3:16 on 3/16

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As Pastor Jeff unpacks the most well-known verse in the Bible,

John 3.16, revealing the depth of God's love, the power of His promise,

and the hope we have in Christ.

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I am so thankful this morning for the fact that God so loved the world. Aren't you?

About six weeks ago, I received an email from the North American Mission Board, which we're part of,

and they were encouraging pastors all over the world to join them and preach

on John 3.16 on March 16th.

That's today, 3.16 on 3.16.

I get a lot of stuff, and I read through it, and I was like,

man, that's a creative thing.

That's a great idea, but we're in the middle of our prayer series right now,

so that would that would push our calendar off.

And so I'm not going to do that. So I deleted the email.

And we've been in a series on prayer, and it's been a great series, I think.

And we're really pushing into prayer in our lives and what that looks like,

not just prayer for the church or prayer in the church, but what prayer does in our own lives.

On Monday this week, I got another email from North America Commission Board

reminding everyone of 316 on 316.

And as I read through it, the Lord pricked my heart.

And I felt the Holy Spirit say, I want you to preach the most important message

that mankind has ever heard or could ever heard or could ever hear that I love them.

And so I didn't want to be disobedient to the Holy Spirit. And so we are pushing

our prayer series back and we'll be back at it next week. And we'll be talking about prayer.

But this week, we're going to focus on something that I think we always look

at as if every person that doesn't know Christ needs this.

But what about us who are in the fight daily, and we struggle and we battle

to be obedient to the Lord,

and yet we still somehow seem to forget that God loves me.

I know some of your weeks that you've had, and I know that you're struggling

and wrestling with things,

and life is tough, and life is hard, and I just am here to remind you this morning that God loves you.

It's been said that the entirety of the Bible and the entirety of the gospel

can be summed up in 25 words. 25.

That if we lost the entire Bible and only had one verse, that John 3.16 would

be more than enough to see and understand God's plan to save all of mankind.

And so here's today's big idea. If you were handed a service sheet,

sermon note sheet, it's on there.

We'll also have it on the screen behind us, but it says this,

God's love is extravagant.

It is costly. It's eternal. And it's available to all who believe in Jesus for salvation.

I want to do something. I want to invite you to all stand up with me right now,

and we're going to read this verse together in honor of the Lord Jesus Christ,

and we're going to just read it out loud. Ready?

Here we go. John 3, 16.

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.

Good job. You can be seated.

John 3.16 is the most well-known and most frequently cited verse in all of the Bible.

You see it if you watch the NFL, you'll see it in the end zones.

You'll see it on athletes. They'll write it on their wrists

or on their cleats or

maybe on their towel on their waistband maybe in

their eye paint heisman trophy tim tebow famously

wrote john 316 in his

eye black during the 2009 bcs national championship game now i'm not a gators

florida gators fan but i'm a tim tebow fan because he's a godly man and check

this out this is incredible three years later to the day after a playoff game

against the Steelers on January 8th of 2012,

he received a call immediately after the game and it pointed out the number

of his yards he threw, the other game statistics,

all aligned with John 316.

This is what his agent sent him or told him on this call.

Tim, do you know how many number of yards you threw for tonight?

He's like, no, I have no idea.

316 yards do you

know what your rushing average was tonight not very

good 3.16 his yards per completion averaged 31.6 it goes on this is just weird

ironic the game's television ratings were 31.6 the broncos time of possession was.

31.6. Now, I love how God does things.

Not everyone understood the meaning of John 3.16, what was written on his face.

And so they took to the internet, like most people do, and they Googled John 3.16.

And on that Monday morning, John 3.16 was the most searched term on Google,

and the Bible verse was the top trending topic on Facebook, and at that time, Twitter.

And this was not the first time that this had happened with Tebow.

When he wore the scripture verse during the national championship game three years earlier,

John 3.16 was reportedly Googled more than 90 million times during the national

championship game, all because he wore it on his face.

What an easy and creative way to spread the gospel.

Now, to understand John 3.16 we

need to understand the context and the background of which it was written.

You see, John 3.16 is part of a larger narrative of the gospel of John,

where Jesus is having this theological discussion with Nicodemus.

Nicodemus, if you've heard of him, maybe you haven't, but he was a Pharisee.

He was this religious guy, member of the Jewish ruling council,

and he'd heard Jesus teaching and he began to think and contemplate the message

that Jesus was proposing.

