NOTES for Joh 3:19

The fear of being condemned at the Last Judgment, which is often called the dread judgment, is familiar to every person. Yet we are used to perceiving this judgment as a legal proceeding in which our actions are examined and the Lord issues a decision that therefore comes to us as if from outside. In this picture of the world, our actions are connected with our fate after death, but only in some mediated way. But Jesus' words show us a completely different picture.

The Lord is unchanging in His love for us; in Him there is no evil and no desire to condemn humanity. A little earlier in Jesus' conversation with Nicodemus, we see a prediction of how far He is ready to go in His love for people: to the torment and suffering of the Cross. But in the light of His sacrifice, our pettiness, the suffering we cause others, and our malice become so clearly visible that it is truly frightening. We want to slip into the shadows and become unnoticed. And so, running away from His love that illuminates everything, we instinctively cling to our human darkness and become our own condemnation.

It is striking that Jesus says this not before a large crowd, but in a nighttime conversation with one disciple, and even a secret one, Nicodemus. Perhaps this is because His words are addressed to each of us individually. The Lord, by His coming to earth, not only changes our idea of the world, but also calls each of us to a transformation of the heart and of the path of our life, calling us to make a choice between light and darkness.

People often say that in the Bible something is confusing, not very clear, something is close and familiar, and something is simple and at the same time deep. This passage belongs to the last group - those that speak directly and plainly about what is happening now and what will happen next. And, as always, there is nothing superfluous or unnecessary for us here; every word is important. How strikingly the evangelist describes the judgment about which so much has been invented and written. Judgment consists in the statement of our choice: light or darkness - good or evil. And there are no fiery frying pans there...

In the words of Christ that we read today in the Gospel of John, what theological language calls the “economy,” that is, God’s design for our salvation, is formulated with striking clarity. We absolutely must listen closely to these words; we absolutely must learn to experience in our hearts the reality of the Creator’s love of which the Lord speaks. God so loved the world that He gave His only-begotten Son for the salvation of all! The Son of God came not to judge the world—for who could withstand the judgment of the Almighty?—but so that the world might be saved through Him! If we entrust ourselves to this revelation, our whole life can be filled with an astonishing joy that no one and nothing can take from us.

There is much evil in the world; injustice and oppression triumph in it. The world is full of innocent suffering, and death awaits every human being. All this is true, and all of it would be grounds for pessimism and resentment against God were it not for God’s will for the salvation of the world, of which the Lord speaks today. To all our questions—“Where is God when people suffer?”, “Why does God tolerate all this?”, and “How could He allow it?”—we receive an answer in these words of Christ. The world is filled with the evil and suffering that people have brought into it, but God not only refuses to accept this triumph of evil; He has also given us a way out. Light has come into this world in Christ, and all of us are called to it. In these Paschal days, when we celebrate Christ’s victory over sin and death, this passage sounds like a true hymn of victory.

Today the Church also commemorates an astonishing man, the prophet Jeremiah, who six centuries before Christ announced to us this design of salvation. Jeremiah lived a life full of suffering, hope, and disappointment. He witnessed attempts to revive faith and the destruction of Jerusalem; he proclaimed God’s call to faith and salvation, and he was killed because the will of the Almighty that he proclaimed did not accord with ideas of national greatness and prestige. When Christ asked His disciples whom people considered Him to be, they named only three prophets, saying, “Some say John the Baptist, others Elijah, and still others Jeremiah” (Mt 16:14). This is important because Jeremiah is a rejected prophet, suffering because of his love for God and for his people and painfully experiencing the tragic rupture between them.

As we glorify the prophet’s feat, let us recall today the chief promise that the Lord gave through him around 600 BC and that was fulfilled in Christ Jesus: “The days are coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah. It will not be like the covenant I made with their fathers on the day when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, My covenant which they broke, though I remained in union with them, says the Lord. But this is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put My law within them and write it upon their hearts; I will be their God, and they shall be My people. No longer shall they teach one another, brother saying to brother, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they shall all know Me, from the least to the greatest, says the Lord, because I will forgive their iniquities and remember their sins no more. Thus says the Lord, who gives the sun for light by day and ordinances to the moon and stars for light by night, who stirs up the sea so that its waves roar; the Lord of hosts is His name” (Jer 31:31–35).

Jesus’ words about Judgment take on a special meaning in the context of His conversation with Nicodemus about the Kingdom. Indeed, the second birth is inseparable from the life of the Kingdom. One does not simply enter it; one must become a new person in order to share in its life. Here and now. One must be born again.

