Turn with me to the gospel of
John, chapter 3. And we will be today in verse
16. When people consider John's gospel,
this is typically what comes to their mind. After all, apart
from some passages in Joshua, and Philippians, and maybe let there be light
and their thoughts and feelings on what we know as the Tribulation.
Most people in general in our country don't know anything about
the Bible at all. And sad to say that probably
most of us have not really considered what is actually being taught
in the context of Scripture holistically throughout our lives.
What I mean by that is that, you know, if we were to rewind
and look at all of our experiences and the fellowship of the congregations
that we've been in and the Bible studies we've been in, a lot
of them press in this idea of topical application or life application
apart from what the Bible actually teaches in said text. For example, if I were to take
John 3, 16 and say, for God so loved the world that He gave
His only begotten Son, or His only Son, that whoever believes
in Him should not perish but have eternal life. And I told
you that that was saying that God loved the world so much that
Jesus died to save everybody. You'd be like, yeah, that sounds
right. That's not what it says at all. It actually does not
say that at all in any aspect of the context of that text.
We see the word for there in John 3, verse 16, and we know
that it's not a new thought. We know that it's something that's
connecting to something else. For, usually causation, or causality,
or response, or reason. So when we learn to read literature,
when we learn to read scripture, and you hear me say this often,
one of the greatest detriments as well as the greatest tools
of usefulness has been the chapters and the verses. One of the most
horrible things that we can do, though, is to divide them in
the context based upon these chapters and verses. Because
this conversation that is written here, recorded by God through
John under the utterance of the Holy Spirit, is not segmented. It's one conversation. It's what
Nicodemus said to Jesus, and it's what Jesus said to Nicodemus,
and back and forth. It's called a dialogue or a discourse,
or if you were using the old King James, it would be called
intercourse. And so when we look at this, we need to recognize
that this is an argument that Jesus is making, clearly teaching,
which was doctrine, about who He is, which is theology, concerning
eternal life. And what we've learned thus far
about what John has taught us through the teaching of Jesus
with Nicodemus, up through this part of verse 15 of chapter three,
what we've learned thus far is imperative to keep on the hook
as we continue to go through it. We're not looking at this
text like we would the Proverbs and saying, okay, now here's
some wisdom on this and here's some teaching on this. This is
not a systematic teaching. This is not a collection of stories.
This is a gospel letter. This is an article written by
the Apostle John and it is so that we might see and know and
believe that Jesus is the Christ and by believing we have life
in his name. So that in this very dialogue, if we can see
it with spiritual eyes and we can grasp it with spiritual hearts
and minds, we are born again. And the way that we have learned
it thus far, it cannot contradict what has already been taught.
So we cannot know that in the prologue of this text, where
it says that Jesus came to His own and His own did not receive
Him, but to all who did receive Him, who are those who believe
in His name, He gave the right to become children of God, not
of the decision of their mind, nor the will of the flesh, nor
of their blood, but by the will of God. So that if that is true
in the context of the pure doctrine of John's essential argument,
that the Living Word, who is God and was in the beginning
with God, and who came in the flesh and dwelt among us, who
has created all things, and who is the light over which the darkness
will not overcome, we must recognize that what Jesus now is saying,
remember me telling you that the prologue of this letter is
the outline of everything in it. We must read all of it. If you were to open up a map,
we were walking through a little place yesterday in Statesboro
for a wedding, and it was in the wilderness, the wildlife
center, and there's a map where you can see certain birds. And
Abigail was a little hesitant to go into the forest. She says,
Daddy, you're okay with going into the forest? I was like,
yeah, I'm okay. What if we get lost? We're not
gonna get lost. And then just a few feet forward,
there's this big map. And she goes, oh, there's a map.
We'll know where we're going. Well, I didn't stop to look at
the map, and so she says, I'm really scared. I said, why, we're
going to get lost. I said, Daddy memorized that
map a long while ago. But just as a three-year-old
understands the necessity of knowing where one is going and
knowing that the map can tell you where you are and where you
are wanting to go and how to get there, such is any piece
of writing, especially New Testament scripture, where the introductions
to those letters are indeed the map to the rest. They are the
legend. They are the key to understanding
everything. And if we don't keep that in
mind, we are running in ignorance to understand everything else
that's written. And so here we are in this text today. Let us
start reading in verse nine of chapter three, and then go down
into verse 21. And I'm only going to deal with
chapter of verse 16, but let's put it into context. Nicodemus said to him, how can
these things be? Now what is he saying that to?
