The Promise of Love - John 3:16

It was about 35 years ago. A little less. I was up one morning early at the campus where I was attending college, and I was walking across the campus. It was pretty early, so not many people were on the campus at that time. And as I walked on the sidewalk, I saw walking toward me, an old man. He looked to be maybe in his mid 70s, maybe his late 70s. He was wearing blue jeans and had a flannel shirt, and he looked a little out of place, too young, or too old to be a student, and dressed far too casually to be a professor. It just caught my attention that this was a little out of the ordinary. I passed by him, and as we passed, I noticed he was wearing a Walmart name tag, like an employee of Walmart would wear, and I thought, well, this is clearly one of the retired men that stand at the front of Walmart greeting kids and give them the little happy face stickers. And he's just maybe wandering around the campus before his shift starts this morning at Walmart. And later that day, there was a, there was an event happening, a groundbreaking ceremony. And I wandered over to this groundbreaking ceremony where they were celebrating the construction, kicking off the construction of a new facility on the campus, and there was that old man, from earlier in the day, on the stage at the groundbreaking in his Walmart name tag, and then it hit me. The name on that name tag was Sam. And the guy I thought I passed was a Walmart greeter, was actually Sam Walton, the founder of the Walmart Empire, and at that point, for about 10 years, the richest man in all of America. And it just taught me that you can't judge somebody's value or worth by passing them on a sidewalk. Something you pass by may have far greater value, someone you pass by may be more significant than you might think they are at 1st glance. I thought of that encounter with Sam, as I thought about this Christmas Eve message. And I thought about what it must have been like to wander past that stable that night. It would have been a little out of the ordinary. A baby wrapped in swaddling clothes in a feeding trough. That would have been something maybe unusual. A bunch of excited shepherds, the commotion of these shepherds gathered around, may have caught your attention, but you would have had no idea how significant that child was. And you would have no idea how momentous this occasion was. That baby, born that holy night in that little town of Bethlehem, wrapped in swallowing clothes, lying in a manger, was God's greatest gift to humanity, the greatest expression of his love for us, and a gift that met our greatest need. If you've been with us at Northland for the last 2 or 3 weeks, you may recall that we've been in what we call our Advent series. There's been a daily devotion every day in our devotion book that you've been reading. There have been videos on social media, some of our members, and each Sunday, we've been focusing on different words, hope, peace and joy. Today, we close out our time talking about love. And our focus tonight will just be one verse, our brief time together. We're going to camp just in this one verse. It's a familiar verse, maybe to many in this room, John 316, for God, so love the world, that he gave his only son. That whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life. There are few verses in the Bible, more popular than this one. There are a few verses more significant than this one. In understanding, the central theme of scripture and the central plan of God for our lives. It's likely a verse that many in this room are familiar with, even if you didn't go to church. I remember, I think it was in the 80s, there was this guy who would wear a rainbow wig and hold up a John 316 sign in the end zone. Everybody remember that? This guy would travel around to sporting events. I always thought, what a cool ministry. God, why don't you call me to be a missionary in the end zone of NFL games? And I've been here preaching to you all for the last 30 years, but this guy would go to NFL games every Sunday and hold up his John 316 signs. So even if you never heard the verse before, maybe you remember this. I looked this up, it is the most memorized verse. Studies on scripture memory have said, this is of any verse, if anyone hears memorize scripture, there's a good chance you memorize this one. For fun, I just asked chat GPT. What's the most important verse in all of the Bible? According to chat GPT, John 3.16. Significant verse. I heard a preacher say one time, if you know nothing about the Bible, start here. Start with John 316. And if you'd ever hit to a point where you know everything about the Bible, come back here to John 316. It's the starting line, it's the finish line of understanding, the scriptures and understanding of what God has for us, that God so loved the world, that he gave his only son, that whoever believes in him, should not perish, but have eternal life. God so loved the world, the birth of Jesus. is the ultimate expression of God's love for us. Our sin had separated us from God. Jesus came so that we might be reconciled to him. I love the, some of the songs we sing at Christmas. I start listening to Christmas music pretty early. I'm one of those people that start kind of mid-November and just kind of skip over Thanksgiving. And one of the things I love about Christmas music is some of the rich theology that's