3:16 Study Guide with DVD, Updated Edition

In this updated classic, bestselling author and pastor Max Lucado unpacks the meaning behind John 3:16, one of the best-known and most-beloved passages in the Bible. This simple verse came out of an unusual conversation that Jesus had under the cover of night with a Pharisee named Nicodemus. From the start, Nicodemus made it clear he inhabited a land of good efforts, sincere gestures, and hard work. Give God your best, his philosophy said, and God does the rest. Jesus' response? Your best won't do. Your works don't work. Unless you are born again, you can't even see what God is doing. Born again. The word born, by definition, implies a passive act. The enwombed child contributes nothing to the delivery. Postpartum celebrations applaud the work of the mother who does the delivery. And the Greek term that Jesus used for again implies that the one who did the work the first time will repeat it. In other words, the original Creator will re-create his creation! Born: God exerts the effort. Again: God restores the beauty. We dont try again. We need, not the muscle of self, but a miracle of God. The thought bewildered Nicodemus. "How can this be?" he asked. Jesus answered by leading him to the Hope diamond of the Bible: "For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life." A twenty-six-word parade of hope: beginning with God, ending with life, and urging us to do the same. A verse brief enough to write on a napkin or memorize in a moment . . . yet solid enough to weather 2,000 years of storms and questions. As this study will reveal, the heart of the human problem is the heart of the human. And God's treatment for the human heart is prescribed in John 3:16: "He loves. He gave. We believe. We live."

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