That a man must be born of the Spirit, again of the Spirit,
in order to see and enter the kingdom of heaven. And he's baffled. He does not understand. And Jesus
says, it's very simple, just like the wind blows and no one
can tell where it goes and from where it comes, such is the Spirit
of God. It blows, He blows where He wishes. So then, Nicodemus, how can these
things be? Jesus answered him, Are you not
the teacher of Israel, and yet you do not understand these things?
Truly, truly, I say to you, we speak of what we know, and bear
witness to what we have seen. If I have told you earthly...
Excuse me, but you do not receive our testimony. If I have told
you earthly things, and you do not believe, how can you believe
if I tell you heavenly things? 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. And whoever believes in Him may
have eternal life. For God so loved the world that
He gave His only Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish
but have eternal life. For God did not send His Son
into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the
world might be saved through Him. Whoever believes in Him
is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned
already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of
God. And this is the judgment. The Light has come into the world,
but people love the darkness rather than the Light, because
their works are evil. For everyone who does wicked
things hates the Light and does not come to the Light, lest his
works should be exposed. But whoever does what is true
comes to the Light, so that it may be clearly seen that his
works have been carried out in God." Here, is the context of verse
16 in its entirety. It is the argument through which
verse 16 is the pivotal thing that we need to keep abreast
our hearts and minds through every breath of this text. We
cannot segregate it for our own idealistic, humanistic worldview.
We must put it in the place that Jesus has it. It must be central. to the focus of God's divine
love, and God's divine ability, and God's divine redemption,
and God's divine power to save His people divinely. And if we look back up, when
Jesus says in verse 12, He says, How in the world, if you cannot
believe earthly things, are you going to be able to believe spiritual
things? Nicodemus, remember your own scripture where Moses was
told to lift up the serpent in the wilderness so that those
whom God was killing through the serpents would live if they
believed and looked upon the serpent. In the same way, I,
the Son of Man, must be lifted up that whoever looks and believes
on me will have eternal life. See, beloved, this is the problem. We approach Scripture sometimes
with a worldly mind. We approach Scripture sometimes
through fleshliness. Well, I know what that means
to me. Well, who are we to say this is what God intended in
His writing? It may be instrumental in your life the way we believe
Scripture's teaching. It may be good for us It may
be special to us. It may be helpful for our relationships,
but it doesn't make it right. It doesn't make it right that
we just plow through all of this truth and pick the one, two,
or three words or phrases or half sentences that we love,
and then we expound upon it as though we are the wiser than
God. Nicodemus, being the greatest
academic mind alive during his day, in relation to the Torah
and the Septuagint, the Old Testament, he knew very well, had it set
to memory. They did not carry around scrolls,
but they were to recite and teach Scripture from memory since they
were 13. And yet he did not understand
the very thing that he knew. He did not have right interpretation
of his own Scripture because he was ignorant of the truth
of Christ. He was ignorant of the truth
of the divine purpose and the power of God. He was ignorant. And his interpretation of Scripture,
just like generations before him, just like the Jews throughout
history, were wrong every time when they said that this is what
the Word of God means. Oh, they knew how to follow the
rules. They knew how to apply the teaching of the law, 614
of them to be exact. They knew how to walk in a manner
that they felt was worthy and honoring to God, but they could
not see the forest for the trees. They could not see truth that
was right before them. Why? Jesus said that you cannot
see except you be born again. And you understand that the gospel
message is not, be born again. Have you ever heard anyone tell
you that? If you have, they've been in grave error. It is not,
be born again, friend. Be born again, oh sinner, for
that would be something that would be impossible for us to
answer. It would be something that would be impossible for
us to do. No one has ever gone to the streets and said, I'm
calling you all to be born again. No. But the imperative is there
just the same. That Jesus says, you must be
born again. You must be born again. In order
to see and in order to enter the Kingdom of Heaven. Now some
people love to debate with me and to fight with this issue
and to hate the Word of God in this context. And they say, well
that is just not good news to me. Okay, then, you make yourself
alive. You come to the place of righteousness.
You do what is required to satisfy the judgment of God. You do whatever
you think you can in your power to come to eternal life. What
shall it be? What do you lay before the banquet
table of God? What do you put on the altar
and say, this is worthy of your time and your salvation, God?
