Sermon for Sunday, March 1, 2026
Genesis 12:1-4a; Romans 4:1-5,13-17; John 3:1-17
As we continue through Lent and this
sermon series on "Following Jesus Together," I want to look at the two main
characters in our readings this morning and see what their examples might show
us as we make our way – or maybe stumble our way – through this journey of
faith. I think what binds these stories together
is the question of how to trust.
The first character is Abram, better known
by the name God gives him a few chapters later, Abraham. At the point where today’s reading begins, we
know nothing about him. The only
backstory from the previous chapter is that Abram’s father takes his extended
family from Ur in what’s now southern Iraq to Haran in what’s now southeastern
Turkey. There, out of the blue, the God
of Israel summons Abram and says, “Go from your country and your kindred and
your father’s house to the land that I will show you. I
will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name
great, so that you will be a blessing. I will bless
those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse; and, in
you, all the families of the earth shall be blessed.” (Genesis 12:1-3)
Can you imagine being Abram in that
moment? He’s 75 years old, married to
Sarai, with no children and no prospects, other than inheriting whatever he got
when his ancient father died. Abram’s
not even a worshiper of Yahweh; there is no “people of Israel”
worshiping Yahweh yet. The Lord simply
taps Abram on the shoulder and says, “You’re the one. Get going.”
And Abram goes. He and Sarai pack up their livestock and the
guys who tend the animals, and they set out for a land they’ve never seen
before with nothing but a prayer. We
don’t hear anything about his motivation – his hopes, his fears, his reckless heart
– and we don’t hear his conversation with Sarai, which must have been … lively.
Maybe it’s the absence of detail that
makes Abram’s story such rich material for the apostle Paul to reflect on, when
he writes about Abram’s trust two millennia later. As we heard in the second reading today, Abram
“‘believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness’” (Romans 4:3). So,
Abram goes down in spiritual history as the paragon of trust … or blind faith,
depending on how you want to see it.
Our other character this morning is Nicodemus.
From the perspective of the Gospel of John, we might see Nicodemus as the anti-Abram.
He’s a spiritual leader – a member of
the Sanhedrin, the Jewish governing council of experts on the Law. He’s a man of status and stature, someone
people turn to for rulings and advice. He’s
the status quo, in the flesh. But
Nicodemus can see that God’s at work in this new rabbi, Jesus, who’s just
turned over the merchants’ tables in the Temple to indict a system that puts profit
ahead of people’s well-being.
Nicodemus probably can’t stand Jesus’ method,
but he, too, sees the system is broken. So,
Nicodemus comes to Jesus under the cover of darkness to learn more. Showing astonishing respect to someone who’s
breaking all the rules, he says, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has
come from God; for no one can do these signs that you do apart from the presence
of God” (John 3:2). “Tell me what you’re
up to.” So, Jesus tells him it’s not
enough to be born into the right community; God wants us be reborn spiritually,
committing ourselves not just in law but in life. Nicodemus just can’t wrap his head around it. Like most of us, I think he wants faith to make
sense before he’s willing to give his heart to it.
So, we have these two examples today,
Abram and Nicodemus. Abram may be Scripture’s
great example of faithfulness, but to me his story has always seemed aspirational
at best. Most of us aren’t receiving
flashes of insight so clear that we know it’s time to take our lives in
a new direction. Most of us are more
like Nicodemus, and we could use some practical guidance in the art of trust.
Well, let’s start with what not to
do, in terms of practicing trust; and at the top of that list is perhaps what tempts
us most: going it alone, spiritually. In
our culture, we love the individual success story, whether it’s the Old West sheriff
who takes down the bad guys, or the entrepreneur who bootstraps his way to wealth,
or the prosperity-Gospel preacher who dishes out truth direct from the Divine. Those stories are compelling … and, I’d say, tempting,
in the sense that they teach us that only special people have the capacity, or
the divine favor, to tap the pipeline to success. And our stories of faith heroes like Abram can
reinforce that narrative: If I could
just trust like he did, I’d see blessings like he saw.
