You have to be born again.

John 3.3-8.

“Born again” has become a Christianese cliché, a phrase we use to mean we’ve come to Jesus, and now we’re all different. And no, you might not be able to see we’re any different, ’cause we still act like the same fruitless, raging jerks you’ll find at political rallies and sporting events. But no, really, we’re born again! We said the sinner’s prayer (possibly years ago) and now we’re new creations in Christ. Bible says so.

Is that anything at all like what Jesus is talking about? Well it’s like what Jesus is talking about; it’s borrowing his idea that some sort of spiritual transformation has happened in a Christian’s life. Problem is, this spiritual transformation, if it’s valid, produces good fruit. That’s the part Christians tend to skip over, because plenty of “born again” Christians haven’t changed at all, and the only fruit they produce is excuses for why all their definitions for the Spirit’s fruit don’t sound at all like basic commonsense definitions should. Why their definitions kinda sound like they’re making excuses for why they have no such fruit.

In short it’s hypocrisy. Let’s not do that.

As popular Christianity would have it, “I’ve been born again” pretty much means “I believe Jesus individually saves me from hell.” Sometimes they also correctly believe he saves us from sin and death. So, y’know, they have one basic orthodox belief. One. Whether they get more of ’em, or whether they produce good fruit, or whether they follow Jesus’s teachings and stop sinning, are entirely different deals. As you’ve seen.

Now let’s look at Jesus’s expectation. As he explained it to Nicodemus:

John 3.3-10 KWL

3 In reply Jesus tells him, “Amen amen! I promise you:

Unless one is born all over again,

one cannot see God’s kingdom.”

4 Nicodemus tells Jesus, “How can a person, being old, be born?

One can’t enter one’s mother’s womb a second time and be born.”

5 Jesus answers, “Amen amen! I promise you:

Unless one is born out of ‘water’ and Spirit,

one cannot enter God’s kingdom.

6 One who was born out of flesh, is flesh.

One who was born out of Spirit, is spirit.

7 You ought not wonder because I tell you

that you have to be born all over again.

8 The Spirit blows wherever he wants.

You hear his voice,

but you didn’t know where he comes from,

nor where he goes.

Same with everyone born of the Spirit.”

Briefly I should mention the “born out of ‘water’ ” bit. I, and many commentators, are pretty sure Jesus uses “water” as a euphemism for bodily fluids. Some of ’em think it refers to the woman’s water breaking during childbirth; some of ’em think it refers to semen. In general it means what physically has to happen before a baby is made. And getting born of the Spirit is what spiritually has to happen before a Christian is made.

The Greek word πνεῦμα/néfma can mean both “wind” and “spirit” and “[Holy] Spirit.” (So can the Aramaic word רוּחַ/ruákh.) Translators have to determine from the context of the passage which definition is correct. You notice most bibles go with “wind” in verse 8: “The wind bloweth where it listeth,” has the KJV. I went with “Spirit” for a few reasons. One is Jesus may mean wind, but he meant for Nicodemus to simultaneously think of both wind and the Holy Spirit; the statement is true of both the wind and the Holy Spirit. One can detect the Spirit’s activity—one can hear his φωνὴν/fonín, “sound, voice”—but does that really mean we know what he’s up to? Not necessarily. Likewise do we know what the Spirit does within us? Not necessarily.

Should we? Well, yeah! Pay attention to him! Follow him. Don’t just dismiss what he’s doing, and presume he’ll just grow fruit within us without any participation on our part. Because it doesn’t work that way at all—as demonstrated by all the fleshly Christians in the world who make “born again” sound like a silly joke to pagans.

Introducing Nicodemus.

John 3.1-4.

Because Cardinal Stephen Langton divided the gospel of John into chapters in the late 1100s, people tend to read John 3 without bothering to read the verses which come right before it. So they kinda miss the context where Jesus knows he can’t fully trust anyone. It’s kinda important to be aware of, because the very next thing in the gospel is when Nicodemus comes to visit him.