What is it that you must say with your mouth? What is it that
you must do in the cognate of your mind? What statement of
truth must you hold and stitch into the fabric of your heart
that you might stand before God and say, I cannot be anything
but saved. Look at what I've done. How pompous
a reality that would be to stand before the God of creation and
say such things. But yet, when we see the world
at large, Many of them who profess Christ as their Savior and their
Lord will no more testify and confess Him as their Savior than
they ever would themselves as God, but they do that just the
same when they take credit for their eternal life. We cannot see if God does not
do a work in us. Faith does not bring us to new
birth. The new birth brings us to faith. Let me say that again. If you
are to believe, you must be born again. That's the imperative
that Jesus has taught. We've spent two or three weeks
priming it and teaching it. If you weren't here, I suggest
you go back and listen to the half-hearted ability that I have,
not half-hearted, but ability, half-abled, of going in and looking
and seeing this argument for what it is. And seeing that the
new birth is necessary. It's a necessary reality. in
order for you to have saving faith. For by grace you have
been saved through faith, and this faith is not of your own
doing, but is a gift of God, so that no one may boast before
Him. Beloved, if our faith, and this
is our sermon for next week, by the way, if our faith was
the effectual agent in pressing the hand of God to do something
to make us alive and justify us, If we were able to believe
without divine intervention, we could boast before God. If
I study very hard, I can ace the physics test. If I study
really, really hard, I can fail the chemistry test. You know,
so what? We can't say that we've done
what is right in our own mind and force God's hand. In order for us to understand
this text this morning, beloved, we must be born again. To understand, to believe, to
trust, to hold fast to the confession of our hope who is in Jesus,
who is Jesus, who is the light, who is the kingdom, who is salvation,
who is our propitiation, who is the God of heaven, heaven
who is Creator. And we might say, well, what's
this for there anyway? Well, let's focus on this in
pieces. Let's look at it right here. Jesus says, and as Moses
lifted up the serpent in the wilderness in verse 14, so must
the Son of Man be lifted up, verse 15, that whoever believes
in Him may have eternal life. 4. God so loved the world. You see, we love that text because
it talks about God's love for the world. But there's no greater
mistaken term than love. The definition of love in our
culture, I would say, and if you read poetry, you really want
to find out what people thought about love in antiquity, read
poetry. Poetry is the language of experience. When we experience something
or we imagine something we've experienced in our minds, we
who are poetic, we write about it and everybody reads it and
then nobody understands what we're talking about because they've
not experienced it. But in some sense, good poetry can take you
there. And you can look and see what
love has always meant to people within the last four or five
hundred years because we not only have poetry, but we have
literature, we have Shakespeare. Makes me gag when I see how Shakespeare
looked at love. Makes me gag when I read James
Joyce. Period. Sometimes we think about love
and we think, well, I know what love is. I know what love's all
about. I know what love is. It's that
really deep feeling that you have for somebody. You know what?
That's constipation. That's acid reflux. That's nervousness. That's endorphins. I mean, you
get the same feeling that you say you have when you're in love
that you do when somebody pulls out in front of you. Or when
a deer chomps out. I'm in love. With what? My whole
life. I didn't die. I mean, yeah, maybe.
But we're not in love with the way we feel. Because let's put that to the
test for a moment. Let's just say that God loves every single
person in the world equally and effectually. And that's a ridiculous
statement for any of you who want to take that sound bite
and ruin me with it. Let's just say. Then what is the causal
agent for God's love toward us to begin with? I mean, all of
us in the room, we have had love and have love, and there's a
reason that we have love. It's because we have found someone
who is fond to us in our eyes, or our company, or our interest,
or our mind, whatever it might be. It's like, you know, I love
this. What we do is we love the idea of each other. We love the
reality that we'd like to see. We love the future. We love the
dreams. We love the fantasy and the fairy
tale. We love the company. We learn
to love each other more and more, but ultimately love is only present
when those things aren't. When things are good and great
and grand and sweet and cuddly, oh, that's not love. It's nausea. It's sort of like, I don't know,
in some sense an idolatry. Love is when all that goes away,
when the edges come out, and when the ugly starts to appear,
and when the affection goes down the drain, and we stand anyway. When the very one that we gave
our heart to, and our lives to, hurt us deeply, and we love them
in spite of it at the cost of ourselves, that's love. Love, according to the Scripture,
is God. In 1 John 4, God is love. God is love. And so if we ask
ourselves, why in the world would God love the world? What is love
all about? What is it supposed to be? And
how is it defined? We need to recognize that if
God has His affection on sinners, why is it so admirable? I mean
seriously, why is God's love to be honored and worshiped?
