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know it's, it's something about
an old saying that say the last, the best for last. Well that's
not true today. You're not getting the best.
But you are getting one thing, you're getting the oldest. You're
getting the oldest. So turn with me if you would
to John chapter 3, I'll get to talking
in a minute, then I probably can't stop. John chapter 3, our text is verse
16, the love of God. One verse, one verse. And we look at this verse, Probably
in familiarity, it's probably one of the most familiar verses
in the Bible, along with Matthew 7.1 where, judge not that you
be not judged. You could ask people walking
down the street to give, quote, a Bible verse to you, and they're
probably gonna give you one of those. So, it's a pretty well-known
fact, This is a well-known verse. It's a household verse. It's
a verse I learned in Sunday school quite a few years ago. Learned
how to quote this verse. But the problem I've had for
many years, or did have for many years, as probably some of you
did, is understanding this verse. This one little verse is probably
one of the most misunderstood verses in the Bible. I think it's not just misunderstood,
it is greatly misunderstood. And so when we look at the Bible,
we begin to study the Bible, and we read verses, and we interpret
those verses wrong, we're in trouble. There's consequences
from that. So before we really get into
this verse today, I want to give us some consequences of interpreting
scripture incorrectly. If we interpret scripture incorrectly,
we're going to have a distorted doctrine of man. We might think that God loves
us all so much because we are so lovable. Remember, we're speaking about
the love of God. And I will say this before I
go any further. The love of God is way over my head. I can't
understand it all. I definitely can't understand
why he loves me. But he does. But some people just have the
idea that they're so lovable, God just loves them. We may think
sometimes people think that the main point of this verse is It's
showing what we're really worth. We're not worth anything, you
know. But the point is, it's not our
worth. It's not our worth to God, but
his worth to us, to us. You know, sometimes we think
that we as law centers, or as were law centers, that Christ just couldn't save
us. It was just too much. Too much
for him to save centers like us. And then when we get to thinking
about ourselves as being so good, You know, we're just so good. God just loves us because of
what I do. We try to take away the glory
that he deserves, because it's all about him. There's no glory
to come to us. All glory is to come to Christ.
And we have to remember that. Another thing, we don't understand
this verse. We don't have a distorted doctrine
of God. We're not going to understand who God is. To understand who God is, we
have to understand God's love. We need to understand God's love. You know, people, some people,
I think that God's, that they think that God sent his son to
die for them because he needed them. And he couldn't bear to
be without them. You know, people think that he
can't live without them. They might get to thinking that
he won't send anyone to hell. Yes, God is a God of love, but
he's also a God of wrath. And when people begin to think
that they're just so good that he just won't do that, they're
looking at this verse wrong. That's wrong. We might even begin to think
that God was uncertain who would believe in him, and that he sent
Christ in hope that people would believe in him. But what kind
of thinking is this? Well, that kind of thinking strips
God of his divine nature, characterizing him as a wishful deity, that
he's just sitting on the edge of his throne, waiting to see
whether or not his plans are going to succeed. You say, well,
people, I don't think that. Well, you may not. But there's
a lot of people thinking about God as this way, that he's just
so lovable that he's not gonna send me to hell. I just do so
much good that he won't send me to hell. Well, I'm just gonna go ahead
and say this before we go any further. That's not the God of the Bible. He is who he says he is. Then if we don't understand this
verse correctly, we're not going to understand the doctrine of
faith. We may think that because we believe in a few spiritual
things, that we believe a few of the facts that the Bible teaches
us about Christ, you know, deceive ourselves, about the condition
of our souls. We may think that faith is our
gift to God, or rather God's gift to us. We may even think
that we are saved by our free will, rather than by his sovereign
will. Y'all know as well as I do that
so many people, the majority of people, believe that their
salvation is totally left up to them. They can accept him
or they can deny him. And people that think like that,
they trust in themselves instead of trusting in Christ. And then
again, the wrong interpretation of John 3, 16 will cause us to
have a distorted doctrine of eternal life. A lot of people don't understand
about eternal life. I don't understand it all. I
won't stand here and claim that I do. But I do know this. You know, it's not going to be
a life that we just have endless pleasures that we are going to
be able to continue doing what we want to do. So you see people living in this
world, living out of the world, they do what they want to do.
