How Can This Be?
HOW CAN THIS BE?
JOHN 3:9-15
New birth is God’s work in us, though the way to it is by putting our trust in the One who died for us.
The new analogy of the wind and the Spirit which Jesus introduces baffles Nicodemus further. “How can this be?” he asks, not so much, it seems, wanting to know how to take the step of faith himself, as unable to comprehend what it is all about. Jesus expresses surprise that someone appointed as a theological teacher of God’s chosen people should be so out of his depth. The idea of birth by water and the Spirit was foreshadowed in the Old Testament, especially in such a passage as Ezekiel 36:25-28.
Jesus speaks not only from Scripture, but also from experience. On the basis of both he gives his testimony. But Nicodemus and those like him did not receive it. An earthly analogy was meant to clarify the heavenly reality. It would be impossible to speak directly of unseen heavenly things to those who cannot understand what they see. In fact there is only one interpreter of heavenly things: the Son of Man. His origin is heavenly, he has a foot in both camps, he bridges the gap between heaven and earth in his own person (cf. 1:51; 1 Corinthians 15:47). Man could never ascend to meet God. God had to descend to meet man.
Not only was the incarnation necessary to reveal the life of heaven to men, the atonement was also. The bronze serpent on the standard was a symbol of healing (Numbers 21:4-9). The Son of Man was likewise to be lifted up (in a double sense—cf. Genesis 40:12f.,18-22; see also 8:28; 12:34; 18:32). As the One lifted up was not a bronze serpent but the living and dying Son of Man, so the benefits were far greater. Here was no temporary cure but eternal life as the result of faith.
Notes 3:11: “We speak of what we know.” This may refer to Jesus’ disciples, and John the Baptist possibly, as well as to Jesus himself. No words of a Christian are worth listening to unless they spring from inner conviction. 3:13: “who is in heaven.” NEB: “whose home is in heaven.” Some manuscripts omit this. Jesus did not cease to be God when he became man.