A Template for Life: The Beauty and Expectations of John 3:16

By Sunday A. Aigbe

Perhaps due to my ageor maybe due to my everyday effort to raise my childrenI began to realize the beauty and expectations of the verse John 3:16. Of course, I have always counted myself fortunate to be a Christian through the work of missionaries in the village where I grew up. I know God loves me and cares for me. But it had never really occurred to me how great that love ishow much I mean to him. He actually wishes more for me than I could ever truly imagine. My everyday walks and talks with children, personally and professionally, have opened a tiny window into the depth and scope of how much God loves me and wishes for me and for all Christians. A primary purpose of this book is to share the lessons learned in those walks and talks.

• Language: English
• Publisher: WestBow Press
• Release date: Oct 9, 2014
• ISBN: 9781490854540

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Copyright © 2014 Sunday A Aigbe.

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(Scriptural quotes are from the New King James Version, unless stated otherwise.)

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ISBN: 978-1-4908-5453-3 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4908-5452-6 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4908-5454-0 (e)

WestBow Press rev. date: 10/01/2014

Contents

Chapter 1 The Beauty, Questions, and Expectations of John 3:16

Chapter 2 God Loves You

Chapter 3 God Believes In You

Chapter 4 God Wants You To Have Life

Chapter 5 Do You Love You?

Chapter 6 Do You Believe In You?

Chapter 7 Do You Want To Have Life?

Chapter 8 The Spiritual Life of a Godly Person

Chapter 9 The Social Life of a Godly Person

Chapter 10 The Economic Life of a Godly Person

Chapter 11 The Political Life of a Godly Person

Chapter 12 A Reflection on a Godly Life

For God So Loved the World

That He Gave His Only Begotten Son

That Whoever Believes in Him

Shall Not Perish

But Have Everlasting Life.

Jesus Christ

CHAPTER 1

The Beauty, Questions, and Expectations of John 3:16

John 3:16 is a popular verse in the Christian community. Most Christians and some non-Christians can easily recite the verse. It is not an overstatement to say that it is perhaps the most cited verse by Christians of all times and places. The verse is very simple and is written poetically, making it easy to recite.

For God so loved the world

that He Gave His only begotten Son,

that whoever believes in Him

shall not perish

but have everlasting life (John 3:16).

The verse summarizes the message of the Scriptures and the story of the Christian community for all times and places. I grew up reciting the verse but do not recall when I memorized it. I’ve just known it by heart for so long that I sometimes do not pay attention to the meaning and message of the verse. Until recently, that is.

Perhaps due to age or maybe due to my everyday efforts to raise my children, I began to realize the beauty and expectations of the verse. I have always counted myself fortunate to be a Christian through the work of missionaries in the village where I grew up. I know God loves me and cares for and about me. But it never really occurred to me how great that love is, how much I mean to him, and that he actually wishes more for me than I could ever imagine. My everyday walks and talks with children personally and professionally have opened a tiny window into the depth and scope of how much God loves and wishes for me and for all Christians. A primary purpose of this book is to share the lessons learned in those walks and talks.

John, one of the apostles of our Lord, Jesus Christ, began the verse with the observation that God loved the world so very much, including you and me, that he would do whatever it took to save us, including the ultimate price of giving his only Son as ransom for our sin.

I have always believed that God loves me as much as he loves everybody else. But what I have never quite understood is why he gave his only Son for the world. Then it dawned on me that the beauty of John 3:16 is that God gave his only Son as a sacrificial Lamb for you and me because:

He loves you and me,

He believes in you and me, and

He wants you and me to have life.

What is even more interesting is the subtext of the verse. While what God is willing to pay, and has paid, for his love, faith in, and desire for you and me is priceless, it will amount to a missed opportunity if I do not appropriate them. Hence the declaration, Whoever believes in him shall not perish, but have everlasting life. The expectations of this summons to faith in Christ are that I should at least love myself, believe in myself, and desire life at least as much as God does for me.

Put differently, I must take myself as seriously as he does regarding his love, faith, and life for me. If I do, my exercise of faith becomes a matter of the next logical step—a step that unleashes in my life the fullness of his faith in me and his love and life desire for me.

