Mar 16:16, Joh 3:14-16 | Barnes | STEP | Verse 16. He that believeth . That is, believeth the gospel. Credits it to be true, and acts as if it were true . This is the whole of faith. Man is a sinner, he should act on the belief of this truth, and repent. There is a God. Man should believe it, and fear and love him, and seek his favour. The Lord Jesus died to save him. To have faith in him, is to believe that this is true, and to act accordingly; i.e., to trust him, to rely on him, to love him, to feel that we have no merit, and to cast our all upon him. There is a heaven and a hell. To believe this, is to credit the account, and act as if it were true; to seek the one, and avoid the other. We are to die. To believe this, is to act as if this were so; to be in readiness for it, and to expect it daily and hourly. In one word, faith is feeling and acting as if there were a God, a Saviour, a heaven, a hell; as ff we were sinners, and must die; as if we deserved eternal death, and were in danger of it; and, in view of all, casting our eternal interests on the mercy of God in Christ Jesus. To do this, is to be a Christian; not to do it, is to be an infidel. Is baptized . Is initiated into the church by the application of water, as significant that he is a sinner, and needs the purifying influences of the Holy Ghost. It is worthy of remark, that Jesus has made baptism of so much importance, he did not say, indeed, that a man could not be saved without baptism, but he has strongly implied that where this is neglected, knowing it to be a command of the Saviour, it endangers the salvation of the soul. Faith and baptism are the beginnings of a Christian life: the one the beginning of piety in the soul, the other of its manifestation before men, or of a profession of religion. And every man endangers his eternal interest by being ashamed of Christ before men. See . Shall be saved . Saved from sin, ( ,) and from eternal death, ( ,) and raised to eternal life in heaven, . Shall be damned . That is, condemned by God, and cast off from his presence, . It implies that they will be adjudged to be guilty by God in the day of judgment, ; that they will deserve to die for ever, ( ) and that they will be cast out into a place of woe to all eternity, . It may be asked how it can be just in God to condemn men for ever for not believing the gospel. I answer: (1.) God has a right to appoint his own terms of mercy. (2.) Man has no claim on him for heaven (3.) The sinner rejects the terms of salvation knowingly, deliberately, and perseveringly. (4.) He has a special disregard and contempt for the gospel. (5.) His unbelief is produced by the love of sin. (6.) He shows by this that he has no love for God, and his law, and for eternity. (7.) He slights the objects dearest to God, and most like him; and, (8.) he must be miserable. A creature who has no confidence in God, who does not believe that he is true or worthy of his regard, and who never seeks his favour, must be wretched. He rejects God, and he must go into eternity without a Father and without a God. And he has no source of comfort in himself, and must die for ever. There is no being in eternity but God that can make man happy; and without his favour the sinner must be wretched. (c) "he that believeth" (d) "but he"

Mark 16:16

Verse 16. He that believeth. That is, believeth the gospel. Credits it to be true, and acts as if it were true. This is the whole of faith. Man is a sinner, he should act on the belief of this truth, and repent. There is a God. Man should believe it, and fear and love him, and seek his favour. The Lord Jesus died to save him. To have faith in him, is to believe that this is true, and to act accordingly; i.e., to trust him, to rely on him, to love him, to feel that we have no merit, and to cast our all upon him. There is a heaven and a hell. To believe this, is to credit the account, and act as if it were true; to seek the one, and avoid the other. We are to die. To believe this, is to act as if this were so; to be in readiness for it, and to expect it daily and hourly. In one word, faith is feeling and acting as if there were a God, a Saviour, a heaven, a hell; as ff we were sinners, and must die; as if we deserved eternal death, and were in danger of it; and, in view of all, casting our eternal interests on the mercy of God in Christ Jesus. To do this, is to be a Christian; not to do it, is to be an infidel.

Is baptized. Is initiated into the church by the application of water, as significant that he is a sinner, and needs the purifying influences of the Holy Ghost. It is worthy of remark, that Jesus has made baptism of so much importance, he did not say, indeed, that a man could not be saved without baptism, but he has strongly implied that where this is neglected, knowing it to be a command of the Saviour, it endangers the salvation of the soul. Faith and baptism are the beginnings of a Christian life: the one the beginning of piety in the soul, the other of its manifestation before men, or of a profession of religion. And every man endangers his eternal interest by being ashamed of Christ before men. See Mk 8:38.

Shall be saved. Saved from sin, (Mt 1:21,) and from eternal death, (Jn 5:24; 3:36,) and raised to eternal life in heaven, Jn 5:28,29; 17:2,24.

Shall be damned. That is, condemned by God, and cast off from his presence, 2Thes 1:6-9. It implies that they will be adjudged to be guilty by God in the day of judgment, Rom 2:12,16, Mt 25:41; that they will deserve to die for ever, (Rom 2:6,8) and that they will be cast out into a place of woe to all eternity, Mt 25:46. It may be asked how it can be just in God to condemn men for ever for not believing the gospel. I answer:

(1.) God has a right to appoint his own terms of mercy.

(2.) Man has no claim on him for heaven

(3.) The sinner rejects the terms of salvation knowingly, deliberately, and perseveringly.

(4.) He has a special disregard and contempt for the gospel.

(5.) His unbelief is produced by the love of sin.

