The Purpose of God's Love: Prequel to John 3:16

3:05Jesus answered, Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the spirit is spirit. Do not be amazed. Do not marvel that I said to you, you must be born again. The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear the sound of it, but do not know where it comes from or where it is going. So is everyone who is born of the Spirit. Nicodemus said to him, How can these things be? Literally, how is this possible?

3:41Verse 10, Jesus answered and said to him, Are you the teacher of Israel, and you do not understand these things? Nicodemus, truly, truly, I say to you, we speak that which we know and testify of what we have seen, and you do not accept our testimony. If I told you heavenly things, excuse me, earthly things, and you do not believe, how will you believe if I tell you heavenly things? No one has ascended into heaven but he who has descended from heaven, the Son of Man. As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, so that whoever believes will in him have eternal life. For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever Believes in him will not perish, but have everlasting life. So we're at John 3.16, the prequel to understanding John 3.16. We need to look at those verses that came just before the conversation with Nicodemus and Jesus. Last month, if you were here, you'd be reminded that we looked at Nicodemus. Jesus calls him the teacher of Israel. We said that he was an almost Christian discovered at that point in time. I believe that later in his life he became a believer. And we also saw this conversation between he and Jesus, a teacher whom Nicodemus says is sent from God because nobody else can do the things that he does unless God's with him. So our text, that last time we looked at it, a little over a month ago, was John 2.23 through 3.10. We looked at the whole concept of the new birth, of being birthed again. To say being born again doesn't really give us justice to the verb that's used there. It's a passive verb. It's something that happens to you. You don't go out and get yourself born again, just like you don't physically birth yourself. You must be birthed from above. So to keep today's message in context, we must remember that Nicodemus is amongst the many who have questions in verse 23, but he's the one that goes at night, looks like by himself.

5:55These people in verse 23, they believed something about Jesus. They believed That he was doing some extraordinary signs, and he was. They saw them, so did Nicodemus. From Jesus' perspective, we saw in John 2:24 that, well, there's an alarming problem about their faith, we see that you'll recall that Jesus wasn't entrusting himself to them. That means that Jesus didn't have faith in their faith. They believed in some God facts and Jesus trivia, was a terminology I used last month. They believed something, but you'll also recall that he wasn't entrusting himself to them. That would include those in verse 23, it would include all the religious rulers of the day, highest-ranking people in Israel, one of those being Nicodemus. So, John 3 clearly demonstrates that Nicodemus is very perplexed. We see that in the language. On the one hand, he recognizes that Jesus comes from God because nobody, he says, can do the things that you do unless God is with him. That's in John 3:2.

7:03Yet on the other hand, Nicodemus fails to understand his Hebrew Bible, the same Bible that you hold in your hands, only in English. It would have been clear if he would have looked at Ezekiel 36 and 37, he would have seen a whole illustration of new birth with multitudes of Israel's army in bones, dry bones, and God births them again in those two passages. As a result of Nicodemus' failure to understand the new birth in Ezekiel, he gives him yet another opportunity. He gives him another opportunity to understand a painting that he's going to issue to him, an understanding of how he can understand the new birth, how he can understand how to see and enter the kingdom of heaven.

7:52That's what he wants him to see. Nicodemus, he's an enthusiastic religious man, that's for sure. He fervently hopes for his own resurrection. And he hears Jesus, who, according to Nicodemus' own testimony, is a teacher sent from God. And Jesus, he warns Nicodemus. He issues Nicodemus an answer to a question he didn't even ask, and he says to him, You'll never see or enter the kingdom of God unless you're birthed again, Nicodemus, from above, birthed from above.

8:28As I like to do, I like to give the application for my messages from the scripture right up front. So, the application, if this is on, guys, there we go. The application to this message that we have here in front of us is that Jesus demonstrates really two shocking realities about salvation for a purpose, and that purpose is so that all those believing in him may have eternal life. That's the message here. That's the application. So, I would bring this message. God brings this message to us that we will. Would believe. So here they are. There's two of them.

