Nicodemus: From Seeking to Serving - Mattie Montgomery

Nicodemus starts by visiting Jesus quietly at night but ends up publicly honoring Him at great personal cost. His story pushes us to ask a simple question: are we just interested in Jesus when it’s convenient, or are we willing to follow Him even when it costs us something?

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:16

Thank you for listening to this message from the altar fellowship.

SPEAKER_01 0:26

It's great to see you guys. I uh I may be a little biased, but we definitely are the best-looking church in town. There's no question. No question. Pastor David's doing most of the heavy lifting there, but Miss Nicole agrees. They are at some sporting event. I can't remember which one, but playing sports somewhere, doing something. I'm really excited. I have this have had for the last couple weeks this sense that God wants to take us from seeking to serving Jesus. And I'll tell you, last week you guys got to receive from uh from my good friend, my brother in the Lord, Pastor Parker Thomason, was that a blessing to you? Are you encouraged? Man, we love him. He he really is a gift to my family and a gift to this house. He's been coming up here pretty pretty regularly since we were, since the church was in my living room. And so we love him very dearly. But uh but I I I think if I'm honest, guys, that uh I I've been feeling, and it's interesting, you know, as I talk with the the elders of the church, some of the staff and leaders, there's there's this sense, and I I I don't want to I don't want to alarm anybody, but I I I for the sake of uh of maybe clarity or or candor, I I want to sort of say what's coming across to me is that there's almost a sense of like frustration, like a holy frustration among some of the leaders in the church at how casually we approach the presence of God, and how casually we treat the assembly of the brethren, and how casually we treat the scriptures in the way that we live our lives. We treat God like we're doing him a favor if we choose to obey him every now and then, and we treat the Word of God like it's suggestions to consider instead of a standard to submit to. And so my hope is to maybe provoke you today to say, I don't just want to be a spectator anymore. You know, I hang out at the church and uh, you know, maybe I even volunteer. Maybe I gave it an offering once or twice too, you know. And I have the Bible app, and it every morning it sends me a Bible verse, and that's pretty nice. And yet I live my life overwhelmingly illiterate to the scriptures, and I live my life overwhelmingly indifferent to the leading of the Holy Spirit, to the convicting of the Holy Spirit, and to the presence of God to which I've been invited. And I don't want that for any of us. In fact, the the reality is that I think a reality we all must wrestle with. The reality is that on that day, many churchgoers will be stunned to find out that going to church on Sundays was never the thing that qualified you for the kingdom. On that day, many churchgoers will find that they knew all about Jesus, but they never knew Jesus. And so I want to draw a line in the sand today to say this. There's a difference between seeking Christ and serving Christ. I think many in the American church seek Christ, and I think we seek him not because we are desperate to know him, but I think we seek him maybe because we're curious. You know, over the last uh few months, yeah, really for years now this has been happening, but I've noticed, you know, in particular there's a few uh politicians who are postulating ideas about Jesus and what he believes and what he taught and and uh and and what he valued. And so uh, you know, there and it just so happens to be that Jesus agrees with everything they agree. What a what a coincidence, you know? And uh and so sometimes we we seek Jesus not because we want to know what Jesus says, but because we want to find a way to make Jesus agree with our position. Sometimes we seek Jesus because we're curious what all the fuss is about. Sometimes we seek Jesus because our friends are seeking Jesus and we want to be included, but the truth is there's a difference between seeking him and serving him. And if we can't cross the line from seekers to servants, we will find ourselves standing before him one day and hearing, Depart from me, you workers of iniquity, for I never knew you. A.W. Tozer once said, What comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us. What comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us. It's true. It defines, it shapes, it undergirds every other aspect of our lives. In our modern culture, whether we realize it or not, all of us determine the way we interact with the world by the way we relate to Jesus Christ. Even unbelievers, they interact with the world the way they interact with the world because they reject the lordship of Jesus Christ. Like all of us define and determine the way we interact with the world by the way we we relate to Jesus Christ. Who we believe Him to be will always shape how we live in relation to ourselves, our world, and of course to the God that made