WHAT’S SO GREAT ABOUT JOHN 3:16?
A little boy was heard talking to himself as he walked across the backyard, baseball cap in place, ball and bat in his hands. "I am the greatest hitter in the world," he said. He threw the ball up, swung and missed. "Strike one," he said. But again, he told himself, "I am the greatest hitter ever." He threw the ball up again, swung and missed. He looked at the ball, and at the bat, and said, "I’m the greatest hitter that ever lived." He threw the ball up again and swung and missed a third time. This time he said, "Wow! Strike three! What a pitcher! I’m the greatest pitcher in the world!”
I want to preach on the greatest sentence in the world.
The greatest sentence ever written is not found in some magazine, or in some book in a library, but is found in God’s Word, the Holy Bible.
This is the easiest and the hardest of all verses to preach. Easy that anyone can preach from it, but hard, because, one cannot give justice to all that is contained in it.
Every verse in the Bible is great, but if there is a greatest verse in all the Bible… it is undoubtedly John 3:16.
If you removed everything from the first word in Genesis to the last word in Revelation and had only John 3:16, there would still be enough gospel left in John 3:16 to save the whole world.
Millions of messages have been preached from this text. John 3:16 is the greatest sentence ever written.
What is so great about John 3:16?
I. IT SPEAKS OF THE GREATEST LOVE A MAN CAN EVER ACKNOWLEDGE
“GOD SO LOVED”
There are DEPTHS and DEGREES to the loves we experience in this world
There is PATRIOTIC LOVE- I love old glory.
There is PARENTAL LOVE- I have heard people tell me thy never heard parents tell them.
There is PERSONAL LOVE- Loyal love of a friend for a friend or man for woman.
But all these pale in comparison to the love of God.
You can’t EXPLAIN it but you can EXPERIENCE it!
Many times the great hymn of F.M. Lehman, "The Love of God" has thrilled our hearts. The familiar first stanza goes:
The love of God is greater far
Than tongue or pen can ever tell,
It goes beyond the highest star
And reaches to the lowest hell;
The guilty pair, bowed down with care,
God gave His Son to win:
His erring child He reconciled
And pardoned from his sin.
Then the chorus:
O Love of God, how rich and pure!
How measureless and strong!
It shall forever-more endure
The saints and angels song.
The story goes that when Lehman tried to write a third verse to the song, but the words just wouldn’t fall into place. He then thought of a card he had once received that had on it a poem about the love of God. He searched for the card and soon found it. Lehman read the words on the card, and his heart was just as thrilled with the poem as it was the first time he read it. He began to voice the words of the poem with the melody he had composed for his song. They fit perfectly and he knew he had his third verse to his song, "The Love of God."
Lehman noticed at the bottom of the card some smaller but heavier printing. It told the story of the origin of the poem. It told that the poem was found written on a cell wall in a prison some 200 years earlier. It was not known why the prisoner was incarcerated; neither was it known if the words were original or if he had heard them elsewhere. Whatever the circumstances, he had written them on the wall of his prison cell. That third stanza goes:
Could we with ink the ocean fill
And were the skies of parchment made,
Were ev’ry stalk on earth a quill
And ev’ry man a scribe by trade,
To write the love of God above
Would drain the ocean dry,
Nor could the scroll contain the whole
Tho stretched from sky to sky.
It is a love that surpasses illustration
The love of a mother is not adequate
The love of a mate is not appropriate since so many get a divorce today.
It is a love that surmounts comprehension.
The mind of man will never be able to comprehend the love of God. The love of God is uncaused and uninfluenced. There was nothing in us to call for it. There was nothing in us to attract it.
IF we could say “God loves us because we first loved Him” we might could understand it, but just the reverse is true.
The love of God is unchangeable. Sinners may go to hell unsaved, but they will never go to hell unloved.
There is no COMPARISON to His Love; and there is no CONCLUSION to His Love!
It is a love that supplies redemption. We never how much one loves till we know whom much they are willing to endure and suffer for us. It is the suffering element that measures love.
“SO LOVED.” So is the one of shortest words but one of the greatest words in this verse. It’s a OVERWHELMING OVERFLOWING word.
A. The importance this love gives to a life
When something is loved, it is gives value to it. The world is embraced by God’s love......none excluded but all included...all colors and all classes.
A little girl was once asked, “Are you worth anything?” After a moment’s reflection she said, “I guess not.” This was followed up by the question, “What the use in keeping you then?”
The little girl blurted out quickly, “Because Momma loves that why.” The only thing that attaches any worth to any of us is the love of God.
B. The difference this love makes in a life
To know that someone loves you makes all the difference in a life.
