of thunder.

2. That inspiration enters man in mystery.—We may trace the early signs of the Spirit’s power in the heart. We cannot penetrate the mystery which shrouds its origin. Man knows not when it begins, though he may know when its energy came forth in actual development. What commenced the change? Not man himself; for he knew it not till its power was felt within. So, too, sudden flashings of new meaning into old truths. What brought this about? Not man himself. Not of himself did he set out on the pilgrim path. A hand touched him, a voice called him.

II. Some of the results of realising this truth.—It would ever work a mighty change. God is brought near, prayer becomes inspired, we are freed from the spell of the material. Did we feel that this communion were ours, this inspiration, it would strengthen spiritual manhood.—Some think this doctrine enervates. They try to rouse themselves. But it rather inspires self-reverence, self-control, resistance of temptations. There is reverence for the soul in which God abides—we must watch its altar flame to keep it pure. It inspires us to work out our own salvation with fear and trembling; for it is God who works in us. It imparts nobility to character.—The man who feels the divine Spirit working within him will not waste power in multiplied professions, or in doing things to be seen of men. It gives power to our Christian hope.—All angelic possibilities lie in the fact that we have within us the Spirit of God; for to be inspired by Him, to be thus open to communion with His love, is to have the “power of an endless life.”—E. L. Hull, B.A.

Joh_3:9. The manner of the new birth.—“How can these things be?”

I. Divine grace gives the new life from above.—

1. Except a man be born from above. This indicates the source of the new life.

2. Water and the Spirit, etc.—In this our Lord reveals the nature and manner of the new birth. The symbolism points back to creation (Gen_1:2). The new creation follows an order as well as the old. The water is the symbol of spiritual cleansing; the Spirit is the element of a new spiritual life, not the spirit of human wisdom, etc., but the Spirit of God.

3. And it is only through the Son of man that this new Spirit of life comes to us (Joh_3:13), freeing us from servitude to sin, healing us, through His cross, from the poison of sin (Joh_3:14).

4. And the original height from which all this blessing flows down to men is the high summit of eternal love (Joh_3:16).

II. Faith lays hold of this divine gift.—

1. Scripture tells us that Christ has been lifted up, etc. But this does not make salvation my possession, etc.

2. But, brethren, how have you sought to make this gift yours? By your own head, heart, exertions? There is but one way: “We have believed and have known that Thou art Christ, the Son of the living God.” “If any man will do His will,” etc. (Joh_7:17); “Whosoever believeth,” etc. (Joh_3:15). Faith in the Son of God opens the door of eternal life.

3. This laying hold by faith is most natural. Suppose you seek to enter the service of some one on earth, how will you find out whether it will be a pleasant service? You can ask those who are already in it, and you can try it yourself. Ask those who have entered Christ’s service, and what is their testimony? Our Lord asked the disciples: “When I sent you without purse, etc., lacked ye any thing?” (Luk_22:35). Think of the history of the faithful—of even those who suffered for Christ’s sake, e.g. a Polycarp, etc. These old servants of Christ, grown grey in His service, testified to the blessedness of His service. And there are millions of witnesses to the same effect.

4. All have not a desire to believe. Humble yourself under the law, and you will see your need of faith, and be led to cry for it. And the cry, “Help Thou mine unbelief,” will speedily be answered.

III. The walk and conversation will bear witness to the new life.—

1. A web has two sets of threads—the warp and woof. A life has two sides: what God does for you, and what you do toward Him.

2. How does God deal with His believing ones? “God sent not His Son into the world to condemn,” etc. (Joh_3:17-18). As life begins here, so also does eternal death. God’s judgments are ever set. The stream roars loudest when it enters the sea and meets the billows; but it roars also along its course. And thus the stream of God’s judgments is ever flowing. For the unrepentant and unbelieving every calamity is a judgment, every whisper of conscience, and even the grace of God itself. It is dark in the heart when the will-o’-the-wisps of the world’s joy go out, and this darkness closes in the night of the grave, and darker night still.

3. But they who believe are not condemned. Grace and life meet them everywhere—become all their joy. They shall learn to love the Saviour more deeply—to cut away more earnestly the wild branches of the natural man. Grace is to them a cross—God’s pruning-knife. But the heart is light—it rejoices in the blessed light which streams from the throne of God; for those who believe are not condemned. This is how God deals with His redeemed children.

4. The attitude of the life toward God will also be manifest. The new-born spirit lives in Christ, and the walk and conversation are in Him, because Christ lives in them. Then there must be love to God. And their works “come to the light because they are done in God.” No cloak is thrown over the heart. The Lord is openly confessed. “He that doeth truth cometh to the light.” They must not seek to hide themselves. Thus we see how the new life is effected, how it is laid hold of, and how it manifests itself.—Dr. Fried. Ahlfeld.

Joh_3:14-15. The cross of Christ the source of life eternal.—These verses refer to a most interesting passage in the history of God’s ancient people. The narrative in which it occurs is not as Dean Stanley says, “the obscure record of a dark, confused time,” but rather the definite record of a definite event which left a deep impression on the minds of the people. Nothing could be more absurd than the conclusions stated by modern “higher critics” in reference to this incident. It is trifling with our intelligence to say that it proves that the Israelites were idolaters at the time of its occurrence, and worshipped the serpent—a cult that continued to Hezekiah’s time! (2Ki_18:4). Did the critics never hear of the holy coat at Treves, and the relic’s adoration in the Romish Church? At the time of the incident, Israel, after being refused a way through the territory of Edom, had to struggle through the barren and rock-strewn valley of the Arabah. It was a terrible march—water was scant and bad, and the people contemned the daily provided manna. They became discouraged “because of the way” (Num_21:4). And forgetting former deliverances, they murmured and rebelled. In order to teach these rebellious Israelites their dependence on God, the poisonous spotted snakes common to the region were permitted to inflict on many the burning fiery bite which gave them their name (נְחָשִׁים שְׂרָפִים), so that a number of the people died. The punishment had the intended effect. It led to reflection and repentance. Moses was ordered to erect on a pole, in full sight of the people, an image of a serpent in brass or copper; and the promise was given that when those who were bitten looked on the brazen serpent they should live. Those who did look, believing the divine promise, were made whole.

I. Our Lord in His conversation with Nicodemus took this historical incident in Israel’s history as a type of His own atoning work. The serpent has usually been taken as a symbol of sin, or the power of evil. Even in this view the type will stand; for God made Christ “to be sin for us who knew no sin” (2Co_5:21). But here rather the effect of the serpent’s bite signifies the results of sin. The sin of the Israelites was their unbelief and base ingratitude—this dread visitation their punishment. They were to learn that just as the reptile’s bite was deadly, so moral evil leads to spiritual death. Sin has introduced an element of confusion into human nature, which has turned it away from its true centre and life. In essence it is the setting up of ourselves and our own wills in opposition to the law and will of God; it leads to contemning the provision God has made for our spiritual life, and to seeking happiness in ways not His. The poison enters our veins. In place of the healthy flow of spiritual life, the elements of corruption begin their deadly work. It is a poison so subtle that it penetrates into all the powers of the soul, infects all the actions, etc. It strengthens as time passes. “Nothing grows weak with age but what will at length die with age” (South). Not so sin. Unless conquered and overcome, it daily grows and increases—a warning to those who linger on the brink of forsaking it. And if men are to be saved from spiritual death, this corrupting influence must be expelled, and a new life transfused in the nature. Men are unable of themselves to effect a cure, as Scripture and human experience tell us. Laws, education, moral teaching—all have failed—not to speak of crude attempts through sacrifice or asceticism. “None can by any means redeem his brother, nor give to God a ransom for him” (Psa_49:7).

II. There is a divine way of escape from sin.—“As Moses lifted up,” etc. In Joh_3:13 Jesus had said: “No man hath ascended,” etc. And in Joh_3:14-15, the reason of the descent of the Son of man is given.

1. Notice the divine necessity of the incarnation and offering up of Christ: “So must the Son of man be lifted up.” If men are to be saved from the power and effects of sin GOD must interpose. As at the command of God Moses set up the serpent of brass on the pole—symbol of the people’s salvation—like, yet so unlike, the source of their danger, the channel by which through faith came healing—so “God sending His Son,” etc. (Rom_8:3). He took on Him the form of our humanity, which had become corrupt and moribund; and in it as the representative of all men He triumphed over the powers of evil, bearing the penalty of sin, though Himself holy, harmless, etc.

2. The immediate means, as in the case of the Israelites, is faith. Faith forms the link between us and the source of all our hopes as we look on this representative of humanity lifted up upon the cross. The divine life and spirit in Him, source of His triumph, flow to us through faith as through an appointed channel, touching our sin-stricken souls. A new life, a new spirit from above, then interfuses and possesses us—the poison is neutralised. We become as new-born, with a nature freed from the deadly plague and quickened unto life eternal. This is God’s way of life. In view of it we may well cry with the apostle, “Oh the depth of the riches,” etc. (Rom_11:33).

III. The consideration of this truth should impress upon us two great outstanding facts.—

1. The terrible nature of sin.—The positions men occupy toward sin are very varied. Some are revelling in its pleasures, but have not yet felt its sting severely. Others have become enslaved by its power, and are filled with its misery. Others again are beginning to loathe the terrible bondage, and long for freedom. But no living man can realise all its awfulness and horror until he has viewed it in the light of the cross. When we come to understand who it was that was “lifted up” on Calvary, and for what end, then we see how eternally hateful and abhorrent sin must be to God. The Holy One was permitted, nay, was sent, to expiate it. And thus when temptation comes the redeemed man will say: “Can I do this great wickedness,” etc. Can I indulge in that to save me from the power of which the Saviour died?

2. And then there is the fact that we owe this great Redemption to the abounding love and mercy of God.—God did not forsake entirely His ancient people when they sinned. He led them to repentance. He did not forsake the whole human race, though they had wandered far from Him. Viewing their misery in the infinite depth of His pitying love, He was, in all the ages, preparing the way for the manifestation of His love in sending His Son. How could many, in view of such glorious declarations, speak in terms which implied that it was the Son’s interposition that turned aside divine wrath from sinful men! True there is divine wrath against sin, for sin cannot dwell with God; but there is also infinite love toward the sinner (Joh_3:16). “God commendeth His love toward us,” etc. (Rom_5:8).

3. Who that have thought on this mighty exhibition of divine love for their salvation can resist the power of that love, and still continue in their rebellion and alienation? With the story of that great love sounding in our ears—love mighty to save—let us turn away through God’s grace resolutely from sin, looking in living faith to Him who can save us from its guilt and power.

HOMILETIC NOTES

“Ver.

3. Born again.—The new life is called:

1. Being born again, in contradistinction to the natural birth;

2. It is called being born from above, or, born of God, because God and not man effects it;

3. It is called being born of water and the Spirit, in reference to the means through which it is brought about. The Romans observed a festival called Fontinalia—feast of fountains. They decorated the fountains with flowers and wreaths to express their thankfulness for the gift of water. By the light of nature they recognised the greatness of the blessing—that God sendeth the springs into the valleys, etc. (Psa_104:10-14). The Romans, therefore, held their springs and fountains as sacred, and believed that each was guarded by a goddess. So many Christians hold a sacred festival around the holy spiritual springs opened up in the gospel.—J. J. Weigel.

Joh_3:3. The gifts of God to the spiritually new born.—Men are not born again in order that they may sin with greater impunity, but in order to live by the power of God, and to let the spirit of His grace work within them for their renewing. The Trinity brings those gifts.

I. God the Father gives His grace and the blessedness of sonship, the assurance of His fatherly care.

II. God the Son gives His love, the fellowship of His sufferings, the merits of His work, the assurance of His true and loving brotherhood, and the participation in His heavenly inheritance.

III. God the Holy Ghost gives His blessed comfort, and the assurance of His gracious indwelling, and mighty controlling power all through life until the end.—Idem.

Joh_3:4-5. How may we know that we are “fit for the kingdom of God”?—

1. By our confession of the Person of Jesus Christ;

2. By our longing for the regeneration of our inner nature;

3. By our experience of the working within us of the Holy Spirit;

4. By our faith in regard to the testimony of Jesus;

5. By the peace and consolation we experience beneath the cross of Jesus.—J. L. Sommer.

Joh_3:5. Water and the Spirit.—“Born of water and of the Spirit,” etc. Men must be born of water and of the Spirit. This is the weighty and unchangeable condition of entrance into the kingdom of God, as our Lord shows by the repeated verily (ἀμήν). A number of expositors think the ἐξ ὕδατος has a reference to Christian baptism; and seek to set aside the objection that Nicodemus could have then no knowledge of Christian baptism, with the remark that this was designed to prepare him for the clearer knowledge of it in the near future, when the actual disclosure could not be postponed. We take our place, however, on the side of those who refer the expression ἐξ ὕδατος immediately to John’s baptism. This alone was known to Nicodemus; to it the Saviour could turn the discourse in His teaching. The baptism of John was a baptism with water (Joh_1:26; Joh_1:31); and it was a baptism of repentance for the remission of sins (Luk_3:3; Mar_1:4; Mat_3:6). This baptism had made a deep excitement among the people, which the Pharisees rather resented (Joh_1:24). It was completed also by immersion; hence the expression ἐξ ὕδατος was most appropriate for this action. It was at this baptism also that John bore witness to Christ (Joh_1:33), as He who should baptise with the Holy Ghost. By the expression Πνεύματος we are to think of the Holy Spirit. To those who in baptism have their sins taken away and forgiven, which also occurred to those who repented in the case of John’s baptism (although there is a special promise for Christian baptism), God gives the Holy Spirit, which exercises a creative energy on men, because He fills them with the divine powers of life. So Hofmann understands the passage when he says: “Water and Spirit attest the beginning of the new life: water, as the Baptist administered it, and Spirit, as he himself promised it should be given by Him who came after him. He who was obedient to the word of God as it came through John, submitted to the water of his baptism, and held himself ready to receive the baptism with the Spirit from that Jesus to whom John bare witness.” Water and the Spirit—these are the means of the new birth. Through the pardon of sin and the communication of divine powers of spiritual life the new birth comes to pass. In the following verse the water is no more spoken of, but the Spirit, because the water in the transaction of being born again (or the new birth) only removes the hindrances. The creative power comes from the Spirit. Spiritual regeneration is indispensably necessary for entrance into the kingdom of God. For the nature of that kingdom is spiritual, and man by nature is of the flesh.—J. L. Sommer.

He connects the water and the Spirit, because under that visible symbol He attests and seals that newness of life which God alone produces in us by His Spirit.—John Calvin.

Joh_3:6. Flesh and Spirit.—

1. The rose bush has thorns, and so, too, has the thorn hedge The former, however, bears lovely roses, whilst the latter only pricks and tears with its thorns. How may man be likened to these plants?

(1) Repentant children of God have their faults, and falter in their holy purpose sometimes; yet they will always be found to have heartfelt sorrow, true repentance, prayer, faith and amendment of life.

(2) Hardened and godless men, on the other hand, have only the appearance of godliness in their lives, and then only for a time. But their lives are always filled with sins and transgressions.

(3) Men are not renewed, like a piece of old worm-eaten wood, by being painted over, and made to assume as fair an appearance as possible. They are renewed through grace; the blood of Christ penetrates with its power to the innermost recesses of the soul; and each man, thus born again, receives a new name, a new life, a new power, a new mind and heart.

(4) As from a bitter fountain we cannot draw one drop that is not bitter, and as in leavened dough no part is left unleavened, thus from sinful men nothing can come that is not influenced by their sinful nature.—J. J. Weigel.

Joh_3:6-7. Three questions answered in our Gospel.—

1. What are we?

2. What ought we to become?

3. How can we attain to what we should be?—V. Stählin.

Joh_3:8. The Wind and the Spirit.—Whatever be the difficulties that lie in the way of interpreting πνεῦμα as “Spirit,” they are not to be named or numbered with the thicket of difficulties and absurdities which beset its translation and interpretation as “wind.” Even supposing we discard the context, and treat Joh_3:8 as a saying unrelated to aught that goes before it, can we for a moment imagine that so wise a teacher as our Lord would ever confuse the mind of an enquirer by using an important word like πνεῦμα in two widely different senses within the compass of a single sentence? If that is inconceivable, I ask those who say we are to read “the wind blows,” what did our Lord mean by the words, “So is every one that hath been born of the wind”? This is a specimen of the difficulties which the old translation presents.… The interpretation of Joh_3:8 must be read in the light of Joh_3:6 : “That which has been born of the Spirit is Spirit.” It contains an amplification and illustration of that statement of the ruling principle of spiritual life. The particle of comparison, οὕτως “so,” limits the likeness to manner of action. The action of spiritual life in the spirit-born resembles the action of the life of the Holy Spirit. It is free; it manifests itself in ways that appeal to the mind and conscience; it is hidden or mysterious. There is no hint here, or in any other part of the record, of an intention to show that the subject was beyond the comprehension or apprehension of Nicodemus. A rabbi, in his distinctive position, … should have had sufficient acquaintance with the revelation of the Holy Spirit, and the record of spiritual life in the Old Testament, to enable him, in some measure, to apprehend such teaching.… The dictum of Meyer, that the Spirit never “blows,” is not so destructive as it looks to the proposal to translate τνέω by “breathe.” It suggests what is, after all, only a minor difficulty of the interpretation which I advocate. In Wilke and Grimm’s Clavis Novi Testamenti, we find under πνέω, “from Homer downwards to breathe, to blow.” In classical authors (see Liddell and Scott) πνέω is sometimes used of flowers giving forth their fragrance.… This suggests a wider meaning and application of the word than is suggested by the few instances in which it is found in the New Testament. It occurs, I believe, six times, πνοή, “breath” (Act_17:25), “wind” (Act_2:2). See also Mar_15:37; Luk_23:46; Act_5:5-10. If the absence of any other instances of such a modification of πνέω in the New Testament is still put forth as an objection to the translation “the Spirit breathes,” I would then say the objectors take a more unwarrantable liberty with πνεῦμα in translating it as “wind.” More reasonable is it, on one occasion, to slightly and legitimately modify the New Testament use of πνέω, which only occurs six times, than to change entirely the meaning of πνεῦμα, which occurs as “spirit” or “breath” three hundred and seventy times. Apart from Joh_3:8, there is only One instance where πνεῦμα may mean “wind” (Heb_1:7), and the interpretation of the quotation from the Old Testament in which it occurs is still in dispute. In this passage πνεῦμα, not πνέω, is the dominant word.—Rev. John Reid in “Expository Times.” [But may not our Lord, led by the circumstances, have made a play on the word, especially when we remember that it was an Aramaic word He would use? Such use of a word in a double meaning was not unknown in the Schools.]

Joh_3:8.—“The wind bloweth,” etc.—If we do not understand what comes under the cognisance of our senses, how can we understand fully and excogitate what is far beyond all human understanding? A modest acknowledgment of our ignorance is better here than a presumptuous inquisitiveness.

1. The wind blows in the air; the Holy Spirit breathes in the hearts of those who have been born again.

2. The wind awakes those who are slumbering; the Holy Spirit awakens the slumbering soul.

3. The wind drives before it the refreshing rains; the Holy Spirit brings the rain of penitent tears.

4. The wind blows the fire into a flame; the Holy Spirit quickens the spark of faith.

5. The wind purifies the air; the Holy Spirit sanctifies the hearts of believers.—From J. J. Weigel.

Joh_3:13.—Ascending with Christ.—

1. “No one hath ascended into heaven but the Son of Man”—“and,” said Maximilianus, when this was repeated to him when he was dying, “all who believe on Him.”

2. “If thou wilt ascend into heaven, become a member of Christ” (Augustine).

ILLUSTRATIONS

Nicodemus.—As the noblest mystics proceeded from the monks of the Roman Catholic Church, from the Dominicans especially, and the great Reformer Luther from the Augustinians, so two great witnesses of the most living Christian faith, Paul and Nicodemus, were supplied to the kingdom of God by the Pharisees, a party noted for their sanctimoniousness and bondage to the letter. In the person of Nicodemus, Christ at the very outset of His ministry conquered not only a Pharisee, but a ruler of the Jews, a member of the Sanhedrin. It has been a common hypothesis in schools of theology, but without any foundation, to regard him as a spy, who at first came to Jesus with a sinister design. The sincerity of his inclinations toward Jesus is, from the first, decided; a genuine germ of faith already begins to combat his own pretensions and prejudices; otherwise he, an old man, could not resort to a young man, and, though a distinguished member of the Council, ask questions of the Galilean Rabbi as a scholar, thus putting his whole reputation in peril. We also see how this germ gradually increased in power, till perfected in the ripe fruit of faith, after passing in its development through distinct stages. But that the germ in its first form was feeble, Nicodemus plainly indicates, not only by his coming to Jesus by night, to which, no doubt, considerations of fear determined him, but also by the tenor of his language.—Lange, “Life of Chris.”

Joh_3:3. The childlike nature is of the kingdom of God.—You have the child’s character in these four things—humility, faith, charity, and cheerfulness. That’s what you’ve got to be converted to. “Except ye be converted and become as little children.” You hear much of conversion nowadays; but people always seem to think they have got to be made wretched by conversion—to be converted to long faces. No, you have got to be converted to short ones; you have to repent into childhood, to repent into delight and delightsomeness. You can’t go into a conventicle but you’ll hear plenty of talk of backsliding. Backsliding, indeed! I can tell you, on the ways most of us go the faster we slide back the better, slide back into the cradle, if going forward is into the grave—back, I tell you—back, out of your long faces, and into your long clothes. It is among children, and as children only, that you will find medicine for your healing, and true wisdom for your teaching. There is poison in the counsels of the men of this world; the words they speak are all bitterness, “the poison of asps is under their lips,” but the “sucking child shall play by the hole of the asp.” There is death in the looks of men, “their eyes are privily set against the poor;” they are as the uncharmable serpent, the cockatrice which slew by seeing. But “the weaned child shall lay his hand on the cockatrice’ den.” There is death in the steps of men; their feet are swift to shed blood; they have compassed us in our steps like the lion that is greedy of his prey, and the young lion lurking in secret places, “but in that kingdom, the wolf shall lie down with the lamb, and the fatling with the lion, and a little child shall lead them.” There is death in the thoughts of men; the world is one wide riddle to them, darker and darker as it draws to a close; but the secret of it is known to the child, and the Lord of heaven and earth is most to be thanked in that “He has hidden these things from the wise and prudent, and has revealed them unto babes.” Yes, and there is death—infinitude of death—in the principalities and powers of men. “As far as the east is from the west,” so far our sins are—not set from us, but multiplied around us: the sun himself, think you how he “rejoices” to run his course, when he plunges westward to the horizon, so widely red, not with clouds, but blood? And it will be red more widely yet. Whatever drought of the early and latter rain may be, there will be none of that red rain; you fortify yourselves, you arm yourselves against it, in vain; the enemy and avenger will be upon you also, unless you learn that it is not out of the mouths of the knitted gun, or the smoothed rifle, but “out of the mouths of babes and sucklings” that the strength is ordained which shall “still the enemy and avenger.”—Ruskin.

Joh_3:5. Our twofold nature and baptism by water and the Spirit.—We have a twofold nature—the nature of the animal and the nature of God; and in the order of God’s providence we begin with the animal. “Howbeit,” says St. Paul, “that is not first which is spiritual, but that which is natural.” Now the moment when these natures are exchanged is the moment of spiritual regeneration. A man is to be born of water, but far rather of the Spirit. Of this expression there are several interpretations: first, the fanatical one. Men of enthusiastic temperaments, chiefly men whose lives have been irregular, whose religion has come to them suddenly, interpreting all cases by their own experiences, have said that the exercise of God’s Spirit is ever sudden and supernatural, and it has seemed to them that to try and bring up a child for God in the way of education is to bid defiance to that Spirit which is like the wind, blowing “where it listeth”; and if a man cannot tell the day or hour when he was converted, to those persons he does not seem to be a Christian at all. He may be holy, humble, loving; but unless there is that visible manifestation of how and when he was changed, he must be still ranked as unregenerate. Another class of persons, of cold, calm temperament, to whom fanaticism is a crime and enthusiasm a thing to be avoided, are perpetually rationalising with Scripture, and explaining away in some low and commonplace way the highest manifestation of the Spirit of God. Thus, Paley tells us that this passage belongs to the Jews, who had forgotten the Messiah’s kingdom; but to speak of a spiritual, regenerative change as necessary for a man brought up in the Church of England is to open the door to all fanaticism. There is a third class, who confound the regeneration of baptism with that of the Spirit, who identify, in point of time, the being born of water and of the Spirit. And it seems to them that regeneration after that is a word without meaning. Of this class there are two divisions: those who hold it openly in the Church of Rome, and those who do not go to the full extent of the Romish doctrine on this subject. These will not say that a miracle has taken place, but they say that a seed of grace has thus been planted. Whichever of these views be taken, for all practical purposes the result must be the same. If this inward spiritual change has taken place at baptism, then to talk of regeneration after that must be an impertinence. But, brethren, looking at this passage, we cannot be persuaded that it belongs to the Jew alone, nor can we believe that the strength of that expression is mere baptism by water. Here is recorded that which is true not for the Jew or heathen only, but for all the human race, without exception. “Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.”—F. W. Robertson.

Joh_3:14-15. The crowning attribute of God.—The cross tells us that the attribute by which God fights against sin is His love. The very fact that Jesus Christ appeared in the flesh showed that God had made common cause with us; and the fact that Jesus died upon the cross is the declaration that upon God’s part all hindrance is removed, and that His will—yea, His yearning desire—is that men should be reconciled to Him. It is by the sunshine of His love that He melts our hard hearts. Force is no remedy. Force may break in pieces the ice, and yet every fragment remains hard: “sunshine makes it flow down in sweet water that mirrors the light that loosed its bonds of cold” The thunder of threatening may appal us, the power of God may humble us and crush us, but it is the love of God that brings back the lost, and wins the wayward heart, and quenches the fire of lust, and makes us His true children. The cross tells us that the crowning attribute of God is love. Love, as it were, is throned and sceptred, and uses all the other attributes of God as her tools and instruments. They all are but the “ministers of love, and feed her sacred flame.” God is love. This is the message, above all others, that has gone to the heart of the world.—Dr. W. Robertson Nicoll.

The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.

V

JESUS IN JERUSALEM, AND NICODEMUS AS A WITNESS OF THE FIRST POWERFUL IMPRESSION OF JESUS UPON THE PHARISEES. THE CONVERSATION OF CHRIST WITH NICODEMUS BY NIGHT CONCERNING THE HEAVENLY BIRTH AS THE CONDITION OF ENTRANCE INTO THE KINGDOM OF GOD. SYMBOLISM OF WATER, WIND, AND THE BRAZEN SERPENT.

Joh_3:1-21

(Joh_3:1-15, Gospel for Trinity Sunday; Joh_3:16-21, Gospel for 2nd Pentecost)

1[But]1 there was a man of the Pharisees, named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews: 2The same came to Jesus [him]2 by night, and said unto him, Rabbi [Master], we know that thou art a teacher come from God; for no man can do these miracles that thou doest, except God be with him. 3Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born3 again from above]4 he cannot see the kingdom of God.5 4Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? can he enter the second time into his mother’s womb, and be born? 5Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the [omit of the]6 Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God [of heaven].7 6That which is [hath been] born of the flesh is flesh; and that which Isaiah 7[hath been] born of the Spirit8 is spirit. Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye 8must be born again [from above]. The wind9 bloweth where it listeth [will], and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell [knowest not, οὐχ οῖ̓δας], whence it cometh, and10 whither it goeth; so is [it with] every one that is [hath been] born of the Spirit. 9Nicodemus answered and said unto him, How can these things be? 10Jesus answered and said unto him, Art thou a master [the teacher, ὁ διδάσχαλος] of Israel, and knowest not these things?

11Verily, verily, I say unto thee, We speak that we do know [that which we know] and testify that [which] we have seen; and ye receive not our witness [testimony]. 12If I have told you earthly [human] things, and ye believe not, how shall ye believe, if I tell you of [omit of] heavenly [divine] thing?1113And no man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the Son of Man which 14[who] is in heaven. And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness [made it a high signal for the surrounding wilderness], even so must the Son of man be lifted up: 15That whosoever believeth in him12 should [may] not perish, but [omit not perish but]13 have eternal life.

16For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should [might] not perish, but have everlasting life. 17For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn [judge]14 the world; but that the world through him might be saved. 18He that believeth on him is not condemned [judged]; but he that believeth not is condemned [hath been judged] already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. 19And this is the condemnation [judgment] that [the]15 light is come into the world, and men loved [the] darkness rather than [the] light, because their deeds were evil.16 20For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh [and cometh not] to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved [detested, discovered, shown to be punishable]. 21But he that doeth [the] truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that [for]17 they are wrought in God.

ΕXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL

[This is one of the richest and most important sections of the Bible. The sixteenth verse alone contains the whole gospel in a nutshell, or “the Bible in miniature,” and is worth more than all the wisdom of the world. The infinite love of the Father, the mission of His Son, the work of the Holy Spirit, the lost condition of man, the necessity of a new birth from above, faith in Christ as a condition of salvation, the kingdom of God, eternal life—all these fundamental doctrines are set forth by the unerring mouth of our Lord in this interview with a timid, yet earnest and anxious inquirer. The central idea of the passage is the new birth, which implies the total depravity of man and the work of divine grace. This great doctrine stands in the proper place at the beginning of Christ’s ministry.

The first miracle of Christ was a miracle of transformation, His first public act in Jerusalem an act of reformation, His first discourse a discourse on regeneration. He is not satisfied with mere improvements of the old, but demands a new life, lays a new foundation. True religion in the soul begins with a personal conviction of sin and guilt, and of the necessity of a radical change. Without such a conviction all efforts to convert a man are in vain. The night discourse with Nicodemus is the locus classicus on the new birth, as the indispensable condition of admission into the kingdom of God. It occupies a position in the Gospel of John, similar to that which the Sermon on the Mount does in the Gospel of Matthew.

It is characteristic of the idealism and mysticism of John that in his Gospel he gives no account of the institution of the church18 and the sacraments. But, anticipating the visible rite, he presents in John 3. the idea of the new birth, which is symbolized in Christian baptism, together with the idea of “the kingdom of God,” which is the internal and abiding essence of the church. So in John 6 he gives the general idea of vital union with Christ, which underlies the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper.

According to the Synoptists, Christ began His public ministry by preaching to the people: “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent ye (change your mind, μετανοεῖτε), and believe in the gospel” (Mar_1:15). According to John, He made, at the outset of His ministry,. the same demand, first indirectly, and then directly (δεῖ ὑμᾶς, Joh_3:7), upon an individual, a man circumcised, orthodox, honest, unblemished, yea, of the highest rank, a member of the Supreme Council of the theocracy, even favorably disposed to Christ and almost ready to accept Him as the Messiah, in a word, a man endowed with every personal and official claim to membership of the Messianic kingdom, yet lacking one fundamental condition: a new birth from above. Christ answers not so much to the words, as to the thoughts of Nicodemus, penetrating his heart to the very core (Joh_2:25). With historical faithfulness, John does not state the result of the conversation, because it did not appear at once, but some time afterwards (Joh_7:50; Joh_19:39).

Regeneration (ἀναγέννησις, παλιγγενεσία) is a creative act of God the Holy Spirit, whereby a new spiritual life from above is implanted in man, through the means of grace, especially the preaching of the gospel; like the natural birth, it can occur but once. Conversion (μετάνοια, which must not be confounded with regeneration) is the corresponding subjective change of heart, whereby man, under the influence of the Spirit, in conscious repentance and faith, turns from the service of sin to the service of God; this may be repeated after a relapse. Regeneration, as to its origin and mode of operation, is a mystery like the natural generation and birth, but a mystery manifest in its effects to all who have spiritual eyes to see; it meets us as a fact in every true Christian, or child of God, who is as sure of the higher life of Christ in his own soul as he is of his natural existence. The difficulties in the exposition of this passage are mainly dogmatical, and arise from the relation of regeneration to baptism, viz., whether water means baptism at all, and, if so, whether it refers to John’s baptism, or the baptism of the disciples of Jesus, or, by anticipation, to Christian baptism (which did not appear till the day of Pentecost), or the general idea of baptism in its various forms as a historic preparation for Christian discipleship; and also from the question as to the necessity of baptism for salvation. These difficulties are fully discussed below.—P. S.]

Joh_3:1. There was a man.—An important incident of the residence of Jesus in Jerusalem, exemplifying what has just been said, and introduced with the continuative δέ. [Comp. however, Text Note 1.—P. S.] Lücke [and Godet]: An example of the higher knowledge just mentioned; Tholuck: Of the weak faith just mentioned;19 De Wette: A proof of Joh_3:23-25; Luthardt: Transition from the people to an individual; Ewald: Nicodemus an exception; Strauss: Added through desire to show a believer from the cultivated world; Baur: Nicodemus a typical figure: outwardly believing, inwardly unbelieving Judaism. (On the contrary Luthardt: He is in fact a genuine disciple in disguise, see Tholuck.) The views of Lücke and Tholuck do not exclude, but meet in, that of De Wette. An example, that is to say, at once of the weak faith to which Jesus cannot entrust Himself, and of His power to discern it. Yet John has especially selected this incident also on account of its great didactic importance, and as an example of the enthusiasm which Jesus at first awakened, extending even into the circle of the Pharisees.20

Nicodemus.—A current name, first with the Greeks, then with the Jews (נַקְדִימוֹן ,נַקְדָם Lightfoot and Wetstein). Akin to Νικόλαος. Starke :“If the name be Hebrew, it is equivalent to innocent blood (נַקִי and דָּם), but if Greek, conqueror of people (the same as Nicolaus). As the Jews gave not only Hebrew, but Greek and Latin names also, to their children, both meanings at last met in Nicodemus.” The gradual unfolding of his faith appears by stages in this place, Joh_7:50 and Joh_19:39. “Tradition adds that he afterwards, having publicly acknowledged the doctrine of Jesus, and having been baptized by Peter and John, was deposed from his office and banished from Jerusalem (Photius, Biblioth., Cod. 171), but was supported in a country-seat by his kinsman Gamaliel, till his death.” Winer. Thus tradition makes him again in an unworthy mariner-keep out of sight with his faith. The Talmud mentions also a Nicodemus, Son of Gorion, properly called Bunni, who was a disciple of Jesus, and survived the destruction of Jerusalem, whose family sank from wealth into great poverty (Delitzsch, (Zeitschr. f. Luth. Theolog. 1854, p. 643). The identity is not proved. Josephus also, Antiq. XIV. 3, 2, speaks of a Nicodemus, who was sent as a legate of the Maccabean Aristobulus to Pompey. The apocryphal literature has completed the biography of Nicodemus in a Gospel ascribed to him.21

The germ of a genuine faith had to contend in Nicodemus with regard for the polite world, thoughts of his station, fear of men, Pharisaic prejudice, but, on a foundation of sincerity, conscientiousness, rectitude, and a higher fidelity even to his office, issues victorious in courageous confession and joyful offerings; and the closing words of the conversation, Joh_3:21, are plainly enough a prediction of the Lord respecting him, after a reproof, Joh_3:20, of his stealthy coming in the night as a suspicious sign. Similar characters, though they probably did not all so decidedly come out, are described in Joh_12:42.

A ruler of the Jews.—Member of the Sanhedrin [comp. Luk_23:13; Luk_24:20; Act_13:27], like Joseph of Arimathea, Joh_7:50. Of the party of the Pharisees. [ἐκ τῶν φαρισαίων. This is not mentioned as derogatory. Hengstenberg remarks that the Pharisees were specially hostile to the doctrine of regeneration and resolved religion into a self-made holiness. But the Sadducees were even more opposed to spiritual religion. A Paul could proceed from the earnest Pharisees, but not from the frivolous and skeptical Sadducees.—P. S.]

Joh_3:2. By night.22—That this is intended for a mark of weakness, is proved by Joh_3:20; and even by the particular mention of this circumstance itself, as well as by the very gradual appearing of his adhesion to Jesus.23 Koppe puts him down as a hypocrite (see Lücke), who came to question the Lord with evil intent, and who feigned simplicity; Niemeyer, on the contrary, represents his shyness as a true caution. “He was an honorable character, rather slow of nature,” says Meyer. Yet no doubt something more. An educated man of age, sitting as pupil to a young, untitled rabbi; a Pharisee, stepping free of the despotic and heresy-scenting spirit of his sect; a Sanhedrist, who soon ventures to oppose the fanaticism of the whole council; a prominent, serene-tempered, mature man of the world, who under the cross of the dead Jesus appears as a disciple, and in a costly burial-gift gives token of his unreserved and joyful devotion, and thus evinces that there were given to him and have continued with him, in his frigid school, a noble vigor of spirit, in his legal dignity a living yearning, in his high age a youthful striving, under all traditional prejudice a large ingenuousness, above all, under the whole system of Pharisaic show a sincere heart, and under all the rust of worldliness the metal of a turn for the faith and devotion of the Christian. Meyer justly observes, against De Wette and others, that the coming of Nicodemus by night does not imply that no disciples were present at the interview; and the directness of the narrative, though bearing the Johannean stamp, leads us to supppose that John was a witness.

Rabbi, we know [οἴδαμεν].—First of all, Nicodemus accords to the Lord the dignity of Rabbi, denied to Him by many (Joh_7:15); and this, considering the importance attached by the scribes to this title, is not without a favorable significance. This “we know” implies that he had kindred spirits in his circle, who acknowledged the high office of Jesus.24 Yet the word shades off, in a somewhat politic sense, from a Pluralis excellentiæ into a suggestion of an indefinite prospect of recognition by the whole Sanhedrin.25 It expresses also the self-sufficient scribe-spirit, and unconsciously betrays over valuation of knowledge and under-valuation of faith.

A teacher come from God.—Acknowledgment of an indefinite prophetic character.26—

For no man can do these miracles.—Acknowledgment of a number of accredited, important miraculous signs [ταῦτα τὰ σημεῖα, hæcce tanta signa], which Jesus had done in Jerusalem, and which, in the judgment of Nicodemus, certified Him to be a new prophet of God. Miracle a test of a prophet, but under qualifications, Deu_13:1; Deu_18:20.

Except God be with him.—The miracle proves the supernatural power which stands by the worker. False miracles might be performed through Satanic agency, Exodus 7. But the character and greatness of the miracles of Jesus made it certain to Nicodemus that He wrought them in the power of God. And this involved the further inference that He was accredited by the miracles as a prophet sent from God. The ἔρχεσθαι is significant, Joh_1:6; Joh_1:15.

Joh_3:3. Verily, verily, I say unto thee.—One of the great cardinal truths of the kingdom of heaven, solemnly introduced. The answer consists of a series of antitheses: (1) The address of Rabbi is answered by an address without Rabbi; (2) the “we know” is met with “verily, verily, I say unto thee;” (3) the word: Thou art come from above, and therefore art a teacher (from the kingdom of God), is met by the word: A man must be even born from above, if he would so much as see the kingdom of God; (4) the sign is met by the kingdom of God itself. And this antithesis runs through all: Thou wouldst know that I am a prophet, but thou still lackest the qualifications for seeing who I am, and seeing in me the personal manifestation of the kingdom of God.