They do it when they want to do it. They do it how they want
to do it. But we as Christians, we see
things a little bit different. But even as us as Christians,
do we understand what this verse is teaching us? Do we really? So before we get into what this
text means, we need to keep several things in mind. The one I made,
John 3, 16, is just one verse in the entire Bible. It's not
a chapter. It's not a book. It's just one
verse. And that one verse by itself
is not capable of teaching us the broad scopes of the doctrine
of this Bible. Not that one verse is not. This verse, as I say, is part
of a chapter, which is part of the Gospel of John, which is
part of the Bible. And it should be interpreted
in light of the overall context. You know, Christ never, never
set John 3.16 apart as a verse above all verses. He never did
that. John 3.16 is no more inspired
than any other verse in the Bible. All of God's Word, is inspired
by God. It is his word. But we can't
pull out verses like this and use them to our own benefit.
We can't just pull out verses like this and say it means this
without knowing what else is taught about the same thing.
And we want to see some of that today. So, to understand this first,
we have to look at the context. We can go back and start again
of John 3, Chapter 3 there. Instead of assuming that believers
in Christ is a free will choice, we have to examine what these
verses teaches. And we have to say what we find
in John 3, 1 through 8. We say there is a teaching on
the rebirth, which refutes that assumption about our own free
will. We see there that Nicodemus, a Pharisee, had come to Jesus
by night and acknowledged that he, talking about Jesus, had
come from God. As we read verses three and five,
it says, Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say
unto thee, except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom
of God. Nicodemus said unto him, how can a man be born when he
is old? Can he enter the second time into his mother's womb and
be born? Jesus answered, verily, verily, I say unto thee, except
a man be born of water and of the spirit, he cannot enter into
the kingdom of God. So we see Nicodemus didn't understand
Jesus and thought he was referring to a physical childbirth. Then
in verses six through eight, We see what Jesus replied to
him and said, he said, that which is born of the flesh is flesh,
and that which is born of the spirit is spirit. Marvel not
that I said unto thee, you must be born again, or really born
from above. Says the wind bloweth where it
listed, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not
tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth. So is every one that
is born of the spirit. So in other words, what Jesus
is telling Nicodemus there, that the rebirth, being born again,
is the act of the Spirit's will, not the human will. We're not
in control of salvation, God is. In teaching like this, it
takes away all the confidence man has to trust in free will. Trusting in free will, even the
sinner's prayer, Many good works. Jesus' question in Nicodemus
in verse 10 could be asked of preachers today, where he says,
are you the teacher of Israel and do not understand these things?
You know, we shouldn't be surprised that a lot of preachers don't
understand the basis of the gospel. We see it nearly everywhere we
go, everything that we listen to, they don't understand. They don't understand that salvation is by the will of God, not the
will of man. We can see that these verses
leading up to John 3.16 teach something different from the
assumption that's usually made on this verse. Then as we look
backward in the Gospel of John, we see a similar truth in John
1.12 and 13. He says there, but as many as
received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God,
even to them that believed on his name, which were born not
of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of
man, but of God. You know, we often think that
receiving Christ is an act of our will, which results in our
new birth. But here in verse 13, John refutes
that idea. Here he's telling us that our
birth, that is our rebirth, is not of blood. It's not of lineage,
you could say that. It's not because of who our parents
was. It wasn't because of this or that. It's because of him. It wasn't because of us. It wasn't
because of our lineage, nor the will of the flesh, which is our
own will, nor the will of man, that could be the will of someone
else, but of God. It's God that brings about the
rebirth, not our will. And this is what Jesus was teaching
Nicodemus. We must be born again by the
spirit of God. He told him the spirit blows
where it pleases. We can't control him. We can't
