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WEEKLY
Volume 1 Number 40
4 March 2007
For God So Loved the World
(Message delivered by Pr Hien
Nguyen at the Sunday Worship Service, 2 pm, Feb 25, 2007)
Text:
John 3:16-18
Do you know and believe that
God loves you very much? God’s Word, the Bible, says that He does, and
we just believe it, take it and enjoy it. “For God so loved the
world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in
him should not perish, but have everlasting life” (John 3:16). I
have shared this verse to others, telling them that God loved them so
much that He sent His only begotten Son to come and die for their sins
and to rise again to be their living Saviour, but many do not believe,
arguing that if God loved mankind so much, then why are there a lot of
evils in this world such as illness, wars, disasters, epidemics, crimes,
etc? They even blame God for those evils. Others say that God is unfair,
questioning why many are healthy, good-looking, smart, skilful, and rich
while many others are in illness, disability or poverty? They fail to
see that the holy and righteous God is still just and fair to condemn
human beings and destroy them in Hell due to their sins, transgressions,
unrighteousness, ingratitude, wickedness, rebellion, blasphemy,
idolatry, and so forth! However, He still loved sinners and planned His
salvation for them in Jesus Christ! May the Lord be gracious unto us and
open our eyes and enlighten our hearts so that we understand and
“know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might
be filled with all the fulness of God” (Eph 3: 19), and “Behold,
what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we
should be called the sons of God” (1 John 3:1).
The Reason of God’s
Salvation: God’s Love
God is the perfect, wise, and
the mighty Designer and Maker. He has never done anything without a
reason or a purpose. He has planned His salvation for mankind from the
foundation of the world because of His great love for them. Why did He
send His only begotten Son into the world to die for sinners? It is “For
God so loved the world” (v 16). The term “love” here is
translated from the Greek word agapao, the highest form of love,
the divine love and holy love as God is divine and holy, and God is love
“agapé”
(1 John 4:8). Many
love their children or friends so much that they ignore their sins, but
God hated sins and had to deal with sins to save sinners by
sending His only begotten Son to die for their sins. The term “world”
here refers to all the inhabitants of the earth, mankind. God has
manifested His love toward mankind when we look at His creation. We
cannot survive without the air, water, and food in a good environment.
How God loved human beings when He only created them after He had
created the heaven and the earth, the firmament, vegetation, the sun,
the moon, the stars, the birds of the air and fishes of the sea, the
animals and retiles!
God has manifested His love
when He preached salvation to mankind right after Adam and Eve’s fall
with His first Gospel (Gen 3:15). God has manifested His love when He
preserved Noah and his family (from them we now exist) when He poured
down His judgment on earth with the great Global Flood due to men’s sins
and wickedness. And above all, God has manifested His love when He sent
His only begotten Son to die for sinners like you and me! Do you believe
that?
The Intensity of God’s
Love: God gave His only begotten Son
When we love someone so much,
we are willing to help him or her and give him or her what we have as
long as they are good and not against us. If you were a king and had
your only begotten son, would you be willing to sacrifice your son to
die for the people who offended you, blasphemed you, and rebelled
against you? Surely, we would hardly do that but would punish those
wicked people. We cannot fully understand and know God’s love “which
passeth knowledge” (Eph 3:18), but God did love sinners like you and
me so much that He gave His only begotten Son! The Bible says, “For
scarcely for a righteous man will one die: yet peradventure for a good
man some would
even dare to die. But God commendeth his love toward us, in that,
while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us”
(Rom 5:7-8), and “In this was manifested the love of God toward
us, because that God sent his only begotten Son into the world, that we
might live through him”(1 John 4:9). We thank God for perfectly
inspiring and preserving His Word in Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek that
underlie the King James Bible. The translators of the KJB were godly and
highly qualified men who did master the Bible languages and so trembled
at God’s Word that they just translated it “word for word.” The term
“only begotten Son” is correctly translated from the Greek term
monogené
(mono means only
and gené
means begotten), not like modern versions translating “one and only”
undermining the eternal Sonship of our Lord Jesus Christ, as we know
some religious groups believe that Jesus was created by God, but not
begotten! It is so dangerous when God’s Word is translated from corrupt
texts by ungodly men with “thought for thought” method!