Various views of the relation of the answer of Jesus to the address of Nicodemus: (1) Intermediate talk omitted (Kuinoel and others). (2) Jesus would lead him from the faith of miracles to the faith which morally transforms (Augustine, De Wette). (3) Jesus is come not as a teacher, but for the moral transformation of the world (Baumgarten-Crusius). (4) Thou thinkest thou already seest a sign of the kingdom of God; no man can see the kingdom of God, unless he be born anew (Lightfoot, Lücke). (5) Meyer: The address of Nicodemus is interrupted by Christ, and must therefore be completed from this answer. Nicodemus intended to ask: What must I do, to enter into the kingdom of the Messiah? To this Christ here gives him the answer. But (a) the hypothesis of interruption is unsuitable; better, that of hesitation; best, that of polite, skilful waiting, as if to say: What more? (b) Nicodemus was as yet hardly so far advanced as to ask what Meyer puts into his mouth. The connection is probably this: Thou thinkest that I am come from God. But ho who would even see the kingdom of God, must be more than this; he must be born from above; how much greater must be said of the Founder of the kingdom of God.

Jesus gave him to understand that he had not yet reached the forecourt of true knowledge. At least Christ’s answer confronts the proud consciousness of the address with the humbling nature of truth. And when He requires the new birth from above as the condition of seeing the kingdom of God, He means, according to the analogy of the Jewish designation of proselytes as born again (Jeramoth fol. 62, etc.), primarily: Except a man come out from the old system, become a proselyte, publicly commit himself to a new position. And in birth from above the word demands a great transition. Nicodemus would privately assure Him of the adhesion of a party of the Pharisees, implying the presumption that he would attach himself to the old order of things. Jesus demands of him a proselytism wrought by God, a coming forth from the darkness of night and of the old party, if he would have any understanding at all of the kingdom of God which he himself announces. We may still suppose that John relates only the essential, salient words, and omits intervening details; the main progress of thought, however, he has undoubtedly given, though in the color of his own contemplation.

Except a man be born from above [Ἐὰν μή τις γεννηθῇ ἄνωθεν].27 Various interpretations of ἄνωθεν: (1) Locally: from heaven (ἐκ τοῦ οὐρανοῦ); (2) temporally: afresh, from the very beginning (ἐξ ἀρῆς). Both views are adduced by Chrysostom [who himself explains the word by παλιγγενεσία]. In favor of the latter, in the sense of iterum, denuo, are the Vulgate [Augustine], Luther [Calvin, Beza], Olshausen, Neander, Tholuck [Alford, Hengstenberg, Godet]. Against it are the verbal criticisms, that ἄνωθεν, taken temporally, means not again, but from the beginning, and that the rendering again has probably arisen under the influence of the expressions of Paul in Rom_12:2; Gal_6:15; Eph_4:23; Col_3:10; Tit_3:5; and of Pet. in 1Pe_1:23. For the local explanation are Origen and many others, down to Bengel [superne, unde Filius hominis descendit], Lücke, and Meyer [also De Wette, Robinson, Baur, Bäumlein, Weizsäcker, Owen, Wordsworth]. From above, in the sense of from God, ἐκ θεοῦ. This is further favored by the consideration “that John conceives regeneration not under the aspect of a second birth, but of a divine birth, Joh_1:13; 1Jn_2:29; 1Jn_3:9; 1Jn_4:7; 1Jn_5:1.” Meyer. The ideas of being born from above or of God and being born anew are, however, in substance interchangeable, and Tholuck’s objections to Lücke, etc. [Krauth’s trs., p. 114], are untenable.

[Often as the fact of regeneration appears in the N. T., the terms for it are rare, and not near as frequent as the terms μετάνοια and others, which signify the corresponding act of man in turning to God under the regenerating operation of the Holy Spirit. The verb ἄνωθεν γεννεθῆναι, to be begotten, or born from above, i.e., from God, which is used twice in this ch. (Joh_3:6-7), occurs nowhere else in the N. T. John also uses once to be born of water and Spirit (γεννηθῆναι ἐξ ὔδατος καὶ πνεύματος), Joh_3:5, and twice to be born of the Spirit (τὸ γεγεννημένον ἐκ τοῦ πνεύματος, Joh_3:6, ὁ γεγ. ἐκ τ. πν., Joh_3:8, without the water), but the more usual phrase with him is to be begotten, or born of God (γεννηθῆναι ἐκ θεοῦ), Joh_1:13; 1Jn_2:19; 1Jn_3:9; 1Jn_4:7; 1Jn_5:1; 1Jn_5:4; 1Jn_5:18. The verb ἀναγεννάομαι, to be begotten, or born again, occurs but once or twice, 1Pe_1:23 (ἀναγεγεννημένοι οὐκ ἐκ σπορᾶς φθαρτῆς ἀλλὰ ἀφθάρτου, διὰ λόγου ζῶντοχ θεοῦ); 1Pe_1:3 (ἀναγεννήσας ἡμᾶς εἰς ἐλπίδα); comp. Jam_1:18 (ἀπεκύησεν ἡμᾶς λόγῳ ἀληθείας). The noun ἀναγέννησις, regeneration, is not found at all in the N. T. (although often in the Greek fathers), but the analogous noun παλιγγεννεσία occurs twice, once in connection with baptism, Tit_3:5 (ἔσωσεν ἡμᾶς διὰ λουτροῦ παλιγγενεσίας καὶ ἀνακαινώσεως πνεύματος ἁγίου), and once in a more comprehensive sense, with reference to the final resurrection and consummation of air things, Mat_19:28 (ἐν τῇ παλιγγενεσία, ὄταν κ. τ. λ.). Paul speaks of a new creature (καινὴ κτίσις) in Christ, 2Co_5:17, and of the new man (καινὸς ἄνθρωπος), Eph_4:24. The Rabbinical theology had a very superficial conception of the new birth and confined it pretty much to the change in the external status of a proselyte to Judaism. Hence the comparative ignorance and perplexity of Nicodemus who, being a circumcised Jew, did not feel the need of such a radical change.—P. S.]

The kingdom of God.—The fact that the phrase “kingdom of God” occurs only here and in Joh_3:5, and nowhere else in John (except Joh_18:36, the βασιλεία Xριστοῦ, which Meyer has overlooked), not only proves, as Meyer rightly observes, the independent originality of this Gospel, but also characterizes John’s view of Christianity. From his point of view John sees not the form of a universal kingdom, but the world transfigured in personal being. Lücke: John seems to have transformed the positive Jewish idea into the more abstract, and to the Greeks more intelligible formula of fellowship (κοινωνία, 1Jn_1:3), the unity of believers with God and Christ. The essential elements of the idea of a kingdom, however, come out distinctly in chapters 10 and 17, and are fully developed in the Apocalypse. On the βασιλεία τοῦ θεοῦ see Com. on Mat_3:2, p. 69. [The kingdom of God is a deeper and more spiritual conception than the church, which is the earthly training school for the heavenly and everlasting kingdom. We could not with any propriety substitute here: “Except… he cannot see the church.”—P. S.]

He cannot see.—Not even see; to say nothing of entering, being at homo therein. Meyer disputes this interpretation; comp. εἰσελθεὶν, Joh_3:5. That entrance and experience go with the seeing, must of course be understood.

Joh_3:4. How can a man be born when he is old?—Taken literally, this reply of Nicodemus supposes, an absurdity. And so Meyer, after Strauss, would take it. He admits that a Jewish theologian must have been familiar with the Old Testament ideas of circumcision of the heart (Deu_30:6; Jer_4:4), and a new heart and spirit (Eze_11:19; Eze_36:26; Psa_51:10; Psa_86:11); yet Nicodemus may have been limited in other respects; and now on meeting Jesus, become really perplexed. We might rather suppose that the good-humored old man spoke, possibly even wittily, with a double meaning.28 The first sentence may mean either: How can a Jewish Senator, an elder of the people, become a heathen proselyte? or: How can a physically old man, undergo new, fundamental, spiritual transformation ? The second sentence would then illustrate this impossibility by a physical impossibility: Can he enter the second time into his mother’s womb? The expositor must remember that the Orientals constantly express their thoughts in such similitudes. Meyer: “The ἄνωθεν he understood not as δεύτερον, but not at all.” He assuredly did understand it as an equivalent of δεύτερον, for the total antithesis is evidently implied: ἄνωθεν γεννηθῆναι, ἐκ τῆς γῆς γεννηθῆαι. Then the idea of being born from above involves that of being born anew. Various interpretations. (1) A Jew is required to make himself the same as a proselyte (wetstein, Knapp). (2) Luthardt: The beginning of a new spiritual life is not to be conceived without a new beginning of the natural. (This could not be said by one familiar with the Old Testament). (3) The demand is as unreasonable as that one should enter a second time into his mother’s womb, etc. (Schweizer, Tholuck). (4) No one can turn in mature age into a different spiritual state (Schleiermacher, Baumgarten-Crusius). Besides the two antitheses here quoted—an old man required to make a new spiritual beginning, a Jewish elder to become a proselyte—the expression contains also the intimation that an old, matured stage of the Jewish spirit could not pass into a new and different youthful life. But we still suppose that Nicodemus employs the sensuous expression in innocent good-nature, to bring out vividly, with rabbinic art, the impossibility of the requirement of Jesus.

Joh_3:5. Born of water and Spirit [γεννηθῇ ἐξ ὔδατος καὶ πνεύματος].—The next answer of Jesus has three noticeable features: (1) The imperturbable confidence expressed in the repetition; (2) The advance of the thought; the explanation of the birth from above as a being born of water and Spirit; (3) The entering into the kingdom of God, instead of seeing it. Whereupon further explanations follow, Joh_3:6-8.

[Before giving the various interpretations, we shall briefly state our own view on this important and difficult passage. The key to it is furnished by the declaration of the Baptist that he baptized only with water, but Christ would baptize with the Holy Ghost, Joh_1:33 (βαπτίζειν ἐν ὔδατι—τὸ πνεῦμα); Mat_3:11, and by the passage of Paul where he connects Christian baptism, as “the bath of regeneration” (λουτρὸν παλιγγενεσίας) with “the renewal of the Holy Ghost” (ἀνακαίνωσις πνεύματος ἁγίου), and yet distinguishes both, Tit_3:5. Comp. also Eph_5:26 (καθαρίσας τῷ λουτρῷ τοῦ ὔδατος); 1Jn_5:6 (“that came by water and blood,” after which א. B. insert καὶ πνεύματος, “not by water only, but by water and blood”); Joh_3:8 (“three that bear witness on earth, the Spirit, and the water, and the blood”). The term ὔδωρ then is closely related to, and yet clearly distinguished from, πνεῦμα, and in such connection always refers to baptismal water. It is water in its well known symbolic significance, as representing purification from sin by the cleansing blood of atonement. So water appears often already in the O. T., especially in Messianic passages. Psa_51:2 : “Wash me thoroughly from mine iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin.” Isa_52:15 : “So shall He sprinkle many nations.” Eze_36:25 : “Then will I sprinkle clean water upon you, and ye shall be clean;” to which is added, Joh_3:26, the promise of a new spirit and a new heart. Zec_13:1 : “In that day there shall be a fountain opened in the house of David and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem for sin and for uncleanness;” comp. Joh_12:10, where the outpouring of the Spirit of grace is promised at the coming of the Messiah. Nicodemus, though ignorant of Christian baptism, which did not appear till the day of Pentecost, was familiar with these passages, with Jewish lustrations, with the baptism of John unto repentance, probably also with the baptism of the disciples of Jesus (mentioned soon afterwards, Joh_3:22; Joh_4:2), and the baptism of proselytes which Jewish tradition traces back to remote antiquity. The idea which underlies all these baptisms is essentially the same. We would therefore not confine ὔδωρ to any particular form of baptism, but (with Lange, see below, No. 5) extend it to all preparatory lustrations; nor would we refer it directly to the sacrament as an external act or rite, but (with Olshausen) to the idea rather of which the cleansing with water is the symbolic expression; just as in John 6. we have an exposition of the general idea of the holy communion before the sacrament was instituted in which it comes to its full embodiment. The idea underlying all forms of baptism, is the forgiveness of sins on condition of repentance. This is the negative part of regeneration, while the new life communicated by the Holy Spirit is the positive part, or regeneration proper. So Peter in his pentecostal sermon represents the matter when he calls upon his hearers: “Repent and be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost” (Act_2:38). The chief matter is, of course, the positive part, the gift of the Holy Spirit, who is the efficient cause, the creative and vivifying agent of regeneration, and who alone can make the word and the sacrament effective. Hence the Spirit alone is mentioned Joh_3:6; Joh_3:8. The omission of water here is as significant, as the omission of baptism in the negative clause of Mar_16:16, where the condition of salvation and the reason of damnation are laid down. This is a sufficient hint that the necessity of water baptism to salvation is not absolute, but relative only. The penitent thief passed into paradise without water baptism. Cornelius was regenerated before he was baptized, and many martyrs in the early ages died for Christ before they had a chance to receive the sacrament. It is possible to have the substance without the form, the baptism of the Spirit, without the baptism of water; as it is quite common, on the other hand, to be baptized with water and have the Christian name without the Christian spirit and life. The Apostles themselves (except Paul) never received Christian baptism, for Christ Himself who alone could have administered it to them, did not baptize (Joh_4:2). In their case the pentecostal effusion of the Spirit was sufficient. We are bound to God’s appointed means of grace, but God is free, and the Spirit “bloweth where it listeth.”—P. S.]

Different interpretations of water.

(1) The water signifies [Christian] baptism (fathers, and older Lutheran divines, Meyer,29 Tholuck, De Wette).30 Baptism is λοντρόν παλιγγενεσίας as the means of cleansing, Tit_3:5; 1Pe_3:21; Eph_5:26; Heb_10:22;’ 1Jn_5:6; 1Jn_5:8. With baptism the gift of the Holy Ghost is joined, Act_2:38. Tholuck: “The water is (Joh_7:39) the symbol of the communication of the Spirit.” Yet probably in another sense. Calvin’s objection: The words would then have been unintelligible, because the baptism of Christ had not yet begun.31 Strauss: This very thing proves a later insertion [a proleptic fiction] of the Evangelist.

(2) The older Reformed divines (except Beza, Aretius), also Arminians, Socinians: ὕδωρ is a figurative term for the purifying power of the Spirit; therefore ἔυ διὰ δυοῖν.32

(3) Piscator, Grotius, Episcopius, Neander, Baumgarten-Crusius: the baptism of John.33

(4) Schweizer: the proselyte baptism, with: not only, but also—to be supplied.34

(5) Baptism in the comprehensive sense as a theocratic historical lustration in its various phases according to the degree of the development of the kingdom of God. Thus the flood even is represented as a prototype of Christian baptism [1Pe_3:20-21], Lücke alone brings forward the universal idea of baptism in its symbolical import. “Water is here, as in the baptism of John, the symbol of purification, of μετάνοια, of the essential but negative beginning of the being born of God.” It is only to be observed, first, that a merely negative beginning is inconceivable; and secondly, that the μετάνοια in question is one which completes itself by entrance into a new, higher fellowship by means of the corresponding lustration. And this lustration, of course, was not yet before Nicodemus in the Christian form, but only in the form of the baptism of John. The word refers, therefore, primarily to the baptism of John. But to this, as the lustration of its time. The word found its fulfilment in the Christian baptism, which actually asserts its character as a dividing lustration between the old world and the new. The passage is therefore to be explained from the words of John: “I baptize with water, etc.;” except that Christ makes of the antithesis a synthesis. Concretely: One must become a divinely begotten proselyte, through the medium of discipleship under John and discipleship under Christ. It cannot be objected, that John’s office is only temporary (against Meyer). As the transition is through the Old Testament into the New, so it is also through the person who closes the Old Testament to him who opens the New, to Christ. One must first become historically a Christian, receiving the lustration of Christian discipline; then, spiritually a Christian. As the condition of salvation, the two things are a concrete unit; the first not without the second, the second not without the first; yet the second, the baptism of the Spirit, the chief and decisive thing according to Joh_3:6.

Of water and Spirit.—The relation of the two.—Olshausen: The water denotes the soul purified in simple repentance, as the feminine principle, the Spirit, the masculine. (Is this a remnant of theosophy?)35 Meyer: The passage shows the necessity of baptism to participation in the kingdom of the Messiah, but only to those passing over to Christianity, not to Christian children (for which he quotes, without warrant, 1Co_7:14). Tholuck: According to the Lutheran doctrine the communication of the Spirit is not absolute, but only ordinarie dependent on baptism. The ἐκ, according to the Lutheran doctrine, denotes the causa materialis, according to Musæus, instrumentalis. Tholuck himself proposes a middle view, making ἐκ denote the visible source, the operating cause. This, however, is not a middle view, but a still stronger form of the causa materialis. Unquestionably the ἐκ with water denotes the historical means, with Spirit, the vital.—The water is the predominantly negative medium of the birth, the Spirit, the predominantly positive. In general, the birth from water might be intelligible to the Israelite from his usual lustrations, and particularly from the promises in Isa_1:16; Mal_3:3; Jer_33:8; Eze_36:25; and the birth from the Spirit, from circumcision, and such promises as Eze_36:26; Joe_2:28; Zec_12:10.

He cannot enter.—Lücke: In the nature of the case εἰσελθεῖν must be the same as ἰδεῖς; that is, have a share in the presence of the kingdom of God. [So also Meyer], Still ἰδεῖν denotes this rather in the aspect of perceiving as an object, εἰσελθεῖν, of entering into it. And this makes the expression a further development of the idea of the participation, corresponding to the further definition of the being born from above, as a being born of water and of the Spirit.

[It is from this expression mainly (οὐ δύναται εἰσελθεῖν, etc.), that the fathers inferred the doctrine of the absolute necessity of baptism for salvation, which is still taught in the symbols of the Greek, Roman, and Lutheran churches. Clement of Alexandria assumed that even the saints of the O. T. were baptized in hades before they could pass into heaven, and Augustine went so far as to exclude all unbaptized infants who die in infancy from heaven,—an inference against which all our nobler feelings instinctively rebel. Baptism no doubt is the ordinary and regular way to Christ’s church, as circumcision was to the Jewish church. But on the other hand it has always been maintained by judicious divines in all churches, that it is not the want, but the contempt of the sacrament that condemns (non defectus , or privatio, sed contemptus sacramenti damnat), and that under certain conditions the baptism of desire (baptismus flaminis), and the baptism of blood in martyrdom (baptismus sanguinis), may be a full equivalent of baptism proper (baptismus fluminis). The omission of water in Joh_3:6; Joh_3:8, implies that the Holy Spirit may produce regeneration without baptism, as He undoubtedly did under the Jewish dispensation and in the case of Cornelius; while on the other hand the example of Simon Magus proves that baptism may take place without being accompanied by spiritual regeneration. The necessity of regeneration and faith to salvation is absolute, the necessity of baptism, or any thing else, is merely relative. Only unbelief, i.e., the rejection of the gospel, with or without baptism, condemns. This is clearly taught, Mar_16:16 : ὁ δὲ ἀπιστήσας (without the addition καὶ μὴ βαπτισθεὶς) κατακριθήσεται. Comp. my remarks on p. 127.—P. S.]

Joh_3:6. That which is born of the flesh.—The σάρξ; here is the designation of human nature in its sinful tendency, antithetic to spirit. Generally John uses σάρξ for human nature as a whole. He now, at the outset, views human nature as sinful σάρξ in contrast with the Spirit (Joh_1:13, and here). But that he can conceive it also as regenerate σάρξ, appears from Joh_1:14; Joh_6:51 sqq. From this alone it follows, that he must have an idea of an original pure σάρξ; and this is evident also from Joh_17:2. Σάρξ, absolutely, therefore, is not “the material nature of man, ethically determined by sinful inclination of which it is the seat, with the principle of the sensuous life of the ψυχή” (Meyer) Σάρξ is here, as in Joh_1:13, the whole human nature, body, soul, and spirit, but under per verse dominion of the σάρξ, in the narrower sense in contrast with the ruling of the human spirit by the Spirit of God. The neuter stands for the personal, to make the expression as general as possible (Winer, p. 160). There is thus the same antithesis as in Joh_1:13. All men are flesh, in so far as they have proceeded from the natural, carnal generation, stand opposed to the kingdom of God, and need the birth from the Spirit. What, therefore, is born of the flesh is flesh, and would be flesh again, though a man could be born the second time of his mother, Besser says: “Not something in us is carnal, but everything” (see Flacius.)

That which is born of the Spirit.—The water in Joh_3:5 is omitted as less decisive, but is implied, especially in so far as the office of the water is to abnegate that which is sinful in the birth from the σάρξ in order to mediate the birth from the Spirit. The passage relates not only to a proceeding of the moral nature and life from the Spirit of God (Meyer), but to a transformation of the whole person himself by the operations of the Spirit.—Is spirit. That is: Is determined in its whole nature by the Spirit as its principle, growing towards entire spiritualization, as that which is born of the flesh is determined by the flesh as its principle, and in its abnormal development sinks into carnality, Rom_8:5. Evidently the whole sentence applies to the whole human race (not, as Kuinoel holds, to the Jews alone), and expresses: (1) The contrast between the old man and Christ as the Son of Man; (2) The contrast between the unregenerate and the regenerate (see Romans 5). Meyer: “In the conclusions respectively, the substantives σάρξ and πνεῦμα stand significantly and strongly [comp. 1Jn_4:8] for the adjectives σαρκικός and πνενματικός, and are to be taken qualitatively.”

Joh_3:7 Marvel not.—The expression of Jesus reflects the astonishment of the aged hearer. His confusion seems to pass into waiting admiration. Christ then shows him why he should not wonder, by illustrating the spiritual mystery by a mystery of nature. With great force He here brings out the word: Ye must, etc. Bengel: Te et eos, quorum nomine locutus es.

Joh_3:8. The wind bloweth where it listeth.—The comparison of the one πνεῦμα with the other, as well as the verb πνεῖ, satisfies us that the subject here is the wind, not the Spirit, as Origen and Augustine took the word. Not alone the double sense of the word (πνεῦμα, רוּהַ), but the symbolical import of the wind also occasions the illustration of the spiritual case by the natural analogy. With John, concrete, graphic circumstances always reflect themselves in high thoughts; and thus we may suppose the figure here to have been furnished by a storm or roaring wind in the night. Now first comes the question: What does the figure say? Then: What does it mean? The wind in its blowing, the air in its motion, is a type of the Spirit, because it is in fact the element of the unity and union of the diversities of the earth. It bloweth where it listeth. The personification of the wind is suggested by its unconfined, apparently free motion, as unaccountable as original, personal will. Where? Meyer presents an example of ποῦ with a verb of motion; but here the where is emphatic, the place where the wind whistles and roars in its strength.

[There are three points of comparison between the wind and the Spirit in the work of regeneration: 1) the freedom and independence: ὅπου θέλοι πνεῖ; 2) the irresistible effect: τήν φωνὴν αὐτοῦ ἀκούεις; 3) the incomprehensibility: οὐκ οἶδας, both as to origin (πόθεν) and termination (ποῦ ὑπάγει). To these might be added a fourth analogy, which, however, is not stated in the text, viz., the different degrees of power; the Holy Spirit acts now like the gentle breeze upon minds as tenderly constituted as John, Melanchthon, Zinzendorf, now like a sweeping storm or whirlwind upon characters as strong as Paul, Luther, Calvin, Knox. Hence the presumption and folly to make our own experience the measure and rule for all others. We should rather adore the wisdom and goodness of God in the variety of His operation.—P. S.]

And thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell.—Though perfectly manifest, the deepest mystery. And first in reference to the whence. Even if the general conditions of its origin be known, as they were only in part to the ancients (locality, season, heat, etc.), yet the particular actual conditions, and the precise origin of a given current, are not known. No more the end of the current, its particular actual effects. So with the Spirit, both as to its origin and its effects, in the matter of regeneration. The origin of the rustling wind of the new life-word of Christ, which stirs him, Nicodemus does not know. The wind comes down mysteriously through the Old Testament with ever increasing strength. Nicodemus has marked many things in the Old Testament, but not the rising motion of the Spirit. Still less knows he whither this mighty Spirit-current leads, out over Israel into the Gentile world, and out over the earth into the eternal heaven. Yet the Lord immediately gives to the figure a definite application. In whatever soul the Spirit of regeneration would act, there he is present all at once in his untrammelled power. The beginnings are a mystery. So the issues in the eternal life. This, too, Nicodemus did not yet know; how the Spirit had seized him, and whither it would go with him, 1Co_15:28. How some of the older theologians used this passage for the doctrine of gratia irresistibilis, while others denied this use of it, and how Calvin interpreted it, not for his system, but only as presenting the incomprehensible and mysterious in the work of the Spirit, see in Tholuck. The words concerning the wind and regeneration would evidently say: Regeneration is a thing which, both as to its origin and its goal, is a mystery of faith, but in its manifestation, especially under the preaching of the Gospel and under awakening miracles, is a mighty, unmistakable life. Faith as life is plain: life as faith is a mystery. The wind a type of divine operation; Xenoph. Memorab., 4, 3, 14. Comp. Psa_135:7; Ecc_11:5.

So is every one.—Popular phrase for: So is it with every one.

Joh_3:9. How can these things be?—Luther: “Nicodemus becomes more foolish and gets no idea of the parable.” Stier: “He now really asks, instead of contradicting.” If the question be interpreted from the advance of the discourse of Jesus, it says far more, and the πῶς is not hæsitantis, as Grotius takes it. Nicodemus asks now with the wish that such a regeneration may be possible by a power which makes water and Spirit operative. Though the wind so mysteriously comes and goes, it yet has its sufficient cause; where lies the sufficient cause for the mysterious regeneration of water and the Spirit? The δύναται having been already treated, the emphasis now is not on it, but on πῶς.

Joh_3:10. Master of Israel, and knowest not these things?—Not now a rebuke for want of faith in the power of the divine Spirit (Tholuck), but a reminder that he, as Master of Israel, ought to know the ground for the outpouring of the Spirit, to wit, the doctrine of Christ the Son of God, and His sufferings and His redeeming work.—Master of Israel. According to Scholl (see Lücke, I. p. 527) three men stood at the head of the Sanhedrin: The president (הַנָּשִׂיא), who was called, by eminence, the public teacher of the law; the vice-president, or pater domus judicii, sive Synedrii (אַב בֵּית דִּין); and the wise man (חָכָם), sitting on the left of the president. Now Nicodemus could hardly have been the president of the Sanhedrin: but he might have been “the wise man.” Yet, as Lücke remarks, this last office is doubtful, and the ideas of wise man, teacher, etc., do not coincide. Lücke, after Erasmus: “Ille doctor, cujus tam Celebris est opinio.” Nicodemus took the lead of those who desired to know concerning Jesus; so far he was the teacher of Israel. He wished to know what he was, and did not know that he was the Messiah, or what the Messiah was, as the basis of the sending of the Spirit and of regeneration. This he might know from Isaiah 11, 61.

Joh_3:11. Verily, verily, We speak that which we know.—The introduction of another cardinal truth of the doctrine of Christ the Son of God, His sufferings and His work. An intimation that it is He himself, without the declaration that it is He. That we do know. The personal certitude of Christ meeting the ignorance of Nicodemus. A plural of personal dignity, veiled in the plural of the new Christian community. The plural, therefore, does not mean simply: (1) Christ and John the Baptist (Knapp, Luthardt); (2) Christ and the prophets (Luther, [Calvin], Tholuck); (3) Christ and God (Chrysostom, and others);36 (4) Christ and the Holy Ghost (Bengel); (5) Men (Baumgarten-Crusius); (6) The universal Christian consciousness (Hilgenfeld); (7) Jesus alone (Meyer).37 “We speak that which we know,” has reference to the consciousness of Christ alone. “Testify that which we have seen,” relates to Christ and his associates, the Baptist and the disciples, who recognized in him the glory of the Son of God, [Hengstenberg and Godet include the disciples in both plurals. Godet makes some good remarks here (I p. 420), and says that the plural gives to the passage a festive rhythmical character in the consciousness of standing no more alone. It reminds one of Mat_11:25, where our Lord thanks His Father that He had revealed the mysteries of the kingdom to babes, while they are hid from the wise and prudent.—P. S.] Meyer refers ἑωράκαμεν to Christ’s having seen with God in his præ-existence. But here the præ-existence and the life of Christ form a concrete unit.

And ye receive not our witness.—The Sanhedrin had not admitted the testimony of John or the manifestation of Christ; Nicodemus himself acknowledged only the prophet in Him, and had objected to the doctrine of regeneration.

Joh_3:12. If I have told you earthly (human) things.—̓Επίγεια, in antithesis with ἐπουράνια. According to the context, the Lord evidently means by ἐπίγεια the doctrine of regeneration and its conditions, as He afterwards means by ἐπουράνια the doctrine of the Son of God, the suffering Christ, the redemption of the world. But why these terms? By ἐπίγεια we understand the truths and facts already having place on earth (ἐπίγειον, that which is found on earth),38 by ἐπουράνια (ἐπουράνιον, that which is found in heaven),39 new heavenly revelations and things. The doctrines of regeneration, of baptism, of the outpouring of the Holy Ghost, were more distinctly expressed in the Old Testament than the doctrine of their cause, the Son of God, etc.; they were in some sense already at home in Israel. For though the ἐπουράνια, before God and in idea, form the prius, and are the basis of the ἐπίγεια, yet here, as every where, the posterius comes to view before the prius in its whole, essential glory. It should be noticed that further on γῆ and οὐρανός come in the same sort of antithesis. In a theological point of view the ἐπίγεια might be compared with anthropological truths, the ἐπονράνια with the strictly theological, Christological, and soteriological.

Various interpretations.

(1) Luther, Beza, Grotius: The ἐπίγεια, are the preceding figurative expressions; therefore the ἐπουράνια, what they mean.

(2) Lücke: ἐπίγεια, synonymous with τὰ ἐν χερσίν, as in Wis_9:16;40 tangible things, lying near to men at hand [easily understood]; those ἐν οὐρανοῖς, unsearchable, remote from men41 (Tholuck: the divine counsels).

(3) De Wette, Baumgarten-Crusius: Moral things, in which the man has a receptive activity, and heavenly things, in which he bears himself with receptive faith.42

(4) Meyer, somewhat more uncertainly: What Jesus had hitherto presented, among other things the doctrine of regeneration, in distinction from what He would present in future, heavenly mysteries.43

(5) Lampe, more clearly: The earthly things, that which had hitherto been presented, because (a) the work of grace is wrought upon earth; (b) Israel had been already instructed concerning it under the economy of the law. The heavenly things, the new things which were to be presented concerning the heavenly origin of that work and the nature of the divine decree, etc., as dark things, and for the most part sremaining yet unknown.

How will ye believe, etc.—Expressing apprehension of finding Nicodemus still more obtuse to what he had yet to say. It should be observed that in both cases Nicodemus is regarded in his connection with the Jews. Just this connection makes it so hard for him to believe. The singular also should be noticed, which here comes in with great strength in contrast with the previous plural: If I tell you,—introducing what follows.

Joh_3:13 And no man hath ascended.—Now follows first the doctrine of the Son of God Himself, yet in deep, obscure hints corresponding to the indecision and incredulity of Nicodemus. The καί here must be noted at the outset. Olshausen makes it adversative (yet), Beza demonstrative (for), Baumgarten-Crusius concessive (indeed), Meyer continuative, that is unmeaning, Lücke corroborative of the preceding. Correctly, “And yet He alone can tell, ἐπουράνια, who is Himself ἐπουράνιος.” That is: And yet you must be told heavenly things by Him who, being the heavenly One, is Himself the first subject of this revelation.

Next must be observed the three significant tenses: Perfect, ἀναβέβηκεν, aorist, καταβάς, and present, ὁ ὤν. Evidently, the first proposition is founded on the second, the second on the third; therefore, conversely the third is proved by the second, the second by the first. If now the whole amounts to: The Son of Man hath ascended into heaven, the perfect cannot be taken for future, referring to the future adscensio (Augustine, Bengel, and others); nor as denoting an ecstatic raptus in cœlum, according to the Socinians; nor tropically, for the immediate knowledge of divine things, which Christ as it were brings down from heaven (Beza, Lücke, referring to Pro_30:4); still less does it say, according to Jansen, Meyer, Tholuck, and others: “Nullus hominum in cœlo fuit, quod adscendendo fieri solet, ut ibi cœlestia contemplaretur, nisi;” that is: No man hath been in heaven, but He, etc. This would reduce the matter to a mere assurance. From the miracles, which Nicodemus himself acknowledged, it should be concluded that Jesus has perfectly ascended to heaven, that is, in virtue of His moral perfection He is a new revelation, and that, the new one, which brings the kingdom of heaven down from heaven. And again from this should be inferred that He came from heaven, that is, has constitutionally a heavenly origin, became man from heaven. From this should further be inferred that He Himself in His incarnation continues one with God, in the presence of God, and thus in heaven. And from this root we pass back again. From the Godhead of Christ, and from the divine consciousness of Christ as the Son of Man, results His incarnation, and from this the new revelation which He, in virtue of His moral perfection, brings from heaven. Then the οὐρανός explains itself. “Lampe, in opposition to the doctrine of the cœlum empyreum of the Reformed theology: Generatim cœlum est symbolum rerum omnium supra nos et extra conspectum nestrum in altum evectarum. Corresponding to this is the Lutheran conception: non τοπικῶς, sed τροπικῶς sumendum, of the status majestatis divinæ (comp. Flacius, Clavis). Yet Quenstedt (III. p. 395) thinks that in the third ἐν οὐρανῷ the status beatitudinis is meant. It accords with John’s use of language simply to suppose, according to rabbinic usage, a metonymic transfer of οὐρανός, the sedes divina, to God Himself; so ἐξ οὐρανοὐ ἑρχόμενος, Joh_3:31; ἐκ τ. ον̓ρ. δεδόμενον, Joh_3:27,” Tholuck. Yet different elements are to be distinguished in the one conception: (1) The world of heavenly spiritual revelations; (2) the world of heavenly life, origin, centre, and goal; (3) the world of the heavenly glory of God, of the omnipresence. The idea of the heaven to which Christ ascends, and which expressly is to be conceived τοπικῶς, attaches itself to the second of these elements. ̔Ο καταβάς, Hunnius and others: “Descendit ratione divinæ naturæ, non quidem motu locali, sed humanæ naturæ assumtione, et voluntaria exinanitione.” The ὁ ὤυ was referred by the older theologians to the omnipræsentia, or the status beatitudinis. Erasmus, the Socinians, Semler, Luthardt quite gratuitously substitute an imperfect: ὅς ἦν. Nor does it denote, according to De Wette and Tholuck, the abiding, real manifestation of God in Christ; for the being of the Son of Man in God is to be distinguished from the being of God in Him.—The Son of Man. Intimating that those characteristics belong to the Messiah; that the Son of Man is the Messiah; and the Messiah is the Son of Man; without more particular explanation.44

Joh_3:14. And as Moses in the wilderness.—The dark expression of the divinity of Christ and His Messiahship is followed by a dark expression of the appointment of the Messiah, to suffering, and to exaltation through suffering. The connection (the καὶ) is variously taken. Meyer: The transition is “neither from the being able to communicate heavenly things to the being obliged to communicate them (Lücke), nor from the theoretical to the practical (De Wette), nor from word to fact (Olshausen), nor from enlightenment to salvation (Scholl), nor from present lack of faith to the future origin of it (Jacobi), nor from the subjective condition of the kingdom of God, regeneration, to the objective redemption (Tholuck), nor from the work of Christ to His person (Baumgarten-Crusius). Nor, we add, “from the ground for believing to the blessedness of him who believes” (Meyer himself). According to Tholuck, 7th ed., it is the transition to the communication of the ἐπουράνιον; which, however, he too evidently began in Joh_3:12. It is clearly the transition from the Son of God to the work of redemption.

The serpent in the wilderness.—Christ attaches His doctrine to the event in Num_21:8 : Moses, at the command of God, set up a brazen serpent as a standard of salvation for those who were bitten by the fiery serpents in the camp.45 Glossa ord.: “Magistrum legis ad significationem legis invitat.” Meyer recognizes only two points of comparison: (1) The lifting up of the brazen serpent, and of Jesus on the cross; 2) the being restored to health by looking on the serpent, and to eternal life, by faith in Christ. He unwarrantably rejects Bengel’s further point: Ut serpens ille fuit serpens sine veneno contra serpentes venenatos, sic Christus homo, homo sine peccato contra serpentem antiquum. But we should go still farther. As the brazen serpent, the image of the deadly serpent, was changed into an image of the remedy, so Christ, the crucified, made in the likeness of the sinner (so Luther, Bengel, Olshausen, Jacobi, Stier, Lechler,), of the deceiver of the people (Mat_27:63), of the false Christ and Antichrist (Mat_12:24; Joh_18:33), a curse (Gal_3:13) and image of sin itself (2Co_5:21), as if He were the very manifestation of the murderer of men (Joh_8:44), was made with His cross the sign of salvation, by looking upon which in faith men should be saved. The contrasts: Bad appearance, good reality; apparently poisonous, in reality wholesome; apparently overcome, made powerless, in fact victorious; lifted up apparently as a reproach, in fact as an honor. Ethical idea at the bottom of these paradoxes, and the same in both cases: Reconciliation with the image of the evil, and infinite calmness resulting therefrom through the believing look, through the πίστις. The serpent bites Him who is lifted up, who destroys it; sin has power over him who has not reconciled himself to the judgment of God, to the evil, as a remedy against the sin. The believing look upon the brazen serpent healed by calming and elevating the soul. Faith in the Crucified is the faith that Christ in the form of one condemned has transformed the judgment of God into deliverance, and the consequent, willingness to suffer the cross with Him. Wis_16:6 : σύμβολον σωτηρίας.

Of course the ὑψωθῆναι primarily means a being lifted up under suffering and shame, not, as Paulus makes it, a being glorified outright; and it darkly points to the lifting up of malefactors on the post; yet the passages Joh_8:28; Joh_12:32 involve also glorification in the death of the cross. And this is also probably (as Lechler, Tholuck, and others think) included here. Hofmann wavers between the wholly opposite ideas of elevation for exhibition (Weissagung und Erfüllung, ΙΙ. p. 143), and for putting away (Schriftbeweis, ΙΙ. p. 198). Tholuck: “A word must have been used in the Aramaic, which admitted both conceptions; and this is the case with זקף (against Bleek’s Beiträge, p. 231), which means in the later Chaldaic, as in the Hebrew, to ‘set up,’ in the Syriac, to ‘crucify,’ but also to ‘lift up,’ Targum Jer_3:2 : זְקוּפִי עֵינָךְ.” This secondary sense Bleek and, according to the impression of Hofmann (II. 1,198), also Luthardt would make in fact the only one, excluding from the passage all reference to the cross, and taking it only as saying that Christ will be, not only as humble, but also as exalted, the object of faith. But both Joh_8:28, and John’s own interpretation, Joh_12:33, put this out of the question. On the contrary the double sense is plainly suggested by the way in which Christ conceives His death as His essential δοξασμός (Joh_13:31-32); according to the sentence of Hamann, “the cross is the star with the rays taken off.” Tholuck’s exposition: “The comparison primarily offered is: Ignominious elevation made saving to believers.” The ignominious, however, does not come first in the imago of the serpent, but the appearance of the hostile and destructive.