9:05First one is a testimony rejected, and we're going to see that unfold itself in verses 11 and 12. And then, secondly, a testimony received from verses 13 through 15. So first, we have to look at it from a negative perspective. What's wrong with Nicodemus's faith and the faith of those in verse 23? Where does it fall short? What kind of faith is it that they have? Well, our first point really addresses that question. It's a testimony rejected. A testimony rejected. So we see in this passage, verses 11 and 12, Jesus says these words to Nicodemus. Truly, truly, I say to you, we speak what we know and we testify what we have seen, and you do not accept our testimony. If I told you earthly things, you would not believe. How will you believe if I tell you heavenly things? Nicodemus is among the first in history to recognize that Jesus is a great teacher who comes from God, but there's a problem. Indeed, there is a warning about his kind of faith. His kind of faith isn't saving faith. He agrees that Jesus does some cool stuff. This is the kind of faith that Jesus does not entrust himself to. Why? Because according to verse 11, verse 11 reveals that it's a refusal to accept. It's a refusal to embrace who Christ is, his message.

10:36It's a refusal to embrace what Jesus and others knows, speaks, and sees. Nicodemus and the many in verse 23 believed that Jesus performed some signs, but they refused to accept the message of repentance and belief that the Father sent the Son. That's it. Keep in mind that Jesus answers life's most important question here, a question that Nicodemus, as I mentioned a moment ago, never dreamt of asking. And yet Jesus answers it for him. And the question is this, how does one see or even enter the kingdom of God? How does somebody go to heaven? That's the question that Jesus is telling Nicodemus you should be asking, Nicodemus.

11:17We must remember that salvation is always by grace through faith alone. By grace alone, through faith alone. So Jesus in verse 11, I love this. For me that's now a southerner born in California, Southern California, he uses the Greek plural, y'all. I love it. The Greek plural, y'all, again, to demonstrate that it was not just Nicodemus who didn't accept salvation by grace alone, through faith alone. It was the others as well, those that he was representing in verse 23. He's pointing back to them. So Jesus kicks off verse 11 by repeating those two familiar words. Truly, truly, this is the third time Nicodemus. Nicodemus hears this couplet, this truly, truly phrase.

12:05You'll find in the Gospel of John, if you wanted to count them, these words truly, truly, are used 25 times. And it points to the truth of Christ. So he says, truly, truly, I say to you, we speak what we know, and we testify what we have seen, and you do not accept our testimony, Nicodemus. As the one who comes from God, Jesus is indeed the primary source of all truth. He repeats it twice here. We know from John 14, 6, John 14, 6, Jesus says, I am the way, the truth. That's pretty bold. I am the truth and the life. No man comes to the Father but through me, Jesus says. And so it's a common theme throughout the Gospel of John to see that Jesus is the truth. And as a primary source of truth, the words truly, truly indicate that every time, or that everything Jesus says can be trusted.

13:01Just mentioned Psalm 118 a moment ago. The Psalm opens up with a very clear statement that everything about God is true eternally, consistently, eternally, and Jesus is God in the flesh. So, in verse 11, Jesus is the primary source for the testimony of Nicodemus that Nicodemus and the others did not embrace. Jesus tells Nicodemus, Jesus tells Nicodemus, that which we have known and we speak, you all are known. Not receiving our testimony. There it is. Y'all do not receive our testimony. All of you, Nicodemus, all the Pharisees, all those in verse 23, all of you aren't accepting what I'm saying. So we'd have to ask the question, what testimony is it that Nicodemus and the others aren't accepting, that they've heard up to this point? And they've continuously rejected. Let's turn back into the Gospel of John, to John chapter 1, and we're going to answer the question of some of the things that they would have known. Certainly, Nicodemus, we know for certain, would have known about John the Baptist's testimony. I'm going to read John the Baptist's testimony in verses 19 through 34, and you're going to see how John the Baptist describes who he himself is, but more importantly, who Jesus is. And these are the things that Nicodemus would have known when he came to Jesus at night.

14:26John 1, verse 19 says this. This is the testimony of John. When the Jews sent him, priests and Levites from Jerusalem, and Nicodemus was amongst them, sending them, to ask him, who are you? And he confessed, and he did not deny, but confessed, I'm not the Christ. I'm not the Messiah. I'm not the Savior, he says. They asked him, what then? Are you Elijah? And he said, and I am not. Are you the prophet? And he answered, no.

