John 3:16-17

Sermon Notes

John 3:16-17

The Unconditional Love of God in Christ

Pastor Matt Pierson

With the Dawn of Redeeming Grace, we experience:

1. The unquenchable hope of God in Christ
2. The unwavering peace of God in Christ
3. The unshakable joy of God in Christ
4. The unconditional love of God in Christ

“We Christians believe that Christ will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead and His kingdom will have no end. This is God’s definitive response to the deepest longings of the human soul… All of our longings meet their end in Christ coming again, bringing healing, peace, joy, and an unimaginable wholeness in His wake.”
Tish Harrison Warren, Advent: The Season of Hope

“If the depth of love is measured by the value of its gift, then God’s love could not be greater, for His love-gift is His most precious possession—His only, eternally beloved Son. He could not love more. ‘The true looking of faith is placing Christ before one’s eyes and beholding in Him the heart of God poured out in love.’”
Bruce Milne, The Bible Speaks Today

1. The unconditional love of God addresses the problem of sin.

“I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring; he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel.”
Genesis 3:15

“Our confidence is not in our love for Him, which is frail, fickle and faltering, but in His love for us, which is steadfast, faithful and persevering.”
John Stott, The Message of Romans

2. The unconditional love of God is a promise based on God’s character.

“The LORD is merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. He will not always chide, nor will he keep his anger forever. He does not deal with us according to our sins, nor repay us according to our iniquities…”
Psalm 103: 8-10

“For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his steadfast love toward those who fear him; as far as the east is from the west, so far does he remove our transgressions from us. As a father shows compassion to his children, so the Lord shows compassion to those who fear him. For he knows our frame, he remembers that we are dust.”
Psalm 103: 11-14

“As for man, his days are like grass; he flourishes like a flower of the field; for the wind passes over it, and it is gone, and its place knows it no more. But the steadfast love of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting on those who fear him and his righteousness to children’s children, to those who keep his covenant and remember to do his commandments. The Lord has established his throne in the heavens, and his kingdom rules over all.”
Psalm 103: 15-19

“Part of what is distinctive about Christianity is that we believe God is love. It’s not that God is theoretically or intermittently loving. Nor is God merely capable of love. The truth is boundlessly better than that. Love is who God is! From all eternity, one God pulsating in Trinitarian love: God perfectly satisfied, whole, and complete.”
Kelly M. Kapic, Christian Life

“God, who needs nothing, loves into existence wholly superfluous creatures in order that He may love and perfect them.”
C.S. Lewis, The Four Loves

3. The unconditional love of God has a plan for our rescue.

“For God so loved the world, that He gave his only Son, that whosoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through Him.”
John 3:16-17

“You can never take God by surprise. You can never anticipate Him. He always makes the first move. He is always there ‘in the beginning.’ Before man existed, God acted. Before man stirs himself to seek God, God has sought man. In the Bible we do not see man groping after God; we see God reaching after man.”
John Stott, Basic Christianity

“… because God is self-existent, His love had no beginning; because He is eternal, His love can have no end; because He is infinite, it has no limit; because He is holy, it is the quintessence of all spotless purity; because He is immense, His love is an incomprehensibly vast, bottomless, shoreless sea.”
A. W. Tozer, The Knowledge of the Holy