And the message Nicodemus brings him? “Rabbi, we know that thou art a teacher come from God.” Jn 3.2 KJV Who’s the “we”? The Judean senate. Nicodemus is an ἄρχων/árhon, “first-rank person,” a word often translated as “prince,” but this does not mean the son of a king or another prince; it means the number-one guy in the country. Or a member of the top caste, or someone from one of the most prominent families in Judea. Nicodemus’s family was important enough, rich enough, politically powerful enough, for him to buy a seat and a vote in their συνέδριον/synédrion (NIV “Sanhedrin,” KJV “council”), the assembly led by the head priest which ran everything in Judea which the Romans didn’t.

So the Judean senate knew Jesus is a teacher who came from God.

And… so what?

Did it mean they respected him as someone sent from God? Listened to him? Carefully considered whatever he taught, and once they determined it jibes with the scriptures and God’s character, followed him? Invited him to speak before the senate, and kept records of his wisdom? Invited him to lunch, at least?

Nope. They ignored him. Except for one senator, who went to visit Jesus at night so he’d be less likely to be seen publicly talking with our Lord in temple or synagogue or the streets.

Like John said, Jesus didn’t trust ’em with himself, because he’s fully aware of what’s in people. Jn 2.24-25 He knew exactly why the senate realized he came from God, but wouldn’t acknowledge him: It’d mean they’d have to repent. They’d have to stop compromising the worship of God and the following of his Law because of their pursuit of political power. They’d have to stop being hypocrites.

But they weren’t gonna make any such changes. Because they didn’t fear God—same as the unjust judge in Jesus’s Persistent Widow Story. (No doubt Jesus based that judge on actual judges in the senate, and his hearers knew exactly the kind of unjust judge he was talking about.) Didn’t follow God at all… yet arrogantly figured he was guaranteed a spot in God’s kingdom because he was a descendant of Abraham. Same as the self-described Christians in our country who assume they’re guaranteed a spot too, because they once said the sinner’s prayer.

Anyway. Nicodemus came with what he thought was good news for Jesus: Hey, in case you were wondering (’cause none of us ever said anything about it), we actually think you’re legitimately from God! You unofficially have our thumbs-up. Great news, huh?

But no, that’s not gonna cut it with Jesus. It’s not enough for them to recognize Jesus comes from God. You wanna see God’s kingdom—the one Messiah’s gonna personally inaugurate into the world—you have to be born again.

John 3.1-4 KWL

1 There’s a person from the Pharisees, Nicodemus by name,

a leader of the Judeans.

2 At night, this Nicodemus comes to Jesus

and tells him, “Rabbi, we knew you, a teacher, came from God:

No one can do these milestones which you do

unless God is with them.”

3 In reply Jesus tells him, “Amen amen! I promise you:

Unless one is born all over again,

one cannot see God’s kingdom.”

4 Nicodemus tells Jesus, “How can a person, being old, be born?

One can’t enter one’s mother’s womb a second time and be born.”

Being born again is a big concept, and I’ll get to it in another article. Today I’m just gonna focus on Nicodemus: Who this guy is, why it’s a big deal for him to come to Jesus, why what Jesus taught him blindsided him, but why it was a big deal for both him and us Christians. After all, part of Jesus’s lesson to Nicodemus has John 3.16 in it y’know.

Jesus knows you’re gonna fail him.

John 2.23-25.

At the end of John 2 there’s this odd statement, which ties right together with chapter 3, which I’ll talk about at that time. It’s where John discusses Jesus’s new fans.

John 2.23-25 KWL

23 While Jesus is in Jerusalem,

at Passover, at the feast,

many trust in his name,

seeing his milestones which he did.

24 Jesus himself isn’t trusting them with himself,

because of the knowledge he has of everyone,

25 for he has no need of anyone testifying about people:

He’s aware of what is in people.

Some Christians read this passage and immediately think, “Ah, it’s the divinity. Jesus doesn’t trust people because he’s God, and still has God’s infinite knowledge of who people are, what they’re like, and what everyone’s secret, selfish motives are.”

