Christ is the only Source of life. If we desire life, we must cling to Him alone and to no other creature. Even angels, holy or fallen, cannot give us life, for their life is derived from God. Not only can they not give life, the greatest of the fallen angels, Satan, is the direct opposite of the Giver of life. Satan is the wily merchant of death, whose obsession is to rob us of the life that Jesus provides. Jesus exposes Satan’s destructive agenda in contrast to His own salvific mission when He declares, “ ‘The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy. I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly’ ” (John 10:10, NKJV).
The devil, the archdeceiver, entices humanity to choose sin rather than righteousness in Christ; then he callously exacts his wages, which are nothing short of eternal death. Paul confirms this fact when he writes in Romans 6:23, “For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord” (NKJV). All good gifts proceed from God, and eternal life, along with abundant life, comes from Him. It is an unfathomable part of the mystery of evil that people—whom Jesus created and for whom He died to save—choose the eternal punishment of death and reject God’s gift of life. As we shall see, the gifts of eternal life and salvation dominate John’s Gospel more than in any other book in Scripture.
More than any other Gospel writer, John distinguishes himself as the one who refers to the incarnate Son of God as the great “I AM.” This title, as we learned in an earlier lesson, is a divine reference to God. In John’s Gospel, Jesus proclaims, for example, “I am the way, the truth, and the life” (John 14:6). When we walk in the Way, who is Jesus, He teaches us His truth that leads to eternal life. Jesus is our only way to the eternal God. The Father will never cast out anyone who sincerely comes to Him in repentance.
Part II: Commentary
As we just said, God is the only One who possesses life. Thus, He is the only One who can give it. No angel or created being can do that—only the Source of life. This notion hearkens back to Deuteronomy 30:20, in which God, through Moses, admonishes His people: “ ‘That you may love the Lord your God, that you may obey His voice, and that you may cling to Him, for He is your life and the length of your days’ ” (NKJV). Here God urges us, in the strongest terms, to cling to Him for life, for outside that divine-human relationship, there is only misery and death. This idea helps us to understand another dimension to John 10:10, which we just cited above, but in this context, it bears quoting again: “ ‘The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy. I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly’ ” (NKJV). Here we see that the only alternative to Christ’s life, abundant and eternal, is Satan’s misery and death.
Some, however, fallaciously argue that there was no real need for Christ to come to this world. But who else could have taken our sins away and clothed us with the robe of God’s righteousness? Who else could have given us life in the place of our death? No one but the all-righteous and life-giving Christ. He valiantly fought our two most deadly enemies, sin and death, and conquered both. His victory becomes ours when we truly believe in Him. Thus, we can trust Jesus when He promises, “ ‘And this is the will of Him who sent Me, that everyone who sees the Son and believes in Him may have everlasting life; and I will raise him up at the last day’ ” (John 6:40, NKJV).
The Words of Eternal Life
In the glorious miracle of feeding the 5,000, Jesus points all those who consumed the bread to Himself, the Bread of Life (John 6:35). He desired them to go beyond their hunger for physical bread, which gave them temporary sustenance, to their need to feed on Him for eternal life. It was well within His power to feed a multitude of hungry people, but Jesus’ divine mission was to offer eternal life and citizenship in God’s glorious kingdom to the ones who believed in Him. Our greatest goal is to seek His kingdom first, and all else that we need will be provided. (See Matt. 6:33.) For if we possess all things but have not Jesus, we are lost. Conversely, if we feed on Christ’s life-giving words, though we do not possess all that we desire in this life, we are true victors.
The psalmist assures us, “The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want” (Ps. 23:1). In other words, when we have the Lord as our priority, He provides for our needs. The Lord knows well what we truly need in life, and He is happy to do right by us. But His top priority is for us to have a saving relationship with Him.
Ellen G. White makes this profound statement about the spiritual necessity of feeding upon the Bread of Life:
“To eat the flesh and drink the blood of Christ is to receive Him as a personal Saviour. . . . What food is to the body, Christ must be to the soul. Food cannot benefit us unless we eat it, unless it becomes a part of our being. So Christ is of no value to us if we do not know Him as a personal Saviour. . . . We must feed upon Him, receive Him into the heart, so that His life becomes our life. His love, His grace, must be assimilated.”—The Desire of Ages, p. 389.