Even so must.—The preparation of this remedy rests upon the divine counsel (δεῖ, comp. Luk_24:46). It is evident also from this passage, that Christ was from the beginning conscious of the necessity of His dying for the salvation of mankind, and of dying an ignominious death under the condemnation of men (see Joh_2:19), and that He from the beginning spoke of it; but at first only in mysterious hints. His unveiled utterances, especially to His disciples, came later. Lücke justly suggests that the must (δεῖ) does not say the death of Christ was rendered necessary by that type of the brazen serpent; still the lifting up of the serpent was made a type only because it really was a type, if not in the mind of the bitten Israelite, at least in the mind of the ordaining Spirit. In Moses, too, must have already flashed the presentiment that evil, the consequence of sin, must become the remedy for evil, the serpent’s bite be healed by the serpent’s image. The οὕτως here has peculiar force: expressing the feeling and contemplation of the infinite contrast between the glory of the Son of Man and His suffering on the cross.

Works: Buxtorf, Dissertat., the treatise: Historia. serpentis ænei; Vitringa, Observat. I. 2, John 11; Rambach, Geheimniss der chernen Schlange; Menken, Ueber die cherne Schlange, 1812. In Menken’s Works, Bremen, 1858, Vol. VI. p. 353 sqq. [Erskine, on the Brazen Serpent.]

The serpent, primarily the type of the devil, is supposed to have been, in the form of the brazen serpent which was attached to the sacred banner of Israel (?), a figure of the sanctification of the human nature of Christ perfected on the cross, and thus the brazen serpent was a symbol of salvation. The fiery serpents in the wilderness, however, were primarily the form of a divine punishment, presented in a form elsewhere denoting sin. The elevated serpent-standard was thus the type of punishment lifted in the phantom of sin, and transformed into a means of salvation. This is the nature of the cross. The look at the cross, is a look at the curse-laden One, who is not a sinner, but a divine token of evil and penalty, and of the suffering of penalty, which is holy and therefore transformed into deliverance. Reconciliation by the suffering of penalty becomes in the believing heart reconciliation with the suffering of penalty, and so salvation. It may even be said: In the form of the cross, as in the form of the serpent, the distinction between damnable sin, which the sinner did not recognize, and wholesome punishment, healing evil, in which he would see his misfortune, is made perfect and clear; and faith means purely distinguishing between bad sin and good penalty or evil. Jacobi, Stud. und Kri., 1835, p. 37; Lechler, Stud. und Krit., 1854, p. 826.

[I add here the note of Alford: “The serpent is in Scripture symbolism, the devil,—from the historical temptation in Genesis 3 downwards. But why is the devil set forth by the serpent? How does the bite of the serpent operate? It pervades with its poison the frame of its victim: that frame becomes poisoned: and death ensues. So sin, the poison of the devil, being instilled into our nature, that nature has become σὰρξ ἁμαρτίας, a poisoned nature,—a, flesh of sin. Now the brazen serpent was made in the likeness of the serpents which had bitten them. It represented to them the poison which had gone through their frames, and it was hung up there on the banner-staff, as a trophy, to show them that for the poison, there was healing;—that the plague had been overcome. In it, there was no poison, only the likeness of it. Now was not the Lord Jesus made ἐν ὁμοιώματι σαρκὸς ἁμαρτὶας, Rom_8:3? Was not He made ‘Sin for us, who knew no sin’ (2Co_5:21)? Did not He, on His cross, make an open show of and triumph over the Enemy, so that it was as if the Enemy himself had been nailed to that cross (Col_2:15)? Were not Sin and Death and Satan crucified, when He was crucified? ἔκεῖ μέν ἐπεὶ δι’ ὅφεως ἡ βλάβη, δι’ ὅφεως καὶ ἤ θεραπεία• ἐνταῦθα δὲ, ἐπεὶ δι’ ἀνθρώπου ὁ θάνατος εἰσῆλθεν εἰς τὸν κόσμον, δι’ ἀνθρώπου καὶ ἡ ζωὴ παρεγένετο. Euthym.—P. S.]

Joh_3:15. That whosoever believeth in him.—Application of the figure. The look at the brazen serpent a type of faith. The thing there to be prevented, death; here, perdition. The thing there to be gained, healing; here, salvation, eternal life. Yet the theocratic looking at the brazen serpent was not without an internal element of faith; and so, on its part, the moral salvation has its external side; it is an infinite vital development from within outward. The ζωὴ αἰώνιος, the opposite of θάνατος and ἀπώλεια; beginning with the new life of faith and love, in the spirit; already manifesting itself in this world in the healthful issues of the spirit through the ψυχή and σῶμα as a real, substantial, not merely moral ζωή; completing itself in eternity and in the appearing of Christ as δόξα and ἀνάστασις. Ζωή in the essential sense, as life from God and participation of His life in Christ, in opposition to essential death in sin; αἰώνιος, not simply the eternity of duration and of the world to come, but the eternity of the transcendent presence of all times and places, according as to their divine purport at every point, as against the ἀπώλεια, in which the man is lost not only from God and from himself, but also from time and space, to go down without bottom and without end. The divine life, or the spiritual, embracing the depth and breadth of eternity. The whosoever must here already be noted. It marks the accessibleness of the salvation to all, its individual and universal character at once, as well as the moral nature of faith (“whosoever believeth in Him.”)

Joh_3:16. For God so loved the world.—The summing up of the several preceding doctrines in a total picture of the ἐπουράνια, after the analogy of Joh_1:14, and like passages. Christology here goes back to the basis of theology; soteriology unfolds itself to the ordo salutis and to eschatology. A gospel in nuce, like the sentences of 1Ti_3:16, and others.

Through Erasmus (see Lücke, Ι. p. 543) the view has become current with later scholars, Kuinoel, Paulus, Tholuck, Olshausen, Maier, and others, that from Joh_3:16 the Evangelist continues the discussion on his own part. The disappearance of dialogue, the preterites ἠγάπησεν, ἦν, the term μονογενής peculiar to John, and the general character of the discourse, are taken to show this. But this hypothesis has been with good reason contradicted by Meyer [p. 168], Stier, Baumgarten-Crusius, and myself in the Leben Jesu ΙΙ. p. 508.46 John’s coloring is in fact admitted elsewhere; why not here? Lücke proposes a middle view. The conversation continues in Joh_3:16, narrated by John, but with the illustrative, amplifying hand of the narrator more free than before. But Kling has justly objected that this even would lead to an undistinguishable mingling of narration and reflection. Against the breaking off of the dialogue it is enough to remark, that there would be no close; in favor of the continuance of it, that all that follows is very specially appropriate for Nicodemus, and peculiarly the closing words in Joh_3:20-21. The disappearance of the form of the dialogue is expressive, showing that Nicodemus has become a willing hearer. Tholuck in support of his view cites Joh_3:31, where it is thought still more necessary to assume a continuation by the Evangelist himself. But there, no more than here and in Joh_1:16-18 [?], can an unmarked interruption of the historical narrative be conceded.

Joh_3:16 contains not merely a confirmative repetition of Joh_3:15 (Tholuck), but gathers the statements of Joh_3:13-15 into one. Here each several word has the utmost weight. The for (γάρ) bases the two preceding statements, the Christological and the soteriological, upon the love of God. The so (οὔτως) is a resonance of the οὔτως in Joh_3:14. Loved (ἠγάπησεν) denotes infinite love as the motive, the purpose, and the act of redemption, or as love, grace, and mercy. God (Θεός), the Holy in His entire antagonism to the world, the Merciful in His entire yearning towards the world. The World (κόσμος) the world of man, founded on the world of God, now lost in worldliness. Against the Jewish particularism (with Lampe: Universitas electorum).47 His only begotten Son (See note on Joh_1:14). [Here John learned the term μονογενής from Christ Himself.] Expresses the singular proof of love, 1Jn_4:9; Rom_8:32; Heb_11:17. An allusion to Abraham’s offering, Gen_22:2.48 At the same time transforming the designation Son of Man into Son of God. Gave. Combining the two ideas of the simple διδόναι (ἀπέστειλεν, 1Jn_4:9; see here Joh_3:13; Joh_3:17) and διδόναι ὑπέρ (Luk_22:19) or παραδιόναι (Rom_8:32), which appears in Joh_3:14-15. Meyer properly remarks, ἔδωκεν contained more than ἀπέστειλεν, Joh_3:17 (which itself, however, in another aspect, contains a specific idea); but when he adds, that it denotes not specially a giving up to death, but the entire state of humiliation, we must observe (1) that the preceding words [Joh_3:15] refer to death, and (2) that Christ is given to the world not only in His humiliation, but also in His glory to all eternity. That (ἵνα) marks the sole object of the sending of Christ; whosoever believeth (πᾶς ὁ πιστεν́ων) expresses at once the universal offer of salvation and the condition of it; might not perish (υὴ ἀπόληται), &c., the salvation itself in its negative and positive infinity. The alternation of the aorist [ἀπόληται] and the present [ἔχῃ] not only denotes the being lost and being saved as already beginning in the present, but also expressing, like the aorist: he gave, the actual present existence of the Redeemer.

Joh_3:17. For God sent not his Son.—A contradiction of the Jewish exclusivism was contained in Joh_3:16. Here it comes out more distinctly. Offsetting the lowly, suffering form of Christ in Joh_3:15, which is visible also through Joh_3:16, the kingly side of Christ in His work is here brought forward. Hence we have here sent instead of given; the power to judge is attributed to Him in reference to the being lost, and it is His power to save which secures for believers eternal, life. It is asserted, however, that the saving of the world is the object of His mission, not the judging. According to the Jewish Christology (Bertholdt, Christologic, pp. 203 and 223) the Messiah was to come for judgment against the heathen. Carnal interpretations of Old Testament passages like Psa_2:9; Mal_4:1; comp. Mat_3:10, had led the exclusive Pharisaic spirit to this view. This decidedly bespeaks this verse as a continuation of the conversation with Nicodemus; yet the second τὸν κόσμον is not on this account to be specially referred merely to the heathen world (Lücke and Tholuck here are not accurately represented by Meyer). The statement, however, is negative enough in its expression of the Christian universalism over against the Jewish particularism. And not only “has the thrice pronounced κόσμος something solemn about it” (Meyer), but also something doctrinally decisive against that particularism. As regards the fact that Christ is nevertheless also Judge of the world, Tholuck puts this right: A damnatory judgment was to be only an incidental result of His advent, as also in Luk_12:51. Meyer distinguishes with more dogmatic clearness between the first advent of Christ to σωτηρία, which was not a coming to judgment, because, if this were to judgment, it would bring condemnation upon all; and the second advent to judgment against those who remain unbelieving, Joh_5:22; Joh_5:27. Both views are right, but not sufficient. The first coming of Christ also brings a judgment with it (Joh_3:19), and the second has for its first feature the consummation of the σωτηρία, and the final judgment, as a judgment to condemnation, is only a revelation of the self-condemnation of the unbelieving, which began with their induration in unbelief. The difference between the Old and New Testament types of the Messiah is this: In the Old Testament the Judge becomes Redeemer by His judging (Isa_10:22; Isa_65:8, &c.; a σπἑρμα is saved); in the New the Redeemer becomes Judge by His redeeming. Acknowledgment of the need of redemption is voluntary self-judgment, repentance; rejection of redemption, unbelief, is the ideal, virtual judgment, which begins at once upon the manifestation of Christ [ch. Joh_12:48]; the establishing of the fact that the man has entirely alienated himself from the Redeemer and the redeemed, and cannot in any way have part in the final redemption, is the last judgment.

Joh_3:18. He that believeth on Him is not judged.—New Testament transfiguration of the Old Testament doctrine of salvation by faith, Genesis 15; Isa_28:16; Hab_2:4. Manifestly these words again are perfectly fitted and designed to shake the Jewish views of Nicodemus. Pharisaic Judaism had perverted the principle: The believer is not judged, the unbeliever is judged,—into the principle: The Jew is not judged, he who is not a Jew is judged. So the Roman Catholic dogma: He who is within the pale of the Catholic faith, is saved; he who is not, is damned. Likewise the old Protestant formula: He who comes in this life into the sphere of the faith of the gospel, &c. Christ, on the contrary, makes salvation dependent on an individual, personal, living faith, and perdition on decided, obstinate personal unbelief. The believer is not judged because he as a sinner puts himself voluntarily under a spiritual judgment, and thereby receives the righteousness of faith for the perfecting of his life in the sphere of salvation.

The guilt of the unbeliever is strongly emphasized as a treble guilt: He has not accepted God in His Son. He has not received the Only Begotten, in whom all the value of faith, the fulness of the manifestation of God, is concentrated. Finally he has not believed in his name, i.e. in the developed knowledge of Christ as concentrated in the sphere of His Spirit. He hath not believed (perfect), i.e. he is fixed in unbelief, and in so much as he is fixed, the fact also is fixed that he has fallen under condemnation to meet the final judgment by the sheer unfoldings of his condemnation. The antithesis is put here with all its sharpness; but not as passing upon the given unbeliever the opinion that he is fixed in his unbelief. The ideal unbeliever is condemned quia, the actual unbeliever quatenus. Tholuck: “But ὅτι gives not the external ground on which the judgment rests (Chrysostom)—for neglect of the Son of God—but the way in which the condemnation is wrought.” Yet it also gives the decisive ground; only the Son of God, in the case, is not to be conceived as external.

Joh_3:19. And this is the judgment.—The tale now, by its form, its choice of terms, turns directly towards Nicodemus, to press him to a decision and bring him to the light. At the same time, as to its matter, it proceeds to the explanation of the immoral, damnable nature of unbelief, and to the intimation that the rulers of the Jews are already further gone in this unbelief than Nicodemus suspects. Thus they are already judged. The actual beginning of the virtual judgment of the world, which from Jerusalem is spreading through the world, working outward from within, runs parallel with the unfolding of faith, till the consummation in the day of glory.

That light is come into the world.—This belongs to the judgment, because it calls for the separation, κρίσις.

And men loved.—Particular signs of this, therefore, have already come to view [see above]. While Nicodemus can still fancy that the Sanhedrin is with him inclined to faith, Christ already sees the beginning of the end. Indeed the δεῖ in Joh_3:15 is connected with this. The aorist, therefore, does not imply that a later period is in mind.

The darkness rather.—Is the μᾶλλον magis or potius? Bengel, Tholuck (“because the φῶς, Joh_1:4, which man originally possessed, prevents him from entirely mistaking the ἀλήθεια in the light”) say the former; Origen, Meyer, the latter: and no doubt rightly, because the Lord is speaking of the time of decision, at which the lesser love of the light passes into hatred of it, Joh_3:20. Before the critical manifestation of the light, it might mean magis; now it means potius. It is the decided choice of the evil, that is in view.—Because their deeds.—Αν̓τῶν placed first is significant. Far more than: They had sin. Their whole bent was to do evil, hence they needed the cover of darkness for their evil deeds. See Matthew 23.

Joh_3:20. For every one that doeth evil. Looking to those who persist in unbelief. Γάρ comes not to justify the preceding χάρ (Meyer), but to explain it and define the expression for the evil choice: ἠγάπησεν μᾶλλον. The doing evil (φαῦλα) denotes the law of the nature. The adjective denotes not only bad, cowardly, hateful, but also trifling, insignificant; and in antithesis to Joh_3:21 probably corrupt, false.—Hateth the light.—Comp. Rom_8:7. Unbelief is the root of impious conduct.—Lest his deeds.—The evil consciousness and intention of unbelief.—Should be reproved.—The ἔλεγχος, the exposure, the conviction, the condemnation of the deeds, shunned by him who through pride and cowardice will not submit to the condemnation of shame, accept the judgment of the penitent spirit, nor renounce his false deeds. Thus he chooses the darkness, i.e. the dominion of delusion, falsehood, with sense of the falsehood. Luk_3:7; Joh_8:9; Eph_5:11; Eph_5:13.

Joh_3:21. But he that doeth the truth.—A most suitable parting word for Nicodemus. If thou art and continuest to be honest, thou wilt yet come to the light. Thus a conditional promise. This, however, is the specific reference of the expression; the general truth is: The Lord gives good speed to the upright, Pro_2:7. Doeth the truth.—Meyer: That which is really moral; Tholuck; Acting in the whole spirit of his life according to objective truth. The doing of the objective truth, however, is expressed by the coming to the light. Hence the references to subjective truth. He who inwardly loves sincerity shuns deceit, is faithful against himself, and acts in this spirit (is true to the inner light), has a leaning towards the light of revelation, towards faith; he feels himself attracted by the light as the false man feels himself repelled.—That his deeds may be made manifest.—Not that he would parade them, but that he would be made certain of his actions and his spirit in the full light of moral day. “The need of moral satisfaction in itself, and of the victory of the good over the world” (Meyer).—For they are wrought in God.—This is the ground of his moral courage and striving after truth. So far as he has acted in sincere regard for the inner light, he has done his work in God. In other words, the drawing of the Father to the Son (Joh_6:44-45), the work of the gratia præveniens, is in it. The for does not mean at all, he is conscious that his deeds are wrought in God, but this direction of his doing is the unconscious ground of his courage. According to his best knowledge and conscience he has acted with inward trembling before the divine, therefore he cannot tremble before the objective light of God in the world. Calvin (with others) takes Joh_3:21 as set against Joh_3:20 only to show what the truth-loving man on the contrary would do (the ideal conception of the truth-loving man). In answer to this Tholuck: Then either all men would fall into the first class and no one would come to Christ, or the regenerate man must be intended. The Greek, Roman Catholic, and Arminian exegesis holds, according to Tholuck’s concurring statement: The good conscience, which may present its strivings, weak as they are, before Christ, whatever of darkness is still about them, however, thereby receiving its κρίσις. Tholuck refers to Joh_8:47; Joh_18:37; Joh_6:44-45; to a Synesius, to the rich young man, to the scribe, Mar_12:34. Over against this he places another interpretation: The Protestant exegesis and Augustine found this sense contrary to the analogia scripturæ, according to which a bonum spirituale before regeneration is impossible. According to Augustine, Luther, Olshausen, Stier, the ποιεῖν τὴν ἀλ. therefore must mean: “to be upright, sincere.” We cannot consider this interpretation clearly distinct from the other. It is plain that the doing of the truth here still cannot mean the doing of revealed truth. Such truth might be spoken of in the case of the Jews before Christ; hardly in the case of the Gentiles before Christ. And even though it be, the doing will be in both cases the doing of objective truth as it shines upon the consciousness. And to endeavor earnestly to conform to this truth would be, to be upright, to act according to the best of one’s knowledge and conscience. The works which proceed from this are works done in God, i.e., relatively good works, striving towards their perfection in God; comp. Rom_2:7. Thus the uprightness is not to be conceived without the fruit of such deeds, nor indeed the doing without the root of uprightness. They are wrought in God. The upright man works unconsciously under the influence of the gratia præveniens, or the Logos, and thus his works, having their starting point in God, will continually reach out towards their full manifestation in the light.

In these words Jesus seemed to say to Nicodemus: Thou art now come to Me in the night; thou wilt yet come to Me in the light; farewell, to meet again in the light.

DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL

[Comp. my introductory remarks, p. 122 f.—P. S.]

1. The interview of Christ with Nicodemus by night. Even a secret disciple Christ admits, if he be sincere, and therefore be tending towards openness. Proof in the history of Christianity: Disciplina arcani, Hugenots, etc. The contrast between a pure secrecy which works towards openness, and an openness which conceals itself in evil secrets. Regeneration itself, the subject of this nocturnal conversation, is a deep secret, which presses towards the most open manifestation in a consistent life and at the day of Christ.

2. The unwavering certainty of Christ towards Nicodemus is reflected in the posture of pure Christianity towards human hierarchy, tradition, rank, and policy. Nicodemus is better than his theology; in theology he is the type of a rationalizing supernaturalism; in character he is an inquiring child involved in the prejudices of old age.

3. Christianity is not merely a purer, newer life, but life absolutely pure and new. [Still less is Christianity mere doctrine, although doctrine is included in life. Luther explains Joh_3:3 : “My teaching is not of doing and leaving undone, but of a radical change in the man, so that it is not new works done, but a new man to do them; not another life only, but another birth.” Alford: “Our Lord replies, It is not learning, but life, that is wanted for the Messiah’s kingdom; and life must begin by birth”—P. S.]

4. Regeneration is the fundamental condition of seeing and entering the kingdom of God.

5. Regeneration, a birth from above. See the exegesis, Joh_3:3. (1) The counterpart of the carnal birth (see Rom_5:12 sqq.); (2) the glorification of pure natural birth as it would have been in paradise; (3) the fulfilment of the typical Old Testament regeneration, represented by circumcision; (4) the groundwork of the future great regeneration in the resurrection and the regeneration, the palingenesia, Mat_19:28.

6. The media or elements of regeneration: (1) The historical and symbolical: washing with water; (2) the active and real: the Spirit.—Of water and Spirit the first creation (Genesis 1); of water and Spirit the second and higher. [But in the first creation, the Spirit brooding over the waters; in the new, the water signifying and sealing the Spirit. In the old, the Spirit applying the water, moulding it to its purposes; in the new and higher, the water applying the Spirit.—E. D. Y.]

7. Christian baptism: (1) The glorification of water; (2) the fulfilment of the symbolical washings, the baptism of John, and the baptism of the disciples of Jesus. (3) the goal of the historical types, the flood and the passage of the Red Sea; (4) the fellowship of the baptism of Jesus with water in the Jordan; (5) the fellowship, the symbol and sacrament of the baptism of Jesus with blood (Rom_6:6); (6) a separation through Him and with Him out of the old world and from it.

8. The Spirit which accompanies baptism: (1) The glorification of the vital air, the blowing wind, the storm at night (as also of fire, Acts 2; see Psa_104:4; Eze_1:4; Eze_37:9; Dan_7:2; Hag_2:6); (2) the fulfilment of the symbolical and typical Spirit—breathings: inspirations, trances, visions, single words and works of the Spirit.

9. Water and Spirit inseparable in the ground-work of the kingdom of God. The word and the sacrament, accompanied by the quickening Spirit.

10. The birth of the new life a deep mystery and the most open manifestation, 1Ti_3:16.

11. The necessity of being born again of water and the Spirit, and its apparent impossibility, v. 1–8. The possibility, the conditions and basis of it, v. 9–16. The basis of the regeneration to be realized on earth lies in the heavenly origin of Christ: His eternal, divine generation, and His heavenly, divine-human birth. This birth is consummated, as to its historical process, in His elevation on the Cross and His death upon the throne of glory, by His atoning death and His victory. And the basis and unity of both lies in the love of God and His giving of His Son for the redemption of the world.

12. The earth, in Scripture, the symbol of the theocracy, of divine institution and administration upon earth, of the historical tradition of salvation, Psa_93:1; Psa_104:5; Rev_13:11. As distinguished on the one hand from the sea, emblem of the swelling, formlessly moving life of the nations, Psa_93:3; Dan_7:3; Rev_13:1. On the other hand from the heavens, emblem of the future kingdom of heaven, the completed revelation of God, Isa_64:1; Mat_3:16.

13. Christ descending and ascending between heaven and earth, because He is in heaven. On His eternal, divine-human constitution and office rest (a) His descending, His incarnation and humiliation, (b) His ascending and exaltation.

14. The brazen serpent the most obscure and the most pregnant mystery of the Old Testament typical system. See the exegesis, v. 14. Its connection with the symbolical use of the serpent in general in the Scriptures.

15. The condition of the appropriation of salvation, faith, and the consequent twofold operation of salvation: redemption and condemnation. Deciding for Christ by faith, secures redemption; deciding against Him by unbelief, begins condemnation (see 1Co_1:18; 2Co_2:16; comp. Deu_30:15).

16. The condition of susceptibility to faith: Sincerity, subjective truth, i. e., obedience to the gratia præveniens. Inward falsehood the source of unbelief, a poison which perverts the form of faith itself into hypocrisy.

17. Yet sincerity or uprightness (Pro_2:7; Ecc_7:29; Joh_1:47) not to be confounded with proud bluntness or downrightness, which way very easily strike over into self-deceit and falsehood. Uprightness moreover, even in company with diffidence, and notwithstanding its timidity, in constant submission to the guidance of God, or through the obedience of truth, issues in the gladness of confession and the light. (Moses, Jeremiah, Calvin,49 like Nicodemus, originally timid characters, but faithfully sincere.)

18. The Pharisee Nicodemus a fore-runner of the Pharisee Paul. [Both alike sincere, but very unlike in energy and decision.—P. S.]

19. The Pericope for Trinity.50 See Strauss [late court-preacher of the King of Prussia and Prof. at Berlin]: Das evang. Kirchenjahr, p. 279. Braune: This account is the gospel for Trinity. The feast arose upon this doctrine, not upon an eternal divine fact (—yet the triune God reveals Himself here through His act as triune God in the triune operation of the new birth—). The church feared that the people might be led by the Christmas festival in honor of the All-Merciful, the Easter festival in honor of the Conqueror of the power of darkness, and Pentecost in honor of the All-Sanctifying Spirit, to worship three Gods in the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. (It no doubt had also a more joyful motive). Strauss distinguishes four periods of the Trinity festival. First period: The day of the feast not yet distinctly prominent. Second period: The trichotomy of the church year makes the feast the octave and appendix of Pentecost (“little Pentecost “). At first Festum omnium sanctorum. This festival Gregory III. or IV. transferred to the 1st November; the Sunday after Pentecost at first became again the Pentecostal octave, while in the East it continued to be All Saints’ day. Third period: Formerly a Trinity festival had been celebrated on the last Sunday of the year; now this is transferred to the octave of Pentecost. Gradual development in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, in which the feast of Trinity becomes the prelude to Corpus Christi.51 Fourth period: Protestant settlement of it as neither a prelude nor a close, but a festival for the opening of the second part of the church year, the Trinity season. On the changes of the pericopes, see Strauss, p. 282.

HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL

See hints already given under the two former heads. What is true of every section of the Bible, is true in a peculiar degree of this: It is homiletically inexhaustible. Many a single verse forms a theme of itself; Joh_3:3; Joh_3:5-6; Joh_3:16, etc.—If we would treat it in larger sections, we must first embrace the whole.

The sacred discourse of the Lord with Nicodemus by night concerning the sacred mysteries of God’s night: (1) Concerning the divine night of regeneration in the soul; (2) by means of the divine night in the operation of means of grace; (3) on the basis of the divine night (Weihnacht, “holy night,” as Christmas is called in the German) of the incarnation of Christ; (4) decided by the divine night of the death and glorification of Christ; (5) all proceeding from the divine night of the purpose and love of God for the redemption of the world; and (6) unfolding its complete operation in the decision between the divine morning of eternal salvation, and the night of judgment.—The conversation of Christ with Nicodemus concerning the being born from above: (1) Concerning the necessity of it (in order to see the kingdom of God), Joh_3:1-4; (2) concerning the effecting of it (through water and the Spirit), Joh_3:5-8; (3) concerning the conditions precedent for the possibility of it; (a) objectively: the incarnation of the Son of God, His passion: both resting on the purpose of divine love; (b) subjectively: faith in the love of God in giving Christ; (4) concerning its decisive operation; (a) saving, negatively: deliverance from corruption, death, perdition; positively: the gift and possession of eternal life; (b) condemning: manifestation of the self-judgment and self-condemnation of unbelief.—Awaking to a Christian life of faith, a birth: (1) A regeneration, or second birth, as distinct from the first; (2) a birth from above, as the perfect, real birth for the eternal kingdom of God.—How Christian earthly things, the personal experiences of the Christian, are rooted in Christian heavenly things, the mysteries of God.—Water and wind, the fundamental elements of the first creation, emblems of the second.—Christianity the most hidden life, and at the same time the most manifest.—The conversion of Nicodemus, or Christ the Saviour even of the great of this world.—And the Saviour of an honest Pharisee.—The being born from heaven alone leads to heaven.—Twice, the number of life: (1) Twice to be born; (2) twice to die; (3) twice to live.—A ruler of the Jews and the King of the Jews, or the hierarch and the Lord.—The heavenly birth and the heavenly eye.—Water and the Spirit.—Wind and the Spirit.—The voice of the wind and the course of the wind.—The newly born: A breath of the Spirit, manifested by its sound.—The knowledge of Nicodemus and the knowledge of Christ.—The threefold relation of Christ to heaven: (1) The inner heaven; (2) the upper heaven; (3) the open heaven.—The serpent emblem, and the emblem of the Crucified.—The elevation in supreme judgment.—God so loved, etc., (Joh_3:1) the infinite scale of the love of God.—Condemnation, despised salvation.—Unbelief, the second and irremediable fall.—Unbelief, sin in its desperate form, as the root, the sum, and the denial of sin. Unbelief once decided, judgment begins.—The false man and the sincere.—The shunning and the seeking of light. The works of the upright strive as shoots of light towards the light of day.

The Pericope for Trinity, Joh_3:1-15. The Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost active and manifest in the work of regeneration.—The experience of the Christian an experience of the Holy Trinity; (1) Of the Spirit, in the virtue of the word and sacrament; (2) of the Son, in the virtue of the death and resurrection of Christ; (3) of the Father, in the virtue of manifested, world-embracing love.

The Pericope for 2. Pentecost, v. 16–21. The love of God for the world, the motive to the divine consummation of the world: (1) In the redeeming gift of the Son; (2) in the testing operation of the Spirit.—The redeeming motion of the love of God in its all-embracing majesty: (1) Comprehended in the gift of the Son, and therefore embracing the world (Jews, heathen, etc.); (2) directed to each lost individual, and to all, as a power of salvation; (3) embracing depth and height (death and life) to raise sinners from perdition to the eternal life of heaven; (4) a redeeming operation so decisive that, embracing heaven and hell, it is manifest both in the condemned and in the saved (in the one as love despised, in the other as love believed); (5) embracing beginning and end, manifest in a process of grace having its root in the election of grace passed upon all the children of truth (gratia præveniens), and its top shining in the light of eternal glory.—Christianity not in any wise a condemnation: (1) Neither in its source (the love of God), (2) nor in its design (the sending of Christ); (3) nor in its operation (the believer is not judged, the unbeliever has judged himself).—The gift of the Son a precursor of the outpouring of the Spirit.—The mysteries of darkness and the mysteries of light in the world, as all brought into day by the light of Christ.

Starke: Examples of notable converts are worth recording, that the goodness of God may be magnified, and others may be encouraged. Those who sit in the highest ranks and the most honorable offices, should think more of their human misery than of their elevation and dignity in the world.—A man, though living in the most hardened condition. (Pharisæism), may nevertheless be converted.—Rank, office, and fear often stand in the way of conversion; but happy they who value more the salvation of their souls, and overcome those hindrances.—Majus: Not all nocturnal meetings for edification are suspicious and to be forbidden.—Fear a great hindrance to goodness.—Osiander: The weak in faith must not be despised.—Lange: The ground of the necessity of regeneration lies in the nature of God and of man.—The doctrine of regeneration must be diligently pressed, 1Co_2:14.—The scruples of scholars.—Tit_3:5.–1Pe_Joh_3:21.—The patience of Christ with the weakness of man, and His friendly care to remove all doubts and scruples, are a model for us, 1Jn_3:9; 2Pe_1:4; Rom_8:5.—Zeisius: All that proceeds not from spiritual regeneration, be it never so pure and brilliant in its glitter, is nothing to wards salvation, and cannot please God.—The nobility of the regenerate: raised to the highest ranks of heaven, Col_3:9-10.—Majus: The senseless astonishment of unbelief is good for nothing, but before the sublimity of the divine mysteries one loves in reverence to wonder.—The same: The grace of the Holy Ghost is free, not bound either to means, persons, or times.—Canstein: As often as we hear the wind, we ought to think of the mystery of regeneration, Job_37:9.—Art thou a master, etc. The true heart-theology is not always to be found among people of great titles and places.—God so loved (v. 16). So overflowingly and so intensely, and after this manner and in this order. The love of God the first and true source of all our blessedness.—Believers must, it is true, stand before the judgment, but they come not into judgment.—Bibl. Wirt.: Faith alone is the means of salvation; therefore unbelief is the sole cause of damnation.—The blame lies with men, Hos_13:9.—Hedinger, on the words: Every one that doeth evil: Wickedness shuns the light, yet it must come to the light.—Zeisius: Could the stones and beams of many a palace and dwelling speak, what abominations, wrought in secret, should we not hear! Yet that great day of judgment will make manifest every hidden thing, as truly as God is God.—Osiander: Many would rather in eternity be put to shame before God, angels, and the elect, than blush a moment before a few people in the world.

Gerlach: A chief point of corruption in the doctrine of the Pharisees of that day was their entirely outward conception of the law, and their consequent utter mistaking of the relation of man to God. The deep, sinful corruption of human nature and the necessity of a regeneration were to all purpose utterly hidden from them. If, therefore, they would partake of the salvation which Christ brings, they must clearly perceive the need of it.—At all events Nicodemus hoped to find out whether the kingdom of God was soon to appear; that he, in that case, was to have a share in that kingdom, he had no doubt.—Jesus shows him that the kingdom of God, which he was expecting as future and external to himself, was already inwardly present; but not yet for him, because this required an entire transformation and renewal of the mind.—The baptism with water was an emblem of repentance under the law, grief for sin; the baptism with the Spirit denotes the operation of the renewing, inwardly transforming power of the grace and truth of God in Christ Jesus. To the water baptism of John (which Jesus continued by His disciples), he therefore says, must be added the Spirit-baptism of the Messiah, which was promised by John himself.—Every force produces its like. If a man should even be bodily born a second time by an external miracle, he would remain the same.—The Spirit, the eternal, almighty, all-creating and all-renewing divine life which is in God and is God Himself, by partaking of which man, against and above nature, is renewed to holiness and to victory over the world and death.—Christ was begotten of the Holy Ghost, and those who believe in Him are children of God by the same Spirit—The beginning of good works is the confession of evil works.

Lisco: Regeneration is necessary in part on account of the constitution of the spiritual kingdom to which the man is to belong, in part on account of the natural state in which the human heart is found, which is flesh (Luther’s Marginal Note).—The two parts: Word and Spirit, belong together, as in wind the two things: sound and blowing.—Faith and unbelief as the inner ground of the opposite fates of men.—Braune: Nicodemus came to Jesus by night. If not through cowardice, at least through delicate self-love and regard for his associates in rank and office. Yet he came, and had much to overcome: riches of earthly goods, riches of reputation and power, riches even of virtue and righteousness.—Gideon’s act in the night, Jdg_6:27.—2Co_5:17.—Every soul has its determination either to rise to glorification in the clear light of the divine Spirit, or to sink into the perdition of the curse, and God would that every soul should be born again not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth forever, 1Pe_1:23.—Rieger: Christ leaves Nicodemus time to take root and bear fruit.

Heubner; Noctes Christianæ more than Noctes Atlicæ.—The danger of worldly honor. He who stands high in the world, must be at unspeakable pains to become small and humble.—The miracles a legitimate ground of belief in the divine mission of Jesus.—Nicodemus here stood in the fore-court of conversion.—A man is always only one thing, ruled either by the flesh, or by the Spirit (there is, however, a stage of transition, Romans 7). Nothing more astonishes and offends an unconverted man, than to say to him: Thou must beradically changed. The doctrine of the Father, the Son, and the Spirit, as the sum of Christianity: (1) God the Father, full of severity and love, has founded a kingdom for which man is destined; (2) for this fallen man needed regeneration by the Spirit; (3) this he now receives through Christ, by faith in Him.—Love of sin prepossesses against truth.—Here is to be found the Christian conception of those who are really obscurantists.—Often the opinion steals in, that the inward alone (that is, what is kept back, shut up,) makes the Christian. When Victorinus (so Augustine relates), deeply moved by reading the Holy Scriptures, said confidently to Simplicianus in Rome: “Know that I am already a Christian,” and Simplicianus answered: “I will not believe it, nor count thee among the Christians, till I see thee in the church of Christ.” Victorinus laughed and said: “Do the walls then make a Christian?” But afterwards, fearing Christ might not confess him, unless he confessed Christ, he suddenly came to Simplicianus and said: “Eamus ad ecclesiam, Christianus volo fieri” (August. Conf., John 2, § 3, 4). Swift held his family worship with his servants in perfect secresy, merely to avoid suspicion of hypocrisy (see his Life of Sheridan). Learn to rise above the judgment of the world; be not ashamed of your better principles.

Schleiermacher: In every one the beginning of the divine working can no more be determined, than the end of it can be descried.—Even those whom we may compare to the master of Israel, have continued but too long in that which could be the property and benefit of only a particular age or a small part of the Christian Church; and they had not been able to rise above this narrow horizon, and view the work of grace in its whole grand compass; and just by reason of this, they have led believers astray.

Joh_3:16-18 : The great object of Christ’s mission. He appeared among us as a (the) token (token and seal) of the love of God, the object of faith, the universal possession of all men.—Besser, on the brazen serpent: Jesus the life of my life, Jesus the death of my death.—Nitzsch: The mystery of our spiritual regeneration: (1) The necessity of it; (2) the possibility of it; (3) the actuality of it.—Hosbach: The new birth: (1) What is it? (2) How does it arise? (3) Whither does it lead?—O. v. Gerlach: The glorification of the triune God in the regeneration of man.—Kling: The being born of the Spirit, on the one hand manifest, on the other hidden as to its origin and end.

[Burkitt: ‘Tis not enough that we be new-dressed, but we must be new-made, that is, thoroughly and universally changed, the will by renovation, the affections by sanctification, the life by reformation. We must be like God, or we can never live with Him. If we be not like Him in the temper of our minds on earth, we can never be happy in the enjoyment of Him in heaven; for heaven, which is a place of the greatest holiness, would be a place of the greatest uneasiness to an unregenerate and an unholy person; the contagion is universal, deep, and inward, therefore such must the change be.—The way and work of the Holy Spirit in the soul’s regeneration, is oft-times very secret, and usually exceeding various. Various as to the time. Some are wrought upon in youth, others in old age. Various in His methods of working: Some are wrought upon by the corrosives of the law, others by lenitives of the gospel. Various in the manner of His working, and in the means by which He works: Upon some by a powerful ordinance, upon others by an awakening Providence. But the Spirit’s work in all still the same, it produces likeness to God.—Ryle: What a feeble beginning a man may make in religion, and yet finally prove a strong Christian. Never despise the day of small things (Zec_4:10).—What a mighty change our Lord declares to be needful to salvation, and what a remarkable expression He uses in describing it.—A day will come when those who are not born again will wish that they had never been born at all.—Augustine (on Joh_3:15): The bite of the Serpent brought death; the death of Christ brings life Look at the Serpent, that the Serpent may not harm you. Look at death that death may not hurt you. But at whose death? At the death of Him who is the Life. Death died in Christ, so that we may now say: “O death, where is thy sting,” etc.—Luther: Henceforward, he who is condemned must not complain of Adam, and his inborn sin. The seed of the woman, promised by God to bruise the head of the serpent, is now come and has atoned for sin and taken away condemnation. But he must cry out against himself for not having accepted and believed in the Christ, the devil’s head-bruiser and sin-strangler. If I do not believe the same, sin and condemnation must continue.—Lavater (Joh_3:16): Jesus means one who creates joy and happiness. He who views Jesus otherwise than as a bringer of joy, the gospel as anything else but a message of joy, suffering as anything but a fountain of joy, knows neither God nor Christ nor the gospel. God is love, and love can only love. God is the living will of love. Love is pure joy and makes happy all who come in contact with it.—P. S.]

Footnotes:

[1]Joh_3:1. [δέ after ῆν seems to imply that Nicodemus was not one of those to whom Christ did not trust Himself, Joh_2:24; for He opened to him the profoundast secrets of the kingdom of God. It may be, however, merely continuative=and.—P. S.]

