Have Eternal Life

John 3:16 “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.”

In my final study of the amazing Bible verse John 3:16, Professor William Barcley points out that “life” is a prominent theme in John’s gospel. The Greek words translated by the English terms “life” and “live” occur more than sixty times in the book of John. The most prominent of these are in reference to the life that God gives through Jesus Christ ... eternal life.

John 3:36a “He who believes in the Son has everlasting life; and he who does not believe the Son shall not see life.”

 The Apostle John writes in John 20:31 “these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have life in His name.” Life in Christ and eternal life are essentially synonymous. Both the book of Genesis and John begin with the words “In the beginning” because God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit created all life. John 1:2-4 goes on to tell us that “He (Jesus) was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. You can only find true life in Jesus Christ, who is Himself the Creator of all life. Jesus goes on to say in John 14:6, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.” We never truly life until we know Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord.

John 17:1b-3 “Glorify Your Son, that Your Son also may glorify You, as You have given Him authority over all flesh, that He should give eternal life to as many as You have given Him. And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent.”

Dr. Barcley explains that “eternal life” in the Bible refers to more than the fact that it never ends. Human beings long for immortality. Why? Our parents, Adam and Eve, were created with immortality with unhindered fellowship with God. Death entered the world because of sin. Adam and Eve eventually died physically; however, on the day they doubted God and ate the forbidden fruit, they died spiritually and the unhindered fellowship with God was broken. We are triune beings, created with body, soul and spirit. It is “the spirit” that died and is dead in all mankind. The true “life”, the “eternal life” that Jesus gives, means the Holy Spirit’s regeneration of our spirit and being reconciled and restored to the state of knowing and communing with the only true God. Because sin has broken our fellowship with God, we must be “born again”, born from above.

John 3:3, 14-15 “Jesus answered and said to him, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life.”

That is, the Holy Spirit must come and give us new life and make us a new creation by His regenerating power. In John 11:25-26 Jesus said, “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in Me, though he may die, he shall live. And whoever lives and believes in Me shall never die. Do you believe this?” When we who trust in God, repent of our sins, and believe by faith in the finished atoning work of Jesus Christ on the cross for our redemption, we have salvation now, a resurrected spirit and the hope of a glorified body in heaven that enables us to commune with God for all eternity. This is the abundant life and we can say, like the Apostle Paul in Philippians 1:21, “For to me, to live is Christ, and to die is gain”, knowing that Jesus said in John 10:10-11, “The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy. I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly. “I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd gives His life for the sheep.” 

Life in Christ, Brian