For God So Loved The World

In John chapter three, we read about a conversation between a man named Nicodemus and Jesus. Nicodemus was a Pharisee. This means he was a religious leader. He knew a lot about the Old Testament. He spent his time studying it and teaching it to others.

Jesus was unlike any other religious teacher in Israel. He was unlike anybody else on earth. He was gaining a lot of popularity. In today’s world, he would be YouTube or Tik Tok famous. He taught like nobody else and he could do things nobody else could do. Nicodemus, being the smart man that he is, began to recognize that these things could only be possible if Jesus was sent by God. So Nicodemus goes to Jesus late at night to speak with him about what has been going on.

Nicodemus tells Jesus that he knows he must have come from God because nobody could do the things he does if he has not come from God. Jesus does not address the truth of that statement. Rather, Jesus says something that sounds kind of bizarre: If you want to see the kingdom of God, you have to be born again. Nicodemus thinks Jesus is talking about being physically born a second time, but this isn’t what Jesus meant. He tells Nicodemus that someone has to be born of water and of the Spirit. What Jesus is telling Nicodemus is that he has to be born spiritually, not physically if he wants to enter into the kingdom of God.

Nicodemus has a hard time understanding this and Jesus tells him that it is because he has not accepted what Jesus has said as true. He says in verse 12:

John 3:12 NASB95

“If I told you earthly things and you do not believe, how will you believe if I tell you heavenly things?

In other words, Nicodemus, if you haven’t believed the things that are easier to believe, how can you believe in the things that are more difficult? It’s like math. If you don’t know the basics of math (addition, subtraction, multiplication, division), how do you expect to understand Algebra, geometry, trigonometry, or calculus? We have to understand the basic truths of life if we are going to understand the more complex.

Jesus provides something Nicodemus knows. He says in verse 14:

John 3:14–15 NASB95

“As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up; so that whoever believes will in Him have eternal life.

You see, in the book of Numbers, a book Nicodemus knows well, there is a story about some serpents that came and bit the Israelites while they were wandering in the desert. People started dying from snake bites. So God tells Moses to make a serpent out of bronze and place it on a staff (a wooden pole). Anyone who looks at the serpent on the staff will live and not die. In the same way, Jesus is telling Nicodemus that the same is true of himself. Whoever looks upon Jesus when He his hung on the cross and believes in Him will have eternal life.

Then Jesus says one of the most important things in all the Bible:

John 3:16 NASB95

“For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life.

Now let’s take this verse that we know so well and break it up. The statement begins with “For God so loved the world.” The theme this morning is love, but not just any love, God’s love. God’s love is different than any kind of love on the planet.

We use the same word to talk about many different kinds of love. When I say that I love Marci and I love my best friend Paul, I mean two very different things. I do not love them both in the exact same way. The way I love Marci and Paul are different than the way I love my brother Jared or my sister Janae. But we use the same word for all of them. The Bible doesn’t do that. Since Greek is the original language the book of John was written in, there are several words for love, all of them describing different types of love. The one used for the love of God describes an unconditional, unfailing love. It is the deepest kind of love anyone can have for someone else, and God has that kind of love for you and me.

God’s love for you never fails or ends.

Dr. Gary Chapman wrote a book years ago called the five love languages. In the book, he describes five ways in which people show and receive love for one another. The 5 love languages are:

5 Love Languages:

Acts of service

Giving/receiving gifts

Quality time

Words of affirmation

Physical touch

Your love language is acts of service if it means more to you than anything when someone does something nice for you. Making breakfast for mom on Mother’s Day, doing extra chores around the house when nobody asked you to, or simply helping someone with something they are already doing are ways this love language is expressed. When the laundry is done before Marci gets home is an act of service that she appreciates. By doing that for her, I communicate to her through action that I love her.

If you feel great when someone gives you a gift, regardless of size or value, your love language might be gift giving/receiving. If you get a bunch of packages in the mail that you didn’t buy, and are kind of hoping one of them is for you, this is a good indication that your love language is gift giving. This love language is expressed by the joy one feels when they receive a gift from someone else or the joy one fees when giving the gift to someone else.

