God’s love is everlasting and always unmerited. However, humans can reject it. We have the opportunity to accept or reject that love, but only because God freely loves us with His perfect, everlasting love prior to anything we do ( Jer. 31:3 ). Our love for God is a response to what has already been given to us even before we asked for it. Read 1 John 4:7–20 , with specific emphasis on verses 7 and 19. What does this tell us about the priority of God’s love? God’s love always comes first. If God...
Jan 08, 2025•15 min•Season 7Ep. 2269
God calls and invites every person into an intimate love relationship with Him (see Matt. 22:1–14 ). Responding appropriately to this call involves obeying God’s command to love God and to love others (see Matt. 22:37–39 ). Whether one enjoys the benefits of this relationship with God depends on whether one freely decides to accept or reject His love. Read Hosea 9:15, Jeremiah 16:5, Romans 11:22, and Jude 21 . What do these texts teach about whether the benefits of God’s love can be rejected—eve...
Jan 07, 2025•17 min•Season 7Ep. 2268
The Bible often depicts God’s special love relationship with us by using family or kinship metaphors, particularly metaphors of the love between a husband and wife or of a good mother for her child. These metaphors are used particularly to depict the special relationship between God and His covenant people. This is a relationship of covenantal love, which involves not only God’s love for His people but also expectations that people will accept this love and will love Him (and one another) in ret...
Jan 06, 2025•12 min•Season 7Ep. 2267
Scripture is clear: God loves everyone. The most famous verse of Scripture, John 3:16 , proclaims this truth: “ ‘For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life’ ” (NKJV). Read Psalm 33:5 and Psalm 145:9 . What do these verses teach about how far God’s loving-kindness, compassion, and mercy extend? Some might think that they are unlovable or that God might love everyone else but not them. Yet, the Bible consi...
Jan 05, 2025•12 min•Season 7Ep. 2266
Read for This Week’s Study 2 Pet. 3:9, Deut. 7:6–9, Rom. 11:22, 1 John 4:7–20, John 15:12, 1 John 3:16 . Memory Text: Many have been taught that the Greek word agape refers to a love that is unique to God, while other terms for love, such as phileo, refer to different kinds of love, more deficient than agape. Some claim, too, that agape refers to unilateral love, a love that only gives but never receives, a love entirely independent of human response. However, careful study of divine love throug...
Jan 04, 2025•6 min•Season 7Ep. 2265
Further Thought: Read Ellen G. White, “ ‘To Meet the Bridegroom,’ ” pp. 405–421, in Christ’s Object Lessons. “It is the darkness of misapprehension of God that is enshrouding the world. Men are losing their knowledge of His character. It has been misunderstood and misinterpreted. At this time a message from God is to be proclaimed, a message illuminating in its influence and saving in its power. His character is to be made known. Into the darkness of the world is to be shed the light of His glor...
Jan 03, 2025•5 min•Season 7Ep. 2264
God invites everyone into a love relationship with Him, but only those who freely accept the invitation enjoy the eternal results. As seen in the parable of the wedding banquet, many whom the king called “ ‘were not willing to come’ ” (Matt. 22:3, NKJV). Accordingly, shortly before His crucifixion, Christ lamented: “ ‘O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the one who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under ...
Jan 02, 2025•7 min•Season 7Ep. 2263
God not only loves people of His own free will, but He also invites them to love Him in return. That God grants them the ability to freely choose whether they will accept or reject His love is apparent in (among other places) Christ’s parable of the wedding banquet. Read Matthew 22:1–14. What is the meaning of this parable? ________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________ In ...
Jan 01, 2025•6 min•Season 7Ep. 2262
God not only continued to bestow His love freely on Israel, despite repeated rebellions, but God also continues to bestow love freely upon us, even while we are sinners. We do not deserve God’s love, and we could never earn it. Conversely, God does not need us. The God of the Bible does not need anything (Acts 17:25). God’s love for you and for me and for all persons is entirely of His own volition. Compare Revelation 4:11 and Psalm 33:6. What do these verses tell us about God’s freedom relative...
Dec 31, 2024•5 min•Season 6Ep. 2261
God’s striking instance of His love for fallen humanity is found in the story of Hosea. God commanded the prophet Hosea, “ ‘Go, take yourself a wife of harlotry and children of harlotry, for the land has committed great harlotry by departing from the Lord’ ” (Hos. 1:2, NKJV). Hosea and his unfaithful wife were to be a living object lesson of God’s love for His people, even despite Israel’s unfaithfulness and spiritual harlotry. That is, it is a story of God’s freely bestowed love on those who do...
Dec 30, 2024•6 min•Season 6Ep. 2260
God not only asks us, “Do you love Me,” but God Himself loves each person, and does so freely. Indeed, He freely loves you and me and every other person more than we could possibly imagine. And we know this love by the way He has acted in the history of His people. Read Exodus 33:15–22 and consider the context of these verses and the narrative in which they appear. What does this passage, especially verse 19, reveal about God’s will and love? _____________________________________________________...
