Desperate to talk with Jesus, Nicodemus asked a friend to arrange a meeting with Jesus at night. There were no street lamps. Night meant that he would not be recognized for he was not on official business. Unlike when multiple representatives investigated the ministry of John the Baptist (John 1:19), he came on his own, but not alone.
That friend was unnamed, but present throughout the entire conversation that evening and recorded it for us (See Ellicott' Commentary)! Note the use of "we":
John 3:2b
“Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God, for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him.”
This is a second time when John the Apostle and author leaves his own name out of the narrative. John, though not a member of the Sanhedrin, was close to the High Priest's family. He, for example, was how Peter was admitted to the courtyard that awful night when Jesus was arrested (John 18:15–16).
The conversation that took place was deliberately confused. Jesus used a Greek word that had a double meaning (anōthen). The ESV translates it "born again" but adds the second meaning in the margin "born from above". Repeatedly Nicodemus heard "born again" when Jesus meant "born from above". The translation is not wrong, the duality is deliberate. To clarify Jesus says definitively:
Jesus answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.
Then again, and very deliberately Jesus uses the word pneuma, which also has a double meaning of either spirit or wind. Jesus masterfully describes God's sovereign choice in election using this duality:
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 it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.”
Election, though invisible, is observable. It is God's choice.
Lastly, Jesus explains to the searching Nicodemus the way of salvation and what is to take place. From the Old Testament He explained that no one, on their own, ascended to Heaven. Salvation is from God.
No one has ascended into heaven except he who descended from heaven, the Son of Man. And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.
What comes next is the most often memorized verse in the Bible, whose King James-era use of "so" clouds the meaning. Today, we use "so" to amplify, as in "He was so tired". The Greek word houtō(s), however, means instead “in this way” (See for examples John 3:8,14).
Like Moses and the bronze serpent, God would love the world by raising up His only begotten Son as free gift of salvation:
“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.
John gave Nicodemus front-row seats to hear for the first time that salvation would be by Christ alone, by grace alone, and by faith alone.
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