in a lot of the hymns that we sing only at Christmas. And some of the songs, even tonight, some of the lyrics, some of the phrases we sang, jumped out at me. Oh, holy night. I love this line. Long lay the world in sin and error pining till he appeared and the soul felt its worth. isn't that powerful? The soul felt its worth. You matter to God. God loves you. And he loves you so much that he sent Jesus Christ to die on the cross for your sin. He gave his only son. His love prompted him to take action. Jesus is God's gift for our salvation because our sin had separated us from God. God provided a way for us to be reconciled to him through Jesus. Jesus' mission was to enter this world he created that he might give his life on the cross for our sins. God just did not send Jesus to the earth. His love did not just send him to the earth. His love also sent him to the cross. And the scripture says that God demonstrated his love for us, and that while we were sinners, Christ died for us. I heard a story one time of a group of college students on a mission trip to a 3rd world country. They were in a very impoverished area of the city. And one of the girls on the team noticed a little girl playing in the dirt covered head to toe in filth. And she asked the guide who was guiding him to the city. Why doesn't that girl's mother come and clean her up? Why doesn't that girl's mother come and clean her up? The guide replied, ma'am, that girl's mother probably loves her child very much, but she doesn't hate dirt. She doesn't hate dirt. And she said, you hate dirt, but you probably don't love that child enough to clean it up. And he said, until hate for dirt, and love for the child are in the same person, that girl's going to remain as she is. That's what this verse is all about. God loved us, but he hated the dirt. He hated the sin in our life. And because he both loved us and hated our sin that separated us from him, he sent Jesus Christ to be our salvation. And that's the theme. We see it even in the very beginnings of the New Testament. In the very beginnings of the story, the life of Jesus, after the angel appears to Mary, she says these words, my soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoiced in God, my Savior, my Savior. Joseph heard this message. She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins. And what was the message of those angels? Fear not. I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people, for unto you is born this day in the city of David, a savior, a savior, who is Christ the Lord. We sang those words an opening song tonight. Peace on earth, and mercy mild, God, and sinners, reconciled. That's what the cross was about. The birth of Jesus was about. that God loved us so much that he sent Jesus to be the sacrifice for our sins, that whoever believes in him. Should not perish, but have eternal life. We have the opportunity to believe in him, to put our faith in him. Being made right with God is not a matter of doing something. It's a matter of believing something. Having a right relation with God is not something you achieve, it's something you receive when you put your faith in Jesus Christ. When we recognize our sinfulness and our helplessness, and we turn to Jesus Christ as our savior. I've said this many times from this pulpit. And in many conversations, there is an eternity of difference between saying, Jesus is the savior and Jesus is my savior. I don't think there's be a lot of people here tonight in churches all across our city, across the country. They're going to celebrate Christmas Eve in a church somewhere because they believe Jesus is the savior. But many of them do not yet know Jesus as their savior. Do you know Jesus as your savior tonight? This is a gift with your name on it? A gift he offers to you if you'll put your faith in him. And then he says, for those who believe, The scripture says they should not perish, but have eternal life. John, who wrote these words who wrote the book that these words are in, would later write a letter. And in that letter, he would write these words, in this, the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only son into the world, so that we might live through him. We have life in Jesus today. There's hope for new life. There's hope for eternal life in the future because of Jesus. I was at the library this week. I was studying for this message. Have my laptop open. I had been typing some things and reading some things, and I just kind of leaned back in the chair for a minute, just take a little break, and I closed my eyes, and just for a moment, I just prayed. God help me as I write this message, give me the words to say. And as I'm praying silently to myself, I hear a voice of a lady say, sir, sir, and open my eyes, it's a librarian. And she said, sir, are you okay? I said, yeah, I'm okay. She said, okay, just checking. And she walked up, and I thought, that I have reached the age. Or if you close your eyes and still long enough, they're going to send someone to check your pulse. Can you relate some of you in this room, you're my age or older? Don't close your eyes at the Green Hills Library. Or that lady's going to come check your pulse. That was going to be a day when I close my eyes. at the Greenhills Library or somewhere, and I'm not going to open them again. And in that moment, because of Jesus, I'm going to open my eyes in the presence of God