us and put us into the world. But I'm concerned that there are many in the American church, even this American church, who do not view or value Christ in a way that can actually bring salvation. We see him as a character or a concept. Maybe we even view him as a king, but we do not serve him as our king. And that must change today. I care about your soul. I care about your relationship with God. And I care about it not just because I think you are worth caring for, but I care about it because all of us will live in the warmth of the fire of your devotion to Christ. Like every one of us will feel either the blessing or the burden of your devotion to Christ. If your devotion to Christ is shallow and passive and indifferent and compromised, we will have to pick up the slack. It makes everyone else's job harder in the church. But if your devotion to Christ is white hot, if your devotion to Christ is passionate and focused and determined and mature, you will bless everyone around you. We will all be able to feel the warmth of your passion for Christ. But I want you to see that there is a uh there's a process to this, that not everybody comes to Christ convinced of his worth and beauty. And if if you came to this place because you, your friends go to this church, like that's okay, you know. If you came to the church because you were driving by one day and you shrugged your shoulders and said, Well, I don't have anything better to do. You know, you come to the church because uh, you know, whatever. It's like free childcare for a couple hours. Um I'm glad that you're here. And I want you to hear this. It's okay. It's like it's okay that you've come into the presence of God today. You're sitting now under the teaching of the word of God today for a reason other than your passionate pursuit of Christ. It it's okay. I want you to know that not everybody comes to Christ because they uh they they uh uh are convinced of his worth or his beauty. But if you came to Christ for any other reason, today is the day that your motivations, your reasons, your convictions must change. And I want to show you in the story, uh in a story found in the scriptures of a man called Nicodemus, how our posture with regard to Christ, or our posture in relation to Christ, can change over time as we begin to see him more clearly. Is that alright? Okay, so let's uh let's pray. Lord, we need you. And uh we love your word, God. It's by your word that we that we have life. We we live by every word that proceeds out of your mouth. And so, God, we submit today to your word and we said let it come and refine us. Let it cut away anything in us that is not worthy of your kingdom. God, let your word examine us and illuminate the parts of our hearts that maybe been shrouded in darkness for too long. God, we give you our attention and our time and our honor in Jesus' name. Okay, in uh John chapter 3, Jesus meets this uh this this character. John 3, uh we'll just read verses 1 through 7, and then uh and then we'll go back through and uh and pull some things out. It says uh in verse 1, John 3, it says, There was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. This man came to Jesus by night and said to him, Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God, for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him. Jesus answered and said to him, Most assuredly I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Nicodemus said to 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? And Jesus answered, Most assuredly I say to you, unless one is born of water and the spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, you must be born again. The wind uh blows where it wishes, and you hear the sound of it, but cannot tell where it comes from or where it goes, so is everyone who is born of the spirit. Okay, I I I want us to get a little familiar with this figure, Nicodemus. The Bible tells us a bit about him, and we can draw from what John writes here in John chapter 3. We can draw a little bit uh uh out about who Nicodemus would have been. It's it says that he was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus. Now, we we know the Pharisees as the bad guys in the gospel narratives, right? And uh and yet here's Nicodemus, right? One of the bad guys. And he's uh he's a part of this group who were sort of famously uh critical and oppositional to the ministry of Jesus. And uh and as a part of this group, he was, um John further elaborates, a ruler of the Jews. There's a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. And so here's what we know about Nicodemus: it's that he was extremely intelligent. Nicodemus would have had memorized the entire first five books of the Bible, the Torah. He would have been able to recite the entire first five books of the Bible. Not only was he extremely intelligent, he also would have been extremely wealthy. He was among the most prosperous, most financially prosperous class in all of Israel at the time, and so he would have been a man that was financially very well taken care of. But in addition to being intelligent and wealthy, Nicodemus also would have been extremely