Dec 29, 2024•7 min•Season 6Ep. 2259
Read for This Week’s Study: Exod. 33:15–22; Hosea 14:1– 4; Rev. 4:11; John 17:24; Matt. 22:1–14; John 10:17, 18. Memory Text: “ ‘I will heal their backsliding, I will love them freely, for My anger has turned away from him’ ” (Hosea 14:4, NKJV). Though Peter had denied Jesus three times, just as Jesus had predicted (Matt. 26:34), these denials were not the end of the story. After the Resurrection, Jesus asked Peter, “ ‘Do you love Me more than these?’ ” And Peter replied, “ ‘Yes, Lord; You know ...
Dec 28, 2024•4 min•Season 6Ep. 2258
God is love. So says 1 John 4:8 and verse 16. The entirety of the Bible testifies to this fact. The Christian faith is centered on God’s character of love. Love is at the core of who God is, at the core of everything that we believe, and should be at the core of everything we do. Accordingly, the way we understand love affects the entirety of our faith and practice. If, for example, one believes that God’s love must be earned or merited, a person might think that God does not love them because t...
Dec 28, 2024•7 min•Season 6Ep. 2257
God’s perspective is vastly different from that of humans. God shares His perspective with us through His Word, the Bible, under the power of the Holy Spirit. It is our choice whether we wish to walk in darkness or accept the light coming from Jesus Christ as revealed in the Word. Integral to this choice is our own personal surrender to Jesus Christ, the Son of God and the Redeemer of humanity. Through the power of the Holy Spirit, God the Father has revealed to us—in the life, death, and resurr...
Dec 27, 2024•7 min•Season 6Ep. 2256
Read John 12:32 . In what ways does this striking statement describe the authority of Jesus Christ? As we have seen throughout this quarter’s lessons, the Gospel of John draws us to Jesus, but only if we are willing to know God and to do His will. Throughout John’s Gospel, people who encounter Jesus either accept the light and grow or reject the light and become blind. Nicodemus, the woman at the well, the royal official, the man at the pool of Bethesda, the 5,000 fed loaves and fishes, Jesus’ b...
Dec 26, 2024•10 min•Season 6Ep. 2255
Read John 4:46–54 . What problem brought the official to Jesus, and what was the real underlying issue here? This man came to Jesus, the Light of the world, but he had made up his mind to believe only if Jesus healed his child. We could say this man’s theology was a “theology from below.” Theology from below sets rules and standards for God and His Word. Human ideas, as flawed and as limited and as subjective as they are, become the final authority on how people interpret the Word of God. What a...
Dec 25, 2024•11 min•Season 6Ep. 2254
Read John 1:4–10; John 3:19–21; John 5:35; John 8:12; John 9:5; John 11:9, 10; and John 12:35 . What great contrast is present here, and why is this contrast so foundational to understanding truth? The world is in darkness; it shuns the light and cannot, on its own, find its way to the true God, the personal God of Creation, revelation, and Redemption. “Never can humanity, of itself, attain to a knowledge of the divine. ‘It is as high as heaven; what canst thou do? deeper than hell; what canst t...
Dec 24, 2024•12 min•Season 6Ep. 2253
Read John 21:20–22 . What question led Peter down a wrong path? How did Jesus straighten the path? Jesus had just restored Peter to ministry and told him, “Follow me” ( John 21:19 ). It was probably an actual physical following of Jesus down the beach. And that is because Peter turns and sees John following Jesus as well, and he inquires about John. “ ‘But Lord, what about this man?’ ” ( John 21:21, NKJV ). In restoring Peter to ministry, Jesus had predicted Peter’s manner of death ( John 21:18 ...
Dec 23, 2024•8 min•Season 6Ep. 2252
Read John 21:1–19 . What crucial truths are revealed here, especially about God’s grace—and human humility? John 20 ends with the purpose of the book, which would be the logical place to conclude, but there is one more chapter. Chapter 21 begins with some of the disciples back in Galilee, with Peter suggesting a night on the lake. It looks as though old times have returned, and the disciples are back to their old trade, fishing. But they catch nothing that night. In the morning, a mysterious str...
Dec 22, 2024•12 min•Season 6Ep. 2251
Read for This Week’s Study John 21; John 11:9, 10; John 8:42–44; John 4:46–54; 2 Tim. 3:16; John 15:1–11 . Memory Text: John’s Gospel, like Mark’s, ends with a meeting in Galilee. This final lesson on John deals with that meeting but integrates it with the theme of how we know Jesus and the Word of God—a concept that runs through the fourth Gospel. Though they were with Jesus more than three years, the disciples were still greatly unprepared for the Crucifixion and Resurrection, even though Jesu...
Dec 21, 2024•5 min•Season 6Ep. 2250
Read Ellen G. White, “ ‘It Is Finished,’ ” pp. 758–764; “ ‘The Lord Is Risen,’ ” pp. 779–787; and “ ‘Why Weepest Thou?’ ” pp. 788–794, in The Desire of Ages. See also, Clifford Goldstein, Risen: Finding Hope in the Empty Tomb (Nampa, ID: Pacific Press, 2020). “Pilate longed to deliver Jesus. But he saw that he could not do this, and yet retain his own position and honor. Rather than lose his worldly power, he chose to sacrifice an innocent life. How many, to escape loss or suffering, in like man...