Now, he didn't want to be caught with Jesus. He didn't want to be seen with Jesus.

So scripture says that Nicodemus went alone at night.

And that's how chapter three of John starts. Nicodemus coming to Jesus at night

to gain understanding of what Jesus had been teaching.

It's then that Jesus tells Nicodemus that you must be born again in order to see the kingdom of God.

This morning, I want to walk through this incredible verse of John 3,

16, and I want to give you five characteristics of God's love.

Five characteristics of God's love. And the first one, if you're taking notes,

is that God's love is extravagant.

Extravagant. Notice what Jesus said in verse 16 For God so loved the world.

Notice, too, that salvation starts with God. Salvation never starts with us.

It's God is the initiator of salvation. God so loved the world.

And one of the greatest descriptives in this verse is about God's love for the world.

John says, God so loved the world. One of my favorite pastors,

David Jeremiah, once said this. He said, the most significant word in John 3,

16 is the little word, so.

In that small word are all the agonies of the cross and all the sufferings that

Jesus experienced while he was on earth.

God loved us, but he loved us in a special way.

He so loved us that he did something about his love.

You see, love requires action, doesn't it? You know, there are a lot of things that I say I love.

Man, John, who's running sound back there, John, he smoked up some meat for

us, and they brought it over to our house last night, and we feasted.

I love that meat.

It was amazing. It was incredible. And the barbecue sauce was amazing and incredible.

And the brownies, which I probably shouldn't have eaten, were amazing.

And guess what? I loved them.

Nick, I love a good Philly cheesesteak. I love a good hoagie.

I love food. On my birthday this past week, guess where we went?

Joe's in Independence, and I had crab rangoon pizza. And you either love it

or you think it sounds disgusting and weird.

And then you taste it and you love it. But you got to love it.

It's amazing. I love pizza.

But you know what? Let me take this a little bit further. This girl that sits

down in the front and sings a lot up in church.

I love her in a completely different way. And I love her so much.

Those not so little kids, those four people that live in our house that are crazy.

Drive cars, build engines, blow up things.

Man, I love them so, so much.

Do not leave this building today, not knowing that God just doesn't love you

like he loves a good ham sandwich.

God so, so, so loves you with the love that you've never experienced that is so out of this world.

I love what 1 John 3 says. John encourages us to see and understand the depth

of this love, this so loved.

And he says, behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us,

that we should be called the sons of God.

That word behold, it's an imperative.

It's a call to action. It's urging readers to pause and to consider and to notice

the depth and the richness and the quality of this love of God that he's granted to us.

When you study this word in the original Greek, the phrase, what manner of love

translates, It's hodapine agapine, which implies this. I love this.

An extraordinary, foreign kind of love, unusual to the worldly experience.

This love is active. It's extravagant.

So much so, so that when we're loved and we believe in him and we confess him

as Lord, that he makes us his own.

I become a son or daughter of God.

So number one, his love for you is extravagant. But number two,

his love is extensive for God so loved who?

The world. You with me, church?

God so loved the world. And the last time I checked, that includes you.

Everyone that's listening to the sound of my voice. Some of you,

you may be here this morning and you're going through something in life and

you're feeling like no one in the world understands.

God doesn't hear me. God couldn't possibly love me. You're wrong.

And we're here today, not by mistake. God knew that you needed to be reminded

of the vast, incredible, extravagant, extensive love for you.

God determined his love for you. In the Old Testament, salvation was only for the Jews.

And so this statement that God so loved the world is a brand new thing that

people had not heard before. It was something new.

The gospel, the good news of salvation was no longer just for the Jews,

but it was going to be for the rest of the world.

Salvation was extended to the entire world.

God's love is not limited to a select few, but it reaches every person in every

nation, every tribe, every stage of life.

It's all-encompassing. Romans 10 says, For there is no difference between Jew and Gentile.

That's the gospel. The gospel unifies us.

The same Lord is Lord of all and richly blesses all who call on him.

For everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.

Salvation is for everyone.

Titus 2, 11 says, for the grace of God has appeared that offers salvation to who?

All people. Come on, church. Who? All people.

1 Timothy 2 says, this is good. And it pleases God, our Savior,

who wants again all people to be saved and come to a knowledge of the truth.

