that everyone who believes in Him may have eternal life.that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life.That whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life.that whosoever believeth may in him have eternal life.
13 sermons cite this verse
… Next verse is this. John chapter 3, verse 15. You're very familiar with this, but hear me out. Jesus says, whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life. Verse 16, for God so loved the world that he gave or gifted his only begotten son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. Verse 17, for God did not send his son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through him might be saved. Verse 18, he who does, or he who believes in him, is not condemned. The word belief is put your weight on him. Trust him. Watch. But he who does not believe is condemned already because he has not believed in the name or the authority of the only begotten son of God. If you're not a Christian today, and I'm not talking Christian like membership. I'm talking about Christian follower of Jesus, okay? If you're not a follower of Jesus, you are under the condemnation of your own sin. God wants you to be convicted and to be saved. Satan wants you to be condemned and lost. …
… John summarizes it in memorable words. For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son that whosoever believes in him should not perish but have exactly what these architects are looking for—everlasting life. But not as a result of putting the windows beyond arm's length, but as a result of bowing down and acknowledging that my life is a disintegrating shambles. that my best endeavors to put it back together are frankly hopeless. And I can't believe this amazing story. Are you telling me that Jesus has done for me what I cannot do for myself? Yes. Now, why do I have to pay for this? Oh, you don't pay. It's free. Oh, but it can't possibly be a gift. Yes, it is. That's Jesus' message. Then in verse 16 and following, we have Jesus' mission. What's his mission? Well, his mission is to take forward his message and to see the message then established in the lives of people. If the kingdom of God is near, as he proclaims, then what are the people to expect? Well, in Old Testament terms, they knew what they should expect because they knew that when the kingdom of God dawned, everything would be different for them. …
… I'm going to John chapter three. He says, for God so loved the world that he gave his only son, that whoever believes in him might not perish, but have eternal life. So he says this belief, but it's really fascinating because later on, Jesus makes a contrast. And the contrast isn't between belief and unbelief. The contrast in John chapter three is between those who believe and those who disobey. So Jesus is making it very, very clear that belief is not just kind of like intellectual assent, like, oh yeah, no, I believe that God's a trinity. It's belief versus disobedience, which means to say that that term that Jesus uses for belief isn't just I understand or isn't just I accept this, but it's more. It's I accept this, I trust this, and now I'll obey. That's why we know this, we know this. Once again, it's less about knowing the right answer and more about submitting myself to the truth who's God himself. I don't think that many of us are going to stand before God and need to know the right answer to a test. …
… For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only son, that whoever believed in him should not perish but have eternal life. From heaven, Christ came to that earth to give his life for you and me. He died, Jesus did, at three o'clock on Friday. And for the Jewish person, Sabbath was coming at sundown. And so I'm not saying his burial was haphazard, but it definitely was a rush job. They had to get Jesus' body off the cross. They had to move him to a nearby cemetery. They had to arrange very quickly a borrowed tomb and wash his body, to wrap it as much as they could, to prepare it with the spices for burial as much as possible and to get his body in the tomb so that they could be home by the time the sun went down. But on Sunday morning, they were coming back. Once the Sabbath had ended, their plan was to go back to the tomb and to finish what they'd started on Friday. …
… lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so the Son of Man must be lifted up, that whoever believes in him would not perish, but have eternal life. For God so loved the world, he gave his only begotten son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For God did not send his son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through him might be saved. 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. So let me ask you a question, when does a person become condemned? the answer, they're already condemned. If you sit here today in unbelief, you are already condemned. Jesus didn't come into the world to condemn because you're already condemned. He came in that you might have life, eternal life, and not more abundantly. So this is the thing. He uses this analogy with Nicodemus. …
… even that guy that loves the raiders, shall not perish, but have eternal life. For God did not send his son into the world to condemn the world, but he sent his son into the world to save it. I just love this. God didn't send Jesus because he was upset with humanity. God sent Jesus because he was obsessed with humanity. God didn't send Jesus to condemn everybody. He sent Jesus to save everybody. In fact, write down point number one today. I love this about God. God sent Jesus to rescue those who are far from him. Anybody that's far from God, it is not the will of God. God wants every human to be close to Jesus. So God sent Jesus not to condemn people, but to rescue people. Oh, I know it's the Oscars here in LA. I know it's Oscars night. so I'm going movie references on you today. How about the movie Taken? Little Liam Neeson for you today in church. That man flew over to Europe to go look all through Europe to find his daughter. …
… Let us listen again for God's word as it comes to us from the Gospel of John, chapter 3, beginning with the 14th verse. Just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life. For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish, but may have eternal life. Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. this is the word of God for you the people of God thanks be to God Today, we celebrate our newly installed associate pastor, Chris Palmer. Later in the service, we will pray God's blessing on Reverend Palmer's ministry. For now, let me simply say this from the heart. It is a joy to have this talented, spiritually grounded, musically gifted pastor as a leader for your young adult ministry and for this whole congregation at Fifth Avenue Presbyterian. …
