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Sermon: “Nicodemus and The Chosen”
Nicodemus approaches Jesus under cover of night, drawn by the undeniable power of Jesus’ ministry but conflicted about the cost of following him. Jesus’ invitation to be “born from above” challenges Nicodemus to release the status, certainty, and identity he has spent a lifetime building. The story becomes a Lenten question for the listener: what must be released in order to live with an open hand before God?
There’s a certain discipline to preaching, and one of the disciplines you may not be aware of—if you don’t preach very often—is that I have to pay attention to how often I reference The Lord of the Rings, Saturday Night Live, and The Chosen. Whenever I’m going to mention one of those in a sermon, I ask myself, “When was the last time I mentioned that in a sermon?” Maybe two or three times a year is okay, but beyond that—well, that’s the discipline I’m talking about here.
So I think it’s been a while since I’ve mentioned The Chosen, so here we go.
If you have seen at least a little bit of the show, raise your hand. Okay—yeah, that’s quite a few of you. It’s a series that was crowdfunded, and they’ve made five seasons now, I think. You can go to thechosen.tv, or even Amazon Prime—they have it there. It’s a magnificent dramatic series depicting the story of Jesus and his disciples and followers, and others of course.
Even though I’ve loved every season of it—and we’re up to the point now where Jesus is in Jerusalem, it’s Passion Week—there are moments in season one that are so transcendent that I don’t think they’ve really topped them since. One of those moments is Jesus’ rooftop nighttime conversation with the Pharisee Nicodemus. We just read that exchange here.
There are so many little details that we miss. Maybe the makers of The Chosen get them right, maybe they get them wrong—but they at least force us to contend with them.
For example, it says Nicodemus came to Jesus by night and said to him. We usually just move past that detail. “Okay—what did he say?” But it says he came by night.
He came to him by night when everyone else was asleep. Why? Because he couldn’t be seen sitting down and having a one-on-one with this rebel, with this crazy miracle worker who doesn’t really seem to care about anybody’s man-made rules and is teaching all this forgiveness, all this inclusion, all this welcome for the prostitutes and the tax collectors and the zealots—let’s get everybody in one room.
Scandalous.
Nicodemus knew his reputation could be ruined if he was seen talking to Jesus, so he made sure it was secret. The show depicts this really well. It’s this beautifully lit scene, and it’s such a warm conversation between them. It’s a famous actor who plays Nicodemus, too—I can’t remember his name right now, but I think he’s the most well-known out of the entire cast.
In the show, Nicodemus comes to Jesus having witnessed the healing of Mary Magdalene. As the story goes, Nicodemus himself had been called in to deal with the problem of this woman who was possessed by demons and seemed like a lost cause.
With the status and reputation he had, Nicodemus was asked, “Maybe you can do something. Maybe you can heal her or bring healing to this woman.” But he was so overwhelmed by her condition that he was distraught. He finally said, “Only God can do something. I can’t do anything.”
Then a week later he saw her again—calm, whole, in her right mind. He saw her healed.
He was overcome by the realization that this crazy itinerant preacher had healed this woman in a way he himself thought impossible. And that is what motivates Nicodemus to ask for this nighttime rooftop conversation.
What the show does well, I think, is that it portrays Nicodemus not as someone testing Jesus—poking at him, trying to trap him—but as someone genuinely humbled by the reality of Jesus’ ministry. By the healing. By the power that he says could only come from God.
He comes with questions:
Who are you?
What is this about?
What are you planning to do next?
Jesus responds in the way we heard in the Gospel reading. He says, essentially, “Do you not understand these things? Is this really so new? Is it so shocking to you that the Spirit of God would move in God’s people for the sake of healing?”
He tells him that unless you are born again, you really can’t see these things.
Unless you let go of everything you have built your life upon to this point and choose to be born from above.
Nicodemus is wealthy. He’s respected. He has status and a comfortable place in society. Yet he’s troubled—otherwise he wouldn’t be there. He knows something is off, something is wrong.
Jesus says, “Sometimes you have to start over. Sometimes you have to become like a baby again, like a child again.”
Nicodemus struggles with this. “What do you mean? As if I could enter my mother’s womb again and be born?” You can tell he’s diverting. He’s asking silly questions because he doesn’t want to grapple with what Jesus is really saying.
You’re telling me I have to give up everything I’ve gained to this point.
Look what I’ve achieved.
Look how people honor me.
