Fourth Sunday of Lent: God So Loved The World

Today's gospel contains one of the most commonly cited verses in all the Bible—John 3:16. We see the citation on signs held by fans at sporting events. You may recall on January 8th of 2009; the Florida Gators were set to play the Oklahoma Sooners for the College Football National Championship. Florida’s Heisman-winning quarterback, Tim Tebow, had the word John written in the eye black beneath his right eye and 3:16 on the left.

On the exact same date three years later, Tebow was then quarterback for the Denver Broncos, playing against the Pittsburgh Steelers for the AFC Wild Card spot. It became known as the 3:16 game. He threw for 316 yards and the numbers 3,1 and 6 were somehow woven into the various measurements and statistics of the game. Dan Brown couldn’t have scripted it any better.

The verse in question: “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life”. It's so fitting that we talk about God's love for us on the Sunday we call Laetare Sunday.

The man Jesus encounters in the Gospel, Nicodemus, is identified as Pharisee, and thus would have been well-educated. Nonetheless, he couldn't piece together the mysteries of faith that Jesus was describing. It can be like that for us as people of the post-modern world, with so much reliance upon scientific intelligence and our rational capacities. The simple matters of our faith often lie beyond our understanding—even when they are simple. I've heard it said that the mysteries of our faith are not so much to be solved, but instead to be lived.

But the disconnect Nicodemus was experiencing and this well-known verse make me think of times I’ve spoken with one person or another, when I can tell they’re feeling down on themselves and discouraged. There have been times that God has put it on my heart, I believe, to remind them of how much He loves them. Often the response is something like: “I hear that, but honestly, I have a hard time believing it and feeling it”. Like Nicodemus, we allow so much stuff—sometimes head-knowledge and sometimes just the voices of doubt within—to get in the way of this important message of love.

But part of the problem to believing and feeling that there’s a loving God is the problem of suffering. If he’s a loving God, then why….(fill in the blank). Jesus, who said “Follow me”, also said that doing so involves accepting a cross, carrying it, and being prepared to be mounted to it. We are deeply misguided if we believe that being a ‘good person’, dismisses us from suffering. That was never promised to us.

I remind us that as God calls us to a cross, he himself, was willing to accept it, carry and be mounted to it. As we ask, “Does God really love us?”, we can look at the cross, where God hangs, with arms wide open, as though indicating, “This is how much I love you”.

Despite your past and anything you wish you could take back and do over, whatever still causes you to wince and feel embarrassment—he still says “This is how much I love you”. Even at your worst, when you grumble and complain, are nasty and impatient, when you take the love of your family for granted, when you are quick to judge, to insult and hurt others, when you lead others to sin and fail to defend his honor, when you give in to fears and the voices of doubt within, when you make no time for him in your life—he still says, “This is how much I love you”.

While fear of God’s righteous anger and fear of hell are not altogether bad, especially in whatever way they bring out virtue and goodness in us, may it instead be principally, God’s love—His love for you, that brings out what is most beautiful in you.

That love and its power will become manifest to us from this altar. As the healing power of the bronze serpent was revealed on a pole, as it was raised up before the Israelites in the wilderness; and as the healing power of God’s love was revealed in Jesus, as he was raised up before the onlookers at Calvary; so, the love of God will be revealed in the Eucharist, will be raised up before us here and now. See it, believe it, let it be your healing and God’s lasting message of love to you.