Sermon by Dr. Jeffrey Jeremiah
December 12, 2004

"He Came to Bring Life"
John 10:10; I John 5:11-12

This week I went to see a dying man. It was Tuesday afternoon. I was seated in a dentist’s chair when I received a call that Arv Koopmans was close to death at Harborview Hospital. Although the weather was awful and I knew the traffic was even worse, I wanted to be with Arv Koopmans before he died. I know that for some people, death is frightening. For most people, death is something they want to keep very, very far away from them. I understand that. It’s a very natural reaction. But for me, it’s different with someone like Arv. Over the years, I’d gotten to know Arv quite well. I knew his life story; I knew about his relationship with his Savior and Lord Jesus Christ. Arv is a quiet man, small in stature, but I know him to be a giant when it comes to his relationship with Jesus Christ. He’d had setbacks and failures in his life, like we all do, but he had found that faith in Jesus sustained and even blessed him. He also had certainty as to his future beyond the grave. I will drop everything to be with a dying man like Arv Koopmans. I have at least two motivations for that. First is that I want to be there to talk about the Jesus we hold in common, to share the promises of God in Jesus Christ. I want to protect that friend in Jesus from possible attacks by the Evil One in those final hours; attacks that attempt to accuse, attempt to undercut faith, attempt to cast doubt on the goodness and grace and love of God. Second, I want to be there to see the promises of Jesus Christ realized. I wanted to say goodbye to Arv, and I also wanted to say welcome, welcome to the glory that awaits you in the coming minutes. I want to be there to witness death defeated, death swallowed up in victory because of what Jesus did on the cross. I go to see him, and he’s semi-conscious, but with the squeeze of his hand and the twitch of his eye, he recognizes me and we begin a conversation in which I know he won’t verbally respond, but he will spiritually. We talk about the fact that his life here is coming to an end, and it will probably be over in a few hours. And I thank Arv for this moment, and I praise God that because of his Savior and Lord Jesus Christ, this death is not the end for Arv. It is just the entrance into the life of glory in the presence of Jesus, a life in which there is no pain, no tears, no sickness, no sorrow. Just life and love and joy and peace and happiness, and it goes on for all eternity. Our life here is compared with the life to come in I Corinthians 4, which says, "Our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal weight of glory that is beyond all comparison." The point being, you can’t even begin to compare this life with the life to come! We talk about Romans 8, which promises that in all things we are more than conquerors in Him who first loved us, and that nothing, absolutely nothing can separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. And as I left, I prayed the great verse in Psalm 118: "Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of His saints," and I ask God to make this death precious and glorious in Jesus Christ. I went to see a dying man, a friend in Jesus Christ. And as I leave the hospital, I think about today’s message, Jesus’ words that He "came to bring life, and bring it to the full" (John 10:10). And I wonder, "Lord, what can I say to several hundred people on Sunday that will help them know and feel and experience and live in the immensity, the vastness, the glory of the life Jesus came to bring? If only I could have brought every one of them with me to this hospital, to this moment, as I visited a dying man! " My friends, my prayer since late Tuesday afternoon has been that God would help you to realize this day that NOTHING is more important than the life Jesus came to bring. Jesus came that we may have life, and have it to the full. What is that life, that full life? When Jesus speaks about life, life to the full, He’s talking about eternal life. There are four points I want to make quickly about the life Jesus came to bring, eternal life.

First, eternal life is not a "ticket" that simply secures your future. You stick it in your pocket, you go through life holding onto that ticket until the end of this life. You die, you give it to God, and it gets you into heaven. Eternal life is about the future, yes, absolutely, but there’s so much more to it than that. Eternal life is about the whole of life, this life and the life to come, the present as well as future. Which brings us to the second point, that eternal life is for the living of this day. It’s to be experienced and enjoyed in the present. Jesus did not say, "I have come so that they will have life in the future." He said, "I have come that they may have life" - present tense, now.

Now is the time to have and enjoy and experience life, eternal life. Third, eternal life now is God the Holy Spirit coming into your life and changing you forever. It’s change for a glorious purpose as you’re saved and accepted and embraced in love by God Himself. The Spirit of God alive in your life has a mission, a great work to do: to make you just like Jesus Christ: your character, your heart and mind, your life is just like Jesus’. When that happens, God’s life, forever life, eternal life is alive in you. All the life that an all-powerful, all-knowing, all-loving God can give, He gives to you. That’s a life of confidence and faith that your God will protect you, provide for you, and bless in the face of obstacles and opposition now and in the future. Eternal life is the reality that death is not the end, death does not mark the beginning of an eternity of judgment and pain and hell. No, eternal life declares that death marks the beginning of a glorious life that cannot be compared with any experience in this life, that eternal life is forever life, God’s life, alive in you. Fourth, eternal life is yours if you "have" Jesus Christ. First John 5:12 says, "He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life." That’s an unusual word to describe a relationship with Jesus Christ, "have." What does it mean to "have" the Son? The word "have" can communicate a number of different meanings. For example, it doesn’t mean quite the same thing when I say, "I have $10," or "I have a cold," or "I have a real estate agent." But there is a common thread to all those uses of the word "have." When I have something, it provides a benefit or an impact for me. If I have $10, the result is that it can buy $10 worth of goods or services. If I have a cold, the impact of that cold is that I have a runny nose, or I’m stuffed up, or I have a cough. If I have a real estate agent, he provides me with the opportunity to buy or sell a home. "He who has the Son has life." If you have Jesus as your personal Savior and Lord, this is what He does for you. He provides, He gives you life, life to the full, eternal life. Jesus did not come to show you life, He came to give it to you, to make it possible for you to possess and experience and enjoy it, now and forever. If you do not "have" Jesus, if you do not "have" the Son of God, you do not have life that is full and eternal. You will certainly have a life characterized by living 24-hour days for 70, 80, or 90 years, but you don’t have the life of God alive in you, and all the riches that that includes, and you have no hope beyond the grave, for what awaits you is a Christ-less eternity. "He who has the Son has life. He who does not have the Son does not have life." But how do you have Jesus Christ? That question is answered in I John 5:13: "I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God so that you may know that you have eternal life." To have the Son is to believe the Son. If you believe in and trust the Son, you have Him, and you have what He offers you: life.