2 Peter 3, the Lord is not slow in keeping his promise as some understand slowness.

He said, I'm coming back for you one day, right?

I'm going away. I'm preparing a place for you. And we say, man,

he's being so slow. It's taking forever.

Listen, he is patient with you. not wanting anyone to perish,

but everyone to come to repentance.

When we get to heaven, did you know, this will shock you, it's not just going

to be white Americans that speak English.

Some of you are like, what? Revelation 7 gives this incredible depiction and

description that John says, After these things I looked,

and behold, a great multitude, which no one could number, of all nations,

tribes, peoples, and tongues,

standing before the throne and before the Lamb. That's Jesus.

God loves the whole world, not those who seem good, not those who seem deserving of being saved.

His love is for the broken. His love is for the lost. His love is for the rebellious.

His love is for the runaway.

His love searches and he desires that all come to know him. All.

My seminary professor used to say, all means all. And that's all means all.

God desires that all come to know him. His love is extravagant,

number one. His love is extensive, number two.

Number three, God's love is expensive. defensive.

God so loved you, God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten son.

His only begotten son. Love is measured by what someone is willing to sacrifice and to give up.

And God's love is so costly because it required the greatest sacrifice he could have ever given.

Jesus, his son, his only begotten son. I like what one commentary says.

It says, The phrase he gave indicates a purposeful action taken by God,

underscoring the depth and selflessness of his love.

Only begotten refers to Jesus Christ, affirming both his unique status and the

profound level of sacrifice involved in this gift.

This giving is not merely about the incarnation or Jesus coming down to earth.

That's what the incarnation, Jesus becoming flesh, taking on flesh,

but is intrinsically linked to the crucifixion where Jesus' ultimate purpose

and God's redemptive plan converge.

God gave the most valuable gift he had so that through Jesus' redemptive work

on the cross, You and I could be rescued from the consequences of our sin.

What are our consequences of sin? Death, hell, eternal separation from God.

And when you come to terms with how expensive a gift it was and how much God

sacrificed for you, you will never get over it.

Everything we do should be fueled and motivated by the fact that God so loved

you and God so loved me that I'm going to live according to his ways and according

to his word that I'm going to submit to him and not to my own desires.

The motivation for our lives is God's love and sacrifice of Jesus on the cross for you and for me.

That's what motivates me every single day to do this. Because guess what? It's not easy.

Life is not easy.

Emotions come in and they change things. And my emotions and mine will say, why are you doing this?

Just go get a job and get some money.

But God so loved the world needs to be heard by everyone. By everyone.

1 John 4, 9 says, In this, the love of God was manifested toward us that God

has sent His only begotten Son into the world that we might live through Him.

Because of His incredible love for you, He sent Jesus. He sent Jesus.

I showed a video here in the first six or eight months when we first opened a couple years ago.

And it was the story of the drawbridge operator who worked at the railroad.

And I want to share it with you again today, but because of time,

I'm not going to show you the video.

But the drawbridge operator worked for the railroad, and his job,

obviously, was to raise and to lower a massive drawbridge that allowed boats

to pass beneath and for trains to cross safely above.

He loved his job, but more than anything, he loved his young son,

who would often accompany him to work.

One day, the man brought his son to the bridge control station.

As he went about his duties, he heard the distant whistle of an oncoming passenger

train full of people speeding toward the bridge.

He reached for the lever to lower the bridge, but at that moment,

he noticed something horrifying.

His son had wandered off and fallen into the massive gears of the bridge's mechanism.

Can you imagine? The father froze in terror.

If he pulled the lever, the gears would crush his beloved only son.

But if he did nothing, the train full of men and women and children would plunge

into the river below, leading to their certain death.

Tears streamed down his face as he made an unthinkable choice.

With a broken heart, he pulled the lever. The bridge lowered into place,

the massive gears turning, and his only son was crushed.

Train sped safely across, its passengers completely unaware of the sacrifice

that had just been made for them.

Some of them were laughing, others still reading books, others just staring

out the window, oblivious to the cost of their safety.

The father devastated, watched as the train disappeared into the distance,

knowing that he had given up his son so that they might live.

Sounds a lot like the story and the truth of the gospel message.

Romans 8, 32 describes our father.

It says, he who did not spare his own son.

He did not spare his own son, but delivered him up for us all.

How shall he not with him also freely give us all things.

