John 3:1-18 | Advent of Love
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Intro
Hey y’all, how’s it going?
Are y’all ready for the break?
Every one feel like December just kinda got vaporized?
Like we were just eating thanksgiving food right?
But next week is Christmas, so if you haven’t bought your gifts, you still have about an hour in amazon haha.
But a thing that i try to do every year is read my favorite Christmas book
Which is Charles Dickens A Christmas Carol.
IF you don’t want to read it, you can watch the movie, I’m sure you’ve all seen one of the movies, i know they made a muppets one.
and its weird.
But if you haven’t go look for the one they made in like the 80’s, that has George C Scott as Scrooge.
That’s the best, closest to the book.
But I love the book,
Because it has a like all time opening couple paragraphs.
Like listen to this.
Marley was dead: to begin with. There is no doubt whatever about that. The register of his burial was signed by the clergyman, the clerk, the undertaker, and the chief mourner. Scrooge signed it: and Scrooge’s name was good upon ’Change, for anything he chose to put his hand to. Old Marley was as dead as a door-nail.
That’s the opening paragraph,
Its about Christmas, three words in, someone is dead.
But then in a couple paragraphs, Dickens circles back to this writes
There is no doubt that Marley was dead. This must be distinctly understood, or nothing wonderful can come of the story I am going to relate.
If that doesn’t kinda pull you in to want to know more about what’s going on, Idk what would.
So, we’ve been going through the themes of Advent.
and tonight the theme is Love,
and so the whole point of advent is to remind ourselves of the coming of Christ,
advent leads up to Christmas, when we celebrate the birth of Christ.
But for it to mean anything to us, we need to understand that Christ physically came,
that God became flesh and dwelt among his people
and the why behind that.
Why did he actually come.
What was the reason God became a man.
and what does that mean for us.
And so where we are going to be tonight is the most famous verse in the entire bible.
Most everyone probably has this verse memorized,
And because it is so famous, we probably brush over it.
It has become so familiar to us that it almost loses its special quality.
Like the whole story runs through this verse,
If we miss this, or if it is not distinctly understood, then nothing wonderful can come from the story.
If we just take the verse for granted and not think on it, then we miss what the whole story of scripture is about.
so here is how tonight is going to work, we are going to be all over the bible tonight.
answering the why behind the most quoted passage in the bible.
Context
So, we are going to start in John 3, starting in verse 16.
so if you need a bible look around for one, and if you have one at home, bring it, if you don’t have one at home take this one.
anyone need a bible?
Let me set up what is going on here.
This passage is the end part of a whole conversation that Jesus is having with with a man named Nicodemus.
So who is Nicodemus?
Nicodemus is a Pharisee, one of the kinda religious ruling class, they’re not in charge charge, but they are setting the pace for morality in Israel at this time.
He was a religious leader and scholar. And pretty well known.
So Nicodemus is curious about who Jesus us,
Usually when we here the pharisees get brought up, they’re trying to trip jesus up, or what ever
they’re the villains usually
But here, is a curious Pharisee named Nicodemus, who knew there something different about Jesus.
and so Nicodemus seeks him out,
and he goes at night,
which means he doesn’t want to really be seen going to see Jesus.
It would be bad for business for him to be caught going to see him
So, this last part of the conversation between Nicodemus and Jesus
So far, Jesus has really confused Nicodemus,
he’s told him that you have to be born again, which doesn’t make sense to nicodemus,
Jesus has tied himself to Moses raising the serpent, which is another story for a different day,
But basically Jesus has kind of confused Nicodemus,
So that brings us to verse 16,
which Jesus is summing up, what he has just told Nicodemus,
Trying to speak to him in a way that he might understand.
So John 3:16-21, lets read this whole passage. but before we do that, let’s pray for our time in the word.
pray
Okay cool, lets read this together
16 “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. 17 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. 18 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. 19 And this is the judgment: the light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil. 20 For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his works should be exposed. 21 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.”
Okay, so there it is, the verse of all verse, the one that is at ever College Game day on a sign, it’s the tshirt verse.
