On billboards or signs at sporting events or anywhere crowds gather, a reference to John 3:16 can often be found. It might be the most quoted verse from the Bible and with good reason. It encapsulates the message of Christianity in just one sentence: “For this is how God loved the world: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life” (NLT).
In these words, we discover some powerful truths:
- God’s motive—love.
- God’s action—giving His one and only Son.
- God’s promise—people who believe will live forever with Him.
However, if we dive a little deeper into the context of this verse—looking at the narrative surrounding this statement—we find that Jesus delineated between superficial and sincere belief.
In a culture of easy-believism, we can discern more clearly what Jesus meant by “everyone who believes in him.” The Greek word translated believed or trusted is pisteuo which means to think to be true, to be persuaded of, to credit, place confidence in.1
Our English translations sometimes miss the play on words used in the original Greek. For example, in John 2:23-24, Jesus essentially said some people believed in Him, but He didn’t believe in them. Jesus knew those who had sincere belief and those just momentarily awed by miracles.
Signs can be the place where faith starts. John recorded miracles in his Gospel for that purpose (John 20:30-31). But genuine belief was necessary for spiritual rebirth. Attractional activities that pique an interest in the gospel message aren’t bad; they just aren’t enough. A person must move from superficial to sincere belief. Jesus revealed in these verses that people who want to experience His works without submitting to His Word will not share His life.
One man who saw Jesus’s miraculous signs wasn’t easily convinced, so he asked questions to delve deeper into Jesus’s teaching. Nicodemus belonged to a group called the Pharisees whose focus was strict obedience to the law. He was also one of the 71 members of the Sanhedrin. The Sanhedrin functioned as a Jewish governing body who made laws and enforced them. Imagine the supreme court and senate rolled into one.
Nicodemus approached Jesus using the term of respect—Rabbi—assuming Jesus was a teacher who came from God. What he didn’t realize was that He was God who had come to teach!
Scholars have debated why Nicodemus came to Jesus at night. Since the text doesn’t tell us, we can only speculate.
- Perhaps he feared what colleagues might think of him and didn’t want to be seen with Jesus.
- Maybe he wanted undisturbed time with Jesus away from the crowd.
- As one with ruling authority, he might have been busy during the day with pressing responsibilities.
Regardless of the reason for this encounter, we can find an application for our own lives. Public worship and study gatherings are important, but there are things we can’t get from Jesus with the crowd. We need personal, intimate meetings with the Savior.
Nicodemus acknowledged the signs Jesus performed but struggled with Jesus’s teaching regarding spiritual rebirth. He couldn’t move what Jesus was saying out of the realm of physical birth asking this question, “How can an old man go back into his mother’s womb and be born again?” (John 3:4, NLT).
Using the birth analogy, Jesus revealed that just as you cannot manufacture babies, you cannot manufacture Christians. Yes, spiritual birth is a mystery, but it is necessary and observable. Jesus also used the wind to illustrate. You don’t know the origin of the wind, but its effects are evident. In the same way, spiritual birth can’t be seen but the transformation is unmistakable.
Jesus made a play on words in the Greek. Wind is pneuma in Greek which can mean “wind,” “breath,” or “spirit.” “He said, ‘You have to be born of the Spirit, and it’s like the wind.’ In other words, the pneuma is like the pneuma.”2
Spiritual birth occurs at the moment of sincere belief. I believed in Jesus when I was nine years old. The transformation wasn’t hugely evident in the following days and months, but over the course of forty years, the wind of God’s Spirit has altered everything.
Those who believe in Jesus (“the Son”) receive eternal life and have no judgment against them because Jesus came not to condemn, but to save. This is good news!
Jesus used several illustrations to help explain salvation—including birth and wind. God loved us so much He sent Jesus to save us from sin. Yet we must believe in Him. This belief must move beyond a superficial longing for His works to a sincere faith that trusts His Word.
Works Cited
- Strong’s 4100, Bible Study Tools, accessed March 25, 2024, https://www.biblestudytools.com/lexicons/greek/nas/pisteuo.html.
- R. C. Sproul, John: An Expositional Commentary (Sanford: Ligonier Ministries, 2009), 39.
In The Gospel of John Bible study, Melissa Spoelstra will encourage you to slow down and linger with the living Word. You’ll appreciate the pace of the Savior who never hurried but completed all that the Father called Him to accomplish. Over 7 sessions, you’ll be challenged to take on the posture of a learner—understanding that the peace Jesus offers is not an ease of circumstances, but a stillness of the soul. As a result, you’ll grow in intimacy with Him and learn to live, serve, and rest in His peace.
ABOUT MELISSA SPOELSTRA
Melissa Spoelstra is a women’s conference speaker, Bible teacher, and author who is madly in love with Jesus and passionate about helping others to seek Christ and know Him more intimately. She holds a Bachelor of Arts in Bible Theology and is a contributor to Proverbs 31 ministries First Five app. She is the author of Isaiah: Striving Less and Trusting God More with Lifeway Women as well as eight other Bible studies and four books. Melissa makes her home in Waxahachie, Texas, with her pastor husband and has four adult-ish children.
