Praise be to Jesus and Mary.
Some editions of the Lectionary, like the one I just followed, say that the words that we heard in today's Gospel were addressed by Jesus to Nicodemus, but this seems to be an accidental repetition of the introduction to yesterday's Gospel, which is not found in other editions of the Lectionary.
In between yesterday's Gospel and today's, there has been a change of scene, and St. John the Baptist has given his final testimony about Jesus.
So most interpreters think that these words that we heard are either St. John the Baptist continuing to speak about Jesus, or the Evangelist summarizing the teaching of this third chapter of the Gospel.
We must be born from above, but Christ is from above.
We must become partakers of the divine nature by baptismal regeneration.
In Christ, as man is a partaker in the divine nature just by his birth in virtue of the Incarnation, or better, in virtue of his conception, which is the same moment as the Incarnation.
He is, in addition, above all, because he is God.
He is not just a partaker in the divine nature, although he is as man, but in his divine nature, he is the divine nature, he is God.
Now one can bear witness to what one has seen.
Those who are earthly can testify about earthly things.
Christ who comes from heaven and has seen heavenly realities, and indeed sees them eternally, can testify concerning them.
He testifies to what he has seen and heard, but strangely, almost no one accepts his testimony.
In Christ said this, there really were very few who truly believe, so few that with a bit of hyperbole he can say, no one.
There were crowds that followed him around, but they were more interested in his miracles than in his teaching, and the Jewish leaders, the scribes, the Pharisees, the Sadducees, mostly opposed him.
Whoever does accept Christ's testimony sets his seal to this, that God is true.
For the motive of faith is the truthfulness of God, who is truth itself.
What Jesus teaches is not his own doctrine as man, but it is God's revelation.
So accepting Christ's testimony is the same thing as formally recognizing the truthfulness of God.
A similar logic applies to the teaching of the church.
We mere humans cannot bear witness, as Christ did, to heavenly realities on the basis of our own experience, but we do not appeal to our experience, but to the revelation of God through Jesus Christ.
Whoever believes the church's teaching on matters of faith therefore believes God, because the church teaches what Christ taught, and Christ teaches what he has seen as God.
So to believe is to recognize God as truthful.
It is to accept the witness of God.
In the case of Jesus' contemporaries, belief was also a recognition that God is truthful insofar as he worked miracles to confirm Christ's teaching.
This is what convinced Nicodemus.
Sometimes, even in our day, we can see miracles that bear witness to truths of the faith, like the Eucharistic miracles that bear witness to the fact that Christ is really present.
But what the Gospel is referring to here is the fact that Jesus' teaching is God's teaching, to Christ the Father is given the Spirit without measure, given the Spirit in fullness, or as our translation says, he has not rationed the Spirit.
Christ, even as man, has the fullness of revelation, the fullness of the gifts of the Holy Spirit, the fullness of holiness.
Because the Father has a singular love for Christ, he has given all things into his hand.
That is, Christ can freely dispose of all things.
He can give this revelation to whom he wills.
Christ can give the gifts of the Spirit to whom he wills.
And of his fullness we have all received, we have believed.
For those who believe receive eternal life, while those who refuse to believe or refuse to obey will not experience eternal life but the wrath of God.
Therefore, in the first reading, the Apostles rightly say, we must obey God rather than men.
All lawful authority comes from God and cannot be used against God.
Where God's will is certain, we must obey God, and any human command to the contrary is without force.
Where God's will remains uncertain, we must obey those men lawfully placed in authority over us, because it is God's will that we obey them.
The Apostles applied this principle rightly because they had abundant evidence of God's will that they preach.
They had been told by Christ in person, their mandate had been confirmed by the descent of the Holy Spirit, as well as a whole series of miracles.
The martyrs too applied this principle rightly, because it is certain that God does not want us to sin.
So they refused to obey the emperors who ordered them to sacrifice to false gods, or to violate their vow of virginity, or to commit other sins.
But there are also those who apply the principle wrongly, taking a certain what is in reality only their own stubborn opinion, or about diabolical deceit, and refusing to obey legitimate authority.
A private revelation does not give sufficient certainty, and so we see saints acting against what they were told in a revelation in order to obey their legitimate superiors.
But the Apostles apply the principle rightly, and refuse to obey the highest court of their people.
They tell them frankly that they are guilty of the blood of Jesus, whom they unjustly condemned, and who is vindicated by God who raised him from the dead.
The Sanhedrin don't like to hear this, but this is the truth.
In their anger, the Sanhedrin mostly wish to have the Apostles killed, have them executed.
With the Apostles the Holy Spirit bears witness, working interiorly, trying to move the hard hearts of the Jewish leaders.
In most he has little success, but at least with one he manages to create at least some hesitancy, as we'll hear tomorrow.
Praised be Jesus and Mary, now and forever.