Dec 20, 2024•8 min•Season 6Ep. 2249
Read John 20:11–13 . What happened here that shows why Mary Magdalene still did not understand the meaning of the empty tomb? The last reference to Mary in the text before this one is her telling Peter and John about the empty tomb ( John 20:2 ) . They ran to the tomb, and she came back there a little later. After Peter and John inspected the tomb, they left it. But Mary returned and, weeping, lingered there. No doubt she had done a great deal of crying during the last few days. And now—this as ...
Dec 19, 2024•12 min•Season 6Ep. 2248
Read John 20:1–7 . What is the importance to us about what is depicted in these verses? Jesus died late on a Friday afternoon and rose early on Sunday. Because the Sabbath was near when He was buried ( John 19:42 ), the burial process was done hastily and not completely. However much they loved Jesus, His followers kept the Sabbath day and did not go to the tomb (compare with Mark 16:1, Luke 23:56 ). After the Sabbath, a number of women bought spices to the tomb on Sunday morning. To their shock...
Dec 18, 2024•8 min•Season 6Ep. 2247
As John 19:17–22 shows, Pilate wrote an inscription in Latin, Greek, and Hebrew that said, “ ‘Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews’ ” ( John 19:19, ESV ). The religious leaders wanted it changed. Pilate would have none of it, and the inscription remained, a mute witness to the truth about Jesus and one of the markers that Jesus is enthroned on the cross as the King. Here was Jesus, truly their King, the King of the Jews, hanging on a cross like a common criminal. “A higher power than Pilate o...
Dec 17, 2024•9 min•Season 6Ep. 2246
Read John 18:38–19:5 . How did Pilate try to persuade the people to ask for Jesus’ release? Pilate did not wait for an answer from Jesus concerning truth. Instead, he went back out to try to persuade the people. By dialoguing with them instead of just letting Jesus go free, Pilate placed himself at a disadvantage. The religious leaders recognized that they could manipulate the governor through the crowd. Pilate refers to a custom of letting a prisoner go free at the time of Passover and asks if ...
Dec 16, 2024•12 min•Season 6Ep. 2245
In John 18:28–32 , the trial of Jesus is not described in detail. The focus is on Jesus brought before Pontius Pilate. Read John 18:33–38 . What did Pilate and Jesus talk about? The governor asks Jesus if He is the king of the Jews ( John 18:33 ). It is the first reference to this title but will not be the last. Jesus asks Pilate if he is asking this on his own or did others say that He was. His question turns the tables on the governor, querying if he understands to whom he is speaking. The rea...
Dec 15, 2024•9 min•Season 6Ep. 2244
Read for This Week’s Study John 18:33–19:5; John 19:17–22; John 19:25–27; Luke 2:34, 35; John 20:1–18; 1 Cor. 15:12–20 . Memory Text: Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection are the climax of John. The first ten chapters cover roughly three and a half years; chapters 11–20, in contrast, cover about one to two weeks. The four Gospels present the death of Jesus in different ways. Though their accounts are compatible, each author emphasizes key points that especially resonate with the themes of his Gos...
Dec 14, 2024•5 min•Season 6Ep. 2243
Read Ellen G. White, “ ‘Let Not Your Heart Be Troubled,’ ” pp. 662–680, in The Desire of Ages; “Additional Note on [John] Chapter 1,” The SDA Bible Commentary, vol. 5, pp. 911–919. In assessing who Jesus is, His opponents judged by human standards “ ‘according to the flesh’ ” ( John 8:15, NKJV ). This is probably even worse than judging “by mere appearances” ( John 7:24, NIV ). Here they resorted to the criteria of the flesh, of fallen humanity in a fallen world, without the compelling control o...
Dec 13, 2024•6 min•Season 6Ep. 2242
John 17 is sometimes called the high priestly prayer of Jesus. It concludes the farewell discourse. Jesus came to this earth so that humanity might be restored, ultimately, to its original personal relationship with God. He faithfully performed the signs that God gave Him to do. In words and acts, He communicated God to the people. Jesus would soon be leaving this earth. He desired to share once again His love for His disciples. He wanted them to understand the close relationship between Himself...
Dec 12, 2024•10 min•Season 6Ep. 2241
The Holy Spirit is not as prominent in the Gospel of John as the Father and the Son are. Yet, His role is crucial to the success of Jesus’ mission. Read John 1:10–13 . What does this text teach us about the importance of the Holy Spirit for conversion? In the first chapter of John, we can see just how central the role of the Holy Spirit is. John tells us that as many as received the Word (that is, as many as believed in Him) became children of God, those “who were born, not of blood, nor of the ...
Dec 11, 2024•10 min•Season 6Ep. 2240
