I am intrigued by the idea that Nicodemus, an earnest Pharisee living in ancient Israel, in the epicenter of God’s chosen people, having memorized the entire Tanakh (Old Testament) and trained himself to teach its core principles (Jn 3:1), could be clueless about eternal salvation and how to be reconciled with God. (10) Similarly Paul, also a Pharisee in all good conscience before God, thought he was serving God by persecuting Christians, profoundly ignorant of justification by faith (1Ti 1:13), until Christ Himself taught him the Gospel. (Ga 1:11-12)
This begs a profound question: why has God written His word the way He has, with the gospel itself being so elusive, hidden and mysterious? Even if we’re intimately familiar with scripture, we still might be missing its primary message. It’s as if God is hiding the truth from us and doesn’t want us to find it very easily.
We know God cannot be pleased in our ignorance because He is supremely loving, to the point of self-sacrifice for anyone who will turn to Him, and He is infinitely wise and good; He did not design His word the way He did by accident; ultimately, He must have some merciful and gracious purpose in mind. (Ro 11:33)
Perhaps God is acknowledging that mankind as a whole will persist in unbelief no matter how clear He explains the gospel, and is hiding the truth so He might have mercy on us all. (32) God is acting as if no one will be receptive to the truth even if He does make it obvious (2Ti 4:4), as if everyone will refuse to be reconciled with Him (Ro 3:11), and so by hiding the truth, purposely making it difficult to find, He is in a sense giving us all somewhat of an out, an alibi to lessen our condemnation. Perhaps God is hiding the truth so He can be a little bit more merciful to those who willfully refuse to seek Him.
Evidently, as there are levels of reward in Heaven (Mt 5:19), it stands to reason there are also levels of punishment in Hell. (Ro 2:5) Perhaps God is dealing with the fact that no one will seek Him on their own; nearly everyone is voluntarily headed for eternal destruction. (Mt 7:13) Perhaps God is providing room for a little bit of mercy to lessen the severity of damnation for all those who neglect to pursue a relationship with Him.
And for His elect, in whom He mercifully intervenes and softens our hearts, it may very well be that in earnestly searching out the truth when it is so hard to find, this very process not only strengthens us (Php 2: 12-13), but makes the truth itself that much more precious to us when we do find it. (Mt 13:45) This is evidently very good. (Pr 25:2)
We should all seek God earnestly so we may know Him (Je 9:24), so we may walk with Him in spirit and truth. (1Jn 1:3) The fact that the truth is hidden is no issue; God has promised to give understanding to all who seek it. (Ja 1:5-6) So, it is not a matter of whether we can ultimately come to understand the truth (Mt 7:7-8), it’s more a question of how God chooses to get us there, how we must invest in doing so: it does cost us everything. (Lk 17:33)
God tells us to commit our all to Him in this pursuit (Mt 19:21), to value Wisdom and Understanding above all else. (Pr 4:7) There is nothing more important than walking out a practical knowledge of God, grounding ourselves in spiritual reality (Php 3:8-9), putting on display what He reveals to us about Himself as we seek Him.
Another aspect to this is that hiding the gospel in the Tanakh is evidently how God so elegantly chose to accomplish our redemption through the very engagement and free agency of Satan himself as the executor: if Satan had understood the plan, he evidently would not have participated in it. (1Co 2:8) As it was, the offer to crucify Christ, to humiliate and torture Him, was simply too tempting for Satan to pass up, yet this is what defeated him. There is certainly a fine piece of poetic justice to be found here. It should be no surprise; God is amazing!
While it is true that the Gospel is much more clearly stated in the New Testament than in the Tanakh, it is also evidently true that exactly how we come to benefit from it, exactly how we are justified and when, is still a bit of a mystery.
We are told to believe in and on Christ, to receive Him (Jn 1:12), but also that many who think they believe in Him actually do not. (Mt 7:22-23)
Salvation is not based on our works (Ga 2:16), yet without works we do not have salvation. (Ja 2:17)
We are called to repent (Mk 1:15), and also that God must give us repentance. (2Ti 2:25-26)
We are told to believe (Ac 16:31), but also that believing is the work of God. (Jn 6:29)
We are not told exactly how to believe in Christ or what this feels like, only in various places what accompanies salvation (He 6:9), which we can search out if we are paying attention.
Whatever we might say, salvation is still not paint-by-the-numbers: if we are not diligently seeking salvation, just like saints of old, striving to enter the kingdom, we will very likely miss it and be lost. (Lk 13:24)