On the Love of God -- Tim Phillips

 



You may not be familiar with the name Rollen Stewart, but if you watched any major sporting event in the 1970’s and 80’s, you are probably familiar with his handiwork. Rollen Stewart was the man who used to wear rainbow-colored wigs and carry large signs that read “John 3:16.” He could often be seen (or at least his sign was seen) on extra points as he sat in the end zone of football games. I did notice that when the Georgia Bulldogs' defensive back Kelee Ringo scored the decisive touchdown in last Mondays' College Football National Championship game, there was someone in the end zone holding up one of those John 3:16 signs. It was not Rollen Stewart, however -- he is currently in prison serving three life sentences for kidnapping.

John 3:16 is, of course, an appropriate verse to display on such a sign. It is a well-known verse (most have in memorized), and it contains a word that resonates with our culture ("love"). Because of that, it runs the risk of being a very misunderstood verse -- not only by the world, but also by Christians. When I was in seminary, there was a Methodist gentleman in one of my classes who assumed that John 3:16 was a magic bullet verse that defeated Calvinism. The way one interprets and defines "love" goes a long way to determining how one reads John 3:16.

So what do we mean by "love," especially when we are speaking of the love of God? The world often interprets "love" in misleading ways. When I was in the 11th grade, I had a crush on a the girl who sat in front of me in Algebra II. She would go on to become homecoming queen the next year, and the following year she married a player on the football team (and as far as I know, they are still married today). I thought at one time I was "in love" (the world used to call it "puppy love"), but that's not what John 3:16 is speaking about. Biblical love is not merely a thought or a feeling, but it expressed by an action. In John 3:16, that action is seen in "giving." God loved the world in this way, that He gave His only begotten Son as the Savior in whom we must believe. A similar statement ("love" implies "giving") can be seen in Ephesians 5:25: "Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her." Today is my oldest daughter's 12th birthday, and one of the ways our family will demonstrate our love for her is in giving gifts to her. John 3:16 tells us that God the Father has given us the greatest gift of all -- His own beloved Son Jesus Christ. And if we believe in Him, if we are trusting in Him as all our refuge and all our righteousness, then we will receive the gift of eternal life through Him.

This past Thursday I officiated the funeral service for a dear lady in our congregation. She died just a couple of weeks shy of her 99th birthday, so she had been blessed by God with a long life. One of the texts she wanted read at her funeral (I used it for my sermon text) was 1 John 4:7-21. In that text, we have another wonderful example of how the love of God is shown clearly to us:

By this the love of God was manifested in us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world so that we might live through Him. In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. (1 John 4:9-10)

Do you want to know the love of God? Come to Jesus Christ. Do you want proof of the love of God? Then look to the Lord Jesus Christ. Ben Franklin once reputedly (and probably apocryphally) said, "Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy." But it is actually the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ where we definitely seen the love of God demonstrated for us. For all who believe in Him, He has taken away our sin, paid our debt, purchased our redemption, and endured the wrath of God in our place, so that we have eternal life in Him. That is far better than beer, better than birthday presents, better than football championships, better than anything this world has to offer. Therefore, let us believe in Jesus Christ and live for Jesus Christ, and let us love one another because He has first loved us.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Make Our Worship Spaces Presbyterian Again by Rev. Benjamin Glaser

Image
We’ve all heard the jokes about Presbyterian’s being anti-fun, the so-called frozen chosen. The seen, but not heard denomination. The post you are about to read is going to sound like it came from the official spokesman of the “Presbyterians against anything nice” coalition. Maybe it’s true, maybe I am the grumpiest Presbyterian alive, but my goal here today is not to get hits or cause trouble. Rabble rousers are boring people. Men who seek out controversy don’t have enough to do and they aren’t really seeking to win converts to their position. They just like to see the fight.  At the end of the day I’m really a harmless little fuzzball who just wants Presbyterians to be Presbyterians, Baptists to be Baptists, and Anglicans to be Anglicans. Good fences make good neighbors. If you know where the other person stands it makes it easier to know where you stand. The topic I’d like to get into today is about the meeting space. Some call it the “sanctuary”, others the “preaching hall”, ...
Read more

What Does the ARP Confess About the Civil Government? by Rev. Benjamin Glaser

Image
A common problem in our conservative Presbyterian circles is that some members of the PCA believe they not only invented American presbyterianism, but that they and the OPC are the only actual members of the party. One way their aloofness shows itself is through an unwillingness to recognize that not all of us descend from the 1729 Adopting Act nor gauge our history through Francis Makemie or the Philadelphia Assembly of 1789. When Makemie established the first presbytery in the American colonies in 1709 some of us were still in Scotland, both in and out of the revolution settlement CoS. Ebenezer Erskine was a spry twenty-nine years old and Alexander Moncrieff was fourteen. The years 1782 and 1803 are relevant to our history in ways the other dates are not. We are not overly concerned with what the mainliners were up to in those days. We’ve been blessedly free from that mess for two hundred twenty plus years. The reason why I bring that up is because the folks who think they hung the m...
Read more

Ralph Erskine and Mental Images by Rev. Benjamin Glaser

Image
  One of the most common exceptions taken in the ARP (and the PCA  et al ) by newly ordained men and those taking transfer exams in presbytery is without a doubt a certain clause in the explanation to Westminster Larger Catechism #109. This mainly concerns the prohibition against making mental images of the Godhead, especially the Second Person, in accordance with the catechism’s teaching on the Second Commandment. I will post the question below: Q. 109.  What sins are forbidden in the second commandment? A. The sins forbidden in the second commandment are, all devising, counseling, commanding, using, and any wise approving, any religious worship not instituted by God himself; the making any representation of God, of all or of any of the three persons, either inwardly in our mind, or outwardly in any kind of image or likeness of any creature whatsoever; all worshiping of it, or God in it or by it; the making of any representation of feigned deities, and all worship of the...
Read more