Nicodemus and Jesus

[Slartibartfast]

So, this week I read that Jesus told Nicodemus that nobody comes to the Father except via him, Jesus. So what does that mean for the Jews prior to the time of Jesus? Was it the case that they were denied access to the Father? What was the relationship prior to Jesus? I find this confusing. Because Moses and others had full access to God.

 

[Trishie]

We know that time is no barrier to God who is eternal and timeless.
Jesus who is truly God and truly Man, is eternal in His divinity

Glory be the the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit,
as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be

"632 The frequent New Testament affirmations that Jesus was “raised from the dead” presuppose that the crucified one sojourned in the realm of the dead prior to his resurrection.478 This was the first meaning given in the apostolic preaching to Christ’s descent into hell: that Jesus, like all men, experienced death and in his soul joined the others in the realm of the dead. But he descended there as Savior, proclaiming the Good News to the spirits imprisoned there.479

633 Scripture calls the abode of the dead, to which the dead Christ went down, “hell” - Sheol in Hebrew or Hades in Greek - because those who are there are deprived of the vision of God.480 Such is the case for all the dead, whether evil or righteous, while they await the Redeemer: which does not mean that their lot is identical, as Jesus shows through the parable of the poor man Lazarus who was received into “Abraham’s bosom”:481 "It is precisely these holy souls, who awaited their Savior in Abraham’s bosom, whom Christ the Lord delivered when he descended into hell."482 Jesus did not descend into hell to deliver the damned, nor to destroy the hell of damnation, but to free the just who had gone before him.483

634 "The gospel was preached even to the dead."484 The descent into hell brings the Gospel message of salvation to complete fulfilment. This is the last phase of Jesus’ messianic mission, a phase which is condensed in time but vast in its real significance: the spread of Christ’s redemptive work to all men of all times and all places, for all who are saved have been made sharers in the redemption. "

http://www.vatican.va/archive/ccc_css/archive/catechism/p122a5p1.htm

 

[Slartibartfast]

What does that mean? I didn’t withdraw it!

 

[De_Maria]

So, this week I read that Jesus told Nicodemus that nobody comes to the Father except via him, Jesus.

Correct.

So what does that mean for the Jews prior to the time of Jesus? Was it the case that they were denied access to the Father?

No.

What was the relationship prior to Jesus? I find this confusing. Because Moses and others had full access to God.

I think your question is answered in the book of Hebrews. Read chapters 11 and 12.

I’ll summarize them for you. Hebrews 11 says that the Jews who were approved, did not enter heaven. They had to wait until we came along to be received into heaven. Here’s the verse:

39 Yet all these, though approved because of their faith, did not receive what had been promised. 40 God had foreseen something better for us, so that without us they should not be made perfect.

Keep these last words in mind. so that without us they should not be made perfect.

Hebrews 12:2 No, you have approached Mount Zion and the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and countless angels in festal gathering, 23 and the assembly of the firstborn enrolled in heaven,[f] and God the judge of all, and the spirits of the just made perfect, 24 and Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant, and the sprinkled blood that speaks more eloquently[g] than that of Abel.

And the spirits of just made perfect.

You see, when we were baptized, we entered the heavenly Jerusalem and joined the spirits of just men made perfect. Do you remember in the Apostles Creed where it says that Jesus descended to the dead? He went there to lead the Jews to heaven. Therefore, they came to the Father through Jesus, just like we do.

I hope that helps.

 

[Slartibartfast]

Many thanks for your and Trishie’s detailed replies.