Speaking of Faith: Love

Speaking of Faith: Love

John 3: 16

Introduction

I think ya’ll are a very smart church.  I don’t have to explain to you the purpose behind my recent sermons.  Ya’ll are smart enough to figure it out for yourselves.

Our Long Range Planning Committee presented a series of recommendations to our church back in September.  One of those suggestions was to emphasize Evangelism and Outreach in the church budget and church calendar for 2012.  And that has been the basic theme of all my sermons this year.

My first few sermons focused on the words of Jesus to his disciples and the ways Jesus’ words to his First Century disciples also applies to his Twenty-First Century disciples.  (By the way, that is what you and I are: Jesus’ Twenty-First Century disciples.)  Jesus expects all his disciples to  (1) spend time with Jesus; (2) obey the teachings of Jesus; (3) imitate the life of Jesus; and (4) continue the ministry of Jesus by spreading the Gospel, the message of the Kingdom of God, around the world.

The reason, or the authority, for evangelism comes from the words of Jesus.  Since Jesus instructed his followers to do the work of evangelism, we can say that the church did not create evangelism.  Evangelism created the church.

Our English word “evangelism” comes to us almost directly from the Greek word “evangelion,” which means “good news” or “Gospel.”  The Gospel is good news, and evangelism is sharing that good news with other people.

The good news of the Gospel can be summarized in many different ways.  However, there is one Bible verse which many Christians name as their favorite Bible verse that truly sums up the good news.  You probably learned John 3: 16 as a child, or at least very early in your life as a Christian.  You can probably quote it with me this morning.  (If you don’t know the words to John 3: 16, I recommend you should memorize them and hide them in your heart.)  Let’s put the words on the screen and say John 3: 16 together.

“For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whosoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life (John 3: 16 NIV).”

This is where we often make a mistake in presenting the Christian Gospel.  Sometimes we treat the Gospel as if it is a purely rational undertaking.  A person should acknowledge that God exists and then give mental assent to a list of Christian propositions.  People should accept Christian notions of the Incarnation of Jesus, the Trinitarian nature of God, the role of the Holy Spirit in both individual and corporate expressions, the nature of sin, and on and on and on.

The Gospel is not about leading people to a rational decision.  The Gospel is about leading people to a relational faith.  God is a person who has proven himself trustworthy.  God is inviting each of us to be in a relationship with himself—person to person.  The Gospel is a love story.

Love Story

The Gospel is a love story.  In a nutshell, God loves you so much that he gave his only Son.  This Son was Jesus of Nazareth.  Jesus was born of a virgin and lived a sinless life to fulfill all the commandments and teachings of the Old Testament.  Jesus also fulfilled the Old Testament in another way.  By upholding all the teachings of the Old Testament, Jesus became the only person qualified to give his life as the once-for-all sacrifice for our sins.  The Old Testament described an elaborate sacrificial system of offering lambs, doves, goats and bulls as sacrifices for specific sins.  Jesus replaced all those sacrifices once-for-all by offering his life as a perfect and final sacrifice for sin.  But sacrifice for sin was not all Jesus did.  Three days after his death on a Roman cross, Jesus rose from the dead.  Jesus’ resurrection is a promise to us that “whosoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”

God loves you and provided a way for you to live with him eternally.  This is a personal story about each of us individually.  And, this is also a universal story about all of the human race.  It is a love story that began in the first book of the Bible, when God created the heavens and the earth.

When God created the first humans, he placed them in a paradise.  We refer to this paradise as the Garden of Eden.  In the beginning, the Garden of Eden was perfect in every way.  Human beings lived together in peace.  The Garden provided for all their physical needs—food, water and shelter.  And human beings experienced relationship with God, enjoying the presence of God in the beauty of God’s creation.

Of course, this paradise didn’t last for long.  It only lasted until sin entered into God’s creation.  When the first humans sinned, all their relationships were broken.  The man and woman first experienced shame and put on clothing to hide their shame.  The creation stopped providing for all their needs, and humans began to work for their food, water, shelter, and now clothing.  And, worst of all, the humans were cast out of the presence of God.

This is where the love story took a rather unexpected turn.  We expect to find the humans doing all they can to restore their original relationship with God.  But, that is not what happened.  In fact, it was just the opposite.  God began pursuing the human race, because God wanted to restore the original relationship.

God pursued Abraham and entered into a relationship with Abraham’s descendants.  It was never God’s intention to have an exclusive relationship with Abraham and his descendants.  Instead, it was God’s plan to use Abraham and his descendants to tell the world about God’s love and God’s desire to have a relationship with individuals from every race and nationality.