Look how they ask me their questions when they’re stumped.
Look at these clothes.
Look at this success I’ve gained.
How could a person start over at my age?
I don’t know how old he was. The show depicts him as maybe in his seventies—let’s say seventy-five.
I mention that very specifically because there’s one thing Nicodemus knew very well: his scriptures. His Old Testament. Genesis.
And what did we read from Genesis this morning?
Abram was seventy-five years old when the Lord came to him and said, “Leave everything you know. All of this life you’ve built up. All your friends, all your neighbors, all this culture and this place. Just go.”
Abram must have said, “Okay… where do you want me to go?”
And God says, “Not telling. Just go.”
An interesting side note: the passage says “leave your father,” but his father ends up coming with him. I’ve never quite known what to do with that. I’m not sure how Abram was supposed to feel about it. Maybe Abram says, “Okay, bye Dad,” and his father just follows along like a little puppy. I don’t think his father makes it the whole way, but it’s always an interesting note.
The same challenge being offered to Abram is the challenge being offered to Nicodemus.
You have built up so much.
You have success in your own eyes and in the eyes of your society.
But you must be born again if you want to see what I’m seeing.
If you want to do what I’m doing.
Years ago—maybe ten or eleven years ago—I was part of a writers’ club. We shared our writing with each other, took turns, critiqued each other’s work, and offered suggestions for improving it.
The best advice I got out of that group was a little one-liner that’s apparently common among writers:
“Kill your darlings.”
That’s a little violent—I’m sorry. I should have warned you.
It’s metaphorical, of course. “Kill your darlings” means: what are your favorite parts of your work? That page you love, that paragraph you’re so proud of, that character you’re attached to.
Other writers will say: if you want to move beyond where you are—if you want to grow—you have to be willing to cut the thing you love most.
Kill your darlings.
Be willing to let go of your favorite things.
That sounds a little bit like Abraham, doesn’t it?
Which is tough. I never quite know how to preach the passage where Abraham is commanded to sacrifice his son—of course he doesn’t, and God stops him. But if we read that story the way Paul reads Abraham’s faith in Romans—faith credited to him as righteousness—it’s that Abraham was willing to let go of what was precious to him in order to move into the next level of faith.
To transcend.
The Chosen adds something interesting to Nicodemus’ story. It’s a bit of a risk, but I like it.
After their conversation about being born again and about God loving the world, Jesus says to Nicodemus:
“Come with us.
Why don’t you follow me too?”
That’s striking, because everyone Jesus had asked to follow him so far was a fisherman, a tax collector, a zealot—people down here in the social order. People who were disrespected.
But to ask a respected Pharisee, a teacher, a man of status—to ask him to follow?
Nicodemus is broken by the invitation. He’s clearly considering it. But he says, “I don’t know if I can.”
Jesus tells him, “In three days we’re leaving. We’ll be at the gate of the city. If you want to come with us, meet us there.”
And through all the emotional moments in that series, this is one of the most heartbreaking.
At the end of the episode, Jesus and the disciples are standing at the city gate. The disciples say, “Okay, it’s time to go.” But Jesus says, “Wait a minute.”
They don’t know why.
He just keeps looking, waiting, hoping Nicodemus will come.
Is he going to accept the invitation or not?
Nicodemus’ whole worldview has been turned upside down. He’s standing before the one his people have prayed for and longed for for generations—and that person is inviting him to come along.
But there’s a cost.
You have to let go.
You have to kill your darlings.
You have to release the thing that’s precious to you.
And Nicodemus can’t do it.
The reason that moment affects me so deeply is that it raises a question for me—and maybe for you.
Especially in this Lenten season.
The wisdom of God—the alternative wisdom that requires us to be born from above—often requires us to let go of the things we’ve been holding on to so tightly.
So the question is:
What are you holding on to?
Are you walking through life with a clenched fist or with an open hand?
If you’re walking around like this—what’s in that fist?
What are you afraid to let go of?
“If I let go of this, I’ll lose respect.”
“I’ll lose a job.”
“I’ll lose status.”
“I’ll lose money.”
Or maybe it’s simpler than that.
Maybe you’re afraid you’ll lose the certainty you’ve been walking around with—and suddenly you’ll have to admit you don’t know.
You’ll have to become ignorant again.
You’ll have to start over.
Through Nicodemus, Jesus is calling us to open that fist.
To let go.
To be reborn.
And to walk through life and faith with an open hand.
Amen.