Why should we worship him for loving people who are not worthy
of love? Or let's put it in a simpler
way, why in the world is God's love so admirable when we are
not lovely? Why? Because God loves people
who are in the world in the totality of their evil. the totality of
the wickedness, the totality of their depravity, and He loves
in spite of that. You might say, well, you know,
I love my kids and they're evil. I love my spouse and they know
I'm evil. See, you can't say they're evil
because you'd get in trouble. We can be loving for people who
are, but can God truly? Can God love darkness? No. It's against His nature. But His nature is also love.
It's a mistaken term. See, the thing is that love and
what God has done in love flows from His perfect will and from
His perfect nature. He loves us in spite of who we
are, beloved. He loves us in our total wickedness. And because of that, man cannot
be saved who isn't first compelled to see his need for salvation.
Man cannot be saved who love darkness and do not see the fact
that their love for darkness is wicked. Because if I'm evil
and I say to you, I'm not evil, and you tell me about a Savior
to save me from this darkness, and I say, what darkness? I'm
blind. When the Bible teaches us about
God's love, and we try to make it human instead of divine, we
have misappropriated the reality of what God has done. So His
Word teaches us the complete aspect of who He is. His Word
teaches us what His love actually is, and how it operates, and
to what end it brings. His Word shows us. 4. God so
loved the world. But then yet we see that God
loved the world, but then John in his first epistle and in other
places in Paul's writing to the Romans, we are commanded not
to love the world. So if we are good students, We
must figure out what in the world, no pun intended, the Bible is
teaching us. If we're to be like God and have
the mind of Christ and to love like God loves and God loves
the world, then what in the world are we to do with the command
to not love the world, in the world? That's an interesting question. It must mean that what John is
saying in the context of the world in 1 John 2 verses 15-17
is not the same context as what John is teaching in the words
of Jesus in John 3.16. That there must be something
else. Let's paint the picture. Nicodemus,
leader of the Jews, the Pharisee, part of the Sanhedrin, the ruling
class, not only the spiritual head, but those that Rome had
put in place to sort of govern the people. You know, Rome's
like, we took over, you belong to us, we're gonna let you sort
of be your people. So we put the Sanhedrin in place for you.
We've got some little kings over here, like this guy and this
guy. They're not really kings, but
we're gonna let them be kings, they're plague kings. And all the while, Israel is
looking, they remember the prophecies of Isaiah, they remember the
promises of God through Moses, that there would be a promised
land, that there would be rest, that there would be a time of
redemption for Israel. And they were to take the word
of God, the oracles of God, and take it to the nations, that
all people might worship God for His grace and salvation. And they were to be separate
from the world, And then they begin to look for
the Messiah. And when John the Baptist came on the scene, they're
like, oh, wait, wait, wait, something's happening. Prophecy's being fulfilled.
Who are you? Are you Elijah? Nope. Are you
the prophet? Jeremiah, we know. That's what they meant. Nope,
not Jeremiah. Are you the Christ? I certainly am not the Christ.
Then who are you? I'm the voice crying out in the
wilderness, make straight the path of the Lord. Then why do
you baptize? Because there's one coming. whose
sandals I am not fit to take off. And do you know who untied
sandals? Slaves who cleaned your feet
when you sat down to eat. And John the Baptist says he's not
worthy to take off the sandals of Jesus. He's not even worthy
to wash his feet. He's below that. What is that? What's below that? And here's Jesus and John proclaiming
and then he goes into the temple and he cleanses it. What sign
do you bring? Tear it down, rebuild it in three
days. I gave you the sign when I came here and cleansed it.
And all the Pharisees got together and they begin to talk and says,
okay, we know this guy's come from God, but let's dare not
say that he's Messiah. Let's go out there and let's tell him
and let's inquire. Do it tonight sometime when the
streets are sort of empty. Nicodemus is there. We know that
you are from God, for no one can do the things you do except
God be with you. I mean, that's a high compliment,
y'all. To be called teacher and know that you're a man of God
because you've come from God and no one can do the things
you do except God be with you. I mean, that's a high compliment. Flattery
at best. And Jesus doesn't say, well,
thank you very much. I'm doing well today. Let me tell you a
little bit about who I really am. He just says, I rebuke you. Amen, amen. Truly, truly. Amen,
amen. I tell you the truth. I tell
you the truth. It is true. It is true. It's worthy of understanding.