It was an expensive, incredibly powerful, painful sacrifice that he gave for us.

God's love for you cost him everything that he had. It was expensive.

Number four, God's love is enduring.

Did you know the phrase, his love endures forever, appears at least 44 times in the Bible?

Most notably in Psalm 136, where it is repeated 26 times, once in every verse.

God's love is not temporary or conditional. It lasts forever and it remains

steadfast in every season of life.

Aren't you glad that although our emotions change and our feelings change and

our situations change, God's love for us never ever changes.

You cannot out-sin God's love or forgiveness.

You hear me? You cannot out-sin God's love or forgiveness, but you also won't

continue to willfully sin when you've experienced God's love and forgiveness. Do you catch that?

No, you can never out-sin God's love, but you won't continue to willfully sin

when you've experienced his love, when you've experienced his forgiveness.

The great preacher Charles Spurgeon once said this,

he said, you may sooner drain the sea of its water or deprive the sun of its

light or make space too narrow than diminish the great mercy of God.

There's nothing that you could do where you could lose God's love or forgiveness or mercy.

Don't let the enemy sneak in and say, you're too far gone. You've messed up too much.

God could never accept you into heaven.

God could never love you. It's false.

Romans 5.20 puts it this way. where sin increased, grace increased all the more.

No matter how far you've fallen, God's love reaches further.

Lamentation says, because of the Lord's great love, we are not consumed for

his compassions never fail.

They are new every morning. Great is your faithfulness. Aren't you glad his

love is new? His compassion is new every morning.

God loves you and he always will. The love of God endures past any sin that

you've ever committed, ever.

Let that sink in this morning. Number five, God's love is exclusive.

What? Man, I was digging this. This was a powerful message until that part.

I thought God loved the whole world.

I can't buy that God's love is exclusive or that salvation is exclusive.

Doesn't the Bible teach that God wants everyone to be saved? Absolutely.

Wasn't point number two that God's love is all-inclusive? Yes. Yes, absolutely.

But what does Scripture say? For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son.

Now watch out, because here comes the exclusivity of the gospel.

That whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

Let me ask you two questions, and they aren't your questions. Who can be saved?

Everyone. All. Everyone. Everyone.

But what is the exclusiveness of the gospel? What is required of us to be saved?

Whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting or eternal life.

Paul emphasizes this as well in Acts 16, 31. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved.

Believe believe,

John records this in John 3 18 he who believes in him referring to Jesus is

not condemned we know the New Testament says there is now no condemnation for

those who are now in Christ,

when you come to believe in Jesus Christ and you confess with your mouth that

he is Lord your penalty has been paid,

But he who does not believe is condemned already because he has not believed

in the name of the only begotten Son of God.

Listen, God doesn't send anyone to hell.

He gave you the choice. And if you end up in hell, it's because you.

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Required for salvation? Belief.

We see that. Romans 10, 9, and 10 says, if you confess with your mouth the Lord

Jesus and believe in your heart that what?

That God has raised him from the dead, you will be saved.

Now it's two parts. For with the heart, one believes unto righteousness,

and with the mouth, confession is made unto salvation.

Listen, salvation is only found in Jesus.

We must believe that Jesus is who he said he was, that he is God,

that he was raised from the dead.

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Then and only then can we be saved.

Well, what about other religions? Aren't we all just kind of going to the same God?

Muhammad, Allah, Joseph Smith, Buddha.

Aren't we all going up the same mountain? No. No.

Acts 4.12 says, Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name

under heaven given to mankind by which we must be saved.

Here's what Jesus said himself.

John 14, 6 Jesus said, I am the way and the truth and the life no one comes

to the Father except through me no one.

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Acts 3.19 says, Repent then and turn to God so that your sins may be wiped out,

that times of refreshing may come from the Lord.

We repent and we turn to God.

It's like driving a car. You imagine you're driving down the highway,

you're following a route, and then all of a sudden you see that Although you

were confident in the way which you were driving, now you see a sign that says, wrong way.

Danger ahead. Suddenly you realize that continuing down this road will lead to disaster.

At that moment, you have the choice.

And you have the choice this morning to either ignore the sign and keep going, hoping for the best.

Or you can acknowledge the mistake. You can hit the brakes. You can do a U-turn

and start heading in the right direction.

Repentance is like that. It's making that U-turn in your life.

