"Ain't no mountain high enough, Ain't no valley low enough, Ain't no river wide enough, To keep me from gettin' to you..." So sing Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell in the chorus of the song by that name. Although it was written as a boy/girl love song, it reminded me of what the apostle Paul wrote in Romans 8 about the love of God for those who belong to him: "For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord."
There is a different mountain and valley situation that we see, though, in the gospel of John, chapters 3 & 4. John first takes us to the mountain top of credentials and prestige and then plunges us into the valley of degradation and loneliness. Surprisingly, a common thread runs through both stories.
In the third chapter of John's Gospel, he tells us about Nicodemus, a member of the Jewish ruling party, who comes to visit Jesus. John packs so much information into this little encounter! In the very first sentence we learn the name of the man who visits Jesus, that he is a ruler of his people and of the highest religious affiliation. Nicodemus is in the elite of his nation. When Jesus speaks to him, He refers to Nicodemus as the teacher of Israel, not a teacher, but THE teacher. His resumŽ would have been impeccable. Although the text really doesn't explain his motive in coming at night, it is a detail that John thinks is significant enough to include. Perhaps it suggests that as a member of the Pharisees and the rulers, visiting Jesus by day could jeopardize Nicodemus' social and political standing.
Nicodemus is paying Jesus a courtesy call, one teacher to another. He is very respectful and tells Jesus that he knows that no one could do the things Jesus is doing unless God is with Him. In essence he is saying that he recognizes that Jesus' teaching is valid and from God, that there is something special about him. Jesus breaks in and abruptly brings the conversation to the focus of His teaching: "Truly, truly, I say to you that unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God."
It's hard to know where Nicodemus was planning on taking the conversation, but with the subject of his teaching having been broached, Jesus, speaking with authority, takes control of the conversation. It is obvious that what He has to say takes this learned man by surprise. "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born from above he cannot see the kingdom of God.''
Befuddled, Nicodemus asks, "How can a man be born when he is old? He cannot enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born, can he?'" This idea of being "born again or born from above" is such a surprise that an absurd response is all that he can muster. At this point Nicodemus is thinking in purely physical terms, which is not surprising. Much of the teaching of the time centered on the idea of how to live the physical life; what you could and could not do according to their laws. Nicodemus had lived his entire life with the notion that you can please God by obeying rules. Quite possibly an elderly man, he is not just here to talk shop with Jesus. He has a serious personal interest beyond academics in finding the answer to what it takes to see the kingdom of God as he himself draws closer to the end of his physical life with each breath he takes.
Jesus answers with authority (Truly, truly!) and explains that those who are simply born of natural means, born of the flesh, cannot enter the kingdom of God. Just as life in the physical world requires a physical birth, life in the spiritual world necessitates a spiritual birth. Jesus then lays out his "resumŽ" for Nicodemus, telling him that He (Jesus) came from Heaven to earth, is the ONLY son of God and through Him and Him alone may anyone be saved. He calls Himself "the Son of Man" which appears to be a reference to Daniel 7:13,14. (In my vision at night I looked, and there before me was one like a son of man, coming with the clouds of heaven. He approached the Ancient of Days and was led into his presence. He was given authority, glory and sovereign power; all peoples, nations and men of every language worshipped him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion that will not pass away, and his kingdom is one that will never be destroyed.)
The account of this encounter between Jesus and Nicodemus ends with Jesus' words: "This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but men loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that his deeds will be exposed. But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what he has done has been done through God."
In the next chapter, Jesus and his disciples are traveling from Judea to Galilee and choose to take the shortest route, through Samaria. Although Samaria was between, the Samaritans and Jews were at enmity with one another. Most people today identify the name Samaritan with the story of "the good Samaritan," a parable in which Jesus intentionally chooses as his protagonist someone despised by his listeners to demonstrate the concept of loving your neighbor; but that's another story.
(Although the Samaritans were considered lesser people by the inhabitants of Judea and Galilee, they were a religious people with roots in Judaism and were of Jewish decent. When forbidden to worship in Jerusalem, they built a rival temple on Mount Gerazim. Their religious practices were similar to those practiced in Jerusalem and based on the Pentateuch, the first five books of the Old Testament, the only portion they considered to be divinely inspired.)
