John 3:16 “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have everlasting life.”

So this is how much God loves you. He gave his one and only Son. A friend of mine once suggested that this wasn’t so hard for God the Father because Jesus was God and wouldn’t have to suffer so much, and God knew that Jesus would rise from the dead.

Don’t think there was anything easy about making this gift. Jesus was the only perfect Son who ever existed. He and his Father were knit together in a perfect bond of love that far surpasses the love between any human parent and child. There is no greater sacrifice any parent could ever make than to give up their one and only child for someone else, even for a little while. But for a sinful world, God says, “I am willing to make the trade.” For you, as part of that world, he says the same.

And when God gave Jesus up to mocking and whipping, and cross and death, there was no avoiding the full brunt of the experience. You may remember that the soldiers who carried out the deed offered Jesus something to drink to take the edge off his pain. But Jesus refused it, because he didn’t want the edge taken off. He was there on a mission, to carry and pay for the sins of the world.

At the cross Jesus was, so to speak, carrying every one of us on his back. As a result, it is as though our sin never existed. It has completely vanished, drowned and washed away in Jesus blood. We became as pure and as clean as the driven snow in God’s eyes. Remember, this is how much God loves you. He gave up his only Son, the Son he loved, to rescue us from sin and make us his very own.

Such a gift, you might think, could only be had for a high price. I mean, with the cleansing of our sins Jesus is presenting to us the cure for death. If the pharmaceutical companies could create such a product, how much would they charge for the drug that cures all death?

About twenty years ago my oldest son was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. A single IV bag of the chemical the nurses called “big red” cost $15,000. Curing cancer isn’t cheap.

But because God loves you so much, he doesn’t charge you anything for his gift. He gives it away for free to those who simply trust Jesus for it.

This faith we share in Jesus as our Savior is not something we have because we are so smart. It is itself his gift to you and me. “Faith comes from hearing the message,” Paul writes. God didn’t wait for us to figure him out, as if that were possible. He told us this wonderful story about how much he loves us. He showed us a bigger love, more faithful and committed and sacrificial and forgiving than any we had ever known. Knowing this love, how could we not put our trust in him?

This is how much God loves you: his Son, your faith, and never-ending life are all his gifts…for you and for our whole world.