When Religion Doesn’t Make It Anymore
John 3:1-21
3 There was a man of the Pharisees, named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews:
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.
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.
4 Nicodemus 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?
5 Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.
6 That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.
7 Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again.
8 The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit.
9 Nicodemus answered and said unto him, How can these things be?
10 Jesus answered and said unto him, Art thou a master of Israel, and knowest not these things?
11 Verily, verily, I say unto thee, We speak that we do know, and testify that we have seen; and ye receive not our witness.
12 If I have told you earthly things, and ye believe not, how shall ye believe, if I tell you of heavenly things?
13 And no man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the Son of man which is in heaven.
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 in him should not perish, but have eternal life.
16 For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.
17 For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved.
18 He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.
19 And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.
20 For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved.
21 But he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God.
Introduction: The 17th century thinker Blaise Pascal famously said, “There is a God-shaped vacuum in the heart of each man, which cannot be satisfied by any created thing but only by God the Creator, made known through Jesus Christ. Religion has to be considered one of those created things. In our text this morning we have an example of a man whose religion was the centerpiece of his life until it wasn’t. Let me introduce you to a man whose religion was his life.
“Next time you’re in an airport notice the difference between passengers who have confirmed tickets and those on standby (Hybels, Too Busy Not to Pray 113). Those who have confirmed tickets are relaxed, their confident and expectant. Those on standby hang around the ticket counter, they pace and smoke, pace and smoke, pace and smoke…all because of uncertainty. God offers us freedom from the burden of uncertainty, so we can know for sure where we stand with God.”
I. The Introduction
Nicodemus whose name means “conqueror of the people” showed every sign of being a committed religionist. He was a Pharisee which means he was known as very pious man and a man who observed every aspect of the Torah and all the Jewish laws and traditions. He was a ruler of the Jews which means he was a member of the Sanhedrim, the most powerful religious body of his day. But like a lot of folks who are trusting in their religiosity there came a point where his religion was not satisfying the deepest longings of his soul. It is my belief that there are many millions in our churches today who have the same issues as this man.
a. One of the tragedies of the modern church is that there are many who are turning away from religion and deconstructing their faith.
b. There are also many who are turning from the evangelical church to a formal, structured, liturgical church. How many of you know who Beth Moore who has left the SBC and is now an elder in the Anglican Church which is the Church of England.
II. The Inquiry
a. The risk he took
He came to Jesus by night. It is clear from the risk he was willing to take by coming to Jesus at all that he knew that there was something missing in his life.
b. The relief he sought – like the Jerry Clower story about the coon hunt. Marcel who was up in the tree and was being attacked by a bobcat cried, “Shoot up among us, one of us has to have some relief.” Nicodemus needed some relief from the nagging pain that in spite of his religion he was longing for something more, something to fill the hole in his heart.
BELOW STANDARD
Two cows were grazing alongside a highway when a tank-truck of milk on its way to the distributor happened to pass. On one side of the truck in big red letters was a sign that read,
"Pasteurized, homogenized, standardized, Vitamin A added."
One cow turned to the other and remarked,
"Makes you feel sort of inadequate, doesn’t it?"
III. The Instruction
"The faith of Jesus is the faith of a little child. There is no affectation about a disciple of Jesus, he is as a little child, amazingly simple but unfathomably deep. Many of us are not childlike enough, we are childish."
a. From Fan to Follower
Nicodemus was ready to take his relationship with Jesus to another level, but it wasn’t that easy. It never is. There would be much to lose if he went public as a follower of Jesus. What would people think if they found out that Nicodemus was an admirer of this homeless-carpenter-turned-rabbi from a nothing town called Galilee? At the very least he would lose his position in the Sanhedrin and his reputation as a religious leader. Being a secret admirer of Jesus cost him nothing, but becoming a follower came with a high price tag. It always does.