[2]Joh_3:2.—The Recepta reads πρὸς τὸν Ἰησοῦν, against which there are decisive authorities, particularly A. B. “Beginning of a section and a lesson.” Meyer.

[3]Joh_3:3. [γεννάω means usually to begat (of the Father), Mat_1:2 ff. and often; hence ὁ γεννήσας, the father; rarely to bear, to bring forth (of the mother), as Luk_1:57. God or the Holy Spirit produces the higher spiritual life; hence begotten from above, would perhaps better express the idea; comp. Joh_1:13; 1Co_4:15; Phm_1:10; 1Jn_2:29; 1Jn_3:9; 1Jn_4:7; 1Jn_5:1; 1Jn_5:4; 1Jn_5:18; Heb_1:5; Heb_5:5.—P. S.]

[4]Joh_3:3. [ἄνωθεν, מֵעַל, the reverse of κάτωθεν, and equivalent to ἐκ τοῦ οὐρανοῦ, from heaven, Joh_3:31; Joh_19:11; Joh_19:23; Mat_27:51; Mar_15:38; Jam_1:17; Jam_3:15; Jam_3:17, or ἐκ θεοῦ, from God, comp. Joh_1:13; ἐκ τοῦ πνεύματος, Joh_3:6; Joh_3:9, which may be taken as the true explication. If the temporal sense be preferred (in which Nicodemus misunderstands it, Joh_3:4); comp. Luk_1:3; Gal_4:9, it should be rendered anew, afresh (from the root, entirely new) rather than again. Tyndale: boren a newe; Cranmer; boren from above; Geneva: begotten againe; Rheims: borne againe; Conant: born again; Alford: born anew, with a marginal note: or, from above; Young: from above; Vulg.: renatus fuerit denuo; Luth.: von neuem geboren werde; Ewald: von vorne an (i. e, ganz von neuem) geb. wird. See the Exegesis.—P. S.]

[5]Joh_3:3. [βασιλεία τοῦ θεοῦ only here and Joh_3:5 in John, but in Joh_18:36 Christ speaks of His kingdom. The Synoptists use for it more frequently the term βασ. τῶν οὐρανῶν, which John never employs unless it be in Joh_3:5. (See note 7 below.—P. S.]

[6]Joh_3:5. [The absence of the article both before ὕδατος and πνεύματος should be noticed. It gives to the two agents a generic character, and favors a more comprehensive interpretation of water than that which confines it to a particular kind of baptism, Jewish, Johannean, or Christian. See Exeg. Notes.—P. S.]

[7]Joh_3:5. [Instead of the text. rec. βασ. τοῦ θεοῦ, which is retained by Tregelles, Alford, Westcott and Hort, and others, Tischendorf (ed. 8.) reads βασ. τῶνοὐρανῶν on the authority of א1 and the still older Euseb. Orig., Hippol., Iren., and Just. M. Irenæus (Fragm. 35) quotes tho passage literally thus: καθὼς καὶ ὁ κύριος ἐφη, ἒαν μή τις, κ.τ.λ., είς τ. βασ. τῶν οὐρανῶν. Justin M. (middle of the 2d cent.), Apol. I. c. 51 (ed. Otto, I. p. 144), cites less accurately from memoryΚαὶ γὰρ ὁ χριστὸς εἶπεν. Ἄν μὴ ἀναγεννηθῆτε (instead of ἔαν μή τις γεννηθῇ), οὐ μὴ εἰσέλθητε (instead of οὐ δύναται είσελθειν) εἰς τὴν βασιλείαν τῶν οὐρανῶν. Chrysostom also, in his homilies on John 3, reads several times βασ. τῶν οὐρανῶν. The change from this into the received reading may be traced to a desire to conform to Joh_3:3.—P. S.]

[8]Joh_3:6. [Here and in Joh_3:8 the article is used before πνεύματος, and of course should be retained in the translation.—P. S.]

[9]Joh_3:8. [The double meaning of the Greek πνεῦμα, and the Hebrew רוּחַ, wind and spirit, suggested this analogy.—P. S.]

[10]Joh_3:8.—Lachmann: ἤ ποῦ, or where, according to A., the Vulgate, and other versions, Armenian, Arabic, Syriac, and several of the fathers The καί, therefore, arose probably from tho need of a proverbial form of the sentence. [The usual reading κ α ὶ ποῦ, and where (whither), is retained by Treg., Alf, Tischend. on the authority of א B. L. T., etc., also Ignatius Ad Philad. c. 7.—P. S.]

[11]Joh_3:12. [Literally the earthly things—the heavenly things: τὰ ἐπίγεια—τὰ ἐπουράνια.—P. S.]

[12]Joh_3:15.—Lachmann: ἐπ’ αὐτόν, according to God. A.; Tischendorf: ἐν αὐτῳ, according to Cod. B. and others. Theodoret and Cod. L. read ἐπ’ αὐτῷ; Meyer is for ἐν αὐτῷ, and proposes to connect this with ἔχη. Against this is the parallel Joh_5:16. Probably the above variations are efforts of the catholic spirit to sharpen the idea of faith; εἰς αὐτόν being a more general conception.

[13]Joh_3:15.—Μὴ ἀπόληται, ἀλλ’ is wanting in [א] B. L. J., and many others. It is omitted by Tischendorf [Treg. Alf.], and put in brackets by Lachmann. It has probably been taken from Joh_3:16.

[14]Joh_3:17. [Κρίνειν, to judge, is used, not κατακρίνειν, to condemn, here and Joh_3:18, and ἡ κρίσις, Joh_3:19. The E. V. is not consistent in the rendering of κρίνειν, κρίμα and κρίσις, using alternately to judge, to condemn, to damn, yet in the great majority of cases to judge. Κατακρίνειν is seventeen times translated to condemn, twice to damn.—P. S.]

[15]Joh_3:19. [τὸ φῶς, the true personal Light, Christ, comp. Joh_1:4-5; Joh_1:8-9. The importance of the definite article is obvious. The E. V. retained it in Joh_3:20, but dropped it here—one of its innumerable inconsistencies.—P. S.]

[16]Joh_3:19.—The order: αὐτῶν πονηρά [instead of πονηρὰ αὐτῶν].

[17]Joh_3:21. [ὅ τ ι assigns the reason for the preceding intention. See Exeg.—P. S.]

[18][The term ἐκκλησία never occurs in John’s Gospel and first Epistle, though repeatedly in his third Epistle, and in the Apocalypse. In the Gospel and first Epistle the ideal side of the church prevails, in the Apocalypse the real, empirical, because it is there represented in its historical conflict with the powers of darkness.]

[19][So Hengstenberg, and Alford: One of the believers on account of Christ’s miracles, ii. 23. Bengel: Ex iis, de quibus c. ii. in fine; sed nonnihil melior multis.—P. S.]

[20]Treatises on the section: Knapp, Scripta varii arg. I., p. 183 sqq; Fabricius, Commentat. Gott. 1825; Scholl, in Klaiber’s Studien V. 1, p. John 71: Jacobi, Stud, und Krit. 1835, 1. Hengstenberg, Evang. Kirchen-Zeitung, 1860, No. 49. [A large number of English tracts on Regeneration (mostly doctrinal and practical) are noticed in Malcom’s Theological Index (Boston, 1869) pp. 396, 397.—P. S.]

[21][The Evangelium Nicodemi comprises the Acta Pilati and the Descensus Christi ad inferos. See Tischendorf, Evangelia Apocrypha, Lips. 1853, pp. 203–412, where the whole is given in Greek and Latin.—P. S.]

[22][Bengel remarks to νυκτός: “Nunquam non recipit Christus ad se venientes.”—P. S.]

[23][Augustine: Quamvis ad Jesum venerit, tamen quia nocte venit, adhuc de tenebris carnis suæ loquitur. Hengstenberg: The night is mentioned as a symbol of the darkness of the mind of Nicodemus (Joh_11:10; Joh_13:30). Bettor: He came in the dark from fear of public opinion. Yet he came, which is far better than not coming at all The remark does not exclude company. John and other disciples of Christ were probably present at the interview, Ewald conjectures that also Nicodemus had some attendants with him.—P. S.]

[24][Bengel: Ego et mei similes, principes potius, quam Pharisæi, xii. 42. Huic plurali respondet pluralis, Joh_3:7.—P. S.]

[25][Comp. here the note of Alford. Stier thinks that Nicodemus, in using the plural, concealed his own conviction, so as to be able to draw back again if necessary. Rather farfetched.—P. S.]

[26][The word διδάσκαλος seems to imply a cautious inconsistency. The expected Messiah was a king, and never regarded “as a mere teacher till the days of modern Socinianism.” Alford].

[27][Bengel: “Sermo indefinitus, quem Nicodemus tamen recte ad se applicat, comp. Joh_3:7, vos.” This passage was already quoted in the middle of the second century by Justin M. See Text. Note 7. The idea of some modern hyper-critics that the author of the Gospel should have borrowed from Justin is simply ridiculous.—P. S.]

[28][Godet finds in the words of Nicodemus no absurdity, but a good-natured irony, une bonhomie un peu ironique. This hardly suits the seriousness of the occasion. Nicodemus speaks comparatively. A moral new birth in an old man seems to him as impossible as a second natural birth.—P. S.]

[29][Meyer: Baptism is meant as the causa medians, the Holy Spirit as the causa efficiens of regeneration. He thinks that no other but Christian baptism can be meant because it is connected with the Holy Spirit.—P. S.]

[30][So also Hengstenberg, Godet, Webster and Wilkinson, A. Barnes, Owen (who explains: except ye receive the rite of Christian baptism). Hooker, as quoted by Wordsworth, remarks: “Of all ancient writers there is not one to be named who ever expounded the text otherwise than as implying external baptism.” Wordsworth, who follows the fathers into all their allegorical fancies, has a curious note here to show what an important part water occupies in the Gospel of John. Christ just came from the water, Christ turned water into wine, Christ presents Himself as the water of life (John 4.), Christ does nothing without water, etc.—P. S.]

[31][True; but Nicodemus understood from the lustrations of the O. T. and the public baptism of John, the general idea of baptismal purification which culminated in Christian baptism; and besides Christ spoke not only to Nicodemus, but through him to all men and all ages. J. C. Ryle (of the evang. party of the Church of England), in his Expository Thoughts on John, urges six arguments against the usual interpretation, especially because the reference of water to baptism would imply the regenerate state of all the baptized and the absolute necessity of baptism for salvation. But this is reasoning from dogmatical inferences which are not justified either by the context or the analogy of Scripture. Christ clearly demands, besides baptism, the new birth of the Spirit, and lays the main stress on this (Joh_3:6; Joh_3:8), as He does on faith, Mar_16:16, as the indispensable condition to salvation. See below.—P. S.]

[32][Calvin: Of water, which is the purifying Spirit, so that water and Spirit mean the same thing, as Spirit and fire, Mat_3:11. Coccejus: Gratia Dei, sordes et vitia abluens. Lampe: Obedientia Christi. Grotius: Spiritus aqueus, i.e., aquæ instar emendans. But in view of the facts that John baptized, that Christ Himself was baptized, that His disciples (Joh_4:2) baptized in His name, it seems impossible to disconnect water from baptism. Calvin’s interpretation arose from doctrinal opposition to the R. Catholic over-valuation of the sacrament, which must be guarded against in another way. Godet, of the Reformed Church of Switzerland, correctly remarks (i. 408): “il est impossible de ne pas prendre le mot eau dans son sens naturel et de ne pas l'appliquer au baptême.”—P. S.]

[33][This view is also held by Bengel, Hofmann, and Dean Alford; yet by the latter so as to allow for a wider application to Christian baptism, which certainly should not be excluded. After showing that ὔδωρ must mean baptismal water, Alford goes on to say: “This being then recognized, to what does ὔδωρ refer? At that time, two kinds of baptism were known: that of the proselytes by which they were received into Judaism,—and that of John, by which, as a preparatory rite, symbolizing repentance, the people were made ready for Him who was to baptize them with the Holy Ghost. But both these were significant of one and the same truth; that namely of the entire cleansing of the man for the new and spiritual life on which he was to enter, symbolized by water cleansing the outward person. Both were appointed means,—the one by the Jewish Church,—the other, stamping that first with approval, by God Himself,—towards their respective ends. John himself declared his baptism to be incomplete,—it was only with water; one was coming, who should baptize with the Holy Ghost. That declaration of his is the key to the understanding of this verse. Baptism, complete, with water and the Spirit, is the admission into the kingdom of God. Those who have received the outward sign and the spiritual grace, have entered into that kingdom. And this entrance was fully ministered to the disciples when the Spirit descended on them on the day of Pentecost. So that, as spoken to Nicodemus, these words referred him to the baptism of John, which probably (see Luk_7:30) he had slighted. But they were not only spoken to him. The words of our Lord have in them life and meaning for all ages of His Church: and more especially these opening declarations of His ministry. He here unites together the two elements of a complete Baptism which were sundered in the words of the Baptist, Joh_1:33—in which united form He afterwards (Mat_28:19-20; Mar_16:16) ordained it as a sacrament of His Church. Here He speaks of spiritual Baptism, as in John 6 of spiritual Communion, and in both places in connection with the outward conditions and media of these sacraments. It is observable that here, as ordinarily (with a special exception, Act_10:44 ff.), the outward sign comes first, and then the spiritual grace, vouchsafed in and by means of it where duly received.” The objection to a reference of ὕδωρ to John’s baptism is, that Christ after manifesting Himself as the Messiah could not well have made the baptism of His forerunner a condition of admission to His kingdom. In this case He would have said at least οὐκ ἐξ ὕδατος μόνον, ἀλλα καί, not only of water, but also and chiefly of the Spirit.—P. S.]

[34][This is entirely inapplicable to Nicodemus, who was a Jew in full communion. Besides it is not quite certain, although probable, that the Jewish proselyte baptism existed before Christ. Comp. Schneckenburger, Ueber das Alter der jüd. Proselytentaufe und deren Zusammenhang mit dem johanneischen und christlichen Ritus, and Herzog’s Encycl., vol. XII., p. 245.—P. S.]

[35][Olshausen refers for illustration to the brooding of the Spirit of God over the waters of the deep in the first creation, which in a certain sense is repeated in every new birth; hence the regenerate is called a new creature, 2Co_5:17.—P. S.]

[36][Stier: The three Persons in the Holy Trinity. But ἐωράκαμεν suits neither God the Father nor the Holy Spirit.—P. S.]

[37][Lücke, De Wette. So also Alford, but in a proverbial rather than rhetorical sense.—P. S.]

[38][Comp. 1Co_15:40; 2Co_5:1; Php_2:10; Php_3:19; Jam_3:15; Sap. Joh_9:16.—P. S.]

[39][Comp. Mat_18:35; 1Co_15:40; 1Co_15:48; Eph_1:3; Php_2:10, etc.—P. S.]

[40][A striking parallel: καὶ μόλις εἰκάζομεν τὰ ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς καὶ τὰ ἐν χερσὶν εὑρίσκομεν μετὰ πόνου, τὰ δὲ ἐν οὐρανοῖς τίς ἐξιχνίασε. But in this passage the earthly things belong to the order of nature, while in our passage the Lord distinguishes between earthly things and heavenly things in the sphere of religion and revelation.—P. S.]

[41][So also Reuss, Hist. de la théol. christ. t. II., p. 427. But ἐπουράνια never has this meaning.—P. S.]

[42][Similarly Godet: les choses dont vous pouvier constater en vous-mêmes la realilé, and on the other hand les secrets du ciel qu’il faudra croire uniquement sur ma parole.—P. S.]

[43][Regeneration, says Meyer (5th ed. p. 162), though originating in heaven, takes place on earth and so far belongs to the category of the ἐπίγεια. He includes in this, however, all that Jesus had hitherto told the Jews (ει̇͂πον ὑμῖν), as distinct from the ἐπουράνια, i.e., the Messianic mysteries and divine counsels in regard to the redemption of the world. Hengstenberg essentially agrees with Meyer (I.197). Alford takes the earthly and the heavenly things to mean the same mysteries but viewed under two aspects, either as occurring on earth and among men, or as having their origin in the divine counsels.—P. S.]

[44][Alford remarks against the figurative explanation of this passage: “Hebrew metaphors are founded on deep insight into divine truth; these words in fact express the truths on which Hebrew metaphors are constructed.” As uniting in Himself God who dwells in heaven, and man who dwells on earth, Christ was always both in heaven and on earth, the golden clasp of both. Augustine: Ecce hic erat et in cœlo erat: hic erat in carne, in cœlo erat divinitate, natus de matre, non recedens a Patre. Augustine adds that in some sense all true Christians partake of this double existence. Tales fecit discipulos suos. Paulum audi apostolum dicentem, nostra autem conversatio in cœlis. Si homo Paulus apostolus ambulabat in carne in terra et conversabatur in cœlo, Deus cœli et, terræ poterat esse et in cœlo et in terra.—P. S]

[45][Num_21:8 f: “And the Lord said unto Moses, Make thee a fiery serpent (שָׂרָף, Sept. ὅφιν χαλκοῦν, Vulg. serpentem. æneum, brazen serpent) and set it upon a pole: and it shall come to pass, that every one that is bitten, when he looketh upon it, shall live. And Moses made a serpent of brass, and put it upon a pole, and it came to pass, that if a serpent had bitten any man, when he beheld the serpent of brass, he lived.” Here we have two kinds of serpents, 1) the living, poisonous serpent whose bite is deadly—image of sin; 2) the dead, brazen serpent without the poison—a symbol of Christ and His salvation. He was made “in the likeness of sin,” yet without sin. (Rom_8:3; 2Co_5:21; 1Pe_2:24). This furnishes the first point of comparison: the brazen serpent and Christ. The other two points are the elevation to the pole—to the cross, and the healing effect, which in the O. T. was physical and temporary, in the N. T. is spiritual and permanent. The Hebrew saraph is so called, from the red spots on its skin, or from the burning effect of its poison which is like a consuming fire: hence certain serpents were called by the Greeks πρηστῆρες and καύσωνες. Moses took not a living serpent, but a dead image of it, which had the appearance, but not the poison of a serpent, and acted as a healer instead of a destroyer. In Egyptian theology the serpent is the symbol of healing, and in Sap. Joh_16:6, it is called σύμβολονσωτηρίας. In the Bible it is primarily the symbol of the devil, of sin and death, from Genesis down to the Apocalypse (Joh_20:2 : τὸν ὅφιν τὸν ἀρχαῖον ὅς ἐστι διάβολος). The physiology of the serpent aids in understanding its agency in the fall. A. F. Krummacher (the father of the celebrated pulpit orator) gives the following unique and suggestive description of this mysterious reptile: “The serpent, a beast like to an embodied thunderbolt that has had its origin in the deepest night, parti-colored, painted like fire, as black and dark as night, its eyes like glowing sparks, its tongue black, yet cloven like a flame, its jaws a chasm of the unknown, its teeth fountains of venom, the sound of its mouth a hiss. Add to this the strange and wonderful motion, ever striving like a flash to quiver, and like an arrow to flee, were it not hindered by its bodily organization. It appears among the beasts like a condemned and fallen angel; in the heathen world of false gods, it hath found and still finds ever awe and adoration; its subtlety has become a byword, its name a naming of Satan, whilst the popular feeling, even now, as in all times past, connects a curse and exorcism with its appearance.”—P. S.]

[46][Also by Alford, in loc., who well sums up the chief arguments. The Dean justly remarks, that it would give us a very mean idea of the honesty or reverence of the Evangelist to suppose him capable of attributing to his Master words and sentiments of his own invention. Of the two examples which are quoted on the other side, Joh_1:16 is not to the point, for the whole prologue is John’s, and Joh_3:31 ff. is disputed, see notes there. In any case John could get such words and ideas only from his divine Master, and would not have ventured on expressing them without authority from Him—P. S.]

[47][To confine κόσμος to the mundus electorum (as is done by supralapsarian Calvinists, and the Swiss Formula Consensus), is to destroy the beauty and force of the passage which is to bring out the boundless love of God to all His creatures. God hates nothing; that He has made, and Christ died for all, but the benefits of His death are available only to those who accept them by faith. World means in the Scriptures and in popular language 1) the whole universe; 2) the earth; 3) all men (so here); 4) the present order of things as distinct from the future world; 5) the ungodly world, in opposition to the kingdom of God, and as subject to Satan, who is called “the prince of this world” (Joh_12:31). But it never means the elect or the saints, which would be just the reverse of the last mentioned signification. If it had this meaning here, Christ might have said: “God so loved the world … that the world (instead of whosoever believeth) might not perish.” The universality of God’s love and the all-sufficiency of Christ’s atonement (which, however, must not be confounded with its actual efficiency) is most clearly taught here and in such passages as 1Ti_2:4; 2Pe_3:9; 1Jn_2:2 (which illustrates our passage): “He is the propitiation for our sins; and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world.”—P. S. ]

[48][So also Stier, Hengstenberg, and Alford. Nicodemus, in being reminded of Isaac’s offering, was reminded of the love required, the substitution made, and the prophecy there uttered to Abraham, to which ἵνα πᾶς ὁ πιστεύων nearly corresponds. Comp. Heb_11:19; Gen_22:16.—P. S.]

[49][Calvin says of himself (Præf. ad Psalm.); “Ego qui natura timido, molli et pusillo animo me esse fateor,” and he fairly trembled when Farel, as by divine authority, detained him in Geneva as his proper field of labor.—P. S.]

[50][Trinity Sunday is the first Sunday after Pentecost or Whitsunday. It commemorates the mystery of the Holy Trinity, and closes the festival part of the Christian year. It is of Latin origin and cannot be clearly traced beyond the tenth century. The Greek church (from the times of Chrysostom) celebrates on the same Sunday the feast of all Saints and Martyrs (which in the Latin church falls on the first of November). The Lutheran and Episcopal churches have together with the other great festivals retained Trinity Sunday. The discourse with Nicodemus is the gospel for the day, because regeneration is the work of the Holy Spirit and the basis of Christian life.—P. S.]

[51][The feast of transubstantiation, which, of course, is rejected by all Protestant churches. It is celebrated in the Roman church with unusually solemn processions on the first Thursday following Trinity Sunday (feria quinta proxima post octavam pentecostes), with reference to Maunday Thursday, as the day of the institution of the Eucharist. In German it is called Fronleichnamsfest. i. e., the feast of the Lord’s body.—P. S.]

Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures (Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical), ed. John Peter Lange, English translation edited by Philip Schaff (1864–1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

CHAPTER 8

REGENERATION THE GREAT SINE QUA NON

Joh 3:1-21. “There was a man of the Pharisees, whose name was Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews; the same came to Him by night, and said, Master, we know that Thou hast come a Teacher from God; for no one is able to do these miracles, which Thou art doing, unless God may be with him.” On the road from Jerusalem to Joppa, I passed through the city of Ramlah, now quite prosperous, with a population of eleven thousand, and a large element of Jews and Christians. It is on the Mediterranean plain, about fifteen miles from the coast. My dragoman told me that the current tradition points out that city as the home of Nicodemus. He was not only a learned Jewish rabbi, but, as we see here, he was a ruler — i.e., a member of the Sanhedrin. Now that Jesus has properly entered upon His official Messiahship, the purification of the temple being His initiatory administration, He is preaching incessantly, and doing many mighty works, of which only a small proportion have been put on record by the four inspired penmen. It has been the privilege of Nicodemus, at this early period of His ministry, to hear Him preach and witness His mighty works. That he is already under a powerful conviction is very clear from his admissions, and I have no doubt but he is this day a member of the blood- washed throng, though we have no direct record of his conversion. Learning, wealth, office, social position, ecclesiastical emolument, all conspired against him. However, when our Savior is on trial he ventures to speak in His vindication. Finally when He was cruelly murdered, Nicodemus gets bold, comes to the front, side by side with his rabbinical comrade, Joseph of Arimathea, and takes a most active part in the interment, furnishing a hundred pounds of valuable Oriental aromatics for the embalmment of the mutilated body of Jesus, thus boldly confessing Him in His death.

“Jesus responded and said to him, Truly, truly, I say unto thee, Unless any one may be born from above, he is not able to see the kingdom of God.” “Man” in E.V. is not a correct translation of the indefinite pronoun tis which means every human being that ever has had an existence or ever will. Thus it is a sweeping and unequivocal abnegation of every human soul from the kingdom of God without this new birth from heaven. The statement of our Savior is absolute and unexceptional. “Again” is not a good translation of another, which simply means from above, affirming the absolute necessity of receiving Divine life from God out of heaven, administered by the Holy Spirit. Without this great intervention of the Almighty, heavenly hope is but the ignis fatuus,

“Whose delusive ray Lights up unreal worlds, And glows but to betray.”

It is only this heavenly nature that can even discern the kingdom of God. Hence, unregenerate people are utterly ignorant of God’s kingdom, having all sorts of fantastical ideas about it, thinking it is the visible Church, or ecclesiastical rites and ceremonies, or something else, manipulated by Satan to augment the delusion and certify the damnation. “Again” in E.V. has led to the conclusion that the spiritual birth must always follow the natural, which is incorrect, and in that case would consign to perdition infants dying unborn; whereas the true reading, “from above,” is as clear in case of prenatal regeneration as the postnatal.

“In Adam all die, but in Christ shall all be made alive” (1Co 15:22),

involves the conclusion that every human being died in Adam, and shall be made alive in Christ. When God created Adam, He created the whole human race, as there never was but one creation, Eve being no exception to the rule, but a transformation from Adam’s rib. The theology frequently preached from popular pulpits, that infants do not need regeneration, and may be so brought up that they will go to heaven without it, is not only flatly contradictory of the Savior, but it throws wide open the Church door, and invites the devil to come in and run it. All human generation is in Adam the First, and consequently locked fast in spiritual death. “Christ tasted death for every one.” (Heb 2:9.) The original, pantos, means every human being that ever has existed or ever will. You see in the Gospels of our Savior how He not only recognizes unsinning infants as members of His kingdom, but even holds them up for model members.

How is this? Whereas the whole human race fell in Adam, the propagation of the species on earth has always been in Adam the First. Adam the Second is the antithesis of Adam the First, the two running as parallel lines throughout the Bible, both representing the whole human race — the latter in grace, and the former in sin. Now, remember this grace is Omnipotent, always taking effect when not resisted by human agency. Before the age of accountability, the will has no power to resist the saving grace of God. As this grace is for “every one,” so soon as soul and body united constitute personality, this redeeming grace normally prevails, administering life to the dead soul. Of course, this is prenatal. Consequently, by the grace of God in Christ, and not by original purity, every human being is born in the kingdom of God, and only gets out by sinning out, as we see in the case of the prodigal son; both being born in the Father’s house — i.e., the kingdom of God — the younger sinning out, and the elder staying in. This explains our Savior’s treatment of infants as model members of His kingdom. God’s time for people to be converted is before they are old enough to commit sin, as He has certainly made no provision for sin; and in that case, infantile justification would never be forfeited. Then in what would the conversion consist? Of just what it means — i.e., a turning — as regeneration does not take away depravity, that being the prerogative of sanctification. Consequently all infants are born with depravity in their hearts, which does not condemn them, as it was transmitted to them without their volition; but it turns their faces away from God and predisposes them to go into sin. So here is the infant, born in the kingdom, with his face away from God. If let alone, when it reaches responsibility and starts off in its own way, it will go directly off, out of the kingdom, like the prodigal son. We should tell it about God, and its need of a Savior, and preach Jesus to it; get it convicted and genuinely converted — i.e., get it turned round and introduced to the Savior, that it may get acquainted with Him, receive the brightness of His countenance and the redeeming benedictions of His grace, and showers of blessing falling upon its infantile heart, rivers of love springing up; it will then spontaneously start Out in the track of Jesus, heaven-born, and heaven-bound. Every adult sinner is a backslider, like the prodigal son at the hog-pen, and the thing for him to do is to come back to his Father’s house, where he was born.

“Nicodemus says to Him, How is a man able to be born when he is old? Is he able to enter the second time into his mother’s womb and be born?” While Nicodemus was a great, learned, and influential preacher in the true Church of God, he was utterly ignorant of first principles; not only unsanctified, but unconverted. Doubtless his succession in the present age ought to be named “Legion.” The great trouble with Nicodemus was his materialistic doctrine, thinking that the new birth had something to do with his body. His successors this day identify water baptism with the new birth, thus making it a physical rather than a spiritual transaction. They certainly ought to profit by the mistake of Nicodemus, which our Savior so faithfully and decisively corrected. “And Jesus responded, Truly, truly, I say unto you, Unless any one is born of water and the Spirit, he is not able to enter into the kingdom of God.” The Holy Spirit is emblematized frequently in the Bible by water, wind, fire, and oil. That water in this passage symbolizes the Spirit, and typically includes water baptism, we do not call in question; but exhort all of our readers to fully satisfy their conscience on that subject. (1Pe 3:21.) But that our Savior here means literal water, unless it be in this mere symbolic sense, just read on into the next chapter, where there is so much more said about water; the woman at Jacob’s Well thinking He meant the water in the well, but Jesus Himself correcting her misapprehension by stating that it is the water of life about which He is speaking, — and you have the problem solved. Every one must be born of this living water and the Holy Spirit.

“That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.” The word here translated flesh, in E.V., is sarx, which is antithetical, not to the human spirit, but to the Holy Spirit, soma being antithetical to the human spirit. Hence sarx in this verse is a spirituality homogeneous to Satan, and dominating the body of fallen humanity. Perhaps this verse would be better understood if it should read:

“That which is born of depravity is depravity, and that which is born of the flesh is flesh.” “To be carnally minded is death, but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. Because the carnal mind is not subject to the law of God: for it is not able to be. Those who are in the flesh are not able to please God.” (Rom 8:6-8)

In these forcible Pauline Scriptures, the word in each verse translated “carnally,” “carnal,” and “flesh,” is this word sarx in the text. Hence, you see it means carnality, the carnal mind, depravity, original sin. In the fall, the Holy Spirit evacuated the human spirit, Satan succeeding Him by his own nature — i.e., depravity. Hence the virus of the original sin is transmitted in all human generation, just like the poison of the rattlesnake; pursuant to which recognized fact, John the Baptist and Jesus call unregenerate humanity, “Generations of vipers.” It is impossible for the stream to rise above the fountain; therefore fallen humanity can never regain an inch of lost ground without a merciful Divine intervention.

“Marvel not that I said unto thee, It behooveth you to be born from above.” This sentence follows a logical sequence from the preceding. All the culture of the universities, all the genius of the ages, and the royal blood of a thousand dynasties, can never add an iota of spiritual amelioration to fallen humanity. You dress up the gorilla like a king, and still he is a groveling animal. The Divine nature must come down from heaven, by the intervention of the Holy Spirit, and enter the fallen human spirit, in order to elevation a solitary iota. “You must be born from above” carries with it an emphasis, veracity, and force which earth and hell combined can never gainsay. Theologians may dodge it, ignore it, and explain it away; but still it stands, like a Popocatepeti, between every soul and heaven.

“The Spirit breathes wheresoever He willeth; and you hear His voice, but you do not know whence He cometh, and whither He goeth; so is every one who has been born of the Spirit.” It is really astounding that the E.V. has “wind” in this passage. It is really inconsistent with itself, translating pneuma “wind” at the beginning of the verse, and “Spirit” at the conclusion. The English reader is doubtless surprised to learn that the very same word, pneuma, at the beginning of this verse, translated “wind,” also occurs at the end, where it is translated “Spirit.” Now, bear in mind that pneuma is the word constantly occurring for the Holy Spirit, and so translated; while anemos is the word for wind, but does not here occur. It is a significant fact that, while pneuma occurs so very frequently in the New Testament, being the word constantly used to reveal the Holy Spirit, this is the only passage in which the E.V. translates it “wind.” In connection with this exalted theme, so astounding and paradoxical to Nicodemus, with all his learning, our Savior in this verse beautifully alludes to the Divine sovereignty: The Spirit breathes where He willeth; i.e., this heavenly birth, which is indispensable to salvation, is wrought by the Holy Spirit in the human spirit pursuant to His own sovereign will, of course responsive to the human conditions of repentance and faith in case of adults, but indiscriminately to all human spirits the moment personality obtains, responsive to the universal redemption of Christ. The reason why the world goes headlong to hell, is because they do not hear the voice of God, whose solution is the fact that dead men do not hear anything, and all are spiritually dead till quickened into life by the breath of the Almighty, when the Holy Spirit breathes into the human spirit the Divine life. “And thou hearest His voice.” The moment the Divine life enters the human spirit, the senses of the soul — i.e., sight, hearing, smelling, taste, and feeling — spring into life, so that you actually hear the voice of God. “But thou dost not know whence He cometh nor whither He goeth;” i.e., no one can possibly know the mysterious movings of the Holy Spirit. Frequently we see many at an altar, seeking: here one uses, with shining face, and testifies to the life that comes down from God out of heaven; while others, here and there, remain dumb.

“Nicodemus answered and said to Him, How are these things able to be? Jesus responded and said to him, Art thou a teacher of Israel, and knowest not these things? Truly, truly, 1 say unto thee, We speak what we know, and testify what we have seen, and you receive not our witness.” Jesus here severely, though lovingly, reprimands Nicodemus for his gross ignorance of the most prominent truth in the Bible, especially considering the fact that he was a teacher in Israel. When I crossed the Atlantic Ocean the second time, I became well acquainted with a very learned, highly cultured, genteel Roman Catholic priest, who, having been liberally educated in America, had spent four years in the Vatican College at Rome, and much reminded me of Nicodemus, as we conversed freely on Scripture, religion, and Christian experience, and he expressed inutterable astonishment when I told him that there was something in regeneration besides water baptism. Doubtless Nicodemus has multitudes of gospel sons, in the ministry of the present day, as ignorant of regeneration as he was — to their shame and confusion, because they are teachers in Israel, standing in the pulpits to teach the people what they themselves know not.

“If I told you things upon the earth, and you believed not, how will you believe if I tell you things in heaven?” Regeneration for sinners and sanctification for Christians are mighty and mysterious works of the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven, but to be received in this life; i.e., they are performed, not in heaven, but upon the earth. This entire life — probationary is but a beginning of an immortal career, that shall sweep on, accumulating new beauty, luster, and glory through the flight of eternal ages. Now see the force of Our Savior’s castigatory response to Nicodemus, “If you, a prominent teacher in Israel, can not understand the works which the Holy Ghost performs in our hearts while in this life; if you thus stagger when I tell you the stupendous miracle of the new birth, — what would you do if I should relate to you the ineffable glories which await the saints in coming eternity?” While Nicodemus was sincere and honest, as well as learned and influential, you see plainly he was hardly an abecedarian in spiritual things. Lord, help us all to profit by his deficiencies and mistakes!

“No one hath ascended up into heaven, but He who came down from heaven, the Son of man who is in heaven.” While the humanity of Jesus was on earth and not in heaven, His Divinity was omnipresent, in heaven, on earth, and in all worlds. “As Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert, even so does it behoove the Son of man to be lifted up, that whosoever believeth on Him may not perish, but have eternal life.” Jesus makes this allusion to the manner of His death here, in the beginning of His ministry, reiterating it ever and anon throughout. If the Jews had put Him to death, He would have been stoned, this being the penalty for blasphemy, of which they falsely accused Him, crucifixion being a Roman punishment, never used among the Jews. Here we have the illustrative portion of our Savior’s wonderful sermon to the Jewish rabbi; having first given him the truth directly and categorically, He now enforces it by a familiar item in Jewish history, utilizing it to pour on His learned auditor floods of light, of which he had never dreamed. Three things God never created — i.e., a devil, a sinner, and a snake. Originally, all created intelligences throughout the celestial universe were evidently on probation. In many of the heavenly worlds that probation has already expired, our earth rapidly hastening to the end. These angels, created in the different celestial worlds, “did not all keep their first estate” (Jud 1:6), Lucifer — i.e., lightbearer — one of the brightest and greatest of all the archangels, leading off the apostasy (Isa 14:12): “How thou art fallen, O Lucifer, the son of the morning” — i.e., the morning star, which is the meaning of Lucifer. John says “his tail” — i.e., his influence drew after him one-third of the heavenly host. (Revelation 12) God created man upright — i.e., perfect [Hebrew] — but unfortunately abduced by Satan, who is fallen Lucifer, he sinned, thus forfeiting his probation, and becoming a sinner. The popular idea that a big snake tempted Mother Eve is not only unscriptural, but revoltingly unreasonable. Conceive a huge old boa-constrictor climbing up one of the trees of Paradise, projecting his monstrous head down over a limb, Opening wide his horrific mouth, and entering into a social conversation with Mother Eye, pure, holy, innocent, and sinless! How many of you believe in the feasibility of such a transaction? I, for one, am satisfied she would have turned her back and run like a race-horse.

The Bible says the nahash beguiled her. Now what was this nahash? We are informed that he was the most subtle — i.e., the shrewdest, the most intelligent of all the animal creation, consequently ranking second only to man, who stood at the head of the zoological column. Many of the biped species at the present day, walking on two feet, using their hands, much resembling human beings; and even many of the quadrupeds (i.e., the horse, the dog, the elephant) exhibit a degree of intelligence decidedly superior to that of the serpent. I doubt not but the nahash which tempted humanity was a biped, and, as you see from the Bible, having the power of oral communication. Consequently it was no surprise to Mother Eve when he spoke to her. You see the result of his subordination by Satan, and utilization as his medium in the abduction and ruin of the human race, resulted in his own transformation, pursuant to the righteous anathema which God pronounced on him because of the mischief he had done:

“Because thou hast done this, on thy stomach thou shalt go, and dust shalt thou eat, all the days of thy life; and I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.” (Gen 3:14-15.)

Methinks I see the nahash, a biped, the intermediate link between man and the animal creation, standing up in the presence of Jehovah, receiving the awful, withering woe, justly following his unfortunate instrumentality in human ruin as a righteous retribution. Meanwhile his awful doom is ringing out on the balmy breezes of Eden; the transformation supervenes, his neck and head assuming a fearful elongation and a hideous deformity, his arms absorbed and disappearing, his posterior members consolidated; the long, hideous body, followed by the obnoxious, wriggling tail, tumbling prostrate on the ground, and running away amid the roses and lilies with horrific hissing and hideous coils, now and henceforth the detestable, venomous serpent, having inherited the narcotic poison from the devil, which he transmits through his cruel teeth, slaying his victims, and vividly emblematizing the awful power and effect of sin.

When Israel refused to pass into Canaan from Kadesh-barnea, the nigh way, and, following the advice of the cowardly spies, turned back into the dreary desert of Arabia, God put them under an awful discipline, sending among them destroying angels, wasting pestilences, and fiery serpents. They have pitched their tents on the desert sands. The whole earth seems to be full of snakes, which did not appear on the surface; but having their dens in the sands, and caverns, which everywhere abound, they issue from the earth, come into the tents, wound the people, and they are dying on all sides. The word “fiery” means the awful narcotic poison which these horrific reptiles imparted to their victims. The ordeal is terrible. They die too fast to bury them. The camp is heaped with mountains of the dead. Moses, who carries the millions of Israel on his breast, falling on his knees, intercedes with Jehovah in importunate pleading in behalf of the dying.

