In a few minutes, I will read these comforting words: So God loved the world, that he gave his only-begotten Son, to the end that all that believe in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. St. John iii. 16.
The Christian religion is not based on man seeking after God. Rather, it is the belief that God has initiated our relationship with Him by His having compassion on us miserable sinners; upon us who are perishing in our sinful, fallen condition and death. God has loved us. And in so loving, He has acted on our behalf. He has freely provided for us the answer to our sinful, rebellious, fallen condition. That answer is nothing less than His only-begotten Son, Jesus of Nazareth. Two thousand years ago, He gave us His Son in His incarnation, but the incarnation was to the end that His Son might perish in our place; that He might pay the penalty of death on the cross in our stead, as only He, the God-Man, might do.
How should we respond to such a gift? We may personally differ in our initial response to the news of this loving act toward us, but the verse makes plain the response that God intends us to have: that is belief. And the Bible teaches us that this belief is of a particular quality. It is no mere intellectual assent to the claims of Christianity. Nor is it the kind of belief with which we trust God to take care of us in this world. It is a repentant belief. The intended response is to repent toward God – to turn our lives from living for self to living for God – and to believe in Jesus for our eternal needs. In this belief, we put all our hope for forgiveness and acceptance by God in Jesus alone. We are made righteous before God, not by our good works, but by His good works on our behalf.
Dear friend, however you may have responded to the story of Jesus in the past, if you have never personally responded to the giving of God’s Son to you by turning from darkness and living for yourself, toward God, and by placing the whole of your trust in Him alone and what He has done for you as all you need to be forgiven of your sins and to be made right with God forever, you must do so, and I plead with you to do so today. For the Son has been given to us that we not perish. God is love, but He’s also holy and just and perish we will in our rebellion if we refuse so great a salvation, so great a gift from God’s loving heart.
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