14:54And they said to him, Who are you? So that we may give an answer to those who sent us, what do you have to say? Say about yourself? He said, I'm a voice crying in the wilderness. He quotes the Old Testament, Make straight the way of the Lord, as Isaiah the prophet said. Now they've been sent from the Pharisees. Now, we know Nicodemus knew about this mission. We knew that whatever was said here by John the Baptist went back to Nicodemus' ears because he was one of the 70. He was the teacher of Israel. He was one of the Pharisees that sent this group of people to ask John the Baptist who he is. So Nicodemus would have known these things. Verse 23, they asked him and said to him, Why then are you baptizing if you are not the Christ nor Elijah or the prophet? Jesus answered them, saying, or excuse me, John answered them, saying, I am baptized in water, but among you stands one whom you do not know. It is he who comes after me, the thong of whose sandal I am not worthy to untie. These things took place in Bethany, beyond the Jordan, where John was baptizing. The next day, he sees Jesus coming to him and says, Behold, as he points to him, look, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. This is he on behalf of whom I said, After me comes a man who is of higher rank than I, for he existed before me. And we know that Jesus existed before John, even though Jesus was born after John, because John 1:1 through 1.4 is very clear with us. He existed from eternity past. He wasn't created. He is the creator. That's the idea here.

16:30Verse 31, I did not recognize him. But so that he might be manifested to Israel, I came baptizing in water. John testified, saying, I've seen the Spirit descending as a dove out of heaven, and he remained upon him. I didn't recognize him. But he who sent me to baptize in water said to me, He upon whom you see the Spirit descending and remaining upon him, this is the one who baptizes in the Holy Spirit. I myself have seen and have testified that this is the Son of God. So what is it that these people in verse 23 and Nicodemus would have known? They would have known this about Jesus, but they didn't want to embrace him. They would have also known in John chapter 2 that Jesus caused water to become wine. They would have known that at the miracle in Cana of Galilee. They would have known. Maybe they were part of the group of people where Jesus made this little handmade whip in the temple and drove out thousands of stinking animals and people out of the temple for making God's house a place of business. Jesus referred to the temple as his own father's house, his father's house. Well, that was a language that was not used in those days. God was not referred to as one's father.

17:48Even Nicodemus admitted that Jesus came from God because no one else is capable of doing the things that he does. So Nicodemus, why not listen to the message of repentance and be Belief and embrace Christ. These are merely the things that we know from the beginning of John 1, that they knew. We also know from John that all the world couldn't contain all the books of all the things that Jesus did and said, but they knew these things.

18:20So we have to ask ourselves the question that if they knew everything Nicodemus knows up to this point, if we knew everything that Nicodemus knows up to this point, what would we do if we were in his sandals? What would we do if we were walking in his shoes? Would we reject Christ the same way they do? Nicodemus, as I said, is one of 70 rulers of Israel, over hundreds of thousands of people, perhaps millions. He's impressed a whole lot of people to get to where he is in society. He's all the way at the top. Jesus refers to him as the teacher of Israel. In essence, there's no other teacher as high as you, Nicodemus. You ought to know these things, Nicodemus. Nicodemus coming to salvation in Christ would be as scandalous as the Pope in the 16th century becoming a reformer.

19:15And for Nicodemus, receiving Jesus' testimony requires an abandonment, an abandonment of his apostate, man-made religion. Certainly, if he embraced Christ, there would be premiums. Death, you'd have to admit that he's a sinner. And you can't be a sinner if you sit on the Pharisaical committees, the Sanhedrin, comprised of the Pharisees and the Sadducees, which means he'd lose his livelihood. Pharisees at this point were very wealthy people. Just like millions of other Christians have lost their livelihoods, just like millions of other Christians, even this week, thousands are paying the ultimate price for their faith in Christ. And here's Nicodemus. He knows he's the teacher of Israel. He sees the wonderful things that he does.

20:06It's not ready to take his Jesus facts and God trivia to the next level. Jesus says, y'all, plural, reject it. This includes his colleagues on the Sanhedrin who refuse to admit John the Baptist's testimony was true, was real, was correct. Those passages that we just read. And also it would refer to the many in John 2:23. It's all these people who reject the message of regeneration, the fact that Jesus paid the debt that we couldn't pay.

