God's Motive for the Cross | Sermon 11/13/2022

John 3:16-21

Jesus just finished His discourse with Nicodemus in verse fifteen and now the apostle John gives his own explanatory reflection. The basis on which the Son of Man will be lifted up on the cross like the bronze serpent is God’s love. And that love is shocking because it is for the most crude and fallen place: the world. God’s love is not some theory, lofty attribute, or floating emotion in heaven, it is tangible; it is seen in its fullest in the giving of the Monogenes Son of God, the unique and only Son. The love in the cross will occur by the greatest hate the world has seen. And all that believe in the Son will experience love in not facing destruction and also in the glorious presence of God in eternal life. Our lives were going to be given for all eternity to pay our debt and now Christ is given as an offering once for all who believe so they inherit this promised life.

We find the true mission of Christ in His incarnation and humiliation is to save the world from the condemnation it is already in. And there is no third option: those who believe in Him are not condemned while those who don’t believe are condemned already. The verdict is in, according the apostle John… those of darkness are faced with a contrast of the Light and they chose their darkness over Him. The ones of this darkness fear exposure of sin, run from conviction, and evade all forms of correction. While the ones who practice truth move toward the Light not away from it. One does their own dark deeds. The other goes to the Light to show his deeds were accomplished in God. The question is: which will we be?