The Divine response orders him to manufacture a brazen serpent, after the most perfect similitude to these awful, poisonous reptiles; suspending it high on a pole, elevated high on the pinnacle of the tabernacle, in the center of the encampment; simultaneously sending swift couriers throughout all the tribes of Israel, with trumpet voices, calling aloud to all, to notify the wounded and the dying to behold the brazen serpent, shining in the splendid air of that cloudless, Oriental sky, where the brand new brazen serpent so radiated the splendors of an Arabian sun as to literally shine with an effulgence dazzling the eye. To the unutterable joy of the hosts, every one that looks is instantaneously healed. The result is, a wave of joyous enthusiasm rolls over the vast encampment, as a thousand people in a minute, from different directions, are gloriously healed by a look at the bright brazen serpent, suspended high in the air. These all run precipitately every way, shouting the good tidings. A few minutes have flown; ten thousand witnesses are running at race-horse speed through the encampment, shouting uproariously the glad tidings. O, what a happy exchange of the mournful wails which a few minutes ago rang in lugubrious howls throughout the vast encampment! Now they‘re exchanged for shouts of joy, everywhere roaring and reverberating in the air. O, how beautiful, how grand the similitude we here find, and how gloriously illustrating the mighty work of our Christ! You see, the brazen serpent was made in the form of the fiery serpents. Do you not know that we all became a race of snakes in the fall? Jesus and John the Baptist called us generations of vipers. You have heard the old maxim, “It takes a rogue to catch a rogue.” Our Savior took the form of us snakes, so He could run into all the snake holes and dens in all this wicked world, and save them. In order to reach us poor, lost sinners, it was necessary that He be a Man, looking like one of us, and actually mistaken by the preachers in His day and killed for a bad man.

You see in that notable wilderness transaction a wonderful exemplification of the primary truth appertaining to the plan of salvation:

(a) That brazen serpent was perfectly clean and pure.

Though having the very form and looking like the poisonous serpents which infested the camp, it had not a single atom of poison in it. Hence it follows, as a legitimate sequence, that though Jesus had the form and looked just like the people of this world, who are all full of sin — i.e., totally depraved — He had not a particle of sin nor infirmity of any kind, but was perfectly pure and sinless.

(b) As those bitten Israelites were poisoned throughout (which you know to be true, as poison is a blood trouble, and by the circulation carried into all parts of the Organism; the blood being the constituent element, every tissue of the constitution is contaminated); hence it follows that the virus of inbred sin — i.e., the poison of the serpent has reached every fiber of the spiritual organism.

See those Israelites had nothing to do but look on the brazen serpent, and they were all healed. Therefore you see that all the sinners of this world have to do is to believe on Jesus; as here you see that our Savior makes faith, on our part, synonymous with the looking in the case of those dying Hebrews.

“For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on Him may not perish, but have eternal life.” You see in this beautiful passage, enunciated by our Savior, that the love of the Father is the great, fundamental fact underlying the plan of salvation. “He that believeth on Him is not condemned; but he that believeth not, has already been condemned, because he hath not believed on the name of the only begotten Son of God.” O how grandly, indubitably, and irrefutably does Jesus preach salvation through faith alone! Of course, this is the same gospel which John the Baptist preached from the standpoint of repentance, which must, in every case, precede justifying faith, as it is the only believing ground John the Baptist preached repentance, thus establishing the people on believing ground, and thus preparing them to receive the gospel of Jesus by faith. Here our Savior certifies that He did not come to condemn the world, but to save it. Where there is sin, condemnation is an inevitable concomitant. Now what is the attitude of the Churches at the present day, both Papal and Protestant? We are sad to say that, with few exceptions, they preach a sinning religion, which must keep their members under perpetual condemnation. The consequence is, they preach a Christ of condemnation, inculcating the dogma that He saves them in their sins. Do you not know that this is untrue, and that a Christ of condemnation it not the Christ of the Bible, but an idolatrous Christ?

Because the Christ of the Bible, as He here says, did not come to condemn, but to save, and actually does save, all who come unto God through Him. Hence, in order to worship the Christ of the Bible, you must receive Him in the capacity of Savior from all your sins, as any other acceptation would not apply to the true Christ of the New Testament at all, but simply implicates you in idolatry, as the worshiper of a false Christ.

19. “This is the condemnation, that light has come into the world, and men love darkness rather than light; for their deeds are evil, and every one doing evil hateth the light, and cometh not to the light, in order that his works may be convicted; he that doeth the truth cometh to the light, in order that his works may be made manifest that they have been wrought in God.” Right here, Satan so adroitly manipulates to deceive the multiplied millions of candid worshipers in all sexes and nationalities, a person has to have a deep conviction, like David, who said, “The sorrows of death encompassed me, and the pains of hell got hold of me,” before he will make up his mind to come to the light, have all his evil deeds exposed, and embark in what is to him a forlorn enterprise of getting rid of them altogether. Entire sanctification is the only religion that faces the music of heaven, and says: “Give me all the light, and reveal all of my meanness; let me see the very worst; and help me, O God, to be true to the heavenly calling unto an uttermost salvation.” It is the only religion that withholds nothing, makes no compromise under any circumstances; but walks in the clear and cloudless light of God’s Word, Spirit, and providence, realizing that “the blood cleanses from all sin.” O the millions of souls now in hell because they never did make a clean breast, and seek the clear and cloudless light! When we courageously walk in all the light which God gives us, our wrongdoing all being convicted and brought into the full blaze of heaven’s cloudless day, faithfully put under the blood, confidingly committed to the consuming fires of the Holy Ghost, doubtlessly relying upon Omnipotent Grace for their utter extermination — soon will come the happy crisis in our experience, when the Holy Spirit will witness to our spirit “that our deeds are wrought in God.”

William B. Godbey, Commentary on the New Testament (1896–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

3:1 John links 2:25 and 3:1 by referring to humanity as a whole (“human nature,” 2:25) and then to one specific man using the same Greek word (anthrōpos) in both verses. • Nicodemus was saturated in religious knowledge and had witnessed Jesus’ work (2:13-24), but he had not experienced spiritual rebirth. • a Pharisee: See study note on 1:24. He was elite, proud of his spiritual purity, and well educated in Jewish law.

Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Joh 3:1. Ἦν δέ, Now there was) Eleven conversations of Jesus are recounted in full detail by John: the first of these now begins.—ἄνθρωπος, a man) one of those, concerning whom see ch. 2, towards the close: but one considerably better than many.

Bengel's Gnomon of the New Testament — English translation (T&T Clark, Edinburgh, 1860) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Joh_3:1-2. Prominence is now given to a specially important narrative, connected by the δέ which continues the discourse,a narrative belonging to that first sojourn in Jerusalem,viz. the conversation with Nicodemus, wherein Jesus more fully explains His person and work. No intimation is given of any inner connection with what precedes (Lücke: now comes an instance of that higher knowledge possessed by Jesus; De Wette, Lange, Hengstenberg: an illustration of the entire statement in Joh_2:23-25; Tholuck: an instance of the beginnings of faith just named; Luthardt: from the people collectively, to whom Jesus had addressed Himself, a transition is now made to His dealing with an individual; Ewald: Nicodemus appears desirous to make an exception to the general standing aloof of men of weight in Jerusalem).

ἄνθρωπος] in its most ordinary use, simply equivalent to τὶς; not un exemplaire de ce type humain que Jésus connaissait si bien (Godet). It is quite independent of Joh_2:25, introducing a new narrative.

Νικόδημος, a frequent name as well among the Greeks (Demosth. 549. 23, and later writers) as among the Jews (נַקְדָם or נַקְדִימוֹן, see Lightfoot and Wetstein). We know nothing certain of this man beyond the statements concerning him in St. John (comp. Joh_7:50, Joh_19:39).[148] The Nicodemus of the Talmud was also called Bunai, must have survived the destruction of Jerusalem, and was known under this latter name as a disciple of Jesus. See Delitzsch in the Zeitschr. f. Luther. Theol. 1854, p. 643. The identity of the two is possible, but uncertain. The so-called Evangelium Nicodemi embraces, though in a doubtful form, two different treatises, viz. the Acta Pilati and the Descensus Christi ad inferos. See Tischendorf, Evang. Apocr. p. 203 ff.

ἄρχων] He was a member of the Sanhedrim, Joh_7:50; Luk_23:13; Luk_24:20.

He came to Jesus by night,[149] being still undecided, in order to avoid the suspicion and hostility of his colleagues. He was not a hypocrite (as Koppe in Pott, Sylloge, IV. p. 31 ff., holds), who pretended to be simple in order to elicit from Jesus some ground of accusation; a circumstance which, if true, John would not have failed to state, especially considering what he says of him in Joh_7:50 and Joh_19:39 : he was, on the contrary, though of a somewhat slow temperament, a man of honourable character, who, together with others (οἴδαμεν, comp. ὑμᾶς, Joh_3:7), was in a general way convinced by the miracles of Jesus that He must be a divinely commissioned and divinely supported Teacher, and he therefore sought, by a confidential interview, to determine more exactly his to that extent half-believing judgment, and especially to find out whether Jesus perhaps was the very Messiah. His position as a Pharisee and a member of the Sanhedrim shows how strongly and honestly he must have felt this need. Comp. Joh_12:42.

For the entire section see Knapp, Scripta var. arg. I. 183; Fabricius, Commentat. Gott. 1825; Scholl in Klaibers Studien, V. 1, p. 71; Jacobi in the Stud. u. Krit. 1835, 1; Hengstenberg in the Evang. K. Z. 1860, 49; Steinfass in the Meklenb. Zeitschr. 1864, p. 913.

That the disciples, and John in particular, were with Jesus during the interview, has nothing against it (as De Wette and most others think), for Nicodemus came to Jesus by night only through fear of the Jews; and the vivid and peculiar features, with the harmonious characteristics of the narrative, even if touched up by the pen of John, confirm the supposition that he was a witness. If not, he must have received what he relates from the Lord Himself, as it impressed itself deeply and indelibly upon his recollection. As to the result of the interview, nothing historically to be relied upon has come down to us, simply because there was no immediate effect apparent in Nicodemus. But see Joh_7:50, Joh_19:39.

ὅτι ἀπὸ θεοῦ ἐλήλ. διδάσκαλος] that thou art come from God as teacher. The expression implies the thought of one divinely sent, but not the idea of the Logos (as Bretschneider holds).

ταῦτα τὰ σημεῖα] emphatic, haecce tanta signa.

ἐὰν μὴ ᾖ ὁ θεὸς μετʼ αὐτοῦ] ὅτι οὐκ ἐξ οἰκείας δυνάμεως ταῦτα ποιεῖ, ἀλλʼ ἐκ τῆς τοῦ θεοῦ, Euthymius Zigabenus. From the miracles (Joh_2:23) Nicodemus thus infers the assistance of God, and from this again that the worker of them is one sent from God.

[148] According to Baur, p. 173, he is a typical person, representing the believing and yet really unbelieving Judaism, just as the Samaritan woman (chap. 4) represents believing heathendom; thus leaving it uncertain how far the narrative is to be taken as fact. According to Strauss, the whole owes its origin to the reproach that Christianity made way only among the common people (notwithstanding 1Co_1:26-27). weisse rejects at least the truth of the account, which De Wette designates a poetical, free, and highly spiritualized reproduction. See on the other hand Brückner. According to Hilgenfeld, the whole conversation cannot be understood unless we view it from the evangelists standing-point; according to which, we see that the design is simply and solely to explain how Christianity essentially distinguished itself from Judaism. According to Scholten, we have here set forth the power of Christianity triumphing over the slowness of heart and prejudices of the learned,this merely, without any historical basis of fact in the story.

[149] A symbolical reference to the still benighted mind must not be attributed to this simple historical statement (against Hengstenberg).

Meyer — Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament — English translation by Peter Christie, edited by Frederick Crombie (T&T Clark, 1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Joh 3:1-21. THE DISCOURSE WITH NICODEMUS

This is the first of the discourses of our Lord which form the main portion, and are among the great characteristics, of this Gospel. They have been used as a powerful argument against its authenticity; (1) because they are unlike the discourses in the Synoptic Gospels, (2) because they are suspiciously like the First Epistle of S. John, which all admit was written by the author of the Fourth Gospel, (3) because this likeness to the First Epistle pervades not only the discourses of our Lord, but those of the Baptist also, as well as the writer’s own reflections throughout the Gospel. The inference is that they are, as much as the speeches in Thucydides, if not as much as those in Livy, the ideal compositions of the writer himself.

On the question as a whole we may say at once with Matthew Arnold (Literature and Dogma, p. 170), “the doctrine and discourses of Jesus cannot in the main be the writer’s, because in the main they are clearly out of his reach.” ‘Never man so spake’ (Joh 7:46). Not even S. John could invent such words.

But the objections urged above are serious and ought to be answered. (1) The discourses in S. John are unlike those in the Synoptists, but we must beware of exaggerating the unlikeness. They are longer, more reflective, less popular. But they are for the most part addressed to the educated and learned, to Elders, Pharisees, and Rabbis: even the discourse on the Bread of Life, which is spoken before a mixed multitude at Capernaum, is largely addressed to the educated portion of it (Joh 6:41; Joh 6:52), the hierarchical party opposed to Him. The discourses in the first three Gospels are mostly spoken among the rude and simple-minded peasants of Galilee. Contrast the University Sermons with the Parish Sermons of an eminent modern preacher, and we should notice similar differences. This fact will account for a good deal. But (2) the discourses both in S. John and in the Synoptists are translations from an Aramaic dialect. Two translations may differ very widely, and yet both be faithful; they may each bear the impress of the translator’s own style, and yet accurately represent the original. This will to a large extent answer objections (2) and (3). And we must remember that it is possible, and perhaps probable, that the peculiar tone of S. John, so unmistakeable, yet so difficult to analyse satisfactorily, may be a reproduction, more or less conscious, of that of his Divine Master.

But on the other hand we must remember that an eventful life of half a century separates the time when S. John heard these discourses from the time when he committed them to writing. Christ had promised (Joh 14:26) that the Holy Spirit should ‘bring all things to the remembrance’ of the Apostles; but we have no right to assume that in so doing He would override the ordinary laws of psychology. Material stored up so long in the breast of the Apostle could not fail to be moulded by the working of his own mind. And therefore we may admit that in his report of the sayings of Christ and of the Baptist there is an element, impossible to separate now, which comes from himself. His report is sometimes a literal translation of the very words used, sometimes the substance of what was said put into his own words: but he gives us no means of distinguishing where the one shades off into the other.

Cardinal Newman has kindly allowed the following to be quoted from a private letter written by him, July 15th, 1878. “Every one writes in his own style. S. John gives our Lord’s meaning in his own way. At that time the third person was not so commonly used in history as now. When a reporter gives one of Gladstone’s speeches in the newspaper, if he uses the first person, I understand not only the matter, but the style, the words, to be Gladstone’s: when the third, I consider the style, &c. to be the reporter’s own. But in ancient times this distinction was not made. Thucydides uses the dramatic method, yet Spartan and Athenian speak in Thucydidean Greek. And so every clause of our Lord’s speeches in S. John may be in S. John’s Greek, yet every clause may contain the matter which our Lord spoke in Aramaic. Again, S. John might and did select or condense (as being inspired for that purpose) the matter of our Lord’s discourses, as that with Nicodemus, and thereby the wording might be S. John’s, though the matter might still be our Lord’s.”

1. ἦν δὲ ἄνθ. Now there was a man. The δέ marks the connexion with what precedes: Nicodemus was one of the ‘many’ who believed on beholding His signs (Joh 2:23). Ἄνθρωπος probably refers to Joh 2:25, as in Joh 1:6 to Joh 1:4; Nicodemus was a sample of that humanity whose inmost being Jesus could read. Else we should expect τις.

Νικόδημος. He is mentioned only by S. John. It is impossible to say whether he is the Nicodemus (Nakedimon), or Bunai, of the Talmud, who survived the destruction of Jerusalem. Love of truth and fear of man, candour and hesitation, seem to be combined in him. Comp. Joh 7:50. In Joh 19:39 his timidity is again noted and illustrated.

ἄρχων. A member of the Sanhedrin (Joh 7:50: comp. Joh 12:42; Luk 23:13; Luk 24:20), which was opposed to Jesus; hence, to avoid compromising himself (Joh 12:42), he comes by night. We do not know whether S. John was present; probably he was. Nicodemus would not be afraid of disciples.

Cambridge Greek Testament for Schools and Colleges (Cambridge University Press, 1896; 21 vols, various authors incl. Carr, Maclear, Plummer, Farrar, Lumby, Moule, M. R. James, Simcox) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Chap.

3:1-21.] The Lord’s discourse with Nicodemus,—one of these believers on account of His Miracles—on the spiritual nature of the kingdom of God and the necessity of the new birth.

1.] We have in the Talmud (see Lightfoot, Hor. Heb. in loc.) a Nicodemus ben Gorion, who was properly called Bonai, and said to have been a disciple of Jesus: but he is found living at the destruction of Jerusalem. This might certainly have been; still it must be quite uncertain whether he be the same with this Nicodemus.

He is mentioned again ch. 7:50; 19:39. He was a member of the Sanhedrim (ἄρχων, see reff.), and, besides, a νομοδιδάσκαλος (ver. 10).

Henry Alford, The Greek Testament (1849–1861) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

The Discourse with Nicodemus (3:1-15)

3:1. Nicodemus appears three times in the Fourth Gospel (see on 7:50, 19:39), but is not mentioned by any other evangelist, unless we may equate him with the ἄρχων of Luk 18:18 (see below on v. 3). The attempt to identify him with Joseph of Arimathæa has no plausibility (see on 19:39); and the suggestion that he is a fictitious character invented by Jn. to serve a literary purpose is arbitrary and improbable (see Introd., p. lxxxiii f.). Νικόδημος is a Greek name borrowed by the Jews, and appears in Josephus (Antt. xiv. iii. 2) as that of an ambassador from Aristobulus to Pompey. In the Talmud (Taanith, 20. 1) mention is made of one Bunai, commonly called Nicodemus ben Gorion, and it is possible (but there is no evidence) that he was the Nicodemus of Jn. He lived until the destruction of Jerusalem, which would accord very well with the idea that Jn. has the “young ruler” of Luk 18:18 in his mind, although in that case γέρων of v. 4 must not be taken to indicate that the person in question was really “old” at the time of speaking. All that can be said with certainty of the Nicodemus of the text is that he was a Pharisee, and a member of the Sanhedrim (7:50), and apparently a wealthy man (19:39). He seems to have been constitutionally cautious and timid (see on 7:50).

Some points in the narrative of 3:1-15 would suggest that the incident here recorded did not happen (as the traditional text gives it) at the beginning of the ministry of Jesus. First, at v. 2, mention is made of σημεῖα at Jerusalem which had attracted the attention of Nicodemus; but we have already noted on 2:23 that no σημεῖον in that city has yet been recorded. On the other hand, the “signs” which had been wrought at Jerusalem during the weeks before the end had excited much curiosity. That Nicodemus should have come secretly during the later period would have been natural, for the hostility of the Sanhedrim to Jesus had already been aroused (7:50); but that there should have been any danger in conversing with the new Teacher in the early days of His ministry does not appear. Again, at v. 14 (where see note), Jesus predicts His Passion; but if this prediction be placed in the early days of His ministry, we are in conflict with the Synoptists,who place the first announcement of His Death after the Confession of Peter. No doubt, Jn. is often in disagreement with the earlier Gospels, but upon a point so significant as this we should expect his record to agree with theirs.

However, there is not sufficient evidence to justify us in transposing the text here; and we leave the story of Nicodemus in its traditional position, although with a suspicion that the original author of the Gospel did not intend it to come so early.1

For the constr. Νικόδημος ὄνομα αὐτῷ, see on 1:6.

International Critical Commentary — older volumes (1896–1929), various authors — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

A man of great estimation, and a ruler amongst the Jews.

There are none sometimes more unlearned, than the learned: but as well the learned as the unlearned must desire wisdom of Christ only.

Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain. Text via Bolls.life.

We found, in the close of the foregoing chapter, that few were brought to Christ at Jerusalem; yet here was one, a considerable one. It is worth while to go a great way for the salvation though but of one soul. Observe,

I. Who this Nicodemus was. Not many mighty and noble are called; yet some are, and here was one. Not many of the rulers, or of the Pharisees; yet. 1. This was a man of the Pharisees, bred to learning, a scholar. Let it not be said that all Christ's followers are unlearned and ignorant men. The principles of the Pharisees, and the peculiarities of their sect, were directly contrary to the spirit of Christianity; yet there were some in whom even those high thoughts were cast down and brought into obedience to Christ. The grace of Christ is able to subdue the greatest opposition. 2. He was a ruler of the Jews, a member of the great sanhedrim, a senator, a privy-counsellor, a man of authority in Jerusalem. Bad as things were, there were some rulers well inclined, who yet could do little good because the stream was so strong against them; they were over-ruled by the majority, and yoked with those that were corrupt, so that the good which they wished to do they could not do; yet Nicodemus continued in his place, and did what he could, when he could not do what he would.

II. His solemn address to our Lord Jesus Christ, Joh 3:2. See here,

1. When he came: He came to Jesus by night. Observe, (1.) He made a private and particular address to Christ, and did not think it enough to hear his public discourses. He resolved to talk with him by himself, where he might be free with him. Personal converse with skilful faithful ministers about the affairs of our souls would be of great use to us, Mal 2:7. (2.) He made this address by night, which may be considered, [1.] As an act of prudence and discretion. Christ was engaged all day in public work, and he would not interrupt him then, nor expect his attendance then, but observed Christ's hour, and waited on him when he was at leisure. Note, Private advantages to ourselves and our own families must give way to those that are public. The greater good must be preferred before the less. Christ had many enemies, and therefore Nicodemus came to him incognito, lest being known to the chief priests they should be the more enraged against Christ. [2.] As an act of zeal and forwardness. Nicodemus was a man of business, and could not spare time all day to make Christ a visit, and therefore he would rather take time from the diversions of the evening, or the rest of the night, than not converse with Christ. When others were sleeping, he was getting knowledge, as David by meditation, Psa 63:6, and Psa 119:148. Probably it was the very next night after he saw Christ's miracles, and he would not neglect the first opportunity of pursuing his convictions. He knew not how soon Christ might leave the town, nor what might happen betwixt that and another feast, and therefore would lose no time. In the night his converse with Christ would be more free, and less liable to disturbance. These were Noctes Christianae - Christian nights, much more instructive than the Noctes Atticae - Attic nights. Or, [3.] As an act of fear and cowardice. He was afraid, or ashamed, to be seen with Christ, and therefore came in the night. When religion is out of fashion, there are many Nicodemites, especially among the rulers, who have a better affection to Christ and his religion than they would be known to have. But observe, First, Though he came by night, Christ bade him welcome, accepted his integrity, and pardoned his infirmity; he considered his temper, which perhaps was timorous, and the temptation he was in from his place and office; and hereby taught his ministers to become all things to all men, and to encourage good beginnings, though weak. Paul preached privately to those of reputation, Gal 2:2. Secondly, Though now he came by night, yet afterwards, when there was occasion, he owned Christ publicly, Joh 7:50; Joh 19:39. The grace which is at first but a grain of mustard-seed may grow to be a great tree.

2. What he said. He did not come to talk with Christ about politics and state-affairs (though he was a ruler), but about the concerns of his own soul and its salvation, and, without circumlocution, comes immediately to the business; he calls Christ Rabbi, which signifies a great man; see Isa 19:20. He shall send them a Saviour, and a great one; a Saviour and a rabbi, so the word is. There are hopes of those who have a respect for Christ, and think and speak honourably of him. He tells Christ how far he had attained: We know that thou art a teacher. Observe, (1.) His assertion concerning Christ: Thou art a teacher come from God; not educated nor ordained by men, as other teachers, but supported with divine inspiration and divine authority. He that was to be the sovereign Ruler came first to be a teacher; for he would rule with reason, not with rigour, by the power of truth, not of the sword. The world lay in ignorance and mistake; the Jewish teachers were corrupt, and caused them to err: It is time for the Lord to work. He came a teacher from God, from God as the Father of mercies, in pity to a dark deceived world; from God as the Father of lights and fountain of truth, all the light and truth upon which we may venture our souls. (2.) His assurance of it: We know, not only I, but others; so he took it for granted, the thing being so plain and self-evident. Perhaps he knew that there were divers of the Pharisees and rulers with whom he conversed that were under the same convictions, but had not the grace to own it. Or, we may suppose that he speaks in the plural number (We know) because he brought with him one or more of his friends and pupils, to receive instructions from Christ, knowing them to be of common concern. "Master," saith he, "we come with a desire to be taught, to be thy scholars, for we are fully satisfied thou art a divine teacher." (3.) The ground of this assurance: No man can do those miracles that thou doest, except God be with him. Here, [1.] We are assured of the truth of Christ's miracles, and that they were not counterfeit. Here was Nicodemus, a judicious, sensible, inquisitive man, one that had all the reason and opportunity imaginable to examine them, so fully satisfied that they were real miracles that he was wrought upon by them to go contrary to his interest, and to the stream of those of his own rank, who were prejudiced against Christ. [2.] We are directed what inference to draw from Christ's miracles: Therefore we are to receive him as a teacher come from God. His miracles were his credentials. The course of nature could not be altered but by the power of the God of nature, who, we are sure, is the God of truth and goodness, and would never set his seal to a lie or a cheat.

III. The discourse between Christ and Nicodemus hereupon, or, rather, the sermon Christ preached to him; the contents of it, and that perhaps an abstract of Christ's public preaching; see Joh 3:11, Joh 3:12. Four things our Saviour here discourses of: -

1. Concerning the necessity and nature of regeneration or the new birth, Joh 3:3-8. Now we must consider this,

(1.) As pertinently answered to Nicodemus's address. Jesus answered, Joh 3:3. This answer was wither, [1.] A rebuke of what he saw defective in the address of Nicodemus. It was not enough for him to admire Christ's miracles, and acknowledge his mission, but he must be born again. It is plain that he expected the kingdom of heaven, the kingdom of the Messiah now shortly to appear. He is betimes aware of the dawning of that day; and, according to the common notion of the Jews, he expects it to appear in external pomp and power. He doubts not but this Jesus, who works these miracles, is either the Messiah or his prophet, and therefore makes his court to him, compliments him, and so hopes to secure a share to himself of the advantages of that kingdom. But Christ tells him that he can have no benefit by that change of the state, unless there be a change of the spirit, of the principles and dispositions, equivalent to a new birth. Nicodemus came by night: "But this will not do," saith Christ. His religion must be owned before men; so Dr. Hammond. Or, [2.] A reply to what he saw designed in his address. When Nicodemus owned Christ a teacher come from God, one entrusted with an extraordinary revelation from heaven, he plainly intimated a desire to know what this revelation was and a readiness to receive it; and Christ declares it.

(2.) As positively and vehemently asserted by our Lord Jesus: Verily, verily, I say unto thee. I the Amen, the Amen, say it; so it may be read: "I the faithful and true witness." The matter is settled irreversibly that except a man be born again he cannot see the kingdom of God. "I say it to thee, though a Pharisee, though a master in Israel." Observe,

[1.] What it is that is required: to be born again; that is, First, We must live a new life. Birth is the beginning of life; to be born again is to begin anew, as those that have hitherto lived either much amiss or to little purpose. We must not think to patch up the old building, but begin from the foundation. Secondly, We must have a new nature, new principles, new affections, new aims. We must be born anōthen, which signifies both denuo - again, and desuper - from above. 1. We must be born anew; so the word is taken, Gal 4:9, and ab initio - from the beginning, Luk 1:3. By our first birth we are corrupt, shapen in sin and iniquity; we must therefore undergo a second birth; our souls must be fashioned and enlivened anew. 2. We must be born from above, so the word is used by the evangelist, Joh 3:31; Joh 19:11, and I take this to be especially intended here, not excluding the other; for to be born from above supposes being born again. But this new birth has its rise from heaven (Joh 1:13) and its tendency to heaven: it is to be born to a divine and heavenly life, a life of communion with God and the upper world, and, in order to this, it is to partake of a divine nature and bear the image of the heavenly.

[2.] The indispensable necessity of this: "Except a man (Any one that partakes of the human nature, and consequently of its corruptions) be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God, the kingdom of the Messiah begun in grace and perfected in glory." Except we be born from above, we cannot see this. That is, First, We cannot understand the nature of it. Such is the nature of things pertaining to the kingdom of God (in which Nicodemus desired to be instructed) that the soul must be re-modelled and moulded, the natural man must become a spiritual man, before he is capable of receiving and understanding them, Co1 2:14. Secondly, We cannot receive the comfort of it, cannot expect any benefit by Christ and his gospel, nor have any part or lot in the matter. Note, Regeneration is absolutely necessary to our happiness here and hereafter. Considering what we are by nature, how corrupt and sinful, - what God is, in whom alone we can be happy, - and what heaven is, to which the perfection of our happiness is reserved, - it will appear, in the nature of the thing, that we must be born again, because it is impossible that we should be happy if we be not holy; see Co1 6:11, Co1 6:12.

This great truth of the necessity of regeneration being thus solemnly laid down,

a. It is objected against by Nicodemus (Joh 3:4): How can a man be born when he is old, old as I am: gerōn ōn - being an old man? Can he enter the second time into his mother's womb, and be born? Herein appears, (a.) His weakness in knowledge; what Christ spoke spiritually he seems to have understood after a corporal and carnal manner, as if there were no other way of regenerating and new-moulding an immortal soul than by new-framing the body, and bringing that back to the rock out of which it was hewn, as if there was such a connection between the soul and the body that there could be no fashioning the heart anew but by forming the bones anew. Nicodemus, as others of the Jews, valued himself, no doubt, very much on his first birth and its dignities and privileges, - the place of it, the Holy Land, perhaps the holy city, - his parentage, such as that which Paul could have gloried in, Phi 3:5. And therefore it is a great surprise to him to hear of being born again. Could he be better bred and born than bred and born an Israelite, or by any other birth stand fairer for a place in the kingdom of the Messiah? Indeed they looked upon a proselyted Gentile to be as one born again or born anew, but could not imagine how a Jew, a Pharisee, could ever better himself by being born again; he therefore thinks, if he must be born again, it must be of her that bore him first. They that are proud of their first birth are hardly brought to a new birth. (b.) His willingness to be taught. He does not turn his back upon Christ because of his hard saying, but ingenuously acknowledges his ignorance, which implies a desire to be better informed; and so I take this, rather than that he had such gross notions of the new birth Christ spoke of: "Lord, make me to understand this, for it is a riddle to me; I am such a fool as to know no other way for a man to be born than of his mother." When we meet with that in the things of God which is dark, and hard to be understood, we must with humility and industry continue our attendance upon the means of knowledge, till God shall reveal even that unto us.

b. It is opened and further explained by our Lord Jesus, Joh 3:5-8. From the objection he takes occasion,

(a.) To repeat and confirm what he had said (Joh 3:5): "Verily, verily, I say unto thee, the very same that I said before." Note, The word of God is not yea and nay, but yea and amen; what he hath said he will abide by, whoever saith against it; nor will he retract any of his sayings for the ignorance and mistakes of men. Though Nicodemus understood not the mystery of regeneration, yet Christ asserts the necessity of it as positively as before. Note, It is folly to think of evading the obligation of evangelical precepts, by pleading that they are unintelligible, Rom 3:3, Rom 3:4.

(b.) To expound and clear what he had said concerning regeneration; for the explication of which he further shows,

[a.] The author of this blessed change, and who it is that works it. To be born again is to be born of the Spirit, Joh 3:5-8. The change is not wrought by any wisdom or power of our own, but by the power and influence of the blessed Spirit of grace. It is the sanctification of the Spirit (Pe1 1:2) and renewing of the Holy Ghost, Tit 3:5. The word he works by is his inspiration, and the heart to be wrought on he has access to.

[b.] The nature of this change, and what that is which is wrought; it is spirit, Joh 3:6. Those that are regenerated are made spiritual, and refined from the dross and dregs of sensuality. The dictates and interests of the rational and immortal soul have retrieved the dominion they ought to have over the flesh. The Pharisees placed their religion in external purity and external performances; and it would be a mighty change indeed with them, no less than a new birth, to become spiritual.

[c.] The necessity of this change. First, Christ here shows that it is necessary in the nature of the thing, for we are not fit to enter into the kingdom of God till we are born again: That which is born of the flesh if flesh, Joh 3:6. Here is our malady, with the causes of it, which are such that it is plain there is no remedy but we must be born again. 1. We are here told what we are: We are flesh, not only corporeal but corrupt, Gen 6:3. The soul is still a spiritual substance, but so wedded to the flesh, so captivated by the will of the flesh, so in love with the delights of the flesh, so employed in making provision for the flesh, that it is mostly called flesh; it is carnal. And what communion can there be between God, who is a spirit, and a soul in this condition? 2. How we came to be so; by being born of the flesh. It is a corruption that is bred in the bone with us, and therefore we cannot have a new nature, but we must be born again. The corrupt nature, which is flesh, takes rise from our first birth; and therefore the new nature, which is spirit, must take rise from a second birth. Nicodemus spoke of entering again into his mother's womb, and being born; but, if he could do so, to what purpose? If he were born of his mother a hundred times, that would not mend the matter, for still that which is born of the flesh if flesh; a clean thing cannot be brought out of an unclean. He must seek for another original, must be born of the Spirit, or he cannot become spiritual. The case is, in short, this: though man is made to consist of body and soul, yet his spiritual part had then so much the dominion over his corporeal part that he was denominated a living soul (Gen 2:7), but by indulging the appetite of the flesh, in eating forbidden fruit, he prostituted the just dominion of the soul to the tyranny of sensual lust, and became no longer a living soul, but flesh: Dust thou art. The living soul became dead and inactive; thus in the day he sinned he surely died, and so he became earthly. In this degenerate state, he begat a son in his own likeness; he transmitted the human nature, which had been entirely deposited in his hands, thus corrupted and depraved; and in the same plight it is still propagated. Corruption and sin are woven into our nature; we are shapen in iniquity, which makes it necessary that the nature be changed. It is not enough to put on a new coat or a new face, but we must put on the new man, we must be new creatures. Secondly, Christ makes it further necessary, by his own word: Marvel not that I said unto thee, You must be born again, Joh 3:7. 1. Christ hath said it, and as he himself never did, nor ever will, unsay it, so all the world cannot gainsay it, that we must be born again. He who is the great Lawgiver, whose will is a law, - he who is the great Mediator of the new covenant, and has full power to settle the terms of our reconciliation to God and happiness in him, - he who is the great Physician of souls, knows their case, and what is necessary to their cure, - he hath said, You must be born again. "I said unto thee that which all are concerned in, You must, you all, one as well as another, you must be born again: not only the common people, but the rulers, the masters in Israel." 2. We are not to marvel at it; for when we consider the holiness of the God with whom we have to do, the great design of our redemption, the depravity of our nature, and the constitution of the happiness set before us, we shall not think it strange that so much stress is laid upon this as the one thing needful, that we must be born again.

[d.] This change is illustrated by two comparisons. First, The regenerating work of the Spirit is compared to water, Joh 3:5. To be born again is to be born of water and of the Spirit, that is, of the Spirit working like water, as (Mat 3:11) with the Holy Ghost and with fire means with the Holy Ghost as with fire. 1. That which is primarily intended here is to show that the Spirit, in sanctifying a soul, (1.) Cleanses and purifies it as water, takes away its filth, by which it was unfit for the kingdom of God. It is the washing of regeneration, Tit 3:5. You are washed, Co1 6:11. See Eze 36:25. (2.) Cools and refreshes it, as water does the hunted hart and the weary traveller. The Spirit is compared to water, Joh 7:38, Joh 7:39; Isa 44:3. In the first creation, the fruits of heaven were born of water (Gen 1:20), in allusion to which, perhaps, they that are born from above are said to be born of water. 2. It is probable that Christ had an eye to the ordinance of baptism, which John had used and he himself had begun to use, "You must be born again of the Spirit," which regeneration by the Spirit should be signified by washing with water, as the visible sign of that spiritual grace: not that all they, and they only, that are baptized, are saved; but without that new birth which is wrought by the Spirit, and signified by baptism, none shall be looked upon as the protected privileged subjects of the kingdom of heaven. The Jews cannot partake of the benefits of the Messiah's kingdom, they have so long looked for, unless they quit all expectations of being justified by the works of the law, and submit to the baptism of repentance, the great gospel duty, for the remission of sins, the great gospel privilege. Secondly, It is compared to wind: The wind bloweth where it listeth, so is every one that is born of the Spirit, Joh 3:8. The same word (pneuma) signifies both the wind and the Spirit. The Spirit came upon the apostles in a rushing mighty wind (Act 2:2), his strong influences on the hearts of sinners are compared to the breathing of the wind (Eze 37:9), and his sweet influences on the souls of saints to the north and south wind, Sol 4:16. This comparison is here used to show, 1. That the Spirit, in regeneration, works arbitrarily, and as a free agent. The wind bloweth where it listeth for us, and does not attend our order, nor is subject to our command. God directs it; it fulfils his word, Psa 148:8. The Spirit dispenses his influences where, and when, on whom, and in what measure and degree, he pleases, dividing to every man severally as he will, Co1 12:11. 2. That he works powerfully, and with evident effects: Thou hearest the sound thereof; though its causes are hidden, its effects are manifest. When the soul is brought to mourn for sin, to groan under the burden of corruption, to breathe after Christ, to cry Abba - Father, then we hear the sound of the Spirit, we find he is at work, as Act 9:11, Behold he prayeth. 3. That he works mysteriously, and in secret hidden ways: Thou canst not tell whence it comes, nor whither it goes. How it gathers and how it spends its strength is a riddle to us; so the manner and methods of the Spirit's working are a mystery. Which way went the Spirit? Kg1 22:24. See Ecc 11:5, and compare it with Psa 139:14.

2. Here is a discourse concerning the certainty and sublimity of gospel truths, which Christ takes occasion for from the weakness of Nicodemus. Here is,

(1.) The objection which Nicodemus still made (Joh 3:9): How can these things be? Christ's explication of the doctrine of the necessity of regeneration, it should seem, made it never the clearer to him. The corruption of nature which makes it necessary, and the way of the Spirit which makes it practicable, are as much mysteries to him as the thing itself; though he had in general owned Christ a divine teacher, yet he was unwilling to receive his teachings when they did not agree with the notions he had imbibed. Thus many profess to admit the doctrine of Christ in general, and yet will neither believe the truths of Christianity nor submit to the laws of it further than they please. Christ shall be their teacher, provided they may choose their lesson. Now here, [1.] Nicodemus owns himself ignorant of Christ's meaning, after all: "How can these things be? They are things I do not understand, my capacity will not reach them." Thus the things of the Spirit of God are foolishness to the natural man. He is not only estranged from them, and therefore they are dark to him, but prejudiced against them, and therefore they are foolishness to him. [2.] Because this doctrine was unintelligible to him (so he was pleased to make it), he questions the truth of it; as if, because it was a paradox to him, it was a chimera in itself. Many have such an opinion of their own capacity as to think that that cannot be proved which they cannot believe; by wisdom they knew not Christ.