SO why?
Have you ever thought about why this is in there?
Why would Jesus say this?
Why does John write it down?
Why is this the ultimate verse?
Because this is the what the whole story of scripture hinges on.
“For God so loved the world that”
It means something for God to love the world.
The word love there is agape, its one of the four words the greek language has for love, and it is the strongest love, its unconditional love.
It is love that is not taken lightly.
This is the love spoken in wedding vows.
We only have one word for love,
and so that word has a ton of varying levels of meaning right?
Like, I love Price and Lauralee,
but I also Waffle House.
which one of those is the stronger love?
Looking at me you might say waffle house,
but It’s Price and Lauralee.
I’ll die for them, I’ll go to jail for them.
I’m not dying for Waffle House, you might die in a waffle house, but that’s different.
So this love is covenantal love.
Its is unconditional love that transcends feelings.
It is not determined by my emotional state.
It goes above feelings.
It is not determined by circumstances.
Unconditional
that’s the sort of love that is said here.
You could translate this almost as, And God so loved the world in this way?
and so that brings us back to the question, why?
P1 - Gen 3.
So flip with me back to the very beginning in Genesis, look at Gen. 3:15.
This is kicking off point of the story of redemption.
Right from the very beginning.
God has a plan to redeem the world.
The is this Fall, Adam and Eve have eaten the fruit they weren’t supposed to eat,
sin enters the world.
This corrupting element enters the world. Death enters the world.
And look what God says to the serpent, the one who tempted them.
Verse 15
15 I will put enmity between you and the woman,
and between your offspring and her offspring;
he shall bruise your head,
and you shall bruise his heel.”
This is the kicking off point for the redemptive story of scripture.
God has created everything,
God created everything good.
And what did we do?
We broke his world,
we allowed sin and death to enter in.
we chose to rebel against God.
and I know you might be sitting there thinking,
I didn’t eat the fruit.
You’re right you didn’t.
But because you are born a human, you have what we call a sin nature.
A bent towards sin, which is a result of the fall, it is a result of what Adam and Eve did.
We are complicit in that, and because of that, we are naturally sinful.
Like no one had to teach you how to lie, you just do that.
Price, has really started to display some of her inherent sin nature,
She doesn’t feel good right now, and she’s on some medication that really hypes her up,
the last few nights she has not wanted me to be in the room for her to go to sleep.
She literally pull on my shirt, and screamed “get out!” at me to leave.
Me and LL were talking about that and were like, where has she even seen tat modeled? We don’t treat each other that way,
where did she learn that,
and I kid you not we both were like, man that sin nature is coming out.
Sin is just a reality, our sin nature is just a reality
We are naturally drawn to sin, we like sinning,
we are good at sining, and sinning can be fun,
But just like the in the garden, sin leads to destruction.
They get kicked out, but not before God clothes them, and send them out, not forsaking them, but keeping them alive.
Something else had to die.
P2
And so then you keep moving through the old testament, the world gets bigger,
The redemptive plan in in motion.
God choses Abraham to be the start of his nation.
God is choosing one family out of the many different families and nations, to bring about the salvation to the rest of the families and nations.
in Exodus, God gives his law to the people.
The 10 Commandments.
And even in the book of Exodus, you see the people forget who God is,
they default to their sin nature.
They can’t do it through sheer will.
and so this becomes the story of the old testament.
The rebel, god judges, and restores, they worship God, then guess what, they rebel, God judges and restores, the worship,\
the cycle goes on.
And as the story moves through the Old Testament,
you start to hear the whispers of a coming one who is going to truly save his people.
The messiah,
The Old Testament points to the need of one to save the people.
Flip over to Isaiah 9:6-7 this s a famous prophecy given
6 For to us a child is born,
to us a son is given;
and the government shall be upon his shoulder,
and his name shall be called
Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God,
Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.
7 Of the increase of his government and of peace
there will be no end,
on the throne of David and over his kingdom,
to establish it and to uphold it
with justice and with righteousness
from this time forth and forevermore.
