3-14-2021 “God So Loved the World” John 3:14-21

Dr. John Tamilio III, Pastor

If you were to make a list of the Bible verses people have memorized the most, John 3:16 would be in the top three, if it wasn’t number one. “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.” This is the verse you inevitably see on placards at football games or on the signs carried by street-corner preachers. Many believers feel as if this verse is the heart of the Gospels. The great Reformation theologian Martin Luther claimed that John 3:16 is the Gospel in miniature.

This is not a bad choice for a summary verse. Gerard Sloyan writes, “God’s love is such that this God wills life and not death for all who believe in the only Son. That is indeed why God gave him…not for the world’s condemnation but its salvation…For many, the Gospel peaks here.”[1]

Merrill C. Tenney writes the following, “’ Eternal,’ the new life God gives, refers not solely to the duration of existence but also to the quality of life as contrasted with futility. It is a deepening and growing experience. It can never be exhausted in any measurable span of time, but it introduces a totally new quality of life.”[2] I love the way Tenney frames this.

When you ask most Christians what the word “salvation” means, they will probably say, “It means you go to heaven when you die.” That’s certainly part of it, but only part of it. Salvation, as I have said many times in the past, is also about how you live your life now. Salvation means that your life has changed. It does not mean that you are better than anyone else. It simply means that life looks different because it is different. Everything changes when Christ enters your life, at least it should. It is as if you go through life following a compass — a compass that has been calibrated by society. The needle points where society says it should point. Values are thrust upon us. We do and say and even think the rights things. (By right things I mean the things that society wants us to do, say, and think.)

When you are saved, something different happens. It is as if you look at life through a different pair of glasses. You see things from God’s perspective, at least you try to. You do and say what Christ would have you do and say. You treat others the way you want to be treated, for example. You love your neighbor as you love yourself. You pray for your enemy. You feed the hungry. You clothe the naked. You welcome the stranger. The world may give you different marching orders — mind your own business, do not get involved, leave it alone because it isn’t your problem — but Jesus says something different. “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me” (Matt. 16:24b).

Don’t get me wrong: salvation is also about what happens to us when we die. However, most people who hang their theology on John 3:16 are typically just talking about who is saved when it comes to the next life and who isn’t, as if it is a competition. Is that what Jesus is saying to Nicodemus? Clearly, the passage ends by talking about eternal life, and it is couched in a discussion about being born again — another concept that is important to many Christians. But the verse begins talking about how “God so loved the world.” Think of a human being using the same construction when talking to someone else: “I so love you that…” (Pause. You think something big is coming.) If the end of that phrase was, “I did the dishes,” you’d say, “That’s it? You love me so much you did the dishes? Really?” Any sentence that begins, “I love you so much that…” needs to end with something earth-shattering.

I love you so much that I would give you an organ.
I love you so much that I would travel across the world to find you.
I love you so much that I would share my Ben and Jerry’s ice cream with you.

I say that last one to Cindy all the time.

Now, let’s change that number exponentially. Instead of loving one person so much, what about loving 7.674 billion intensely? That’s the current population of the world: the world that God loves so much. Well, when Jesus walked the earth the population was about 300 million. Still, you get the point. God so loved the world — not just some of us, not just the people you love, not just the people I love — God so loved the entire world that he sent Jesus.

Imagine being lost in the woods. It’s night. It’s getting cold. You do not know where you are or how far you have to walk through the thicket in order to find shelter, food, and water. You look at signs all around you — the light of the moon, maybe the flow of water from a nearby river — but none of this is much of a help. Suddenly, a light appears: a warm, brilliant light. Not only does this light illumine the entire area around you, but it makes you feel safe in the core of your being. It penetrates your soul assuring you that everything will be alright. You do not suddenly have the answer to every question you’ve ever had, but you know you are not alone and that there is someone or something that loves you. That someone or something will not desert you. That someone or something will lead you. That someone or something is Jesus. This is how much God loves us.

It is easy to lose sight of this: to look at how difficult life can be and become dejected — to adopt the cynic’s worldview and think that each one of us is alone in this world. We begin to think like Orson Wells, who said, “We’re born alone, we live alone, we die alone.” There’s more to that quote, though. The second part is, “Only through our love and friendship can we create the illusion for the moment that we’re not alone.”

The truth, my friends, is that we are not alone. Sure, we have friendships through which we experience love. That incomplete, imperfect, human love is a taste of divine love, which is not illusory at all.

God so loved the world that he decided to be here himself, because it is only through personal interaction that you can fully express the love you have for another being. God so loved the world that he became one of us to lead us out of the dark and into the light. A.W. Tozer may have said it best. I’ll give him the final word.

Jesus Christ came not to condemn you but to save you, knowing your name, knowing all about you, knowing your weight right now, knowing your age, knowing what you do, knowing where you live, knowing what you ate for supper and what you will eat for breakfast, where you will sleep tonight, how much your clothing cost, who your parents were. He knows you individually as though there were not another person in the entire world. He died for you as certainly as if you had been the only lost one. He knows the worst about you and is the One who loves you the most.[3]

Amen, and Amen.

[1] Gerard Sloyan, John from the series Interpretation: A Bible Commentary for Teaching and Preaching (Atlanta: John Knox Press, 1988), 46.

[2] Merrill C. Tenney, John from The Expositor’s Bible Commentary, vol. 9 (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1981), 50.

[3] A.W. Tozer, And He Dwelt Among Us: Teachings from the Gospel of John (Bloomington: Bethany House Publishers, 2009), 136.