(2.) The reproof which Christ gave him for his dulness and ignorance: "Art thou a master in Israel, Didaskalos - a teacher, a tutor, one who sits in Moses's chair, and yet not only unacquainted with the doctrine of regeneration, but incapable of understanding it?" This word is a reproof, [1.] To those who undertake to teach others and yet are ignorant and unskilful in the word of righteousness themselves. [2.] To those that spend their time in learning and teaching notions and ceremonies in religion, niceties and criticisms in the scripture, and neglect that which is practical and tends to reform the heart and life. Two words in the reproof are very emphatic: - First, The place where his lot was cast: in Israel, where there was such great plenty of the means of knowledge, where divine revelation was. He might have learned this out of the Old Testament. Secondly, The things he was thus ignorant in: these things, these necessary things, there great things, these divine things; had he never read Psa 50:5, Psa 50:10; Eze 18:31; Eze 36:25, Eze 36:26?

(3.) Christ's discourse, hereupon, of the certainty and sublimity of gospel truths (Joh 3:11-13), to show the folly of those who make strange of these things, and to recommend them to our search. Observe here,

[1.] That the truths Christ taught were very certain and what we may venture upon (Joh 3:11): We speak that we do know. We; whom does he mean besides himself? Some understand it of those that bore witness to him and with him on earth, the prophets and John Baptist; they spoke what they knew, and had seen, and were themselves abundantly satisfied in: divine revelation carries its own proof along with it. Others of those that bore witness from heaven, the Father and the Holy Ghost; the Father was with him, the Spirit of the Lord was upon him; therefore he speaks in the plural number, as Joh 14:23 : We will come unto him. Observe, First, That the truths of Christ are of undoubted certainty. We have all the reason in the world to be assured that the sayings of Christ are faithful sayings, and such as we may venture our souls upon; for he is not only a credible witness, who would not go about to deceive us, but a competent witness, who could not himself be deceived: We testify that we have seen. He spoke not upon hear-say, but upon the clearest evidence, and therefore with the greatest assurance. What he spoke of God, of the invisible world, of heaven and hell, of the divine will concerning us, and the counsels of peace, was what he knew, and had seen, for he was by him as one brought up with him, Pro 8:30. Whatever Christ spoke, he spoke of his own knowledge. Secondly, That the unbelief of sinners is greatly aggravated by the infallible certainty of the truths of Christ. The things are thus sure, thus clear; and yet you receive not our witness. Multitudes to be unbelievers of that which yet (so cogent are the motives of credibility) they cannot disbelieve!

[2.] The truths Christ taught, though communicated in language and expressions borrowed from common and earthly things, yet in their own nature were most sublime and heavenly; this is intimated, Joh 3:12 : "If I have told them earthly things, that is, have told them the great things of God in similitudes taken from earthly things, to make them the more easy and intelligible, as that of the new birth and the wind, - if I have thus accommodated myself to your capacities, and lisped to you in your own language, and cannot make you to understand my doctrine, - what would you do if I should accommodate myself to the nature of the things, and speak with the tongue of angels, that language which mortals cannot utter? If such familiar expressions be stumbling-blocks, what would abstract ideas be, and spiritual things painted proper?" Now we may learn hence, First, To admire the height and depth of the doctrine of Christ; it is a great mystery of godliness. The things of the gospel are heavenly things, out of the road of the enquiries of human reason, and much more out of the reach of its discoveries. Secondly, To acknowledge with thankfulness the condescension of Christ, that he is pleased to suit the manner of the gospel revelation to our capacities, to speak to us as to children. He considers our frame, that we are of the earth, and our place, that we are on the earth, and therefore speaks to us earthly things, and makes things sensible the vehicle of things spiritual, to make them the more easy and familiar to us. Thus he has done both in parables and in sacraments. Thirdly, To lament the corruption of our nature, and our great unaptness to receive and entertain the truths of Christ. Earthly things are despised because they are vulgar, and heavenly things because they are abstruse; and so, whatever method is taken, still some fault or other is found with it (Mat 11:17), but Wisdom is, and will be, justified of her children, notwithstanding.

[3.] Our Lord Jesus, and he alone, was fit to reveal to us a doctrine thus certain, thus sublime: No man hath ascended up into heaven but he, Joh 3:13.

First, None but Christ was able to reveal to us the will of God for our salvation. Nicodemus addressed Christ as a prophet; but he must know that he is greater than all the Old Testament prophets, for none of them had ascended into heaven. They wrote by divine inspiration, and not of their own knowledge; see Joh 1:18. Moses ascended into the mount, but not into heaven. No man hath attained to the certain knowledge of God and heavenly things as Christ has; see Mat 11:27. It is not for us to send to heaven for instructions; we must wait to receive what instructions Heaven will send to us; see Pro 30:4; Deu 30:12.

Secondly, Jesus Christ is able, and fit, and every way qualified, to reveal the will of God to us; for it is he that came down from heaven and is in heaven. He had said (Joh 3:12), How shall ye believe, if I tell you of heavenly things? Now here, 1. He gives them an instance of those heavenly things which he could tell them of, when he tells them of one that came down from heaven, and yet is the Son of man; is the Son of man, and yet is in heaven. If the regeneration of the soul of man is such a mystery, what then is the incarnation of the Son of God? These are divine and heavenly things indeed. We have here an intimation of Christ's two distinct natures in one person: his divine nature, in which he came down from heaven; his human nature, in which he is the Son of man; and that union of those two, in that while he is the Son of man yet he is in heaven. 2. He gives them a proof of his ability to speak to them heavenly things, and to lead them into the arcana of the kingdom of heaven, by telling them, (1.) That he came down from heaven. The intercourse settled between God and man began above; the first motion towards it did not arise from this earth, but came down from heaven. We love him, and send to him, because he first loved us, and sent to us. Now this intimates, [1.] Christ's divine nature. He that came down from heaven is certainly more than a mere man; he is the Lord from heaven, Co1 15:47. [2.] His intimate acquaintance with the divine counsels; for, coming from the court of heaven, he had been from eternity conversant with them. [3.] The manifestation of God. Under the Old Testament God's favours to his people are expressed by his hearing from heaven (Ch2 7:14), looking from heaven (Psa 80:14), speaking from heaven (Neh 9:13), sending from heaven, Psa 57:3. But the New Testament shows us God coming down from heaven, to teach and save us. That he thus descended is an admirable mystery, for the Godhead cannot change places, nor did he bring his body from heaven; but that he thus condescended for our redemption is a more admirable mercy; herein he commended his love. (2.) That he is the Son of man, that Son of man spoken of by Daniel (Dan 7:13), by which the Jews always understand to be meant the Messiah. Christ, in calling himself the Son of man, shows that he is the second Adam, for the first Adam was the father of man. And of all the Old Testament titles of the Messiah he chose to make use of this, because it was most expressive of his humility, and most agreeable to his present state of humiliation. (3.) That he is in heaven. Now at this time, when he is talking with Nicodemus on earth, yet, as God, he is in heaven. The Son of man, as such, was not in heaven till his ascension; but he that was the Son of man was now, by his divine nature, every where present, and particularly in heaven. Thus the Lord of glory, as such, could not be crucified, nor could God, as such, shed his blood; yet that person who was the Lord of glory was crucified (Co1 2:8), and God purchased the church with his own blood, Act 20:28. So close is the union of the two natures in one person that there is a communication of properties. He doth not say hos esti. God is the ho ōn tō ouranō - he that is, and heaven i

Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

CHAPTER III.

The conversation between Nicodemus and our Lord, about the new

birth and faith in his testimony, 1-15.

The love of God, the source of human salvation, 16.

Who are condemned, and who are approved, 17-21.

Jesus and his disciples come to Judea, and baptize, 22.

John baptizes in AEnon, 23, 24.

The disciples of John and the Pharisees dispute about purifying,

25

The discourse between John and his disciples about Christ, in

which the excellence, perfection, and privileges, of the

Christian dispensation are pointed out, 26-36.

NOTES ON CHAP. III.

Verse 1. Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews.] One of the members of the grand Sanhedrin; for such were ordinarily styled rulers among the Jews. A person of the name of Nicodemus, the son of Gorion, is mentioned in the Jewish writings, who lived in the time of Vespasian, and was reputed to be so rich that he could support all the inhabitants of Jerusalem for ten years. But this is said in their usual extravagant mode of talking.

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

1. Now there was a man of the Pharisees. In the person of Nicodemus the Evangelist now exhibits to our view how vain and fleeting was the faith of those who, having been excited by miracles, suddenly professed to be the disciples of Christ. For since this man was of the order of the Pharisees, and held the rank of a ruler in his nation, he must have been far more excellent than others. The common people, for the most part, are light and unsteady; but who would not have thought that he who had learning and experience was also a wise and prudent man? Yet from Christ’s reply it is evident, that nothing was farther from his design in coming than a desire to learn the first principles of religion. If he who was a ruler among men is less than a child, what ought we to think of the multitude at large? Now though the design of the Evangelist was, to exhibit, as in a mirror, how few there were in Jerusalem who were properly disposed to receive the Gospel, yet, for other reasons, this narrative is highly useful to us; and especially because it instructs us concerning the depraved nature of mankind, what is the proper entrance into the school of Christ, and what must be the commencement of our training to make progress in the heavenly doctrine. For the sum of Christ’s discourse is, that, in order that we may be his true disciples, we must become new men. But, before proceeding farther, we must ascertain from the circumstances which are here detailed by the Evangelist, what were the obstacles which prevented Nicodemus from giving himself unreservedly to Christ.

Of the Pharisees. This designation was, no doubt, regarded by his countrymen as honorable to Nicodemus; but it is not for the sake of honor that it is given to him by the Evangelist, who, on the contrary, draws our attention to it as having prevented him from coming freely and cheerfully to Christ. Hence we are reminded that they who occupy a lofty station in the world are, for the most part, entangled by very dangerous snares; nay, we see many of them held so firmly bound, that not even the slightest wish or prayer arises from them towards heaven throughout their whole life. Why they were called Pharisees we have elsewhere explained; for they boasted of being the only expounders of the Law, as if they were in possession, of the marrow and hidden meaning of Scripture; and for that reason they called themselves פרושים (Perushim.) Though the Essenes led a more austere life, which gained them a high reputation for holiness; yet because, like hermits, they forsook the ordinary life and custom of men, the sect of the Pharisees was on that account held in higher estimation. Besides, the Evangelist mentions not only that Nicodemus was of the order of the Pharisees, but that he was one of the rulers of his nation.

John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.

III.

(1) There was a man.—Read, But there was a man. Our division of chapters breaks the connection, and the omission of the conjunction leads us to think of the visit of Nicodemus as quite distinct from what has gone before; whereas it really rises out of it (comp. Joh_3:2 with Joh_2:23).

The name Nicodemus was not uncommon among the Jews, but like Stephen, Philip, Jason, etc., was derived from their intercourse with the Greeks. (Comp. e.g., Demosth. 549, 23, and Jos. Ant. xiv. 3, § 2.) Of this particular Nicodemus, we know with certainty nothing more than is told us in this Gospel (Joh_7:50; Joh_19:39). The Talmud mentions a Nakedimon, so called from a miracle performed by him, who was the son of Gorion, and whose real name was Bonai. It also gives the name Bonai as one of the disciples of Jesus. He was one of the three richest Jews when Titus besieged Jerusalem, but his family was reduced to the most abject poverty. So far the Talmud. The inference is that this change of fortune is connected with his becoming a Christian and with the persecution which followed, and he is himself identified with the Nicodemus of the Gospel. We can only say this may be so. The reader who cares for more on the subject will find full references in Lampe, and the extracts from the Talmud translated in Lightfoot. Others may be content to accept this latter writer’s conclusion. “It is not worth while to take great pains in a question which is very involved, if we may not also call it useless.” (For the “Pharisees,” to which sect Nicodemus belonged, comp. Joh_1:24, and Mat_3:7.)

Ruler of the Jews.—One of the Sanhedrin (comp. Joh_1:19, Note). This is made certain by the position of Nicodemus, in Joh_7:50.

(1) The word πνεῦμα (pneuma) occurs some 370 times in the Greek New Testament, and of these, twenty-three times in this Gospel. It is nowhere rendered “wind” by our translators, except in this instance, and they have rendered the same word by “Spirit” in the same verse, and twice besides in the same context (Joh_3:5-6). There is another word for “wind” (ἄνεμος), which occurs thirty-one times in the New Testament, and which John himself uses in Joh_6:18. It is not contended that πνεῦμα may not mean “wind,” “the breath of wind,” but that this is not its New Testament use, where the word is restricted to its special meaning. (It is plural in Heb_1:7; see Note there.) It is admitted also that the Hebrew or Chaldee word which πνεῦμα here translates has the two senses, but the sense in which it is here used is fixed by the translator.

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

The same came to Jesus by night,.... Through fear of the Jews, of being reproached or turned out of his place by them; or through shame, that such a doctor as he was, should be known to go to Jesus of Nazareth, to be instructed by him; or lest he should offend any of his brethren of the sanhedrim: though some things may be said in favour of this conduct of Nicodemus; for since Christ would not trust himself with those that believed in him upon seeing his miracles, Joh 2:23, among whom Nicodemus seems to be; or would not admit them into his company, and enter into a free conversation with him; it was necessary, that if he would have any discourse with him, that he should take this method; and if it was the same night, in which he had seen his miracles in the day, as is probable, he took the first opportunity he could, and which shows great readiness and respect; add to which, that it was very common with the Jewish doctors, to meet and converse together, and study the law in the night.

"R. Aba rose, , "in the middle of the night", and the rest of the companions, to study in the law (e).''

And it is often (f) said of R. Simeon ben Joehal, and Eleazar his son, that they sat in the night and laboured in the law; and it was reckoned very commendable so to do, and highly pleasing to God: it is said (g),

"whoever studies in the law in the night, the holy blessed God draws a thread of mercy upon him in the day:''

and likewise (h), that

"every one that studies in the law in the night, the Shekinah is over against him.''

But it seems, the Babylonian Jews did not study in the law in the night (i): it might seem a needless question to ask, whether Nicodemus came alone, or not, were it not that according to the Jewish canon (k) a scholar might not go out in the night alone, because of suspicion:

and said unto him, Rabbi; a title which now greatly obtained among the Jewish doctors, and of which they were very fond; See Gill on Mat 23:7. It comes from a word, which signifies great and large; and was used by them, to suggest the large compass, and great plenty of knowledge they would be thought to have had; and best becomes and suits with our Lord Jesus Christ, in whom all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge are: salutations among the Jews, were forbidden in the night (l);

"says R. Jochanan, it is forbidden a man to salute his neighbour in the night, lest it should be a demon:''

but here was no such danger; nor was this salutation made in the street, and in the dark, which the canon seems to respect:

we know that thou art a teacher come from God; the Jews expected the Messiah as a teacher, which they might learn from many prophecies, as from Isa 2:2. Upon the first of which, and on that passage in it, "he will teach us of his ways", a noted commentator (m) of theirs has this remark;

"the teacher", he is the King Messiah.''

And the Targum on Joe 2:23 paraphrases the words thus:

"O ye children of Zion, rejoice and be glad in the word of the Lord your God, for he will return , "your teacher" to you.''

And Nicodemus acknowledges Jesus as such; and as one that did not come, or was sent by men, as their doctors were; nor did he come of himself, as false teachers did; but he came from God, and had his mission and commission from him: and this was a known case, a clear point, not only to himself, but to many of the Jews; and even to some of his brethren, the members of the sanhedrim; who upon hearing of, and seeing the miracles done by Christ, might meet and converse freely together about him; and give their sentiments of him; and might then agree pretty much in this at that time, that he was at least a prophet, and some extraordinary teacher, whom God had sent among them; and Nicodemus coming directly from them, repeats his own sense and theirs, supported by the following reason:

for no man can do these miracles that thou dost, except God be with him: referring to the miracles he had done at the passover in Jerusalem, very lately; see Joh 2:23. And which, though they are not particularly mentioned, may be concluded to be such, as the dispossessing of devils, the curing of all manner of diseases by a word, or touch, from what he at other times, and elsewhere did. Miracles were expected by the Jews, to be wrought by the Messiah, and many believed in Jesus on this account; see Joh 6:14; though the modern Jews deny it to be necessary, that miracles should be done by the Messiah (n); but Nicodemus, and other Jews, thought otherwise, and considered the miracles of Christ as such, as could never be done by man, nor without the presence and power of God; and concluded that he was with God, and God with him, and was the true Immanuel, who is God with us.

(e) Zohar in Exod. fol. 84. 1. (f) Ib. fol. 8S. 2. in Lev. fol. 5. 3, 4. & 10. 1. & passim. (g) T. Bab. Chagiga, fol. 12. 2. Avoda Zara, fol. 3. 2. Maimon. Hilch. Talmud Tora, c. 3. sect. 13. (h) T. Bab. Tamid. foi. 32. 2. (i) T. Bab. Taanith, fol. 9. 2. (k) T. Bab. Cholin, fol. 91. 1. Piske Tosephot Pesach, art. 12. & Maimon. Hilch, Deyot. c. 5. sect. 9. (l) T. Bab. Sanhedrin, fol. 44. 1. & Megilla, fol. 3. 1. & Piske Tosephot Megilla, art. 4. & in Yebamot, art. 238. (m) R David Kimchi in loc. (n) Maimon. Hilch. Melacim, c. 11. sect. 3.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

1 There was a man of the Pharisees, named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews:

Ver. 1. A ruler of the Jews] Either a chieftain of the Pharisees, as he was, Luk 14:1; or one of the Sanhedrim, one of the 70 seniors, whose learning hung in their light, 1Co 2:8. Yet was neither learned Nathanael, nor Nicodemus, a master of Israel, excluded from Christ’s discipline (saith Joan. de Turrecremata), lest if he had admitted simple men only, it might have been thought they were deceived through their simplicity. {a}

{a} Ne si solos simplices vocasset, credi possit quod fuissent ex simplicitate decepti.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

A man of the Pharisees - A Pharisee. See the notes at Mat 3:7.

Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews - One of the “Sanhedrin,” or great council of the nation. He is twice mentioned after this as being friendly to our Saviour; in the first instance as advocating his cause, and defending him against the unjust suspicion of the Jews Joh 7:50, and in the second instance as one who came to aid in embalming his body, Joh 19:39. It will be recollected that the design of John in writing this gospel was to show that Jesus was the Messiah. To do this he here adduces the testimony of one of the rulers of the Jews, who early became convinced of it, and who retained the belief of it until the death of Jesus.

Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

The particle there being put in only to fit our idiom to the Greek, where is nothing but the verb, signifies nothing to prove that what we read in this chapter was done at Jerusalem. It is a dispute amongst some interpreters, whether he was there or no. It should seem by Joh 7:50, that Nicodemus’s chief residence was there. He was one of the Pharisees, who were a sect (as we have showed before) which had their name either from a Hebrew word, which signifieth to explain, (because they were expounders of the law), or from another word, which signifieth to divide, because they were separate from others: the opinions have both learned patrons. This man’s name in Greek signifies, The victory of the people. He was either the head of a family among the Jews, or a ruler of the synagogue, or one of the sanhedrim: it seemeth most probable he is here called a ruler upon the last account, if we consider Joh 7:50.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

The New Birth. John's Testimony to Jesus

1-15. Conversation with Nicodemus. The ministry at Jerusalem, though disappointing, was not fruitless. Christ's miracles and teaching had made an impression, not only on Nicodemus, but as Nicodemus himself says (Joh_3:2, cp. Joh_12:42), on other members of the Sanhedrin. This interview took place by night, on account of the timidity of Nicodemus (cp. Joh_7:50), and probably in St. John's house at Jerusalem, the evangelist himself being present. Nicodemus may possibly be the Nicodemus, son of Gorion, mentioned in the Talmud.

1. A ruler] i.e. a member of the Sanhedrin.

2, 3. Nicodemus had asked no question, but Jesus knew what he wished to ask, viz. 'If Thou art the Messiah, as some of us are inclined to believe, tell us how we must enter that Kingdom of God, which Thou hast come to establish, and of which Thou hast said so much.' Our Lord answers that a new birth, i.e. a new heart and a new nature, are necessary, according to the testimony of the OT. prophets: 'I will put my Law in their inward parts and write it in their hearts' (see Jer_31:31.; Eze_37:26, etc.). As evidence of the 'new birth,' our Lord would require humility, humble trust in God for salvation through Christ, not a vainglorious boasting in descent from Abraham, or in the punctilious fulfilment of legal ceremonies; also repentance, i.e. sincere abhorrence of sin, and not merely of ceremonial defilement; and, lastly, love, and that not only of one's friends, but also of one's enemies; not only of the righteous, but of publicans and sinners; not only of the Jew, but of the Samaritan and the Gentile—a love, moreover, manifesting itself not in word only, but in works of mercy, such as feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, and instructing the ignorant.

4. How can a man] Nicodemus is unwilling to believe that he, an orthodox and pious Jew, and withal a ruler and a Pharisee, must undergo so radical a change, before he can enter Christ's Kingdom. He therefore affects to misunderstand Christ's words: cp. Joh_6:52.

5. Of water and of the Spirit] Our Lord again insists that a new birth is necessary, and explains that it must be an inward and spiritual one. It must not be only of 'water,' i.e. the reception of the outward rite of baptism without proper appreciation of what membership of Christ's Kingdom involves, but also of 'the Spirit,' i.e. Nicodemus must approach Christ's baptism with such sincerity of repentance and faith, and such earnest resolution to live up to the ideals of the new Kingdom, that in his case the outward rite will be accompanied by an effusion of the Spirit, that will make his baptism a real 'new birth of water and of the Spirit.' Baptism is again spoken of as a 'new birth' by St. Paul—'according to his mercy he saved us by (RV 'through') the washing (RM 'laver,' i.e. bath) of regeneration (or 'new birth') and renewing of the Holy Ghost' (Tit_3:5). Christ's baptism is often distinguished from John's, as a baptism of the Spirit (Mat_3:11; Joh_1:33; Act_1:5; Act_19:4, etc.). It confers (on those who receive it rightly) spiritual graces which could not be fully given until Jesus had been glorified (Joh_7:39). We learn from Joh_3:26 that already Jesus was admitting disciples into His Kingdom by the rite of baptism, and this explains the allusion to 'water' here.

Jewish and Christian Baptism

(1) The phrase 'new birth' or 'regeneration' here applied by our Lord to Christian baptism was not a new one. The rabbis were accustomed to admit proselytes to Judaism by three rites, all of which they regarded as essential—(a) baptism (always by complete immersion) in the presence of witnesses who answered to the Christian 'sponsors' or 'godparents'; (b) in the case of males, circumcision; (c) sacrifice. The rabbis frequently spoke of this proselyte baptism as a 'regeneration,' i.e. a new birth from heathenism, in which the proselytes had been under the dominion of Satan, into the family of God, in which they enjoyed the privileges of the covenant of Abraham. Our Lord, therefore, might fairly expect Nicodemus, a rabbi and a sanhedrist, to understand Him when He spoke of His own baptism as a new birth from the ceremonies and shadows of the Law to the spiritual reality and power of the New Dispensation.

(2) The context of this v., in which much more is said about 'spirit' than about 'water,' warns us not to rely unduly upon the saving efficacy of baptism regarded as a merely external ordinance. Baptism is not a charm like the purifications of the heathen, nor a mere symbol of purity like those of the Jewish Law, but a sacrament, i.e. a moral means of grace, the full efficacy and effect of which depend upon the response in the soul of the baptised person to the covenanted grace proffered in the ordinance.

(3) No argument against infant baptism can be drawn from the words 'Except a man,' etc. The Greek is quite indefinite, 'Except any one.' In the case of infants the conscious response of the soul to the proffered grace of the ordinance takes place when the age of reason is reached. On infant baptism, see on Mat_19:13-15.

(4) On this passage, together with Mat_28:19; (cp. Mar_16:16), is founded the prevailing opinion that baptism ('where it may be had') is indispensably necessary for admission into the Christian covenant.

6. The nature we inherit from our parents is corrupt; the new nature which comes with the new birth is holy and spiritual.

8. As none can trace the source or aim of the wind, yet all can hear and feel it, so is it with those who have experienced the new birth. There is something in the inner life not to be explained, but which reveals itself in its operations, and can be known only by experience.

10. 'You a teacher in Israel, and this, without which all religion is a dead thing, not known to you!'

11. We] Probably St. John and a few other disciples were present.

12. Earthly things] i.e. religious facts and experiences (e.g. repentance, faith, the new birth, etc.), which happen upon this earth, and which are, therefore, comparatively easy to apprehend. Heavenly things] i.e. the hidden and unfathomable counsels of God for human salvation, e.g. the Incarnation, and the Atonement (Joh_3:13-14, Joh_3:15).

13. Ascended] This word is not to be taken quite literally. Our Lord only means that He had been in heaven before His Incarnation, and hence could speak of heavenly things (i.e. the Father's most secret counsels) from personal experience. Which is in heaven] Some important authorities omit these words, which, if genuine, affirm that our Lord was at the same time on earth and in heaven, in a state of humiliation, and in a state of glory.

14. See Num_21:6-9. As the children of Israel, bitten by the fiery serpents, were cured by looking at the brazen serpent, so sinners may receive remission of sins and eternal life by looking with faith at Jesus, who was 'lifted up,' first upon the cross, and afterwards into heaven: cp. Joh_8:28; Joh_12:32, Joh_12:34.

15. RV 'that whosoever believeth may in Him have eternal life.'

Eternal life] This expression, though found in the other Gospels (Mat_19:16, etc.) and in the Pauline Epistles (Rom_2:7, etc.), is specially characteristic of St. John. It is that state of blissful communion with God, which is enjoyed by the believer who is reconciled to God through faith in Christ. The NT. generally speaks of it as a future possession, but St. John often regards it as possessed already to some extent in this world. 'Eternal,' lit. 'æonian,' means not simply 'endless,' but 'belonging to the world to come,' and so 'supernatural,' 'spiritual,' 'heavenly.'

16-21. are probably words of Jesus, though some regard them as reflections of the evangelist. They state the broad saving truths of the gospel in direct opposition to the narrow Pharisaism in which Nicodemus had been reared. Whereas the Pharisees confined salvation to a single race, and believed that the Messiah would judge the Gentiles with extreme severity, our Lord declares that God has sent His Son to save the whole world, and not to judge or condemn any part of it. 'Whosoever will,' may believe and be saved.

17. Condemn] lit. 'judge' (RV), but the context shows that an unfavourable judgment is meant.

18. Is condemned (lit. 'hath been judged') already] God's judgment upon men's actions is a present fact; He judges men here and now. The publication of His judgment, however, will not take place until the Last Day.

18. The name] i.e. (practically) the Person.

19. This is the condemnation (RV 'judgment')] i.e. the condemnation is based upon this, that the Light is come into the world, etc. It is implied that men whose deeds are really good, are irresistibly attracted by Christ's words and works, so that they become believers.

21. To 'do the truth,' means to live the Christian life, for Christian truth is more than a belief, it is a way of life. The phrase is peculiar to St. John: cp. 1Jn_1:6.

22-36. Jesus leaves Jerusalem and baptises in the country districts of Judæa, where He probably spent most of the time from the Passover, 27 a.d., to the late harvest (December) of the same year: see on Joh_4:35. His great success rouses the jealousy of John's disciples (Joh_3:26), but the Baptist, so far from regarding Christ's disciples as too many, laments that they are too few (Joh_3:32), and again testifies his belief in Christ's Messiahship.

22. Baptized] Our Lord baptised only through the ministry of His disciples (Joh_4:2). The synoptists represent Christian baptism as not ordained till after the Resurrection (Mat_28:19; Mar_16:16); but here it is said to have been practised from the beginning of the ministry. The two accounts are not really inconsistent. What had been Christ's practice during His ministry was raised to the dignity of a perpetual ordinance after the Resurrection. Some regard this preliminary baptism of Christ as a mere baptism of repentance like John's, but it is apparently called a birth 'of water and the Spirit' (Joh_3:5), and consequently must have been specifically Christian baptism, although doubtless the fulness of the Spirit could not be given till after the Ascension (Joh_7:39). That the Spirit could be given in some measure before the Ascension, Joh_20:22 is evidence.

23. Ænon] lit. 'full of springs,' is generally located 8 m. S. of Scythopolis, near Salim (Salumias) and the Jordan.

24. This v. corrects the impression which the synoptic narrative produces, that John was imprisoned immediately after our Lord's baptism. As a matter of fact, the two ministries overlapped by several months, perhaps by a whole year.

25. The Jews] RV 'a Jew.' Perhaps the Jew was a disciple of Jesus, and the dispute was about the comparative cleansing power of John's baptism and Christ's.

27. 'Do not wonder at the success of Jesus. No man can usurp what heaven has not granted him.'

29. By Jewish custom 'the friend of the bridegroom' arranged the marriage contract between the bridegroom and the bride, and presided at the wedding feast. This John did for Jesus, by preparing the Jewish people (the bride) to receive our Lord's teaching.

31-36. Not, as some think, a reflection of the evangelist, but a continuation of the testimony of the Baptist. The Baptist places Christ (he that cometh from above) at an infinite elevation above himself (he that is of the earth) (Joh_3:31). He declares that Christ came down from heaven, and so can testify to what He has seen there (Joh_3:32). He alone can give the Spirit without measure (Joh_3:34). He is God's Son; to Him all power is committed; and through faith in Him eternal life is offered. To disobey Him is to incur God's wrath (Joh_3:35-36).

31. Christ's teaching is as superior to John's as the heavens are higher than the earth.

32. No man] a rhetorical overstatement. John deplores that the number of Christ's followers, though great, is as nothing compared with what it ought to be.

33. That God is true (lit. 'truthful')] To believe the Messiah is to believe God, for the Messiah is God's ambassador and interpreter (see the next v.).

34. For God (RV 'he') giveth] This may either mean 'for Christ giveth not the Spirit by measure (to believers),' or, 'for God giveth not the Spirit by measure (to Christ).'

36. Believeth not] RV 'obeyeth not.'

J. R. Dummelow, A Commentary on the Holy Bible (Macmillan, 1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

§ 21. JESUS’S DISCOURSE WITH NICODEMUS 1-21.

1. There was a man—John now proceeds to give a specimen of the many mentioned at the close of the last chapter (see our note Joh_2:23) who were converted by Jesus’s miracles, but not trustworthily converted at heart, in order to show how Jesus would deal with such a case. Thereby a believer by logic is guided to a faith of the heart.

Nicodemus—Josephus, the historian, had a brother named Nicodemus Ben Gorion, (as the tradition reports,) who was a member of the Sanhedrim, and counted one of the three richest men of Jerusalem. He was able, say they, to have maintained the city for ten years; and marvelous account are given of the dowry of his daughters. But it is said he afterwards became poor; and his daughter was seen by another rabbi gathering barley corns for food from under the horses’ feet. Some have conjectured that this was the result of the persecutions he received for having embraced Christianity. This Nicodemus, it was said, was found living at the destruction of Jerusalem.

A ruler of the Jews—He was one of the Sanhedrim, which consisted of priests, Levites, elderly men, and rabbis.

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

This is the first of the eleven discourses recorded by this evangelist, and for the most part addressed to the cultivated, hierarcical party in Jerusalem, who questioned him in an unfriendly spirit. On the sources of these records, and the degree to which John"s subjectivity coloured his record of them, see Introduction.

But there was a man of the Pharisees. Is this narrative introduced, as Baur thinks, to give a specimen of wrongly directed faith, to which Christ did not entrust himself? and was the evangelist busy at once on his great mission of undervaluing the Jewish parties and nation? Certainly not. We have a clear proof that, in the case of the genuine inquirer, Christ did open His very heart; and to a "ruler of Jews," to a "Pharisee," to a "teacher of Israel," he deigned (because he knew what was in the man, and required nobody"s help) to unveil the deepest realities of the kingdom of God and of the salvation of man. Baur is not correct in making Nicodemus out to be a specimen of unbelieving Judaism and unsusceptible Pharisaism, seeing that the later notices of this Sanhedrist show that he became a disciple of Jesus, if secretly, Nicodemus was attracted, as others had been, by the "signs" which Jesus had wrought; but he had gone further and deeper than they, and Jesus "knew it." A controversy has arisen on the point Did our Lord, by these penetrative glances, manifest his Divine nature, assume a Divine prerogative, or exercise a lofty, penetrative human gift? Westcott, on the philological ground of the contrast in meaning between ginwskein and eidenai , urges that the former word, used here, represents knowledge acquired by processes of inquiry and perception, as distinct from the latter, which is reserved for absolute and settled knowledge. Godet, on theological grounds, urges that the phrase refers to the human faculty of observation rather than to the Divine prerogative of heart-searching. There are, however, many other indications of this same thought-mastery, which the evangelists appear to regard as proofs of Divine power; so that I think the real significance of the passage is an ascription to Jesus of Divine power. The supernatural in mind, the superhuman mental processes of Jesus, are part of the proof we have that, though he was Man, he created the irresistible impression that he was more than man. Thus Nathanael and Thomas found these to be the most irresistible proofs of the supreme Divine perfections of their Master. (cf. Joh_1:49 Joh_4:17 Joh_6:61 Joh 11:4, 14 13:11 21:17; and also Rev_2:2, Rev_2:9, Rev_2:13, etc.) "The man of the Pharisees" furnishes (Godet) a test for determining the authenticity of the narrative. If the lines of the following discourse, which move from the first fundamental conditions of admission into the kingdom of God to the deepest principles of Divine character, and the grounds and consequences of reconciliation with God, are such as meet the standpoint and correct the deductions of the Pharisee, we have, then, all but demonstrative evidence that this conversation did not evolve itself out of the consciousness of the second century. The Pharisaic party was excited by the ministry of John (ch. 1:240, and throughout the early ministry of Jesus in Galilee followed him, with suspicious, malicious suggestions, even plans for his suppression. The name Nicodemus, if Hebrew in etymology from dam and naki, may have meant "innocent blood;" it Greek, as is more probable, seeing that the plan of bearing Greek as well as Hebrew names was not uncommon, it would signify "Conqueror of the people." Tradition says that he was baptized by Peter and John, and deposed from his position in the Sanhedrin, but supported by his kinsman, Gamaliel. Each reference to him (Joh_7:50 and Joh_19:39) implies a certain timidity, and perhaps unworthy reticence. These are relative terms. Much moral courage must have been required for a ruler of the Jews (a phrase only applicable to a man of high ecclesiastical rank) to have dreamed of doing what he is reported to have done here and elsewhere. The Talmud mentions a Nicodemus ben Gotten, who was also called Bonai, a disciple of Jesus, of great wealth and piety, who survived the destruction of Jerusalem, and therein lost nil his fortune (Lightfoot, in loc.; Delitzsch, "Zeitsch. Luth. Theol.," 1854). The hint that he was an old man in this year (A.U.C. 781, or A.D. 29) renders his survival till A.D. 70 improbable, but not impossible by any means. The identification is not complete. The Talmud does not speak of him as a Sanhedrist, though it gives curious details, which imply that he must have been a priest in the temple, and had the charge of providing the water supply for the pilgrims (Geikie, 1:584; Winer, "Real.," 2:152).

Vers. 1-8. The interview of Christ with Nicodemus.

This brings before us one of the most important passages in Scripture.

I NICODEMUS APPEARS HERE AS A RELIGIOUS INQUIRER.

1. He was a ruler of the Jews. " That is, not a civic magistrate, but a member of the Sanhedrin, which governed the Jewish community in ecclesiastical concerns.

2. He was a Pharisee. The most popular and influential of the Jewish sects narrow in its particularism, and with a zeal springing out of a selfish root. According to his view as a Pharisee, every Jew with the authorized ritualistic qualification would enter the Messianic kingdom as a matter of right, and saw in the Messiah the Head of a new kingdom that would annihilate Gentile powers and control the destiny of the world.

3. Nicodemus was of a timid and compromising temper. He came to Jesus "by night;" not, as some suppose, because he feared to give too much importance to the young Rabbi by coming openly, but because he feared to lose his credit with his unbelieving colleagues of the Sanhedrin. This timid spirit never left him, though he became somewhat stronger with experience; for he afterwards defended Jesus without acknowledging any personal interest in him, (Joh_7:51) and it was not till Jesus was dead and his body in the hands of Joseph of Arimathaea, that he brought the precious offering that displayed his faith.

4. His curiosity in Jesus may have been excited by the report made to the Sanhedrin by the deputation that waited on John the Baptist. His present secret visit, therefore, was one of inquiry as to whether Jesus was not the Messiah spoken of by the Baptist.

II THE MODE OF HIS INQUIRY. "Rabbi, we know that thou art a Teacher come from God: for no man can do these miracles that thou doest, except God be with him.

1. He concedes that Jesus was a Rabbi, though he had not received his knowledge from the rabbinical schools, but "from God" himself.

2. He concedes his miracle-working power as an evidence of his Divine mission. This was in accordance with our Lord"s own declaration at another time, that "his works bore witness that the Father sent him". (Joh_5:36) It is suggestive that Nicodemus uses the very expression of Peter when, in describing our Lord"s ministry and miracles, that apostle said, "God was with him". (Act_10:38)

3. Yet he does not concede our Lords Messiahship, much less his Divinity as the Son of God. He calls him simply "a Teacher," as if he were not different from other teachers. This was the error of Nicodemus.

4. Yet his inquiry, though not formally expressed, was for further light as to how far this teaching and these miracles betokened the dawn of the Messiah"s kingdom.

III OUR LORD"S ANSWER TO HIS INQUIRY. "Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God." We have here the statement of the doctrine of regeneration by the Holy Ghost. The answer is, in substance, "You are asking, Am I the Messiah, and is my kingdom near, as my miracles seem to testify? I answer that my kingdom is at hand; but it is not a kingdom that men see coming "with observation," but a spiritual state into which men enter by a transformation of character.

1. Our Lord asserts the fact of the new birth.

(1) This new phrase is used six times in this Gospel, six times in the First Epistle of John, and once in the First Epistle of Peter. It marks the starting point of a new spiritual experience.

(2) It is more than moral renovation or outward conformity to a rule of life.

(3) It is more than baptism, to which some think it a theological equivalent; for baptism was no mystery to the Pharisees, as this new birth appeared to be, for they were familiar with the baptism of proselytes.

(4) It signified the change of heart which is wrought by the Spirit of God, when a sinner believes repentingly on Jesus Christ. It is no mere fact of New Testament experience. (Eze_11:19 Eze_36:26)

(5) Yet it was a mystery to Nicodemus, notwithstanding his presumed knowledge of Scripture; else he never would have asked the absurd question, "How can a man be born when he is old?" He confounded a second beginning with a different beginning the sphere of nature with the sphere of grace.

2. Our Lord asserts the condition of this new birth, and the agent in its accomplishment. "Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God." The usual interpretation is that the water refers to a definite external rite baptism and to an internal spiritual operation. The theory of baptismal regeneration points to this passage as one of its favourite proofs. Many able divines, however, believe that there is no allusion whatever here to Christian baptism.

(1) Because this ordinance was not then instituted, though the baptism of John must have been familiar to Nicodemus.

(2) Because, if the expression, "born of water," refers to baptism, and the expression, "born of the Spirit," to regeneration, they are distinct. The very use of the two terms implies that baptism will not of itself save.

(3) Because, in an analogous passage, "He who believeth and is baptized, shall be saved," baptism and faith are not regarded as the same thing. There may be baptism without faith, and faith without baptism.

(4) Because to understand baptism by "the water" here involves the absurdity of extending the same meaning to the word everywhere in this Gospel wherever anything spiritual is meant by water.

But let it be conceded that "born of water" does refer to baptism, there is nothing in the passage to justify the theory of regeneration by baptism.

(1) Consider that John the Baptist made a marked distinction between baptism by water and baptism by the Holy Ghost. He could administer the one; Jesus only could administer the other.

