God's Motive for the Cross | Sermon 11/13/2022

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If you would, please turn with me, Church, in your Bibles to the Gospel according to John, chapter 3.

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John, chapter 3. Today we're going to be in verses 16 through 21.

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16 through 21. The title of the sermon today, Church, is

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God's Motive for the Cross. God's Motive for the

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Cross. Starting in verse 16 of chapter 3 of the

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Gospel according to John, hear now the inerrant and infallible words of the living and true

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God. For God so loved the world, that He gave

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His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life.

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For God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through Him.

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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

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Son of God. This is the judgment, that the light has come into the world, and men love the darkness rather than the light, for their deeds were evil.

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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.

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Thus ending the reading of God's holy and inspired word. Let's pray quickly, church. Lord, I ask you that you would please speak through me today.

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Lord God, would you please enlighten the holy scriptures by your Spirit, the same

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Spirit who inspired them. Lord, please use me today, edify your people, teach your people, do what only you can do today, dear

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Lord. And God, please help me to speak in a way that is clear and helpful, and let it always be true.

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I pray this in Jesus' mighty name. Amen. So, as we just read our passage today, we are covering the famous John 3 .16.

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That Bible verse is likely the most well -known Bible verse in at least this country, maybe in all the world.

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It reminds me of a few examples in pop culture. Let me share some of those with you.

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Starting in May of 1957, Madison Square Garden was filled for an unprecedented 16 weeks.

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2 .4 million people attended and passed through what was called Billy Graham's New York Crusade.

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There is, of course, where he gave one of his most famous discourses on the 3rd chapter and 16th verse of the

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Gospel according to John. Now, many know it because they've heard Billy Graham speak on it many times over the years.

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Many got saved at some of those events. Then there's Rollin Stewart, also known as Rockin' Rollin or Rainbow Man.

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Some of you may know what I'm talking about. Let me remind you here. Rainbow Man was a fixture in American sports culture.

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Why? After professing to become a born -again Christian, Stewart was determined to get the message of Jesus out.

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So his first major appearance was in 1977 at the

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NBA Finals. He was wearing a rainbow -colored Afro wig.

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You may have seen this in times past or in some sporting documentaries.

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Everyone would see his rainbow Afro wig. Every time he was, he was holding a sign that said

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John 316. And so the cameras would turn to this man with the rainbow

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Afro and they would broadcast his sign across the network.

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He appeared even at NFL goalposts. He was near Olympic medal stands and even at the

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Augusta National Golf Club. At the 1982 Indianapolis 500,

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Stewart was even behind the pits of the race winner Gordon Johncock. Now, beyond that,

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I even remember growing up 12 years in Southern California. I was born there. I know.

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Don't hate me. I've lived 20 -plus years in Arizona, which that's not even going to be much better pretty soon.

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But I remember growing up in California and distinctly we would go get In -N -Out Burger and on the bottom of the cup you'd see

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John 316. So you have these moments where you see that. If you have the unfortunate pleasure of being a

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WWE or WWF fan in your lifetime, you may remember even

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Stone Cold Steve Austin made a speech against wrestler Jake Roberts. This man apparently had in real life become a

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Christian. He changed his wrestling persona and he became like a preacher as he wrestled for the

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WWE and WWF. And he would quote Bible verses and in this theatrical weird wrestling world that again a lot of us don't admit to ever participating or watching.

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Yeah, I saw that back there. Maybe you did. But when

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Steve Austin beat Roberts, he said, forget all that John 316, blah, blah, blah.

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He's on the mic and he says, it's Austin 316. And then he went ahead and said something blasphemous.

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And so some people have wondered, is Steve Austin a Christian? No, it's quite actually the opposite.

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He was making fun of John 316 in this, again, fake speech.

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But in the last 15 years, this Bible verse has made another national debut.

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When a football player Tim Tebow had written on his eye sticker black paint, he had put

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John under one eye and 316 under the other when he was in college. In fact, you're not allowed to do that anymore because of him.

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But three years after that, when the cameras had seen that, he played his first NFL playoff game in which he threw for 316 yards.

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He averaged 31 .6 yards per completion. And a pivotal interception for the game happened at third and 16.

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The game finished with a time of possession of 31 .6. And the ratings for the game came out as being reported to be up by 31 .6%.

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In fact, you could just look this up. It became known as this anomaly, the 316 game.

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And all these figures with 316 occurred. And in fact, it made tons of people go to Google.

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In that first two weeks or so, people were Googling John 316. They had to know what this

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Bible verse was. It must have meant something miraculous if this number kept popping up, right? And so, you have these moments like this.

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But this section of Scripture has truly been one of the most used by God to save sinners.

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I believe that. Sixteenth -century reformer Martin Luther called John 316 the gospel in miniature.

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The gospel in miniature. Let me give you one last example. When D .L.

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Moody accidentally promised Henry Morehouse his own pulpit to preach on Sunday, if Morehouse were to ever come to Chicago, Moody didn't think he would actually show up.