Others read it and figure, “Ah, Jesus understands basic human depravity. He knows all humans are inherently selfish, and without the Holy Spirit that’s all we’ll ever be. So he knows better than to trust any of ’em.”

So which of the two does Jesus have?—full divine knowledge of the cosmos, or a generic understanding of a typical human trait? Well, I believe when God became human, he had to surrender his divine power, which includes his full divine knowledge of the cosmos, because all that data cannot physically fit into 2 pounds of brain matter. Your brain holds 2½ petabytes max. That’s a lot of data (it’s 20 quadrillion bits), but it’s nowhere near enough to know everything about ancient Jerusalem, much less the whole ancient world, and even less the 8 billion humans on today’s world.

Yeah, some Christians balk at that idea, because to their minds, God is power. Jesus without power wouldn’t be God. Problem is, Jesus with all that divine power wouldn’t authentically be human. He’d only be pretending to be human, and that’d make him a hypocrite, and hypocrisy is the one thing which annoys Jesus most.

So Jesus surrendered his power. But he can still tap God’s power same as we can: He has the Holy Spirit without limit, Jn 3.34 and the Spirit is just as infinitely powerful and knowledgeable as ever. If Jesus wants to know anything about anyone, the Spirit knows and will tell him. If Jesus wants to know just what kind of darkness lies in the heart of every other human being, the Spirit can give him a quick summary: Human depravity. We’re all messed up because we prioritize ourselves over other people and God.

And whether Jesus gained his knowledge through divine omniscience, or simply knowing about basic human depravity, it really doesn’t matter: He knows. He can’t trust other people. Not fully. They will fail. Even the best of them will fail him. Even his best student, Simon Peter; even the students who were family members, like James and John; they mean well, but they’re only human.

Even us. Even me. Even you. You will fail him. Sorry, but don’t kid yourself.

And don’t beat yourself up about it either. He already knows you’re gonna fail him. He loves you anyway. Wants you to follow him anyway. Wants you, once you fail, to repent, come back to him, and keep taking care of his sheep, same as Peter. Jn 21.17 Try not to fail, but if you do fail, you still have Jesus. 1Jn 2.1 Who won’t fail.

But other than Jesus, people fail. So don’t be so gobsmacked when they do!

Knock the temple down?

John 2.18-22.

During the first Passover we read of in the gospel of John, our Lord goes into temple, sees people selling animals in the Gentile Court, makes a whip, and drives the merchants out.

In the synoptic gospels, Jesus got critiqued for it either the next morning, Mk 11.27-33, Mt 21.23-27 or days later. Lk 20.1-8 But in John it seems he got pushback immediately. Now it could’ve happened much later; John wasn’t always too worried about chronology. (As you’ll see when he briefly talks about Jesus rising from the dead.) John preferred to stick to themes, not timeline.

Nevertheless here’s the story.

John 2.18-22 KWL

18 So in reply, the Judeans tell Jesus,

“What milestone do you show us that you can do this?”

19 In reply Jesus tells them, “Break down this shrine.

In three days I’ll raise it.”

20 So the Judeans say, “This shrine took 46 years to build.

And you, in three days, will raise it?”

21 This Jesus is speaking of the shrine of his body,

22 so when he’s raised from the dead,

his students will remember he says this,

and believe the scripture, and the word Jesus says.

Okay. So Jesus shows up in temple, starts knocking stuff over, starts bossing people around. And in the context of the Judean culture and Hebrew religion, this means one of three things:

• This guy legitimately hears the LORD and was ordered to speak for him, and is telling them to do this stuff because the LORD said so.
• This guy works for the Romans, or the Judean senate, or some other civic authority with the power to actually decree these things.
• This guy’s a nut.

Same as if he showed up in one of our churches and ordered the pastors to shut down the bookstore. Either the LORD decreed it, or he’s from the city or county and thinks they’re breaking the law, or he’s a nut.

Now if Jesus worked for the Romans, they’d probably do everything he told them. And protest a lot, because the priests had Roman citizenship and would demand their rights, and a fair trial, and maybe get the governor fired if they could.