20:44Why would all these people live in ongoing, consistent rejection of the teacher who comes from God, who does things that nobody else to Nicodemus's own admission has the capability? Of doing. It's not a problem with head knowledge. The simple answer is that when man's pride is embraced, the Messiah, the Savior is rejected. But there's more to rejecting God than meets the eye. There's more than simple answers. Do you really want to know the theological reason people reject God? They refuse to walk in Him, with Him? People don't accept His testimony. The closest reason that we can see is right there in your passage in John 3, verse 19. It's so clear that men agape the darkness. They love the darkness. The same kind of Greek word that is used as God's love for the world is the kind of love they have for the darkness rather than the light. According to Matthew 7, verses 13 through 16, according to that passage, false religion is a wide, open gate that leads to destruction, but narrow is the gate that leads to life. Jesus is the truth. Nicodemus was a very wealthy man, as I suggested. And as such, Jesus said it's easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God. This is very tough for him. Again, stand in his sandals. He has some decisions to make here.

22:22Hearing this, Jesus' disciples, they question him, saying, well, who then can go to heaven? Who can be saved? Do you remember Jesus' words in Matthew 19, 26? And looking at them, Jesus said to them, With people, this is impossible. With people, it's impossible to be saved, but with God, all things are possible. The fact that it's impossible for a man to be saved apart from God's grace is only the tip of the proverbial iceberg. The iceberg is much deeper than appears. Wait till you see the rest of this massive message for Nicodemus and for the many as well as for us.

23:04These descriptions include every human who ever lived prior to exercising the kind of faith that Jesus is looking for in John 3:15 and 16. So here it goes. Before salvation, the Bible tells us what people are like before they come to know Christ. Number one, here's what the Bible says: they are enemies of God. If while we were enemies of God, we were reconciled to God. James 4, 4. Whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy with God. What else does Nicodemus and the many and those who reject God, how else does God refer to them? They refuse to know God. The wicked in his haughtiness of his countenance does not seek God. The fool has said in his heart, there is no God.

23:53What else do we know about Nicodemus and the people in verse 23? Those who hate the Lord, says Psalm 81. 15 would pretend obedience to him. They have a pretending kind of obedience. They like those Jesus facts, God trivia. They believe something. Romans 1:28 and 32 through 32. God gave them over to a depraved mind because they are haters of God. We find that they're referred to as Satan's children. He says, You are of your father, the devil, and you want to do the desires of your father.

24:271 John 3:10, The children of the devil are obvious, and the children of God are obvious. They're slaves to sin. Everyone who commits sin is a slave to sin. And Romans 6:17 and verse 20 is the same thing. You were slaves to sin. Ephesians 2 says that we were all born and are dead in our trespasses and sins. We are all sinners. These are the descriptions of the people that are those who consist of Nicodemus and those in verse 23. They don't accept our testimony. That's the idea here. Now, there's two groups of people I would address today: those who are Christians and those who are non-Christians, of course, because the text warrants this. If you're a Christian today, then now's a good time to recognize God's sovereignty in your life, what He does in the life of a believer who fits the description of those that we just looked at. Thank God for His mercy.

25:31If you're not a Christian right now, I would ask you to hang on till point number two. It's coming up, and that's verses 13 through 15. But now, this brings us to John 3.12. John 3.12, he says, If I told you, and he's talking to all of them, that would be verse 23 people. If I told you earthly things and you all do not believe, how will you all believe if I tell you heavenly things? It's a fascinating passage. As I mentioned here, each time the word you appears, it's plural. It's plural. It indicates that Jesus is addressing more than just Nicodemus. And what he's about to say is addressed to everybody refusing to receive the testimony mentioned in the previous verse, verse 11. So, verse 12 talks about earthly things. If I told you all earthly things and you do not believe me, how will you believe if I tell you heavenly things?

26:24This raises a really important question for us. What is it, the earthly things that he had been telling Nicodemus? What are these earthly things that have not been believed? Well, number one, the whole concept of being born again, that's an earthly thing. We can't decide one day as people that we're going to be born, much less conceived. People are birthed on earth. This is an earthly thing that Nicodemus says this is impossible to be birthed again.

26:54Being birthed, like we're birthed here, doesn't happen in heaven. So it's not a heavenly thing. In order to be birthed, our parents have to give us birth. And he didn't understand that. So up to this point, Nicodemus has been very verbal in this whole conversation taking place. He's been engaged in the conversation. The teacher of Israel, at this point, seems to have been stumped. He doesn't repeat the question he posed in verse 9: How is this possible? He doesn't repeat that question. The situation moves from an apparent lack of understanding to an outright dismissal of the truth. Nicodemus has nothing to say because he can't argue against the facts. He can't argue against what he's seen and heard. His mouth is shut. Nicodemus is the perfect classic example of a case study of evidentialism. That's a new term for you. Evidentialism says that if we just present enough people, enough facts, enough undeniable head knowledge, then presto, they'll embrace Christ because we've silenced them with a really good argument and they can't give a reasonable reply, so thereby they must bow the knee to Christ.

