For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life

 

 "For God so loved the world that 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 of God.  And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.  For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed.  But he who does the truth comes to the light, that his deeds may be clearly seen, that they have been done in God."

 

- John 3:16–21 

 

Yesterday we read that when Jesus was in Jerusalem at the Passover, during the feast, many believed in His name when they saw the signs which He did.  But Jesus did not commit Himself to them, because He knew all men, and had no need that anyone should testify of man, for He knew what was in man. There was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews.  This man came to Jesus by night and said to Him, "Rabbi, we know that You are a teacher come from God; for no one can do these signs that You do unless God is with him."  Jesus answered and said to him, "Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God."  Nicodemus said to Him, "How can a man be born when he is old?  Can he enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born?"  Jesus answered, "Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.  That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.  Do not marvel that I said to you, 'You must be born again.'  The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear the sound of it, but cannot tell where it comes from and where it goes.  So is everyone who is born of the Spirit."  Nicodemus answered and said to Him, "How can these things be?"  Jesus answered and said to him, "Are you the teacher of Israel, and do not know these things?  Most assuredly, I say to you, We speak what We know and testify what We have seen, and you do not receive our witness.  If I have told you earthly things and you do not believe, how will you believe if I tell you heavenly things?  No one has ascended to heaven but He who came down from heaven, that is, the Son of Man who is in heaven.  And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life."

 

  "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life."  My study Bible comments that in order to show the reason the Son must be crucified ("lifted up" -- see yesterday's reading, above), Jesus here declares the great love of God not only for Israel, but for the world.  This single verse, it says, expresses the whole of the message of John's Gospel, and even of salvation history.  

"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 of God.  And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.  For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed.  But he who does the truth comes to the light, that his deeds may be clearly seen, that they have been done in God."  While Christ came to save and not to condemn, my study Bible says, human beings have free will.  So, therefore, we can reject this gift, and become condemned by our own rejection. 

 

 "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life."  There is a reason why this verse (John 3:16) is perhaps the most frequently encountered verse quoted around us.  But the reason may be much bigger and broader than one thinks.  This is because, quite simply, this verse not only sums up the Gospels, or John's Gospel, or even the story of salvation.  That is because when we think of the word "salvation" that also needs to be broader than what we usually think of when we encounter the word in our religious context.  Mostly we tend, for various reasons, to focus on sin as the reason for the necessity of Christ's Incarnation, so that we are saved through Him from our "fallen" or sinful state.  But the truth about Christ's Incarnation, as early Church Fathers testify, is really much, much bigger than that.  For Christ as the Lord populates the whole of the Bible, Old and New Testaments, in the many encounters with the Lord we can read about -- from the Lord walking in the Garden (where Adam and Eve heard the sound of God walking - Genesis 3:8), to Abraham being visited by the Lord (Genesis 18), to Moses encountering the Lord in the Burning Bush (Exodus 3), or on Mount Sinai in Exodus 33 or 36, and the various other encounters with the Lord documented in both Old and New Testaments.  This is partly because, while we are used to thinking of time in terms of the linear way in which you and I experience it, God is not bound by time, and as Christ is the only begotten, He is also God.  Thus these encounters with the Lord are encounters with the Son, the Logos, who not only brought the world into existence as the Word together with the Father and the Holy Spirit, but becomes incarnate Himself as Jesus Christ, and also makes these other appearances among God's creation.  Our salvation is so much more than salvation from sin, because God the Son has come among us in the person of Jesus, but also in other encounters we read about in Scripture.  Why?  Each encounter, including the life and ministry of Jesus Christ, is for this purpose:  so that we know that God so loved the world (the κοσμος/cosmos) that He sent His only begotten so so that we creatures should not perish but have eternal life.  This is the reality of the Incarnation; it is an expression of God's love seeking ultimate union with us, with the creation that God loves.  It cannot be minimized to a kind of chance happenstance because human beings have sinned, or even a kind of benign projection because God knew that "would" happen.  Why?  Because Scripture also tells us that Jesus Christ the Lord is the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world (Revelation 13:8).  His sacrifice of the greatest love (John 15:13) is one already made ("slain" in the Greek describes a state that already exists) from the very creation of the world.  Whatever we are, from the greatest saint to the greatest sinner, and even for the whole of creation, the cosmos, Christ is the Lamb slain from the foundation of creation.  The Son's sacrifice speaks to us of pure love, and this is indeed the message of the Gospel, the message of the Christ, the one thing necessary we must always know and carry with us -- that He is the Lord who died for us.  Keep this sense with you at all times, and be grateful for it, because this is ultimately the message that saves, in all circumstances.  While Christ indeed calls us to repentance, He does so first and before all else out of love as the foundation for everything else.  He calls us to the light and away from the darkness for this reason.  He gives us His truth and asks us to walk in that truth.  He calls us forward to be with Him for an eternity, He asks us to accept His gift, He defeated death out of love for us, He died for you and for me and for the whole world.  Let us always keep this understanding with us.  