(2) As Pusey concedes there was no such thing as baptismal regeneration till the Spirit was given after the ascension of Christ, there could have been no such thing when Jesus spoke to Nicodemus no possibility of a man on that night Being born both of water and of the Spirit.

(3) Scripture uniformly represents faith, not baptism, as necessary to salvation. As a matter of fact, faith was, in adults, regarded as necessary to baptism; and as faith is the pure effect of regeneration, regeneration can, no more than faith, be the effect of baptism. We have instances in the New Testament of regeneration before baptism, and therefore without baptism; therefore baptism does not regenerate. (Act_10:44-48; etc.)

(4) Much as John speaks of regeneration in his First Epistle, he never connects it with baptism. Yet, in naming the tests of regeneration, he never includes baptism among them.

(5) Regeneration is expressly referred to the Word, and not to baptism. (1Pe_1:23 Jam_1:18) There is an analogy, indeed, in the relation of baptism and the Word respectively to salvation. The Word saves, as baptism saves; yet all who hear it do not believe, just as all the baptized are not regenerated.

(6) If "water" in the text means baptism, then baptism is necessary to salvation. Then, all the unbaptized, not to speak of the whole body of the Quakers, are lost.

(7) This theory implies that all the baptized are saved. Yet Simon Magus was still unregenerate after his baptism.

(8) If this theory be true, people are born of God who have not a single mark of regeneration, but rather every sign of godless apostasy.

(9) Such an interpretation makes it difficult to understand why our Lord rebuked Nicodemus for not knowing it: "Knowest thou not these things?" He knew there was baptism, but he did not know it involved regeneration.

(10) If baptism is equivalent to regeneration, why should it be so seldom referred to in Scripture? Faith, which is the true means of our salvation, is mentioned everywhere. Yet baptism is only mentioned twice in Romans, seven times in Corinthians, only once in Galatians, Ephesians, Colossians, Hebrews, and Peter.

IV THE NECESSITY OF THE NEW BIRTH. "That which is of the flesh, is flesh; and that which is of the Spirit, is spirit." Nicodemus had spoken of a man entering once more into his mother"s womb, and being born again. Our Lord declares that if such a thing were possible, it would not effect the new birth. Children will always be like their parents. Grace does not descend with blood. Therefore there is a profound necessity for the life of the Spirit being imparted by the Spirit.

V THE MYSTERY OF THE NEW BIRTH. "The wind bloweth where it listeth,...but thou canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth." We cannot account for the beginning, or the influence, or the direction of the wind. So there is deep mystery in the action of the Holy Spirit upon the spirit of man; for while man preserves his absolute moral freedom, the Spirit works in him to will and to do according to his good pleasure.

VI THE EVIDENCE OF THE NEW BIRTH. "Thou hearest the sound thereof." We cannot know all the mysteries of the wind, but we see and feel the effects of its presence in nature. So the mystery of regeneration comes visibly to the surface of Christian life in the fruits of that life.

HOMILIES BY D. YOUNG Vers. 1, 2. Coming to Jesus by night.

I THE SIMPLE FACT IS STATED. We are left to draw our own inferences. Evidently we are meant to think the worse of Nicodemus for coming by night, and we may draw inferences without making Nicodemus out to be an exceptionally bad character. Just the average man of the world, with a position made for him, having much to lose by taking up boldly with new ways, and therefore feeling he could not be too cautious in his first approach to Jesus. He did not want to be compromised.

II JESUS DID NOT SEND AWAY THE MAN WHO CAME BY NIGHT. He did not stand upon his dignity. He did not say, "Go away again, and come by daylight." Jesus is the most accessible of beings. It is better to come by day than by night, because such a coming indicates a brave, determined mind, bent on getting at the truth, and so much the better placed for reaching the truth, because it has risen above that fear of man which bringeth a snare. But it is better to come by night than not at all; and it matters a great deal to us to know that Jesus did not send this man away because he came by night. Thus we have illustration how Jesus does not break the bruised reed or quench the smoking flax. If weak ones are to make headway in the path of faith and righteousness, they must not he dealt with hardly in the beginning.

III JESUS HAS THE SAME MESSAGE WHENEVER WE MAY COME. Whatever hour Nicodemus may choose, it is the same truth he will have to hear, the same process he will have to go through. Come at midnight or come at noonday, the announcement is the same, "Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.

IV CONTRAST THE COMING OF NICODEMUS WITH HIS DEPARTURE. Not that we are told how he departed. He may have succeeded in his immediate desire. His visit to Jesus may have remained unknown to everybody but Jesus and himself, he came in the darkness of physical night, and in the darkness of physical night he probably went away. But nevertheless, uncomfortable consequences must have come to him in ways he did not at all expect, he came in the gross darkness of spiritual ignorance, but he can hardly have gone away without some dim rays of spiritual light upon his path. There must. at all events, have been a disturbing sense of a larger world than he had. been heretofore accustomed to. He had been brought face to face with more searching views of life. You may, perhaps, choose what you will begin and how, but how you will end is beyond your choice. The one thing that everybody now knows about Nicodemus is that he is the man who came to Jesus by night. What a commentary on the vain wisdom and expectations of men! The very means Nicodemus takes to ensure secrecy end in the widest publicity. And yet it is a publicity that does not hurt Nicodemus, and it is for the world"s good. It is long, long ago since it could matter in the least to Nicodemus who knew the way of his coming to Jesus. Y.

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

A ruler - One of the great council.

John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.

The Visit of Nicodemus.

The call by night:

v. 1. There was a man of the Pharisees, named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews.

v. 2. The same came to Jesus by night and said unto Him, Rabbi, we know that Thou art a teacher come from God; for no man can do these miracles that Thou doest except God be with him.

v. 3. Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.

Here is an incident from the happenings of this Passover week which shows the Savior’s kind and searching love. There was a certain man in Jerusalem that belonged to the Pharisees, the sect of the Jews which was peculiarly zealous for the keeping of the traditions of the elders. The Pharisees were leaders of Jewish thought, many of them, if not all, teachers, but strongly imbued with the idea of self-righteousness. This man, Nicodemus, not only belonged to them, but he was even a member of the Sanhedrin, the highest council of the Jewish Church, Joh 7:50. He came to Jesus by night, partly because he feared his colleagues, whose enmity toward Jesus was evident from the first, and partly because he wanted to be undisturbed. He felt a growing dissatisfaction with the manner in which the Jewish leaders were condemning Jesus. He believed that this new Teacher had a wonderful message and should be heard; he had a desire to know more of His message. Addressing Jesus in a very respectful way, he frankly tells Him that he himself and the party he represented, probably a few earnest souls in the otherwise hostile council, knew, they had come to the conclusion, that Jesus was a Teacher come from God. They recognized in Him a divinely commissioned Teacher, which does not imply an understanding of Christ’s miraculous origin. These Jews to whom Nicodemus belonged had simply drawn their conclusions from the evidence before their eyes. God had confirmed the teaching of Jesus by miracles of a kind that brought conviction. They were no tricks or sleight-of-hand performances, but such wonders as indicated the power of God beyond all question. There could be no doubt of God’s being with the man that could perform such miracles. The knowledge of Nicodemus went so far as to recognize in Jesus a prophet on a level with those of the Old Testament, but it did not go so far as to accept Him as the Messiah. The position of Nicodemus is shared by many so-called Christians of our day. Their confession of Jesus is entirely in conformity with reason. They believe Him to be a great Teacher" they praise His doctrine. But they do not want to acknowledge Him as the Savior of the world. The statement of Nicodemus was a feeler. He indicated that he and his party were inclined to go still farther in their belief; he suggested that Jesus should express Himself as to His actual position and intentions. The idea of a temporal Messianic kingdom was always foremost in the minds of the Jews. But Jesus solemnly declares that an inquiry of this nature, and with that probable end in view, was useless without an understanding of the manner of the entering into the kingdom of God. Unless a person comes into being, is born, anew, again, is made over entirely into a new creature, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God which Jesus is preaching so earnestly. Without such complete regeneration a participation in the joys of the true kingdom of God is impossible. No one can be saved unless he is regenerated. Nicodemus, like all the Pharisees, believed that he could be saved by the works of the Law. His view is shared by millions of misguided people today. To be worthy of heaven by one’s own merits, that is the aim of all modern Pharisees. But the demand of Christ differs radically from that assumption. It overthrows all self-righteousness and pride completely. It insists upon a complete change in the moral condition of a man, a thorough and all including transformation of the heart, of the mind, of the will of a person, which also must become evident in anew manner of living, so that such a person, in his thinking, willing, feeling, in words and in works, is anew man. Without such regeneration no one can enter into the kingdom of God.

Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Joh 3:3

I. The first thing to be observed, as we read this discourse just as it lies before us, is the clear deliverance, by implication at least, on the doctrine of the complete depravity of human nature. It was to Nicodemus—with his morality and unblemished life, with his position as a teacher of the only true religion that was in the world at the time, and not to some dark, sin-defiled creature who had trampled on all law—that the Saviour says, "You are all wrong; you must be born again."

II. The next and corresponding truth is the radical character of the religion of Christ. In order to meet this great need, that religion goes to the root of everything within us, and touching and transforming all creates us anew in Christ Jesus.

III. The inexorable character of this requirement. It is a law of the kingdom of Christ, and it stands at the entrance to that kingdom, never to be disannulled: "Ye must be born again." Like the rocks which sometimes guard the entrance to a safe and spacious harbour, these words stand. A ship must enter here, or turn back to the wide ocean, with no haven or home.

IV. Although this law is itself radical and inexorable, there is nothing uniform or unchangeable as to times and modes of its fulfilment. In these there may be, and indeed there is, endless variety. As it is well not to fall short of the teaching of Scripture, it is also well not to go beyond it. In this matter of regeneration or conversion, nothing can be firmer and clearer than the law, nothing wider and more unlimited than the mode.

V. This great change is very blessed. Great happiness will accrue to a man when it is accomplished, and when he is living the new life in Christ. It is, indeed, a most blessed thing that such a change is possible, still more that it is realised in actual fact; that it occurs in cases around us; that God thus comes to dwell with men; that His Spirit touches and transforms human spirits; that men become new creatures in Christ Jesus. These are great and good things. "Ye may be born again." Does not that give a new and more luminous aspect of the case? Why should we look upon the new birth only as a stern necessity? Why not regard it as a glorious privilege? It is by far the most beneficent change that takes place under the sun. It is the seed of all virtue, the starting-point of an endless progress, the first outburst of the living water springing up into everlasting life.

A. Raleigh, From Dawn to the Perfect Day, p. 108.

References: Joh 3:3.—H. W. Beecher, Christian World Pulpit, vol. x., p. 201; vol. xxx., p. 33; Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. iii., No. 130; G. Moberly, Plain Sermons at Brighstone, p. 1; F. D. Maurice, The Gospel of St. John, p. 85.

Joh 3:5-6

I. By "being born again" is meant exactly the same thing as by "rising again;" or, rather, the same two things are meant by it. In its literal sense it means what is meant by the Resurrection literally; that is, our entrance upon a new state of being, after our present one is over. By being born, we came into this world from a state of nothingness; by being born again, we shall pass into another world from a similar state of nothingness—that is, from death. This is being born again literally; and by thus being born again we enter into the kingdom of God. Now, in one sense certainly we are all in His kingdom already. We cannot go anywhere where He is not over all; we see the whole of Nature around us, the very stars of heaven in their courses moving according to His laws. But here there are some things which do not obey Him, but have chosen to themselves another king; and these things are the evil hearts of men. It will then be the kingdom of God truly and perfectly, when there shall be nothing which does not obey Him—when not the earth, the moon, and the stars shall move more entirely according to His will than the hearts of all His reasonable creatures.

II. Into this kingdom of God, into this new and Divine life, we can by no natural process be born. That which is born of the Spirit is spirit. By His new creation a new nature is wrought for us, incapable of delay, incapable of sin, and so fit for the eternal society of God. It is still by the Spirit and the water and the blood, all agreeing in one, that we are brought nearer and nearer to the redemption of our body, to the real resurrection, the real birth, into the kingdom of God; not by water only—that is by repentance—but by water and blood, by our repentance and our grateful faith in God’s love through Christ; and not by these only, but by the constant indwelling of the Spirit of Him who raised up Jesus from the dead; that abiding with us, and ripening in us all His blessed fruits of love and peace and joy, He may, when our spirits are fully quickened, quicken also our mortal bodies; that having heard Christ’s call from the death of sin, and having arisen to His spiritual life, we may hear it also from the very grave, and come forth and be born again to a life which shall never die.

T. Arnold, Sermons, vol. vi., p. 124.

References: Joh 3:5, Joh 3:6.—H. W. Beecher, Christian World Pulpit, vol. viii., p. 172. Joh 3:5-8.—Homilist, vol. iv., p. 361. Joh 3:5, Joh 3:16, Joh 3:17.—Clergyman’s Magazine, vol. iv., p. 225. Joh 3:6.—Homilist, 4th series, vol. 1., p. 40; T. T. Carter, Sermons, p. 15; G. Brooks, Outlines of Sermons, p. 185; H. Scott Holland, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxvii., p. 1; Homilist, 3rd series, vol. i., p. 222. Joh 3:6, Joh 3:7.—Church of England Pulpit, vol. xix., p. 49. Joh 3:7.—G. Brooks, Outlines of Sermons, p. 350; Clergyman’s Magazine, vol. i., p. 224; J. Keble, Sermons from Ascensiontide to Trinity, p. 219; Christian World Pulpit, vol. vi., p. 186; Ibid., vol. viii., p. 204; Spurgeon, Morning by Morning, p. 66; Ibid., Sermons, vol. xxv., No. 1,455. Joh 3:7, Joh 3:8.—Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxiii., p. 347; J. Caird, Sermons, p. 65; G. Dawson, The Authentic Gospel, p. 58.

Joh 3:8

The Fruits of the Spirit.

I. Such words as those of the text must sound as dreams to those analytical philosophers, who allow nothing in man below the sphere of consciousness actual or possible; who have dissected the human mind till they find in it no personal will, no indestructible spiritual self, but a character which is only the net result of innumerable states of consciousness; who hold that man’s outward actions, and also his inmost instincts, are all the result either of calculations about profit and loss, pleasure, pain, or of emotions, whether hereditary or acquired. Ignoring the deep and ancient distinction—which no one ever brought out so clearly as St. Paul—between the flesh and the spirit, they hold that man is flesh and can be nothing more; that each person is not really a person, but is the consequence of his brain and nerves, and having thus, by logical analysis, got rid of the spirit of man, their reason and their conscience quite honestly and consistently see no need for, no possibility of, a Spirit of God, to ennoble and enable the human spirit.

II. But St. Paul says, and we say, that, crushed under this animal nature, there is in man a spirit; we say that, below all his consciousness there is a nobler element, a Divine spark, or at least a Divine fuel, which must be kindled into life by the Divine Spirit, the Spirit of God. And we say that, in proportion as that Spirit of God kindles the spirit of man, he begins to act after a fashion for which he can give no logical reason; that by instinct, and without calculation of profit or loss, pleasure or pain, he begins to act on what he calls duty, honour, love, self-sacrifice. And we say, moreover, that those who deny this, and dream of a morality and a civilisation without the Spirit of God, are unconsciously throwing down the ladder by which they themselves have climbed, and sawing off the very bough to which they cling.

C. Kingsley, Westminster Sermons, p. 67.

Let us briefly endeavour to trace the import of this simile in three forms of the action of the Eternal Spirit: His creation of a sacred literature; His guidance of a Divine society; His work upon the individual soul.

I. As we turn ever the pages of the Bible, must we not say, "The wind bloweth where it listeth"? The Bible is like Nature in its immense, its exhaustless, variety. Like Nature, it reflects all the higher moods of the human soul, because it does more—because it brings us face to face with the infinity of the Divine life. In the Bible the wind of heaven pays scant heed to our anticipations or our prejudices. It "bloweth where it listeth." The Spirit is in the genealogies of the Chronicles not less than in the last conversation of the Supper-room, though with an admitted difference of manner and degree.

II. The words of the text have an application in the life of the Church of Christ. We may trace revivals in it all along the line of history. The Spirit living in the Church has by them attested His presence and His will, and has recalled a lukewarm generation, paralysed by indifference and degraded by indulgence, to the spirit and level of Christian faith and love. In such movements there is often what seems at first sight an element of caprice. It is easy, as we survey them, to say something else was needed, that what was done might have been done better and more completely. But we forget whose work it is, though overlaid and thwarted by human passion, that we may be criticising. The Eternal Spirit is passing, and we can only say, He breatheth when He listeth.

III. Especially our Lord’s words apply to the Christian character. We know not the purpose of each saintly life in the designs of Providence; we know not much of the depths and heights whence it draws its inspiration; we cannot tell whence it cometh or whither it goeth. We only know that He whose workmanship it is bloweth where He listeth. Not in caprice, or by accident, but because He knows exactly of what material each of His creatures is made, and apportions His distinctions with the unerring decision of perfect love and perfect justice.

H. P. Liddon, Oxford and Cambridge Journal, June 8th, 1876.

I. Spiritual Life a Divine Inspiration. (1) Spiritual life is impossible without this inspiration. (2) That inspiration enters man in mystery.

II. Look at some of the results of realising this truth. (1) It would strengthen spiritual manhood. (2) It imparts nobility to character. (3) It gives power to our Christian hope.

E. L. Hull, Sermons, 2nd series, p. 63.

References: Joh 3:8.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xi., No. 630; Ibid., vol. xxiii., No. 1356; Homilist, 3rd series, vol. iii., p. 260; D. Fraser, Metaphors of the Gospels, p. 267; G. Moberly, Plain Sermons at Brighstone, p. 231; E. Johnson, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxiv., p. 67; Homiletic Quarterly, vol. i., p. 82; G. Brooks, Outlines of Sermons, p. 350; H. W. Beecher, Christian World Pulpit, vol. ii., p. 180; J. Foster, Ibid., vol. xviii., p. 356; Preacher’s Monthly, vol. i., p. 418; Expositor, 1st series, vol. xii., p. 237; J. Keble, Sermons from Septuagesima to Ash Wednesday, p. 333.

Joh 3:9

The Christian Mysteries.

The Feast of Trinity succeeds Pentecost; the light of the Gospel does not remove mysteries in religion. This is our subject. Let us enlarge upon it.

I. Consider such difficulties in religion as press upon us independently of the Scriptures. Now we shall find the Gospel has not removed these; they remain as great as before Christ came. Why does God permit so much evil in His own world? This was a mystery before God gave His revelation. It is as great a mystery now, and doubtless for this reason, because knowledge about it would do us no good; it would merely satisfy curiosity.

II. Nor, again, are the difficulties of Judaism removed by Christianity. The Gospel gives us no advantages, in mere barren knowledge, above the Jew, or above the unenlightened heathen.

III. Nay, we may proceed to say, further than this, that it increases our difficulties. It is, indeed, a remarkable circumstance, that the very revelation that brings us practical and useful knowledge about our souls, in the very act of doing so, may (as it would seem), in consequence of doing so, bring us mysteries. We gain spiritual light at the expense of intellectual perplexity; a blessed exchange doubtless, still at the price of perplexity. As we draw forth many remarkable facts concerning the natural world which do not lie on its surface, so by meditation we detect in revelation this remarkable principle, which is not openly propounded, that religious light is intellectual darkness.

IV. Such being the necessary mysteriousness of Scripture doctrine, how can we best turn it to account in the contest which we are engaged on with our own evil hearts? Difficulties in revelation are expressly given to prove the reality of our faith. They are stumbling-blocks to proud, unhumbled minds, and were intended to be such. Faith is unassuming, modest, thankful, obedient. Those that believe not fall away; the true disciples remain firm, for they feel their eternal interests at stake, and ask the very plain and practical, as well as affectionate, question, "To whom shall we go" if we leave Christ?

J. H. Newman, Parochial and Plain Sermons, vol. i., p. 203.

References: Joh 3:11.—J. Keble, Sermons from Ascensiontide to Trinity, p. 332. Joh 3:12.—Homiletic Quarterly, vol. iv., p. 401; R. S. Candlish, The Gospel of Forgiveness, p. 1.

Joh 3:13

Resurrection the Key to the Life of Christ.

Resurrection is the natural, inevitable issue of the life of the Man of Sorrows, the Lord of glory. Unless the universal life is one great tragedy, that life which from the first moment of its conscious activity had looked on, though it would not press on, to Calvary, could not find the term of that conscious activity in the rock-hewn tomb, where loving hands laid the crucified body of their Lord.

I. It was the force supplied by faith in the resurrection and reign of the Man Christ Jesus, the Man who had led a sinless and absolutely self-sacrificing life on earth, and who rose in Divine strength to make the power by which He lived and died the conqueror of sin and selfishness in man—it was just this force which lifted humanity out of the slough wherein it was fast settling, and gave to it a firm, rock-like foundation, on which it could build victoriously the temple of its higher life. It needed superhuman power, through the supernatural fact—the Resurrection of the Lord Jesus—to lay hold on the corrupt and dying world with a grasp strong enough to lift it, and to begin, by underbuilding it with a solid foundation of Divine truth, the work of its salvation.

II. None can read the great biography thoughtfully without feeling that the life which it portrays had the shadow of death on it from the first. And yet—and this is the transcendently wonderful feature—the atmosphere about it, the sentiment of it, was always of life, and never of death. There was no trace of habitual gloom hanging about the daily pathways of the Lord. All breathed the expression of vivid, intense, energetic, blessed, victorious life. Always the abiding thing, the victorious thing, the beautiful Divine thing, in the word and the work of the Man of Sorrows, is life. His life was entirely healthful, robust and hopeful, though Gethsemane and Calvary were clearly at the end of it. The life was never stronger, fuller, deeper in the springs than when He looked full face on death. What could such a life, what could such a death, as His mean but resurrection? Life was bursting through death as the agony deepened, and when, with the words, "It is finished," He gave up the ghost, the only thing that died was death.

J. Baldwin Brown, The Risen Christ the King of Men, p. 77.

References: Joh 3:13.—Preacher’s Monthly, vol. ix., p. 203; Spurgeon, Evening by Evening, p. 85; A. Barry, Cheltenham College Sermons, p. 344; H. Wace, Expositor, 2nd series, vol. ii., p. 196. Joh 3:14.—R. D. B. Rawnsley, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxxii., p. 141.

Joh 3:14-15

Consider some of the lessons of Gospel truth which seem to be foreshadowed in the story of the brazen serpent.

I. There was contained in it a significant intimation that Christ would die. I say significant, because to these Israelites it could hardly be a direct and positive intimation. They must connect it with other types and prophecies, intimating that it would be by His own death that the Seed of the woman should bruise the serpent’s head, and then the death of Him who was to be their Saviour would be not unaptly represented by hanging the acknowledged type of Him upon a pole. As used in the conversation with Nicodemus, however, there is no doubt about the point of the reference. But it would not be—or, at least, to him, as a master in Israel, it ought not to be—any mystery that the Messiah Prince should be cut off out of the land of the living.

II. A second Gospel truth conveyed by this history is, that salvation does not come to us through Christ being lifted up merely, but through our looking to Him when He is lifted up. God forces salvation upon no man. It is ready, it is free, it is within the compass of all; but it must be sought. Like some among the Israelites, we would fain have the brazen serpent brought down from the pole, to touch us, and heal and give life to us, against our will. But this would not Moses, this would not God. "Look unto Me and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth."

III. "And it came to pass, that if a serpent had bitten any man, when he beheld the serpent of brass, he lived." How so? Suppose he beheld it carelessly and without faith, and, as it were, in indolent curiosity, just to see what this new thing was,—did he live then? Clearly not. That look must have been a believing look, an obedient look, a look which, casting all carnal reasoning behind, makes its fearless and trusting venture on the word of promise, that "whosoever believeth on Him should not perish." Faith is a command. At the first opening of the eyes we must believe; when the earth is quaking beneath us, and the door of the eternal world is standing ajar, and despair and death are about to claim us for their own, there is nothing for us but to believe.

J. Moore, Penny Pulpit, No. 3,390.

References: Joh 3:14, Joh 3:15.—J. Natt, Posthumous Sermons, p. 192; Homilist, 3rd series, vol. ix., p. 45; E. Cooper, Practical Sermons, vol. i., p. 126; Church of England Pulpit, vol. viii., p. 222; J. Foster, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xviii., p. 380; W. Walters, Ibid., vol. xx., p. 237; J. Keble, Sermons for Holy Week, p. 114; Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. iii., No. 153. Joh 3:14-17.—Homiletic Magazine, vol. vii., p. 294. Joh 3:14-18.—Ibid., vol. xii., p. 91.

Joh 3:16

I. A difficulty arises in considering this text. If God so loved the world, why did He allow the fall of man. I answer, Never was a kinder act in God’s whole government than that fall of man. For, from what did He fall? A garden. To what does he rise? A heaven. But how can a loving Father permit so much pain, and sin, and misery among His creatures? Two keys unlock that mystery. (1) One is Christ. This world of ours was made to be a platform for the manifestation of the Lord Jesus Christ. You will never read rightly the history of this earth till you adopt that as your first principle—this world was made to be a platform to show Christ. To that manifestation of Christ in His redeeming work, pain, and sin, and misery were absolutely essential. (2) The other key is eternity. We do not yet know how that world will explain and rectify this. We do not yet know how the discipline of this world is bringing out the joy of another; and how the rough and noisy quarry of this Lebanon is giving effect to that temple which is now rising in its calmness upon the hill of Zion. When we behold all its balanced action, and its perfect unity, and its grand results, I am quite sure that we shall say of it all, "God is love."

II. God does not give many things. He lends many; and what He lends, He recalls. He lends everything that has not Christ in it; and therefore He recalls everything that has not Christ in it. But Christ, and what has Christ in it, He never recalls. A Christian affection—a Christian union—a Christian peace—He never recalls! Christ fills it. God gave Christ; therefore that affection, that peace, that union is for ever and ever. You will observe that the promise is twofold—one negative and the other positive. (1) The negative we owe, strictly speaking, to the death of Christ. Our punishment having passed on to Christ, it would not be just in God to punish us also, for that would be punishing the same sin twice. (2) The positive boon, our admission into heaven, we owe to the meritorious righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ, which is imputed to us. And when in that righteousness, we have an actual claim, even the same claim that Christ has, of admission into the heavenly kingdom, because we carry Christ’s own claim—His righteousness imputed to us.

J. Vaughan, Sermons, 1865.

Joh 3:16-17

The Atonement.

I. As one of the wisest of the heathens said, everything has two handles—one by which it may, and one by which it may not, be taken hold of. The handle by which this blessed truth of the Atonement should be taken hold of is that which Christ Himself pointed out to us. It is the moral—it is the practical—handle of it, not the theological, not the speculative. We need the doctrine, surely, as a comfort, and not as an anathema. We need it as a bond of unity, not as a test of difference. We need it as an incentive to holiness, not as a source of rancour.

II. There is a side of the Atonement which, when we contemplate, we can understand, and not only understand, but adore; for it is revealed to us not only on its transcendent side, but also on its human side—not only in its relations to God, but also in its effects on man. And on this side you will see, if you search your Bibles, that there are mainly four metaphors by which it is shadowed forth. The Atonement of Christ is described (1) as a sin offering; (2) as our reconciliation to God; (3) as a ransom from slavery; (4) as the release from a debt which it was wholly beyond our power to pay. Now here we have no doubt, no mystery, only blessing and peace. Christ is our sin-offering. When the ancient Israelite had brought his sin-offering, and seen the flame consume it on the altar, he believed that in some way, he knew not how, his sin would be forgiven; but for us, Christ, by the Eternal Spirit, offered Himself without spot to God. Christ is our reconciliation, not in type and shadow, but in very truth. He, as a mediator, stands in the place of God to man, and in the place of man to God. Christ is our ransom. Would you be grateful to one who, finding you chained in a dungeon, broke your chains and flung open your prison doors? Here is a redemption which delivers you from the captivity of sin and Satan, the worst of all captivities. Christ paid our heavy debt. If with a hearty repentance and true faith we turn to Him, the debt—the debt of the horribly wasted and desecrated past—the debt of the miserably blighted and wasted present—is cancelled, and we are free.

F. W. Farrar, Penny Pulpit, new series, No. 1,024.

References: Joh 3:16.—G. Brooks, Outlines of Sermons, p. 6; Homilist, vol. iv., p. 112; Ibid., new series, vol. ii., p. 526; Preacher’s Monthly, vol. i., p. 424; J. Keble, Sermons for Holy Week, p. 400; Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xxxi., No. 1850; R. Glover, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxi., p. 170. Joh 3:16-21.—Homiletic Magazine, vol. xii., p. 274; Clergyman’s Magazine, vol. ii., p. 271.

Joh 3:18

In this text unbelief in Christ is represented as a positive crime—a crime with which, in point of enormity, no other form of human sinfulness can be compared—a crime which not only fastens upon its subject the guilt, and binds him over to the penalty of all his other sins, but which is itself the fullest and most striking development of enmity against God and opposition to His government which can possibly be presented.

I. Note the new circumstances and position in which the Gospel of Christ places every one of its subjects. We are here upon trial for an eternal world. Pardon is offered to us as a free gift from Him who has magnified the law and made it honourable; and everything now turns upon simple faith in Jesus Christ, upon an accordance with God’s plan of forgiveness, a cordial acquiescence in the principles upon which that forgiveness is offered. Now the language addressed to us is not "He that doeth these things shall live by them," but "He that believeth shall be saved."

II. It goes not a little way to aggravate the guilt of the unbeliever, that God has been pleased in His Gospel not only to state the plan through which He forgives sin, but to show also the indispensable necessity of that plan as growing out of His justice as God, and His uprightness as a moral governor. He tells us in language too plain to be misunderstood, that He can save us in no other way than through faith in His Son. The a sacrifice of Jesus Christ was a method of infinite wisdom to pay tribute of justice, while it threw the mantle of mercy over the lost.

III. The Gospel of Jesus Christ, which unbelief rejects, is the highest expression which God could give us of His grace. Unbelief stands by itself, perfectly isolated in the features of enormity which mark it as least of all sins allowing of an apology or admitting of defence. It is not a sin of ignorance, for every man under the light of truth knows it to be wrong. The convictions of his own spirit—clear, numerous, and irrepressible—often testify against him as one who sins against light and knowledge.

E. Mason, A Pastor’s Legacy, p. 80.

References: Joh 3:18.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. vii., Nos. 361, 362; Ibid., vol. xvi., No. 964.

Joh 3:19

God’s Condemnation of Men.

Note:—

I. The principles of Divine condemnation. If we accept these words in honest simplicity we must believe that it is not for being dark, but for being content to be dark that God condemns man.

II. Pass on now to the rise of sin into conscious deeds. (1) Every act of sin darkens the light of conscience. (2) Every step decreases the power of resistance.

III. Glance at the manifestation of this principle in the coming of Christ. When the Light came, every man, who rejected Him, proved his contentment in sin.

E. L. Hull, Sermons, 1st series, p. 303.

References: Joh 3:19.—Homilist, new series, vol. iii., p. 348. Joh 3:19-24.—Homiletic Magazine, vol. xii., pp. 162, 167.

Joh 3:20

Notice:—

I. That the Jews, to whom our text was originally applied, hated the light, and would not come to it because their deeds were evil. Their national rejection of our Lord was the result of their national depravity. We gather enough from the incidental notices of the inspired historians to assure us that when Christ came upon earth Judæa was overrun with almost universal profligacy. No man of common feeling can read our Lord’s denunciations of the Pharisees without a consciousness that a fierce, unblushing depravity must have reigned among these teachers and rulers of the people, ere the lowly and compassionate Jesus could have poured forth such a torrent of reproach. Analyse the matter as nicely as you will, you cannot avoid allowing that it was just because the darkness of the false system favoured and fostered their evil deeds, while the light of the true system poured upon their shame and required their banishment, that with a tenacity which excites our surprise, and a fierceness which moves our indignation, the Jews scorned the Saviour when He stood amongst them and displayed the credentials of a marvellous and manifold miracle.

II. The same explanation may be given of infidelity, open or concealed, among ourselves. Viciousness of practice produces this strange preference of darkness to light. Men will not come to the light; they love darkness lest their deeds should be reproved. Conversion, in place of being desired, is literally and actually dreaded. It would be the most ill-omened message if you told the money-maker in the midst of his accumulations, or the pleasure-hunter in his revelries, or the child of ambition as he toils up the steep of preferment, that a day would soon dawn, bringing with it such a change in his feelings and character that wealth would be looked upon as dross, and voluptuousness spurned as an enemy, and distinctions fled from as dangerous and destructive, while he would count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Jesus Christ his Lord. Infidelity is a thing of man’s own choice, and the choice results from men’s own conduct. And thus the decision of our text, harsh as it may sound, and bigoted and illiberal, is, in every case, substantiated. The Jew and Gentile, the Deist, who openly denounces revelation as a forgery, and the worldling who gives it the homage of formal respect and then the contempt of a God-denying life—to all and each of these may the text be unreservedly applied: "Every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved."

H. Melvill, Penny Pulpit, No. 2,585.

Reference: Joh 3:20, Joh 3:21.—Homiletic Quarterly, vol. ii., p. 497.

Joh 3:21

I. Let us endeavour to arrive at some distinct meaning of that remarkable expression—doing truth. (1) The first thing in it is to be really in earnest. Until a man is thoroughly in earnest about his soul God will have nothing to do with him. But as soon as a man is really in earnest, the work is almost half done; at all events, the result is safe. (2) A man who is doing truth has begun to draw to Christ. He makes much of Christ. He begins to feel the power and beauty of Christ. He is learning to depend upon Christ; to find Christ in everything. (3) To do truth is to be very practical in religion. It is not only to hold Christ; but to carry out Christ into daily life. It is true that actions are the results of feelings; but every one who would have lightened feelings must do actions. Whoever will do His will, he shall know of the doctrine.

II. Of this character God says he is coming to the light. For there are assimilations in moral truth, as there are in nature, and wherever there is an assimilation, there is an attraction. This man has some light, and therefore he is under the influence of light! Light draws him. There is a principle in him which must be always running up to the Fountain from which this principle sprang. This man who comes to the light is daily growing in the beautiful grace of transparency of character. The nearer he gets to the light, the more transparent he is. His whole being can now bear examination. He loves truth; he courts truth; he is truth. There is reality in that man. You may weigh his words; you may scrutinise his actions: for he is learning to walk as a child of light. Up and up towards the very Fountain of light he is daily travelling. He is not light, but he is coming to the light. In greater nearness to Jesus every day; in more constant communion with Him; with more of His presence; in more of His image; he is striving to live to Him. Christ is a centre around which he moves continually, in a closer and a closer circle, coming to the light! He to Christ; Christ to him. The affinity grows stronger and stronger.

J. Vaughan, Fifty Sermons, 2nd series, p. 251.

References: Joh 3:23-36.—Homiletic Magazine, vol. ix., p. 184 Joh 3:24.—Ibid., vol. xi., p. 235. Joh 3:29, Joh 3:30.—J. Stoughton, Christian World Pulpit, vol. vi., p. 395.

Joh 3:30

Look at these words—

I. As the language of true nobility of character. Is it not refreshing to come across a really great man, a man who has too much of Christ within him ever to be ignoble? John’s language here is not the language of sullen acquiescence. It does not need any grace to talk in that strain. It is not—"Well, He must increase, and I must decrease; and I cannot help it." No, it is the language of joy, "This my joy, therefore, is fulfilled." It is the lack of this spirit which gives rise to so many splits in our churches. It is the want of this great-heartedness which takes away the power for testimony, and causes that wretched smallness of soul which cannot rejoice in the success, or the greater success, of another.

II. As the language of prophetic utterance, "He must increase—on and on and ever increasing—and I must decrease." John was the last of the prophets who foretold the coming of the kingdom of Christ. He was the forerunner, the herald of Christ, and now that the Messiah had come forth to found His kingdom, John’s mission was fulfilled. This is his last sermon. He cried, "Behold the Lamb of God!"

III. As the language of a believer’s heart. We commence life with all of self and none of Christ. It is the "I" in our aims, in our thoughts, in our conversation, in our actions, it is self we worship, self we admire, self we seek, and self we serve. But in the day of conversion Jesus Christ comes into the heart, and then there is Christ and "I" within the same breast. There is a new nature, and there is an old. It is the house of David waxing stronger and stronger, while the house of Saul waxes weaker and weaker. If I am being sanctified, Christ will occupy more and more of my thinking power. Thoughts concerning Christ and His kingdom will flow with ever-increasing volume through the channel of my mind. As Christ increases self must decrease.

A. G. Brown, Penny Pulpit, new series, No. 1,065.

This text contains a great principle—the principle on which God governs His children, always and everywhere. God’s manifest purpose is, to keep His children humble, to make our Saviour everything and ourselves nothing. We are empty; in Him dwells all fulness. We are weak, in Him is Almighty strength. We can bring to Him only our guilt, our cares, our sorrows, our poor unworthy selves. In Him is everything—grace and peace and hope and life, wisdom and sanctification and complete redemption. And it is a great and happy Christian attainment, if we can with our whole heart assent to this. We have in these words—

I. The way to be saved. You know how natural it is for us all to think that we can do something or suffer something that may recommend us to God; that may make some amends for our sin against Him. We must decrease from that; that would be saving ourselves. We must learn and feel in our heart, that we can do nothing to make amends to the law we have broken; that we must be forgiven, if forgiven at all, of God’s free grace, and for our Redeemer’s sake. We must decrease, as regards our merit before God, and as regards our estimate of our merit and ourselves before God to nothing; and our Saviour must increase till He is felt to be all in all.

II. The rule of a holy and happy life. Here is the secret of great usefulness. Here is the thing that will keep us kindly, unenvious, and unsoured in spirit; to utterly cast our self-seeking, self-assertion, self-conceit, to quite forget ourselves and our own importance and advancement, and with a single heart to think of our God and Saviour, and of the advancement of His glory in the saving and comforting of souls. Just in proportion to the degree in which you cease to think of self, and with a single eye make your Master’s glory your great end, will be the good you will do. There is nothing that goes home to the hearts of people you try to influence for good, like the conviction that you are not thinking of yourself at all; but that you are thinking of them, and of Christ’s glory in their advantage and blessing here and hereafter. It is not the fussy person trying to do good, but with much self-consciousness and self-conceit mingling with all his doings—it is not that man who will do most good. It is rather the humbler servant whose whole life says, "Now I am not working for effect; I don’t care what you think of me; I am aiming at your good and Christ’s glory only." For that humble servant, without perhaps ever thinking of it, has caught the sublime spirit of one concerning whom his Saviour said that a greater was never born of woman; and whose words about his Saviour were these, spoken ungrudgingly and with all his heart: "He must increase; but I must decrease."

A. K. H. B., Graver Thoughts of a Country Parson, 2nd series, p. 36.

Let us try to enter into the spirit of that deep and affectionate loyalty to our Lord, which is everywhere to be seen in the Holy Baptist’s character. I mean his not thinking of himself, but of his Master; giving up everything to His glory; rejoicing, as he went on, to find that Jesus Christ every day was showing Himself more and more glorious above him, and throwing him quite into the shade. His "burning and shining light" was to be put out and disappear, like a star, when the sun arises. And he is glad and thankful to have it so; like Jonathan, who truly rejoiced in seeing David by degrees mounting up to the kingdom which, according to earthly ways of thinking, Jonathan might have looked for himself.