Your love language is quality time if spending time with someone one-on-one is extremely valuable to you. If you just like to hang out and spend time with people, this is your love language. It doesn’t matter what the activity is or if there even is one. If spending time with you is what gets you excited, this is your love language.

If you love it when someone tells you that you’re doing a good job, or you look beautiful, or notices you got a new haircut, or something like that, your love language is likely words of affirmation. This is expressed through encouragement, affirmation, and empathy.

If you feel love through a hug, holding hands, or some other means of physical contact, physical touch is your love language. Now the key here is appropriate physical touch. This one is a big one for me. The worst thing Marci can do to me if we get in an argument is withhold physical contact. We can say we are sorry, spend time together, do stuff for each other, but I will not know if I actually believe it until she physically touches me again through a hug, placing her hand on my arm, something. Only then will I know that she loves me and meant what she said.

Now here’s the big question:

Which love language is God’s love language?

All of them!

The point here is this: love is far more than a noun. It is a verb. Love demands demonstration or it is not love. So we read that God so loved the world, that (the result of the clause preceding it) He gave (the demonstrable action taken) His only Son.

Now I want you to focus on the word only right before Son. The word only indicates there is one. When it’s gone, it’s gone. It can’t be replaced. When you only have one of something, it is harder to part with because of its meaning and value to the one who possesses it.

What do you only have one of that would be very difficult for you to part with?

I have many things in my house. There are many things that I only have one of. But as I was thinking about this concept, I realized that though I have one of many things, those things are replaceable. So I kept thinking to myself, what is one thing that I have that if I lost or had to give up, could not be replaced. I remembered I have a small container of my grandmother’s powder. It’s one item I can’t replace.

God gave His only Son. Far more important than a trinket or a token, but a person. He couldn’t replace him. He couldn’t create another one, be cause like Him, he is uncreated. His value is immeasurable. It cannot be weighed or compared. There is nothing you or I have that even comes close to the value of Jesus. Yet, because 's love is unending and unconditional, He gave us that which is most precious to Him. The preciousness of the gift demonstrates the greatness of his love.

As we continue through the verse we come across another conjunction. The word that, like the one before it, means because the previous is true, so is what is about to be said. Because God loves us, and because He gave us His Son, then whoever believes in Him, the gift given, should not perish, but have eternal life. Belief is the response to the gift of God’s only Son. Love is a two way street. Love works when two people give of themselves to one another. One gives of himself while the other responds with giving of herself. If it is only one-sided, then it does not work. The giving of the gift amounts to nothing if nobody gives themselves (the response of belief/trust) in return.

Two benefits are seen as a result of this belief:

Benefits of believing in Jesus:

You will not perish.

You will have eternal life.

Notice the first is a negation of something tragic, while the second is an affirmation of something desirable. These benefits are made more clear in the following verses.

John 3:17–18 NASB95

“For God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through Him. “He who believes in Him is not judged; he who does not believe has been judged already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.

Jesus is teaching Nicodemus God’s purpose in sending His Son. He sent His Son not to condemn the world, but to bring salvation. God will one day bring judgment on His creation. Those who believe in the Son He sent is not judged, but the one who does not is judged on the basis of his disbelief. It all comes down to what we believe about Jesus. Do you believe that Jesus was sent by God to pay the penalty of your sins and mine, or was he somebody else?

John 3:19–21 NASB95

“This is the judgment, that the Light has come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the Light, for their deeds were evil. “For everyone who does evil hates the Light, and does not come to the Light for fear that his deeds will be exposed. “But he who practices the truth comes to the Light, so that his deeds may be manifested as having been wrought in God.”

The fundamental problem for humanity is we love darkness rather than the light. The light teaches us that the darkness is evil. But we learned this week that like Daniel, we must do good by obeying God. Jesus came and showed us what obeying God looks like.