Marcus Nelson preaching on John 3:16 ‘Christianity has not worked for me.’
He tackles the thorny issue of what faith is and breaks it down into simplistic terms.
‘Faith is not an action I must will…How could we not look to Jesus….He draws us with his love…to not look at him is such a terrible and unreasonable thing to do.’
Marcus makes the point that if he tells us there is something strange and wonderful on the wall behind us, we would not have to make a decision to look, we would be drawn to look. In fact we would have to try hard if we wanted to not look! Is this not the point of Numbers 21 with the snake lifted up?
This illustrates the attractional power of Jesus and takes the onus from us.
He then makes a great point about eternal life.
‘Jesus has come that we may have eternal life. Eternal life is defined for us. Eternal life is to know him and his Father.’
This reminds us that eternal life has truly started for us now who believe.
While this does not tackle some of the issues head on about Christianity ‘not working’, it actually does the thing needed. It causes us to put down our baggage and look.
Blog of Si Walker 