The Key West citizen. [volume] (Key West, Fla.) 1879-current, 1954-01-16
Jesus and Nieodemvs. John 3
By RALPH ROGERS

1t is assumed that many people
have studied and commented on
the lesson as we find it today. Most
Of that comment has been on the
man Nicodemus--what kind of q
man was he--was he sincere?--
why didn't he openly support the
Christian cause? Too often we for
get the object of his visit, the old,
old question, what must. / do to
be saved. Jesus gives the answer
to the most important question.
Some have said that Nicodemus
was a skeptic. He simply wanted
to get some informtion or evidence
on Jesus so that he could further
prosecute and prosecute him. The
designing mind would reach such
conclusion because Nicodemus
was Pharisee and a member Of
the Sanhedrin, the governing body
of the Jewish religion. Had he
been SO inclined like far too many
so-called religious people today,
he could have rendered an errone-
Gus report, reading into the con-
versation meanings not at all in.
tended and misrepresented Jesus
words entirely. Nicodemus was too
intelligent for that. He believed In
God and in the religion of his faith
ers. He had something to stick to.
Far too many today are not SO
fortunate. They are like the skeptic
on his death bed calling in another
of his ilk and the consoling BROTH
Ter said, Stick to it Tom" And
Tom gasped, ayes, but there's
nothing to stick to"
Nicodemus rather was a brave
man. Surrounded as he was with
the bigotry and darkness of blind
ed and stagnated church council,
he bravely and bodily went out
at night to get the truth. Had his
brother Pharisees seen him 90
they would have censored his re,
port, they would perhaps have
|liquidated him as was the common
practice Of the day especially to
any who might disagree with the
mighty and infaIlible CD Sanhedrin.
This man who came by night stood
against them all alone and demand
ed fair hearing for the Galilean
at the moment when the disciples
had fed In panic. He came again
at night with myrrh and aloes to
|embalm the body of the one who
had shown him the way to saliva
ton.
When Nicodemus went TO Jesus
at night for light and help, the
answer he got was perhaps fanifl-
lar to him. He had read, "A new
heart also will / give you, and a
new spirit will | put within you:
and will take away the stony
heart" Ezekiel 1926 The errant
and stony hearted like the Israe.
|lites of that day, have to have a
new heart and a new spirit. They
have to be born all over again,
spiritually or we cannot enter the
kingdom of God" That is a most
difficult task. One must have the
humility to admit his sins, he must
adjust his relations with his neigh.
Dor, he must really want the peace.
full life leading to abundance here
and eternal JOY hereafter. It's like
teaching an old dog new tricks, but
it can and has been done, even II
it is a Earring, disturbing adjust.
ment,
Back in the EOS England's Peck's
Bad Boy wrote iauntily in bright.
brash and brasSy way that the next
fifty years would administer the
coup de grace 10 Christianity He
admitted that old England would
have 1 few cathedrals still stand
ing TO show tourists but that the
real fire and spirit Of religion
would be dead. BY 1919 he appar.
entity had been somewhere and be-
ran ~ 1iffs-@-s Ii-h4 II