The Daily Word

 

So far in John 3 v16, we have seen how much God has put into seeking to bring mankind back to Himself. We have also seen the response God requires to take advantage of the effort that God has made. I can visualise this as God reaching out His hand to lift us up, and like a lifebelt thrown to a drowning man, we only have to believe and reach out and take the hand being offered.

BUT, what happens if we don’t reach out, if we don’t react, if we don’t put our faith in Jesus’ death and resurrection? Well, there are results crystalised in this verse for either reaching out, or for not trusting and John deals with the negative one first, because the verse goes on to say that if we don’t accept Jesus as our Saviour, then there is an unavoidable sentence already passed on us and that is DEATH. The part of the verse we are concerned with says, “that whosoever believes in Him, shall not perish”. The converse of that statement is, whoever does NOT BELIEVE will perish!

It is obvious to all that physical death is inevitable, but what then? The Bible makes it quite clear we have an eternal soul. The greatest sin we can commit is disbelieving God! It also makes it clear that the soul that sins shall die. But the clincher in this progression comes in Hebrews, “It is appointed unto man once to die, BUT after that, the judgement!” Solemn and serious words because God has already judged sin by punishing Jesus on the cross and there is no Plan B, however much we might think there is. So God has to judge our sin because we have not accepted His provision and that means eternal separation in a place of torment, the Bible calls this ‘the second death’. This is a fate we can all avoid by simple belief in Jesus, and we shall consider tomorrow the vast and unfathomable benefits of taking that step.

Article written by Brian Preston, Elder @SFGH Church 

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