influential. He's a man whose voice shaped culture. And so the opinions Nicodemus held, the ideas Nicodemus offered, his suggestions they carried weight with people that was uncommon for his time. And so, you know, Jesus would later say in his ministry that it's harder for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven than it is for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle. And I think it's men like Nicodemus, Jesus was probably talking about. Guys who have a lot to lose. This has been my experience as well. It's that, you know, when people are desperate and they're at rock bottom and their whole world has fallen apart, they're very open to the gospel. But when they're prospering, when things are going well for them, when their relationship is great and their bank account looks better than ever, and they they just got a new car and a new house, then suddenly God's showing up and saying, I would like you to deny yourself, take up your cross and follow me. That's a much more costly invitation for a wealthy man. That's a much higher expectation, a much higher standard for someone who has a lot to lose. And there were very few people in the world that had as much to lose as Nicodemus. And so Nicodemus does what I think is probably in entirely to be expected for a man in his position. And it says Nicodemus, uh ruler of the Jews, in verse 2, it says, This man came to Jesus by night and said to him, Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher, come from God, for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him. Nicodemus came to Jesus by night. I've got that phrase by night circled in my Bible because it communicates something to us. It communicates to us that Nicodemus wanted to visit Jesus, but he wanted to make sure no one knew he was visiting Jesus. And this has stuck out to me for years, and it stuck out to me because I think how how often is that the way that I approach Christ too? Like, how often do I want to be close to him, but I just don't want anybody to know. Like, I want to have a relationship with Jesus where we talk and we exchange ideas, but I don't know that I want to do it in public. I don't know I want all my coworkers to see. I don't know that I want everybody on my you know Facebook page to know that I'm like one of those crazy Jesus people, you know. Like I want to be close to Jesus, I want to be close enough to talk with him. I want to have a private relationship with him, but I don't know that I want to like force my beliefs down other people's throats. Maybe you can relate to this. I don't know that I want to insist that everybody look at my walk with God or my pursuit of Jesus. So Nicodemus, he's seeking Christ. I mean, he he goes out of his way, he inconveniences himself to come and find Jesus to have this conversation, but he's really intentional, it's really strategic about the way that he does it, and he's strategic in this way because he's trying to hide his pursuit of Christ. And I need you to hear this that Jesus says to his followers that if you deny me before men, I will deny you before my Father in heaven. We don't get the luxury of hiding our pursuit of Christ. It's it's either we belong to him or we don't. We do not get to demand that Jesus relate to us on our terms. We come to him as king or we do not come to him at all. We come to him as king or we rebel against his lordship. Like those are our only two options. And so Nicodemus in this moment is saying, well, listen, Jesus, I'm only really comfortable coming to you like this. And if I'm honest, most of the churchgoers I know are just like Nicodemus. They're comfortable being with Jesus as long as it doesn't cost them anything. As long as it uh it doesn't demand anything, as long as it doesn't humiliate or or or inconvenience or burden them, then they're okay with Jesus. As long as uh nobody sees me as a crazy person, as long as he doesn't call me to change something dramatic about my life, as long as he doesn't expose my sin or my compromise, well then I'm happy with him. But I'll only take Jesus as long as he allows me to come to him on my own terms. So Nicodemus comes to Jesus by night and he says to him, Rabbi, that means teacher. He's acknowledging Jesus as a teacher, and genuinely from Nicodemus, that's a high compliment. Nicodemus easily could have taken the position that other Pharisees took, and that is that Jesus is just a ridiculous, demonized deceiver, that he's lying, that he's manipulating people, that he's not worthy to be spoken to or about with any respect, but he he doesn't do that. He comes to Jesus and calls him teacher. Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher. Come from God, for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him. I love that Nicodemus uses the word we. Because you don't hear Pharisees admitting openly in the rest of the book of John that Jesus was sent by God. But Nicodemus comes and confesses on behalf of all of them. We all know. They won't tell you, they won't admit it, but Jesus, I came to tell you tonight, we all know that God is with you. There's something different about you. We've all heard teaching, we've all seen leadership, but Jesus, there's something different about you, and we all know it. That's that's the thing, you know, one of the things I've been studying in school recently has has been what we call presuppositional apologetics or or covenantal apologetics. And um it's this it's this idea, I think I shared it a couple weeks ago. It's this idea that when you're doing, when you're offering an apologetic, when you're trying to vindicate or defend the Christian worldview, uh one of the one of the best approaches to that is to help somebody see that their framework for the world is actually built on a foundation of scripture. Whether they recognize it or not, even their ability to reason is a gift that was given to them by God, their mind that works, their heart that cares and has values. You know, we we sort of all agree that what has happened through the Epstein situation is evil and vile. Like as a culture, we all agree that it's evil and vile. However, what Epstein and his friends were doing, that's exactly what the Romans were doing in Jesus' day. The only reason the world sees that as despicable is because of the Christian worldview that was propagated by the first century church. So what an amazing gift that we have given to the world, a sense of moral outrage and disgust at, you know, pedophilia and and uh and cannibalism. Like it's you're welcome, right? And so I think this is the uh this is the thing that we that we sort of see here with uh with Nicodemus, is that he he's saying, like, Rabbi, we know that you're a teacher who's come from God. We may not admit it. Like this is this is the reality. I don't know that I've ever met someone that can't believe there is a God. I've met many people who refuse to acknowledge that they know there's a God because it would be an inconvenient acknowledgement. It's it's a it's a fake position of, you know, uh it's it's a fake moral position to say, well, I just can't believe in God, there's not enough evidence. It's like existence is evidence. Creation is evidence. There's there's it is a a really uh uh uh insane position to take, to look at the order of creation and to think that it happened on accident. The most logical conclusion is that there is a creator, and yet millions of people. Deny that there is a creator and they'll tell you that it's because they can't believe. And I would say, no, I don't think that's the case. I think it's because you just don't want to. And why is this important? Because all of us are able to choose what we believe. That means we can choose deception. Like it means that we can choose the bad theologies that best fit our own predispositions. Like if I if I wanted to find some theology that would allow people to engage in sexual sin outside of God's design, that would be easy to find. If I wanted to find some theology that would allow me to avoid ever talking about wrath or judgment, I could find that. It's not hard to find half truths that fit our desires or our dispositions. But what we see in Nicodemus is the character needed to at least admit what he knows to be true. Maybe, Jesus, I don't really understand you. Maybe I don't even like what you're doing. It kind of freaks me out. I'm pretty scared of you, so I'm coming at night because I don't want to be known as one of those crazy Christ followers, but I can't deny what I can plainly see in front of me, and that is that you are a teacher come from God. For no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with them. But notice, and we'll come back to this, Nicodemus calls him rabbi and teacher, not master or savior. You hear Bartimaeus crying out, Son of David, have mercy on me. That's a different sort of thing. You hear Peter in Matthew chapter 16 saying, You are the Christ, the Messiah, the Son of the living God. Now Nicodemus doesn't acknowledge any of that. He doesn't understand or have a grid for any of that. He's just not ready for that in John chapter 3. He calls him rabbi and teacher, but he does not call him master and savior. But he says, We know that you're a teacher come from God. But Jesus answered in verse 3 and said to him, Most assuredly I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Now we, it's interesting for me because we've made this idea of being born again so doctrinal that it's almost inaccessible. You know, we talk about regeneration. That's the that's the systematic theology word. You know, that's we talk about uh regeneration, and people argue, and they have for a long time now, about whether you're regenerated prior to your justification or whether you're justified first and then you're regenerated, or you're regenerated and therefore you pray to receive Christ, or do you pray to receive Christ and then you're regenerated because you prayed that prayer? Frankly, I don't really want to get in any of those fights. I'm not really uh um so concerned with the mechanics of my salvation as much as I am with working it out with fear and trembling. I'm grateful that I've been given the gift of salvation, and I want to continue to use that gift for the glory of God. And uh and so this, but this idea, I want to make this