It's worthy of understanding. Listen, listen, listen, listen,
listen. Here is the absolute truth and I repeat it to you
that you cannot see the Kingdom of Heaven unless you're born
again. Isn't that an odd thing to hear? If you come to me and you say,
hey James, you know, I saw you doing your Kung Fu and you're
like a master Kung Fu guy. And I say, you must be born again
for you can see the Wing Chun. How ridiculous. Now the kids are listening. What?
What are we... Why would Jesus do that? Because
He's telling Nicodemus the truth. And then He gives him the gospel
by showing him the parallel of Moses in the Old Testament and
the serpent. And then He's telling him that the way you're born
again is by the power of the Spirit hearing the truth of the
gospel, which is me being lifted up like the snake. And if you
believe, then you can have eternal life, and then you can see the
kingdom, and then you can enter the kingdom, and then you're part of the kingdom.
It doesn't matter that you're a Jew, Nicodemus. God is not
going to save people because of their race. He's going to
save them. based on what Christ has done
for them. You believe in me, Jesus would
say. Abide in me. Drink of the drink. Eat of my flesh. Drink of my
blood. These are hard statements and people were bewildered. I
don't get it. Why do we get it? Because the
Spirit of God has helped us see it. But the question is, do you
just see it and say, oh yeah, I know what that means. Or do
you see it and say, that's mine. That's my hope. He's my Lord. He's my Savior, because He saved
me. I believe that He worked His
life and died on the cross for me. My hope, my salvation, only
Christ saves. Saving faith is to see with faith,
believe, not just know, but have intimacy. And Nicodemus is thinking,
Well, why am I not in the kingdom if I'm Jewish? Isn't that the
context of the last seven verses? Yes. This is yes. It's yes. Then Jesus says, for God so loved
the world. And Nicodemus' awe went to horror. Do not marvel that I say to you,
you must be born again. Do not marvel. How can you not
believe these things? We... See, you came here, Nicodemus,
saying, we know that you... Well, let me tell you what we
know, Jesus says. We know what we know, for we have come from
heaven. We know because we brought heaven
down. Remember what He said to Nathaniel?
I am the kingdom. I am life. I am the light. You, Nicodemus, think that it's
about you and your people and the lineage of your household
and all of the tribes. It has nothing to do with that.
Those are labels for the sake of redemptive history to show
the small, small shadow of the picture of the cross of Christ. We know, and you do not receive
our testimony because you've not been born again. Let me give
you the gospel. Jesus is raised when I'm raised. If you look and believe, I have
eternal life, why? Why, Nicodemus would think, why,
what is he talking about? Why am I not, why is Israel not
the apple of God's eye? For God so loved the world, is
the answer. For God so loved the world. And now all of a sudden, it's
like two trains running full throttle, hitting in the center
of a rail. and the worldview of Nicodemus
and all his eternal security, and all of the righteousness
of his own making, and everything that he ever knew, he saw it
for darkness, because that's what it was, hit straight head
forward with the gospel of Jesus Christ and the grace of God.
And his world blew up. And he's thinking, how does God
have love for the world? Because you see, there are two
classes of people in first century Palestine according to Jews.
Them and everybody else. There's Israel and the world. That is the context of this. That does not say that God loved
every single person in the world. It says God loved the world,
the totality of nations, the totality of tribes and peoples
and tongues. Gentiles also, not just you Jews,
not just us Israel, all peoples. God's love is not restricted
by race. God's love is not restricted
by ethnicity. God's love is given, not because
of the worthiness or the loveliness of humanity, but because God
is love, and He has chosen in His wisdom to love people. And the question, of course,
is, who are those people? Who are those people? Well, we'll
show you who those people are. Four. Let's look at the word
four. We're just getting started. Four. This transition reveals
the reason for God lifting up the Son. Why would God lift up
the Son? Why would God sacrifice Jesus,
the Son? Because He loved the world. Four. God loved the world. God loved
the world. Now when we started today, I
gave this sort of improper understanding of the interpretation of, for
God so loved the world, and I dragged out, so God loved the world so
much. And that is the kindergarten
Sunday school instructor's manual on the love of God, right? It's
what I was taught. It's what you were taught. It's
what all God's children are taught. Red and yellow, black and white.
