“Unless one has been born again, no one can see the kingdom of God.” If you would, just reflect for a moment on how those famous words strike you. Are they reassuring? Do they give you the creeps…to be honest? Do they make you think mostly of another Christian who made you feel incomplete? Do you hear them as words inviting you to ongoing transformation? Do you hear them as words that belong to the other kind of Christian?

The language we use for our faith shows what we are attracted to and what we are repulsed by, what’s real and what isn’t real for us. Language is more than important. It reveals us. By revealing us, our language gives us an opportunity to reflect on where we are on the journey, and then, like pilots or merely travelers, to make the course corrections we need.

My sense is that in churches like ours, we flee from the language of rebirth like vampires from daylight! The words inspire uneasiness. They remind us of our evangelical brothers and sisters who use this language frequently and sometimes against us; worse, who make a rule out of it. And because liberal Christians so often define themselves as “not like them,” we are left with a gigantic vacuum in our own faith. Marcus Borg comments that “mainline Christians have generally allowed their more conservative Christian brothers and sisters to have a near monopoly on ‘born again’ language.” I know how it is. When I hear it, I’ll often feel myself shutting down. But can we be true to our faith without this language or at least the reality it hints of?

Borg has some explanations for the problems liberal Christians have with ”reborn” language. The language calls to mind what he calls “sweaty” Christianity: the raised hands, the impassioned preacher, the white handkerchief to wipe the brow. Sweaty; not very intellectual. In the UCC we have a “thing” about being intellectual.

For others, the language of being born again is linked with a narrow formula or rule for salvation. Such a formula may be delivered with a smile, but the message is, believe this formulation, or else. The language may make us think of those who entered the fold of the church only to become more rigid and exclusive. So we don’t want to be associated with it.

But here’s the news. Rebirth is a part of our identity too; so I will to face up to it rather than flip the page on this part of our lectionary. Rebirth and the Liberal Christian.
I begin by noting two of the images Jesus used in his conversation with Nicodemus. One is wind. The other is rebirth. He linked them rather closely, even though at first thought they don’t seem to be related.

While in college, I became a leader of extended canoe trips around northern Maine with elementary and junior high kids. One June day, by noon we had spent hours digging our paddles into the chop, fighting the wind and waves and moving so slowly toward our distant campsite. I was at a point in life when I was disdainful of those who cruised by us in their power boats on their way to a fishing hole. We had the moral high ground, I assured myself, because with our paddles we were so much closer to nature…The thought would energize the next paddle stroke... O well!.. At some point in the day, we passed from one windy lake to another through a small river. Now our direction was a bit different. Time had passed, and the wind direction had shifted as well. It was at our backs!

Suddenly, it was a new world. The hard labor and the dutiful sense of roughing it were replaced by elation. We rigged up ponchos and paddles and ropes into ragged but passable sailing gear, and ran before the wind. With froth at the bow, our canoes chased and caught the white-capped waves, rank on rank. What a day! What a transformation!

It was freedom!

I now think of that change of wind as a image of grace. It was so unexpected, and certainly so unearned. In fact, given the self- righteous “roughing it” with which I had begun the day, what I truly deserved was a summer squall in my face…… not a tail wind! But no, the wind blew where it willed. As I remember that day, I am less inclined [although I fall into temptation] to regard faith as a job, and more inclined to accept God’s spirit as a gift, a gift that changes the way we go about living; in fact, a transformation, a rebirth. Not something to be done, but something given and to be received; not something we force, but something that leads us.

In such a way, Jesus says, like the wind does the Spirit move, unexpected and unearned, full of grace. “The wind blows, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from or where it is going.”

Faith, I believe, has many moments; there are moments when God’s call leads to dark places, courage is required, and we feel very much that every mountain is made higher and every valley deeper. They happen. Lent exists in part to validate those darker passages. It leads us to deeper kinship with Jesus. As he tells us, he rejoices with those who rejoice and weeps with those who weep.

Equally true among the moments of faith are those of lightness and release; if I might borrow from Bette Midler, times when the spirit seems like the wind beneath our wings.

Jesus spoke of those who made sure everyone knew they were fasting, going about as they did with the tormented look: This is tough, but I’m doing it for my own good. He took note of the practice of praying in public, and advised that this moment of relationship with God be hidden. Fred Craddock has said, “Nothing could be more appropriate for Lent than a reminder that prayer and fasting do not earn anything.” Prayer and fasting may help us to become more receptive, they can create a space, an opening,  to God’s voice, but that is all they do; they are not some price we pay in exchange for a blessing.

I am beginning to think that Jesus chose the language of rebirth to free us from the idea of faith being yet one more job to be added to burdened lives. Birth is not something subject to control (by the baby). The baby doesn’t do birth. It happens to the baby. The baby is really quite passive.

So Jesus would say that rebirth is a gift from above, “God is the primary player,” and trust is the appropriate response to God who loves his world. The marks of  the Christian, according to the apostle Paul, are not about the achievements and benchmarks by which we generally measure our progress through life. All of these things are about our actions, and what we earn by our actions. No, the marks of the Christian are peace, freedom, joy, and love; characteristics we can open ourselves to and receive, but not earn.

A prayer from the church is New Guinea goes like this: “Gracious God, oil the hinges of our hearts’ doors that they may swing gently and easily to welcome your coming.” What a wonderful image! It leads to the heart of rebirth, that we might become with God’s help, new people. The Book of Revelation ends with a restatement of a promise of Isaiah, that at the consummation of time there will be a new earth AND a new heaven.

Today, we look at one connected piece of that larger picture: ourselves. I cannot think of a prayer I have ever said that did not at least include the need for me to be changed into something closer to God’s image. Like you, I am most often a bent reflection- a funhouse mirror image-  of what God has called us to be. When I offer prayers of confession here or in solitude, I recognize my need to be changed, my need to be transformed, my need to be renewed, my need to be reborn.

Nicodemus came, more than likely, from Jerusalem’s educated elite. He spoke to Jesus of the consensus of educated religious people, “We know you are a teacher sent from God. No one could do what you do unless God were with him” Nicodemus came at night. The gospel is clueing us that Nicodemus may have been in the dark in more than one way. He was hoping to win Jesus’ approval, and then go home in peace.

Jesus did not give him that peace. He made Nicodemus look at himself, and what it was that kept him from hearing truth and answering with his whole heart.

I believe that liberal Christians are somewhat in the dark as well when it comes to allowing ourselves to be grasped by what Jesus meant by saying, “You must be reborn.” We are too concerned with what the words mean to others. We are ready to be accepted and loved perhaps, but maybe not so ready to be changed, not so ready to answer with the whole heart.

As part of our Lenten preparation for Good Friday and for Easter, may we make ourselves open to the possibility of being “reborn,” by the need and the hope that in the new heaven and the new earth of God’s future there will also be a new us. “May GOD oil the hinges of our hearts’ doors that they may swing gently and easily to welcome his coming.”