really simple for us. Consider who Jesus is speaking to here. He's talking to one of the most wealthy, intelligent, influential men in his society, and he and he says to Nicodemus, You must be born again if you're ever going to see the kingdom. Now, Nicodemus would have known the promises that God made to Abraham through uh uh through through Daniel, the promises that he made uh uh to David about there being an eternal kingdom. Nicodemus, as much as anyone else, maybe more than than most other people, would have been eagerly awaiting the establishment of a kingdom. And Jesus comes and he doesn't say we're gonna have to like get some guys together and attack the Romans if you want to see the kingdom. He says, Nicodemus, you need to be born again. And here I think are maybe two things that it means to be born again that sometimes in uh in our Christian ease we can fail to consider. The first is that to be born again means to leave behind the thing you once were. To be born again means to leave behind the thing you once were. For Nicodemus, this would have been especially difficult. For Nicodemus, it would have mean to be born again means all the things you have built to this point have to count for nothing. All of your accomplishments, forget them. All of your achievements, all the things you've earned, all the things you've built, uh, the reputation you have, the influence you hold, all of those things have to end. Imagine, I mean, spending your whole life learning languages, learning uh, you know, books, memorizing entire books of the Bible. Imagine spending the, you know, all of your life building for yourself uh, you know, financially, building for your family some uh, you know, a good, comfortable, safe, prosperous life, only to have somebody say, you're gonna have to start all over. Be born again. Take this life that you've built for yourself and delete that. To be born again means first, to leave behind the thing you once were. And I would say in addition to that, that it that it means to allow yourself to become teachable, malleable, and needy. You know, I have said this before, and everybody always laughs, but it's this is the truth. I one of the things that shocked me when we started having kids is that babies don't know anything. It I like I understand we know, yeah, babies don't know anything, but I mean they know even less than I thought they would know. Like, I it was you know, our kids were like months old before they realized that their hands were attached to their body, you know? Like they don't know where their own mouth is. It's like they can't find, you know, you try to give them a bottle and they're like, where is it? You know, they don't know how to fall asleep. Imagine not knowing how to fall asleep, it's like you just go to sleep. I don't know. Like, babies don't know anything at all. And so for Jesus to say to Nicodemus, you're gonna have to be born again, is for him to say, Nicodemus, I want you to take your sense of personal competence and self-sufficiency, and I want you to lay that down on the altar. You're gonna have to become needy again. You're gonna have to become teachable again. You are gonna have to acknowledge, Nicodemus, that you know nothing. Maybe you're impressive to the world, but in the kingdom, Nicodemus, you have nothing to offer, and you are going to have to become needy and teachable again. And so the first thing that it means to be born again is to leave behind the thing you once were. And then the second thing that it means to be born again is that you would become a different type of thing. You're not just leaving behind the thing you once were, you're becoming a different type of thing. You're being born again, that is to say, you're being born into a nature that is different than the nature you were born into before that. You were born in the flesh. Your parents, who were flesh and blood people, they gave birth to you, you are made of flesh and blood. You have carried around your flesh with its impulses, with its weaknesses, with its dispositions since the moment of your conception. And uh, and Jesus is saying that is not adequate. If you're gonna be born again, you're gonna have to be born not of the flesh, but of the spirit. So not only are you going to have to leave behind the thing you once were, but you're gonna have to become a different type of thing. And this different type of thing, that is a person born of the spirit, you are going to become the type of thing that loves God's word and that esteems God's will above your own desires. This is good news to those who want to be free from sin, and it's bad news to those who don't. Here's what I mean. If Christ has invited us to be born again, that means, among other things, that God can not only forgive me for the sin I've committed, God can actually reform me into the type of creature that can resist sin in the future. That I can be faced with temptation and I can turn away from it. I can be faced with the opportunity to resist or rebel against God's standard, and yet I can yield to God, and I can say along with my king, Father, not my will, but yours be done. Like this is what it