Is God’s love for all people the same or does he love some more than others? We will look at two examples of his love. Associated with these two examples of love are the two words, “ask” and “accept”.
Our first verse reads, “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16 ESV). “For God so loved the world” is to say that he loves all people of the world. He loves those who will go to heaven and he loves those who will go to eternal destruction. The verse contains no indication that there is any difference in his love for the two groups of people. If you come to salvation using John 3:16 and “ASK” Christ into your life then with what love does he love you. Is it the same love as for the unsaved? Consider a second possibility.
The second text reads, “that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, so that, because you have been rooted and grounded in love, you may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth [of his love], and thus to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled up to all the fullness of God” (Ephesians 3:17 – 19 NET). If God chose you as a vessel of honor according to his foreknowledge and caused you to be born again, you would “know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge” when you “ACCEPT” the gift of eternal life.
Before Adam sinned, God knew what was going to happen and what he was going to do. He had already chosen from the future world population a people for himself. As each chosen one is born physically, God begins a spiritual work in them in partnership with those searching for lost sheep. At the point of spiritual birth it is like a mother that can’t hold back her child from physical birth. It must be born. These are the ones that know and understand how deep God’s love is for them. They know that salvation was God’s doing and their part was simply to accept.
The John 3:16 people are often quite different. In the above case a person over time shares the word out of friendship and love allowing God to bring about necessary growth. In the case of John 3:16 we have emotional alter calls with pressure to get people forward. On a personal basis our conversation of sharing turns into a debate in an attempt to get that person to accept. It is beyond my comprehension how you can through a debate get a person to accept and at the same time believe that you are persuading God to comply with your timetable of spiritual birth. These people may accept your persuasion, but as time passes they may not experience much change, if any, in their lives and wonder if God loves them any more than the ones headed for hell.
John 3:16 is not an invitation verse as the western church thinks. It simply states that God loves all people enough to sacrifice his son. It also states that those who believe have eternal life and are secure. How they believe is covered elsewhere. I spent several years in China before I got this figured out. We must not forget that salvation is by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone. God chooses and we search. If you prayerfully walk with God in this process and you will spend less time trying to argue someone into heaven that God hasn't chosen. You cannot cause a person to be born again. Only God can do that and when he does that person truly knows and is thankful for his love.
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