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I believe they were in England. And Moody promises Morehouse, if you ever come to Chicago, if you ever come to the

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States, you've got my pulpit. You can preach. And he said that not even knowing

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Morehouse's theology or biblical stances or theological pedigree or anything like that, his faithfulness to the

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Word of God. And so, Morehouse shows up and says, so can I preach this Sunday?

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And Moody is going, what do I do? He's talking to his other elders. He's talking to his wife. Why did

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I promise this guy the pulpit? I don't know anything about him. And he's coming this Sunday. And so, even though, despite his reluctance and concern, he let

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Morehouse preach on Sunday, he himself had to be out of town that Lord's Day service.

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And so, when he came back, Moody asked his wife, how did he do?

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And Moody's wife said this, he's a better preacher than you are. He is telling sinners that God loves them.

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You've got to hear him. And Moody goes, what? He's telling sinners that God loves him?

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That's not true. And Moody says this. He's incredulous. Morehouse was preaching more during the week, and Moody was determined to go hear

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Morehouse preach. I've got to find out what he's telling people. What did I do? What did I invite into my church?

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What did I let take the pulpit? And Morehouse is preaching on John 3 .16. Moody reports that he was basically in tears.

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He had never heard John 3 .16 exposited the way it was by Morehouse.

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He had never realized until that moment the great love of our God. It was biblical.

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It was extremely biblical, he found out. So, many people, of course, have used

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John 3 .16 in the wrong way over the centuries. No doubt. But, the apostle

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John recorded this down for a reason, and I think it's more meaningful than we could ever have thought.

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More meaningful than being on the bottom of a cup, or on a sign, or anything like that. So let's consider the text together today, church.

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But I have to mention one thing. Verse 16 is on the screen here.

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But I've got to, as a preacher, share with you some research that has been done regarding this passage.

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Okay? Then we'll really get into the meat of the text. Chapter 3 has been disputed in various ways over the centuries.

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I'm not even kidding. John chapter 3 has caused a lot of confusion and disputes over the centuries for theologians.

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And it goes down to, again, where I preached on the water and spirit, and the serpent on the pole, and really there's all these things that people argue about regarding this chapter.

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But this, that I'm going to bring up today, I think is important for you to know. Okay? The fact is, in chapter 3, you have

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Jesus speaking, Nicodemus speaking, and you have John the Apostle narrating or giving a reflection, and you have

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John the Baptist at the end of the chapter talking. So you have like two Johns, and a Jesus, and Nicodemus, and what's happening is people know that there's transitions taking place, but they don't know where.

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They don't know where someone stops and the other starts. I've told you before, in Greek, there are no quotation marks.

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It is what it is. The text is there, okay? So, some have said that Jesus stops talking at verse 10, which we already run over.

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Some believe that Jesus stops talking at verse 21, that this is a quote of Jesus, and it'll continue until verse 21, then narrative will take place in verse 22.

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In fact, my Bible, and probably your Bible, has red letters, maybe, or quotations that would be of Jesus all the way to verse 21.

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That's, for the most part, what our Bibles show. But I will tell you, based on my own research,

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I, of course, want to honor the text. You know, as a preacher, I want to honor

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God's word above all things. I think tradition is good, but tradition should always be checked against Scripture.

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So that's what I've done, and many theologians, many scholars besides me, this isn't a weighed invention.

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This is something that I have verified over and over again, and the translators still have it differently.

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So, I believe, church, that our sermon last week, that stopped at verse 15, that's when

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Jesus stops talking with Nicodemus. That would mean that verse 16, starting here to verse 21, is the

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Apostle John, the one who wrote the fourth Gospel, it is his commentary.

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He's making reflection for the sake of the reader. Here's why

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I think this is John beginning to speak, or narrate, or provide reflection, that it is, rather, a quote of Jesus.

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First, that word for is in the Greek, Gar. Gar. Okay?

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Gamma, alpha, rho. That word is a conjunction in the Greek. It is intended to make our minds go, okay, a transition has taken place, an explanation is being given for something that was just said.

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So, Gar for is the first word, and that's typical, okay?

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Second, if you just read church, if you read verses 16 through 21 in full, we already read it, but even if you're wondering what

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I'm saying, and you go home later, and you read verses 16 through 21, you'll see that these words are exactly like the prologue language, exactly like chapter 1 of John.

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Almost the same language. You'll see cosmos, or world, is used a lot in chapter 1.

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You'll see light is used a lot. Light is used very much in verses 19 through 21.

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And then, even so, you'll see, only begotten Son. Okay?

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Honestly, if you just pull it out, and you read 16 through 21, you'll see that this is different.

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This is much like John the Apostle speaking. In fact, monogamous, which is only begotten in this translation, which we went over in chapter 1, it is never used by Jesus.

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That word, only begotten, monogamous, huios, that word is only ever used by John the

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Apostle. Jesus never calls Himself the only begotten Son.

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Okay? That's the third thing. I'm sorry, that's the second thing.

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The third thing is, here Jesus says about God, He says, ha theos.

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We never see Jesus use ha theos. That is used in the prologue in chapter 1 of John the

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Apostle speaking. Okay? Fourth thing, why I believe this is not

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Jesus, but John beginning to speak. Fourth thing is, if you look, loved, for God so loved the world that He gave

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His only begotten Son. There's been a fundamental change in the verbs in this chapter.