means to be born again. It's not just that I would put off my old self, my old competencies and accomplishments, it's that I would put on this new nature that loves and honors and cherishes God's holy word. And and that because of this, I should be able to expect that my appetites would change. This is this is the thing that is, I think, unique about the Christian worldview is that every other religion says to you, here's a list of things God wants you to do, do those things. And then you just you try hard. You know, you lay out your mat and you pray five times a day, and you fast for these parts of the year, and you uh, you know, and you let your hair grow out on the sides, and and you wear a funny hat, like you know, and you don't eat pork, and you just like the list of things that God tells you you need to do, you do those things so God will be happy with you. But here's the thing that's different is that in Christianity there is certainly a moral code, but the God who made you and gave you that moral code actually comes himself. And with his own presence, he empowers you to rise to that standard. And so you're not just being sanctified by, you know, determination or or or or or self-will. You're being sanctified by the work of God within you. God has reached himself into your life and he's transforming you from the inside out. That's the beauty of this of the gospel of Jesus Christ. It's that it invites us to walk in holiness not as a result of personal conviction or determination, but as a result of the presence and power of God at work within us. So Jesus tells Nicodemus, most assuredly I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. And so there's more to this, and maybe, I don't know, maybe next week or something, we'll we'll unpack the rest of this section because Jesus then unleashes one of the most beautiful uh explanations. He begins to teach on the kingdom and the relationship between the spirit and the flesh, and the relationship between Christ as our Savior, the Son of Man, uh given as a propitiation for our sin and uh the mercy of God available to those who believe in Christ and the wrath of God uh given to those who who reject Christ. And and I I would love to get into that. I don't know that I have time or or instruction today to unpack all of it. I would love to do that maybe next week, Lord willing. But but today I want to focus on the story of Nicodemus. So Jesus, he begins to teach Nicodemus in John chapter 3. And he teaches him about being born of the Spirit. And uh and he teaches him about what that looks like. He teaches him, this is where we get John 3, 16 from. For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. We have these amazing uh life verses in John chapter 3. These are all from the message that Jesus preaches to Nicodemus. But here's what happens at the end of that exchange is that Jesus finishes talking, and that's the end of it. You you don't hear how Nicodemus responded. It doesn't tell you, and then Nicodemus fell to the ground weeping and confessed Christ as his Lord. Uh it just uh Jesus finishes his uh his teaching and then it just moves on to a story about John the Baptist in John 3.22. And so um it feels like it leaves Nicodemus' story unfinished, but I want to show you actually that he pops up two more times in the book of John. John wants to make sure that you're able to follow the story of Nicodemus. Now I want to go a little bit quick here. In John chapter 7, some of the religious leaders of the time they are debating who Jesus is. They're wondering who this man is. Remember, Nicodemus showed up and called him what? Rabbi, teacher, right? Not master or savior, not king or lord, but he saw him as a teacher, an instructor. And so in John chapter 7, starting in verse 40, it says, Therefore, many from the crowd, when they heard this saying, said, Truly, this is the prophet. Others said, This is the Christ. But some said, Will the Christ come out of Galilee? Has not the scripture said that the Christ comes from the seed of David and from the town of Bethlehem where David was? So there was a division among the people because of him. Now, some of them wanted to take him, but no one laid hands on him. Then the officers came to the chief priests and Pharisees. You remember this is Nicodemus' voice. Uh the officers came to the chief priests and Pharisees who said to them, Why have you not brought him? And the officers answered, No man ever spoke like this man. Then the Pharisees answered them, Are you also deceived? Have any of the rulers or the Pharisees believed in him? But this crowd does not know the uh this this crowd that does not know the law is accursed. I it's interesting to me, and this is maybe just a side note for your uh personal study, the the Pharisees hold themselves up as the standard. We don't believe in him, so you shouldn't either. Uh they they say, uh, no man has ever spoken like this man. These guys are saying, hey, there's a there's a witness in our spirit that we're seeing something from Jesus we've never seen before. Something inside of me is leaping when I hear him speak. And the Pharisees say, Are you also