This summons to God’s love and the associated expectations does not apply only to me. It applies to you as well. Here are the three questions you must ask yourself if God’s love and life desire for you and his faith in you are to make a difference in your life:

Do you love you as much as he loves you?

Do you believe in you as much as he believes in you?

Do you want to have life as much as he desires life for you?

Adequate responses to these questions require us to take a closer look at the Scriptures, especially what Jesus has to say about this life to which we are invited to partake by placing our faith in him. Jesus declared that he laid down his life so we might have life. In the event that we didn’t fully comprehend the nature and scope of the life he’s offered us, he declared emphatically, I have come that they may have life and have it more abundantly. (John 10:10) Life, as social scientists and students of Scripture have observed, consists of at least four dimensions: the spiritual, the social, the economic, and the political.

The Scriptures and certainly the life of Jesus exemplify these dimensions as characteristic of a holistic life lived abundantly. This four-dimensional approach to a holistic life can be called, for a lack of better term, a template for life. A failure to recognize this template truncates a godly life. Understanding and embracing this template assures a productive godly living, a life to which we are invited to lead in the fullness and riches of Jesus Christ. It then begs the following questions:

Do you have an abundant spiritual life?

Do you have an abundant social life?

Do you have an abundant economic life?

Do you have an abundant political life?

The goal of this book is to explore the beauty and expectations of John 3:16 in the context of the observations and questions above. In Part 1, we discuss the beauty of knowing that God loves you (Chapter 2), God believes in you (Chapter 3), and God wants you to have life (Chapter 4).

In Part 2, we examine the questions that the expectations of John 3:16 demand you ask yourself: Do you love you? (Chapter 5), Do you believe in you? (Chapter 6), and Do you want to have life? (Chapter 7).

In Part 3, we examine the nature, scope, and implications of the abundant life Jesus desired for us in four dimensions: spiritual life (Chapter 8), social life (Chapter 9), economic life (Chapter 10), and political life (Chapter 11). The book concludes with a reflection on the richness of a godly life lived in the light of the beauty and expectations of John 3:16 (Chapter 12).

CHAPTER 2

God Loves You

Yes, God loves the world, and that includes you. The opening sentence of John 3:16 says clearly that God so loved the world. He loved the world so much that he, the Almighty, spent six days creating a habitat for us. His love for us becomes so precious when we realize that he created everything else before creating us, the human beings.

He created the world of light, waters, plants and flowers, animals, and a beautiful garden. How awesome to think of God’s love for us—that he went to such great lengths to make all these preparations before creating us. We are not only the crown jewel of his creation but the benefactors of the fruits of his hard work. Yes, hard work! He had to rest to catch his breath when it was all said and done. God’s love for us is awesome!

Lessons from an Expectant Couple

Imagine the excitement and preparations of a couple expecting a baby. Their love and excitement for the baby is so great that they will go to great lengths not only to see the doctor to make sure that all is well with the pregnancy but also to talk to anyone who will listen to them about their pregnancy. They shop for baby-related items, decorate the baby’s room, buy a stroller and practice how to place a baby in it, and, in some cases, actually walk the stroller down the street, pretending that a baby is in there. They buy items for feeding—baby bottles, napkins, spoons—and practice using them with a dummy baby. The couple does all these things and much more as the pregnancy progresses in preparation for the baby’s arrival. More importantly, these things demonstrate the couple’s love for the baby who will come into the family.

Do you ever wonder where humans got this practice of preparing for a great expectation? Of course you are right. We got it from God. After all, we are created in his image and likeness. If we can demonstrate our love in practical ways, we can’t expect less from God.

Insurance for Us

So profound is God’s love for us that before he created us, he actually purchased insurance for us in case something went wrong. He offered his Son as the Lamb who was slain for our sin, even before he created the world. After all, God knew that what could go wrong would go wrong. And you know what? Things did go wrong. The first humans blew it by making wrong choices, and the Lamb who was slain since the foundation of the world came in handy. Did you ever wonder what would have happened if there had been no Lamb ready to step in to help us out? Or how humans came up with the idea of insurance? Our creativeness reflects God’s likeness and image in us, the crown jewel of his creation. God loves us so much that he not only created an elaborate habitat for us but ensured that we will always remain the object of his