Moreover, the words of Christ have His life inherent in them. They represent His person and character. In receiving Jesus’ words today and assimilating them into the heart, we receive Jesus Himself. It is true that we cannot visibly see Jesus in the flesh on a day-to-day basis, as the disciples did, but we truly see Him through His words, bequeathed to us through Scripture. Peter’s response to Christ’s question implies not only that the Savior Himself has eternal life but that His words do also. (See John 6:68.) Inspired by the Holy Spirit, Peter sought to convey the divine truth that no person, place, or proclamation could point us to eternal life except the Source of life itself.
Believing and New Birth
Faith is not a commodity to be hoarded by a select few to the exclusion of others. It is evident that faith is a universal gift from God to everyone born into this world. Human existence begins with faith that is embedded in our hearts by our Creator, and it is to be built upon by accepting and believing in the One who gave it. This conviction is then reinforced by our asking God to take full control of our lives. John affirms this fact by saying, “But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name” (John 1:12, NKJV).
Simply put, faith is a pure gift from God. (See Rom. 4:1–8.) God’s gift of faith is the divine link that connects us to Him. This faith link reminds us that we belong to Him, and it gives meaning to our entire existence.
Even repentance is a gift from God, for it is a response to the promptings of the Holy Spirit to submit to Him. Many make the mistake of waiting first to have both faith to believe and the repentance to come to God; but these twin gifts are already there, awaiting our reception and application. There is no need to wait in order to receive them. Peter and the apostles affirmed this reality in Acts 5:31: “ ‘Him [Christ] God has exalted to His right hand to be Prince and Savior, to give repentance to Israel and forgiveness of sins’ ” (NKJV). So why does the sinner need to wait any longer? Come to Christ with the faith He has given you, and receive His gift of repentance to live His life today!
Rejection and Condemnation (John 3:18–21)
Unfortunately, light and darkness are becoming increasingly confused today. There is more ambivalence about what truth is. Why are people more interested in darkness than in the light of truth? Jesus answers this pivotal question when he says, “ ‘And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil’ ” (John 3:19, NKJV).
Those who decide against the light in favor of the darkness, which God’s truth dispels, are condemned by their own evil deeds. In their stubbornness and pride, they refuse to humble themselves and repent, rejecting the only light that gives them any hope. But there is no healing unless they open themselves to the light of Christ’s power to restore. Why not forsake our evil deeds while there is still ample opportunity? Why wait until it’s too late? The door of the ark is still open, and the light of the truth is still shining. So why not invite the light to dispel darkness, and without hesitation enter safety, before it is too late?
In the context of this discussion about choosing between light and darkness, let us turn our attention to John 3:16. This verse is one of the most important verses in the entire Scripture, for it is the gospel encapsulated. The focus of this verse is not only on salvation but also on the negative consequence of perishing should we fail to believe. Condemnation results from the wrong choice. Jesus continues this thought in John 3:18 when He asserts, “ ‘He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God’ ” (NKJV).
Our eternal destiny hangs upon our trusting Christ and His words of life. Adam and Eve doubted the truth of God’s wisdom, and we know how that worked out. There are countless other examples in Scripture of those who suffered the consequences of their disbelief. However, Jesus, the Second Adam, conquered by trusting in His Father’s words of affirmation of the Father-Son relationship. It was this very relationship that Satan challenged when he tempted Jesus in the wilderness, saying, “ ‘If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread’ ” (Matt. 4:3, NKJV). Jesus’ ready defense in that next verse was simply “ ‘It is written . . .’ ” (Matt. 4:4), thus modeling for us the trust we are likewise to show in the Word of God.
Part III: Life Application
Think about and answer the following questions:
What is the connection between reading God’s Word and actually hearing it? Contemplate the following statement and respond: “The word of the living God is not merely written, but spoken. The Bible is God’s voice speaking to us, just as surely as though we could hear it with our ears. . . . The reading and contemplation of the Scriptures would be regarded as an audience with the Infinite One.”—Ellen G. White, Testimonies for the Church, vol. 6, p. 393.
In John 14:3, Jesus says to His disciples, “ ‘I will come again and receive you to Myself; that where I am, there you may be also’ ” (NKJV). How does trusting His words for the future impact your life today?
Ellen G. White wrote, “Christ’s life becomes our life.”—The Desire of Ages, p. 389. What an amazing promise! How do you personally incorporate it into your life? What are the dynamics that make this reality possible in everyday life?
