“Look And Live!”
John 3:14-21
Earlier in John chapter three Jesus has confronted Nicodemus with the momentous announcement that even he must be born again. Although he is a respected leader, a moral man, even a religious man he is still lost. Jesus is still talking to Nicodemus, he is responding to the question Nicodemus asked in verse nine, “How can this be?” What Nicodemus really wants to know is, “How does the new birth happen?” And so the Lord answers with an illustration that Nicodemus would never forget.
Jesus ends his conversation with Nicodemus by telling him three things about salvation.
First, A Picture of Salvation (3:14-15)
In verses fourteen and fifteen Jesus uses an event from Israel’s history to illustrate His teaching. “And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilder-ness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, (15) that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life.”
Jesus calls to mind a scene from the book of Numbers 21:4-9. “Then they journeyed from Mount Hor by the way of the Red Sea, to go around the land of Edom: and the soul of the people became very discouraged on the way. (5) And the people spoke against God, and against Moses, “Why have you brought us out of Egypt to die in the wilder-ness? For there is no food, and no water; and our soul loathes this worthless bread (manna). (6) And the Lord sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the people; and many of the people of Israel died. (7) Therefore the people came to Moses, and said, ‘We have sinned, for we have spoken against the Lord, and against you; pray to the Lord, that he take away the serpents from us. So Moses prayed for the people. (8) Then the Lord said unto Moses, Make a fiery serpent, and set it on a pole: and it shall be that everyone that is bitten, when he looks at it, shall live. (9) So Moses made a bronze serpent, and put it upon a pole, and it was, if a serpent had bitten anyone, when he looked at the bronze serpent, he lived".
In this passage the people of Israel are journeying through the wilderness and have recently traveled from the Mount Hor area near the Red Sea to the borders of Edom near where Petra is located. It is without a doubt some of the most inhospitable territory on the earth. The Bible says that because of the difficulty of the journey the people became discouraged and began to complain against God and His servant Moses (Numbers 21:4). Because of their grumbling and murmuring, God in response sends poisonous snakes into their midst and many of the people are bitten and die from the snake bites (v. 6). Then the people repented and cried out, “We have sinned” (v. 7).The Lord then offered salvation through a strange means. He commanded Moses to make the image of a serpent from bronze and to hang it from a pole. The people who were bitten and were dying could be healed only by lifting their eyes and looking at the serpent. They would be saved by an act of faith, those who looked up at the serpent were saved. It certainly goes without saying that the remedy proposed by God through Moses sounds utterly absurd.
The details of the analogy are remarkable. First, it is a story of sin and its consequences.
Nicodemus understood that it was sin that had brought the judgment of God upon the people. It was a result of their sin that they were dying.
Secondly, the only people who were saved by looking to the bronze serpent were those who acknowledged that they were dying. These were people who were perishing because of their sin and they knew it!
Third, we dare not overlook the importance of the “look of faith,” it was by faith that those who were bitten looked at the bronze snake lived. Moses lifted up the serpent in the camp and all the dying Israelites had to do was look at the pole and they would be saved. “No matter how horribly they were bitten, no matter how many times they had been bitten or how sick they were, the opportunity for salvation was there. Even the most degraded and miserable sinner who looks to Christ will be saved. That is why the Lord used this wonderful illustration.” [R. Kent Hughes. “Preaching the Word: John –That You May Believe.” (Wheaton: Ill.: Crossway Books, 1999) p. 83]
It should be noted that it was not enough to know that salvation was offered, each man had to look for himself otherwise God’s provision was useless. Jesus is saying that being born again comes through the simple dependence of a look of faith, not by having a perfect faith. Even so, Jesus would be lifted up on a cross, and all those who look unto him will be saved.
“On January 6,1850, a snowstorm almost crippled the city of Colchester, England and a teenage boy was unable to get to the church he usually attended. So he made his way to a nearby Primitive Methodist chapel, where an ill-prepared layman was substituting for the absent preacher. His text was Isaiah 45:22 – ‘Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth.’ For many months this young teenager had been miserable and under deep conviction; but though he was reared in church (both his father and grandfather were preachers), he did not have the assurance of salvation.
The unprepared substitute minister did not have much to say, so he kept repeating the text. ‘A man need not go to college to learn to look,’ he shouted. ‘Anyone can look – a child can look!’ About that time, he saw the visitor sitting to one side, and he pointed at him and said, ‘Young man, you look very miserable. Young man, look to Jesus Christ!’
The young man did look by faith and that was how the great preacher Charles Haddon Spurgeon was converted!” [Warren Wiersbe. “Be Alive.” (Wheaton, ILL: Victor Books, 1986) pp. 39-40]
Not Only A Picture of Salvation but …
Secondly, The Motivation For Salvation (3:16)
“For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.”