28:10Surely, if they'll just read the handy-dandy evolution refutal, they'll see that they have no basis of faith and evolution and they'll come to Christ. That's the idea, not to cast dispersion on that great book, but it's the Bible, it's the Scripture, it's the gospel that brings people to Christ. 1 Corinthians 1:18 is so clear. It not? The gospel is irrational to those who would study the handy-dandy evolution refuter and still reject God. It's foolishness to those who are perishing, Paul says. Using rational arguments void of the gospel is selfish, self-centered, and it denies the truth of Scripture. People must hear the message that Jesus is giving here, that John is giving here. The way to heaven is repentance and belief that the Father sent the Son.

29:01You, just like Nicodemus, must believe that you are a great sinner and Jesus is a great Savior. And even as I say that, I'm humbled in my own life because I was once dead in my trespasses and sins, and God saved me. Well, this brings us to the second shocking reality about salvation that leads to eternal life. Here we go. The second one, it's a testimony believed. And I'll just read the text. No one has ascended into heaven, but he who has descended from heaven, namely the Son of Man. As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up so that whoever believes in him will have eternal life.

29:43So as Nicodemus and the many only believe Jesus' facts and God's trivia, let's watch how Jesus moves them and him to the next step of salvation, which includes death on a cross, so that those believing in him can have eternal life in verses 15 and 16. That's the message. In verse 15, Jesus appeals to Nicodemus' admission in 3.2 that Jesus has come from God as a teacher. He appeals to that message, but Jesus takes Nicodemus' admission a step further with a heavenly analogy. Yes, Jesus descended from heaven, and he also ascended back to heaven. No teacher coming from God has ever done this, not even Enoch nor Elijah in the Old Testament. They never ascended and descended back and forth from heaven. So here's the heavenly analogy that Jesus wants the teacher of Israel to understand. You see, Jesus is more than a teacher coming from God doing some great stuff, he's the incarnate God, he's God in the flesh, he is the link between heaven and earth, he's the revealer of heavenly truth to man.

30:52Jesus says to Paul in 1 Timothy 2:5, for there is no God, no one God, and excuse me, for there is one God and one mediator also between God and man, the man Jesus Christ. That's who he's talking about. Hebrews 12, 24, Hebrews 8, 6, we see that Jesus is far more than a teacher who comes from God. He's the only mediator between a new and better covenant. Nicodemus says the teacher of Israel should understand that. So now in John 3:13, Jesus refers to himself as the Son of Man.

31:28What is that? I thought he was the Son of God. Why would he refer to himself as the Son of Man? You see, this is a title that Jesus takes from the Old Testament, specifically Daniel 7, verses 13 through 14, which is a messianic account of how Jesus frequently describes himself over 80 times in the New Testament. You want to know more about the Son of Man? Read Daniel 7, verses 13 through 14. This, Nicodemus, this is what you're not accepting, Nicodemus. In fact, y'all aren't accepting what Jesus, your long-awaited Messiah, is saying, those of you in verse 23, which is the reason Jesus patiently gives Nicodemus another analogy. Glance back at verse 14. Verse 14 says this, as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up. Huh?

32:26What on earth is he talking about? From our perspective, that sounds a little strange. What is he talking about? But Nicodemus immediately would have understood. His mind would have gone back to the book of Numbers. It's another analogy that Jesus gives to Nicodemus, and he doesn't understand it. He doesn't get it. Turn over to Numbers chapter 21, and I'll say that this is what Nicodemus understood that Jesus was talking about. And I would venture to say that when Jesus said this, he knew exactly what Jesus had in mind. mind. Numbers 21, starting in verse 1.

