Sermon Tone Analysis

Introduction

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John 3:

As we are working through the 3rd chapter of the Apostle John’s Gospel let me remind you that the apostle has a single purpose for those who read this gospel account which differs from Matthew, Mark, and Luke greatly.

John’s Gospel is not just a picture of a historical event (though it is that too), but it has a single purpose for the audience of: past (John’s original audience the 1st century New Testament church), present (for us today who gather in obedience to worship Christ as our Savior), and future (for those in which if we are obedient to our command will carry forth this good news as a torch; a light into a very dark world).

John’s Gospel has a single focus for its reader.

John reveals this purpose nearly at the end of his gospel, though this focus begins in chapter 1 and never leaves even as the Apostle dots the last period, his pressing into the papyrus (paper) is felt like a compression on our chests even to this very day.

The Apostle John’s single focus and purpose can be found in .

“so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life […] in his name.”

As we Jesus speaks to the great teacher of that day, Nicodemus (A Pharisee) he also speaks to us.

And may the words of the Apostle’s meditation on the truth of Jesus and His life-giving work, stir your affections to Him and Him alone.

As we dive specifically into vv.16-21

today, lean in.

This word brings life and hope.

This word has heart.

Frank Bruner, in his commentary about , says:

The verse deserves underlying as the heart of the Gospel of John.

I would echo Bruner in that statement, but also raise to each of us to behold something that gives rhythm to Bruner’s truth and our reality.

Let’s dial it up a notch as we cling to the Apostle’s purpose.

Here’s what we must understand:

The heartbeat of New Birth is belief in Jesus.

repeat

Exposition

Within this text let us look at four truths that give life to both the Apostle’s purpose and why new birth (regeneration) can only exist in glory of God’s gift of belief.

1.

The Heartbeat of God’s Love (): 

The heartbeat of God’s love is belief in His only Son, Jesus Christ, in which He gave in order to rescue those awakened to His grace by faith to eternal life.

This should not become “the Jesus post-it note” on the refrigerator of our hearts.

With intent to remember but allowing to blend into the worldly clutter of everything else stowed away there.

To reduce this to simply memory while not feeling the compression of the Apostle’s weighty meditation of God’s truth is to be spiritually, and comfortably numb, in a war that we pretend is in someone else’s life.

The weight of Spiritual warfare and its cost ways heavy in this text and we must understand that God’s heart is a heart of love and grace and one that gives His very best for His very worst.

Bruner puts it this way:

The wonderful divine way into the Spirit’s transformation is simple trust in the divine-human Son given for and to us needy creatures in the whole wide world.

Here we learn that the source of the Son’s self-gift is God the Father’s deeply loving surrender of his Son for us and to us.

NT scholar and theologian Don Carson draws us into the weightiness even more when he says,

Here is what you need to know:

the words ‘his one and only Son’ stress the greatness of the gift.

The Father gave his best, his unique and beloved Son.

Carson immediately backs this statement up by referencing the Apostle Pauls words about God’s love in

Again, I compel you to hear me: The heartbeat of God’s love is belief in His only Son, Jesus Christ, in which He gave in order to rescue those awakened to His grace by faith to eternal life.

the words ‘his one and only Son’ (cf.

notes on 1:14) stress the greatness of the gift.

The Father gave his best, his unique and beloved SonHere is what you need to know:

Here is what you need to know:

The heartbeat of New Birth is belief in Jesus.

So, First we are to see the heartbeat of God’s love in this text.

Next we are to see...

2. The Heartbeat is Redemptive Life (): 

The heartbeat of redemptive life is belief in Christ alone, not given as a means of blame and shame, but as a means of grace and restoration back to the God in which we have all sinned against.

John 3:17-18

Again let Scripture interpret Scripture, as the Apostle Paul rightly proclaims:

Why?

Because of BELIEF in Jesus Christ!

The Son of God.

Let this truth was over you.

And hear what its saying instead of reading through unworthy lenses.

God designed this FOR unworthy lenses to have hope when they gaze upon it.

The problem is that when we approach it we are either doing some “drive-by glancing” that is misdirected, scattered, and unintentional.

OR… we read it from a believing yet complacent heart, or an unbelieving realistic heart.

Not understanding the supernatural realm in which our God works.

We easily will limit Him with our finite minds missing the bountiful blessings in which His Holy Spirit poured out of His Apostle.

We struggle in the tension of this because put to the test, we think we deserve this king of forgiveness, but rarely would we give it.

We are steeped in the knowledge of knowing our own condemnation so much so it becomes comforting and “the it is” instead of accepting the truth and believing their is a God who would sacrifice so much for someone so undeserving because we surly couldn’t.

We can hurdle over this passage with too much self-confidence or we can dodge it because of too little.

And lets just call that what it is…A lack of faith in the God who can and did rescue an underserving world.

The heartbeat of New Birth is belief in Jesus.

See often we would rather highlight the sin, instead of the Savior who takes it away.

And when we do that we find ourselves experiencing the third truth of this text...

3. The Heartbeat that Flatlines (): 

The heartbeat that flatlines does so because there is no belief in Jesus.

The judgment of God awaits both the believer and the unbeliever.

The one whose heart beats for Christ is seen faultless on Christ’s finished work alone, and lives restored to God.

However, the one who has no belief in Christ has no heartbeat and is found guilty of all works (good or bad) a part from faith in Christ.

The absence of belief is the absence of life.

I’m going to let my boy Don Carson drop some knowledge on us.

Listen to this.

He says:

while the lover of darkness shuns the light out of fear of exposure, shame and conviction, the lover of light does not prance forward to parade his wares with cocky self-righteousness, but comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what he has done has been done through God.

This strange expression makes it clear that the lover of light is not some intrinsically superior person.

Carson goes on to say:

These verses do not tell us how one moves from the darkness to the light, i.e. how one becomes a true disciple, a ‘Christian’, but simply focuses on the fundamental distinction that must be made between those who at the moment are rejecting the ultimate revelation of God in Jesus Christ, and those who are delighting in it.

The one follows its course because its deeds are evil; the other follows its course not because its deeds are righteous, but because it longs to show that its deeds have been done through God.

These verses do not tell us how one moves from the darkness to the light, i.e. how one becomes a true disciple, a ‘Christian’, but simply focuses on the fundamental distinction that must be made between those who at the moment are rejecting the ultimate revelation of God in Jesus Christ, and those who are delighting in it.

These verses do not tell us how one moves from the darkness to the light, i.e. how one becomes a true disciple, a ‘Christian’, but simply focuses on the fundamental distinction that must be made between those who at the moment are rejecting the ultimate revelation of God in Jesus Christ, and those who are delighting in it.

These verses do not tell us how one moves from the darkness to the light, i.e. how one becomes a true disciple, a ‘Christian’, but simply focuses on the fundamental distinction that must be made between those who at the moment are rejecting the ultimate revelation of God in Jesus Christ, and those who are delighting in it.

The heartbeat that flatlines does so because there is no belief in Jesus.

And the judgment of God awaits.

That’s why we must understand that...

The heartbeat that flatlines does so because there is no belief in Jesus.

And the judgment of God awaits.

The heartbeat that flatlines does so because there is no belief in Jesus.

And the judgment of God awaits.

That’s why we must understand that...

That’s why we must understand that...

The heartbeat of New Birth is belief in Jesus.

So the text teaches us about:

The heartbeat of God’s love

[that] The heartbeat is redemptive life

[also it teaches us about] The heartbeat that flatlines, and...

This text teaches us about...

4. The Heartbeat Restores Truth and Light ():