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Study Focus: John 3:18–21
Christ is the only Source of life. If we desire life, we must cling to Him alone and to no other creature. Even angels, holy or fallen, cannot give us life, for their life is derived from God. Not only can they not give life, the greatest of the fallen angels, Satan, is the direct opposite of the Giver of life. Satan is the wily merchant of death, whose obsession is to rob us of the life that Jesus provides. Jesus exposes Satan’s destructive agenda in contrast to His own salvific mission when He declares, “ ‘The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy. I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly’ ” (John 10:10, NKJV).
The devil, the archdeceiver, entices humanity to choose sin rather than righteousness in Christ; then he callously exacts his wages, which are nothing short of eternal death. Paul confirms this fact when he writes in Romans 6:23, “For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord” (NKJV). All good gifts proceed from God, and eternal life, along with abundant life, comes from Him. It is an unfathomable part of the mystery of evil that people—whom Jesus created and for whom He died to save—choose the eternal punishment of death and reject God’s gift of life. As we shall see, the gifts of eternal life and salvation dominate John’s Gospel more than in any other book in Scripture.
More than any other Gospel writer, John distinguishes himself as the one who refers to the incarnate Son of God as the great “I AM.” This title, as we learned in an earlier lesson, is a divine reference to God. In John’s Gospel, Jesus proclaims, for example, “I am the way, the truth, and the life” (John 14:6). When we walk in the Way, who is Jesus, He teaches us His truth that leads to eternal life. Jesus is our only way to the eternal God. The Father will never cast out anyone who sincerely comes to Him in repentance.
Part II: Commentary
As we just said, God is the only One who possesses life. Thus, He is the only One who can give it. No angel or created being can do that—only the Source of life. This notion hearkens back to Deuteronomy 30:20, in which God, through Moses, admonishes His people: “ ‘That you may love the Lord your God, that you may obey His voice, and that you may cling to Him, for He is your life and the length of your days’ ” (NKJV). Here God urges us, in the strongest terms, to cling to Him for life, for outside that divine-human relationship, there is only misery and death. This idea helps us to understand another dimension to John 10:10, which we just cited above, but in this context, it bears quoting again: “ ‘The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy. I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly’ ” (NKJV). Here we see that the only alternative to Christ’s life, abundant and eternal, is Satan’s misery and death.
Some, however, fallaciously argue that there was no real need for Christ to come to this world. But who else could have taken our sins away and clothed us with the robe of God’s righteousness? Who else could have given us life in the place of our death? No one but the all-righteous and life-giving Christ. He valiantly fought our two most deadly enemies, sin and death, and conquered both. His victory becomes ours when we truly believe in Him. Thus, we can trust Jesus when He promises, “ ‘And this is the will of Him who sent Me, that everyone who sees the Son and believes in Him may have everlasting life; and I will raise him up at the last day’ ” (John 6:40, NKJV).
The Words of Eternal Life
In the glorious miracle of feeding the 5,000, Jesus points all those who consumed the bread to Himself, the Bread of Life (John 6:35). He desired them to go beyond their hunger for physical bread, which gave them temporary sustenance, to their need to feed on Him for eternal life. It was well within His power to feed a multitude of hungry people, but Jesus’ divine mission was to offer eternal life and citizenship in God’s glorious kingdom to the ones who believed in Him. Our greatest goal is to seek His kingdom first, and all else that we need will be provided. (See Matt. 6:33.) For if we possess all things but have not Jesus, we are lost. Conversely, if we feed on Christ’s life-giving words, though we do not possess all that we desire in this life, we are true victors.
The psalmist assures us, “The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want” (Ps. 23:1). In other words, when we have the Lord as our priority, He provides for our needs. The Lord knows well what we truly need in life, and He is happy to do right by us. But His top priority is for us to have a saving relationship with Him.
Ellen G. White makes this profound statement about the spiritual necessity of feeding upon the Bread of Life:
“To eat the flesh and drink the blood of Christ is to receive Him as a personal Saviour. . . . What food is to the body, Christ must be to the soul. Food cannot benefit us unless we eat it, unless it becomes a part of our being. So Christ is of no value to us if we do not know Him as a personal Saviour. . . . We must feed upon Him, receive Him into the heart, so that His life becomes our life. His love, His grace, must be assimilated.”—The Desire of Ages, p. 389.
