John 3, Part 2
Notes
Transcript
Last week, we looked at the interaction between Jesus and Nicodemus. Nicodemus asked questions of the “Rabbi”, saying he knew that the signs and miracles he performed could not have been done without God. Instead of answering the question directly, Jesus responded to him that one must be born again to see the kingdom of God. Of course, this brings more questions about how one could be physically born again… Jesus explains this is not a physical birth, but spiritual. Next comes the most recognized scripture - which displays God’s great love for the world.
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.
Notice the first part of the sentence - God so loved the world. This was not a love of only the religious and good, but for every man and woman ever born. NO ONE is exempt from the love of God.
Love - agapeo - it is a showing, a demonstration of God’s love ; The Greek term for divine love as opposed to worldly love.
Notice loved is past tense, God has already proved Himself and this is a stated fact.
God demonstrated His love for the world by sending His only Son.
True love expresses itself, it doesn’t sit still and not do anything. It’s not dormant, complacent, inactive. If love actually exists, it has to act and express itself; it has to do something good. Love is loving; that is, love is always demonstrating love to others.
God demonstrated His love in the most perfect way possible: He gave His only begotten Son to the world. As God, He is perfect, which means His love is perfect. Therefore, God not only loves, but He so loves. He loves to perfection, loves to the ultimate degree. Whatever the ultimate degree and the perfect act and expression of love is, God shows it. Without question, the greatest act of love is the sacrifice of a man’s own life; therefore, God sacrificed the life of His own Son to save man.
A most glorious evidence of God’s love is that God took the initiative to save man. Man did not seek to save himself; God sought to save him. God gave His Son so that we might be forgiven and saved. The most glorious truth is that God gave His only begotten Son. This is the most remarkable proof of God’s love. It magnifies and shows how great His love really is. He was willing to give the thing most dear to His heart in order to save the world. Note this: God even planned to give His Son throughout eternity.
Why? So that we might not perish. Perish - to be lost, utterly destroyed, spiritually destitute, lose the chance of eternal life. This means if one does not accept Jesus as their personal Savior, that they will die, will face judgment, will be condemned, will suffer separation from God, and will experience hell. God chose a way so we would not have to perish. Wouldn’t have to experience all these things IF we believe in Jesus.
The next verse gives us a deeper understanding of WHY God sent His Son to this earth to die in place of us.
Verse 17 shows proof of God’s love - God sent His Son into the world. Jesus BECAME flesh just as John tells us in John 1:14
14 And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.
And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.
He was sent, not to condemn the world - not to point out how we could never live up to God’s standards, not how we were depraved and not worthy of heaven, not to be judged on our failures, but instead so the whole world could be saved. His purpose was to save us from perishing and to save us to eternal life.
We were no longer were sentenced to perish - to be lost and spiritually destitute and without a chance of eternal life, but instead so the world could be saved and HAVE the opportunity of eternal life. Jesus is our means of salvation! Salvation is through Him (Christ Jesus) and through Him alone.
The fact that God truly loves ALL is shocking to many. Some wonder and others question how God could possibly love the …
• vile person
• murderer
• immoral person
• wife beater
• child abuser
• prostitute
• thief
• alcoholic
• street person
• oppressor
• enslaver
• bitter, vengeful
The better question might be, what if God didn’t love US the same way he loved all these others because, truthfully, which of our sins are less “sinful” than those listed? Just because we “think” of “big” or “little” sins, God only sees sin.
Man Condemns Himself
Man Condemns Himself
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.”
God sent His Son into the world to save the world, but this does not mean that everyone is automatically saved. In fact, some are condemned and doomed. Jesus reveals man’s condemnation. Who is condemned? Not the believer, but the unbeliever.
The critical importance of belief cannot be overstressed. Belief stays, prevents, arrests, and stops judgment. The believer is saved. He is as guilty as the unbeliever, but there is one critical difference: the believer believes on Jesus Christ and has committed his life to Him. The believer is actively and diligently seeking Christ (He. 11:6). God will save any man who will believe and seek and honor His Son.
6 And without faith it is impossible to please him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.
The believer is released from condemnation because he believes on Christ. The believer believes that Christ died for his sins, in his place, as his substitute, paying the penalty for his sins (which was death).
It is the UNBELIEVER that is condemned. Note who the unbeliever is. He is the person who has “not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.” God has only one begotten Son. The man who has not already believed on God’s Son is the unbeliever. It does not matter who the man is or where he is; he is an unbeliever if he has not already believed on the only begotten Son of God. They are in a lost state in this world, and in a lost state in the world to come.