We're all taught this stuff. Oh, what a fright. I mean, you
know. Is it true that God loves us
so much? Yes, but it's not taught there.
But it is. But it's not. It's not saying
how much God loved the world. It's saying in what way. God
loves the world. How so? This way. See, we have a very inferior
grammar in our day. Our vernacular has been totally
taken over by emoticons and slang and abbreviations that don't
make sense and I'm lost. I don't know what any of these
things mean. I'm getting dumber by the day. Read something a little bit above
your pay grade and increase your vocabulary. Increase your understanding
of good grammar. and syntax. It's difficult, but
once you do, your palate is fuller, and you can understand simple
English like this, For God so loved the world. For God loved
the world so. Which way? So. If I say so, and
I point there, that's what I'm telling you. In this way, in
this manner, that He gave His only Son. God loved the world
in the manner in which He gave His only Son. This is how God
loved the world. It doesn't say how God feels
about the world, because we know how God feels about the world,
don't we? How does God feel about the world? He hates it. What
is God going to do with the world? He's going to bring judgment
upon it. As a matter of fact, Paul says
He's going to pour out wrath on all unrighteousness, period. What unrighteousness? You're
talking about thorns and thistles and vipers and snakes? No, men. And
that's not a misogynistic pronoun. It stands for humanity, mankind. Ladies, you're in that group.
For all humanity, the wrath of God will be poured out on the
righteousness of all humanity. Now that can scare a lot of folks.
And fear, in some sense, is a motivator to do something. No one wants
to die. No one wants judgment. No one
wants to feel the burn of guilt. But friends, that fear will not
take you to the face of grace. That fear will not take you to
the throne of grace. That fear will not take you to
the cross. That fear will cause you to hide. And that fear will
cause you to try to find other ways to come to the knowledge
of truth. And that fear will cause you
to listen to the deceit of the devil, who will tell you, if
you say this, if you do this, if you go there, if you come
this way, if you act this way, if you live this way, if you
answer the call, if you serve in this manner, if you give this
much money, if you sing this song, or you do whatever, Then
you will come and feel confident in Christ. That's not the truth. The reality of judgment is upon
us all, and we know it even before we're told. But the grace of
God reveals His mercy, and the grace of God reveals His love
for us, and that Christ died for us, and saved us from our
sin, and that we are no longer objects of wrath because we are
the beloved of God, you see. This is good news. This is the
gospel of Jesus. It's the only gospel that saves.
It's the only truth of Christ. It's the only message through
which any person can escape wrath and judgment and have eternal
life. That Jesus Christ was lifted up and what He did on the cross
is worthy of trusting. And in that trusting, we escape
the judgment of God. It is the gospel. If you have
come to faith in any other gospel, my friend, you are not a child
of God. If you have trusted in any other
message, you are lost. You are as lost as you ever have
been, even if you were loving the world with every fiber of
your body. Believe in the message of the cross. Believe in the
message of Christ, that He alone is your salvation and your hope.
And trust in Him not today, not yesterday, and not tomorrow,
but every moment of your life, every breath that you breathe,
every sin that you commit. And you say, oh God, I better
straighten my life out that I might be right before God. No. You
say, have mercy, Father, for You have given me life through
Christ. This sin was on Him. The love of God is the motivator
for God's giving of His Son Jesus Christ. So God's love to put
Jesus on the cross was purposeful. And it is what caused Him to
lift the Son up. so that all who looked and believed
would not perish, but have eternal life." So God's love for the
world is that God, in His love for those people, would cause
them not to perish. I'll say it again. God's love
for the world is so that God's love for those people would cause
them not to perish. You know what it's not? It's
not an opportunity to escape judgment. It's a promise that
you've escaped judgment. It's not a possibility. It's
an absolute promise. This is the gospel. This is the gospel. God loved
the world. in this way, that He gave His
Son, Jesus Christ. Remember, everything we've learned
thus far about what Christ has done and what the Scriptures
has taught about His work of redemption. This God who is love,
who operates out of His will and desire and out of His nature
and attributes in His love, He killed Jesus Christ. Why? so that we, those whom He loved,
can escape judgment. Romans 5, 8-10 says, But God
shows His love for us, and that while we were still sinners,
Christ died for us. Since, therefore, we have now
been justified by His blood, much more shall we be saved by
Him from the wrath of God. For if, while we were his enemies,
we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more
now that we are reconciled shall we be saved by his life." Oh,
I wish we could just go another hour and just talk about that
text. That's the context of the giving
of the Son, is that the Son paid for the sin, guilt of a people. And those are the people that
God loves. The question is, beloved, do
you believe in the love of God for you? Do you trust in the
love of God for you? Do you believe the love of God
is your hope? And this big word here, we don't
have a lot of time to deal with it. For God so loved the world,
that He gave His only Son, that whoever believes in Him should
not perish, but have eternal life. That whoever, or if we
like to take the old King James, whosoever. Old English. There's two words there in the
King James. Whosoever believeth. And those are really old words
that mean whoever believes. It's real hard. Whosoever is
an old English variant of whoever. Believeth. It's real difficult. Just put the "-eth-" off the
end of it and you've got the root of what we speak. Believe. Whosoever
believeth. Whoever believes. Whoever. Who are those? What
are some of the pronouns? They. Those who believe. They
who believe. He who believes. She who believes.
