THE GREATEST GIFT
By George W. Sinquefield
Advertise Your Business Or Website At
HomewithGod.com
By George W. Sinquefield
(John 3:16 KJV) "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."
Mr. Moorhouse, a preacher in the past, had preached for 6 nights on John 3:16. The 7th night came - he was in the pulpit. The congregation waited to see if he would preach from it again. Every eye was on him.
He said, "Beloved friends, I have been hunting all day for a new text but I cannot find anything so good as the old one, so we will go back to John 3:16.
He continued by saying, "My friends for a whole week I have been trying to tell you how much God loves you, but I cannot do it with this poor stammering tongue. If I could borrow Jacob's ladder and climb up into Heaven and ask Gabriel, who stands in the presence of the Almighty, to tell me how much love the Father has for the world all he could say would be, "God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on Him should not perish but have everlasting life"
When Martin Luther's translation of the Bible was being printed in Germany, pieces of the printer's work fell to the floor. His little girl picked up a piece of paper on which she found the words, "God so loved the world that He gave." That was all it said. But to one who had been brought up to fear God as one who could be approached only through deeds done for penance, it was quite a revelation. It so filled her soul with radiance that her mother asked the reason for it. From her pocket she pulled a crumpled piece of paper. Her mother read it. "God so loved the world that He gave." Perplexed, she said, "He gave -- what was it He gave?" The little girl replied, "I don't know. But if He loved us well enough to give us anything, we need not be afraid of Him."
I. God So Loved That He Gave
Love, the God kind of Love is the reaching out, the giving of self, doing something for the ones we love.
You cannot separate the two words -- loved and gave. D. L. Moody tells us that in his earlier years, he thought that God loved us because Jesus died for us. He felt that God was a hard, cold, revengeful Judge who looks upon this world of sinners with no mercy but only a determination to judge and punish. Jesus, in pity for us, came between us and this wrathful Judge and died for us and this changed God's attitude toward us. He learned that he was wrong. Nothing was further from the truth. Jesus died to redeem us because God already loved us. The death of Jesus for our redemption is the proof of the Father's love - not the cause of it. God's love is so different from our love.
Agape -- God kind of Love
Dr. Ray Robbins said, "God's love is an unselfish love and ours is a selfish love. God loves us for our good - not His. We love others because of what they mean to us.
In comparison:
Christ and Christ alone is absolutely unique and incomparable.
J. Sidlow Baxter asks, Was there even a gift like the Savior given?" He answers his question by saying, "He leaves the bosom of the eternal Father and comes to the bosom of an earthly mother. The Son of God becomes the Son of Mary. The Infinite becomes and infant. He who holds the worlds in His arms is held in the arms of a frail woman. He whose garment is space, whose house is the universe, whose chariots are the clouds, and whose diadems are the stars, is wrapped in swaddling bands, and laid in a manger. He leaves the songs of the angels, for the gibes and taunts of wicked crucifiers. He leaves the palace-beautiful of heaven for the stable and the workbench, and the having "not where to lay His head," He lays aside His celestial insignia, for the peasant dress and the purple robe of ridicule. He puts aside His sceptre of universal sovereignty, for the reed of mock royalty in Pilate's hall. He leaves the very throne of heaven, for that cross outside the city wall. He who is the Prince of Life bows His head in death. He who is without sin becomes the Sin bearer. The Christ of God becomes the Crucified. He who is the Father's delight becomes the God-forsaken. He who lit the stars lies in the dust. He comes, He toils, He hungers and thirsts, He weeps, He suffers, He bleeds and dies; He redeemingly agonizes in a depthless, boundless infinity of suffering which only His infinite capacity for suffering could experience; for "God SO loved the world that He GAVE UP His only begotten Son.""
"Thanks be unto God for His unspeakable gift," exclaims Paul as he thinks of Christ and the cross.
"Unspeakable," it was with care that Paul picked this adjective. It appears no where else in the New Testament. In the utter sense Christ is God's "unspeakable" gift. This is a gift of such staggering immensity and infinite glory that language breaks down. Christ, the Heavenly Father's gift to this world is a sheer divine wonder.
"Unspeakable," oh, the unspeakableness of such a gift. What food is to the starving; what water is to the thirsty; what liberation is to the slave; what riches are to the poverty stricken; what relief is to the suffering; what release is to the condemned prisoner, what healing is to the sick and dying; what all these are and much more; is Jesus Christ, God's gift to men. Yes, language breaks down. He is indeed, "unspeakable".
II. God Gave His Son To Die For A Lost World
(1 John 4:9 KJV) "In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent his only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through him.
(1 John 4:10 KJV) Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins."
In World War I, it is said that the people in Britain had the habit of putting a gold star in the window of their homes when they lost a son out of that home and out of the family circle. That gold star in the window meant that that home had given a son to die for the nation of England and the British Empire.
It is said that one night a fine Christian man and his little boy were walking along the streets in Britain at Christmas time. As they walked along they thought about the coming of Christ into the world to die for the sins of all mankind.
The little boy said, "Dad, over there is a gold star in the window. What does it mean?"
The father said, "Son, it means that family gave their boy to die on the battle field for your safety and mine.
As they walked along, they came to an intersection. There were no trees to hide the sky and they could see the stars shine.
The little boy said, "Dad, what does that star mean? Does it mean that God gave His Son too?"
The Christian father with great delight said, "Yes, Son, God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. God gave His Son."