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Everything before had present tense and perfect tense. We are now switched to the aorist.

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The aorist is past tense. This is someone who has been through the resurrection.

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He's been through the ascension. This is someone who's providing narrative reflection on the previous verses.

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God loved. God gave. Because what? We'll go over this, but when

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God gave His Son, it's not just talking about the incarnation, the appearance of God. It's talking about also the humiliation of Christ, which in chapter 3 hasn't happened yet.

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So, this is what I think a reflection comment. And lastly, the question always is, does this occur elsewhere?

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That's important for us to consider when we are talking about big things like this. And it does.

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You may have even missed it. In chapter 2, when we saw at the end of the water and the wine, but especially in the middle of the passages regarding the temple cleansing, in the middle of that,

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John all of a sudden gives reflection. He gives statements. He says, and for this reason, the disciples knew that he was talking about the resurrection.

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And then John even quotes from Psalm 69, and he says, and for this reason, we know that Jesus' fulfilled zeal for my

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Father's house has consumed Him. So all of a sudden, in the middle of a dialogue, John is narrating or providing a reflection or things for the readers to understand.

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That's what I believe is happening here. A discourse has just happened in verses 1 -15 between Jesus and Nicodemus, and now

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John is trying to make his readers understand. Because remember, what did

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John say in chapter 20 and verse 21? I have written these things down so that you would believe that Jesus is the

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Christ. And so that's what he's doing. John is expounding upon Jesus' discussion with Nicodemus in verses 1 -15.

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This is going to happen again in verses 31 -36. But essentially, we've just learned that Jesus would have to be raised up on the cross like the serpent on the staff.

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We had just gone over that. All who believe in Him will have eternal life. John now adds to this as someone after the crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension.

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And I know that might upset some people here. That might upset some people who have said this is their favorite verse.

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These are Jesus' words. These are in the red letters. They can't get any better. But I would argue and submit to you that these words of John are no different than the very quotes of Jesus Christ.

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Jesus is the logos. Jesus is the Word of God. These are

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God -breathed words. These are the words that Jesus wanted John to record down. These are

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Jesus' words. They're just not a direct quote of them. We can have faith in His Word.

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Nothing that John says here goes against that. So let's really get into the text now.

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For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten

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Son that whoever believes in Him will not perish but have eternal life.

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I want you, church, to come to this as infants in Christ again.

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If you have been a mature believer all your life or for many years,

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I'm calling you to come to this text again as a child would to learn your

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ABCs again. Come to this text as someone who hasn't heard it a million times.

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That's what I'm calling you today. Let the biblical text break the hardened shell that you may have.

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Let us look at God today when we first saw Jesus. Needy, helpless, burdened, in awe of the blood -stained cross.

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Let's approach it in this way today. Now the first thing to point out is it says, for God.

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For God. That's huge. That's significant.

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Brothers and sisters, for thousands of years, man has tried to act. Man tried to obey

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God, but has always failed. If anything good, if any grace, if any mercy are going to come down to mankind,

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God must initiate it for God. It starts with God.

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Without such action, we would be without a hope in the world.

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When you and I were engaged in our sin, for God so loved, for God, He began.

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The word so, by the way, in God so loved the world is haotos, which typically is an adverb that shows a higher degree of something.

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But I have to tell you, Greek scholars have looked at this and haotos accompanied with hoste.

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Hoste is in this verse right now. When they are brought together, it would be translated better instead of so, like a degree of something.

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It would be better translated in this way. In this way.

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So, for God in this way loved the world. For God in this way loved the world.

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That's how you could say it. World, as you know, is kosmos in the Greek. And many have looked at world and they have thought that this is a universalistic salvation.

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However, we can see only those who believe will not perish.

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Those who don't believe will unfortunately perish. So many look at kosmos, they look at world, and they think that means both

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Jews and Gentiles. And of course, kosmos has like a dozen different meanings.

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World in the Bible has many, many different meanings. But here, it's not even just Jews and Gentiles.

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It's not just men of all types and tongues loved by God and saved by God.

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That is, of course, true. No doubt. It's men of every type. Men and women of every type are to be saved, but that's not the point.

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We'd be missing it if we thought it was a universalistic salvation, but we'd also be missing it if we thought world meant just simply men of different types.

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Here's what's being said. Thus far in John, we have only heard negative things regarding the word world.

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Only negative. Only negative. And that's what makes this statement all the more shocking.

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God loved the world. God loved the world. And it's not that the world has so many people, and that's what's baffling.

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It's that the world is so bad, and God loves it. That's the point.

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He still loves it even though it's so bad. Nowhere else in this Gospel or in the entire New Testament is it said in this way that God loves the world like this.

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And that is meant to be shocking. It functions similarly when it says in John 1 that the logos became sarks.

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If you remember from that, sarks is the most crudest way to say flesh. Jesus became flesh.

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It is shocking. God Himself took on flesh. And we are to look to this verse and be shocked.