… again. Well, what does that mean? Listen to what he says in verse 14. Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the desert, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, so that everyone who believes in him may have what? Eternal life. Then we know the next verse. Quote it with me if you know it. God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whoever believes in him will never perish, but will have eternal life. That's the picture here. He's giving eternal life. John chapter 4, verse 14. He's having a conversation with this Samaritan woman at the well, crossing all kinds of boundaries. And what does he say to her? He says, whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water, welling up to eternal life. Look over in John chapter 5. John chapter 5, verse 21. This is a great text right here that describes some of the things we've been talking about, how the Father is working. …
… Everyone knows this one, that he gave his one and only son that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life. For God did not send his son, amen, into the world to condemn the world. Why? Because they were already under the wrath of God. He didn't need to do any more condemning. He sent his son into the world to save the world through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because they have not believed in the name of God's one and only son. This is the verdict. Light has come into the world, but people love darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. Everyone who does evil hates the light and will not come into the light for fear that their deeds will be exposed. But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light so that it may be plainly seen that what they have done has been done in the sight of God. We were just over here, so loved the world that he gave his only son. And just a sentence or two later, we're in the light, living in the light, sanctified, becoming set apart and made into all of what God has put in us at salvation. We looked at this text last week in Titus, Paul speaking to one of his protégés. At one time, we too were foolish, But look at verse four. …
… and one day you get eternal life because john 3 16 put it like this for god so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life. I'm so glad Anita, because she knew Jesus. I'm so glad that about 250 of us in this room can thank God right now that whatever happens, however I leave, I got something else on the other side of this. I got a crown on the other side, a mansion on the other side, rest on the other side. Does anybody want to help me thank God that it don't end in Chicago? It ends on some golden streets when we all get to heaven. And so the very name Anita is a derivative of the name Anna. And that name Anna means grace. Anita's name means grace. And may her life, her grace. and may God's grace hold you until we all meet on the other shore. Let's turn up for our sister Aniba.
… And then he says in verse 16, for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life or everlasting life. But what does it mean to believe in Jesus Christ? Well, I think there are a lot of people out there who are very deceived. who really and truly believe that somewhere along the way, they have believed in Jesus Christ, and therefore, they are safe. They are comfortable. They're safe. So what I'd like to do is to think for just a moment with you about what these people are thinking and how they think when they say, yes, I do believe. Well, I think there's some people who genuinely would say to you, yes, I believe the Bible. I believe in God. I believe in Jesus Christ. And therefore, they think that they're safe. What they're saying is, I believe the facts. That is, this is the Bible. This is God's Word. I believe the Bible does teach about God, and the Bible does teach about Jesus. …
And so chapter 3 begins with this introduction of Nicodemus. There was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus a ruler of the Jews. Not all of the Pharisees were elevated to membership in the Sanhedrin, which was the ruling body of the Jewish people. This would be akin to a senator in the United States Senate. This is a man of very high authority in the government of the affairs of the Jewish people who is also skilled as a theologian, or at least he's supposed to be. And we are told that he came to Jesus by night. John doesn't tell us why he came at night. Maybe he was too busy during the day, or maybe as many guests, he was a little bit embarrassed about being seen publicly with this Jesus who was gaining some kind of a reputation, which was basically negative among the Pharisees and the rulers of the Jews. So maybe Nicodemus was seeking the cover of darkness and hoping for a clandestine meeting with Jesus so that he could interrogate Him in private. …
… that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life. Now, there's something significant about the word order here in John 3.15, that whoever believes in Him should have eternal life? No. But first what is stated is the negative. believes in the one who is lifted up won't perish. Do you see how that draws the parallel exactly from the situation in the wilderness? These people who were bitten by these poisonous snakes were going to die. They were in a predicament where they were bent on perishing. And so the remedy that God gave was a remedy to preserve them from certain destruction. And what Jesus is saying here to Nicodemus is we're in that same state by nature, that But apart from Christ, apart from the cross, we are as exposed to perishing and destruction as those people were who were bitten by deadly snakes. And Jesus is saying, there's many who believe on Me. they won't perish. Just as those in the Old Testament did not perish if they looked to the bronze serpent. Now, in verse 16 in the Bible that I'm using here, I'll just lift it up and let you see it, and you can see there's something unusual about this little Bible, and that is that it's a red letter edition. Can you see that, Joe? See the red letter? …