deceived? Have any of the rulers or the Pharisees believed in him? Meaning, if none of the most popular among you believe in him, then you shouldn't either. That is bad advice. We should believe the truth when we hear it. No matter what powerful or influential people say. Have any of the rulers or the Pharisees believed in him? But the crowd that does not know the law is accursed. Nicodemus, this is verse 50, who he who came to Jesus by night, being one of them, said to them, Does our law judge a man before it hears him and knows what he's doing? So Nicodemus says, Guys, I understand that you have your opinions or your thoughts, maybe your fears or your frustrations or concerns or offenses with Jesus, but the law that we claim to uphold and adhere to demands that we consider someone to be innocent unless there are multiple witnesses that can testify to their breaking of the law. Does our law judge a man before it hears him and knows what he's doing? In verse 52, they answered and said to him, Are you also from Galilee? Search and look, for no prophet has arisen out of Galilee. And they're they're hostile toward Nicodemus now. He he begins sort of to sheepishly advocate for Jesus. He's maybe not saying, Hey guys, I'm convinced that Jesus of Nazareth is the Christ, the Son of the living God. He's just saying, hey, let's just walk through due process. Instead of condemning him because we're scared of him, let's maybe take the time to consider what he's actually saying instead of what we're hearing through the grapevine from other people that he's saying or doing. Let's judge with righteous judgment as we look at Jesus. Nicodemus here, he advocates for Christ against the destructive efforts of his contemporaries. He begins to stand. Can I tell you, not everybody is going to become a roaring lion the first time they stand up for Christ? I have got to tell you, even still, I've shared the gospel with tens of thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of people in my life. And still, when I'm in an airplane or a gas station or someplace, and I realize somebody needs to hear the gospel, I still get nervous. My palms still sweat, and my voice is a little bit shaky, and it's still a scary step to take. It's worth, it's worth it. It really is. It always is. But I've got to tell you, you know, not everybody is going to be as bold as a lion the first time they stand for Christ. But Nicodemus, he does something. You know, he says, well, let's just wait to condemn him and let's uh let's judge with righteous judgment here. And uh and then I I want to go to uh to John chapter 19, and this is the last passage in the scriptures that teaches us about Nicodemus. This is after Christ was arrested, flogged, crucified. This is after Jesus died on the cross, after he hung there and declared it is finished, as the sun went black and the earth shook. And it says, uh after this, we'll start in verse 38 of John chapter 19. It says, after this, Joseph of Arimathea, being a disciple of Jesus, but secretly for fear of the Jews, asked Pilate that he might take away the body of Jesus, and Pilate gave him permission. So he came and took the body of Jesus. And then I love this. Verse 39, here's our old buddy Nicodemus again. And Nicodemus, who at first came to Jesus by night, also came. I I love that phrase. I love that John says the first time Nicodemus came, he came at night. But this time, he came right in front of everybody. Right. In in the in the the evening before the Passover, Nicodemus, who once came to Jesus hiding, was done hiding. Nicodemus, who at first came to Jesus by night, also came, bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about a hundred pounds. In verse uh 40, it says, Then they took the body of Jesus and bound it in strips of linen with the spices, as the custom of the Jews is to bury. I want you to go back to verse 39, because I need to point this out to you. I did a little research on this. Nicodemus, who at first came to Jesus by night, he also came bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about a hundred pounds. It's interesting to me that John goes out of his way to make sure that he writes that phrase, about a hundred pounds. That he explains how much, that seems like a lot, doesn't it? A hundred pounds of oil and perfume. It turns out that is a lot. That's if we were to convert that in into today's uh finances or today's money, that would cost more than$150,000. Nicodemus brought more than$150,000 of oil and spices to come and embalm and clean and prepare the body of Jesus for burial. This is the same Nicodemus that was too scared to even be seen talking to Jesus in public. And I think John included this because it would communicate to those who read it that Jesus wasn't prepared for burial like a carpenter. Jesus was prepared for burial like a king. This is how they would manage or maintain a royal burial. It was with an extravagant demonstration of care for the body. And so Nicodemus, who once saw Jesus as just a teacher, now began to honor Jesus as a king. And uh and I I guess I want you to consider this morning the radical transformation that Nicodemus had