For God so loved the world
It’s now the 4th Sunday of Lent and today’s gospel talks about two important things that our Lord Jesus Christ said to Nicodemus when they met at night. First was about the Son of Man being lifted up so that the people would be drawn to him and believe. The other thing that our Lord Jesus told Nicodemus is one of the most important Bible passages that all Christians are requested to memorize by heart… about the Love of God. You can read all of this in your Bible in John 3:14-21.
“14 And just as Moses lifted up the Serpent in the desert, so must the
Son of Man be lifted up, 15 so that whoever believes in him may have eternal life. 16 For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son that whoever believes in him may not be lost, but may have eternal life.
17 For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him. 18 Whoever believes in him may not be condemned, but whoever does not believe has already been condemned, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God.
19 And this is the verdict, that the light came into the world, but people preferred darkness to light, because their works were evil. 20 For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come toward the light. 21 But whoever lives the truth comes to the light, so that his works may be clearly seen as done in God.”
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Having written every Sunday on the gospels for more than five years now, we have come across this very important meeting between our Lord Jesus Christ and the man known only in the Gospel of John as Nicodemus. So who was Nicodemus? He is mentioned in John’s Gospel three times… the first one was when he came to our Lord Jesus in the night, which is what we are reading in today’s gospel. The second meeting with Jesus and Nicodemus was during the trial of our Lord before the Sanhedrin, where Nicodemus reminded his fellow members that the law requires that a person be heard before the Sanhedrin judges the person.
The third time that the name of Nicodemus was mentioned by John was during the crucifixion of our Lord Jesus Christ where he helped Joseph of Arimathea, in preparing the body of our Lord for burial. Yes, this member of the Sanhedrin helped bury our Lord in that cave in Golgotha, which is now a huge Byzantine Church outside the walls of Jerusalem and considered one of the holiest sites in Christendom. Christian tradition has been spread around that Nicodemus was eventually martyred because he believed in our Lord Jesus Christ.
Actually this meeting in the night with Nicodemus and our Lord Jesus Christ starts from John 3: 1-21. But we start in John 3:14 when our Lord told Nicodemus, “And just as Moses lifted up the Serpent in the desert, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, so that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.” For those who do Bible study, they know that the New Testament have not yet been written. So there was no question that our Lord Jesus used a passage from the Torah or the Old Testament.
Since both Nicodemus and our Lord Jesus were devout Jews… when our Lord told this passage to Nicodemus, he knew that this passage was taken from Numbers 21:8 which goes, “Then the Lord instructed Moses, “Make a poisonous snake out of bronze and fasten it to a pole. Anyone who has been bitten by the Seraph and looks at it will live.” Remember our separated brethren who always complains that Catholics do idol worship?
Well, God himself ordered Moses to make a bronze Seraph and told the Hebrews who were bitten by the poisonous snake to look up to the Bronze Seraph when Moses lifted it up so that they would live. Surely those separated brethren of ours would never say that the Hebrews who sinned against God worshiped the bronze serpent, which was raised up before their eyes so they would be healed? What our Lord told Nicodemus was actually a prophesy that he… the Son of Man would be lifted up on the cross so that those who see him lifted up would be drawn to him and true enough, when the Lord died, it happened to the Roman Centurion and to Nicodemus.
Lastly, our Lord told Nicodemus one of the most important scriptural passages of the New Testament… “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son that whoever believes in him may not be lost, but may have eternal life.” When God asked Abraham to offer his only son in the altar, Abraham did not hesitate and obeyed God without question. Yet God the Father too allowed his only begotten Son our Lord Jesus Christ to become a pleasing and worthy sacrifice so that mankind would be restored to Paradise, which Adam and Eve lost. But our Lord Jesus restores all things back to God.
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