Advent-Love:John 3:16; Romans 5:8

“For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life” (John 3:16, NASB).

The next four articles will be based on Advent. The word “advent” means the arrival of a notable person, thing, or event. For the Christian Church, advent marks the first season of the Christian Church year. To be more specific, advent means “coming.” This is a period of anticipation and preparation of the coming of Christ. Advent begins four Sundays before Christmas. According to my research, I found different ordering of the four Sundays. Regardless, I will follow the order of love, hope, joy, and peace.

When I was a child growing up in a small town, the best known bible verse was John 3:16. I did not know that there are many translations and versions of the bible. In those days our family had bibles according to the King James Version. The same was true in the church. Now the King James Version of John 3:16 say, “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” (KJV).

Now, as I understood it during those days, I thought that this verse means that God loves every person. This is true, but the phrase “God so loved the world” is not limited to God’s love for people. Rather, God loves the entirety of the world that He created. This means that when we believe in God’s Son, Jesus, who is the Christ and our Savior, we believe in One who loves the entirety of His creation. Why then, do we place emphasis on God’s love for people? What does the love of God have to do with His love for the whole world?

In order to understand how God’s love for people and His love for the entirety of His creation are connected, we have to take a closer look at what God did in creation. The word “Genesis” means beginning. The book of Genesis is about what God did in the beginning. Before I go further, it is important that we know that the world that God first created is not exactly the world that we live in today. So, let us look at what God did first to create the world.

Genesis 1-3 is not a history book in the sense that we think of history. Genesis 1 is not about the creation itself. In fact, although Genesis 1 tells us something about the world that God created, Genesis 1 is about God. The first verse in the bible says, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. The noun subject of this sentence is “God” The verb “created tells us what God did. It is the action that God that God took. God created. The compound direct object tells us what God created—the heavens and the earth. The prepositional phrase “in the beginning” tells us when God created. As the author of Genesis writes about the things that were created, the subject of the sentence is God.

Those that believe that Moses wrote the first five books of the bible know that he wrote to a people that had been slaves in Egypt. God delivered them from slavery because of the promise that He had made to their forefathers—Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob (see Exodus 3:6-9). The Hebrew slaves had lived in bondage to a people that worship many gods, and they were going to a land in which the people worshiped many gods. Genesis 1 is a declaration that The God that was saving them is the same thing that created the entire world. The gods that the people in Egypt and Canaan worshiped are no God at all. They created nothing. This explained to the Hebrew people the reason that they were to worship God only. What does this have to do with God’s love?

After God had finished His work of creation, He was pleased with the results. God created human beings, man and woman to be together to take care of the world that God had created (Genesis 1:26-28). The author of Genesis describes God’s satisfaction with what He had created. “God saw all that He had made, and behold, it was very good. And the evening and the morning was the sixth day” (Genesis 1:31, NASB). Further, Moses wrote, “Thus the heavens and the earth were completed and all their hosts. By the seventh day God completed His work which He had done, and he rested on the seventh day from all of His work which He had done” (Genesis 2:1-2).

The world that God had created in the beginning did not stay the same. Genesis 3 tells us about the deception of the woman by the serpent. She ate fruit from the forbidden fruit and the man followed her lead. Both were equally guilty of sin. They disobeyed God and transgressed the law. “Everyone who practices sin also practices lawlessness; and sin is lawlessness” (1 John 3:4, NASB). “Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law: for sin is the transgression of the law” (KJV).

Sin changed everything. It changed the relationship between God and the people that He had created. The man and the woman were not allowed to live in the garden enjoying the presence of God and the comforts that He had provided. Now, they would live outside the garden. They would endure pain and hardships. The ground was cursed. It would produce thorns and thistles (see Genesis 3:16-24). We can see that the sins of people affect everything that takes place in the earth. Since human beings are the caretakers of the earth, the earth too will suffer until the redemption of human beings (See Romans 8:18-25).

God created human beings because He was satisfied with everything that He had created. Scientist studies the earth and the universe using every method of technology trying to determine what is going wrong in the universe. They want to know what happened in the past; what is happening today; and what are the possible outcomes in the future. What can humankind do to prevent further harm and to ensure a better future. The debate about global warming is a debate about how the actions of human beings affect the entirety of the earth and its inhabitants.

Scientists concentrate their studies on what people do. The scriptures concentrate on the relationship between human beings that God created. The real source of the problems that we face is sin. Sin separates us from God. Thus, we lack the knowledge that God wants us to have so that we can take care of His creation (Proverbs 1:7). Until we acknowledge God and follow His laws that govern creation we will lack the wisdom to utilize the knowledge that we do have. So, the issue is this. What can be done to restore God’s relationship with His creation that was in the beginning? What must be done to eliminate sin? What can human beings do in order that the relationship with God that was in the beginning be restored? Can we make anything right with God? The entirety of the scriptures declares that there is nothing that people can do. The only hope that we have is in Jesus.

God never stopped loving His creation. God never stopped loving the human beings that He created and blessed. However, God cannot abide sin. God will not allow sin to live in His presence. Sin is a violation of God’s laws that sustains human life and the life of the planet. Since God was satisfied with the world that He created in the beginning, God had a plan to redeem His world beginning with the crown of His creation—the man and the woman.

When the bible speaks about God’s love we often think about how God feels about us. While Jesus is a high priest that can identify with our suffering because He suffered, God was not motivated by His feelings to redeem the world. The love of God is a decision to act. God created because of His own decision to express His attributes and His attitudes. God did not send His Son to suffer in the earth and die on the cross because god was emotionally overwhelmed. God exist outside of creation and before all creation. God decided to act in love because love is of God. Love is who God is. “Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God” (1 John 4:7, NASB). “The one who does not love does not know God, for God is love” (1 John 4:8). It is impossible to know God and not love. It is impossible to have a relationship with God and make a decision not to love (see vv. 9-21).

How do we know that God loves us? Paul the author of the book of Romans gives us the answer. “But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8). God did not wait on us to make a decision to look for Him. God made a decision. He had created the heavens and the earth because He wanted to express His love. The sins of human beings could not eradicate God’s love. So, God decided to send His Son to die on the cross so that human beings might be redeemed. Through Christ we have been made new. Just as we are new, the world that we will live in will be new also.

As stated at the beginning, advent means that the Jews anticipated the coming of their Savior to restore them to their relationship with God. For all of humankind advent also anticipated the Second Coming of Christ. He will create a new heavens and new earth for a new people to inhabit. “Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth passed away, and there is no more sea” (Revelation 21:1, NASB). Everything happens because of God’s love.