The more God loves mankind,
the more He gets angry when His love is rejected, “He that believeth
on the Son hath everlasting life: and he that believeth not the Son
shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him” (John
3:36). It is a terrible thing to ignore and reject God’s love and
salvation! “How shall we escape, if we neglect so great salvation”
(Heb 2:3), “And with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in
them that perish; because they received not the love of the truth,
that they might be saved” (2 Thess 2:10), and “He that
believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is
condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the
only begotten Son of God” (v 18). Then shall you and I not believe
and receive God’s love and salvation and then love Him, worship Him and
serve Him?
The Purpose of God’s Love:
Salvation for All
The purpose of God when He
sent His only begotten Son into this world is to save all sinners.
“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son,
that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have
everlasting life.” The purpose clause is “that whosoever
believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”
Through the phrases “loved the world,” and “whosoever” or
“anyone who,” we learn that God loved all mankind and desired all to be
saved, and not to perish (eternal death in Hell), but have eternal life.
Hyper-Calvinists believe that God only loved the elect and Christ only
died for the elect; and as a result, they do not promote evangelism.
Through the Bible we know that this belief is wrong and unbiblical. The
Bible confirms that God loved all and desired all to be saved and sent
His Son to die for all. “For God sent not his Son into the world to
condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved”
(v 17), and “Who (God) will have all men to be saved, and
to come unto the knowledge of the truth” (1 Tim 2:4), and “The
Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness;
but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish,
but that all should come to repentance” (2 Peter 3:9), and
“And he (Jesus Christ) is the propitiation for our sins: and not for
ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world” (1 John
2:2), and so forth. Then, if anyone perishes because of his unbelief, it
is his fault and responsibility. My dear friends, we can never blame God
for anything except thank Him for His love, and we can only blame
ourselves for our corrupt nature!
The Effect of God’s Love:
Salvation for Those Who Believe
Although God loved all and
desired all to be saved, but not all are to be saved automatically. Some
religious groups believe that as God is love and Christ died for all,
all will be saved and no one will be condemned to Hell. This belief is
wrong and unbiblical. The Bible confirms, “He that believeth on
him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already,
because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of
God” (v 18) and “But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the
abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and
idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which
burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death” (Rev
21:8). Then, in order to be saved, each of us must believe in the Lord
Jesus Christ and receive Him as our personal Lord and Saviour, “whosoever
believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life”
(v 16). What does it mean to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ? The Bible
says that even “the devils also believe and tremble” (while many people
do not tremble before God at all) but they cannot be saved because they
do not submit themselves to the Lord and His Word. Many professing
Christians believe in the Lord Jesus but without their submission to Him
and His Word. Our Lord Jesus says, “Not every one that saith unto
me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that
doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven” (Matt 7:21).
Then the true and living faith must come from the true and living God as
a gift from Him, “For by grace are ye saved through faith; and
that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God:” (Eph 2:8). Then
you and I must be humble before God to receive His grace since He
resists the proud (James 4:6).
Our Lord Jesus gives us an
illustration of a proper faith in Him, saying, “And as Moses
lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be
lifted up: That whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but
have eternal life” (vv 14-15). When the people of Israel spoke
against the Lord and Moses, God sent fiery serpents to bite them. When
they repented, God instructed Moses to make a serpent of brass and put
it upon a pole (an emblem of the coming Saviour Jesus Christ crucified
on the cross). “Every one that is bitten, when he looketh upon it,
shall live” (Num 21:8). If they had looked at Moses, or at
others, or at the fiery serpents, or at themselves, or at their wounds,
they would never have been cured but perished. We are to acknowledge our
fatal wounds of sin and hopeless condemnation to Hell and then throw
ourselves on His mercy and look unto our Saviour Jesus Christ alone with
our full trust and submission for His healing, cleansing, forgiveness
and salvation. “Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our
faith” (Heb 12:2), and “Look unto me, and be ye saved, all
the ends of the earth: for I am God, and there is none else” (Isa
45:22).
Conclusion
My dear friends, although God
loved all mankind, we have to believe and receive God’s love and
salvation for ourselves personally. It is so good, comforting,
meaningful, and effective when you and I can sincerely say with faith in
this truth, “For God so loved me” like the apostle Paul,
saying, “I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I,
but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I
live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself
for me” (Gal 2:20). May “the love of Christ constrain us”
(2 Cor 5:14) and move us to love Him, live for Him, serve Him with a
thankful heart and then share His love with others, telling them that
God loves them and gives them the Saviour Jesus Christ, and praying that
by God’s grace and in His good timing some may receive His love and be
saved, all for His glory. Amen.
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