This is one of the best known verses in all the Bible, no doubt because it states the gospel so clearly and simply. It summarizes what the Lord Jesus had been teaching Nicodemus concerning the manner by which the new birth is received.
But Jesus is not through turning Nicodemus’ world upside down because in verse sixteen, Nicodemus is told that the love of God extends to the whole “world.” In John’s writing the “world” (Gk- cosmos) is not a reference to the physical world of plants and animals, that is of such concern to activists groups like Greenpeace and the Sierra Club. The “world” that John is referring to is humanity. “The world” here includes all mankind. Yet this does not mean that everyone is saved. A person must receive what Christ has done for him before God will give him eternal life.
The idea that God is concerned with the whole of humanity is an idea Nicodemus would have found shocking indeed! This was an idea that was almost beyond comprehension for the Jews. Remember the prophet Jonah, he could not conceive that God’s love included the Ninevites (who were not only Gentiles but vile unloving and unlovable Gentiles).
The disciples John and James wanted to call down fire from heaven to torch a Samaritan village (Luke 9:52-56). It took a special vision from God to convince Peter that his plan called for including Gentiles in the Church (Acts 11:1-3)
God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son that whoever (you can write your name in here and I can write mine – in fact in your outline this morning is verse sixteen with a blank – I want you to write your name in that blank) believes in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life. Notice that the word “believe” is accompanied by the little preposition “in” which means to believe “in Christ.” That is, we must trust Him as the One who bore the penalty for our sins. This is a personal thing. We must each believe that He died in our place. That means that you must believe that He died for you.
There is no need for anyone to perish. A way has been provided by which all might be saved, but a person must acknowledge the Lord Jesus Christ as personal Savior. When he does this, he has eternal life as a present possession.
Not Only The Motivation for Salvation but
Third, The Necessity of Salvation (3:17-21)
“For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved. (18) “He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.”
When Jesus came the first time, He did not come as “a” judge. He made that very clear to the man who wanted Him to give a judgment between himself and his brother. He said, “… Man, who made me a judge or a divider over you?” (Luke 12:14). He didn’t come as “a” Judge the first time. He came as “the” Savior. He will come the next time as “the” Judge. But now He says that God didn’t send Him into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.
Jesus did not come to condemn an already condemned world, what good would that do? He doesn’t say that those who refuse the Light will be condemned at some future date. He says that they are “already condemned” they are just waiting for the sentence to be carried out!
If you were to make a trip to Cummins Prison and be taken on a tour of “death row” you would see inmates who are waiting the carrying out of the death sentence. They are not waiting to be condemned they are already condemned men living on borrowed time just waiting for the sentence they have already received to be carried out. The thought that in a very short time they will die for their crimes sends a shiver up our spine.
But there is something more horrible still. Everyday you come in contact with a host of condemned men and women, condemned by their sin, because they have never accepted Christ as their savior. They are not condemned to die by lethal injection but they are still only waiting for the carrying out of the just sentence that their sins demand. It is a sentence of judgment that people impose upon themselves.
The only way to escape that condemnation is to believe in Jesus. In Romans 8:1 the Apostle Paul writes, “There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus…” As this verse so clearly states “in Christ” there is no condemnation. Those who are not in Christ are already condemned. There are a great many who feel that the world is on trial today. It is not. The world is lost. You and I live in a lost world, our position is some-thing like a man who is in prison being asked whether or not he will accept a pardon. That is the gospel. It is not telling a man that he is on trial. He is already condemned. He is already in prison waiting for execution. But the gospel tells him a pardon is offered to him. The point is, will you accept the pardon? How wonderfully clear that is. The gospel is to save those who are already lost.
Beginning in verse nineteen we are given man’s reaction to the light. “And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. (20) For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed. (21) But he who does the truth comes to the light, that his deeds may be clearly seen, that they have been done in God.”
Jesus is “the light” who came “into the world.” He was the sinless Son of God. He died for the sins of all the world. But do all men love Him for this? No – some resent His intrusion into their lives and they resent being revealed for what they are. They prefer their sins to having Jesus as Savior, and so they reject Him. Just as rats and cock roaches and other creeping things scurry away when light enters a room, even so wicked men and women flee from the presence of Christ.
According to verse twenty, those who love sin hate “the light,” because the light exposes their sinfulness. When Jesus was here in the world, sinful men were made uncomfortable by His presence because He revealed their awful condition by His own holiness.
“Look And Live!”
John 3:14-21
First, The _____________ of Salvation (3:14-15)
(Numbers 21:4-9)
•It is a story of sin and its _____________.
It was a result of their sin that they were dying.
•The only people who were saved were those who acknowledged that they were ______.
•It was by ______ that those who were bitten looked at the bronze snake lived.
Secondly, The ___________ For Salvation (3:16)
(Romans 8:1)
“For God so loved ________ that he gave his only begotten Son that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.”
Third, The _____________ of Salvation (3:17-21)