When we realize we're headed in the wrong direction because of our sins,

we can't just feel sorry.

There's a lot of sorry people out there.

We have to stop. We have to turn and we have to move in a direction that God is calling us.

Isaiah 55, 7 says, But I'm not wicked.

If the blood has not been applied to your life, we are all dirty, filthy rags.

There is nothing that we can do to be saved on our own.

There are no good works that we can do we could spend our whole life serving

other people loving other people doing the best work but if we don't believe

in the name of Jesus Christ and confess with our mouth and believe in our heart

that God raised him from the dead,

we're headed to hell.

Good works are a result,

of salvation. Isaiah says, let the wicked forsake his ways and the unrighteous man his thoughts.

Let him return to the Lord and he will have mercy on him and to our God for

he will abundantly pardon.

True repentance is not just feeling bad about sin.

It's making a complete turnaround. and walking in obedience to Christ.

Good works. It's not loving others or serving that gets us eternal life.

Those are all great things, but none of it will result in eternal life or entrance

to heaven. Here's the good news.

It's a free gift. It's an absolutely free gift.

I like to say it because it's simple and it's easy. It's as simple as ABC,

admit that you're a sinner, believe in Jesus, and then confess that he is Lord.

I never want to take it for granted, whether we have five people or 500 at Generations

Church, we are always going to give the gospel out, because it's all about the

gospel, isn't it? It's all about John 3, 16.

And I want to give you an opportunity, and I don't want you to,

I don't want to take it for granted that everyone in here has admitted that

they're a sinner, that they've believed on the Lord Jesus Christ and that they

are confessing that he is Lord.

So if you don't mind, I just want to take a minute. I want to ask you to bow

your heads and close your eyes.

Listen, if you're here this morning and you've never given your life to Christ,

man, maybe you have struggled.

I just don't even know what to do or what to say.

Just say, Heavenly Father.

I ask you to come into my heart and life. I realize that I'm a sinner.

I need you.

I need you to rescue me. There's a bridge between me and you,

and that's Jesus. So I'm trusting Jesus to save me.

I believe that he died for my sin and he paid the penalty for my sin so that

I can live with you forever.

Please come into my life.

And I want to pause there. If you've prayed that prayer right now,

I'm not going to embarrass you.

I'm not going to call on you or point you out,

but with every eye closed still, I want you to raise your hand just so I can

celebrate with you that your life was headed for devastation and death and hell,

and now you've been saved.

Would you just slip your hand up and let me celebrate with you?

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Secondly,

we have been given the responsibility and the commandment.

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Once we've accepted Christ as Lord and Savior to be baptized and then to make disciples.

Next week we're having a baptism service if you've never been baptized I want

you to sign up and do that so we can celebrate your obedience,

get involved with the community, with the body of Christ,

and grow you'll be glad you did,

on your seat you can look up now on your seat you should have been either on

your chair or next to you there were these little cards that we printed off

316 on 316 each one of us we know people.

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That have not yet come to Christ,

I want you to write Write the name down of someone that you want to see come to Christ.

If you got five people you want to see to Christ, come to Christ,

grab some more and write them down.

Write them down. And here's what I want you to do. Write their name down and then take it home.

Put it in your Bible. Put it on your bedside table. Put it somewhere where you will pray for them.

If you've been following along and using your prayer journal like I have for

our current series, put it in your prayer journal.

And be praying for those people that do not yet know him.

And I want you to invite them to come to church.

He died for us. It was an expensive, costly life.

Gift, and he wants all to come to know him. So invite someone to church next week, guys.

Invite, invite, invite. I'm going to pray, and then the team is going to lead.

If you need prayer this morning, our team is up front. I'll be up front.

Come. We'd love to pray with you or talk with you about life or anything that

you need help with. We're here for you. We love you guys.

Um, father, we come to you. Thank you for being here with us.

We pray that you would, that you would just do what only you can do,

that you would draw men and women and boys and girls to yourself.

That you would use us,

to invite, to live out the gospel to people every day.

Christianity is not a Sunday thing. It's a lifestyle.

Thank you so much for loving us extravagantly.

Lord, thank you for eternal life.

We love you. We ask you in your name. Amen.

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You've been listening to the generations church podcast if you'd like more information

about generations church feel free to get in touch with us at info at generation church dot us or.

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