What Does "Believe" Mean?

John 3:16 ESV

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

This all I need to Know

Have an Idea of who Jesus is...

Know that / believe that He is the Son of God

Understand the factuality of...

They are saved from their sins and have received salvation

John 3:17 ESV

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.

1st verse memorized as a child

One of the most well-known Bible verse in the world

This verse encapsulate the

1 Timothy 2:4 ESV

who desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.

2 Peter 3:9 ESV

The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.

1. God Gave Us More than John 3:16

Jesus taught more than John 3:16

John wrote more than this verse

The Holy Spirit inspired men to write more than

Manuals to cars, Instruction to put something together

Only do 1% what your Father said, or Boss

Acts 20:20–21 ESV

how I did not shrink from declaring to you anything that was profitable, and teaching you in public and from house to house, testifying both to Jews and to Greeks of repentance toward God and of faith in our Lord Jesus Christ.

2. Words Have Different Meanings

Have to very careful how we interpret words

The set has the most meaning according the Genes Book of World Records 60K words describe 40 different senses of SET

I Object to that Object

Overlook

Know and know on a deeper level

1 Samuel 3:7 ESV

Now Samuel did not yet know the Lord, and the word of the Lord had not yet been revealed to him.

In biblical matters have to know the context

Matthew 7:1 ESV

“Judge not, that you be not judged.

3. What Does Believe Mean

Believe according to St. Webster

“To consider to be true”

“To hold as an opinion”

“To suppose” or “to think”

“To accept as true or real”

John 14:6 ESV

Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.

What people heard in not necessarily what God meant

John 3:14–15 ESV

And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.

Numbers 21:6–9 ESV

Then the Lord sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the people, so that many people of Israel died. And the people came to Moses and said, “We have sinned, for we have spoken against the Lord and against you. Pray to the Lord, that he take away the serpents from us.” So Moses prayed for the people. And the Lord said to Moses, “Make a fiery serpent and set it on a pole, and everyone who is bitten, when he sees it, shall live.” So Moses made a bronze serpent and set it on a pole. And if a serpent bit anyone, he would look at the bronze serpent and live.

John 3:5 ESV

Jesus answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.