Now, to go back to my metaphor, the lake makes a river. 'God so loved
the world that He gave His only begotten Son.'
So then, it was not Christ's death that turned God from hating and
being angry, but it was God's love that appointed Christ's death. If
you will only remember that, a great many of the shallow and popular
objections to the great doctrine of the Atonement disappear at once.
'God so loved … that He gave.' But some people say that when we preach
that Jesus Christ died for our sins, that God's wrath might not fall
upon men, our teaching is immoral, because it means 'Christ came, and
so God loved.' It is the other way about, friend. 'God so loved … that
He gave.'
But now let me carry you back to the Old Testament. Do you remember the
story of the father taking his boy who carried the bundle of wood and
the fire, and tramping over the mountains till they reached the place
where the sacrifice was to be offered? Do you remember the boy's
question that brings tears quickly to the reader's eyes: 'Here is the
wood, and here is the fire, where is the lamb'? Do you not think it
would be hard for the father to steady his voice and say, 'My son, God
will provide the lamb'? And do you remember the end of that story? 'The
Angel of the Lord said unto Abraham, Because thou hast done this thing,
and hast not _withheld_ thy son, _thine only son_, from Me, therefore
blessing I will bless thee,' etc. Remember that one of the Apostles
said, using the very same word that is used in Genesis as to Abraham's
giving up his son to God, 'He _spared not_ His own Son, but delivered
Him up to the death for us all.' Does not that point to a mysterious
parallel? Somehow or other—we have no right to attempt to say
how—somehow or other, God not only _sent_ His Son, as it is said in the
next verse to my text, but far more tenderly, wonderfully,
pathetically, God _gave_—gave up His Son, and the sacrifice was
enhanced, because it was His only begotten Son.
Ah! dear brethren, do not let us be afraid of following out all that is
included in that great word, 'God … _loved_ the world.' For there is no
love which does not delight in giving, and there is no love that does
not delight in depriving itself, in some fashion, of what it gives. And
I, for my part, believe that Paul's words are to be taken in all their
blessed depth and wonderfulness of meaning when he says, 'He gave
up'—as well as gave—'Him to the death for us all.'
And now, do you not think that we are able in some measure to estimate
the greatness of that little word 'so'? 'God _so_ loved'—_so_ deeply,
so holily, _so_ perfectly—that He 'gave His only begotten Son'; and the
gift of that Son is, as it were, the river by which the love of God
comes to every soul in the world.
Now there are a great many people who would like to put the middle part
of this great text of ours into a parenthesis. They say that we should
bring the first words and the last words of this text together, and
never mind all that lies between. People who do not like the doctrine
of the Cross would say, 'God so loved the world that He gave…
everlasting life'; and there an end. 'If there is a God, and if He
loves the world, why cannot He save the world without more ado? There
is no need for these interposed clauses. God so loved the world that
everybody will go to heaven'—that is the gospel of a great many of you;
and it is the gospel of a great many wise and learned people. But it is
not John's Gospel, and it is not Christ's Gospel. The beginning and the
end of the text cannot be buckled up together in that rough-and-ready
fashion. They have to be linked by a chain; and there are two links in
the chain: God forges the one, and we have to forge the other. 'God so
loved the world that He gave'—then He has done His work. 'That
whosoever believeth'—that is your work. And it is in vain that God
forges _His_ link, unless you will forge _yours_ and link it up to His.
'God so loved the world,' that is step number one in the process; 'that
He gave,' that is step number two; and then there comes another
'that'—'that whosoever believeth,' that is step number three; and they
are all needed before you come to number four, which is the
landing-place and not a step—'should not perish, but have everlasting
life.'