Into the World: When We Needed Him Most, God Showed Up

"For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. For God sent not His Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved.” (John 3:16-17, KJV)

I was a ten-year-old boy when I invited my best friend Ray over to my house. I had already planned it out! In my bedroom, the record-player was humming with “Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so...” My brothers weren’t home, so we would not be distracted, and I had already prepared a short presentation of John 3:16-17 to impact eternity.

What an amazing moment! Right there in my bedroom, I won my first person to Christ as Ray invited Jesus into his heart. For the next couple of years, my dad and I would pick up Ray from his trailer park and bring him to our little church in Alanson, Michigan. He attended faithfully and even participated on our church Bible Quiz team. But after Ray left that day, I was jumping all over the house because I caught a microscopic glimpse of what Christ must feel every time one person changes course away from Hell toward Heaven.

Of course, impacting eternity is so important to Christ that He, Himself, came INTO THE WORLD. God entered the fishbowl. To the atheist or agnostic, there is no opening to the fishbowl—it’s a closed system. Colored rocks and plant life and fish are already in the fishbowl, but nobody knows how they arrived. The fishbowl is closed! The universe is on its own or is nothing more than a washing machine where we are tumbling around with nowhere to go. A meaningless conglomeration of molecules that accidentally connected through random selection... Bang! Suddenly, there’s a fish! Somehow the “goo becomes you through the zoo.” But here’s the optimum question, “How did the fish get there?”

It always amazes me how humankind tries to take God out of the equation and close the fishbowl without having an answer for the arrival of the fish.

• During the Renaissance, we tried to work God out of the picture
• During the Age of Enlightenment, we tried to reason God out of the picture.
• During the Industrial Revolution, we tried to innovate God out of the picture.
• During the Technological Revolution, we’ve tried to socialize God out of the picture.
• During the Age of Artificial Intelligence, we will try to intellectualize God out of the picture.

In every age, humankind tries to take God out of the equation, even though we all know the undeniable truth that the fish, plant life, and colored rocks occurred because of an opening in the fishbowl! God showed up! God came INTO THE WORLD.

Now, there were serious consequences! Because God came into the world, He was placed in the hands of a deranged murder. That’s right—humankind murdered Jesus! We crucified Him on a cross. And yet, God still invited us into His family and made us heirs over everything He owned.

Now some may take God’s great sacrifice to the extreme by saying, “Oh, God would never send anyone to Hell because He loves us too much.” But then, does it really make sense that there are no consequences for our actions in life? Suppose you or I become the victim of a horrific murder, and during the event, the murderer is also killed. As we stand before God, do you think God will say, “It doesn’t matter how you lived your life; come on into Heaven because I’m not sending anyone to Hell”? So, the murderer with blood still on his hands and you or I, who was murdered, both enter Heaven together? I don’t think so.

God didn’t come into the world to turn a blind eye to sin. Even our kids know that there are right and wrong consequences for their actions! The truth is that God didn’t come into the world to keep everyone from Hell, but He came into the world to provide a way out of Hell.

It’s not that God loves humankind too much to send anyone to Hell, but that He loves humankind too much to send everyone to Heaven.

God came INTO THE WORLD to provide a way to Heaven for Ray! God showed up so we wouldn’t be abandoned on the doorstep of life to fend for ourselves, walking according to the course of this world, and dead in our trespasses and sins. When we needed Him, God showed up! When we were in crises, chaos, and confusion, God showed up! When we needed someone to enter the fishbowl, God showed up! Because He so loved the world, and desired to save the world, He came INTO THE WORLD and impacted eternity!