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For God in this way loved the world. It is unbelievable. Unbelievable.

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God came for those who are in darkness. What made

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God come down to fallenness, to brokenness, to be among evil, to be subject to human weakness, suffering, torment, and shame?

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What made God do that love of the world? Love of the world? Love of the ones who will even bring those terrible things upon Him?

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Now, we can love the world and the things of the world in a wicked way. John will say that in his epistle later.

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But God loves the world in a pure and selfless way. When we love the world, we look to our own benefit.

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When God loves the world, He looks to our benefit. So then, the lifting up of the

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Son of Man, Jesus as the serpent on the pole from Numbers 21, His crucifixion rests on the basis of God's love.

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The cross occurred because of God's love. That, my friends, is it.

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Love is the unspoken motivation behind verses 1 -15.

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Where did love come from? Where did love come from? Not anything outside of God other than Himself.

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Love comes from God. God's love springs forth from Himself. God is love is a verse in John's epistle.

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And it's not that God chooses to love and then it comes forth. It's that God is love.

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It's in His very nature. And so when God acts, it is not divorced from His love. He doesn't need to decide to do a loving thing.

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God is love, so when He acts, it is love. Nothing on earth could merit

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His love and draw it from Him. He brings forth His love on fallen mankind like rain.

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And it is tangible in many ways. And yet, it is immeasurable.

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You can't contain God. You can't reserve God to only one place in the universe, in the spiritual realm, wherever.

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So is the same with God's love. God's love is not contained in a small space.

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God's love can even fill every void should He choose in the whole universe. Now that love is not some sort of lofty idea.

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We think of love. You think of Cupid. You think of darts and arrows and getting poked on the behind and someone's in love or something like that, right?

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We see Valentine's Day. We see these lame movies where they're in love and stuff like that.

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So we have these ideas that love is some sort of lofty idea. It's just floating out there like this ethereal idea in space.

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It's in a bubble, and hopefully one day that bubble of love will just pop over me and all have love, right?

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That's what we do sometimes. That's not God's love though. His love is seen in His giving.

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In the beginning, we saw God's love in giving us life, in giving us trees for food, the beasts of the field to eat, the springs of water to drink, wife and children to multiply.

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We saw His love even in the giving of His revelation. His Word.

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Could you imagine a life without the Word? Right? We would be here today, oh

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God, but if You would only bring someone down and give us Your Word or only if we could go up to You and receive instruction and bring it down, oh

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God, we have nothing to go off of. We have nowhere to go. But God didn't do that.

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He sent us His revelation. We don't need to lament that. He already has.

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So what you have in your hands or on your phone or on a shelf at home, when you have the

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Bible, those are, as some preachers have said, God's love letters. And I like that.

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I'm okay with that. They are God's love letters in a sense to you, and so we need to read them as people who are at war.

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What does the soldier do when he's down and he's in the ditch and he's getting bombed all around him?

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He pulls out his sweetheart's love letters and he reads them so he can keep going on. Some of us are in the ditch and we're being bombed all around us and we have yet to pull out the love letters from God.

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Now we saw the Lord's love and giving of the promised land. As soon as Israel left Egypt, they grumbled and complained, but the

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Lord gave them the land anyway. That's grace. That's grace. But what does the text say?

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For God loved the world in this way that He gave His one and only Son. That's monogamous. His one and only

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Son. God's love isn't an idea. God's love is Jesus Christ and Him crucified.

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That's God's love. We often say, does God love me? Does God love me?

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Are we serious? Does God love me? If you are a believer today in the

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Lord Jesus Christ, you better believe God loved you. You better believe it. God loved you very much.

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He gave His Son. The unique Son of His love.

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The One whom the Father has eternal and binding love with, He gave to you on your behalf.

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His most dearest and most loved possession in all existence was sent to exile among men in the wilderness of this world.

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Right? God sent His Son. Does God love me? God sent His Son.

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Does He love you? The heir of all things.

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The preeminent One was given. Fathers and mothers, I'm calling out to fathers and mothers here.

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Listen to this. I can imagine you sending Junior to school in another state.

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I can imagine that. I can imagine you sending one of your children to the military and accepting the possible ramifications.

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I could get that. I can imagine you sending your son or daughter to go on mission in another country for the

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Lord. And I can imagine you sending one of your children to another state as they marry their spouse and move away from you.

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And you, of course, deal with it. But can you imagine? Can you imagine knowing and sending one of your children to die the way that Jesus did?

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And you knew it? And you were, of course, pleased to do it?

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Could you imagine sending your son or daughter in that way? Can you imagine a perfect being,

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God Himself, stepping into this fallen world as an infant to be sought after for death from the very beginning, to be mocked and shamed in His earthly ministry, to have the people conspire against Him and seek

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His destruction, to falsely accuse Him, and while He stood there in front of His people, the people who

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He loved, the people who He came for, they shouted, crucify Him! Crucify Him!

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Scourged and whipped to the point that He should have been dead from blood loss and exposure.

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A crown of thorns was shoved upon His head so that blood cascaded down His face.

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Nails in His hands and feet. His full body weight held on wood by a few of these nails tearing into His flesh.