make him save anyone. We can't predict where he's gonna
move the next time. We can't predict who he's gonna
save next. We can't tell him to save our
lost loved one. The spirit of God moves Where
and when did he decide? Not us. Not us. So, all this can't be ignored
when we begin to look at John 3 and 16. And we shouldn't interpret
John 3 and 16 in a way that contradicts what has already been taught
in the verses we've just read. And the same truth is taught
in John 6 and 44. Jesus said, no one can come to
me unless the Father who sent me draws him, and I will raise
him up on the last day. Here Jesus is teaching that men,
we don't have the ability to come to him unless the Father
is drawing us. And that's through the working
of the Holy Spirit. We know, we've heard, we should
understand that a dead man can't do nothing. Can't do anything. Think about that, and I think
about when Jesus called Lazarus from the tomb. He said, Lazarus,
come forth. He called his name. And what
did Lazarus do? He came forth. He had to hear Jesus calling. If he hadn't heard that, he'd
still been there. And so it is with us today. If
God's spirit don't call us and draw us to him, we will never
come. Because we're dead. Lost man
is dead in his trespasses and sin, and he cannot come. He cannot
come. So we can see that the context
of our verse today has to shape our interpretation of what this
verse is saying. We can't ignore what all these
other passages say. A lot of people do, but it's
wrong. We can't interpret this verse
without first being able to understand what these other verses say. Then we can look a little bit
further there in this chapter, and we see that Jesus makes reference
in verses 14 and 15 there to Moses lifting up the bronze serpent
in the wilderness. He says, in the same way, the
Son of Man must be lifted up so that all those believing in
him should have eternal life. This context helps us understand
the meaning of believing. Because the Israelites, the ones
that were bitten by the serpent, because of their grumbling and
complaining against God, they believed that meant that
they had to look up to the bronze serpent, trusting in God for
their salvation from death. And that's the analogy that Jesus
used to introduce the subject of believing in John 3 in 15
and 16. We can see that faith as they
look into the crucified Christ, trusting that he alone is the
God-appointed provision for our salvation. It is looking to Christ
alone, trusting in his death as the only acceptable sacrifice
for our sins. Now with all that being said, we begin to look at this verse.
Let's break it down and see what it says. Hopefully, and with God's help,
we can understand what Jesus is saying here to Nicodemus and
to us with his help. So let's start as the verse started. Let's talk about God's love,
the love of God. And I'm sure that we've all heard
questions asked about God's love. So maybe we can answer some of
those questions today. Questions like, when did God
start loving us? How did we receive this love?
Who does God love? How does he show this love? What did God's love cost him? Why does God love us? And I could
go on and on. But these and many more questions
could be asked. Let's start over in Romans 8
chapter. You want to follow along if you
don't want to just read what it says. Romans 8 verses 35 through
39. Read these verses to bring out
one point because we don't have time to deposit all these verses.
But there we see the Apostle Paul says, beginning in verse
35, who shall separate, and look at these little words, the little
words. Who shall separate us from the
love of Christ? Shall tribulation or distress
or persecution or famine or nakedness or pearl or sword? As it is written,
for thy sake we are killed all the day long. We are counted
as sheep for the slaughter. Nay, in all these things we are
more than conquerors through him that loved us. For I am persuaded
that neither death nor life nor angels nor principalities nor
power nor things present nor things to come nor height nor
depth nor any other creature shall be able to separate us
from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. So that little word, the word
us in verse 39 means God's people. So we read of the love which
is in Christ Jesus our Lord. And I'll throw this in too. There
is no love outside of Christ. That's where all of God's love
to us comes from. It comes to us through Christ. And we need to remember that. Remember, there is no love of
God outside of Christ. And if I read a verse or two,
a quote, a verse or two that's been already used today, then
it was meant to be. Psalm 145 and I say, the Lord
is good to all, and his tender mercies are over all his works.