But I think most of us are wired more like
Nicodemus. Now, Nicodemus has every
reason to go it alone. He’s the answer
man – an elder, a Pharisee, a religious expert. But Nicodemus is wise enough to know what he doesn’t
know. He can see that Jesus is
channeling God, but it’s not happening the way it’s supposed to happen –
through meticulous legal study and wise rulings from smart guys like him. So, he goes to Jesus and does maybe the hardest
thing in this journey of spiritual growth: He admits he doesn’t get it. “Look, Jesus, you say that we know God’s presence
and power in our lives by being ‘born from above’ – what does that even mean?” I love that.
Here’s the answer man becoming the student sitting at the true teacher’s
feet. Now, Jesus can’t give it to him
all at once. It’ll take 18 more chapters
of John’s Gospel to begin to glimpse the mystery that being lifted up on
a cross opens the door to eternal love. But I hear Jesus saying to Nicodemus, “Hang in
there. Even when you don’t have the answers,
trust that I do. The longer you walk
with me, the clearer Love becomes.”
Nicodemus shows up again in the Gospel story
only twice more. A few chapters later,
when the people of Jerusalem are hanging on Jesus’ every word, the religious
leaders send their police to arrest him. Nicodemus speaks up against the other members
of the council, wanting to give Jesus a hearing, at least. All he gets is ridicule from the other experts.
(John 7:45-52)
But one of them, at least, must have connected
with the way Nicodemus saw Jesus in a different light – and that’s Joseph of
Arimathea. Now, Scripture doesn’t say anything
about this directly, but I think Nicodemus must have found a spiritual
companion in his fellow council member, Joseph (Mark 15:43). If you recognize that name, Joseph of
Arimathea, it’s from the crucifixion story. Once Jesus dies on the cross, Joseph goes to Pilate
and asks for the body. And then, he and
Nicodemus take the body, carefully prepare it for burial, and place it in
Joseph’s family tomb. (John 19:38-42) Why
would Joseph and Nicodemus take on this awful job together? I like to think
they must have been talking for a long time about this mysterious teacher from
Galilee. They both disagreed with the other
religious leaders, who wanted to see this pesky Messiah dead. I imagine Nicodemus and Joseph wrestling with Jesus’
story as it played out – witnessing his miracles, struggling with his teaching,
finally making the connection between their tradition and this stranger from
heaven. Their spiritual friendship
empowered them to hold their heads high, go stand before Pilate, and honor Jesus
when nearly everyone else turned away.
Unless we’re Abram or some other spiritual
superstar, we don’t do so well at trusting God on our own. And, blessedly, I don’t think that’s what God
has in mind. So, what kinds of resources
can help us learn to trust when the path’s not clear? When we can’t even see the next step, much
less the end of the journey, where can we turn?
For me, the power to trust comes from conversation
partners – human and divine. We find some
of those partners in Scripture and other spiritual writing. This is why it matters to read the Bible – not
in the sense of meeting some dreary obligation, nor in the sense of looking for
magic words to conjure up what we want from God, but in the sense of listening
to the wisdom of our spiritual forebears who’ve already traveled the road we’re
on. That same truth holds about other spiritual
guides, from ancient writers to today’s podcasters. I can’t count the number of times I’ve felt
lost and alone and then heard precisely what I needed to hear in that morning’s
reading or podcast.
And then there are the conversation
partners God gives us in the flesh. This
is the point of the Companion Groups we’re beginning, and for which more than a
hundred of you have signed up – the chance to share how we experience God showing
up, or not, in day-to-day life. In
addition, you can find opportunities for theological reflection nearly everywhere
you look in the life of the church, formal and informal – in worship, and Bible
studies, and prayer groups, and classes, and coffee-hour conversations, and spiritual
direction, and coaching with your friendly local clergyperson. Just to say this out loud: People sometimes tell me they don’t want to bother
the clergy for a spiritual conversation because we’re “so busy.” Let me tell you, there are bothersome aspects of
our jobs, but talking with you about finding God in your life is not one
of them. That’s why we’re here. Let us share the joy of those life-giving
conversations.
However it is that you’re wired to find connection, take God up on the offer. If you do have an Abram moment and immediately trust in a word straight from the Almighty, more power to you. For the rest of us, trust grows through listening to one divine voice after another – from Scripture, from conversations, from books, from podcasts, from prayer – maybe even from sermons (stranger things have happened). When we listen that way – with a heart like Nicodemus, willing to keep at it even when we don’t understand – then we can trust that we’ll hear God speaking just what we need to hear.