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And upon that cross, the wrath that was due for us was extinguished upon Him. Anguish beyond comprehension.

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A wicked man's death. Killed in brutality, the Bible says in Isaiah, marred beyond recognition.

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And He did it willingly. He did it willingly. And the

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Father and the Son and the Spirit knew that that would occur. In fact,

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God predestined it. All for you and for me. If that's not love,

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I don't know what is. Every moment of love that you've ever felt for another person or for God or anything in this world pales in comparison.

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In fact, you could probably say that the love that you and I have ever felt is basically hate compared to the love that God gave us in sending

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His Son. That's how amazing the love is. D .A.

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Carson said the love of God is not the consequence of our loveliness, but of the sublime truth that God is love.

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Love is mentioned 57 times in this Gospel. Love is a substantial aspect of this

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Gospel. 44 of those times that love is mentioned is agapeo or agape.

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This is the highest regarded love. This is sacrificial love. This is a love immense with affection and adoration.

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And this is the love that's in this verse. We see it in different ways used in the

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Gospel according to John. We see that it was used in that the Father loves the

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Son. The Son loves the Father. Jesus loves His disciples.

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He loves His own who were given to Him. And they love Jesus and are called to love Him. It says that they must love each other and that includes us.

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A few times the Father's love for the flock is mentioned, but largely the

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Father's love is mediated through the Son. There are all these examples of love, but there is no love for God among fallen humanity.

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They hate Him. We need God to love us first so that we can love

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Him. For God loved the world in this way that He gave

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His unique Son that all believing in Him shall not perish but have eternal life. Now what is typically translated whoever, or maybe in your translation it says whosoever, is simply the

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Greek word pas. Pas is just all or every.

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That's all that it is. So many of our translations bring it out to whosoever or whoever, and that's true.

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All whom Jesus came for, all who believe in Him, will not perish.

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That is true. All who believe in Jesus in truth will be saved.

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That's what the verse says. Now we can go into, of course, the effectual call and how regeneration has to occur before faith is even used.

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But really at the heart of this we have to see the fact that yes, all who believe will be saved.

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All who truly believe will be saved. Perish is apollumai or apollumi.

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This Greek word is a compound of away from and destroy at the same time. So the image is utter destruction.

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It is absolutely or permanent perishing. And though our sins would cause us to perish,

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God's love is seen in the promise that we will not. That would also indicate that our faith will not perish either.

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God will preserve you. If He's going to save you for eternity, He's going to preserve you in your faith.

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He will make you persevere. He will uphold the loving promise that He gave you in His Son.

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Now you may get discouraged at times in this Christian walk, but He won't let your confidence in Him perish as well.

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Your desire to kill your sins will not perish. Your love for God and pursuit of holiness will not perish.

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Jesus says later in John, I shall lose none that the Father has given me, but raise them up on the last day.

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Brothers and sisters, if you are believing on Christ for salvation, your abode won't be in destruction.

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It will be in heaven. For God loved you in this way that you will not perish, and that promise has never and will never perish as well.

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So we have seen God's love in His one and only Son in the incarnation and humiliation.

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We have seen God's love in keeping us from perishing. And now we will see God's love in giving us everlasting life.

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That's the last part. And it's supposed to be in contrast to Apollumi. It is contrasted.

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The word is aionios, which means you think of ion, right?

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Unlimited ages of time. However, it's not just quantitative, it's qualitative. We spoke about that last week.

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Because the word life is associated with aionios. It is forever life.

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By the way, just something to keep in mind, do you see a third option? I see either perish or have eternal life.

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I don't see a third option up there. That's it. That's it.

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From the moment God ordained it before the foundations of the earth, it was etched in unbreakable stone. In the moment

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God granted you belief in His Son, what was promised and already there finally appeared before you.

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Like a flame that is in heaven that will never and has never faded, so is that promise for you like a star shining in the sky that has never gone out.

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So is the promise of everlasting life. All who believe will have eternal life. Not some.

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Not those who do the best as a Christian. But all who believe in Him will have eternal life.

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Now, we need not get jaded from this truth. We can rest today because of this truth.

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Some of us have been more excited about receiving an inheritance from our mother and father when they die.

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A monetary inheritance. But do you look forward to this inheritance that has been given to you through Christ?

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We need to change our attitude about this. When you are suffering, remember you have everlasting life.

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When you're struggling with family or illness or financial woes or fired from your job, you have eternal life.

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You have something to look forward to. So many of us still fear death.

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Do you still fear death? Many of us do. We shouldn't.

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I'm calling myself and all of us, every single Christian, not to fear death. It makes me remember the great

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Puritan book Pilgrim's Progress. And it shows at the end when they are about to go into heaven, it shows that death is seen as a river.

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And the narrator puts it to the fact that all must pass through the river to get to the kingdom of God.

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We have to wade through it. And on the other side of the river crossing is our heavenly abode.

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So we need not fear what Christ has already conquered. Christ crossed the river already.

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He provided the way for us. There is a way over the river now. It was tumultuous and there was waves and it was that high flooding season and we couldn't pass over it.

