The Wind Blows Where It Wishes

The Wind Blows Where It Wishes.  Whatever might have been today’s devotional thought, yesterday’s windstorm blew it away entirely, as well as loose branches, recycling bins, buckets, and even some pieces of stacked firewood.

Wind is a mighty force. Humans have tried to harness, predict, and bottle-up the wind for millennia but it always eludes domestication. It is little wonder that ancient people created myths about storm-gods such as Thor, Zeus, and Baal, including horrible non-mythical attempts to appease the fury of these capricious demons in their wild guesses of libations, pledges, and sacrifices. But on the lighter side, children often assume that the clouds push the wind, though it is the wind that pushes the clouds. Observable patterns in the wind exist, but pinning the wind to those patterns is ultimately futile—just ask Charlie Brown whenever he tries to fly his kite.

In 1492, when Christopher Columbus sailed the ocean blue proposing that there was a “river of wind” that could drive the Niña, Pinta, and Santa Maria east across the Atlantic, he was largely dismissed as a dreamer. But of course, he was right. The Jet Stream above and the Gulf Stream below the ocean’s surface still rush in a navigable pattern, though the Atlantic Ocean is never tame.

Jesus spoke of the mystery of the wind when sparring with Nicodemus, the Pharisee. Nicodemus had a question—presumably “Where do you come from?”—but he never got to ask it because Jesus beat him to the punch. Poor Nicodemus was fighting above his weight class and didn’t know it. Jesus was kind yet skillful in exposing Nicodemus’ inability to grasp Jesus’ concept of salvation: “You must be born again” (John 3:7). Jesus cornered the so-called expert back to elemental truths, which Nicodemus should have known. “The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So is everyone who is born of the Spirit” (John 3:8). “Nicodemus said to him, ‘How can these things be?’” (John 3:9). Jesus gently rebuked his ignorance of basic principles. “Are you the teacher of Israel and yet you do not understand these things? . . . If I have told you earthly things and you do not believe, how can you believe if I tell you heavenly things?” (John 3:10, 12).

This encounter with Jesus was a windstorm that frankly was not in Nicodemus’ forecast; he was thoroughly unprepared. Staying several steps ahead, Jesus gave Nicodemus the answer to the question underneath his question. “No one has ascended into heaven except he who descended from heaven, the Son of Man” (John 3:13). The question Nicodemus didn’t even know to ask answers all other questions about Jesus’ point of origin. Jesus is the heavenly man, the Son of Man (e.g., God the Son) in Daniel 7:13 who was divine and human yet distinct from the Ancient of Days (e.g., God the Father), who was “coming in the clouds.” Nicodemus, and all the world’s experts along with him, was blown away: a technical knock-out. “Whoever believes in him may have eternal life” (John 3:15).