July 8th, 2008

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. John 3:16, NIV

The other day I gave my left over French fries to a kid sitting on the stoop outside of McDonalds. He was there with a girl, smoking, and I’d seen him begging earlier. On my way to the bus, I walked right passed them, then turned around and went back. I asked if they wanted my fries. The girl pointed to him and as our hands briefly touched around the fry box a huge smile spread over his cigarette-smudged face and he said “Spaciba.” I smiled back and simply said “Pozhalusta” and as I walked on to my bus thoughts—wishes— of having said more ran through my head. “You could have told him Jesus loves him”, I told myself. And then thought of how odd, how trite, how irrelevant that statement is to someone who doesn’t know. That thought, the thought of saying Jesus loves you being the absolute wrong thing to say if it was all I had to say left me uneasy inside. It has been haunting me all week and, honestly, I’ve tried to avoid thinking about it.

Later in the week a friend of mine was talking about how she had been struggling with the fact that she was unworthy of Jesus’ death. She just couldn’t understand why he would die for her and why he would continually offer her forgiveness. I mentioned his ways and thoughts being higher than ours.

But tonight, as I sat by my window praying for Poltava and talking to God, John 3:16 ran through my head. And everything made so much since again. That is the message that I have to tell. That is the answer to my friend’s question of “why for me?”

It’s not about Jesus loving me or you or even the whole world. And at the same time, that’s the entirety of it (I’m a huge fan of paradoxes). The answer to why starts with the beginning of that verse. In the English language the word for can be translated because:

Because God.
So loved.
The world.
He gave.

I pray the kid who ate my fries will come to know Love, not just hear that he is [loved]. That someone will come and tell him that salvation waits for him in the sacrifice of Jesus Christ and in that there is hope.

To my friend, I would like to add to my statement that His thoughts are higher than ours. I would like to tell her that yes, he died for her sin, but he died for his glory.

Revelation 7:10 “…salvation belongs to our God…”

Ezekiel 36:22-23
Therefore say to house of Israel, “this is what the Sovereign Lord says: it is not for your sake, O house of Israel, that I am going to do these things, but for the sake of my holy name, which you have profaned among the nations where you have gone. I will show the holiness of my great name, which has been profaned among the nations, the name you have profaned among them. Then the nations will know that I am the Lord, declares the Sovereign Lord, when I show myself holy through you before their eyes.