WHAT MATTERS TO GOD
John 3.16-17
S: God’s love
C: Evangelism
Th: Our Time, Our Turn, Our All
Pr: LOVE PEOPLE LIKE JESUS DOES.
I. LOVE
II. PEOPLE
III. DANGER
IV. LIFE
PA: How is the change to be observed?
• Know your mission.
• Communicate good news.
Version: ESV
RMBC 31 May 09 AM
ILL Change (S)
A few years ago, in a Los Angeles nightclub, Alex McManus’ church, Mosaic, began a worship celebration to reach the west side of their city, and the entertainment industry. The ministry grew, incorporating changes along the way to continue reaching new people.
But some of the original attenders began to complain that things were getting too “youthy.”
“I can’t handle it anymore,” said one young woman. “All of this new technology is getting in the way of my worship.”
She was 26.
You see, the issue regarding change is an “any age” issue, not just one for older people.
But it is true, the older we get, the less we like it.
I am finding this true in my own life now that I have hit the half century mark.
We like some things to be constant.
I have found one constant though.
Do you know what it is?
The one constant I can really depend on … is change!
We are on the 6th item of our prayer action plan where I have affectionately been asking you to…
PRACT
Pract means to pray and to act.
Don’t just pray on it, but be the answer to the prayer as well, and act on it.
This week, our renouncement is…
We renounce inward focus.
What we have come to realize is that, as a church, we have fallen into a trap of thinking this is about us.
We may not have said that outright, but we have been acting like it.
Whether it was intentional or unintentional, it does not matter.
The important part for us at this point is to recognize that our focus has become inward.
Thus, our announcement…
We announce God’s command that we reach out with His love.
We know, though, that inward focus is not what God has called us to.
We, in fact, have a different mission.
So, let us proclaim this affirmation…
We affirm that God reaches out with his love and He expects us to do the same.
Then, let this be our commitment…
We will eagerly extend God’s love by acts of caring and making disciples.
Today, we are studying the most famous verse in all of Scripture.
And I can’t think of a better verse that goes with our prayer action plan today.
John 3.16
I don’t need to say more.
We nod our heads.
We know that the heart of the gospel lies in these few words.
Preschoolers can recite it.
Football fans paint it boldly across cardboard signs.
It’s brief enough to write on a napkin or memorize in moment, yet solid enough to withstand 2000 years of storms and questions.
It begins with God, ends with life, and urges us to do the same!
Listen to the impact this verse has had on people’s lives:
ILL John 3.16 (S)
Mac Powell, Third Day:
“I love John 3:16 because it is the gospel in a nutshell. It shares God’s great love for us, and our great need for him.”
Ernie Johnson, TNT Sportscaster
“John 3:16 is the foundation of my faith. A picture of undeserved, unconditional, and unwavering love from a Father to his kids.”
Anne Graham Lotz
“John 3:16 is the North Star of the Bible. If you align your life with it, you can find The Way home.”
Jeff Foxworthy
“This is the promise that bears hope for the hopeless. When we finally realize ‘I can’t do this on my own’ this is the Father responding, ‘I know, so I’ve done it for you.’”
Here it is in the ESV, with verse 17 following…
For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.
Note first…
LOVE
“For God so loved…”
God is love.
And you know what?
He can’t help it!
He loves because it is His nature to do so.
He can’t do it any other way.
He is a passionate God.
And this passion motivates Him to act.
You see…
He also loves because He chooses to do so.
It is not a self-centered love.
Rather, it is a love that chooses to love and reaches out.
He reaches out and draws us in, even when we seem hell-bent on resisting His love.
ILL God (S)
There is a story in the Old Testament that describes this kind of love that God has for us. It is found in the prophetic writing of Hosea.
God commanded Hosea to marry Gomer, a woman who was a harlot. Now I don’t know what you think about that, but I imagine that Hosea was not all that excited to be marrying a prostitute.
He does follow the command of God and marries her. But it is going to be a test. Gomer knows nothing about faithfulness. In fact, she had the fidelity of a rabbit as she hopped from man to man. She ruined her life and shattered Hosea’s heart.
Gomer comes to the day that she is penniless, and was placed for sale in a slave market. And can you guess who stepped forward to buy her?
Hosea, the man of God, who had never removed his wedding band.
The way he treated her you would have thought she’d never loved another man.
And that folks, is the way God loves us. Always faithful. Ever patient. There. Always there.
Why?
PEOPLE
Because people matter to God.
“For God so loved the world…”
We matter!
You matter.
I matter.
And there is no favoritism.
God does not offer salvation to only the people He likes.
There are no requirements.
You don’t have to be white, black, pro-life, liberal, democratic, republican, young, old, single, poor or rich.
Jesus is for all people that are missing from being participants in His kingdom.
You see…
He does not want anyone to perish!
As long as a person has breath, God waits patiently for the person to turn around and come home.
He does not give up on us.
He possesses a patient love.
But here is the reality.
There is…
DANGER
God is very serious about sin.
Do you notice that word “perish” in that verse?
It shows us that…
Law is reality!
It does not go away.
This is why Jesus came.
Sin deserves death.
We live in a time that sin is out of fashion and hell is considered a myth.
But John 3.16 makes no sense if sin is not a real problem and hell is not a real destination.
We may try to dilute them.
We may try to delete them.
But not Jesus.
He came because of them.
ILL Hell (S)
Max Lucado:
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.
What is the solution?
It is something that goes against our instincts.
It is “whoever believes…”
It’s so simple.
We expect a more complicated cure, a more sophisticated salvation.
After all, doesn’t the Bible say, “God helps those who help themselves”?
No!
It’s not there.
It’s not in the Bible.
You can’t help yourself.