But if Jesus works for the LORD… well, they figured they likewise worked for the LORD, and surely they could figure out whether the LORD had decided to upset their comfortable status quo by sending ’em a prophet or judge. So they wanted proof Jesus was a prophet of the LORD: Give us something which might confirm you’re legitimate.

And that… is actually a valid request. We’re supposed to test prophets. Not just accept they’re prophets because they have a website, and business cards printed up, and introduce themselves as “Prophet Whatshisname” whenever they say hello to people. All sorts of people claim that title, and way too many of them are talking to mental sock puppets instead of God. We need evidence. ’Cause if it’s really God, he can stand up to scrutiny. And fakes can’t.

Now no, they weren’t asking for a trick. Like Moses turning his staff into a snake, or spontaneously sprouting leprosy, or turning water to blood. Ex 4.1-9 Any illusionist can create one of those; the Egyptian illusionists certainly did. They were looking for a σημεῖον/simeíon, “milestone,” an event which couldn’t be self-fulfilling or coincidental. Typically this’d be an event which would happen in the near future.

And… well, Jesus gave ’em one. His own resurrection. Break him down, and in three days he’ll rise again. Which they did; which he did.

When Jesus got out the whip.

John 2.12-17.

Since we’re here, let’s just start with the story.

John 2.12-17 KWL

12 After the wedding, Jesus goes down to Capharnaum

with his mother, his siblings, and his students.

Not many days do they stay there;

13 it’s nearly the Judeans’ Passover,

and Jesus goes up to Jerusalem.

14 In temple Jesus finds cattle, sheep, and pigeon sellers,

and cashiers taking up residence.

15 Making a whip out of ropes,

Jesus throws everyone, plus sheep and cattle, out of temple.

He pours out the cashiers’ coins.

He flips over the tables.

16 He tells the pigeon sellers, “Get these things out of here!

Don’t make my Father’s house a market-house!”

17 Jesus’s students recalled it’s written,

“The zeal of your house will eat me up.” Ps 69.9

In the other gospels, Jesus kicked the merchants out of temple during Holy Week, Mk 11.15-17, Mt 21.12-13, Lk 19.45-46 meaning the week before Passover in the year 33. In John it takes place at Passover in the year 27, as deduced by how long the temple’d been under renovation. Jn 2.20 Hence the debate among scholars is whether Jesus kicked the merchants out of temple

1. once in the year 33, but the gospels don’t have their facts straight, or
2. twice—once in 27 at beginning of his mission, and once again in 33 before he was killed.

And let’s not rule out the possibility Jesus did this every single time he went to temple—in John’s gospel we read of the first time, and in the synoptic gospels we read of the last. Because why would Jesus drive the merchants out once, then put up with them for years thereafter, then right before he died finally drive them out again? I mean, it wasn’t okay for them to go back to business for all the years inbetween; wouldn’t Jesus have kept at them?

Funny thing is, the most common theory is it happened once, on Holy Week. Even the inerrantists in the churches where I was raised, teach it happened once. They wouldn’t overtly say only once, but that’s how they’d teach it: They’d say today’s passage came from Mark or Matthew or Luke… and they’d fill in some of the blanks in the story with John, implying this is all the same event.

One of the most obvious blanks they’d fill in from John: The whip. Because Jesus didn’t have a whip in the synoptic gospels. Really! Read ’em for yourself.

Mark 11.15-17 KJV

15 And they come to Jerusalem: and Jesus went into the temple, and began to cast out them that sold and bought in the temple, and overthrew the tables of the moneychangers, and the seats of them that sold doves; 16 and would not suffer that any man should carry any vessel through the temple. 17 And he taught, saying unto them, Is it not written, My house shall be called of all nations the house of prayer? but ye have made it a den of thieves.

 

Matthew 21.12-13 KJV

12 And Jesus went into the temple of God, and cast out all them that sold and bought in the temple, and overthrew the tables of the moneychangers, and the seats of them that sold doves, 13 and said unto them, It is written, My house shall be called the house of prayer; but ye have made it a den of thieves.