Across the desk of a Methodist minister in Van Wert, Ohio, during the dark days of World War II, there sat a father who had just received the red-starred telegram from the government which contained the notification of the death of his son as a military casualty.
"What have I done to deserve this" Why has God punished me in this manner?" This was not the time nor the place to explain that death is not a punishment, and so I let him pour out the emotional content of his soul. Then, when he had paused I quietly added, "God understands. He gave His Son to make the world a better place in which to live. God is a Gold Star parent. He knows. He understands. He gave too."
" But I lost my son," the man cried again. I again quietly interrupted to say, "You did not lose your son. You gave your son, as God gave His, in the daring hope that through such sacrifice the world might be made better."
Gradually the anguish subsided as the father made the discovery that now he belonged to the parade of parents across the calendar of history who had given sons or daughters with the prayerful hope that the world might be a more decent place in which to live, that men might have life to the full, that the Kingdom of God might come on earth as it has come in heaven, that brotherhood might become a reality, that a just, and enduring peace might arise from the sacrifice of the hour.
One has said "If it had been possible for an angel to have atoned for our sins, God would never have sacrificed His Son, but if the whole world had been filled with crosses and on every cross there hung an archangel, the debt of human sin would still have been unpaid. There was only one who could understand to fullness the hideousness of sin in the eyes of a holy God. Only one who, Himself sinless, could shoulder the burden of a world's guilt and bear the awful stroke of divine judgment in our stead."
God gave His only begotten Son because He alone could atone for our sins.
III. Jesus Gave Himself For Us
(John 10:14-17 KJV) ". . . . I lay down my life for the sheep. . . . Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again.
(John 10:18 KJV) No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. . . . "
(Titus 2:14 KJV) "Who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, . . . ."
(Eph 5:25 KJV) ". . . . Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it;"
(Gal 1:4 KJV) "Who gave himself for our sins, . . . . "
(1 Tim 2:6 KJV) "Who gave himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time."
Jesus speaks to us in this hymn.
"I gave my life for thee
My precious blood I shed
That thou mightest ransomed be
And quickened from the dead
I gave, I gave My life for thee
What hast thou given for me?"
Jesus was not forced to die. He said He could call 12 legions of angels and they would deliver Him out of the hands of the Roman soldiers.
The spikes and nails did not hold Jesus to the cross. It was His love for a lost world, for you and me, that held Him there. He gave Himself to die in our place.
A true story and a wonderful story is told about a man named Willy Lear. His tombstone can be seen today in Palmyra, Mo.
Willly Lear was a young single man during the Civil War. A group of southern soldiers had been sentenced to be shot by northern soldiers. The ten men were blind folded and lined up to be shot, when a young man walked up and said, "Who is the captain of the firing squad?"
A man said, "I am, don't interrupt me." Willy Lear said, "But I will for a moment." Standing at the end of the line is a father of 10 children. When you shoot him today, you are going to make orphans out of ten little boys and girls. Do you believe in one taking the place of another?"
The man said, "I do." Willy Lear said, "I would like to take that man's place. I have no loved ones nor family. I would like to take his place."
The captain said, "Take the blindfold off the man at the end of the line and get in your place if you mean business."
In a few moments, Willy Lear stood blind folded, his hands tied behind him. The shots began to fire and 10 men fell dead.
After the war was over, a man went out to the little cemetery and put up a tombstone with these words on it, "Here lies the body of Willy Lear, the man who died for me."
How Much Does Jesus Love Us?
After World War II a chaplain was asked, "What was the greatest lesson you learned during the war?"
He answered, "I learned that one man loved me more than he loved his own life." He told how he and his buddy were standing in a trench when a deadly hand grenade was thrown in. They knew that both of them would be instantly killed when the grenade exploded, but his buddy flung his own body over the grenade and was blown to bits, thus saving the life of the chaplain. "I am alive today," the chaplain said, "because he loved me and died for me. I am going to seek to live in the future so as to be worthy of that love."
Scriptures that tell us Jesus died for us. We are saved by His blood and His death. (John 15:13 KJV) "Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends."
IV. God's Gift Is That Which The World Needs Most Of All
We receive gifts some times that we do not need, but this sinful world desperately needs the Gift that God gave.
People without Christ are dead spiritually. They are lost and bound for hell.
(Eph 2:1 KJV) "And you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins:"
(John 10:10 KJV) ". . . . I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly."
(1 John 5:12 KJV) "He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life."
(John 5:24 KJV) "Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life."
We label some gifts we receive as precious but none can compare with the preciousness of God's gift.
(1 Pet 2:7 KJV) "Unto you therefore which believe he is precious: but unto them which be disobedient, the stone which the builders disallowed, the same is made the head of the corner,"
(1 Pet 1:18-19 KJV) "Forasmuch as ye know that ye were not redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold, . . . . But with the precious blood of Christ, . . . . "
Steinberg (the great artist) would often bring a little gypsy girl into his studio and she would sit and watch him paint. One day he was painting his famous picture of Jesus upon the cross. She asked, "Is that a mean man?"
He answered, "O, no, he was a very good man. In fact some people think He was the best man who ever lived. But, you see, He was dying for others.
She ask, "Well Mr. Steinberg, did He die for you?"
Hear me now. Are you listening? You've heard it before but I want to tell you again.
Jesus died for you.
He said, "I am come that you might have life."
Do you have that life? Accept Him and be saved today.