And it is what makes true Christianity distinctive.
No other religion offers what Jesus promises.
Judaism sees salvation as a Judgment Day decision based on morality.
Buddhism grades your life according to the Four Noble Truths and the Eightfold Path.
Muslims earn their way to Allah by performing the duties of the Five Pillars of Faith.
But not Christianity.
Jesus calls us to do one thing: believe!
Believe in order to receive…
LIFE
“…whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life.”
We all have lived with false impressions, I think, of what eternal life, heaven is going to be like.
But note this…
He has your best in mind!
And here is what I think…
Everybody will be in their prime.
All my orneriness, and all your orneriness, will be gone.
No one will doubt your word.
No one will question your motives.
No one will speak evil behind your back.
And the most amazing things will happen:
A soldier will embrace the sharpshooter who killed him.
A daughter will hug her abusive, but repentant father.
A son will clutch the mother who aborted him.
Forgiveness will be the name of the day, every day.
No sin…
No thieves…
No divorce…
No heartbreak…
And no boredom!
Everything will have meaning.
Every moment will have meaning
One thing is for sure…
You will love it!
And our appreciation for God will grow.
ILL God (S)
Max Lucado…
Endless attributes await us. His grace will increasingly stun, wisdom progressively astound, ad perfection ever more sharpen into focus.
CHALLENGE:
So what do we do with John 3.16?
What are you going to do with John 3.16?
Here is what I want you to note right now.
Your mission is in John 3.16, so I want you to…
Know your mission.
We have a mission.
It is simply this…
Love people like Jesus does.
He came to us.
He did not expect us to come to Him.
He sacrificed for us.
He did not expect us to become something we are not.
We need to have the same forward push that Jesus had.
We need to love people like Jesus does.
Which brings me to this question…
Are you a conquistador, native, or immigrant?
I know…you are thinking…what kind of question is that?
Are you a native?
Natives are people that are comfortable within their own culture.
And they tell the church, “You target my taste, I will stay and serve.”
And they tell others, “Welcome into our community, but don’t touch anything: we like it the way it is.”
Are you a conquistador?
Conquistadors possess a sense of mission to take the gospel to the world.
But one problem – they insist on taking their culture with them.
And they tell others, “We will know when you have arrived, because you will look like us.”
Both the native and the conquistador place high value on doing church the way we like it do done.
The immigrant, though, is different.
The immigrant grasps a greater vision of mission.
The immigrant is humble, and looks not for a place to meet his/her needs, but for a place to serve Christ and reach others.
The immigrant will assimilate into the culture in order to reach others more effectively.
Now, I admit, it is not a perfect analogy, but I think Jesus has acted more like an immigrant, than native or conquistador.
Consider this…
ILL Incarnation (S)
Mark Batterson:
The Omniscient One had to learn reading, writing and arithmetic. The Omnipresent One downsized to the confines of Mary’s womb. And the Omnipotent One became a helpless baby that needed to be nursed, burped and changed like the rest of us. But the end result was a High Priest who understands our weaknesses. He understands what goes through our heads and our hearts because He’s lived in our skin. The incarnation made Jesus omni-relevant.
So I admit it…
I want you to be an immigrant with good news to tell, because John 3.16 is really good news.
This is good news.
When you have good news, what do you do with it?
Ask me about my Jetta, and my eyes will light up!
• Handles road so precisely
• Accelerate around curves
• Great gas mileage
• Plenty of power
• Just plain fun to drive
Ask me about Grovers, and again, my eyes will light up!
• Best hamburgers in the area
• Fresh ground meat
• Huge and juicy
• Great price
• Historical – Grover Cleveland’s hunting cabin
Now…
Isn’t the news about Jesus so much better?
So tell it!
But where do you start?
I encourage you to use your testimony
And here is the formula…
Testimony = B.C. & A.D.
BC is Before Christ.
AD is After the Decision.
This is your most natural tool.
It’s about Jesus and you.
Tell anyone who will listen what has happened to you.
Finally, I want to encourage you to…
Be kind.
This has been the basis of our The Church Has Left the Building and more recently Reach Day.
But you don’t need a program to help you be kind.
It can be raking the neighbor’s leaves or mowing their grass.
It can be passing out drinks on a hot day.
It can be picking up a child’s shoe that has fallen off as a mother has put them in the car.
It is pointing people to Jesus, by both word and deed.
It is loving people like Jesus does.
So…
LOVE PEOPLE LIKE JESUS DOES.
For Further Study: Exodus 34.6-7; Deuteronomy 10.15; I Chronicles 12.32; Psalm 139.13-16; Jeremiah 29.11, 31.3; Luke 14.15-24, 15.1-32; John 1.12; Acts 20.24; Romans 5.8, 8.35-39; Ephesians 3.14-19; I Timothy 2.3-4; James 1.27; II Peter 3.9; I John 4.8
BENEDICTION:
New members
Business mtg
Annual mtg
Prayer
Now may the God of peace equip you with everything good for doing his will, and may he work in us what is pleasing to him, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen.
RESOURCES:
SermonCentral
Anselmi, Jeffery He Loves
Bayles, Scott 3:16 The Numbers of Hope
Burgess, Aaron What Is God Like?
Dillahunty, George Roadblock on Hell’s Road
Ellis, Ray All People Matter to God
Pfell, Richard We Were Made for a Mission
Other
Batterson, Mark. "Got Street Smarts?" Outreach Magazine, Nov/Dec 206.
Lucado, Max. 3:16: The Numbers of Hope. Carmel, NY: Guideposts, 2007.
McManus, Alex. Going Native. 2008. Accessed 19 Jun 2008. Available from www.buildingchurchleaders.com/2008/goingnative.html.