Luke 6, 35, he is kind unto the thankful and to the evil. Matthew 5.45, I heard this today. He maketh his son to rise on
the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and
on the unjust. We see that the Lord is good
to all. And I'm not standing here before
you today and telling you that God is not good to all. But what
I'm trying to tell you today is God loves his people and he
has sent his people for the blessings. We are the ones who receive the
blessings. So the Lord is good to all, but
his love is reserved to his elect. and I'm talking about his redemptive
love. We'll get a little bit more about this other, we heard
a little bit about this morning, we'll go a little bit further
with it in just a few minutes. It's God's love, his redemptive
love is reserved for his elect. And the word world in John 3,
16 is used there in a general term, used in contrast with the
Jews, and it must be interpreted in a way that it does not contradict
John 3 in 36. John 3 in 36 says this, Whoever believes in the Son has
eternal life, but whoever rejects the Son will not see life, for
God's wrath remains on him. Since God loves his people in
Christ, we can understand that we, you know, we didn't do nothing
during that love. I hope we can understand that.
He loves us. He loves us in Christ, not because
of who we are, what we have done, what we're going to do. No, he
loves us in Christ. He chose us before the foundation
of the world. And he loves us in Christ. And
since God loves his people in Christ, his love does not change.
Because who loves us in Christ, our Father loves us as Christ. Boy, what a blessing. What a
blessing. You know, the time will come
when Christ's prayer of John 17 and 23, it will be answered. And that is where Jesus said
that the world may know that you have sent me and have loved
them as you have loved me. You know, God's love for us,
it just didn't start. I want my finger snapped. And
God started loving us. No. But when did he start loving
us? He loved us an eternity past.
It started in an eternity. If you can figure out that time,
tell me, because I can't. God's always loved his elect. Always. Jeremiah 31, three says,
I have loved you with an everlasting love. And I really like how time to
really exposit that verse and really tell you what it means,
but I'm glad I'm live, because I might go with five, 10 minutes.
If you have to go, you just have to go. I respect your 45 minute
limit, but I respect God's word too, and I'm afraid that I'll
be through. But he said there, I have loved
you with an everlasting love. Now to my ears, and I'm just
a dumb old country redneck boy, but to my ears, something everlasting,
it don't change. It don't go away. Always. I can't do nothing to
make God quit loving me. You can't do nothing that will
make God quit loving you. He loves us with that everlasting
love. We might get a little bit more of that in if we have time.
1 John 4 and verse 10 says, Herein
is love, not that we love God, but that he loved us and sent
his son to be the perpetuation for our sins. Our sins. Our sins. It is because God loves us in
Christ and always had that his gifts, they never change. God
don't give us something and take it away from us. God is not like
that. The love of God makes a change
in our hearts, but it don't change Him. God don't change. Even when He chastens us, He
is in love. And guess what? It's for our
good, too. It is for our good. Remember this too. He chastens
whom he loves. Hebrews 12 and six. It's just
not out there. God chastens who he loves. He
blesses all people. He gives all people a lot of
blessings. But he loves his people. Hope we see that more. And that brings us to the question, how does God show his love to
us? Well, that's a 24-hour message. I'll just give you two or three
things. How about an election? In the election of the consequence
of his love, Ephesians 1, 4-5, he had chosen us and him for
the foundation of the world, having predestined us unto the
adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself. And why did
he do it? According to the good pleasure
of his will. We think about redemption moving on hurriedly. Out of his
sovereign love, God made provision of Christ. Christ satisfied the
wrath of God. He made provision for that, for
our sins. Romans 8, 32, share this verse
with you. He that spared not his own son,
but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also
freely give us all things? It's hard to read verses without
seeing that us in it. He gives us all things. He gives
us his people. Here again, it's clear proof
that his son wasn't levered up to the cross for all mankind. He didn't die for everybody.
Yeah, I hope that's not shocking to you. But he did. If he'd have died for everybody,
what would have happened? Yeah, everybody would have been saved.
or not. He don't give everybody his Holy
Spirit. He don't give everybody a new nature. He don't give everybody
repentance and faith. But he gives that to us, his
chosen, his elect. Then another way that God shows
his love to us, how about our effectual call? When that call
comes, it is effectual too. Having loved his elect with an
everlasting love, therefore we love in kindness. He does draw
them. He quickens us into newness of
life. He calls us out of darkness into his marvelous light. He
makes us his children. 1 John 3 and 1 says, Behold,
what manner of the Father has bestowed upon us that we should
be called the sons of God. Therefore the world, here's the
word world again, knoweth us not because it, talking about
the world, knew him not. Solomon said this, and we know
Solomon was a wise man. He said, Many waters cannot quench
love, nor can floods drown it. I say, such is God's love to his people.
