(cont.)
The verse is an alphabet of grace, a table of contents to the Christian hope, each word a safe-deposit box of jewels. Read it again, slowly and aloud, and note the word that snatches your attention. “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”
“God so
loved the world...” We’d expect an anger-fueled God. One who punishes the world, recycles the world, forsakes the world... but loves the world?
The
world? This world? Heartbreakers, hope-snatchers, and dream-dousers prowl this orb. Dictators rage. Abusers inflict. Reverends think they deserve the title. But God loves. And he loves the world so much he gave his:
No. The heart-stilling, mind-bending, deal-making-or-breaking claim of
John 3:16 is this:
God gave his son... his only son. No abstract ideas but a flesh-wrapped divinity. Scripture equates Jesus with God. God, then, gave himself. Why? So that “whoever believes in him shall not perish.”
John Newton, who set faith to music in “Amazing Grace,” loved this barrier-breaking pronoun. He said, “If I read ‘God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that when John Newton believed he should have everlasting life,’ I should say, perhaps, there is some other John Newton; but ‘whosoever’ means this John Newton and the other John Newton, and everybody else, whatever his name may be.”
Whoever . . . a universal word.
And
perish... a sobering word. We’d like to dilute, if not delete, the term. Not Jesus. He pounds Do Not Enter signs on every square inch of Satan’s gate and tells those hell-bent on entering to do so over his dead body. Even so, some souls insist.
In the end, some perish and some live. And what determines the difference? Not works or talents, pedigrees or possessions. Nicodemus had these in hoards. The difference is determined by our belief. “Whoever
believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”
Bible translators in the New Hebrides islands struggled to find an appropriate verb for
believe. This was a serious problem, as the word and the concept are essential to Scripture.
One Bible translator, John G. Paton, accidentally came upon a solution while hunting with a tribesman. The two men bagged a large deer and carried it on a pole along a steep mountain path to Paton’s home. When they reached the veranda, both men dropped the load and plopped into the porch chairs. As they did so, the native exclaimed in the language of his people, “My, it is good to stretch yourself out here and rest.” Paton immediately reached for paper and pencil and recorded the phrase.
As a result, his final translation of
John 3:16 could be worded: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever stretcheth himself out on Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”
Stretch out on Christ and rest.
Martin Luther did. When the great reformer was dying, severe headaches left him bedfast and pain struck. He was offered a medication to relieve the discomfort. He declined and explained, “My best prescription for head and heart is that
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 best prescription for head and heart. Who couldn’t benefit from a dose? As things turned out, Nicodemus took his share. When Jesus was crucified, the theologian showed up with Joseph of Arimathea. The two offered their respects and oversaw Jesus’s burial. No small gesture, given the anti-Christ climate of the day. When word hit the streets that Jesus was out of the tomb and back on his feet, don’t you know Nicodemus smiled and thought of his late-night chat?
Born again, eh? Who would’ve thought he’d start with himself.