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We would be swept away and taken to hell, but now there's a bridge, and that bridge is Christ. So you can come to death as a believer with the expectation that you will cross through the river, you will wade through because of Christ, and you will enter the kingdom of God, you will enter heaven.

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And that is a gift. That the moment your eyes close for the last time is when your life is really getting started in a sense.

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That is a gift. My exhortation to all of us is to live like you have eternal life.

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Control your conduct because you have eternal life. Suffer in this world like you have eternal life.

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Hope, believe, love, forgive, live and die as one who has eternal life. You know, it makes me think of COVID.

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So many Christians were afraid. I'm going to die. I'm going to die. There was this whole spirit and fear of death in the air for a couple of years.

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And even Christians were falling prey to it. We don't need to. We're different. We have a hope.

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We have eternal life. Now, going through verse 16 was the heart of this sermon, but let's go through the rest as quickly as possible.

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Go to verses 17 and 18. For God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through Him.

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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

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Son of God. So, verse 17 is further clarification on verse 16.

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And the first thing I must point out is that God sent His Son. It says 18 times in this

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Gospel that God sent His Son, and that is only with the words God sent.

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There's many other inferences to the fact that God sent His Son in this Gospel.

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And so, the question is, what was the mission the

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Father sent the Son on? Right now, in His earthly ministry, in the text we're looking at, in the context, what is the mission of Jesus?

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It is to save the world. And it says it in the negative here as well. God did not send the

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Son into the world to judge the world. That's part of His mission. It is not to condemn the world.

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And by the way, condemn is probably the better use of crene here. God did not send the

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Son into the world to condemn the world. From the moment that man fell in the garden, the world was condemned.

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Jesus came into an already condemned world. The Father doesn't need the

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Son to come down simply for judgment. God can wage judgment from Heaven.

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There's something special in God coming down, in coming in the incarnation, and it is not for simply judgment.

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But it is to save His creatures from the coming judgment, to bring deliverance, to bring salvation.

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Jesus will say later in chapter 9 that He did come to bring judgment, but on those who are blind and unwilling to see.

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The Son coming into the world will inevitably put people into two camps. Two camps.

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We're going to see that for the rest of these verses. It is the believing and the unbelieving, the condemned and those not condemned.

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Those are the two camps that Jesus will show us. The sending of the

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Son, though, as we have seen, is a mission of love. Jesus declared to Zacchaeus when

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Zacchaeus repented in Luke 19, Jesus said, for the Son of Man has come to seek and save that which is lost.

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That's His mission. His mission is coming to save the world.

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And by the way, you see that at the end of verse 17?

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But that the world might be saved through Him. In the original language, there is no might.

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It just says, but that the world would be saved through Him. There is no possibility.

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There is no maybe. There is no trying on God's behalf. God will do it.

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That's not in the language. God will accomplish it.

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There's no attempt. He will save those whom He loves. You think of movies.

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You have the shining knight on the white horse and he comes in to save the damsel of distress and he hopes he can save her.

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Right? But God doesn't need to hope. God doesn't need to pray that He would be able to save His church, to save the people who believe in Him, to save His elect.

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He will do all that He desires. And no one can stay His hand. No one can thwart

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His plans or defeat Him. Okay? Now, again, some would look at the word world again and think wrongly.

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They would apply a universalist salvation to it that basically Jesus came and regardless of your belief, whether you believe in Jesus or not, all will be saved by Jesus because everyone's part of the world.

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I explained the world already. The fact that Jesus came from a fallen world. But that's not what it's saying here.

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Right? We saw in the prologue that there are those who will not become children of God. There are those who do not receive

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Him. I think of what Charles Spurgeon said. It's very accurate.

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Charles Spurgeon said this regarding this text. God did not so love the world that any man who does not believe in Christ shall be saved.

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Neither did God give His Son that any man shall be saved who refuses to believe in Him.

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He's just stating the verse in the way it was written. God did not love the world that any man who does not believe in Christ will be saved.

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It says they must believe. Those who believe will be saved. That's the fact.

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Now, if we consider the verse in context, verse 18 even adds to this, right?

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People will look at verse 17 and go, okay, it's a universal salvation. Just go to verse 18.

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He who believes in Him is not judged. He who does not believe has been judged already. There are those who are condemned and those who are not condemned.

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There are those who believe and those who don't believe, and they are different from each other. The world is now not spoken of as a whole, but those who are in those camps.

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Those who don't believe or do believe in the unique Son. Everyone already needed a

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Savior before Jesus came. And now that He's come, some have not believed in Him.

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And you know what? It says they stand even further condemned. By the way,

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I really think we need to see doctrines like the justification by faith in these passages.

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I think John 3 .16 -21 showed justification by faith. It is by faith alone, by grace alone, in Christ alone.

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And you can really see that in these words here. And it's not just believing in God, right?

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It is more specific. Many believed in the one true God at this point. Even demons believed and recognized

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Jesus. One demon called Jesus the Holy One of God. What's the difference?

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If you don't believe in the name of the monogamous Son of God, the unique one and only

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Son of God, you are condemned. But wait, the name? You must believe in the name?

