Last week we started talking about Jesus’ interaction with Nicodemus. Nicodemus was a Pharisee and a member of the Sanhedrin. After Jesus’ cleansing of the temple and His working of signs during the Passover and Feast of Unleavened Bread, Nicodemus approached Him to learn more about Him. He spoke to Jesus as an equal, a peer, another teacher with whom he could exchange ideas, compare notes and possibly learn something from, he came confident of his knowledge and conditioned by his understanding. Nicodemus may have had more education and more authority than any of us but he approached Jesus in the same way that most of us do, willing to hear what He has to say but pretty secure in what we already know. It’s the same way that the rich young ruler would approach Jesus later. He asked Jesus, “Good Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” He asked the question knowing he had kept the commandments. He came to Jesus for affirmation rather than revelation, he came to Jesus expecting approval of what he had already done on his own, expecting Jesus to announce once and for all that since he had already done all that he knew to do then he had already been assured of the eternal life that he was seeking. Mark writes that after the young man announced to Jesus that he had kept all the commandments that Jesus had listed, kept them ever since he was a little boy, that Jesus then “Looked at him and loved him”. The love of Jesus is unlike any other love. The love of Jesus doesn’t simply affirm what we are already sure of or even provide for us what we believe we are lacking, the love of Jesus sees through what we are, where we have been, what we desire and even what we know and believe and it works to redeem and transform us into what we were created to be. Jesus looked at the young man and loved him and then from His love said “One thing you lack. Go, sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow Me.” Did you notice what Jesus said to the young man? “One thing you lack.” The thing the young man was missing was actually tied to the things that he was holding onto so tightly. Jesus was telling him that what the young man was looking for could only be found by releasing what he already had, that the secret to filling his hands and his heart was to first empty out his heart and his hands. I like to think that Jesus looked at Nicodemus and loved him the same way that he looked at and loved the rich young ruler because I believe that Jesus looks at and loves us all. He looked at Nicodemus and then answered his statement of knowledge similarly to the way He had answered the rich young ruler’s: “I tell you the truth, unless one is born from above, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” Nicodemus was a teacher of Israel, a man of the Law, a leader of God’s people, if anyone was assured of the kingdom of God it had to be him but when Jesus met him He basically said, “your knowledge has left you blind and your understanding can do you no good, if you want to see God you must start over again, you must stop trying to tell Me what you know and let Me show you what you could have never known until now.” Whether it’s the rich young ruler, Nicodemus, or you and I, when we truly meet with God He often must offend our senses so that He can change our perspective. This morning I pray that we will let God offend us, that we will stop digging our heels in and instead loosen our grip on what we know and let Jesus teach us what we could have never seen before, that we will let Him do in our lives what He came to do in every life, show us who His Father truly is and what He is like and call us to lose all so that we can gain the one thing that is greater than we could have ever imagined.