Believing Loving Doing

Open

Faith and works should travel side by side, step answering to step, like the legs of men walking. First faith, and then works; and then faith again, and then works again—until you can scarcely distinguish which is the one and which is the other.

William Booth

OPEN (Big Picture Point)

Good Morning Everyone!

Today we get the opportunity to open the Word of God together, this is something that I love doing and I take it very seriously.

OBJECTIVES

I want for us all today to accomplish two things.

One, that our view of God gets bigger not smaller and

Two, that we have a deeper understanding of the why behind what we do as Christians.

TEACHING

Today we are going to unpack John 3.16-21 so let’s turn there in our bibles.

Now you might be thinking…seriously…John3.16, we have heard this maybe a million times.

I get it, but I will also tell you this, getting comfortable with a familiar scripture can become a problem because we block ourselves from learning anything new about it, because we think we already know it.

Look we all do it and it is something we have to actively work against.

So we before we read it, I want to teach you a Greek word, actually, I think that many of you will already know it.

The word in this passage that gets translated as World is the Greek word Kosmos. Did you know that Cosmos, doesn’t just mean Universe, it means a well ordered Universe.

As we have been talking previously, we also understand that belief, is a relational trust with something that is true.

I think we can get a sense for where this is going.

John 3:16 NRSV

16 “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.

To explain the above God Loved the well ordered Cosmos in this way, He gave His unique Son, in order that all who relationally trust won’t be destroyed but have life unto the age.

Sometimes we need to be shaken from the familiar to help gain valuable insight.

Shane Willard a fantastic teacher says it this way, words matter less, than how we picture those words functioning.

I’ll give an example, I would be willing to bet that when we heard the word world, we thought and imagined people.

When I said Kosmos, we thought Universe, we thought big not small.

That is the point in this passage and it is so vital to understand. See let’s take a look at the Passage now, so it opens and says that God so loved the whole of His good creation, all of it, including us, but not limited to us. He loves it in this way that He gave His unique one of a kind Son to it, the word gave here doesn’t necessarily have sacrificial overtones, again Jesus did more for us than just die, He lived, He taught, He suffered, He preached, He healed, He laughed, He cried, He had a full human experience, He gave Himself fully to His Creation so that we could have the opportunity to be in a trusting relationship with Him and therefore not be part of what gets Destroyed but have (now in the present) Life of the age to come. John will later in Ch.17 say that Life unto the Age is to know and be in relationship with Jesus. What is assumed here is the actions that the relationship consists of. Which we are going to unpack next. But let’s just pause for a second.

Guys…John 3.16 hey, right…the Bible. It is so deep and it is so easy to just read right past it.

Who here has ever read it like that before? The whole Bible is like this. This is how you can read it for a lifetime and still not plumb it’s depths.

Let’s Continue:

Now we have to understand that in English it is considered improper Grammar to have repetition of words but for understanding purposes I am going to repeat them.

John 3:17–21 NRSV

17 “Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. 18 Those who believe in him are not condemned; but those who do not believe are condemned already, because they have not believed in the name of the only Son of God. 19 And this is the judgment, that the light has come into the world, and people loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil. 20 For all who do evil hate the light and do not come to the light, so that their deeds may not be exposed. 21 But those who do what is true come to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that their deeds have been done in God.”

v.17 To explain the above (again) God did not send the Son into the Cosmos to Judge the Cosmos, but in order that the Cosmos might be rescued, healed, delivered into safety, specifically from harm or death through Him.

The word for Saved is Sozo, the common word for healed, delivered and rescued from harm or death, specifically as the result of Sin.

Now again, if we heard world and thought people and if we hear saved and only think “going to heaven when we die” that will really mislead us. We can see that this may be challenging some of our preconceived notions.