undergone over the course of Christ's three-year ministry. He who once approached Jesus in secret, calling him only rabbi and teacher, now served him openly and honored him as a king. Think about this Nicodemus with his own hands soft from being an academic, an institutional. Leader, not a man that did his own hard work. Nicodemus, with his own soft hands, pulled the nails out of the hands and feet of our Savior. He himself lifted the crown of thorns off his head. And he wiped the dried blood from the lifeless body of the spotless Lamb of God. Nicodemus, with hundreds of thousands of dollars, with a wealth of oils, got down on his knees and he cleaned the wounds. He wiped the blood. Nicodemus would have known where every scar was, where every cut was located. He would have run his fingers over every wound and every gash. Nicodemus saw and knew the suffering of Christ more intimately than anyone else in history. And I can't help but imagine that as he cared for the broken, mangled body of Christ, that he thought back to that first night they met. And maybe Nicodemus thought. And now this is what he's done for me. I didn't want anybody to know that we had a conversation. I could see that there's something different about him. I wish I would have stood up for him more. I wish that I wouldn't have been so afraid. I wish that I could have been as courageous as he was. I can't help but imagine that as he cared for the broken body of the Messiah, maybe he thought back to that first night they met when Jesus had shared with him the dream of the kingdom to come. And now I can't say whether Nicodemus, while he prepared the body for burial, knew the significance of what had happened. But we know that something had shifted in Nicodemus's heart. He was no longer a spectator on the sidelines of Christ's ministry. He was no longer seeking Jesus. In this moment in John 19, Nicodemus was serving Jesus. And if we could take a page out of Nicodemus's book, I think it might just change everything if we could take the same step. How many of us, you know, we approach Jesus at night? It costs us nothing. It requires nothing. Maybe if everybody around us is bashing and accusing him, maybe we won't stand up and fiercely uh uh fiercely join ourselves to him, maybe we'll just say, I don't know, you know, just take it easy on the guy. But guys, I think if we could learn something from Nicodemus, it is that if we look at Jesus, if we see him with a humble and honest heart, if we can see him with eyes that are clear. That there has never been anyone more worth loving. There has never been anyone more worth sacrificing for. And so if it costs me everything, I can only imagine what it was like for Nicodemus walking back into the city after preparing the body of Jesus for burial and seeing the guise that condemned him to death. As he's covered in his blood. And now I've got to believe that as Nicodemus laid him in the tomb of Joseph of Arimathea, that he was changed forever, that there's no way you come back from that and go back to your normal life. And I can't help but look at the story of Nicodemus as a condemnation of the unbelief of the rest of the Pharisees. Nicodemus had a lot to lose too. But he looked into the eyes of Jesus and realized that if I lose everything I've built, but I get to be with him, that is infinitely worth it. And a sacrifice I'm more than willing to make. And so this morning, family, I want to challenge you to ask yourself, am I seeking Jesus or am I serving Jesus? Can you tell my devotion to Jesus by the things I sacrifice? Is my service of Christ, is it costly to me or does it stop at the boundaries of my comfort zone? Because it is costly service that joins us with Christ. And there there are no shortcuts into the kingdom. So Lord, we God, we thank you for your word. We thank you for the story of Nicodemus. Thank you, God, that we can see ourselves so clearly in his story. And we ask, God, that ours would end like his did with our faithful, costly, public service to you, being the final word of our time on earth. God, we confess to you that we have so often approached you with conditions and caveats. And Lord, we we bow before you this morning as our King. And we say, God, we don't just want to seek you, we want to serve you. We invite the convicting voice of your Holy Spirit to come and show us the areas of our life that are holding us at a distance from you. And we ask you, God, to move every barrier, to break down every wall, and to carry us closer to you than we've ever thought possible. Be with us this week. Bless the work of our hands and use our lives to glorify your name. And we ask this in the holy name of your Son Jesus. Amen. Amen. Hey family, God bless you. Thank you so much. We'll see you Thursday night at the next class and then, of course, next Sunday.

SPEAKER_00 51:18

Thank you for tuning in to this service from the Altar Fellowship. We pray that you were impacted powerfully by this message. If you have been personally affected by our ministry and you would like to partner with the altar as we work to establish the kingdom of heaven, please visit our website at www.altar.org.