From Enemy to Friend? (John 3:1-17)

(Fade up on an establishment shot of a park, late at night. Pan over empty playground equipment, and a jogging path lit only by moonlight with the ominous shadows of trees playing across its surface. Medium shot on our hero, Fedora pulled low on his brow, sitting to one side of a park bench, impatiently smoking, trench coat reflecting the moonlight. From the left of frame, another man enters carrying a briefcase. He crosses with a quick and rigid gate and sits next to our hero on the bench. They both look straight ahead, sitting next to each other in silence for two beats.)

Hero: I got your message.
Man: I see that.
Hero: I’m here, and you haven’t killed me. So, what do you want?
Man: (Setting the briefcase at Hero’s feet) I wanted to give you this.
Hero: (With a wry smile) So, I can blow myself up later?
Man: (Laughs without humor) No. In it, you will find all the information you need to bring down the Organization: names, payments, plans, everything.
Hero: (Trying to cover his shock) Now, why would you do that?
Man: Even a man such as myself can find a conscience, somewhere.
Hero: I hope that’s true.
Man: (Standing) It is. Now, I must be going. That information will be worthless to you if they notice my absence.

(Hero stands, turns to Man, and grabs his arm. Man remains facing straight ahead.)

Hero: Thank you. This could finally mean the end of it all.
Man: Do not start thanking me now. I know what my actions prior to this moment have wrought.

(Man turns and exits to left of frame with the same quick and rigid step. Hero remains, watching his departure for a beat, extinguishes his cigarette, puts his hands in his coat pockets, and exits to the right of frame.)

Spy thrillers, crime dramas, Noir stories, and action films love to deploy the trope of a long time enemy transforming into a furtive friend at a decisive moment. It propels plots forward, shakes the solid ground of character development, and allows in healthy doses of uncertainty. “Did he really change, or is this just another nefarious plot?” It adds depth by opening up the possibility of redemption, that no person lives statically. Even the heart of a villain’s right hand can change. Darth Vader can chuck the Emperor into the abyss to save his son. The long time fixer can turn states evidence on the mob boss. The Pharisee can defend Christ.

The encounter between Nicodemus and Jesus, in John 3, shares a lot with the spy movie version of this scene. They meet late at night across tightly drawn battles lines. Jesus Christ, God among us, who immediately before in John 2, drove the money changers out of the Temple and threatened to destroy it, sits across from Nicodemus, Pharisee, member of the Sanhedrin, the Temple based ruling religious body, who will do their best to put Jesus in a grave. While they do debate, the scene doesn’t center on conflict. Nicodemus opens with a concession. He recognizes that God sent Jesus. Christ then works to open Nicodemus’s eyes the breadth of what God has in the works.

Does Nicodemus grasp it? John’s Gospel gives us tantalizing details. When the Pharisees and Chief Priests debate the merits of arresting Jesus in John 7, Nicodemus speaks up in Christ’s defense. “Nicodemus, who had gone to Jesus before, and who was one of them, asked, ‘Our law does not judge people without first giving them a hearing to find out what they are doing, does it?’” (John 7:50-51 NRSV) He neither condemns Jesus nor supports the content of Christ’s message. Nicodemus plays it safe, simply calling the Pharisees to follow their own rules, but even that pushes against the grain and requires some courage.

 At Christ’s burial, Nicodemus shows up again, this time with what Biblical scholar, James A. Brooks, describes as an “enormous amount of spices for Jesus’ burial.” One would only do this for a friend or family member, a loved one, but we hear nothing of Nicodemus defending Jesus in the run up to his crucifixion. He feels bad that Jesus died, but when we had an opportunity to try and stop it, he didn’t.

Nicodemus always ends up somewhere in between an enemy and a friend. He seeks out Christ, hears him out, recognizes his divine origins, wants him treated fairly, and feels something profound at Christ’s death. However, he only ever does so in ways that won’t affect him too much. Nicodemus comes in secret, at night, speaks up only on procedure, and quietly assists with burial rights. It feels like we see an internal conflict, a feeling drawn to Jesus, and a desire to protect a powerful and valuable position.

We never get the satisfaction of a full redemption arc with Nicodemus. Later, noncanonical, sources write one for him, but John leaves it open. We witness the wrestling but not the epiphany. Yet, even to see a Pharisee and Sanhedrin member begin to change testifies to the reality of what Jesus tries to teach Nicodemus. We can follow radically different trajectories because God loves us, sent God’s son, and opened up to us a new, eternal life.

The whole scene centers on the verb, “believes.” Protestantism’s best known Scripture shifts the tone to explicit teaching, “‘For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.” (John 3:16 NRSV) New and eternal life only requires belief. Nicodemus seems to want to believe, and certainly, he begins his journey in that direction. He hardly starts from a neutral position. Most of the people around him want to arrest and kill Jesus. Even still, we can see him buffeted about by the wind of the Spirit.

There’s an interesting coda here. We lose track of Nicodemus with Christ’s burial, but soon, a new Pharisee drawn to Christ will enter the narrative – Paul. Where Nicodemus ends with ambiguity, Paul has never done a single thing in half measures. Nicodemus appears uncomfortable and guilty about his colleagues’ more violent urges. Paul cosigns violence and sets out to do some violence himself. Maybe, Nicodemus found his way to faith. Paul grew into one of the faith’s greatest church planters and theologians. Biblical Scholars place John’s Gospel as the last one written, in a time, where Paul was a prominent leader in the movement. I wonder if John, knowing of Paul’s ministry and background, tells the story of Nicodemus to show the winds of the Spirit moving among the Pharisees even at an early point that eventually blows Paul into the thick of the making the Church happen.