How are we going? To be sure this is saying that Jesus came to Heal and Rescue the whole Cosmos, that we are of course part of, but it is much bigger than just us individually and we can also see that Sin has corrupted not just us but the whole of creation.

v.18 Those people [see how the pattern is Cosmic (big), then People (small) ] it has been designed to show us the big picture overall effort and then our place in it.

who relationally trust are not under present judgement, but those who do not relationally trust are judged because they haven’t believed at all in the name of the only Son of God.

v.19 here is the Judgement, or here is how that is decided, the light has come and is here into the Cosmos and people continue to love as they always have the darkness more than light and we know because their work are repeatedly harmful and wicked.

v.20 to explain again All means ALL who repeatedly do harmful wickedness actively hate the light and do not arrive to the light in order that their work wouldn’t be corrected (because they love what they do)

v.21 in contrast to that, those that act in truth arrive to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that their work is done in God (This is the concept beneath blamelessness) (It isn’t perfect, it is just all in the open).

That was a lot of ground to cover and so much to say, I mean what a scathingly accurate commentary on the state of things. I mean, honestly, this just described what I observed last week, this is incredibly relevant and is giving us keen discernment.

What I want to point out is that the Author here binds a connection between trust, loving and doing.

What we trust, we love, what we love, we will do.

God loved and therefore acted and that action was the proof of that love.

For our part we will trust what we love and act accordingly, whether we love darkness or light. The Author is highlighting this truth.

This author clearly also wrote 1 John and in that epistle, it is the most straight shooting, hard hitting things I think in all of Scripture and we will go there in a minute because in the passage that we just read, the author points out the evidence of those that love darkness but didn’t really address the actions of those that love the light other than they relationally trust and act according to truth, which is effectively saying the same thing.

1 John 5:1–3 NRSV

1 Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ has been born of God, and everyone who loves the parent loves the child. 2 By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and obey his commandments. 3 For the love of God is this, that we obey his commandments. And his commandments are not burdensome,

See the author has now been very specific about what the relationship between believing(trusting), loving and doing will produce in a believer (someone who loves the light), they will love God which is the same as obeying his commandments and they are not a burden. (That speaks of a mindset)

This is really where I want to park for the rest of our time here.

I shouldn’t really be treading new ground here by saying we love what we trust and do what we love. Any nutritionist would tell us the same thing, they would say, if you are going on a diet don’t just try to eat all the food you hate, you will not stay on it.

No one does what they hate. No one, however, people will do what they dislike or hard things if there is something greater that they love!

I know for me I like knowing the why!

At this point it is important to see the big picture, that is that God is enacting a rescue plan for the whole Cosmos and we here, who are sitting here are beneficiaries of that but also we are inaugurated into part of it!

Matthew 28:18–20 NRSV

18 And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

Jesus Commanded us many a great thing but I think this one is so vital. I think spurgeon says it best

Faith and obedience are bound up in the same bundle. He that obeys God, trusts God, and he that trusts God, obeys God. He that is without faith is without works; and he that is without works is without faith. Do not oppose faith and good works to one another, for there is a blessed relationship between them; and if you abound in obedience your faith shall grow exceedingly.

Charles Spurgeon

We all know this, who here prefers On The Job training!

Like theory is hard but let me learn by doing…this is that!

If you want to see God do big and amazing things in your life, start living for mission. This is what we refer to as Kingdom Living, living out this mandate!

In order to accomplish this we are going to need to learn all that Jesus commanded us so that we can Disciple others and teach them to obey and guard and keep the commandments, you can not give what you do not have, someone can not model what you don’t live.

Big Picture Point

There is a beautiful relationship between believing/trusting, loving and doing, they are three parts to a united whole.

OBJECTIVE

I hope today we can see that God is bigger, His plans more expansive and you can see why we do what we do.

ACTION

This whole message has been about action, so I want you to ask and answer these questions:

Based on what was read, does my life align to what has been asked of me?

What steps could I take to progress on what is already happening

Am I discipling anyone, if not who can I disciple, or do I need to be discipled, if so who can do that for me?

CLOSE

I want to open this up for anyone who maybe has never made a decision to follow Jesus, to start that Journey of trusting and loving and doing. I will be up here in the front to help lead you in the decision.

for the rest of you, the Cafe is open, lets close in a blessing.

The New Revised Standard Version The Priestly Benediction

The LORD bless you and keep you;

25 the LORD make his face to shine upon you, and be gracious to you;

26 the LORD lift up his countenance upon you, and give you peace