 

Luke 19.45-46 KJV

45 And he went into the temple, and began to cast out them that sold therein, and them that bought; 46 saying unto them, It is written, My house is the house of prayer: but ye have made it a den of thieves.

Yep, no whip! But man do Christians love that image of Jesus with a whip. So they deliberately swipe it from John. Didn’t matter if they believed the story in John happened at another time; they just couldn’t pass up the idea of Jesus giving the merchants a good whipping. I leave it to you as to whether prioritizing the whip over the textual integrity suggests something sorta demented about them.

The less-common but popular variant of this theory is it still happened only once—but at the beginning of Jesus’s mission, following John’s timetable. Not during Holy Week. So why do the synoptic gospels put it there? ’Cause it’s more dramatic.

My view is Jesus kicked the merchants out of temple more than once. Maybe every time he went to temple. Maybe that’s why he had a whip in John, but not the other gospels: They learned their lesson by the time Holy Week came around.

Jesus provides six kegs for a drunken party.

John 2.6-11.

Continuing the story from yesterday. Yes, I’m aware this article has a provocative title. But read verse 10: The wedding planner pointed out you don’t serve wine like this when the guests are good and drunk, because they wouldn’t appreciate it. Indicating they were good and drunk.

Every time I’ve written about or taught on this passage, I run into someone who insists Jesus did not make wine. There’s a popular claim among Christian churches which don’t drink alcohol (and I’m part of the Assemblies of God, which is a whole denomination which doesn’t approve of alcohol) that Jesus actually made “new wine.” Because it’s new, they say, it hasn’t had the chance to be fermented. Ergo it’s actually grape juice.

If you’ve never heard that interpretation before, great! Me, I didn’t hear it till adulthood, and I’ve found it’s all over the place. It’s even wormed its way into children’s books.

From a children’s book in which Jesus turns water into “juice.”

This spin on the story makes no logical sense—for two reasons.

First, if the guests had only been drinking grape juice this whole time, how would they be insensible to how good Jesus’s “juice” is? Wouldn’t they easily be able to tell? I mean, if I’ve been drinking one of those 10-percent-juice drinks which are mostly pear juice with grape flavor added, and you swap it with 100-percent-grape-juice Welch’s, I’m gonna know. Even though I’m no grape-juice connoisseur.

Second, the bible brings up “new wine” multiple times, and in no way is it a reference to grape juice.

Hosea 4.11 KJV

Whoredom and wine and new wine take away the heart.

By “heart,” Hosea meant the part of us we think with; really the mind. Now, in what way does grape juice dull the mind? True, it’s full of sugar, and it’s a little hard to focus when you’re full of sugar… but one’s mind isn’t gone in the same way as when horniness or alcohol seize a person.

Matthew 9.17 KJV

Neither do men put new wine into old bottles: else the bottles break, and the wine runneth out, and the bottles perish: but they put new wine into new bottles, and both are preserved.

If you’ve ever made wine, you probably know wine bottles don’t break in the fermentation process, which is precisely why winemakers use ’em. The translators of the KJV apparently didn’t know squat about winemaking, and ἀσκοὺς/askús actually means “wineskins,” not “bottles.” And old wineskins could burst when wine fermented further. But they’d need to be somewhat fermented in the first place… i.e. they’d need to be wine, not grape juice. Jesus also points out the old wine is better than the new stuff, Lk 5.39 indicating he and the people of his culture preferred the fermented stuff. Which ain’t grape juice.

Acts 2.13 KJV

Others mocking said, These men are full of new wine.

In context this verse is about the apostles speaking in tongues on the first Pentecost. Some recognized the tongues as their own foreign languages, and some mocked and said the apostles must’ve been drinking. Drinkng grape juice? Clearly not, and Simon Peter points out it’s too early in the morning for anyone to be drunk Ac 2.15 —and how can you be drunk on grape juice?

