“Circumcise your heart!” So exhorted Moses, the great prophet to the Jews. The man who sought to excuse himself from divine ordination because of an inability to speak, preached three lengthy sermons to the ancient people of God as that generation was set to take possession of the Promised Land. And, in the heart of it all, the man of God called his people to obey the law of God and to love and serve the Lord with all their souls. But, alas, he knew the futility of these expectations. He then addressed the root of their spiritual problem, saying, “Therefore circumcise the foreskin of your heart, and be stiff-necked no longer” (Deut 10:16). Earlier, Moses warned of a time when the nation, having turned from God, would suffer chastening terrors from the hand of the Lord. Yet, God pledged that under such heavy conditions, “if they confess their iniquity…if their uncircumcised hearts are humbled, and they accept their guilt – then I will remember My covenant” (Lev 26:40-42). Finally, as Moses wrapped up his last sermon, he spoke “the words of the covenant …besides the covenant which He made with them in Horeb [i.e., Sinai]” (Deut 29:1). This new covenant would be unlike the bilateral arrangement of blessing for obedience to divine law or cursing for disobedience. God promised a new one in which “the Lord your God will circumcise your heart and the heart of your descendants, to love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, that you may live” (Deut 30:6). What the people could not do – circumcise their hearts to love God – He would do for them!
Many years later, the Lord similarly spoke through Jeremiah to his generation, saying, “Circumcise yourselves to the Lord and take away the foreskins of your hearts, you men of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem, lest My fury come forth like fire, and burn so that no one can quench it, because of the evil of your doings” (Jer 4:4). Well, history proves out how that generation did not repent and was subsequently judged. But through that same prophet, God promised again (even as he did through Moses), “I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah – not according to the covenant…which they broke…But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel in those days…I will put My law in their minds and write it on their hearts” (Jer 31:31-34). Ezekiel, a contemporary of the weeping prophet of Judah, used similar language, pleading, “Get yourselves a new heart, for why should you die, O house of Israel” (Ezek 18:31). He then wrote of how God would sprinkle on them “clean water…cleanse you from all your filthiness and from all your idols. I will give you a new heart and put My Spirit within you; I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh” (Ezek 36:25-26). The language of the NT is much the same, calling sinners to repentance and faith (Mark 1:15; Acts 26:20) yet at the same time pointing them to the power of God who alone can effect transformation (Tit 3:3-5). Friend, the Bible says that God is after your heart!
What do these all have in common? Gospel truths that Nicodemus, “the teacher of Israel” (John 3:10) should have known, but yet had not embraced until a fateful meeting with Jesus Christ. The man Nicodemus was a Pharisee. He was a very religious Jew, devoted to the ancient traditions of his Jewish fathers. Careful to observe all things in the law to do them, he was blameless. But he was more. As “a ruler of the Jews” (v. 1) he held a position of leadership, had a voice in the Jewish Supreme Court (cf. 7:50-51), and commanded respect. He was also a witness of Jesus’ signs (2:23), confessing that He must have come from God “for no one can do these signs that You do unless God is with him” (John 3:2). But Nicodemus was also afraid. Not wanting to be discovered, he came with his questions for Jesus “by night” (v. 2) for “fear of the Jews” (cf. 12:42-43). Even more significant than these, Nicodemus was an unbeliever (vv. 11-12). He had seen much and come to a reasonable conclusion as to Jesus’ origin “from God” (v. 2), but he was not yet converted. His heart was still enslaved to sin as he had not experienced the new birth about which Moses, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel taught.
Jesus, who loved the man, cut to the root of Nicodemus’ spiritual condition, saying, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God” (v. 3) and, “unless one is born of water and the Spirit (about which Ezekiel wrote) he cannot enter the kingdom of God.” “Heaven,” Jesus was telling the ruler of the Jews, “is shut to you. For entrance is reserved alone for those who are born of the Spirit.”
By this telling statement, Jesus still speaks to the world He was sent to save (v. 17). Apart from the new birth, you cannot go to heaven; the gates of paradise are shut to you. Heaven is closed to those with supposed superior ethnic background (Jew), nor is it availed to those of strict religious practice (Pharisee), to those who hold positions of political or legal power and influence (ruler of the Jews), nor even to those who teach others about God (teacher of Israel). The promise of a new heart is not for the man who does good works, but for those upon whom the Spirit does the good work. He alone reaches the heart, for like the wind that blows where it wishes, salvation is a work of the Spirit of God (v. 8). It is nonetheless availed to whoever will believe (v. 15-16) and issues in a transformed life evidenced by “deeds done in God” (v. 19).
Whatever happened to Nicodemus? We know that he spoke on behalf of Christ before the Sanhedrin, but was quickly shut down (7:50-52) and that he accompanied his associate, Joseph of Arimathea, in giving Jesus an honorable burial after the Savior’s death on the cross (19:39). It is elsewhere recorded that he was kicked off the Sanhedrin, banished from Jerusalem, and that his remains were later found in a common grave. Perhaps he suffered for embracing the gift of eternal life, that new birth about which Jesus spoke on that life-changing night, esteeming the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures of his life; for he looked to the reward (cf. Heb 11:26). The same life-change is available to you. Call upon Him today and the Spirit of God will give you a new heart.
Scriptures to Memorize: Titus 3:3-5
