John 3:1-21
Our text for today includes perhaps the most famous verse in the entire Bible: “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.
These famous words are part of a conversation between Nicodemus and Jesus. I’ve heard this text since I was a child….but I’ll be honest, it’s not an easy text to completely understand. There are several themes and phrases that we won’t touch on today….but I would like to approach this text with two images that Jesus refers to: WIND and LIGHT.
Nicodemus comes at night. That detail matters. John rarely wastes words. Nicodemus is a serious man — a Pharisee, a teacher of Israel. He is thoughtful, moral, devout. And yet he comes in the dark. He is curious, but cautious. He’s drawn to Jesus, but not yet ready to be seen publicly with him.
Nicodemus says “we know you’re from God. You’re a great teacher….or you wouldn’t be able to perform these miraculous signs.” Jesus seems to ignore his comment, speaking to him first about birth — about being “born again” (this can also be translated as “born from above” or “born anew.”) Nicodemus hears biology – “how can one return to a mother’s womb and be born again?”; but Jesus speaks of mystery, using images of water and spirit. “To enter the kingdom of God you must be born spiritually…..from above.”
And then comes that striking image in verse 8:
“The wind blows where it wishes… you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.”
The Greek word pneuma means both wind and Spirit. Like wind, the Spirit is not controlled, scheduled, or engineered. The wind moves freely. It cannot be managed. It cannot be coerced. It is sovereign.
Which means something humbling: none of us can believe unless the Spirit moves first. We will be stuck like Nicodemus – believing that Jesus is good, maybe even a great teacher…. but not necessarily our Messiah, Savior, Lord.
As Jesus shares with Nicodemus in verse 16, the primary condition for entering the kingdom of God, or receiving eternal life…is “to believe” or to have faith in Jesus. Yet, this faith is not a self-improvement project. It is not intellectual achievement. It is not moral effort. It is new birth, through the miracle of the Spirit! And spiritual birth, like physical birth, is not something that you yourself can initiate. We are reminded of Paul’s words in his communication to the believers in Corinth, “No one can confess that ‘Jesus is Lord’ without a miracle of the Holy Spirit.”
So while we cannot manufacture belief, we can respond when the wind begins to stir. And that leads us to the second image: light.
After speaking of God’s great love — “For God so loved the world…” (v. 16) — Jesus moves from wind to light:
“The light has come into the world… and people loved darkness rather than light… But those who do what is true come to the light.” (vv. 19–21)
Here is the mystery: we cannot make the wind blow — but we can step into the light.
The Spirit moves freely. And when the Spirit begins to stir — when conviction pricks the heart, when truth unsettles us, when grace draws us — we are invited to step forward.
Stepping into the light means honesty.
It means allowing our lives to be seen.
It means bringing our sin, our confusion, our questions out of hiding.
Nicodemus’ “new birth” began in the dark. But John’s Gospel hints that he did not stay there. Later, in chapter 7, he will defend Jesus publicly. Later still, he will help lift Jesus’ broken body down from the cross and prepare Jesus’ body for burial – in the open light of day.
For Nicodemus, the wind moved…the Holy Spirit worked in his heart. And eventually, Nicodemus appears to have stepped into the light.
Verse 16 tells us the required response: believe; trust; entrust ourselves to the Son.
But perhaps one very concrete way we “believe” is simply this: when the Spirit stirs, we do not retreat into the shadows. We step forward. We confess. We open up. We come into the light.
We cannot control the wind.
But we can open the windows of our hearts…to allow the Holy Spirit access.
We cannot create the light.
But we can step into it.
And when we do, we discover something astonishing: the light does not expose us to condemn us. After all, Jesus didn’t come to condemn us! Instead, the light reveals that our works “have been done in God.” The Spirit was already at work. The wind was already blowing.
Salvation begins in God’s mysterious movement — like wind.
It grows as we respond and step honestly into the light.
And it results, not in condemnation, but in eternal life.
“For God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.” (v. 17)
The wind is blowing.
The light is shining.
During this Lenten season, let’s step into it!
Amen.
(the above is a summary of the message shared during worship on March 1, 2026.)
Japanese Congregational Church 