The love of God is so great that he gave his only begotten son,
that all who would believe in him would, and not might, have
eternal life. So, this should bring us to what
the true meaning of John 3, 16 really is. But as with any verse
of the Bible, clear interpretation is obtained by examining the
definition of the words that's used there. By comparing the
things in the text here with the same things taught elsewhere,
and we've looked at a little bit of that. Then we have to
look carefully at the grammar and the context. We cannot completely
define the word love apart from the word world. We won't fully
know what it means that God loved without first understanding what
is meant by world, which is the object of God's love in our text. We cannot understand the phrase,
for God so loved the world, without first examining the context and
then examining the uses of love and world in other scriptures.
And we have looked at that. And as I said, we've already
looked at that according to context, but I want to look a little bit
further. And the reason is all the scriptures, they reflect
the mind of God. When we see them, they reflect
his mind. And since God is the author of
all scripture, what is said in one place won't be contradicted
in another place. If we read a passage here and
it says this and we go here and read a passage and we think it's
talking about the same thing and see it all together different,
we better go back and start looking. Because God, he's the author
of it all and he didn't put things in his word contradictory. And
that's one thing that we need to remember. And when people
pull John 3, 16 out of context and start telling you that God
loved everybody in the world and he wouldn't send nobody to
hell because of love and all this, You either got to get them
to hush and sit down and listen to the truth, or either you just
turn a deaf ear to what they say, because that's what you'll
run into. So we see that this verse, John
3, 16, where God so loved the world cannot contradict other
passages of scripture that address the same subject matter. So,
we've talked a good bit about the love of God, but what does
it mean for God to love the world? Is love a feeling that God has
for the world, just a feeling that he has? Does it mean that
he loves everybody no matter what? Does it mean that because
he loves everybody that he'll Give everybody everything that
they need, everything that they want. Does it mean because of
his love for the world that nothing bad's gonna ever happen to us? Because God loves the world,
does that mean he won't send anybody to hell? And that brings up a thought. You know, God's love's everlasting. Does God love the people that
die and go to hell? Does he? If he ever loved them, he does.
Because his love don't change, it's everlasting. But we got
people that say that God loves and he won't send anybody to
hell. And God's word says it's different. says differ. But what the problem is, people
try to define what the word love means instead of letting God's
word define his word. And God's word has to do that.
It has to define scripture, not us. And scripture must define what
love means in this verse and every other passage. In John
3, 16, the word for love is agape. And we know what that word means.
It means brotherly love, affection, goodwill, benevolence. And that's
the highest form of love that we know about. Matter of fact,
it is the word that Jesus used in John 17, 23 through 26 to
describe the father's love for the son, for the foundation of
the world. But people today, they read John
3.16 and think how wonderful they must be to have secured
God's affection. Man, I'm doing all right. I'm a good boy. I'm a good girl.
God loves me. Okay. What they need to do, and us
too, is we need to reflect on how wonderful Christ is. He is
that one gift. He is the one gift that the Father
chose to give as an expression of that love. The one gift. And to properly understand John
3.16, we have to deal with a very unpopular belief. God does not
love everyone, at least, and let me say this before I go any
further. God don't love everyone like he loves his elect, okay? Let me put it that way. At least
he don't love them with redemptive love. And I might read a verse
or two that you've heard today that I think would back this
up. Matter of fact, the verses I'm gonna read talk about God
hate. Like from Psalms 5, 6, where he says, you hate all who
do iniquity. And there it didn't say he hated
iniquity, it said he hates all who does iniquity. The Lord abhors
the man of bloodshed and deceit. Psalm 11 5, the Lord tests the
righteous and the wicked and the one who loves violence. His
soul hates And just throw this in too, when
somebody tells me exactly what they think the word world means
in this verse, I want them to explain to me what hate means
in these verses that we're looking at today. Then it goes on, Proverbs
6, 16, a very familiar verse to us. First, there are six things
which the Lord hates. And I started not to write them
down, but I think it might help us to see a little bit better.
