Fresh Wind Fresh Fire

John 3: 1-21. Isaiah 6:1-8

I have a love hate relationship with the John text...it is a text that has been abused and misused- along with the term Born Again. Adrian Plass has some interesting comments on this very phrase.
As an evangelist I acknowledge that people need a spiritual re-birth, but as a pastor I see that so many within the church see themselves as second class Christians because they cannot point back to a dramatic experience, they cannot pinpoint a time or place...
People who live godly lives- showing real evidence of spiritual fruit are uncertain of their salvation because they cannot point back to a day and time of re-birth...they feel they are not proper Christians. another reaction is to dismiss experience and criticise other for spiritual excesses
When we lived in Texas, I had to go to collect my Social Security number, while we were there a young lady came into the office, her purse had been stolen- she was getting married the next day and needed her Social Security number- she knew all of the information about herself (of course she did...) but was unable to prove her identity because everything had been stolen- birth certificate, drivers licence, passport everything. She had no proof of her own existence, yet she was standing right in front of the clerk, giving detailed information- obviously alive, and very human in her distress...
The clerk was unable to help- she needed more, she needed documents....
Jesus is not interested in our documentation, isn't interested in which family we were born into, the time and day of our birth, what he is interested in is our entry into a new birth, a new way- he is interested into us entering into a spiritual reality...
The young lady was not asking for papers and official stamps- she was wanting to enter into a new relationship- one where she would give herself in marriage- one that would in many ways make her a different person because she had joined her life with another life. In a marriage ceremony rings are exchanged along with vows, the tow bind themselves to one another- often the woman takes a new surname as a sign to the world that all is not as it was.
That is what Jesus is pointing to- Nicodemus has come late at night, intrigued by what he has seen and heard, he comes acknowledging this- essentially asking- who are you, and is confronted immediately with the need for rebirth- spiritual birth;
Nicodemus understood the importance of spiritual life, he would probably have assented to the belief that the soul was made of 3 parts which are called by the Hebrew names, nefesh, ruach and neshama. The word neshama is a cognate of nesheema, which means literally "breath." Ruach means "wind." Nefesh comes from the root nafash, meaning "rest," as in the verse, "On the seventh day, [God] ceased work and rested (nafash)." (Exodus 31:17).
God's exhaling a soul can be compared to a glassblower forming a vessel. The breath (neshama) first leaves his lips, travels as a wind (ruach) and finally comes to rest (nefesh) in the vessel. Of these three levels of the soul, neshama is therefore the highest and closes to God, while nefesh is that aspect of the soul residing in the body. Ruach stands between the two, binding man to his spiritual Source.
Ruach is the word Jesus uses here, he is speaking of fresh wind from God, fresh wind bringing about re-birth to eternal life, a new move of God's Spirit
Nicodemus would have believed in Resurrection following judgement in the last times- he may have held to the thought that the main judgement after death is in Gehenna, where the soul is cleansed in a spiritual fire, and purified so that it can receive its eternal reward.
Jesus was pointing to a new way- a way that started with re-birth now, a way that would lead to eternal life not because of the righteousness of the person entering into it, but because of Jesus own righteousness. Not because of any experience we may have had but through receiving new life into ourselves- God breathed life-fresh wind, fresh fire. Ruach.
Jesus points to his crucifixion- saying how like serpent Moses raised up on a pole in the desert was the source of healing for the Israelites who had been bitten by the serpents that came amongst them,Jesus was too become the source of our healing- the illustration is a deep one - the serpent had been the source of the problem- it was through looking truly at the source of the problem that the Israelites received healing. On the cross Jesus somehow took upon and into himself all of the worlds ills -
he bore our sins and carried our diseases
Looking to him; lifted up , looking to him as crucified Lord , we look into our own sin and recognise our need for re-birth, for renewal- for fresh wind- for cleansing fire...
Isaiah when faced with the awesome holiness of God declared
Woe to me!" I cried. "I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the LORD Almighty."
Jesus reveals God to us on the cross in a new way- the God who came close, the God who entered fully into our world- the God who on the cross shows us ourselves, and when we acknowledge our need comes with fresh wind and fire to recreate us...
We need to live in the reality of our spiritual re-birth everyday- our very lives will show the evidence of it if life is there for we will live as those who walk in the light- not perfect, but not ashamed of our imperfections for we are being transformed...
The alternative is stark, unable to look to Jesus we hide in the darkness- possibly trying to perfect ourselves, to drag ourselves into the light- but the truth is plain- we cannot produce a re-birth within ourselves- we need to be born from above... to allow Gods breath to blow through our lives Ruach binding us to our source, fresh Spirit wind, renewing, recreating and restoring...

The Fathers love...

Have you ever thought about what it might mean to be a person who radiates God’s love? Jesus radiated that love and in doing so opened himself to criticism; about his friendships, his cleanliness and his eating habits! He received the clean and the unclean alike, touching both (often to the horror of the former)...
How weak as I am can I pattern my life after his?
First I must accept Gods’ loving embrace:
"The Father interrupted the sons strategy for return....The interruption ... performed a transformation. After failure in the distant country the son reconstructed his identity as a "son not worthy to be called a son". By the sheer joy of his fathers embrace, without a word his identity starts to be changed again. The son made his confession but right at the point where his strategy dictate that he inform his father about the new identity he has constructed for himself.... the father interrupts him again. The confession made to the father who embraced him has taken his identity in relation to the father out of his hands and placed it into the hands of the father. With a command to the slaves, the father reconstructed the prodigal’s identity. He ordered a robe the best one- pit on him, a ring placed on his finger, as the prodigal was transformed before our eyes he called him son of mine. First he symbolically remade the "son who is not worthy to be called a son" into the "son he could be proud" of, then he named him "son of mine". The secret, the father would not let his son, his lost and dead son out of his hearts embrace."- Volf -Exclusion and Embrace
God does not let us out of His embrace, He waits for us patiently, arms and heart ready to receive... despite our frailty, our weakness and our brokenness we are received, we need no masks, we have no need to construct a new identity for ourselves (it will be rejected anyway).
Once we have received the embrace of God, truly received it we will be changed, and we will find ourselves able to love and accept others...
The problem is we leave home often, sometimes without realising it, we wander away and when we meet others in need of embrace we reject them because they are other... at that moment what is sorely needed is for us to r return home, to receive again the embrace of the Father, the kiss of the Mother.
As children grow, they come to believe that they no longer need touch, no longer need to be embraced.... they are wrong, just as we are when we leave home and stray away from the loving arms of God Only then are we able to radiate God’s love...