Weary from their travels, Jesus and his disciples have stopped to rest in a little town. While the disciples are away buying food, Jesus strikes up a conversation with a Samaritan woman, which was quite shocking to Jesus' disciples, once they learned of it. It was rare enough for a Jew to have any interaction with a Samaritan, much less a Samaritan woman, being a patriarchal society. However, throughout scripture we see Jesus continually challenging the thinking of his contemporaries, just as his teaching continues to challenge ours.
The common practice of the day was for women to go to the community well in the morning, the cool of the day, to draw water for the day's use. It was something of a social time, as well as being practical. This woman, however, goes out alone in the middle of the day. Why would someone choose to go out alone in the heat of the day when it was customary to gather together in the morning? It certainly appears that this woman was something of an outcast; she was an outcast among an outcast people.
Here is this Samaritan woman, coming alone to the well, only to have a Jewish man there who surprises her not only by speaking to her, but asking her for a drink. It catches her off guard and she asks him how it is that he, being a Jew, asks her for a drink. His response? He tells her that if she had any idea who she was talking to, that she would be asking him for something; that he has something he calls "living water." " ...Everyone who drinks of this water (from the well) shall thrist again; but whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall become in him a well of water springing up to eternal life."
Not unlike Nicodemus, she is not prepared for what he has to say. He speaks in metaphor, while she is thinking only in the literal sense. He tells her that he is prepared to give her living water. This sounds like a good thing to her and she exclaims that she wants this "living water" so that she doesn't have to come all the way to the well to draw water again.
Obviously, the woman has missed that Jesus wants to talk about something deeper than this well. Although he's mentioned that the "living water" he offers springs up to eternal life, she has missed that key detail, which should have alerted her to the fact that this man had something else on his mind, so Jesus shifts the discussion. He tells her to go and call her husband. She responds, perhaps sadly or bitterly, that she has no husband. Jesus, gets her attention when he tells her "You are right when you say you have no husband. The fact is, you have had five husbands, and the man you now have is not your husband. What you have just said is quite true."
Imagine for just a moment encountering a stranger who is able to disclose such details of your life to you. You've never seen this person before, yet they are able to tell you painful details of your life. It would get your attention, as it did hers.She proclaims that he is a prophet and brings up the subject of where the proper place is to worship God. There are still religions to this day that proclaim this city or that to be THE place to worship God, but Jesus tells her: "But an hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers shall worship the Father in spirit and truth; for such people the Father seeks to be His worshipers. God is spirit; and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth."
This is the truly exciting part! In both cases, Jesus' directive is the same. It doesn't matter how good or bad you are by earthly standards. It doesn't matter how high you've risen or how low you've fallen, Jesus' answer is still the same, he is available. You cannot reach him or drive him away by your level of performance. The message is the message of hope. It should not be surprising that Jesus' encounter with Nicodemus contains what has become the most famous verse from the New Testament: "For God so loved the world, that He gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have eternal life." (John 3:16)
What is the result of these two encounters? Although we aren't told what Nicodemus' immediate reaction was, John later records that during a discussion among the Pharisees of how to deal with Jesus, Nicodemus raises an objection and is scorned for it. (see John 7: 49...) Also in chapter 19 John tells of Nicodemus' involvement in preparing Jesus' body for entombment. Somewhere between the first and last pages of John's Gospel, Nicodemus evidently makes a paradigm shift, from living a life trying to please God by following a set of rules, to following Jesus.
And what of the woman at the well? Still incredulous of what has happened and even Jesus' own word attesting to his identity as the Messiah., she runs into the village and tells the men to come out and see this man who told her all about herself. They invite Jesus to stay with them, which he does. "And because of his words many more became believers. They said to the woman, "We no longer believe just because of what you said; now we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this man really is the Savior of the world." (John 4: 41,42)
The gospel of Jesus is one of hope for those who truly desire to meet God on His terms. To those who have been caught up in trying to earn favor with God by following rules and regulations, for those who think that they can put together a resumŽ that will impress God, it is an invitation to quit striving and simply be born into a new family; to undergo a spiritual transformation. To those who think they could never be good enough to be accepted by God, who think that what they've done in their past or where life has taken them makes them unacceptable to God, unredeemable, the message is think again. These things won't stop God from reaching out to you. In both cases, where you are makes no difference to God. "An hour is coming and now is, when the true worshipers shall worship the Father in spirit and truth; for such people the Father seeks to be His worshipers." Quite simply, there ain't no mountain high enough; ain't no valley low enough to keep the love of God from reaching out to us.
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