Moreover, the words of Christ have His life inherent in them. They represent His person and character. In receiving Jesus’ words today and assimilating them into the heart, we receive Jesus Himself. It is true that we cannot visibly see Jesus in the flesh on a day-to-day basis, as the disciples did, but we truly see Him through His words, bequeathed to us through Scripture. Peter’s response to Christ’s question implies not only that the Savior Himself has eternal life but that His words do also. (See John 6:68.) Inspired by the Holy Spirit, Peter sought to convey the divine truth that no person, place, or proclamation could point us to eternal life except the Source of life itself.
Believing and New Birth
Faith is not a commodity to be hoarded by a select few to the exclusion of others. It is evident that faith is a universal gift from God to everyone born into this world. Human existence begins with faith that is embedded in our hearts by our Creator, and it is to be built upon by accepting and believing in the One who gave it. This conviction is then reinforced by our asking God to take full control of our lives. John affirms this fact by saying, “But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name” (John 1:12, NKJV).
Simply put, faith is a pure gift from God. (See Rom. 4:1–8.) God’s gift of faith is the divine link that connects us to Him. This faith link reminds us that we belong to Him, and it gives meaning to our entire existence.
Even repentance is a gift from God, for it is a response to the promptings of the Holy Spirit to submit to Him. Many make the mistake of waiting first to have both faith to believe and the repentance to come to God; but these twin gifts are already there, awaiting our reception and application. There is no need to wait in order to receive them. Peter and the apostles affirmed this reality in Acts 5:31: “ ‘Him [Christ] God has exalted to His right hand to be Prince and Savior, to give repentance to Israel and forgiveness of sins’ ” (NKJV). So why does the sinner need to wait any longer? Come to Christ with the faith He has given you, and receive His gift of repentance to live His life today!
Rejection and Condemnation (John 3:18–21)
Unfortunately, light and darkness are becoming increasingly confused today. There is more ambivalence about what truth is. Why are people more interested in darkness than in the light of truth? Jesus answers this pivotal question when he says, “ ‘And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil’ ” (John 3:19, NKJV).
Those who decide against the light in favor of the darkness, which God’s truth dispels, are condemned by their own evil deeds. In their stubbornness and pride, they refuse to humble themselves and repent, rejecting the only light that gives them any hope. But there is no healing unless they open themselves to the light of Christ’s power to restore. Why not forsake our evil deeds while there is still ample opportunity? Why wait until it’s too late? The door of the ark is still open, and the light of the truth is still shining. So why not invite the light to dispel darkness, and without hesitation enter safety, before it is too late?
In the context of this discussion about choosing between light and darkness, let us turn our attention to John 3:16. This verse is one of the most important verses in the entire Scripture, for it is the gospel encapsulated. The focus of this verse is not only on salvation but also on the negative consequence of perishing should we fail to believe. Condemnation results from the wrong choice. Jesus continues this thought in John 3:18 when He asserts, “ ‘He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God’ ” (NKJV).
Our eternal destiny hangs upon our trusting Christ and His words of life. Adam and Eve doubted the truth of God’s wisdom, and we know how that worked out. There are countless other examples in Scripture of those who suffered the consequences of their disbelief. However, Jesus, the Second Adam, conquered by trusting in His Father’s words of affirmation of the Father-Son relationship. It was this very relationship that Satan challenged when he tempted Jesus in the wilderness, saying, “ ‘If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread’ ” (Matt. 4:3, NKJV). Jesus’ ready defense in that next verse was simply “ ‘It is written . . .’ ” (Matt. 4:4), thus modeling for us the trust we are likewise to show in the Word of God.
Part III: Life Application
Think about and answer the following questions:
What is the connection between reading God’s Word and actually hearing it? Contemplate the following statement and respond: “The word of the living God is not merely written, but spoken. The Bible is God’s voice speaking to us, just as surely as though we could hear it with our ears. . . . The reading and contemplation of the Scriptures would be regarded as an audience with the Infinite One.”—Ellen G. White, Testimonies for the Church, vol. 6, p. 393.
In John 14:3, Jesus says to His disciples, “ ‘I will come again and receive you to Myself; that where I am, there you may be also’ ” (NKJV). How does trusting His words for the future impact your life today?
Ellen G. White wrote, “Christ’s life becomes our life.”—The Desire of Ages, p. 389. What an amazing promise! How do you personally incorporate it into your life? What are the dynamics that make this reality possible in everyday life?