But the problem is that we quote it as a stand alone verse, out there all by its lonesome and we easily forget that it, like all the texts of the Bible, has a context, and, as we say, "Context is king." If we look at it from the standpoint of a stand alone verse, we can become easy pickings for those who come along and say, "The verse says nothing about the death of Christ, nor does it say anything about His resurrection, yet, you say that an essential part of the gospel is that Christ died for our sins and rose from the dead, but the verse you quote doesn't even mention those two events, so they must not be part of the gospel."
OH, WE BEG TO DIFFER
Let's go to the context, that is, let's look at John 3:14, just a scant two verses before 3:16: "As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up." 3:14 is defining how "God gave His only begotten Son." Jesus explains that He's going to be "lifted up," an obvious reference to the cross, as the parallel text in John 12:32-33 confirms: "And I, if I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to Myself.” But He was saying this to indicate the kind of death by which He was to die." The death of Christ is right there in the context of 3:16.
The reader of the Gospel of John wouldn't have begun his reading with 3:16. He would have carefully been unrolling the scroll, beginning with what we call 1:1 and kept unrolling it until he came to 3:16, and by then, he would have realized that the book was declaring that Jesus is God (1:1), that Jesus is the lamb of God who would take away the sins of the world (1:29), and that Jesus would be raised from the dead (2:18-22).
Within the context of the scroll, the reader would have known a great deal of important information by the time he unrolled enough of the scroll to read 3:16.
Side one of the contextual coin is that we state what is in in the specific verse and the specific context and that only. We don't import what's not there.
THE OTHER SIDE OF THE CONTEXTUAL COIN
But the problem is that there's this tendency to add to the context; to import stuff, guff, and sand into the context that just aren't there and we see this done to John 3:16 time and time again.
What does 3:16 say that the reader is to do? "Believe on Him." That's it; faith alone for eternal life. But there are those who add words, all that stuff, guff, and sand to the context.
An author, known worldwide for his gift of description and story-telling is one such person. In his book, 3:16--The Numbers of Hope, Max Lucado takes John 3:16 apart word by word. Yet when his analysis is all said and done, instead of leaving "whosoever believes in Him" alone, he adds the stuff, the guff, and the sand when he explains how we can have eternal life: "We can‟t get on board and not know it. Nor can we get on board and hide it. No stowaways permitted. Christ-followers go public with their belief. We turn from bad behavior to good (repentance). We stop following our passions and salute our new captain (confession). We publicly demonstrate our devotion (baptism). We don't keep our choice a secret."
Into John 3:16, he's added: turning from bad to good behavior, the stopping of the following of our passions, the saluting of our new captain, and the demonstration of our devotion. Or as he says, "repentance," "confession," and "baptism."
Strange, isn't it? John never ever uses the words "repent" or "repentance" in the entire book, yet there it is as a requirement for salvation. Imported into the context are such things as ceremonies (confession and baptism) to observe and good works to do (good behavior).
Beware of the stuff, the guff, and the sand. They change the gospel into a false one, one that has yet to save anyone.
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