Kyle Idleman, "Not a Fan" (p. 29)
b. From Faith
RELIGION A VS. RELIGION B
The 19th-century Danish theologian Soren Kierkegaard identified two kinds of religion--Religion A and Religion B. The first is "faith" in name only (2 Tim. 3:5). It's the practice of attending church without genuine faith in the living Lord.
Religion B, on the other hand, is a life-transforming, destiny-changing experience. It's a definite commitment to the crucified and risen Savior, which establishes an ongoing personal relationship between a forgiven sinner and a gracious God.
This difference explains why for many years British author C. S. Lewis had such great difficulty in becoming a Christian. Religion A had blinded him to Religion B. According to his brother Warren, his conversion was "no sudden plunge into a new life, but rather a slow, steady convalescence from a deep-seated spiritual illness--an illness that had its origins in our childhood, in the dry husks of religion offered by the semi-political churchgoing of Ulster, and the similar dull emptiness of compulsory church during our school days."
-- Our Daily Bread, March 15, 1994, 10,000 Sermon Illustrations
THE CRISIS OF ALL RELIGION
Jesus is unique....This is highlighted in the ministry of a well-known missionary in India, Dr. E. Stanley Jones. Jones often lectured to Hindu audiences having Hindus as chairmen of the meetings. On one such occasion the chairman was a chief minister of state. During his introduction he said, "I shall reserve my remarks for the close of the address, for no matter what the speaker says, I will find parallel things in our own sacred books." At the close of the meeting he was at a loss for words. Dr. Jones had not presented "things"; he had presented a person, Jesus Christ; and that person was not found in their sacred books. As someone has put it, "Christ is the crisis of all religion."
SOURCE: Dr. R. A. Robinson MA in "With So Many Religions, Why Christianity"
IV. The Impact
a. His defense of Jesus
John 7:50 Nicodemus saith unto them, (he that came to Jesus by night, being one of them,)
51 Doth our law judge any man, before it hear him, and know what he doeth?
b. His open acknowledgment of Jesus
John 19:39 And there came also Nicodemus, which at the first came to Jesus by night, and brought a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about an hundred pound weight.
40 Then took they the body of Jesus, and wound it in linen clothes with the spices, as the manner of the Jews is to bury.
41 Now in the place where he was crucified there was a garden; and in the garden a new sepulchre, wherein was never man yet laid.
42 There laid they Jesus therefore because of the Jews' preparation day; for the sepulchre was nigh at hand.
DEFINING RELIGION
Religion is hanging around the cross, Christianity is hanging on the cross. — Stephen Hill
Conclusion: The danger of religion without relationship
PRAGMATIC RELIGION
Years ago in Germany, there was a young Jewish boy who had a profound sense of admiration for his father. His family’s life centered on the acts of piety and devotion prescribed by their religion. The father was zealous in attending worship and religious instruction, and he demanded the same from his children. While the boy was a teenager, the family was forced to move to another town in Germany. There was no synagogue in the new town, and the pillars of the community all belonged to the Lutheran church. Suddenly the father announced to the family that they were going to abandon their Jewish traditions and join the Lutheran church. When the stunned family asked why, the father explained that changing religions was necessary to help his business.
The youngster was bewildered and confused. His deep disappointment soon gave way to anger and a kind of intense bitterness that plagued him throughout his life. That disappointed son, disillusioned by his father’s lack of integrity, eventually left Germany and went to England to study. He sat daily at the British Museum, formulating various ideas and writing a book. In that work, he introduced an entirely new world-view, envisioning a movement that would change the social and political systems of the world. Drawing from past experiences with his father, he described religion as an “opiate for the masses” that could be explained totally in terms of economics and personal gain. Today, millions of people still live under the system invented by this embittered man, and millions more suffered under previous regimes that incorporated its values. His name, of course, was Karl Marx, and his idea was communism. And it all began with his father’s misuse of the name of God for the sake of profit.
SOURCE: James Emery White, You Can Experience an Authentic Life, pp. 33-34