because of Jesus Christ. I don't know when that day is going to be. Christmas is hard for all of us at one level because I'm going to guess everyone here is going to celebrate sometime tonight, tomorrow, and there's going to be somebody missing from the celebration that you've lost in recent months or years. There's going to be an empty chair that someone used to sit in that's no longer there. And next year, that could be the chair of any one of us in this room. It's so comforting to know that because of Jesus. We have the hope of eternal life, because of Jesus, this world is not the end. We sang it in the opening song, mild, he lays his glory by, born that men may no more may die. Born that we may no more may die. Forgiveness of sin, a reconciled relationship with God, eternal life in the presence of God, or the promises of Christmas. And here's the cool thing. And here's what, here's what a lot of people this year and every year at Christmas time we're going to miss. Christmas was only the beginning. If you come to celebrate Christmas. And you go back home, you don't follow the rest of the story, you're missing the best stuff. This is just the beginning. Christmas, someone once said Christmas was the promise. Easter was the proof. Christmas was the promise. See, it gets better. The virgin birth, the miraculous star, the visits from angels, the celestial choir, all of that was just the beginning, the grand finale, would be a death on a cross and an empty tomb for our salvation. I'm one of those people that likes the state of the end. I don't know if you're like that. If you're not, don't go with me to any event, because I'm a state of the end. I like it when people try to beat traffic. It's like, the game's not over. You're gonna leave with 2 minutes on the clock, so you can beat the traffic, and you might miss the best play of the whole game. You're gonna leave, I went to see a musical. And on this will really bug me. If you do this, I'm sorry. I'm gonna go to meddling. People who leave during the curtain call to beat the crowd. I'm like, stand up and clap for these people who put on this show, don't leave yet. Don't leave during the concert, you know that band's going to play their best song for the encore. If you leave before the encore, you're going to miss their number one hit that they ever played because you're trying to rush out to the car. Here's the thing. People get to Christmas and they turn away and they miss the best stuff. They miss the fact that this baby that we celebrate tonight would live a sinless life. And that man would die a sacrificial death, and then rise triumphantly from the dead. Christmas is only the start of what Jesus came to do. And tonight you can call on. The one who gave his life for you. The one who came as God's gift of love for you, the one sacrificed on the cross for your salvation. He doesn't have to just be the savior. He can be your savior tonight. You can turn to him and say, Jesus, I want you to be my savior. I want to turn from the sin that has separated us, and I want to put my faith in you and walk with you. Not just celebrate your birth, but to follow the life you live, to trust in the death you died, to believe the resurrection from the grave that you experienced. You can have that tonight, whoever. Whoever believes. And you might say, listen, I'm not a very religious person. I've not been a very religious person. The scripture says, whoever, whoever. You say, I've not lived a very good life. Whoever. You see, I've done some really, really terrible things. Whoever. But I'm wrestling with addiction. Whoever. But I've been skeptical and even critical. In fact, I'm only here tonight because a family member made me come. Whoever. You say, I haven't been here since last Christmas, and honestly wasn't planning to come back till next Christmas. Whoever. Whoever calls on Jesus Christ tonight can be saved. He said, but, I once thought I believe, but I've wandered away, whoever. Whoever calls on the name of the Lord, can be said, that's the gift of God's love, this Christmas, the hope of salvation, the hope of eternal life, the promise of forgiveness, because of Jesus. Let's pray together. Even in these final moments of our time together, you could call on him. asking Jesus, the one who was born to this world for our salvation, who died on the cross, for our sins, who rose from the dead, proving his victory over sin and death. The one who you may see as the savior, tonight you can say he's my savior. If you'll turn to him. Bring your sin to him. Trust in him, believe in him tonight. Father, I pray for everyone here tonight that we'd be reminded of the significance of what happened. that is miraculous as it was to, for a virgin to give birth, for a star to guide the wise men, for acquire to sing before acquired of angels to sing before shepherds, that was just the beginning. of what you came to do, Jesus. We thank you, Jesus, for your death on the cross and your resurrection from the dead. Let us not stop the story at Christmas. That that's just the beginning of what you showed for us in your love. Jesus, I pray for those who have never trusted in you, that tonight they would do that. Tonight might be the start of a journey. Tonight might be the beginning of asking some questions. Tonight you might through what we experience tonight. Turn hearts toward you, Jesus. We pray this in your name. Amen.