33:07We read this passage to understand the way God shows his love for the world. They had to look to the risen bronze serpent, the risen bronze snake that we're about to read about, just like we need to look to the risen Christ. Keep that in mind as I read verses 1 through 9. When the Canaanite, the king of Arad, who lived in the Negev, heard that Israel was coming by the way of Ethraim, then he fought against Israel and took some of them captives. So Israel made a vow to the Lord and said, If you will indeed deliver this people into my hand, then I will utterly destroy their cities. The Lord heard the voice of Israel and delivered up the Canaanites, and they utterly destroyed them and their cities. Thus the name of the place was called Hormah. Then they set out from Mount Hor by the way of the Red Sea to go around the land of Edom. And the people became impatient because of their journey. They doubted God again. Verse 5, the people spoke against God, Yikes, and Moses, saying, Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there's no food and no water here, and we loathe this miserable food. What miserable food? The miserable food that God gave them. They loathe it.

34:26What does God do? Verse 6, the Lord sent fiery... Serpents among the people, and they bit the people, so that many people of Israel died. So, what happens next? The people came to Moses and said, We've sinned because we've spoken against the Lord and you, and please intercede with the Lord that he may remove the serpents from us. Just take away the trouble we've caused. We don't want to get bit anymore. And Moses interceded for the people. Then the Lord said to Moses, Make a fiery serpent and set it on a standard, and it shall come about that everyone who is bitten, when he looks at it, will live. And so Moses made a bronze serpent and set it on a standard, and it came about that if the serpent bit any man, when he looked at the bronze serpent, he lived.

35:15Wow. John 3, verse 14. Moses, as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up. What happened when he lifted up that bronze serpent? What happened? They looked at it, and their miserable lives were spared briefly. God spared them because of the faith of looking at it. And he says to them, Look to Jesus, the risen Christ, risen on the cross, risen from the dead after he was crucified. A little background here to what happens in the book of Numbers, just to shed some light on the whole situation. It's far worse than we think.

36:00This event, should I say this, 25 months after Israel leaves Egypt, the book of Numbers begins. The history that happens is 25 months after they leave Egypt. 19 days after the book of Numbers begins, Israel sets out on a journey to inhabit the land that God promised to them. Then, four months later, just four months later, the Israelites reached the events recorded in Numbers chapter 13 and 14. You recall it well, there were 10 spies of the 12 spies that spied out the land who gave a wicked, and in fact, the Hebrew wording in that passage is it's a slanderous report about the promised land. It was an out-and-out known lie which led to Israel's refusal to accept this free gift from God's hand, the land. Folks, this is analogous to Nicodemus' refusal to accept the free gift of salvation. The result of Israel's refusal to take the land is that everybody, 20 years of age and older, die, and the nation wanders for a total of 40 years in the desert before God gives them the land.

37:17Shortly, before the 40-year mark, God gives Israel several victories, and then they sink again back into doubt and complaints against God and Moses, and they preferred to be slaves in Egypt rather than. Death in this desert because they didn't think God would continue taking care of them. What's the analogy about the bronze snake in the wilderness and Jesus in John 3? Just as rebellious Israel had to look at that bronze snake hidden up on that standard to survive, held up in Moses' hands to prolong their mortal lives from a physical snake bite, they must look to the risen, crucified Christ to see and enter the kingdom of heaven.

38:03Why? Why is this? Well, the answer is in verse 15. Verse 15, so that. When you see the words, so that, that's what that means. It's so that. That gives us the reason. Verse 15, that so that is what we refer to in the Greek language as a hinna purpose clause. It tells us the purpose of what's going on. This simply ties verses 14 and 15 with the verse, well, verse 14 with the verse 15, to help us to understand that the Son of Man must be lifted up and must be crucified. We must look to his crucifixion, is what Jesus is telling Nicodemus long before the crucifixion.

38:42Why? For the purpose or so that all the people believing in him will have eternal life. That's the idea. Those words, whoever believe, are important. The words whoever believe, the Greek word is so simple. It's the word pot. And it's written 65 times in the Gospel of John, and only four times is it ever translated as the word whoever. It's fascinating. It means every, it means everyone, can mean whoever. The English word whoever is only translated from pos four times. Here in verse 15, verse 16, and then a couple more times in chapter 4 and 5 in reference to drinking waters and healing waters. Literally speaking, it says this: So must the Son of Man be lifted up, so that all the people believing in him will have eternal life. Isn't that fascinating?

39:42It's the same way in John 3:16, so that all the people believing in him, present, ongoing, continuous action, all those believing in him will have eternal life. Such a statement in the ears of the many, like Nicodemus, is scandalous because it renders meaningless everything about his life for which he believed and practiced. To Nicodemus' way of thinking, these things cannot be possible because people who both want to see and enter the kingdom of God, they never had to meticulously obey the laws that Nicodemus and his ilk were peddling about their man-made apostate religion.