The one who believes is Him. The one who believes is Her.
the persons who believe, the person who believes, whoever,
whosoever. This is just a pronoun of whoever
is the one believing, whoever are the ones believing, whoever
are the believing ones. Never has this ever meant, ever,
every single person in the world. Because if it does, then John's
an idiot. And if he quoted Jesus correctly,
Jesus is an idiot. And we know that's not true.
Because he goes on to say, verse 18, whoever believes in the king
James, whosoever believeth in him is condemned not. Whoever
believes in him is not condemned, but whosoever believeth not is
condemned already. You see the problem with the
argument? How is it that whosoever in verse
16 means every single person in the world that ever lived,
but whosoever in verse 18 means what? It can't mean that. So the qualifier
of who that word is, is based on what those people are doing.
Whoever believes and whoever is not believing. Those are the
two groups of people in the world. And those who are in the world,
those who are the world, who are believing, have eternal life
because Christ has paid for their sins. Christ has justified them. Christ has satisfied the wrath
of God. Guess what? We can't owe God something He's been paid
for. It makes God a liar. God's Word cannot say that Jesus
is propitiation. And God's Word cannot say that
by the blood of the cross that we are justified. And God's Word
cannot say that Jesus is our atonement. And then all of a
sudden say, well, not really. Because that makes God a liar.
In the very articles of John's writing, both his first epistle
and this gospel, Jesus teaches that God testifies to Himself. that the Father testifies of
the Son, that the Spirit testifies of the Son. Nowhere in any language
does whoever or whosoever mean every single person. Let's test
the word usage in the Gospel of John. There's three other
places, very quickly. In John 1.29, John the Baptist says,
Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. Let's
put that idea, if the world is whosoever meaning everybody,
Well, is the world, does Jesus take away the sin of every person
in the world? No. Just those in the world who believe. Just those in the world who believe.
How about John 6, 33? The bread of God is coming down
from heaven, who gives life to the world. So Jesus gave life
to every person in the world? No, only those who believe, who
are out of the world. That's why the context of Scripture
teaches that we are not of the world, but we are in the world.
And God has snatched us out of the domain of darkness, which
is the world that we are commanded not to love, and brought us into
the light of the kingdom of His Son. John 17, 9, Jesus is praying,
is high priest in prayer. He says, I pray for these, I
pray not for the world. But God loves the world, why
would Jesus not pray for the world? Because the point is,
Jesus is praying for him, his people. Those whom you are giving
me out of the world, Jesus says, those who are part of this flock
and those who are part of this flock who have not yet come to
me, Father, I pray for these. I'm not praying for the world. Why does it matter? Because teaching a universal,
effectual love of God to every human being is a damnable heresy. Does God love all people in some
manner? I have to say yes. Jesus loved
His crucifiers. Jesus loved His enemies. And
we're to love His enemies too. But there is something mysteriously
unknown about how God loves, reprobates. It's not something we can understand.
It's not something we can understand. We just know that God is love
so therefore all that comes from Him in wrath and grace, all of
it is love. It's all loving in its context
because it comes from Him and He is love. Love is not something
God does. Love is who God is. Friends, only those who believe have eternal life. Whoever believes
that Christ paid for their sins has eternal life. Those who do not believe, as
we'll see next week, are condemned already. See how strong that
is? Jesus doesn't say, if you believe,
you'll have eternal life, but if you don't believe, you could
be condemned. It's going to be too late one
day. Are you a believing one? Are you an unbelieving one? Why
is it that we as human beings, as Christians in a culture, in
a Bible belt, have for so long fought against the truth of the
gospel to such a degree that we've changed it and made it
no gospel. Because humanity still wants
a humanistic Savior. Humanity still wants a fair shake
at being God, just like Adam, just like Lucifer. Humanity wants
to be the ruler of their own destiny. And to stand in the
midst of men and say, you know what, I did what was right. Why
don't you come too? Maybe I can convince you to do
the right thing. Will you do the right thing?