There are six things which the Lord hates. Yes, seven, which
are an abomination to him. haughty eyes, a lying tongue,
and hands that shed innocent blood, a heart that devises wicked
plans, feet that run rapidly to evil, a false witness who
utters lies, and a one-spread strife among brethren. And I
really believe that this verse is talking about people. So he says he hates people that
does that. Jeremiah 12, 8 says, I have come
to hate her. Hosea 9, 15. I came to hate them
there. And you've heard this verse today,
and I'm not going to dispute with the brother about it. I
agree with him 100%. And I'll read this verse and
tell you my thought. Romans 9, 13, it just says, Rhett
and Jacob have a love, but Esau, I hate it. We know the verses
like these are unpopular. But they are true. Usually people
don't memorize them, but as I said earlier, they're just as inspired
as John 3, 16 is. Something else God does not say
is that he hates the sin, but loves his sinner. God hates the
sin and the sinner. Yes, as we've already said, and
we've seen it in Matthew, and we've seen it in other verses,
God does provide for all of his creation. He does send rain on
the just and the unjust. The sun does come up on the just
and the unjust. Providentially, he does provide,
but that is not redemptive love. He does take care of his people.
He takes care of his elect. He takes care of the lost. and
I'm not disputing that. But what I am saying is, and
I'll continue to say this as long as the Lord gives me breath
to say it, God does not love everybody in this world. He loves
his redemptive people, the ones he chose and the ones he redeems.
His elect is who God loves and he has always loved them and
he always will. And I am proud to be in that
number. There was a time in my life that I was Like Esau was. The Lord took
care of me. I've been in many places and
don't have time to tell you. I've been in many places. God
was there taking care of me. And I know that God did. But
he didn't love me like he loves me now. So we'll just let that
rest. Don't have time to go any further.
But all verses like this, people don't know. And the reason they
don't know them is because they're biblically illiterate or willfully
ignorant. It's not because these verses are not important. There's
something else that I'd like to make as clear as I can. God
has not changed. God has not changed. We can go
back over in the Old Testament and we can see time and time
again where God fought Israel's battles. Sometimes he would tell them
to go out, he says, you kill every man, woman, and child,
and the beast, all the animals, you kill them all. Tell me how
much God loved them. God hasn't changed from the Old
Testament now. As he said in Malachi 3 and 6, for I the Lord
do not change. The point here is that God is
perfect. He's always been perfect. He
don't need to change. He does not change because He
don't need to change. Sinners are the ones who need to change.
I'll say again, God hated the wicked in the Old Testament.
He hates them today. But there's a difference and we need to see
this. Talk about God hating the wicked. By the way, his hatred
is a perfect hatred. God is perfect. We can't hate
like God does. We can't love like God does.
You know, the majority of people today say that the Bible says
that God loves everyone. Here and everywhere you go, God
loves everybody. I say, show me that verse that God says love
everybody. And they're going to jump, well, look at John 3,
16. Again, they don't understand the verse. It said from the beginning,
this verse cannot be taken out of its context and understood
apart from the rest of the teachings of the Bible. If there are verses
that God hates the wicked, we have to allow these verses to
shape our understanding of John 3 and 16. We don't have the right
to ignore them simply because we don't like them or because
they mess up our traditions that we've been taught by our forefathers.
It's time to stand up and be a man. It's time to stand up
for God's word. Accept the truths of God's word.
And we have people who object and say, but God is love. I say, amen. God is love. What's the problem? But again,
we have to look at the scripture. Because the fact that God is
love necessarily mean that God loves everybody. I know I'm just
about out of time. Think about the devil for a minute.
