John 3:4 (G)

Moving on to Luke 18:31-34, we read as follows:

Jesus took the Twelve aside and told them, "We are going up to Jerusalem, and everything that is written by the prophets about the Son of Man will be fulfilled. He will be handed over to the Gentiles. They will mock him, insult him, spit on him, flog him and kill him. On the third day he will rise again."

The disciples did not understand any of this. Its meaning was hidden from them, and they did not know what he was talking about.

Is this not remarkable? And does this not prove our point, that a person can be as dull about spiritual things as Nicodemus appears in John 3? He could even be a biblical scholar, but without the Spirit's illumination, there can be no understanding. Here Jesus tells his disciples plainly and directly, without using figures of speech, about what would happen to him. But "the disciples did not understand any of this."

This is why I wonder about those commentators whose interpretation of John 3:4 hinges on their own refusal to believe that Nicodemus could be as spiritually dull as he appears. These people have no insight into man's spiritual condition. The truth is that, depending on what kind of audience one is addressing, sometimes a minister would find that most of his hearers are as spiritually dull as Nicodemus and the disciples. They would not understand regardless of how plainly you tell them what you mean. It is as if I were to say to someone ten times, and in different ways, "My name is Vincent," and then the next thing that comes out of his mouth is, "But what is your name?"

If you have been a Christian for very long, you should know what I am talking about, and surely most ministers have encountered such cases. Sometimes the people appear so dull that, if you do not know better, you would think that they are pretending not to understand, and pretending to be stupid, perhaps to aggravate you or play a trick on you. But the truth is that they really do not understand what you are telling them. Nevertheless, experience proves nothing, but the commentators should accept this and the many other biblical passages that illustrate the point.

There are many other passages that I can cite, and you can probably think of several yourself. But let us end this section with 1 Corinthians 2:14, since it aptly summarizes the explanation concerning the unbeliever's intellectual deficiency: "The man without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned."

The verse says that the natural man, the man without the Spirit, "cannot understand." The natural man rejects spiritual truths not because he is intellectually superior, but because he is intellectually inferior, and this intellectual inferiority has a spiritual cause as its root. As Paul says, "For the foolishness of God is wiser than man's wisdom" (1 Corinthians 1:25). This is why even the greatest natural intellect is still far too feeble to grasp the lowest spiritual truths. He is only wise according to human standards (v. 26) – that is, when compared to other unbelievers, to other fools. But the Christian has received wisdom from God.

If a person is surprised by the lack of understanding in Nicodemus, if he thinks that Nicodemus should surely be further down the road than he appears, then he is utterly out of touch with what Scripture teaches about man's condition. But those who acknowledge what Scripture teaches realize that Nicodemus already represents the best of unregenerate humanity. In both learning and religion, he represents the best that man can attain apart from regeneration, from the new birth, and yet he is exactly as shallow and dull as he appears. At this point, Nicodemus is still a natural man, a man without the Spirit. This is why he fails to understand, and this is why he needs to be born again.

(to be continued)

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