Eventually, God took the extreme measure to send his only Son.  In the person of Jesus, God entered into human history to invite each of us to be in relationship with God.

Created for Love

This is what we were created for.  We were created for love—to be in relationship with God and to be in relationship with each other.

We see this in the story of creation.  Of all the creatures God made, there is something special about humans.

“Then God said, ‘Let us make man in our image, in our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.’  So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them (Genesis 1: 26 – 27 NIV).”

One of the distinctive Christian beliefs is the Trinitarian view that God is One and God is Three.  God is (and has always been) Father, Son and Holy Spirit.  Therefore, God is in relationship and created us in his image—to be in relationship.

We also see this emphasis on relationship in Genesis 2, when God created the first woman.  There is a kind of rhythm in the biblical story of creation.  God spoke.  Creation came into existence.  God spoke again.

Each time God created something, God said, “It is good.”  That is until God created the first man.  God created Adam and said, “It is NOT good…for the man to be alone.”  Then, God created the first woman.  Man and woman were created to be in relationship with each other…and to be in relationship with God. 

There is something deep within us that recognizes this.  We know we were created for relationships.  We naturally seek out friendship and relationship with others.  Even people who are introverted and seek out solitude are also interested in having another person with whom they can connect either as a spouse or as a close friend.  There are negative psychological effects when a person is isolated from all other people—a man stranded on a deserted island or a prisoner forced into solitary confinement.

We know we were created for relationships.  Despite the fact that our culture has launched an assault on traditional marriage, people continue to get married.  Social commentators claim that marriage is old fashioned and outdated.  Marriage is oppressive to women who have to give up their name and take the name of their husbands as a sign of giving up their rights (values) as individuals.  Yet, every week we read about another female celebrity who chooses to get married.  In the same way, we hear that divorce rates are soaring through the roof (some estimate that 50% of marriages end in divorce)…yet people continue to get married, because we know we were created for relationships.

Our desire for relationship with others serves at least two important roles in our lives.  In the first place, it helps us get a little closer to the purpose for which God created us.  In the second place, it sounds like a voice crying from the distance reminding us there must be more to life than living and being in relationship with other people.  We were also made for relationship with God.  God had made us for himself, and our hearts are restless until they find rest in God alone.

We know this, because human relationships are so difficult.  We long for relationship and work on our relationships with others only to find ourselves unfulfilled.

Unfulfilled Love

Relationships are hard work.  Friendships are hard to get right.  The parent-child relationship sometimes seems impossible.  And the only people who have all the answers about marriage are the people who have never been married.  But when we get it right, relationships are worth all the effort we put into them.

The problem is we so often fail to get our relationships right.  Marriage serves as a good example here.  People want to get married (even celebrities like Kim Kardashian), but the divorce rates are extremely high.  Some marriages last only a matter of months.  And maybe that demonstrates how we want to experience love and relationship but sometimes find them to be unfulfilling (or perhaps just too much work).

Another example is to look at the lives of the wealthiest and most powerful people in the world.  It would seem logical to believe that wealthy and powerful people are very happy people.  But that is not what experience tells us.  Wealthy and powerful people are unhappy, because they have sacrificed everything in life to achieve something that cannot satisfy.  Wealth and power are not the most important things in life.  Love is what really matters.  The only people who find satisfaction in life are the people who know they are loved.

Sadly, this cannot always be found in human relationships—friendship, parent-child, marriage.  But there is one place where we can all experience true and unconditional love. 

There is one relationship which can fulfill the longing of the human heart.  We are unfulfilled until we experience the love God demonstrated by giving his only Son, Jesus.

Conclusion

We live in a world full of people who are searching.  Some people search for the meaning of life in wealth and possessions.  Some people search for fulfillment in popularity or in having power over other people.  Some people search for purpose through knowledge and education.  If we were created in the image of God, none of these will ever satisfy our search.  There is only one way to find true meaning, purpose and fulfillment.  We are restless and unfulfilled until we embrace and allow ourselves to be embraced by the living God who loves us and sent his Son to provide the way for an eternal relationship with God.

This is what all of us are lacking.  This is what your friends are searching for.  And it is our responsibility to recognize that search in others and help them to discover the only love which fulfills.  The love of John 3:16…God loves you so much that he gave his one and only Son, Jesus, who lived in fulfillment of the Old Testament Law and died as the once-for-all sacrifice for sins.  Jesus rose again as the first to experience resurrection and eternal life.  Whosoever believes in Jesus has forgiveness of sins and will not perish but will have eternal life.