Nah. As the children’s book makes clear, some Christians have been indoctrinated with this “Jesus made juice” idea for as long as they can remember, and think it’s true because of course they would. How often do people seriously question something they’ve heard all their lives? (Not enough, obviously!)

Likewise there’s a popular interpretation that first-century Jews watered down their wine: They didn’t drink pure wine, but a mixture of 50 percent water and 50 percent wine. Or 90 percent water and 10 percent wine; just enough wine to kill bacteria, because you couldn’t trust water back then. Watering down wine in order to party longer was a pagan Greek practice, and these folks assume Jews did it too. But nope; it’s also rubbish. Partly because these wedding guests in this story got drunk; plus there are all those admonitions in the bible to watch out for wine because it’ll get you drunk, so there was clearly something which required people to watch out!

Jesus made actual wine. Stuff just as fermented, just as strong, as the stuff Jews regularly drank at parties. Better quality of course; betcha it didn’t taste like feet at all. (Hey, no feet had ever touched it!) When God provides, he doesn’t provide inferior stuff or pathetic substitutes. We do that; we get stingy, and figure people don’t deserve the best… and should be happy to get anything, including inferior substitutes. God doesn’t think that way at all, and neither should his kids.

Jesus’s mom asks his help.

John 2.1-5.

The next town over from Jesus’s hometown of Nazareth, about 4 kilometers away, was Cana. (Today Kfar Kanna is a suburb of Nazareth.) It’s not close enough for the two towns to share a synagogue, ’cause the rabbis declared you could only travel 2,000 cubits (i.e. 1km) from and to your home on Sabbath. But it’s still walking distance; it’s still close enough for the towns to share resources, get to know one another, and even intermarry.

Intermarriage is probably why Jesus and his mom were invited to the wedding in this story: I suspect they were related to the bride. It’s the only way Mary’s take-charge behavior in this story really makes sense; she’d have to be family.

I don’t know how they were related to the bride. She could be Jesus’s sister or aunt or cousin or even grandmother. Some folks even think Mary herself was getting remarried… but then it’d make no sense for Jesus to later put her in the care of one of his students. Jn 19.26-27 Jesus was in his 30s, Lk 3.23 which means it’s entirely possible for him to have a sibling with a 13-year-old daughter, and you might actually get married at that age back then, so the bride could even have been Jesus’s niece.

If it weirds you out to think of Jesus having such family members—as if he only ever had a mom and dad and that’s all, ’cause of the nativity crêches—the bible mentions his family multiple times. They were good people. His brothers James and Jude even wrote books of the New Testament.

Conspiracy theorists (and some Latter-day Saints) even speculate this was Jesus’s wedding; that he was the groom, and all the bridegroom metaphors throughout the New Testament are kinda pointing back to Jesus’s literal wedding to some Galilean girl. Thing is, the text clearly says Jesus ἐκλήθη/eklíthi, “is called,” to the wedding—and the groom back then wasn’t summoned to the wedding; he hosted the wedding. The groom’s not a passive participant, like western weddings nowadays.

Plus the groom obviously lived in Cana. First-century Israeli wedding celebrations took place at the groom’s house. The families would agree long in advance for their kids to get hitched. (Some Christians claim they’d sign a marriage contract, but that’s a medieval tradition, not a first-century one.) The groom would either own, buy, or build a house, and prepare it for his bride to live there; then he’d gather his friends and family, and they’d march to the bride’s house to get her. The bride’s family and friends would then go with her to the groom’s house, and they’d party.

No, not have a wedding ceremony. The Jews didn’t do ’em till the 19th century—and at the time it was wealthy Jews who wanted to have a ceremony like Christians did, so they swiped our tradition and added Jewish elements. Good, meaningful elements; but they’re 19th-century traditions, not first-century. But various naïve Christians and Messianic Jews don’t know this, and try to claim, “Wow, look how much Jewish wedding customs parallel the marriage supper of the Lamb!” Rv 21 Well of course they do; they got ’em from us! We Christians borrowed heavily from the marriage supper of the Lamb idea to create our traditions. But the Christian traditions come first, not the Jewish ones.