But what is to be done with sin? Judgment is a consequence of sin—or, more precisely, of human sinfulness. Even the pre-exilic prophets spoke of Judgment as an encounter with God face to face, in which everything hidden would become visible. It is not God who judges a person; the person judges himself. Or, rather, a person is judged by his own sin. And now comes a unique offer. Entry into the Kingdom is open to everyone, regardless of their sins, granted in advance. The King of this Kingdom, appointed by God, is endowed with special authority: He has the right to accept everyone who turns to Him and trusts Him, entrusting themselves and their life to Him.

Such a person will enter the Kingdom and share in its life. The King Himself will deal with that person’s sins. But this King will not expel a sinner from the Kingdom unless the sinner chooses to leave, unwilling to work on himself. In short, everything concerning Judgment for such people will be connected with the King, and in due time this same King will present each of His subjects to God, His heavenly Father.

Moreover, a guarantee is offered: if a subject does not abandon his King under any circumstances and agrees to the work on himself and his sins that the King proposes, forgiveness of sins by the heavenly Father is guaranteed. This is a peculiar kind of delegated heavenly justice. The question arises: what could make a person refuse so advantageous an offer? Obviously only one thing: confidence that, despite his sins, he will not work on himself. Not because he cannot—the King knows His subjects, and His tasks are often difficult but never impossible—but because he does not want to, for reasons known to him alone. Whatever those reasons may be, one thing is clear: such a person will prefer to keep away from God, and from the Kingdom as well. He thereby determines his own fate in eternity, for love cannot be compelled.

The coming of the Son of God into the world is a manifestation not of God's wrath, but of love. In today's reading Jesus says that God sent the Son not to judge, but to save. And at the same time, the very fact of the coming of the Son of God is already judgment, because He is light. In this light the most important thing becomes visible: people's hearts.

As long as He was not near, it was possible to pretend that everything was all right. More than that, one could say that one loved God and continue living in whatever way was convenient. When He is near, there is no longer any room for any lie. That is exactly why it was so hard for those who saw Him in the days of His earthly life, face to face, to receive Him.

We have believed without seeing Him. The question is what His light is for us: life and joy, or exposure? And do we truly want to meet Him? Let us pray that His light may enlighten our hearts and that He may become our life.

Jesus' words about Judgment, it would seem, should by no means have sounded new or unexpected to Nicodemus. After all, Nicodemus, as a learned rabbi, should have known well the holy Scripture of his time, which included not only the Torah but also the prophetic books. And what Jesus says about Judgment had already been said by them more than once. Amos was the first to speak about Judgment as a meeting with God face to face. He was also the first to warn his fellow tribesmen and fellow believers that Judgment might turn out for them not at all to be the triumph of victors, as many expected, but a moment of truth - and for many, a very unpleasant truth. And there will be no other Judgment: for God wants to save the human being and open to him the fullness of life intended for him, not to sentence him.

Jesus says the same thing when He speaks of Himself as Judge, not in the sense in which the believing majority understood this at the time, but in the prophetic sense: He brought the Kingdom into the world, whose light shines on everyone, and people judge themselves by choosing darkness.

That is why the outcome of Judgment for each person depends on his attitude toward Jesus, or more precisely, on his relationship with Jesus. If a person trusts the One who brought the Kingdom into the world, then he has made his choice, and in principle the outcome of Judgment over him is determined: the Kingdom will be given to him, even if this does not happen immediately. If there is no trust, then the person thereby judges himself, depriving himself of the possibility of entering the Kingdom. Thus, fully in the spirit of the prophetic tradition, Jesus resolves the question of Judgment, while at the same time pointing to Himself as the One to whom it has been given to bring into the world both the Kingdom and Judgment.

It is no wonder that Jesus' words shocked Nicodemus so much. In his view, a place in the Kingdom of the coming Messiah was guaranteed to him by the very fact of being born to Jewish parents and belonging to the chosen people. But the Lord tells him, and us, that what is born of the flesh (that is, of people, even Jewish people) is flesh, and that in order to enter the Kingdom of the Spirit one must be born of water (receive baptism) and the Spirit (receive that gift of the Spirit which, according to the word of the Lord, everyone who believes in Him receives - John 7:38).

Of course, it is easy for you and me to smile at an authoritative Jewish teacher who does not understand such simple things, since we know what the Lord Jesus is speaking about. Yes, thanks be to God, unlike Nicodemus, we understand when the Teacher speaks "of earthly things"; but does that mean we will understand when He begins to speak "of heavenly things"? If He calls birth from the Spirit "earthly," what then is "heavenly"? Perhaps we should not exalt ourselves so much over Nicodemus; beside the Lord Jesus we always remain slow-witted disciples...