Love can motivate life and give meaning to a life. To know that God loves me is amazing. O, the wonder that is evoked by God’s love.
II. IT SPEAKS OF THE GREATEST GIFT A MAN CAN EVER ACCEPT
The gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ.
There is no greater gift anywhere.
Oh what a gift the Father gave
When He bestowed His Son,
To save poor ruined, guilty man,
By sin defiled, undone!
A. It was AN EXPRESSIVE GIFT!
Gifts are expressive of certain emotions and feelings. When we give gifts we do so to show:
ADORATION - our love for someone
APPRECIATION - to say thanks
CONGRATULATIONS - on some accomplishment
CONSIDERATION - we were thinking of you
B. It was an EXPENSIVE GIFT.
1. How costly it proved
The gift of eternal life was not cheap. It was extremely costly. This was no cheap gift.
Salvation is FREE but it’s not CHEAP! GOD sent His SON to die for our SINS!
John 3:16 has 25 words in it. It has GOD at the beginning of it and LIFE at the end of it. It has the SON in exactly the center of it; - 12 words on either side! This gift centers around the SON of God.
Salvation is free, but it is not cheap. It cost God His only begotten and well beloved Son, and it cost the Lord Jesus a death of shame and agony on the cross.
God has declared that the blood shed for us is "precious blood" ( I Peter 1:18-19 ), and so it is. The cost of Calvary is beyond all human computation; the value of the shed blood of Jesus is beyond all our comprehension.
You may GIVE without LOVING, but you cannot LOVE without GIVING!
It cost God the very life of His beloved
Son. God gave His very best! God’s love-gift involved a great price and sacrifice. God gave His all!
God loved us and sent His Son to die for us. 2. How gladly it was paid
God so loved the world that He
gave—what....the silver and the gold which are His? No. Such a gift would cost Him nothing....the cattle on a thousand hills? No. Such a gift would cost Him nothing.
God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son—that cost Him everything. That is the measure of His love for you.
When John says, "that he gave," it means that He did something out of love for us—did it quite voluntarily, freely, without being forced or obligated.
Years ago the keeper of a drawbridge over a great river heard the thunder of the train, and just then his little child, playing by his side, rolled down the sharp embankment into that mad stream. He knew if he but plunged down after his child he could not close the drawbridge, and the trainload of passengers would plunge to their death. He hesitated a moment, and then slowly swung the great bridge out to its place, and then plunged into the wild waters and pulled out his dead child. He couldn’t save both. GOD couldn’t save His Son and save the world at the same time. SO He willing gave His only begotten Son.
C. It is an ESSENTIAL GIFT!
Everybody needs it.
III. IT SPEAKS OF THE GREATEST CHOICE A MAN HAS EVER BEEN APPOINTED.
There is no greater choice for any man to make. There is no greater choice that man has ever been charged with. It is the greatest choice a man will ever be faced with.
We are faced with choices and decision every day, but none are greater than the decision as to what we do with Jesus Christ. Our eternal destiny depends upon our choice
Perish or life rest on our choice.
Once to every man and nation
Comes the moment to decide
In the strife of truth or falsehood
For the good or evil side.
But to every man there openeth
A high way and a low
And every man decideth
Which way his soul shall go.
A. Notice the respect God shows for us
He leaves the choice to us. Becoming a Christian is not a matter of chance but of choice.
It is a matter of our will. God does not violate our will
“Whosoever believeth in him.”
B. Notice the response God seeks from us
“Believeth in him”
God seeks our believe in Christ Lone. Nothing can take the place of Christ. Christ is all we need.
"IN HIM" - NOT in a creed, not in the Church, not in the preacher, BUT in Him; not in my goodness, but in His grace.
You don’t have to have certain parents, just believe in Him; you don’t have to solve a puzzle or riddle, just believe in Him; you don’t have to learn a foreign language, just believe in Him; you don’t to get somebody to recommend you, just believe in Him; you don’t have to have a bag of gold, just believe in Him.
When a person believes on the Lord Jesus two things are involved.
1. First, there is the acknowledgment of our inability .
We recognize the fact that we cannot save ourselves. We understand that all our good deeds, good works, and human efforts are not enough to save us. It is impossible for us to save ourselves, no matter who we are or what we do.
2. Second, there is the acceptance of His ability.
If we cannot save ourselves, then we need a Saviour! We need to turn to Someone Who can save us, and that Someone is the Lord Jesus! To believe on the Lord Jesus is to come to Him and cast our soul and eternity upon what He did on the cross of Calvary.
The act of salvation is simply coming to Jesus and accepting what He did on the cross for you.
Conclusion
What’s so great about John 3:16?
EVERYTHING!