40:26Well, today we've seen the proof. Prequil to John 3:16. We've seen the prequel about how God shows his love for the world. Next week, come back because we're going to develop it just a little bit deeper in John 3:16, the most famous Bible verse in the entire planet. And I fear it's misunderstood in such a dramatic way. Come back next week, we'll look at more of it. But today we've seen that Jesus really presents, demonstrates two shocking realities about salvation. Why? Well, so that all people, all those believing in him, may have eternal life. So here they are. There's a testimony that's rejected in verses 11 and 12. Lots of people believe some truth about Jesus. He cleared the temple.

41:15He made my tummy feel better yesterday. And, well, he takes care of my family, and that would be true. We all get grace like that. But there's a pride that gets in the way. And they, like Nicodemus, just can't face the reality that nothing about them is good enough to see and enter the kingdom of heaven. Really, you think about it, the teacher of Israel, indulge me a moment, he ain't going. Yet he's the best-behaved boy on the planet.

41:47I realize I could be speaking to two groups of people today. One group contains individuals who have repented of their sins, they've embraced Jesus Christ as their Savior. Another group, another group, isn't saved yet. If you're self-defense, Is secure in Christ, then you've got to know this message cold. You need to understand this message because it is a message of salvation that Jesus thought so important that he gave it to the teacher of Israel. And then, of course, the second one is a testimony believed in verses 13 through 15. Just like the people with the snake bites in Numbers 21 had to look at that silly bronze serpent on a stick to rescue their temporal lives.

42:28People must look to Jesus, who's lifted up on the cross, who died for the remission of their sins, so that all people believing in him may have eternal life. And I'm going to end with a quote from R. Kent Hughes. Maybe you've heard of him. I love the way he summarizes this passage. Otherwise, I'd try to come up with something as good as his, but his is really good. He says, This: Christ is telling us that the new birth comes through the simple gaze of faith, not by a perfect faith. Perhaps you're hesitating to come to Christ because you're trying to work up enough faith, trying to gin it up, is what Hughes is saying. You say, I want to believe. I want to experience what other people have, but I just don't have enough faith.

43:19Some of those dying Israelites had doubts. They procrastinated. They rationalized. You want me to look at a bronze snake on a pole, really? Not all of them believed with the same quality of belief, but there came a time when they did exercise that look. He says, Do not look at your look. I love it. He says, Look to Christ. If you have a repentant spirit and you realize that Jesus Christ bore your sins on the cross, then you need to do, all you need to do is look and be saved.

44:01And here's Nicodemus, a man with the equivalent of multiple PhDs, who's been a good boy, and he hears this message. And the truth of the fact is that all he has to look at the risen Christ. Repent and believe. Hughes closes his quote with these words: What a great illustration our Savior used, and it is indeed. I would say, if you want more information about what you just heard in John 3, I would invite you to talk to the pastoral staff, talk to the elders, talk to somebody who brought you here. They love you, they care for you. If you're a believer in Christ, know this message. Know this message so you can live it and explain it to others. But please, come back next week for John 3:16. We're not going to do the prequel. We're going to do the real deal, which shows Nicodemus and us really the purpose of God's love. The purpose of God's love is eternal life for all those believing in it. Him.

45:02That's it. Would you come back next week? Let's close in prayer. Father, what a refreshing message this is from your son to not just Nicodemus, the teacher of Israel. He has a message here for the people in the street. People of all walks of life, those in John 2:23 who believe Jesus facts and God trivia, and they just love seeing the things that Jesus does. Lord, if they don't repent, if they don't embrace the Savior, there's an eternity without you.

45:52God, as people are losing their lives around us daily, both here and around the world, as Lord, as people are crossing our borders, you're bringing the nations to us. Bring your message to them that they would embrace you. Oh, Lord. We would not look at them with derision and spite for them coming, but that we would just share the gospel. That we would be praying for our brothers and sisters in Christ. Little children today, this last week, were beheaded for their faith.

46:31Or their parents' faith, Lord. This is a serious day in which we live. And this message given to Nicodemus, his personal one-on-one meeting with you 2,000 years ago, is so applicable to our lives today that you want us to know it and live it for your glory. May we never look at your word as trivia or facts, just mere facts to wrangle around with, but to embrace it and to embrace you. We thank you in Christ's name.