I. This loyal and self-devoted feeling St. John here expresses in words; but his whole life and conduct before had expressed it, to a considerate mind, quite as clearly. All his doctrine ran upon this; that neither his preaching nor his baptism was anything at all in itself, but only to prepare the way for the perfect Gospel, the spiritual Baptism, which Jesus Christ should set up afterwards. It may seem suitable to this dutiful temper of mind, that St. John, when the people asked him what they should do, referred them always to the plainest and simplest duties, the very thing, as it were, which came next in each man’s way. In every instance the advice which he gives was as plain and simple as could be, not at all leading them to think of him, nor of any particular wisdom or goodness that was in him, but only to glorify God in their stations by sincere obedience. So again, the Baptist never shrank from showing people the severe side of the truth. "The wrath to come," "the unquenchable fire," "the axe laid to the root of the tree,"—these are the things of which he continually kept putting people in mind; but these are not the subjects on which he would have delighted to dwell, had he desired to please and attract his hearers, or to obtain personal influence and authority with them. But in this respect, as in all others, the Forerunner of Christ was like His Apostles after Him: he preached not himself, but Christ Jesus the Lord.

II. Finally, in the last of his trials, his imprisonment through the malice of Herodias, we find him still of the same mind, still careful to turn all, as well as he could, to the preparing of Christ’s way; still anxious to put himself down and exalt his Master and Saviour. For this purpose, having heard in the prison the works of Christ, he sent two of his disciples with the question: "Art thou He that should come, or do we look for another?" He could not be ignorant who Jesus was, after what he had seen at His Baptism; but no doubt his intention was, to show his disciples the truth concerning Him. Thus he died, as he had lived, pointing out Jesus to men. Now there is one point in particular which we may well learn this day, from considering John the Baptist’s character; namely, that in such measure as we are duly preparing to meet Christ when He comes to be our Judge, in the same measure we shall be still practising to humble ourselves more and more—to think less of what we do or have done, and more of Him and His unspeakable mercies. We shall no longer anxiously and grudgingly count the minutes, the hours which we spend on serving Christ in His Church, but every little time we can win for that holy employment, away from the world, we shall reckon it clear gain. The more we can give, the more yet shall we contrive to spare; every step in any kind of holiness will be to us like a step upwards on a high mountain, revealing to our sight fresh blessings and fresh duties beyond what we had ever dreamed of, until the last and most blessed step of all shall land us in the Paradise of God.

Plain Sermons by Contributors to "Tracts for the Times," vol. vi., p. 129.

References: Joh 3:30.—F. D. Maurice, The Gospel of St. John, p. 101; J. A. Hessey, Church of England Pulpit, vol. vi., p. 8; H. M. Butler, Harrow Sermons, p. 202; Preacher’s Monthly, vol. iv., p. 301; J. Keble, Sermons for Saints’ Days, p. 268; J. E. Vaux, Sermon Notes, 4th series, p. 84; Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xvii., No. 102. Joh 3:31-36.—Homilist, 3rd series, vol. x., p. 143. John 3—Homiletic Magazine, vol. xii., p. 109; Clergyman’s Magazine, vol. i., p. 239.

The Sermon Bible, ed. William Robertson Nicoll (1888–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

The former part of the chapter acquaints us with that famous conference which our blessed Saviour had with Nicodemus. This man was by sect a Pharisee; which signifies a person separated and set apart for the study of the law of God, and to teach it unto others; and by calling or profession a ruler of the Jews, that is probably one of the Jews’ Sanhedrin, a chief person in their ecclesiastical court and council.

Consider we Nicodemus first as a Pharisee, which sort of men were filled with inveterate prejudice and enmity against Christ: yet from hence we may gather, that such is the efficacy of divine grace, that it sometimes convinces and converts also those that are the greatest enemies to Christ, and fiercest opposers of him. No such bitter enemies to Christ as the Pharisees; yet behold Nicodemus, a Pharisee, coming to him, convinced and converted by him!

Consider him, secondly, as a ruler of the Jews, as a person of place and power, making a figure in the world. Though they were generally the poor which followed Christ, yet some of the great and rich men of the world, as Nicodemus, a master of Israel, and Joseph of Arimathea, an honourable counsellor, are called to Christ, and received by him: lest, if he had admitted illiterate and simple men only, the world might have thought that they were deceived through their simplicity.

Observe farther, The time when Nicodemus came to Christ: It was by night, partly out of shame, lest the world should think that such a knowing man as he was, wanted instruction; and partly out of fear; he had something to lose, and therefore durst not own Christ publicly.

However, our dear Lord upbraids him not with his timorousness, but graciously condescends to instruct him in the fundamental principle of Christianity, the great doctrine of regeneration. Such is the tenderness of our compassionate Saviour, that he will not extinguish the least spark of holy fire, nor quench the smoking flax.

William Burkitt's Expository Notes on the New Testament (1700–1703) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

J. W. McGarvey's The Fourfold Gospel [XXIV. B. Jesus Talks with Nicodemus].

XXIV. JESUS ATTENDS THE FIRST PASSOVER OF HIS MINISTRY. (Jerusalem, April 9, A. D. 27.) Subdivision B. JESUS TALKS WITH NICODEMUS. dJOHN III. 1-21.

d1 Now there was a man of the Pharisees, named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. [Nicodemus is mentioned only by John. His character is marked by a prudence amounting almost to timidity. At Joh_7:50-52 he defends Jesus, but without committing himself as in any way interested in him: at Joh_19:38, Joh_19:39 he brought spices for the body of Jesus, but only after Joseph of Arimathæa had secured the body. Nicodemus was a ruler, or a member of the Sanhedrin]: 2 the same came unto him by night [Thus avoiding the hostility of his colleagues, and also obtaining a more personal and uninterrupted interview with Jesus. That his coming by night revealed his character is shown by the fact that John repeats the expression when describing him at Joh_19:39. But, in justice, it should be said that Nicodemus was the only one of his order who came at all during our Lord's life], and said to him, Rabbi, we [Nicodemus uses the plural, to avoid committing himself too much. Nicodemus would assert nothing but that which was commonly admitted by many. We learn from Joh_12:42, Joh_12:43 that late in the ministry of Christ, when hostility towards him was most bitter, many of the rulers still believed in him. No doubt, then, when Nicodemus said "we" he used the word advisedly and conscientiously] know that thou art a teacher come from God [The rulers knew that Jesus was not the product of any of the rabbinical schools, and his miracles marked him as a prophet and distinguished him from all who were guided merely by reason, no matter how learned]; for no one can do these signs that thou doest [ Joh_2:25], except God be with him. [These words show the effect of Christ's miracles. Miracles arrest attention and challenge investigation, [126] and prove that he who works them is from God-- Act_10:38.] 3 Jesus answered [Not the words, but the thoughts of Nicodemus. The answers of Jesus often look rather to the thoughts of the questioner than to the form of the question. Nicodemus came seeking to know something about the kingdom of God, and Jesus opened at once upon the subject] and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except one be born anew, he cannot see the kingdom of God. [The word translated "anew" may also mean "from above," and some commentators seek to so translate it here, but it is rightly translated "anew," for Nicodemus understood it to mean a second birth. As to the import of the passage, Luther's words are pertinent: "My doctrine is not of doing, and of leaving undone, but of being and becoming; so that it is not a new work to be done, but the being new created--not the living otherwise, but the being new-born." To "see" the kingdom means to possess or enjoy it-- Psa_16:10, Psa_90:15, Joh_8:51, Luk_2:26.] 4 Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? can he enter a second time into his mother's womb, and be born? [Knowing that a man can not be literally born a second time, Nicodemus states to Jesus the literal import of his words, hoping thereby to draw from him an explanation of this new, strange metaphor which he was using. So far as he did grasp the meaning of Jesus, Nicodemus saw himself barred forever from the kingdom by an impossible requirement. Many, like him, need to learn that God asks of us nothing that is impossible; that, on the contrary, the yoke is easy and the burden is light.] 5 Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except one be born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. [By far the vast majority of scholars consider the word "water" in this verse as a reference to Christian baptism. The Cambridge Bible says "the outward sign and inward grace of Christian baptism are here clearly given, and an unbiased mind can scarcely avoid seeing this plain fact. This becomes still clearer when we compare [127] Joh_1:26, Joh_1:33, where the Baptist declares, 'I baptize in water', the Messiah 'baptizeth in the Holy Spirit'. The fathers, both Greek and Latin, thus interpret the passage with singular unanimity." Men would have no difficulty in understanding this passage were it not that its terms apparently exclude "the pious unimmersed" from Christ's kingdom. But difficulties, however distressing, will justify no man in wrestling the Scriptures of God ( 2Pe_3:16, Rom_3:4). Water and Spirit are joined at Mat_28:19, Act_2:38, Act_19:1-7, Tit_3:5.] 6 That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. [Jesus here draws the distinction between fleshly birth and spiritual birth. He did this to prepare Nicodemus to understand that it is the spirit and not the flesh which undergoes the change called the new birth. Regeneration is no slight, superficial change, but a radical one, and one which we can not work for ourselves.] 7 Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born anew. [Jesus here plainly declares that none are exempt from this gospel requirement. Man must obtain more than his fleshly nature if he would inherit eternal life.] 8 The wind bloweth where it will, and thou hearest the voice thereof, but knowest not whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit. [In this sentence we have the word pneuma translated by the two words "wind" and "spirit." There can be no justification in rendering pneuma "wind," when in the last clause of the same sentence, and three times in the immediate context, it is rendered "spirit." There can be no doubt that it means the same in both clauses of this verse, and if we render it wind in the first clause, we must say "born of the wind" in the last clause. Whatever is the meaning of this verse, it must be extracted from the rendering which the Revisers have strangely placed in the margin, viz.: "The Spirit breathes where it will, and thou hearest," etc. It teaches that a man is born of the Spirit, breathing as he wills through inspired men. It is equivalent to Paul's maxim that faith comes by hearing the [128] word of God. Mat_15:14). Nicodemus should have understood that such a change as Jesus was speaking of would be necessary, for, 1. It was foreshadowed in the Old Testament ( Deu_10:16, 1Sa_10:9, 1Sa_16:13, Psa_51:10, Eze_18:31, Jer_4:4). 2. John the Baptist suggested the need of some such change when he attacked the Jewish trust in their descent from Abraham.] 11 Verily, verily, I say unto thee, We [a rhetorical plural-- Mar_4:30] speak that which we know, and bear witness of that which we have seen. [his words were not founded upon reasonings, speculations, and guesses, but were the plain testimony of an eye-witness, who was able to see and had seen things which to us are invisible]; and ye receive not our witness. [Ye teachers of Israel, who, above all men, should receive our guidance, are the very last to follow us. As the Jewish rulers would not receive Christ's testimony, let us not be surprised if many of our day refuse to listen to the gospel which we preach.] 12 If I have told you earthly things and ye believe not, how shall ye believe if I tell you heavenly things? [Jesus here divides religious phenomena into two divisions--earthly and heavenly. The earthly phenomena are those which have their sphere in this world. In this sense [129] regeneration is an earthly thing; for though it has a heavenly origin, its manifestations are among the daily sights and experiences of our earthly life. Religion has also its heavenly phenomena, such as the ordering of God's celestial household; the experiences of those who pass into the divine presence; the propitiation, or the changes wrought in the attitude of God toward man by the sacrifice of Christ; the powers and limitations of Christ's priestly intercession, etc. These things have their sphere far removed from earth, and transcended the comprehension of Nicodemus. Now, if Nicodemus would not believe Jesus when he told him of things which he himself partially knew, how would he believe when Jesus spoke of that which was utterly unknown to him?] 13 And no one hath ascended into heaven, but he that descended out of heaven, i even the Son of man, who is in heaven. [Nicodemus is here informed that Christ alone can teach concerning heavenly things. Jesus can so teach, for he did not begin on earth and ascend to heaven, but he came from heaven to earth, and returned thence (afterwards) to heaven. Jesus speaks of himself as being present in heaven, because his divine nature was in constant communication with the powers of heaven. If we conceive of heaven as a locality (a proper conception), Jesus was upon the earth; but if we conceive of it as a present communion with the presence of God (also a proper conception), then Christ was in heaven as he talked with Nicodemus-- Joh_8:29.] 14 And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up; 15 that whosoever believeth may in him have eternal life. [Jesus here indicates the prophetical character of the Old Testament. The extent of Christ's indorsement of the Old Testament becomes apparent when we consider on how many occasions he revealed himself under the same symbolism which the Old Testament used to reveal him. At Joh_2:19 he revealed his resurrection under the symbolism of the destroyed and restored temple. At Mat_12:40 the same event is revealed under the symbolism of Jonah and the whale. And [130] here his crucifixion is likewise partially veiled and partially disclosed under a symbolic reference to the brazen serpent. The account of the brazen serpent will be found at Num_21:4-9. The lesson of the brazen serpent will be found in its main points of resemblance to the crucifixion of Christ. When the people were bitten by fiery serpents, something made to resemble a serpent was hung upon a pole, and the people who looked to it in faith through it healing and life. Such is the epitome of Christ's gospel. When the world was perishing because of sin, Jesus, made to resemble sin ( Rom_8:3, 2Co_5:21) was hung upon the cross, that those who look unto him in faith ( Isa_45:22) may find life through him-- 1Jo_5:11-13.] 16 For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on him should not perish, but have eternal life. [Luther calls this verse "the Bible in miniature." It is a lesson as to God's love: 1. Its magnitude--he gave his only begotten Son. 2. Its reach--he gave it to a sinful world ( Rom_5:8). 3. Its impartiality--he gives it to whomsoever; that is, to all alike ( Mat_5:45, Rev_22:17). 4. Its beneficial richness--it blesses with life eternal. 5. Its limitations--it is nowhere said that God so loves that he will save unbelievers. Love is the mutual and binding grace between God and man; it may almost be said that in Christ it made God human and man divine. John uses the word "eternal" seventeen times in his Gospel and six times in his first Epistle. He always applies it to life. The synoptists use it eight times, applying it to life, and also to fire, punishment, damnation, and habitation.] 17 For God sent not the Son into the world to judge the world; but that the world should be saved through him. [Christ's first mission to the world was for salvation rather than for judgment. His second mission will be for judgment, but a judgment-hour wherein he will be able to save those who have accepted the means of grace which he established by his first coming. But the first coming of Christ incidentally involved judgment ( Joh_9:39), and John the Baptist emphasized the judgment of Christ. [131] This judgment, however, was not the principal object of Christ's coming, but was an inevitable result of it. Jesus here speaks of it as a self-executed judgment. It was a necessary result of the revealed presence of Christ ( Luk_2:35). That Christ is at present a Saviour, and not a judge, is a truth which needs to be emphasized. Catholics are taught to fear Christ and flee to the Virgin; and many ignorant Protestants are disposed to look upon him as a prosecutor rather than as an advocate.] 18 He that believeth on him is not judged; he that believeth not hath been judged already, because he hath not believed on the name of the only begotten Son of God. [The name "Jesus" means Saviour; to disbelieve this name is to reject Christ as Saviour. Joh_3:14, Joh_3:15 require belief in Jesus as the Son of man. This verse requires belief in him as the Son of God. Belief in this dual nature of Jesus is essential to salvation. Unbelief is the world's crowning sin; and belief is, humanly speaking, the source of its justification. The verse teaches that God's judgments are in a state of perpetually present enactment. The believer is saved now ( Act_13:39), and the unbeliever rests already under that condemnation which he fears the Son of God may some day pronounce against him.] 19 And this is the judgment, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than the light; for their works were evil. 20 For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, and cometh not to the light, lest his works should be reproved. 21 But he that doeth the truth cometh to the light, that his works may be made manifest, that they have been wrought in God. [These verses show that when God judges a man by his faith, the judgment is not arbitrary and irrational. Men believe according to the secret aspirations and desires of their nature. Christ, as the example and model of life, shines out as the light of the world; those who approve and love such a life are drawn to him and constrained to believe in him. Spiritually, they abide in his presence, that they may compare their lives with his, and that they may be assured that their works are [132] wrought under the renewing and sanctifying influence of the Holy Spirit, who is sent of Christ. But one whose desires are evil shrinks from Christ, and struggles to disbelieve in him: he seeks to know as little of Christ as possible, because such knowledge exposes the wickedness and depravity of his own sinful nature.]

* From this (Bro. McGarvey's) construction of Joh_3:8 I dissent, and hold that the Revisers have given us the true reading in the text. The question has been fully discussed in Lard's Quarterly, Vol. III, p. 337; Benjamin Franklin's Sermons, Vol. I, p. 281; Millennial Harbinger, 1832, p. 604; 1833, p. 24; 1869, pp. 317, 478, 522, 688. I take this passage to mean that the process by which a man is regenerated by the Spirit of God is no more mysterious than other operations in the natural world, of which operations the blowing of the wind is taken as an example.--P.

[FFG 126-132]

J. W. McGarvey (with Philip Y. Pendleton), Commentaries on the New Testament (The Fourfold Gospel, 1914; Acts; and the epistles) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

John Chapter 3

But there was a man (chap. 3)-and that a Pharisee-who was not satisfied with this inoperative conviction. His conscience was reached. Seeing Jesus, and hearing His testimony, had produced a sense of need in his heart. It is not the knowledge of grace, but it is with respect to man’s condition a total change. He knows nothing of the truth, but he has seen that it is in Jesus, and he desires it. He has also at once an instinctive sense that the world will be against him; and he comes by night. The heart fears the world as soon as it has to do with God; for the world is opposed to Him. The friendship of the world is enmity against God. This sense of need made the difference in the case of Nicodemus. He had been convinced like the others. Accordingly he says, “We know that thou art a teacher come from God.” And the source of this conviction was the miracles. But Jesus stops him short; and that on account of the true need felt in the heart of Nicodemus. The work of blessing was not to be wrought by teaching the old man. Man needed to be renewed in the source of his nature, without which he could not see the kingdom. [17]

The things of God are spiritually discerned; and man is carnal, he has not the Spirit. The Lord does not go beyond the kingdom-which, moreover, was not the law-for Nicodemus ought to have known something about the kingdom. But He does not begin to teach the Jews as a prophet under the law. He presents the kingdom itself; but to see it, according to His testimony, a man must be born again. But the kingdom as thus come in the carpenter’s Son could not be seen without a wholly new nature, it struck no chord of man’s comprehension or Jews’ expectation, though testimony to it was amply given in word and work: as to entering and having a part in it there is more development as to the how. Nicodemus sees no farther than the flesh.

The Lord explains Himself. Two things were necessary-to be born of water, and of the Spirit. Water cleanses. And, spiritually, in his affections, heart, conscience, thoughts, actions, etc., man lives, and in practice is morally purified, through the application, by the power of the Spirit, of the word of God, which judges all things, and works in us livingly new thoughts and affections. This is the water; it is withal the death of the flesh. The true water which cleanses in a Christian way came forth from the side of a dead Christ. He came by water and blood, in the power of cleansing and of expiation. He sanctifies the assembly by cleansing it through the washing of water by the word. “Ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you.” It is therefore the mighty word of God which, since man must be born again in the principle and source of his moral being, judges, as being death, all that is of the flesh. [18]

But there is in fact the communication of a new life; that which is born of the Spirit is spirit, is not flesh, has its nature from the Spirit. It is not the Spirit-that would be an incarnation; but this new life is spirit. It partakes of the nature of its origin. Without this, man cannot enter into the kingdom. But this is not all. If it was a necessity for the Jew, who already was nominally a child of the kingdom, for here we deal with what is essential and true, it was also asovereign act of God, and consequently it is accomplished wherever the Spirit acts in this power. “So is every one that is born of the Spirit.” This in principle opens the door to the Gentiles.

Nevertheless Nicodemus, as a master of Israel, ought to have understood this. The prophets had declared that Israel was to undergo this change, in order to enjoy the fulfilment of the promises (see Eze 36:1-38), which God had given them with regard to their blessing in the holy land. But Jesus spoke of these things in an immediate way, and in connection with the nature and the glory of God Himself. A master in Israel ought to have known that which the sure word of prophecy contained. The Son of God declared that which He knew, and that which He had seen with His Father. The defiled nature of man could not be in relationship with Him who revealed Himself in heaven whence Jesus came. The glory (from the fulness of which He came, and which formed therefore the subject of His testimony as having seen it, and from which the kingdom had its origin) could have nothing in it that was defiled. They must be born again to possess it. He bore testimony therefore, as having come from above and knowing that which was suitable to God His Father. Man did not receive His testimony. Convinced outwardly by miracles he might be; but to receive that which was befitting the presence of God was another thing. And if Nicodemus could not receive the truth in its connection with the earthly part of the kingdom, of which even the prophets had spoken, what would he and the other Jews do if Jesus spoke of heavenly things? Nevertheless no one could learn anything about them by any other means. No one had gone up there and come down again to bring back word. Jesus only, in virtue of what He was, could reveal them-the Son of man on earth, existing at the same time in heaven, the manifestation to men of that which was heavenly, of God Himself in man-as God being in heaven and everywhere-as the Son of man being before the eyes of Nicodemus and of all. Nevertheless He was to be crucified, and thus lifted up from the world to which He had come as the manifestation of the love of God in all His ways and of God Himself, and so only could the door be opened for sinful men into heaven, so only a link formed for man with it.

For this brought out another fundamental truth. If heaven was in question, something more was needed than being born again. Sin existed. It must be put away for those who should have eternal life. And if Jesus, coming down from heaven, was come to impart this eternal life to others, He must, in undertaking this work, put sin away-be thus made sin-in order that the dishonour done to God should be washed away, and the truth of His character (without which there is nothing sure, or good, or righteous) maintained. The Son of man must be lifted up, even as the serpent was lifted up in the wilderness, that the curse, under which the people were dying, might be removed. His divine testimony rejected, man, as he was down here, shewed himself to be incapable of receiving blessing from above. He must be redeemed, his sin expiated and put away; he must be treated according to the reality of his condition, and according to the character of God who cannot deny Himself. Jesus in grace undertook to do this. It was necessary that the Son of man should be lifted up, rejected from the earth by man, accomplishing the atonement before the God of righteousness. In a word, Christ comes with the knowledge of what heaven is and divine glory. In order that man might share it, the Son of man must die-must take the place of expiation-outside the earth. [19] Observe here the deep and glorious character of that which Jesus brought with Him, of the revelation He made.

The cross, and the absolute separation between man on earth and God-this is the meeting-place of faith and God; for there is at once thetruth of man’s condition, and the love that meets it. Thus, in approaching the holy place from the camp, the first thing they met on going through the gate of the court was the altar. It presented itself to every one that quitted the world without, and entered in. Christ, lifted up from the earth, draws all men to Him. But if (owing to man’s state of alienation and guilt) it needed that the Son of man should be lifted up from the earth, in order that whosoever believes in Him should have everlasting life, there was another aspect of this same glorious fact; God had so loved the world that He had given His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him should have everlasting life. On the cross we see the necessity morally of the death of the Son of man; we see the ineffable gift of the Son of God. These two truths unite in the common object of the gift of eternal life to all believers. And if it was to all believers, it was a question of man, of God, and of heaven, and went outside the promises made to the Jews, and the limits of God’s dealings with that people. For God sent His Son into the world, not to condemn it, but to save it. But salvation is by faith; and he who believes in the coming of the Son, putting all things now to the test, is not condemned (his state is decided thereby); he who believes not is condemned already, he has not believed in the only begotten Son of God, he has manifested his condition.

And this is the thing that God lays to their charge. Light is come into the world, and they have loved darkness because their works were evil. Could there be a more just subject of condemnation? It was no question of their not finding pardon, but of their preferring darkness to light that they might continue in sin.

The rest of the chapter presents the contrast between the positions of John and of Christ. They are both before the eye. The one is the faithful friend of the Bridegroom, living only for Him; the other is the Bridegroom, to whom all belongs: the one, in himself, an earthly man, great as might be the gift he had received from heaven; the other from heaven Himself, and above all. The bride was His. The friend of the Bridegroom, hearing His voice, was full of joy. Nothing more beautiful than this expression of John the Baptist’s heart, inspired by the Lord’s presence, near enough to Jesus to be glad and rejoice that Jesus was all. Thus it ever is.

With respect to the testimony, John bore witness in connection with earthly things. For that end he was sent. He who Himself came from heaven was above all, and bore witness of heavenly things, of that which He had seen and heard. No one received His testimony. Man was not of heaven. Without grace one believes according to one’s own thoughts. But in speaking as a man on the earth, Jesus spoke the words of God; and he who received His testimony set to his seal that God was true. For the Spirit is not given by measure. As a witness the testimony of Jesus was the testimony of God Himself; His words, the words of God. Precious truth! Moreover, He was the Son, [20] and the Father loved Him, and had given all things into His hand. This is another glorious title of Christ, another aspect of His glory. But the consequences of this for man were eternal. It was not almighty help to pilgrims, nor faithfulness to promises, so that His people could trust in Him in spite of all. It was the quickening life-giving Son of the Father. All was comprised in it. “He who believeth in the Son hath everlasting life, he who believeth not shall not see life.” He remains in his guilt. The wrath of God abides on him.

All this is a kind of introduction. The ministry of the Lord, properly so called, comes after. John (Joh 3:24) was not yet cast into prison. It was not till after that event that the Lord began His public testimony. The chapter we have been considering explains what His ministry was, the character in wh ich He came, His position, the glory of His Person, the character of the testimony He bore, the position of man in connection with the things of which He spake, beginning with the Jews, and going on, by the new birth, the cross, and the love of God, to His rights as come into the world, and the supreme dignity of His own Person, to His properly divine testimony, to His relationship with the Father, the object of whose love He was, and who had given all things into His hand. He was the faithful witness, and that of heavenly things (see Joh 3:13), but He was also the Son Himself come from the Father. Everything for man rested on faith in Him. The Lord comes out from Judaism, while presenting the testimony of the prophets, and brings from heaven the direct testimony of God and of glory, shewing the only ground on which we can have a part in it. Jew or Gentile must be born again; and heavenly things could only be entered by the cross, the wondrous proof of God’s love to the world. John gives place to Him, bringing out-not in public testimony to Israel but to his disciples-the true glory of His Person and of His work [21] in this world. The thought of the bride and Bridegroom is, I believe, general. John says indeed that he is not the Christ, and that the earthly bride belongs to Jesus; but He has never taken her; and John speaks of His rights, which for us are realised in a better land and another clime than this world. It is, I repeat, the general idea. But we have now entered on the new ground of a new nature, the cross, and the world and God’s love to it.

Footnotes for John Chapter 3

17: That is, as it was then come. They saw the carpenter’s Son. In glory, of course, every eye on earth shall see it.

18: Observe here that baptism, instead of being the sign of the gift of life, is the sign of death. We are baptised to His death. In coming up out of the water, we begin a new life in resurrection (all that belonged to the natural man being reckoned to be dead in Christ, and passed away for ever). “Ye are dead”; and “he that is dead is freed [justified] from sin.” But we live also and have a good conscience by the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Thus Peter compares baptism to the deluge, through which Noah was saved, but which destroyed the old world, that had, as it were, a new life when it emerged from the flood.

19: On the cross, Christ is not on the earth, but lifted up from it, rejected ignominiously by man, but withal through this presented as a victim on the altar to God.

20: The question presents itself naturally, where John’s testimony closes and the evangelist’s begins. The last two verses, I apprehend, are the evangelist’s.

21: Observe here, that the Lord-while not concealing (Joh 3:11-13) the character of His testimony, as indeed He could not-speaks of the necessity of His death, and of the love of God. John speaks of the glory of His Person. Jesus magnifies His Father by submitting to the necessity which the condition of men imposed on Him, if He would bring them into a new relationship with God. “God,” said He, “hath so loved.” John magnifies Jesus. All is perfect and in place. There are four points in that which is said with regard to Jesus: His supremacy; His testimony-this is the Baptist’s testimony to Him. What follows (Joh 3:35-36)-His having all things given to Him by the Father who loved Him, life everlasting in contrast with the wrath that is the portion of the unbeliever from God-is rather the new revelation; the purpose of God giving all things to Him, and His being Himself eternal life come down from heaven, is that of John the evangelist.

John Nelson Darby — Synopsis of the Books of the Bible: the New Testament (c. 1857–1862) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

1. There was a man of the Pharisees, named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. Nicodemus is named three times by John, and not elsewhere; here; in chapter 7:50, 51, where he protests against condemning Jesus unheard; and in chapter 19:38, 39, where he aids Joseph of Arimathæa in the burial of Jesus. He was a Pharisee, a member of the Sanhedrim (a ruler), and a rabbi (verse 10).

B. W. Johnson's The People's New Testament with Notes (1889–1891) — public domain. Electronic text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) ThML edition.

General Information:

Nicodemus comes to see Jesus.

Now

This word is used here to mark a new part of the story and to introduce Nicodemus. (See: Introduction of New and Old Participants)

we know

Here "we" is exclusive, referring only to Nicodemus and the other members of the Jewish council.

translationWords

Pharisee

council

Rabbi

God

unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.

A man. With a reference to the last word of the previous chapter. The interview with Nicodemus is, apart from the important truth which it embodies, an illustration of Christ 's knowledge of what was in man. Godet truthfully observes that John reminds us by the word anqrwpov (man), that Nicodemus was a specimen of the race which Jesus knew so well.

Named Nicodemus. Literally, Nicodemus, the name unto him. The name means conqueror of the people (nikh, victory, and dhmov, people), though some give it a Hebrew derivation meaning innocent blood.

A ruler. A member of the Sanhedrim.

Marvin R. Vincent, Word Studies in the New Testament (1887–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

ADDITIONAL NOTES BY THE AMERICAN EDITOR.

XII. CHAPTER III.

The first twenty-one verses of the third chapter contain the account of the interview between Jesus and Nicodemus. This interview occurred during the visit to Jerusalem at the Passover, and, when viewed in its close connection with Joh 2:13-25, it cannot be reasonably doubted that the story is inserted here as a part of the testimony to Jesus. It is the first testimony of the words, which play so important a part in what follows, as the Cana miracle was the first of the works. On this passage the following suggestions may be offered:

1. It is evident that Nicodemus was one of those whose attention was aroused by the “signs” alluded to in Joh 2:23. His mind must, therefore, have been in a susceptible state, beyond most of those around him, and he came to Jesus honestly to inquire after the truth. The course taken by him on the occasion referred to in Joh 7:45-52 makes it probable that he was established in his belief in consequence of, and as following upon this interview. His action at the time of Joh 7:45 ff., was both honorable and courageous. So was that which is related of him in Joh 19:38-42. The latter action showed love to Jesus of a most tender order. And yet the mere statement of the author of this Gospel that he made his first visit to Jesus by night has been, as it were, the only thing borne in mind respecting him, and has determined the estimate of his character. The author, however, does not say that this first coming was by night because of unworthy fear, much less that Nicodemus was marked in his whole career by this characteristic.

2. That he visited Jesus with a mind open to conviction, and with an honest desire to hear what He had to say, is evident from the second verse as most naturally explained. There is no reason to believe that his first words were spoken in any other than a straightforward and sincere way. We must believe that some conversation on the part of both parties took place between Joh 3:2 and Joh 3:3. It is probable that Nicodemus came to inquire as to what Jesus had to say about the Messianic Kingdom, and that, after introducing the whole conversation by the words of Joh 3:2, he soon raised the question which he had in mind as to that subject. Otherwise, the words of Jesus in Joh 3:3 have an abruptness which is almost inexplicable.

3. The idea of Nicodemus with regard to the kingdom was, of course, the ordinary one of the time, according to which it was to be a temporal kingdom for the Jews. The entrance into it was through a Jewish birth, so far as the chosen nation was concerned. Jesus strikes at the very foundation of this idea, and makes the entrance to be only through a birth of another sort—a birth of the spirit. The difficulty which Nicodemus sets forth in the question of Joh 3:4 is connected with this marvelously new idea, and is to be interpreted accordingly, and not according to the literalism of its words. The state of Nicodemus’ mind is that of Joh 3:9 : “How can these things be?”—that is, the new doctrine is incomprehensible. He stood, in this regard, where the Jewish opponents of Paul stood, when he taught the doctrine of justification, not through possession of the law and the being a Jew outwardly, but through a new and living principle, even faith in Jesus Christ.

4. The meaning of the wordἄνωθεν —whether from above or anew —must be regarded as doubtful. The arguments in favor of the former meaning are: (a) The use of the word in the sense from above in the only other instances in John’s Gospel which can be compared with this case. There are, however, only two such instances. In Joh 19:23 it is used of the tunic of Jesus, which is said to have been woven from the top throughout. (b) One of these two instances is in this present chapter (Joh 3:31). This fact—although the word occurs in the report of the expressions of John the Baptist on another occasion—would seem to indicate what the writer understood by it. (c) The Johannean idea of the spiritual birth is that of being born of God, of the Spirit, that is, from above, and not of a new or second birth. Born of the Spirit is an expression found in this very conversation. (d) For the idea of a second birth πάλιν or δεύτερον would have been more naturally selected. On the other hand, it is claimed (a) that the understanding of Nicodemus was that it was a second birth (see Joh 3:4); (b) that the word was so understood by the translators of the Peshito, Coptic, Old Latin and Vulgate versions; (c) that in the passage from Artemidorus, which is referred to by Godet—the only instance in the classics where ἄνωθεν γεννᾶσθαι is used, it has this meaning; so also the adverb in the two other passages cited by Godet in his note from Josephus and the Acta Pauli; (d) that the use in Gal 4:9 justifies this meaning; (e) that, if Jesus had here meant from above, He would have used the expression ἐκ θεοῦ, instead of this adverb. The tendency of the majority of commentators has been, on the whole, towards the latter view, or towards the position taken by R. V., which places anew in the text, and from above in the margin. If the second view is adopted, it must be observed—as is now generally admitted—that the word does not mean precisely again (πάλιν) or a second time (δεύτερον), but, as in Gal 4:9, from the beginning, as indicating the idea of beginning over again, and thus of a completely new birth. The writer of this note would merely express his own view that from above is somewhat more probably the correct rendering of the word, because this meaning seems more in accordance with the general Johannean idea of the spiritual life—that it comes, in every sense, from heaven—and also because this is evidently the meaning of ανωθενin Joh 3:31. That Nicodemus spoke of a second birth does not seem to be the measure for the determination of Jesus’ thought. In the bewilderment of his mind as to the words of Jesus, any idea of birth must have seemed to him to suggest a second birth of some sort, and especially as his idea of the kingdom was, that it was to belong to Jews by reason of their birth. Nicodemus was evidently unable to grasp the thought of Jesus with a clear apprehension of it.

5. With reference to Joh 3:5, the following brief suggestions are offered: (a) If we take the conversation as it stands recorded, we can hardly explain the words of this verse, unless they connect themselves with something which might easily have been before the mind of Nicodemus when the interview began. (b) This thing must have been outside of his old, Pharisaic ideas, for the whole exposition of the entranceway and life of the kingdom is clearly intended to take him wholly away from those ideas—to awaken him, as it were, by a startling contradiction of what he had previously had in mind, to a new world of thought. (c) The only thing which can have suggested the words here used must, therefore, have been the teaching and work of John the Baptist. That this work and teaching had affected the mind of Nicodemus we may believe because of his coming to Jesus. His coming, in itself, showed that his attention had been easily turned to the great subject of the kingdom. A mind thus ready could not have overlooked the remarkable work of John, or have failed, if his attention was given to it, to consider the chief elements of John’s doctrine. (d) One of the striking expressions of John, in setting forth his office and his relation to Jesus, was that respecting baptism with water and with the Spirit. If Nicodemus had known of John’s preaching, it would seem that he must have had his attention drawn to this expression. (e) In explaining the matter of the entrance into the kingdom, therefore, it would not be unnatural for Jesus to turn the mind of Nicodemus away from his past ideas to the ideas belonging to the Christian system by uniting these two words water and spirit. The work for which the forerunner prepares the way, and which He himself introduces and sets on its course, is that by which men are drawn away from the outward and temporal view of the kingdom to individual spiritual life. (f) If there is in the words this uniting of His work with John’s, we may easily understand why the word water falls away at once and the further development is wholly in the use of the word spirit. (g) The immediate and primary reference in ὕδατος is, accordingly, not to baptism as found in the Christian system, though, in the fullness of the idea of the sentence in the mind of Jesus, there may have been a secondary reference to it. But whatever may be said as to this point, there can be no doubt that the main thought of Jesus, which was intended to be conveyed to Nicodemus, was that of the spiritual birth as essential to membership in the kingdom.

6. The meaning of σάρξ, as used in Joh 3:6, is to be limited to the physical idea, and not to be regarded as including the moral. The object of this verse is to confirm, by the contrast here indicated, the necessity of the new birth. The natural birth, as into the Jewish people, can only result in what pertains to the physical or psychical sphere, but the kingdom of God is in a higher sphere. The aim of Jesus is, throughout, to show Nicodemus that his old views were utterly wrong.

7. The thought of Joh 3:8 is immediately connected with Joh 3:7. Nicodemus should not marvel at the idea of a new birth of the spirit, for the analogy of nature shows results coming from invisible sources. But it seems not improbable, also, that there is a suggestion here of the origin of membership in the kingdom as being widely different from what he had thought. It is an influence working in an unseen way, which may affect any one of any nation, and may leave any one unaffected—which neither moves along the lines of ordinary birth nor is connected with it.

8. The suggestions already made serve to explain the words of Jesus in the tenth verse. The object of what precedes having been to set forth the spiritual nature of the kingdom, the expression of astonishment follows, that one whose office it was, as teacher of Israel, to comprehend the Old Testament in its deepest meaning, should be so unable to grasp the spiritual idea.

Ver. 1. “There was a man of the Pharisees, whose name was Nicodemus, one of the rulers of the Jews.”

The name Nicodemus, though of Greek origin, was not unusual among the Jews. The Talmud mentions several times a person of this name (Nakedimon), called also Bounai, reckoned in the number of Jesus’ disciples. He was one of the four richest inhabitants of the capital. His family fell into the greatest destitution. He must have been alive also at the time of the destruction of Jerusalem. This last circumstance, connected with the great age of Nicodemus at the time of Jesus’ ministry, renders the identity of the latter with the personage of whom the Talmud speaks, doubtful. Stier saw in the word ἄνθρωπος, a man, an allusion to Joh 2:25; John would remind us thereby that Nicodemus was an example of that human type which Jesus knew so well; this is far-fetched. Before naming him, John points out his quality as Pharisee. This characteristic signifies much more, indeed, than his name, for the understanding of the following conversation. The most narrow and exalted national particularism had created for itself an organ in the Pharisaic party. According to the ideas of that sect, every Jew possessing the legal virtues and qualities had a right of entrance into the Messianic kingdom. Universo Israeli est portio in mundo futuro, said the Rabbis. The Messiah Himself was only the perfect and all-powerful Jew, who, raised by His miracles to the summit of glory, was to destroy the Gentile power and place Israel at the head of humanity. This Messianic programme, which the imagination of the Pharisaic doctors had drawn out of the prophecies, was that which brought with it Nicodemus to the presence of Jesus. The title ἄρχων, ruler, denotes, undoubtedly, one of the lay members of the Sanhedrim (Joh 7:50), in contrast to the ἀρχιερεῖς, chief priests (Joh 7:50; Luk 23:13).

Frédéric Louis Godet — Commentaries on Luke, John, Romans, and 1 Corinthians — English translation (T&T Clark, Edinburgh, 1870s–1890s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.