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We've talked about this in a previous sermon. That in ancient times, when it says believe in the name of Jesus, it wasn't just a label.

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Like, my name's Wade. That's my label. That's my name. But in the ancient world, when it says believe in the name of, it would have meant that you believe in the character and deeds and all that that person is made of and done.

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That's what it means. All who He is, you believe in Him and believe in what

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He's done. And Jesus' name will now forever be associated with the love of God. Peter said it well, filled with the

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Holy Spirit. It says in Acts 4, and there is salvation in no one else.

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For there is no other name under heaven that has been given among men by which we must be saved.

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Let's go to our final verses. Verses 19 -21 This is the judgment that the light has come into the world and men love the darkness rather than the light.

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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.

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But he who practices the truth comes to the light so that his deeds may be manifested as having been wrought in God.

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This is the judgment. In fact, this would be better said that John is saying this is the verdict.

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The verdict is in that the light has come into the world and men love the darkness rather than the light.

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And this is a verdict that is an ongoing judicial process that will finalize at the last day.

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The light has come into the world and men love the darkness rather than the light.

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And as I told you, John is calling us back to the thoughts of the prologue about light. Jesus, from eternity past, is the light of men.

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He was the One through Whom the power and the magnificence emanated when it was declared in Genesis 1, let there be light, and Jesus created.

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He created the light. But now He walks among men as the light here to create again.

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But some love the darkness rather than the light of the world. God is tabernacled among us, it's said.

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God is with us. And the One Who they thought they were worshiping this whole time has come right in front of them and instead, they still reject

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Him. Can you imagine? You've been worshiping God your whole life.

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All these Pharisees, all these Jews, they've worshipped God and they pray things and they say,

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God, I desire to see Your face. God, I desire to be in Your presence. And then God literally comes down and they reject

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Him. It's unfathomable. And yet in fallen humanity, we would have done the same.

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We would have done it too. Imagine this.

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Like a prisoner in a cold, dark, and black cell, chiseling away at a brick wall with his nails hoping to break free, just scratching at brick in a black cell.

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And then Jesus, shining in bright light, appears and comes before the cell door, but the men who love the darkness would rather claw at the wall for all eternity.

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Jesus is there. He's provided a way. And men would rather claw at the wall than turn to Christ.

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They love the darkness. It'll be a covering for them instead of the righteous rope of Christ.

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By the way, this is one of the few times... See love there? Love the darkness? This is one of the few times in the

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New Testament that agape, that sacrificial love that I mentioned, is used for something that is not

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God, or not each other. It says that they agape loved the darkness.

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They sacrificially loved the darkness. They'll give everything to the darkness.

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This word darkness in the Greek is often associated with the dominion of Satan. The condemnation has been brought on by themselves.

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How do we know that they love the darkness? How? It says for their deeds are evil. Men prefer darkness, evil, impurities, idolatry, perversion, chaos, rebellion, lawlessness, cruelty, selfishness, pride, greed, jealousies and strife, partialities, all the things that are opposite of God's good design men and women love.

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So what do we do as Christians in light? Paul says it best in Ephesians 5, he says, do not participate in the unfruitful deeds of darkness, rather expose them.

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We as Christians are to go in the world, give the Gospel, but we're even called to expose that which is dark.

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Bring it into the light. That's what we're trying to do. That's what we share.

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Even our church goes out. We go to abortion mills. We try to share the truth that children are being murdered.

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We try to expose the deeds of darkness. Verse 20, for everyone who does evil hates the light and does not come to the light for fear that his deeds will be exposed.

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Okay, look at verse 20. That last word, exposed, has a triple meaning in the

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Greek. Okay? Let me explain what they are. First, exposure.

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Second, conviction. And third, reproof or rebuke. Okay? Let me illustrate that or define what that means, okay?

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For everyone who hates Christ, they do not come to Him for fear that they will be exposed.

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They don't want their sin to be seen by others. They don't even realize, of course, that God sees their sin every day.

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It's like a child who puts a blanket over their head and they think that they're invisible. They're like, it's dark for me.

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No one sees me. Right? Kids do that all the time. Maybe they don't, and I just made that up.

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Right? But that's the kind of futility we have. People in this world do dark things and they think no one sees them and yet God sees everything.

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Many attempt to suppress their shame and worldly sorrow, but it only leads to more guilt. Even if they think their deeds are hidden now, a day is coming when all will be laid bare.

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That's the promise. All will see them. That is, in the secret place, in the darkness, behind closed doors, all that these people have done will be brought to the light.

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The word also means conviction. They don't come to Christ for fear of being convicted.

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People avoid the Bible. They avoid church.

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They will often leave saying stuff like, that place is full of a bunch of self -righteous hypocrites.

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Right? An unbeliever will come in here and go, that place is full of a bunch of hypocrites. Because what's happening?

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They're being convicted. And so it's not that Christians are self -righteous, although they can act that way, right?

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Sinfully. But a lot of times, these unbelievers come into these churches and they do this and say things like that because they're feeling conviction.

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Those who are dark stay in the dark so they never feel bad about their deeds not being light.