Devil's a sinner, but God love the devil. God hates the devil. Is it inconsistent for him to
hate the children of the devil? You know, don't have time, but
you go and read John 8, 38 through 47, where Jesus tell the Jews
there that their father is the devil. Hmm, they in the world
too. He tells them their father's
the devil. Then people say it's wrong for God to hate anyone. I ask the question is, who has
the right to determine what God does? He's the one that determines
what's right or wrong. If God's word says that God hates
the wicked, we can safely conclude that is right and good for, you
know, that is right and good. He hates them. But now let us look at the word
world. It's often assumed that world
in John 3, 16 refers to every single person in the world. But
does it? You know, sometimes it refers
to this planet. Scripture talks about the foundation
of the world. Sometimes it refers to the Gentile
world as opposed to the Jewish world. You know, he's talking
to Nicodemus there. Nicodemus, I may not, yeah, Nicodemus
there. He thought the Jews had it all.
Jesus would tell him no. He died for Jews and the Gentiles. Sometimes the word world does
refer to the Jewish world, but sometimes it refers to the world
of believers too. And in other cases, the word
world refers specifically to the world of unbelievers, as
in John 7, 7, where he said, the world cannot hate you, but
it hates me because I testify of it that its deeds are evil.
So obviously believers love Christ, but they are not included in
the word world there, world of people that hate Christ. You
can go to other scriptures too, we don't have time for that.
But other scriptures, John 14, 17, 12, 31, they say the same
thing. Sometimes world simply means
a multitude of people. We can see this in John 12 and
19. It says, so the Pharisee, paraphrasing it here, the Pharisee
said to one another, you see that you are not doing any good,
look, the world has gone after him. So here the word world cannot
mean every single person in the world. Since the vast majority
of people in the world were not living in Israel and were not
following Christ. And add to that, the Pharisees
wasn't even following Christ either. So it couldn't mean every
person in the world. 1 John 4, 9 and 10. By this the
love of God will manifest in us that God sent his only begotten
son into the world that we might live through him. And this is
love, not that we love God, but that he loved us and sent his
son to be the perpetuation for our sins. And this passage there
is parallel to John 3 and 16. Here John tells us how God has
shown his love. And he did that by sending his
only begotten son. And there are a lot of similarities
between these passages. But there are some different
expressions. Some things mentioned here is
not mentioned in John 3 and 16. Here John is clearly speaking
about believers. Of this epistle and all epistles.
is written to believers. The pronoun's us, and we refer
to believers, not non-believers. John speaks of the love of God
being manifested in us. So who is the love of God manifest
in? It's revealed to us, us believers. In verse 10, we see that God
loved us. The word world is not used here
as the object of God's love, but rather us. So if we compare
John 3.16 with 1 John 4.9.10, we see that God loves the world
in the former and God loves us in the latter. And seeing that
these passages are parallel and knowing that they do not contradict
one another, we have to conclude that John 3.16 is teaching the
same thing as these verses here in 1 John 4. Naming that God
loves believers, and that's us. He loves believers in the world.
Now my time's done gone, but we'll finish up here. Couple
of statements. John 3.16 does not teach that
God loves every person in the world with redemptive love. It
teaches that he loved all those believing in him, scattered throughout
the world. He did not merely love believing
Jews. He loved believing Gentiles as well. And John 3.16 does not
teach that God is uncertain about who will be saved. The word whoever
is not found in the original Greek and is a misleading translation
of the Greek word pas, P-A-S, meaning all. God knows exactly
what will happen before it happens, because God works out all things
after the counsel of his own will. He knows what will happen
not merely because he foresees it, but because he foreordained
it to happen. John 3.16 is a glorious verse
when understood properly. For the glory of God shines through
it. May God use this verse to shine in your heart the light
of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ. Amen. Brother.
5 - The Love of God
Series 2024 Bible Conference
Brother Robert Harley preached this message during our Bible Conference.
| Sermon ID | 615242152413621 |
| Duration | 49:57 |
| Date | |
| Category | Conference |
| Bible Text | John 3:16 |
| Language | English |
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