Message For The Day

Do We believe?                                                        

John 3:16-3:18

God’s Word today is quite possibly one of the most well-known Bible verses in America so I want to take a close look at it this morning.

I think that it is worth mentioning that some form of the word “believe” appears 4 times in the three verses. In fact, some form of the word “believe” appears over 320 times in the Bible. Even with limited understanding of the Scriptures, we can conclude that believing in God is an obvious necessity within the Christian faith.

And that makes perfect sense. You cannot come to God when you don’t believe that there is a God to come to.  So belief is a requirement for dealing with things that pertain to God.

As we look at John 3:16 I want to break it down a little and examine it a piece at a time so that we can see what it tells us.

John 3:16 tells us of: 
1. The Greatest Love – God so loved the world.
I find it so amazing that God has enough time to love me when He has the whole rest of the world to love. He loves me, insignificant me. He loves you. He loves us even though we are sinners. He even loves those who don’t believe He exists. He loves all of the atheists of the world. That is hard to believe, but He does. Name any kind of sinner there is in the world and He loves that person. He doesn’t love their sins, but He loves the person. Every person in the world can be assured of His love.

John 3:16 tells us of:
2. The Greatest Gift – He gave His Only Son
I don’t know why my life is so important that God allowed His son to go to the Cross for my sins. He loves all of us so much that His Son made the ultimate sacrifice for our sins. I suppose this is one of the easiest things to accept and yet the hardest to understand. In fact, I still don’t completely understand. I’m just thankful for it.

A gem dealer was strolling the aisles at a Gem and Mineral Show when he noticed a blue-violet stone the size and shape of a potato. He looked it over, then, as calmly as possible, asked the vendor, "You want $15 for this?" The seller, realizing the rock wasn’t as pretty as others in the bin, lowered the price to $10. The stone has since been certified as a 1,905-carat natural star sapphire, about 800 carats larger than the largest stone of its kind. It was appraised at $2.28 million.

It took a lover of stones to recognize the sapphire’s worth. It took the Lover of Souls to recognize the true value of ordinary people like us. That’s why He gave us this gift. He knows our true value.

We’ll talk more tomorrow