 

 

Then came the Day of Unleavened Bread, when the Passover must be killed. And He sent Peter and John, saying, "Go and prepare the Passover for us, that we may eat"

 

 Now the Feast of Unleavened Bread drew near, which is called Passover.  And the chief priests and the scribes sought how they might kill Him, for they feared the people.  Then Satan entered Judas, surnamed Iscariot, who was numbered among the twelve.  So he went his way and conferred with the chief priests and captains, how he might betray Him to them.  And they were glad, and agreed to give him money.  So he promised and sought opportunity to betray Him to them in the absence of the multitude.  

Then came the Day of Unleavened Bread, when the Passover must be killed.  And He sent Peter and John, saying, "Go and prepare the Passover for us, that we may eat."  So they said to Him, "Where do You want us to prepare?"  And He said to them, "Behold, when you have entered the city, a man will meet you carrying a pitcher of water; follow him into the house which he enters.  Then you shall say to the master of the house, 'The Teacher says to you, "Where is the guest room where I may eat the Passover with My disciples?"'  Then he will show you a large, furnished upper room; there make ready."  So they went and found it just as He had said to them, and they prepared the Passover. 

 

- Luke 22:1–13 

 

On Tuesday, we read that Jesus spoke to them a parable after speaking about end times:  "Look at the fig tree, and all the trees.  When they are already budding, you see and know for yourselves that summer is now near.  So you also, when you see these things happening, know that the kingdom of God is near.  Assuredly, I say to you, this generation will by no means pass away till all things take place.  Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will by no means pass away.  But take heed to yourselves, lest your hearts be weighed down with carousing, drunkenness, and cares of this life, and that Day come on you unexpectedly.  For it will come as a snare on all those who dwell on the face of the whole earth.  Watch therefore, and pray always that you may be counted worthy to escape all these things that will come to pass, and to stand before the Son of Man."  And in the daytime He was teaching in the temple, but at night He went out and stayed on the mountain called Olivet.  Then early in the morning all the people came to Him in the temple to hear Him. 

 

Now the Feast of Unleavened Bread drew near, which is called Passover.  And the chief priests and the scribes sought how they might kill Him, for they feared the people.  My study Bible explains that the Passover (Πασχα/Pascha in Greek) is the celebration of the firstborn of Egypt and the deliverance of God's people from bondage (Exodus 12 - 14).  In remembrance of this, the Jews would slaughter an unblemished lamb and partake of it with unleavened bread.  This, it says, prefigures Christ's Passion, in which the only-begotten Son of God is slain in order to deliver His people from their bondage to sin and death, and then is raised to lead them into the eternal Kingdom.  See also Revelation 13:8.  Orthodox Christians refer to the death and Resurrection of Christ primarily by the use of the word Pascha, known in the West as Easter.  