-When is the unbeliever condemned? Already, right now. It is not that he is to be condemned; he is already condemned. At least three things are meant by being “condemned already”. Condemnation is a sure fact. The unbeliever’s judgment is sure, so sure it is as though he has already been condemned. Nothing can change or stop the judgment from coming upon the unbeliever. Ignoring, denying, and struggling against the great day of judgment will not change one detail of the day. It is coming, and every single unbeliever will be judged.
The unbeliever is already under the present curse of sin. He is … without Christ, an alien from the people of God, a stranger to the promises of God, without hope, and without God in the world (Ep. 2:12).
12 remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world.
The unbeliever already stands guilty of all the sins he has ever committed; he is already condemned. The law of God already exists. Every time a man breaks the law of God, he immediately becomes guilty and is condemned. The judgment is already pronounced. The unbeliever must pay the penalty for every transgression of God’s law. He is already under the curse, the full force of the law.
Christ is the great remedy for man’s sins. Therefore, unbelief—rejecting and refusing to believe Him—is the great sin. The unbeliever is condemned because Light has come into the world. The Light came into the world to give light to men, to enable men to walk out of the darkness of a sinful and perishing world. The Light came to show men the way, the truth, and the life: The Light shows man the way God intends for him to live, The Light shows man the truth of life, that is, the truth of God and of man and of the world that surrounds man, The Light shows man the truth of life, that is, the truth of God and of man and of the world that surrounds man.
The point is this: the life of Jesus Christ now stands in the world to give Light. Any man who does not turn and walk in the Light is naturally in the dark. He is condemned to the darkness and to all that happens to those who walk in the darkness.
The unbeliever is condemned because he loves darkness. Why would he love darkness? Because his deeds are evil, and to turn and walk in the Light would expose his evil deeds for what they are: immoral, unrighteous, and disobedient to God. There are at least four reasons why man prefers to walk in darkness and prefer to hang on to his sins.
The unbeliever loves his sin and does not want to turn and face the conviction of the Light. If he turned to the Light, He would have to give up his sin; and he loves the feeling, the stimulation, the comfort, the ease, the challenge, the recognition, the power, the fame, the possessions, the things which the sin brings. He loves it all too much to give it up.
The unbeliever loves his sin and does not want to turn and face the conviction of the Light. If he turned to the Light, He would have to give up his sin; and he loves the feeling, the stimulation, the comfort, the ease, the challenge, the recognition, the power, the fame, the possessions, the things which the sin brings. He loves it all too much to give it up.
The unbeliever is enslaved, in bondage to sin and gripped by the darkness; he has been in darkness so long that he does not have the strength to break the enslavement.
The unbeliever is enslaved, in bondage to sin and gripped by the darkness; he has been in darkness so long that he does not have the strength to break the enslavement.
The unbeliever is uncomfortable in the Light. Therefore, he shuns everything that presents the Light to him: the church, believers, the Bible, prayer, and spiritual conversation.
Note that unbelievers are said to hate the Light. They ignore, reject, deny, and fight the Light. They speak and write against it, ridicule and curse it, persecute and seek to stamp it out.
-Who escapes condemnation? The man who does three things.
a. The man who practices truth and lives righteously escapes condemnation. He knows what is right and he does it. The verb is continuous action. He practices truth, continually and habitually. Note two things about this man.
1) This does not mean he lives perfectly, without ever sinning. No man is or can be perfect. It means that the man directs his life toward truth: diligently seeks the truth and seeks to be truthful. He may slip and sin, but he immediately turns back to God, repenting and hanging on to his integrity.
2) Christ said that the man who does truth hears His voice (Jn. 18:37; 1 Jn. 1:6). Only the man who desires truth is saved, and every man who comes to the truth is saved. Christ is truth.
The man who comes to the Light escapes condemnation. Only the Light (Christ) can dispel the darkness in a man’s life.
The man whose works are wrought in God escapes condemnation. The word wrought (eirgasmena) means to work, produce, perform, originate, manufacture, and fashion from something. The idea is that the man comes to Christ (the Light) p 69 so that his works will be “wrought,” originated, and worked in and of God. The man who comes to Christ lives close to God. He walks and talks and listens to God (His Word), and he does what God says.
15 And if anyone’s name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire.
27 But nothing unclean will ever enter it, nor anyone who does what is detestable or false, but only those who are written in the Lamb’s book of life.
5 The one who conquers will be clothed thus in white garments, and I will never blot his name out of the book of life. I will confess his name before my Father and before his angels.