What does that even mean? What is a right thing? Outside
of faith, all right things are wrong things. Outside of faith
in Christ, all righteous works are filthy rags. Will you come and just believe
in the gospel of Christ? People like or hate that message
because people must twist plain truth from Scripture in order
to establish proof text for their false gospels. I mean, how ridiculous
would it be as after decades of ministry,
of seeing, this is my story, not decades at the time, but
a decade, of teaching things somewhat half-truthed, which
makes it what? Wrong. So convoluted and so confused. Let me get a text that proves
my point. Oh, if I don't read that whole
sentence, I take those six words. And then it works. We have to. Why? Because we lose favor with
men when we turn to our humility and we say, man, I was wrong.
People go, my goodness, you were an icon of the faith. Don't do
this now. No! People hate it because God purposes,
this is a hard one, God purposes the devil to confuse them and
blind their eyes, that they might not see the glory of Christ.
Well, you're stretching it there, preacher, let me give it to you.
The parable of the sower. There's three soils that will
not produce saving faith, but they all receive the word of
God joyfully. The devil takes the word of God
away. That's why we need to bind the
devil. You can't bind what God has already bound, beloved. Nobody's
letting the devil loose on you, I promise. Jesse and I, as we
were hanging out a little bit this week, I thought all of a
sudden how heavy the temptation of Adam and Eve must have been.
They were the only souls alive. How intense that temptation. God purposes the enemy to confuse
the eyes of unbelievers, no matter what they receive in their fleshly
minds. In 2 Corinthians 4, I've quoted this text a lot, God has
blinded the eyes of unbelievers to keep them from seeing the
light of the glory of God. Why? Because He purposes it in
His wisdom. But it's not hopeless, because we all were once blind.
Then he says, but God who says, let light shine out of darkness
has shone in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge
of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. You know nothing
else. God shines the light in the darkness of our heart that
we might be able to see the knowledge of His glory who is Jesus Christ.
Behold and believe. Why is it so hard for us? Because
we must be born again. See, the outcome of it all, look
at these last phrases, that we will not perish, the believing
ones will not perish, the believing ones will have eternal life.
The negative and the positive, absolutes. The believing ones
will not perish, the believing ones will have eternal life.
Why? For God loved them and He gave His Son for them. And they
believe. There is no universalism here.
Only those who believe will have eternal life. Belief is not birthed
out of regeneration. Regeneration is where faith is
born. Belief that is not granted by
God through the hearing of the gospel is not true faith. If our belief is in something
else but what Scripture teaches about the Gospel, it's not true
faith. The object of our faith cannot
save. The Gospel that Jesus gave to
Nicodemus rocked his world. Yet it was the power of God and
it was loving in all of its glory and all of its truth. And if
you believe in the message of Jesus Christ, who is your only
hope, in the face of God's righteous justice, you have eternal life,
because God has granted you repentance, and He has loved you, get this,
with an everlasting love. And next week we will look at
what faith really looks like in this context, but let me say
this one thing in closing. God's love is eternal. Because that's one of the arguments
that I always get. Well, God loves us after we believe. No. It can't
be. God is immutable. So those whom
He loves, He loves. Those whom He does not love,
He does not love. God is not tossed to and fro
by the works of men. God loves His people, beloved. And you can praise Him for His
glorious grace. That's the writing to the Ephesians.
because He loved you eternally. God loved you before you were.
Rejoice. Let's pray. We thank You, Father,
for what a grand truth You've given us. What a wonderful and amazing
reality. The good news of Christ for us,
effectually, because of Your great love for us. Perfectly. Grow us deep into that understanding.
Help us to take this gospel to a dying world and give it away
freely. Share it without strings attached. Father, to proclaim what You
have done for the nations, for the world, for all peoples, so
that Your people would come and believe. Lord, let us not be a respecter
of persons, but take and make disciples of all. We praise You
for Your truth, and for Your power, and for Your love in Your
Son, Jesus Christ.