Then Satan entered Judas, surnamed Iscariot, who was numbered among the twelve.  So he went his way and conferred with the chief priests and captains, how he might betray Him to them.  And they were glad, and agreed to give him money.  So he promised and sought opportunity to betray Him to them in the absence of the multitude.  My study Bible comments that Satan does not enter a person except by that person's consent.  The reason that Judas was chosen by Satan, and none of the others, is because Judas had a place for Satan in his heart, and the others did not.  Luke's mention of Judas being numbered among the twelve, my study Bible tells us, is an emphasis on the depth of the betrayal.  Moreover, it shows that religious position is worthless if not accompanied by faith and virtue.  

Then came the Day of Unleavened Bread, when the Passover must be killed.  And He sent Peter and John, saying, "Go and prepare the Passover for us, that we may eat."  So they said to Him, "Where do You want us to prepare?"  And He said to them, "Behold, when you have entered the city, a man will meet you carrying a pitcher of water; follow him into the house which he enters.  Then you shall say to the master of the house, 'The Teacher says to you, "Where is the guest room where I may eat the Passover with My disciples?"'  Then he will show you a large, furnished upper room; there make ready."  So they went and found it just as He had said to them, and they prepared the Passover.  Expanding further on commentary for the first verse in today's reading (see above), my study Bible explains that the term Passover (Greek Πασχα/Pascha) can refer to several things.  It can refer to the original event, or the celebration of that event, to the food that is eaten, or even to the lamb that is slain.  My study Bible adds that in patristic commentary, Peter represents zeal and John represents spiritual understanding -- these, it says, are the virtues with which we are to partake of the Lord's Supper. 

It's interesting that the Passover refers to so many different things, as my study Bible notes.  One thing is for certain, the Passover is central to our understanding of Christ and who He is, and therefore to our understanding of our faith.  One of the most profound and intriguing ways Christ is referenced is in the Revelation:  "All who dwell on the earth will worship him, whose names have not been written in the Book of Life of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world" (Revelation 13:8).  Here the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world ties Jesus Christ to the Passover in ways that extend both before and long after the event in Exodus recorded as the Passover.  For this Lamb was slain from the foundation of the world, meaning that Christ, our Passover, was always sacrificed for us -- indicating that when any of us sacrifices or suffers for our own faith, we are entering into His sacrifice made once and for all time, and for all of us.  The story of the Passover in Exodus 12 begins with the LORD instructing Moses and Aaron:  "This month shall be your beginning of months; it shall be the first month of the year to you. Speak to all the congregation of Israel, saying: 'On the tenth of this month every man shall take for himself a lamb, according to the house of his father, a lamb for a household' " (Exodus 12:2-3).  Note that the LORD's instructions clearly begin a kind of calendar:  "So this day shall be to you a memorial; and you shall keep it as a feast to the Lord throughout your generations. You shall keep it as a feast by an everlasting ordinance" (Exodus 12:14).  In this sense of marking time and creating a calendar, even a "first of months" and a "memorial" of "everlasting ordinance" is a way of God giving instructions for manifesting a spiritual reality that already existed:  the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world.  It's also notable that the Feast of Unleavened Bread is established by the LORD as a memorial for "the same day I will have brought your armies out of the land of Egypt" (Exodus 12:17).  So, this day begun in the Gospel, the Feast of the Unleavened Bread, the Passover, is at once a type of manifestation both of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world, as well as the setting free of God's people, our liberation from bondage.  But this time the Lord Himself, the Lamb, has come into the world as a human being, and He will, as Jesus, become the Passover, and our Liberator for "all who dwell on the earth."  For in His sacrifice is the foundation of our life and its sustenance of which we all may partake.  For Christians, this is the central event of history.  In the fulfillment of this everlasting ordinance, Christ gives instructions for this final Passover of His earthly life as Jesus, for this time of fulfillment that is at hand in His Passion and Resurrection, and most certainly in the institution of the Eucharist, our own everlasting memorial.  Returning to my study Bible's mention of the patristic interpretation of Peter representing zeal and John spiritual understanding -- we take up the Lord's Supper and His manifestation of the Kingdom at hand, even the mysteries in which we are invited to partake.  Let us give thanks, for so we may enter into His Passover, of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world.  For His flesh is food indeed, and His blood is drink indeed (John 6:55).