The zeal of the Lord of hosts will do this.
This is Isaiah the prophet speaking, in the midst of all this bad, all the war, all the judgment,
God is sending a messiah.
This is foreshadowing what happens in the new testament.
Flip over to Luke 2:11
11 For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.
See the similarities in words,
All of the Old Testament is leading up to this moment here.
The story that begins in the old testament comes to fruition right here in Luke.
P3
So back to John 3.
Nicodemus, would have known and studied all of these verses.
He would have been familiar with the history of the hebrew people.
He would have known these Old Testament passages better probably than we would have.
And yet he is confused.
Jesus is standing there telling him, that he is the one all of the scriptures are pointing towards,
that all of the OT is culminating in who Christ is.
and Nicodemus is confused.
And so, Jesus tells him.
For God so loved the world,
He starts the passage off that way.
Not in order to save his people.
Not for the fulfilment of the prophecies,
But, For God so loved.
That he gave his only son.
That who ever believes in him should not perish but have everlasting life.
So why? Why is the most famous verse?
Because in 6 verses it sums up the entire story of redemption.
It sums up the whole story of salvation.
It tells us where we have been, where we are and where we are going.
Look at the rest of the passage.
17 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. 18 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. 19 And this is the judgment: the light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil. 20 For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his works should be exposed. 21 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.”
verse 17-18 tells us what we already know, Christ came to save not condemn, because the world is already condemned.
We know that, that’s Gen 3, we are born with the sin nature.
God is coming to atone for that.
Whoever doesn’t believe, his state doesn’t change, he was already condemned.
It’s like if you’re standing in the street and giant truck is about to hit you, and someone is like he move, but you don’t believe in the truck.
So you’re like, nah.
It’s not going to hit me.
Whats going to happen?
You’re gonna get hit, but if you hear that the truck is coming and you move, you don’t
its the belief that changes the state.
And so this is what Christ came to do.
Save the world.
To bringing people into the light by coming into the world
Verse 19 John 3:19
19 And this is the judgment: the light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil.
Jesus is coming.
That is what advent remind us of and points our hearts toward.
Christ is coming to shine a light as either a beacon of hope peace, joy and love.
Or a light which drives out darkness.
Timeless truth:
here is the truth
This is what it means for the word to become flesh. This is what John meant in the beginning of the book that we read early,
5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.
Jesus is coming to shine a light, to bring us in to the light and save us, and to drive out the darkness.
Truth for our context
And so for us, the question then becomes are you going to step in to the light or not?
Are you going to see the light of Christ and follow it home? Follow it to him.
This passage is the gospel.
The He in Gen 3, he will crush his head, and the he in Isaiah and Luke, is the Son in John 3.
For god so loved you that he sent his son to die.
That is John 3:16, God so loved you, that he took your place.
But the good news is that he did not stay in the grave, but rose out of the grave.
The baby in the manger is the same person who walks out of the tomb.
We get to live in the reality of that love. That the love of God is manifested on the cross and in and out of the grave for us. For you.
P2Christ - its not the law that saves, but the person. step in to the light. what are you relying on?
So here is the invitation.
Believe in Him
step in to the light.
ask yourself, what do you rely on?
The whole Old Testament is the story of the hebrew people not being able to keep the law not being good enough.
Constantly need to be saved,
pointing to a need for a savior.
What does this passage tell us?
It is not good works, or law, or rules, or any thing that we can do to save ourself.
It’s not the law that saves you but the person who fulfilled the law that saves.
whoever believes in Him, is saved.
and so, ask yourself, what are you relying in?
Do you know Jesus, do you believe in Him?
If you want to know him, or what it means to follow him, come talk to me.
Talk to some one, talk to one of the adults.
So I want to leave you with this.
As you go into the business of the Christmas season, don’t get lost in the pace,
don’t get lost in the presents
all are a part of it
but remember why we celebrate
Remember why we have hope, why we have peace, why we have joy, why we have love,
because the light has come into the world.
Come see Christ as Lord, come see Christ as King.
pray with me .
