For this is how God loved the world: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life. John 3:16 (NLT)
How does Jesus feel about the world?
As a young believer, I’d read verses like 1 John 2:15-17 and James 4:4 that talked about the world’s corruptive influence and how we are not to love the world or befriend it. Yet I also found verses like today’s that spoke of God’s deep love for the world and how Jesus died for it. How are all these scriptures true?
The better I began to understand God’s Word, the more I noticed people in one of two ditches on this topic.
In one ditch, I found legalistic, religious people, wagging judgmental fingers at anyone who listened to the radio, went to the movies or even owned Barbie dolls! These people believed enjoying anything worldly meant you were on the road to hell.
In the other ditch were people who subscribed to the extreme opposite. They’d say things like, “God loves everyone, and there’s no hell, so we’re all okay.”
As believers, let’s stay out of the ditches and on the road of truth! Fortunately, we have the Holy Spirit—the spirit of truth—within us, helping us to understand God’s principles. (See 1 John 2:26-27, John 16:13.)
The truth is, God loves the people in this world like crazy. He gave His Son’s life for every person on earth because of that love. He does not, however, love the horrible spirit of the enemy in the world that’s running rampant, trying to ruin people’s lives.
Jesus doesn’t love the world’s value systems or our enemy. He loves people. Understanding that makes all the difference.
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