(6.) He shows by this that he has no love for God, and his law, and for eternity.

(7.) He slights the objects dearest to God, and most like him; and,

(8.) he must be miserable. A creature who has no confidence in God, who does not believe that he is true or worthy of his regard, and who never seeks his favour, must be wretched. He rejects God, and he must go into eternity without a Father and without a God. And he has no source of comfort in himself, and must die for ever. There is no being in eternity but God that can make man happy; and without his favour the sinner must be wretched.

John 3:14-16

Verse 14. And as Moses. Jesus proceeds in this and the following verses to state the reason why he came into the world; and, in order to this, he illustrates his design, and the efficacy of his coming, by a reference to the case of the brazen serpent, recorded in Nu 21:8,9. The people were bitten by flying fiery serpents. There was no cure for the bite. Moses was directed to make an image of the serpent, and place it in sight of the people, that they might look on it and be healed. There is no evidence that this was intended to be a type of the Messiah, but it is used by Jesus as strikingly illustrating his work. Men are sinners. There is no cure by human means for the maladies of the soul; and as the people who were bitten might look on the image of the serpent and be healed, so may sinners look to the Saviour and be cured of the moral maladies of our nature.

Lifted up. Erected on a pole. Placed on high, so that it might be seen by the people.

The serpent. The image of a serpent made of brass.

In the wilderness. Near the land of Edom. In the desert and desolate country to the south of Mount Hor, Nu 21:4.

Even so. In a similar manner and with a similar design. He here refers, doubtless, to his own death. Comp. Jn 12:32, 8:28. The points of resemblance between his being lifted up and that of the brazen serpent seem to be these:

1st. In each case those who are to/be benefited can be aided in no other way. The bite of the serpent was deadly, and could be healed only by looking on the brazen serpent; and sin is deadly in its nature, and can be removed only by looking on the cross.

2nd. The mode of their being lifted up. The brazen serpent was in the sight of the people, So Jesus was exalted from the earth--raised on a tree or cross.

3rd. The design was similar. The one was to save the life, the other the soul; the one to save from temporal, the other from eternal death.

4th. The manner of the cure was similar. The people of Israel were to look on the serpent and be healed, and so sinners are to look on the Lord Jesus that they may be saved.

Must. It is proper; necessary; indispensable, if men are saved. Comp. Lk 24:26, 22:42.

The Son of man. The Messiah.

(l) "as Moses" Nu 21:9 Verse 15. That whosoever. This shows the fulness and freeness of the gospel. All may come and be saved.

Believeth in him. Whosoever puts confidence in him as able and willing to save. All who feel that they are sinners, that they have no righteousness of their own, and are willing to look to him as their only Saviour.

Should not perish. They are in danger, by nature, of perishing--that is, of sinking down to the pains of hell; of "being punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his power," 2Thes 1:9. All who believe on Jesus shall be saved from this condemnation and be raised up to eternal life. And from this we learn,

1st. That there is salvation in no other.

2nd. That salvation is here full and free for all who will come.

3rd. That it is easy. What was more easy for a poor, wounded, dying Israelite, bitten by a poisonous serpent, than to look up to a brazen serpent? So with the poor, lost, dying sinner. And what more foolish than for such a wounded, dying man to refuse to look on a remedy so easy and effectual? So nothing is more foolish than for a lost and dying sinner to refuse to look on God's only Son, exalted on a cross to die for the sins of men, and able to save to the uttermost all who come to God by him.

(m) "That whosoever" Jn 3:36, Heb 7:25 Verse 16. For God so loved. This does not mean that God approved the conduct of men, but that he had benevolent feelings toward them, or was earnestly desirous of their happiness. God hates wickedness, but he still desires the happiness of those who are sinful. He hates the sin, but loves the sinner. A parent may love his child and desire his welfare, and yet be strongly opposed to the conduct of that child. When we approve the conduct of another, this is the love of complacency; when we desire simply their happiness, this is the love of benevolence.

The world. All mankind. It does not mean any particular part of the world, but man as man--the race that had rebelled and that deserved to die. See Jn 6:33, 17:21. His love for the world, or for all mankind, in giving his Son, was shown by these circumstances:

1st. All the world was in ruin, and exposed to the wrath of God.

2nd. All men were in a hopeless condition.

3rd. God gave his Son. Man had no claim on him; it was a gift--an undeserved gift.

4th. He gave him up to extreme sufferings, even the bitter pains of death on the cross.

5th. It was for all the world. He tasted "death for every man," He 2:9. He "died for all," 2Cor 5:15. "He is the propitiation for the sins of the whole world," 1Jn 2:2.

That he gave. It was a free and unmerited gift. Man had no claim; and when there was no eye to pity or arm to save, it pleased God to give his Son into the hands of men to die in their stead, Gal 1:4; Rom 8:32, Lk 22:19. It was the mere movement of love; the expression of eternal compassion, and of a desire that sinners should not perish forever.

His only-begotten Son. Jn 1:14. This is the highest expression of love of which we can conceive. A parent who should give up his only son to die for others who are guilty--if this could or might be done--would show higher love than could be manifested in any other way. So it shows the depth of the love of God, that he was willing to give his only Son into the hands of sinful men that he might be slain, and thus redeem them from eternal sorrow.

(n) "For God" 1Jn 4:9