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Because conviction means that you have to act. Conviction means that there needs to be change, but they don't want to change.

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Now, the last meaning of this word for exposed is reprove or rebuke.

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They fear coming to the light lest they and their deeds are rebuked or corrected by others.

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They don't want righteous laws. They don't want you to tell them to do differently. Right? Have you ever had a family member or a relative or a friend who you knew they were going the wrong way, and you even lovingly and graciously, you came to them and you said, look,

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I'll even say I love you. I'm here for you. I support you.

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But I have to tell you what the Word of God says. I've just got to tell you that you're going the wrong way.

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This is the right way. And I love you. Will you please look at the Word of God says? And what happens?

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People like that get defensive. They don't come to the light because they don't want to be corrected.

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They want to stay in their sin. Leave me alone. You have your truth.

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I have my truth. That means you go by God's standard and I make a standard of my own that's arbitrary.

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Right? That's what happens. They get angry with us.

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They get defensive. Because look, darkness feels like it's covered. It feels safe.

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Hidden to do sin. In fact, a lot of our sinning happens at night even as Christians.

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Lots of sin happens at night. There's even something in our mind where we think darkness is some sort of covering.

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But it's not. It's not. We're not safe then.

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It's not hidden to do sin. And if any of that resonates with you, exposure, conviction, or correction, if any of that resonates with you as a believer, then it's because as Christians sometimes we still do those things.

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Exposure of your sin you think would open you to judgment from your peers. But confession and exposure,

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I will tell you, is the first step to killing your sin. You must expose your sin and confess it to the brethren if you have any hope of getting over your sin.

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That is a biblical principle. Expose and confess your sin and there begins the steps to kill it.

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Next, conviction of your sin should not be avoided. We often don't read the

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Word of God. We skip church. We stop listening to that podcast or that good sermon group on Ligonier or whatever.

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We stop doing these things. We avoid certain godly friends so that we can escape spirit -wrought conviction.

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We are unwilling then sometimes to be corrected. Then when we are unwilling to be corrected, we act like those who don't love the light.

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We're acting like those who hate Him. But we are to be light -seekers. That's what verse 21 shows.

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But he who practices the truth comes to the light so that his deeds may be manifested as having been wrought in God.

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We've talked a lot about the love of God tonight. I would say that doing the things

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I just stated, not wanting exposure, conviction, or rebuke, is because we're often forgetting our first love.

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We are forgetting the love of God in sending His Son. We're forgetting truths like John 3 .16,

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for God loved the world in this way that He gave His only begotten Son that whoever believes in Him will not perish but have eternal life.

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We're forgetting it. John will later say in his epistle, there's no fear in love.

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Perfect love casts out fear. These light -seekers in verse 21, these

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Christ -seekers do believe. And therefore, they hate evil.

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They love the light and practice the truth. This is to be in contrast with verse 20. We are people who move toward the light.

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We don't move away from it. Opposed to the one hiding from shame, this one goes to the light to have their shame removed.

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One commentator said, while the evildoer embraces who he is, the one who does truth embraces who

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Christ is. By the way, I don't want you to be confused about verse 21.

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This is not a formula on how someone is saved. Some have wrongfully read it that way.

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Verse 20 and verse 21 are a declaration of those who have believed or not believed, who have not condemned or condemned.

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Now finally, look at the end of verse 21. Our works, our deeds are ultimately of God and through God.

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We do works in union with the Lord and by His power. Paul put it this way in Ephesians 2.

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He said, for by His workmanship we are created in Christ Jesus unto good works that He prepared beforehand that we would walk in them.

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God prepared the works. God brought them to us.

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He allows us to walk in them. Good deeds then are wrought in God. The one who loves the darkness performs their deeds out of their own volition and desire, while the one who loves the light has his deeds shown to be accomplished in God.

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But really, the point of these last two verses is to show then that if you don't know this

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One who can remedy this situation, you are to run to Him. Run to the light.

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Run away from the darkness. Don't shrink back from the light. Run to it. And so let's end it, church, by going back then to where we started.

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That God, for God, He loved.

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He initiated. He loved the world of all places. He loved the world.

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And that's the Gospel. Love accomplished that. Love never fails, the

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Word says. And I pray as believers we can all look to the idea of perishing and laugh.

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We know the power of the atonement. We know that God doesn't try. He will give you what

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He promised. And this allows us to look at suffering and death in a new light.

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Knowing what's ahead allows us to move forward. You, brothers and sisters, will outlast the moon and the stars.

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As long as there is a Lord God Almighty, which there always will be, the believer shall not only exist, but live and live forever.

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And His love will fill the expanse of that eternity. Let's pray.

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Father, please bless the message that went out today. Lord, please use it in the lives of Your people today here,

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Lord. God, this is a verse that we've heard many, many times. And I pray it was an encouragement to Your people.

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God, largely that we would look upon this love that is so strange and peculiar.

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Lord, a love that is unfathomable that would save sinful people.

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God, we thank You for this great love without which we would be destined to perish.

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But now, those of us who have believed have eternal life. And it's all by Your grace. It's all by Your sovereign hand.