OCTOBER RADIO MESSAGE
they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly.” Note those words for Jesus said that He is come that they who hear Him might have life. The whole purpose of the coming of Christ was that they and we might have life, not that they might have forgiveness of sins, but that they might have life. Now I am turning back in the same John’s Gospel to chapter 5, verse 39, where the Lord Jesus is speaking to the religious leaders — the teachers and preachers — of His day. And He says to them in verse 39, “Ye search the Scriptures, for in them ye think ye have eternal life; and they are they which testify of me. And ye will not come to me, that ye might have life.” Notice: Jesus Christ' is the only One ordained of God, to give life.” Now, incidentally, these people were just as alive then as you and I are to day — they were moving, they were conscious all the time, yet He was of fering them life. Just as Jesus Christ might say to you today, “Ye will not come to me that ye might have life.” Now that is exactly what Christ meant: He might be saying to you within the sound of my voice that you will not come to Him that you might have life. You have forgiveness of sins and you have a home in heaven, but you are making an awful shambles of the way you are living today. You are over come by temptation and your witness is helpless. Your stand for Me is hope less, yet you will not come to Me that you may have life. I wonder if the Holy Spirit could bring this thought home to your heart now? Here we have the whole purpose, “but have everlasting life.” And the whole purpose of this is positive. There are two parts in John 3:16 — there is the negative part “should not per ish,” and the positive part “but have everlasting life.” Now you see you may have been op erating your Christian life on the nega tive emphasis, based upon the fact that you were not going to perish — and then you went out to live a Christian life. No wonder you found so much 30
the cause °f FAILURE
by Dr. John Hunter O ur previous study concluded with the tremendous thought in the end of John’s Gospel that “These things are written that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing ye might have life . . Here we were considering the ques tion of the failure in your life and mine — the ineffectiveness, the lack of power in our daily living. There is a lack of power in meeting tempta tions, and a lack of power in standing up and speaking boldly for Jesus. When I trusted the Saviour in all my need, I was bidden to go out and live for Jesus and be a good soldier under Him. Then there came a day when the joy and thrill had gone and the excitement of Christ as my Saviour had dulled a little — the things of the world became oppressive. When you and I tried to live for Jesus and tried to strug gle for Him, we only met failure on our part. Since then, we have been wondering whether the thing works, whether we have really been saved, whether we need to be saved again and just what was the trouble! We are going on now to consider the fact that God’s salavtion is not just the forgiveness of sins, it includes that. But I am turning back in my Bible to John’s Gospel, chapter 10, verse 10 where the Lord Jesus speaking says, “The thief cometh not, but to steal, and to kill, and to destroy: I am come that
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