The Rev. Canon Anne E. Kitch
Genesis 12:1-4, John 3:1-17
It’s called a logarithmic spiral. This particular kind of spiral curve is mathematically defined. In fact, if you look up its definition, you will find an equation. It has perfect proportions. In geometry it is known as the golden spiral and is built on the proportion of the golden rectangle. But it is more than a concept or something that can be computer generated. In the 17th century, mathematician Jacob Bernoulli called it the “spira mirabilis” which means miraculous spiral. It is miraculous because it is exquisitely beautiful math. And it is miraculous because it is also found in nature.
It is seen in the spiral path of a hawk as it descends on its prey. It is found in the shape of the Milky Way and other galaxies. It is familiar to us in that spiral of clouds of a low pressure system demonstrated so often on the weather channel. And it is found in the chambered nautilus.
This sea creature, a type of mollusk, builds its shell as it grows in this perfect spiral shape. When cut in half, the shell of this nautilus reveals a beautiful mother of pearl interior made of chamber after chamber. Each section is slightly larger than the last, in perfect proportion to the one before. The creature itself does not fill the entire shell. Rather, it lives in only one chamber at a time. While it lives and grows, it busily prepares the next chamber. When it outgrows that space in which it resides, it moves into the new chamber and seals the passageway behind it. But the old chamber, while left behind, is far from useless. The inner chambers are filled with gas and help the nautilus to maintain neutral buoyancy. When the nautilus needs to dive, it can exchange the gas with liquid in order to reach the depths. The chambered nautilus is considered to be a "living fossil" as it has undergone little change in over 400 million years. Perhaps it has the right idea.
Nicodemus did not quite have the right idea. A Pharisee and part of the leadership in the Israel of Jesus’ time, he was a respected teacher. I will venture to say that he was a man of some years, to have gained such wisdom and status. Perhaps he had become what he wanted to be when he grew up. Or perhaps not. Because he comes to Jesus at night seeking something. He knows there is something about Jesus, but what is it? He comes in the darkness approaching the one we know as the light of the world. So…this is how I imagine it goes.
Nic: Rabbi, can you explain one thing to me? See I know you can’t be apart from God because you do all these signs and things.
Jesus: Well, I tell you what. No one can see the Kingdom of God without being born from above…(or born again, because the Greek word means both).
Nic: Say what? OK for argument's sake, let's go with the born again theme. Just how do we do that after we have grown old?
Perhaps Nic is feeling his age. Perhaps he thinks he is too old to learn a new way of being. But Jesus goes on to call Nicodemus into a new kind of birth, one that will stretch his very soul. Jesus challenges Nicodemus to embark on a path that will lead him to new growth and eventually to the foot of the cross.
We know that Nicodemus was changed by this encounter. He moved beyond his set ways. He stepped beyond his familiar beaten path. A bit later we find him defending Jesus to the Pharisees and chief priests. They were ready to condemn Jesus and his teachings. They had sent their officers to arrest him and when these folks come back to the council without Jesus, the leadership is ready to act against him anyway. It is Nicodemus who speaks up, “Wait a minute, since when does our law judge a man without first giving him a hearing and learning what he is really about?” And on the day of the crucifixion, when Joseph of Arimathea comes to take away the body of Jesus for burial, it is Nicodemus who comes with myrrh and aloes to anoint the body and prepare it for burial according to custom. Nicodemus offers that last service of love and ritual.
Truly, I tell you, Nicodemus has moved from darkness into the light. He left behind the confines of his safe, but cramped, world of knowledge where the miracles of Jesus could not exist. He turned his face toward the light, and nurtured a faith that brought him new life.
What about us? Do we have the right idea? Where are you in your spiral of growth? Is it time to realize the confines of the space you are in? Is it time to move beyond this chamber and into the space waiting beyond? Is it time to be born again, from above, through water and spirit? In this time of Lent, what new life do we need to nurture, give space to, encourage? We can choose to move on, knowing that as we enter into new space all that is past remains a part of us, giving us buoyancy and allowing us to navigate the waters of this life. As the seasons roll on, as we grow up (and even grow old), we continue to have new space, new vistas, new understanding in front of us. After all, Abram was 75 when he set out from Haran following God’s lead. And God didn’t tell him where they were headed.
And finally, at last we move into the greatest chamber of all: the dwelling place in God’s house that has been prepared for us. We are truly nurtured within a miraculous spiral, which leads to light and life and God.
The poet Oliver Wendell Holmes (1809-94) had the right idea. Contemplating this amazing sea creature he composed The Chambered Nautilus. This is how his poem ends:
…Year after year beheld the silent toil
That spread his lustrous coil;
Still, as the spiral grew,
He left the past year's dwelling for the new,
Stole with soft step its shining archway through,
Built up its idle door,
Stretched in his last-found home, and knew the old no more.
Thanks for the heavenly message brought by thee,
Child of the wandering sea,
Cast from her lap, forlorn!
From thy dead lips a clearer note is born
Than ever Triton blew from wreathed horn;
While on mine ear it rings,
Through the deep caves of thought I hear a voice that sings:--
Build thee more stately mansions, O my soul,
As the swift seasons roll!
Leave thy low-vaulted past!
Let each new temple, nobler than the last,
Shut thee from heaven with a dome more vast,
Till thou at length art free,
Leaving thine outgrown shell by life's unresting sea!
